Today, the second day of the Resurrection and the feast of St. George the Trophy Bearer, the whole of Greece will smile. The focus opens which has been under siege for six months, making industry professionals and workers, despite state aid, reach the limits of their financial strength and, in many cases, on the brink of survival. And here we have to admit that they faced the problems with characteristic calmness and wisdom. And from the moment the message was given, they fell face down at work so that today they are ready. And their smiles have already blossomed!

But for us citizens, the closure of the restaurant was one of the most unpleasant consequences of the pandemic. Because if you think about it, Taverns and restaurants are a unique part of Greek life.

And if we want today, a week before the opening, to make an account of the losses of the Covid 19 period, apart of course the human losses, what we lacked was our relationship with the restaurant, the taverns, the cafes, the bars, the restaurants. To live again and remember scenes and moments from the past: beautiful groups, gossip, ticks, parties, celebrations and birthdays, loves and drunks, drunks, bruises and fights, to list some of what remains unchanged in our memory.

So today I will accompany my thoughts and my joy for the release of the focus with smiles of professionals from all over Greece, who honor their place and its gastronomy. I sat down and found from the records of my travels smiles that had been frozen for six months and that from Easter Monday we will meet again on the front line. Smiles from Lemnos, Halkidiki, Paros, Poros, Athens and Thessaloniki, Amorgos, Andros, Crete, Rhodes, Corfu, Arta. Smiles associated with local flavors, local cuisine, landscapes and especially with the courtesy and warm hospitality of professionals who practice the gastronomic diplomacy of their place.

All these professionals come out heavily taken, and very financially strained for the new beginning, with a horizon moderately optimistic, but not cloudless, because the margins of tourism development of our country have not been clarified yet, due to the ambiguity that exists in the countries from which we expect the relevant arrivals. In the beginning, the revitalization of the restaurant should be done by us Greeks, either in our place and our neighborhood, or by strengthening our tourism with our choices. This year, more than ever before, we must honor and support all these professionals whose shops for so many years have offered us so many joys and so many beautiful memories. Give them courage while at the same time to take back our life, the life of the tavern.

Because food is not a simple physical need. It is not a simple and formal process of providing the necessary nutrients for the satiety and alleviation of hunger. Nor is it, on the other hand, the enjoyment with a ritual process of high aesthetic and gastronomic delicacies accompanied by wines of similar specifications. Food, in addition to biological and instinctive need, is connected to our emotional world as a result of the mother's emotional attachment to the little creature in life. And since then food was associated with physicality -the contact with the breast, the smell and the mother's arms- that is with emotion and human contact. It is a means that helps man at the same time to express his emotion, to open his soul and to express the embodied communication and intercourse.  And that was what we mostly missed during our forced incarceration.

On the occasion of this six-month deprivation, and the resurrection of focus, I recalled some lines from my book "Athenian tavern" (2009):

«From the beginning of the 20th century, the tavern shaped its history keeping pace with every era. After 1922, in the tavern the escaped Greeks of Asia Minor sweetened their pain, the outcasts and the marginalized found refuge, the rebetiko and the folk song spread its wings, the old Athenians celebrated Carnival and the Carnival was celebrated. of the young people during the junta period, when they sang Theodorakis' songs, and there the youth of 1980 learned to sing the immortal rebetikas. Despite its historical mutations, the tavern remains a place of popular entertainment, the place that allows everyone to remove a weight from their heart. With the help of wine, feasting and socializing, get away from the insignificant, which have so burdened and darkened our lives - "we knelt by the many ornaments", as the poet says - and focus on the now, the joy of life, in the essence of human existence.
In matters of heart, companionship, solidarity, communication and love».

Catering, and consequently gastronomy, nowadays is one of the main chapters of every tourist destination, because it contributes to the development of the agri-food sector, stimulates the local economy, while at the same time highlighting the cultural identity each place, strengthening it tourist identity and brand name of each area. At the same time, it is among the three priorities of factors that shape the choice of a tourist destination, while at the same time, from an economic point of view, the value of food is 1/3 of the tourist expenditure per visitor.

In recent years, Greece has taken very important steps in the development of catering and gastronomy. From Michelin its restaurants, the fine cuisine, the fine dining and creative cuisine, to comfort kitchen, The local cuisine and street food, local specialties and local delicacies, from its award-winning ambassadors wines to simple wines - vin de table -, and from PDO-PGE or deli Greek products to humble legumes and vegetables, create a strong gastronomic quiver providing the hallmark of honesty, quality and identity, and are the result of private sector initiatives and concern life investments.

Pandemics, major disasters, trials, in addition to tragic consequences, work in part and as "machines" of innovation. Indicatively in Greece during the era of Covid 19 and the lockdowns, e-commerce, teleworking, the explosion of innovations in the field of government and the state (movement messages, vaccination process, etc.) flourished. Another form of "innovation" was the opportunity we were given to reflect the meaning of life. To rethink our real priorities, to prioritize our values ​​and to redefine our identity. And to give more value to them we took for granted - such as our health, the health of our loved ones, the small moments of everyday life that give meaning to our lives - and to re-evaluate them.

And appreciating the value of life and the importance of health, the role of the heroes of hospitals, doctors and nurses and all those who lifted the weight of this unprecedented health crisis emerged at the same time. And if anything good comes out of this pandemic, it is the feeling that life is not something one can hoard, but live. And if that's the case, and if life matters as much as anything else, then governments and societies should be inspired by it and shield the protection of citizens' health and promote policies that respect and promote individual dignity, pride of every citizen. The smiles of the depicted professionals I am sure they also express their deep gratitude to the visible and invisible fighters of the National Health System!

Returning to catering, I would like to point out the crucial role of catering professionals, and for the imprint that they should leave to each local community and how they can help local communities grow. I will never forget his speech Carlo Petrini, its chairman Slow Food a few years ago in Turin, when he said at a conference that the task of every restaurant should be to maintain exclusively, at least one local producer, otherwise the food multinationals will dominate and the nutritional biodiversity.

I'm glad to know that the smiles of the depicted professionals, of MarsOf SteliosOf Mario, of Giotas, of Malamas, of Left, of Vangelitsa and others, in addition to the hospitable mood, express their satisfaction, because they are well aware that they leave their mark in their place, maintaining fishermen to have fish of the day, divers to provide rare seafood, growers for fresh and organic vegetables from boosts and cheesemakers to have special cheeses, winemakers and distillers to provide them with the best they have, etc.

Having repeatedly expressed the belief that Greek Tourism today, in the post-covid era, it is necessary to create a narrative, starring the real comparative advantages of our country, those that give value to life, such as authenticity, healthy eating, the discovery of moderation, the apotheosis of small scale and diversity, cordial hospitality and openness of soul. And because everything is in the heart of Greek Gastronomy, the honest representatives of the Greek restaurant after 6 months of exclusion, are ready to offer them with smile on lips.

Today, on May 2, 2021, after a 6-month abstention, the restaurant opens, an important branch of the Greek economy, and an important sector of the social and cultural life of our country. The focus smiles, will bring to joy hundreds of smiles coming from areas that supply the focus on raw materials and complementary products. Wine producers, brewers, soft drink companies, spirits, spirits, food producers, but also small producers and growers roll up their sleeves and restart the machines. A new era is dawning, with smiles blooming.