There's No Time Like Coffee Time!

It's the Greeks' favorite pastime, and they've got a cafe at every corner in every city or village to prove it. There's nothing like sipping your favorite coffee with friends while talking about everything and anything. Don't be rash to judge it until you try it. You'll be hooked...

Here in Greece, any time is ideal for coffee, and there are places for every age to enjoy it. You start going out with your friends "yia kafe" when you're probably around thirteen. You may not drink coffee at first. It'll probably be juice, or the sweetest coffee the store has to offer. The biggest coffee drinkers, however, are university students. Most of them have so much free time to kill that they spend at least 2-3 hours chatting with friends over coffee. Coming into the real world, the hours of enjoyment may be reduced drastically, but the relaxing effect of coffee time still remains. Now, you look forward to that one Sunday, when you can wake up, buy the newspaper and enjoy your favorite java. As you step into middle age with a spouse and children, you find yourself going out with families to coffee places that have activities for your children. Finally, the golden years of retirement find most men these days at cafes called "kafeneia" where a whole different subculture has developed over the last several decades.

It's a sacred time, you know, for the Greeks. People of this nation are not ones to take a quick sip just to wake up or stay on edge. They relish every sip, every minute spent around that coffee table. Perhaps this is why coffee is actually quite expensive in Greece: if you were a cafe owner that has spent thousands of euros on a stylish decoration and music in a country where people come and grab a table for 3-4 hours, while only drinking one coffee each, then you too would raise your prices to make the business worthwhile.

Although the average tourist visiting the country either doesn't drink coffee or just doesn't enjoy sitting with one drink for three hours, they have to admit that at least there's a variety of coffee that you can at least try:

(visit www.allthegreeks.com to read about the coffee Greeks drink) Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/33284937@N04/3808242154/