Plaka

The demand of the new mayor of Athens, Haris Doukas, for an increase in the fees imposed on accommodation in the capital's hotels in order to finance the increased needs for infrastructure and personnel created by the increase of tourists in the capital has triggered a confrontation with hoteliers.

Pepi Loulakaki met Bahar years ago, when she was just 12 years old and selling flowers in downtown Athens' Plaka district. Bahar would often pop into the older photographer's home to rest her weary feet from walking around the streets selling gardenias to romancing couples. They gradually became friends and started to learn each other's language.

After years of abandonment, the house in the Plaka district of Athens once belonging to the celebrated Greek poet Kostis Palamas, will be restored and given a new lease on life as a landmark and as a place to exhibit his work and to study modern Greek literature.

The so-called commercial triangle of Athens, including districts such as Plaka and Monastiraki, secured an average monthly income of some 3,200 euros during this year's third quarter (July-September) through short-term rentals (STRs).

Amid fears of imminent inspections and the threat of legal consequences, the idyllic beaches of Plaka, Agia Anna and Agios Prokopios on the Cycladic island of Naxos were emptied of sunbeds and beach furniture. 

The move practically implies that there were either no permits or there were huge violations of the leases.

For the first time in 40 years, efforts are under way to restore and promote the Holy Church of Agios Nicholas Rangavas, Athens' oldest Byzantine church.

The Culture Ministry has approved funding for restoration studies aimed at preserving the 11th-century church, once part of the Rangavas family palace at the foot of the Acropolis in the Plaka neighborhood. 

The spread between the taxable rates of properties, known as "objective values," and market prices is widening again, just two years after the last adjustment of the former, which started applying from January 2022.

This development is recorded mainly in the expensive areas of the center of Athens and the southern and northern suburbs of the capital.

Something of a war has broken out in the Church of Greece after an Athens priest enlisted the help of two girls from his congregation to fill in for the altar boys in the Pentecostal liturgy.

Democrats Abroad Greece brings together trans-Atlantic travelers, students, long-settled Greek Americans and digital nomads who care about US democracy and each other. On Wednesday, March 22, connect with new friends and allies in Athens at the Dems Abroad Happy Hour, from 6-9 p.m. at Plakaki Cafe (Filomousou Eterias Square, Plaka).

A new playground created by the Alexander S. Onassis Foundation for the City of Athens stands out with its vivid colors in Avdi Square, in the downtown district of Metaxourgeio.