Researchers found in a new study that intermittent fasting is linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular death. Credit: Quick Spice / Flickr / CC BY 2.0
New research from the American Heart Association’s recent event in Chicago suggests that how long we eat each day could impact our heart health. Scientists looked at data from more than 20,000 adults in the United States.
They found that those who ate within a shorter time frame of less than 8 hours a day, following a plan called time-restricted eating (intermittent fasting), had a higher risk of dying from heart disease compared to those who spread their meals over 12 to 16 hours a day.
What is time-restricted eating?
Time-restricted eating, a form of intermittent fasting, means you eat only during certain hours of the day. This could be anywhere from 4 to 12 hours out of a 24-hour period.
Many people who practice this kind of eating stick to what’s called a 16:8 schedule. That means they eat all their meals within an 8-hour window and then fast for the other 16 hours each day, according to the American Heart Association (AHA).
In previous studies, researchers discovered that time-restricted eating can have some positive effects on our heart and metabolic health. It can help keep blood pressure, blood sugar, and cholesterol levels in check.
“Restricting daily eating time to a short period, such as 8 hours per day, has gained popularity in recent years as a way to lose weight and improve heart health,” said senior study author Victor Wenze Zhong. “However, the long-term health effects of time-restricted eating, including risk of death from any cause or cardiovascular disease, are unknown.”
Intermittent fasting linked to higher risk of cardiovascular death
The new study focused on exploring how sticking to an eight-hour time-restricted eating plan could affect our health over a long period. To do this, researchers looked at details about what people ate from the yearly 2003-2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES).
They compared this information with data on people who passed away in the U.S. from 2003 to December 2019, gathered from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Death Index database.
The study discovered that people who ate all their meals in less than eight hours each day faced a much higher risk of dying from heart problems—91 percent higher. This risk was also found among those dealing with heart disease or cancer.
Even for those already with heart issues, sticking to an eating window of at least eight but less than ten hours daily meant a 66 percent increased risk of dying from heart-related problems.
Moreover, while time-restricted eating didn’t lower the overall risk of dying from anything, eating within a span of over sixteen hours each day was linked to a lower risk of dying from cancer for people already diagnosed with the disease.
Only seven countries meet the international air quality standard set by the World Health Organization, according to a new report. Credit: United Nations Photo. CC BY 2.0/flickr
According to a new report, only seven countries meet the international air quality standard, while dangerous levels of air pollution are on the rise in certain areas due to both an uptick in economic activity and the toxic impact of wildfire smoke.
Of 134 countries and regions surveyed in the 6th Annual World Air Quality Report by IQAir, just seven—Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Australia, Iceland, Mauritius, and New Zealand—meet the World Health Organization (WHO) guideline limit for miniscule airborne particles called PM2.5 let off by cars, trucks, and industrial processes.
“In 2023 air pollution remained a global health catastrophe, @IQAir’s global data set provides an important reminder of the resulting injustices and the need to implement the many solutions that exist to this problem" @AidanFarrow, Greenpeace scientisthttps://t.co/RZO33jztnU
The highest emitter was Bangladesh, which was responsible for 79.9 micrograms per meter cubed—more than fifteen times higher than the WHO PM2.5 annual guideline. Bangladesh is closely followed by Pakistan (73.7 micrograms), India (54.4 micrograms), Tajikistan (49.0 micrograms), and Burkina Faso with 46.6 micrograms.
The report states that Africa remains the most underrepresented continent with a third of the population still lacking access to air quality data. Additionally, climate conditions and transboundary haze were major factors in Southeast Asia, where PM2.5 concentrations rose in nearly every country.
Furthermore, the findings show that the region of Central and South Asia was home to the top ten most polluted cities in the worldwith Begusarai, India being the most polluted metropolitan area of 2023. India was home to the four most polluted cities in the world.
The most polluted major US city, according to the report, was Columbus, Ohio, while Beloit, Wisconsin was identified as the most polluted city in the country overall. Las Vegas, Nevada was the cleanest major city in the US.
While the number of countries and regions with air quality monitoring has steadily increased over the past six years, there remain significant gaps in government-operated regulatory instrumentation in many parts of the world. Low-cost air quality monitors, sponsored and hosted by citizen scientists, researchers, community advocates, and local organizations, have proven to be valuable tools to reduce gaps in air monitoring networks across the world.
“A clean, healthy, and sustainable environment is a universal human right. In many parts of the world the lack of air quality data delays decisive action and perpetuates unnecessary human suffering. Air quality data saves lives. Where air quality is reported, action is taken, and air quality improves,” states Frank Hammes, Global CEO, IQAir.
Where does Greece stand in the air quality report?
Athens, Greece. Credit: Matt Kieffe / CC-BY-SA-2.0 / Wikimedia Commons
Taking into account population size, the 2023 average PM2.5 concentration for Greece (17.4 micrograms per meter cubed), puts the country in fiftieth place. This means that out of the 134 nations included, Greece emits the fiftieth highest level of these particulates.
Under the capital city categorization of the report Athens also ranked fiftieth among 114 listed, with 16.7 micrograms of PM2.5 per meter cubed.
Greek Orthodox and Western Easter will never coincide after 2700. Public Domain/Wikipedia
Orthodox and Catholic Easter are usually set on different dates. Greece is slowly but surely coming closer to the great feast of Greek Orthodox Easter, or Pascha—a religious occasion celebrated in Greece with more gusto than in many other Western Christian countries.
Unlike most European nations, which will celebrate Easter on March 31st, Greece will adhere to the date for Orthodox Easter, which falls more than a month later this year, on May 5th.
Orthodox Churches still use the Julian calendar for Easter, meaning that at certain times there can be a weeks-long lag behind the Gregorian.
Due to this difference in the measurement of days, the last time the two great Christian denominations shared a date for the celebration was in 2017.
The gap in time between the celebration of Easter for the two denominations will be getting wider and wider.
As a result of this widening gap, from 2700 onward, the celebration of Easter for the Greek Orthodox Church and the Western Christian churches will never coincide again.
Altogether, in the whole of the 21st century, the celebration of Easter will be held on the same day 31 times, but during every coming century, this will happen more and more rarely.
The last time Easter celebrations will coincide is estimated to be in 2698. From then on, Orthodox and western Christians will never celebrate the Resurrection of Christ together again.
Calculating the dates of Greek Orthodox and Catholic Easter
Some of the symbols of Greek Easter, or Pascha. Credit: ManosHacker/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 4.0
A complicating factor that caused debates throughout history was finding a single date for Easter and sticking to it. In the early days of their faith, Christians celebrated the resurrection of Jesus Christ at various times throughout the year.
It was the Holy Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council in 325 AD who came up with a uniform way of setting the date.
They decreed that Easter was to be celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the vernal equinox, but always after Passover.
To this day, the Orthodox have stuck with this method of calculating the date of the feast, leading to the celebration of Orthodox Easter usually falling later than in the Western world.
In some years, however, Eastern and Western Easter fall on the same date, and this will once again be the case in the year 2025.
In 1923, a group of Orthodox churches met in Constantinople (today’s Istanbul) to re-examine the calendar issue, eventually adopting a controversial position that important religious dates would follow the more astronomically-accurate Gregorian calendar, with the exception of Easter.
Watch the Greek Reporter’s documentary on the “Rocketwar,” a unique Greek Easter custom which takes place on Chios Island every Easter.
A 400-year-old Shipwreck believed to be carrying £4bn worth of gold just off the UK coast has a chance of being found. Credit: DirectDish. CC BY 2.0/flickr
A 400-year-old Shipwreck believed to be carrying £4bn ($5bn) worth of gold just off the UK coast has a chance of being found now that renewed efforts are being launched by a UK company.
The Merchant Royal’s shipwreck, also known as the El Dorado of the Seas, sank in 1641 and is thought to be somewhere off the coast of Cornwall. The sunken vessel has been the object of many recovery expeditions over the years, with no success, but now a UK company called Multibeam Services believes it can locate it.
Run by former commercial fisherman and diver Nigel Hodge, with a team of 11, the company specializes in locating lost shipwrecks, and is setting out to try and find the vessel next month.
Hodge plans to spend the remainder of this year searching for the wreck, covering an area of 200 square miles of the English channel. It’s “not a gold rush” though, Hodge told Metro.co.uk, even though he thinks the shipwreck may be worth billions.
Because of the strict laws on who has ownership of discovered treasure, “the days of people finding a big pile of gold and becoming rich overnight are well and truly gone,” added Hodge, who also said that the attraction for him lies in finding answers, with any precious metals on board set to become heritage artifacts.
The latest technology may help solve the mystery of the missing wreck, with the company owning unmanned underwater vessels worth £3.5 million ($4.4 million), capable of submerging up to 6,000 meters – deeper than the deepest part of the search area – alongside new sonar tech.
Hodge said the mission will be a difficult one, being that the stretch of water where the ship sank is notoriously dangerous.
“There’s thousands of shipwrecks down there and the Merchant Royal is just one of them,” he told Metro.co.uk. “So we’ve got to literally pick through a lot of wrecks as we’re doing them and then identify them. It’s not straightforward. If it was straightforward, it would have been done.”
Headquartered in Redruth and comprising a handful of former fishermen, Hodge believes his company is well placed to ‘bring home the gold’ where others have failed due to its local knowledge and tech advancements.
The Story of the Shipwreck and the Gold
The ship plunged on its way to Dartmouth on September 23, 1641, after a stay in the Spanish port of Cadiz where it was repaired and took on more cargo on its way back from Mexico and the Caribbean.
The modern day Port of Cadiz. Credit: Rab. CC BY 2.0/flickr
It was manoeuvring payment for 30,000 soldiers in Flanders, alongside treasures from the ‘New World’ including 400 bars of Mexican silver and 500,000 pieces of eight. A report about the shipwreck from 1641 housed by the British Library says it was carrying “300,000 in ready boliogne and 100,000 pound in gold and as much value in jewels.”
Historians have not come to an agreement on how much treasure could be on board, with some debate around whether the 100,000 pounds of gold meant in currency or weight. At the lowest estimate however, the treasure on board would still be worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The cargo, along with 18 crew members, plunged to the bottom of the ocean, but 40 sailors, including the ship’s captain John Limbrey, were rescued by her sister vessel in convoy, the Merchant Dover.
The financial loss at the time was so heavy that proceedings in the House of Commons were stopped to hear the news, and King Charles I said the event was “the greatest loss ever sustained in one ship.”
Despite its being lost for 400 years, the mission to find it was stoked in 2019 after a fishing boat, the Spirited Lady, hauled up an anchor thought to belong to the long-lost vessel.
Multibeam Services has reportedly already discovered lost wrecks, and even found a sunken pirate ship filled with treasure last year.
Hodge’s attempts to locate one of the world’s most elusive and mysterious shipwrecks will be followed by a documentary crew starting next month, which will be hosted by ex-special forces and commando Jason Fox.
“Some will say it’s a needle in a haystack,” Hodge told Metro.co.uk. “I wouldn’t say it’s quite that but it is a large area and we’ve got the elements to deal with. We need to wait for certain conditions to be able to use the equipment.”
The former fishermen’s crew will base themselves on the Isles of Scilly to prevent themselves having to go back and forth from the mainland.
Elon Musk aims to shake the AI industry with his latest creation, Grok. Credit: Public Domain
In a groundbreaking move on Sunday night, Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI released its brand-new, cutting-edge chatbot, Grok, as an open-source project. This resulted in a lot of excitement but equally drew a lot of criticism.
The development, which was long-awaited, marks a significant milestone for the entire AI community. This is because Musk’s new project opens up brand new ways of collaboration between companies and people and aims to boost AI innovation. Its main characteristic, however, is that it claims to promote the democratization of this advanced conversational AI technology.
Grok’s open-source nature and its release bring much potential with them. Grok could quite literally revolutionize the way developers and researchers alike approach their AI chatbot interactions, creating a much more inclusive and dynamic ecosystem for its development unlike what we have witnessed thus far.
Background of Grok
Grok is the child of xAI, a startup company founded by Elon Musk in March 2023 to push the boundaries of artificial intelligence even further.
Developed as a direct competitor to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Grok distinguishes itself through its unique, one-of-a-kind architecture. Additionally, Grok has real-time access to Twitter (now called X) data and a distinctive personality modeled after “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” a comedy science fiction work by Douglas Adams.
It has to be noted that with its impressive 314 billion parameter Mixture-of-Experts model, Grok proves how Musk’s xAI will attempt to technologically advance the field and bring more opportunities for innovation in the coming months and years. The Mixture-of-Experts model is a collaborative neural network architecture that utilizes multiple specialized sub-networks, called experts. These “experts” are asked to handle different parts of the inputs, and a specialized mechanism determines which expert(s) will be used and get activated after certain input.
Grok’s open-source release
What makes this recent release equally crucial and groundbreaking is that its open-source software has a lot to offer and is quite promising.
By releasing Grok, xAI made a bold statement. Musk is committed to remaining open, using transparency and community-driven development as a driving force.
Based on xAI’s decision to open source the whole project, developers and researchers can now access, modify, and build upon Grok’s codebase freely and at their own will. Although this might sound simple, it is fundamentally groundbreaking, as it opens up endless possibilities for enhancements and customization. However, it may also lead to endless windows by which things could potentially go wrong.
Characteristics of Grok
Grok boasts an impressive array of features that set it apart from other AI chatbots. Its 314 billion parameter Mixture-of-Experts architecture allows both for efficient processing and routing of information in a seamless way.
Additionally, Grok’s direct access to real-time Twitter data through the X platform allows it the opportunity to engage in timely and relevant conversations in a way that would remind us of Twitter discussions and threads.
On top of all this and perhaps most notably, the unique personality of Grok, inspired by “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy,” comedy enriches it with a witty and sometimes rebellious personality, making interactions with it more engaging and certainly more entertaining.
Implications of Grok’s release
As it is obvious, even though we’re still in the very early days, the decision to open-source Grok will have severe implications for the AI industry and our societies overall. By democratizing access to AI technology, Grok will give developers and researchers from different backgrounds the opportunity to contribute to its development and shape its future towards an end goal that they deem appropriate.
This collaborative approach will most certainly accelerate innovation, but it will also establish a more inclusive and transparent AI ecosystem. xAI believes that it can offer access to data that other AI companies restrict.
Nonetheless, as is understandable, this release also raises important questions on crucial topics such as data privacy, model transparency, and important ethical considerations surrounding the use of AI chatbots by the public.
This exact open-source nature of Grok is what makes many people in the wider AI community adopt a more critical stance.
Many challenges and concerns have been raised by experts already. One major fear is that the technology unleashed by Musk could be misused by bad actors of various backgrounds who are ready to generate and spread mass disinformation at an unprecedented scale that we haven’t even seen thus far.
Without guaranteed and proper safeguards and regulation by authorities, the powerful language model of Grok could be deeply exploited to create convincing fake news, as well as wild conspiracy theories and misleading propaganda that could serve maleficent actors in the international arena.
Additionally, there are worries about the lack of transparency and accountability in the development stage of such AI systems prior to their open source release. There is also a possibility of biases and inaccuracies in output because of lack of transparency.
Grok’s performance and limitations
While Grok does showcase impressive capabilities, it is imperative for us to evaluate its performance objectively. Perplexity AI, a popular platform that includes multiple AI models, has already confirmed it will include Grok on its website.
Benchmarks show Grok is very competitive with other AI models, particularly in handling more complex and nuanced conversations, as well as generating creative content.
However, like every other AI system out there, Grok has its own limitations. Its overreliance on Twitter data, for example, may introduce biases based on its users’ perspectives along with its accuracy and factual consistency.
Accessing and using Grok
For developers and AI enthusiasts who are eager to explore the potential of Grok, accessing its open-source model is pretty easy and straightforward.
The codebase and model weights are already available on GitHub, along with very detailed explanations and guidelines for its usage and features. As the community begins to “play around” and experiment with Grok, we can expect to see a number of applications and innovations in the near future. These will most probably range from enhanced conversational interfaces accessible to all to creative content generation and beyond.
What’s next for AI development?
The release of Grok as an open source is indeed a fundamentally crucial moment in the history of AI development. By making its technology freely and openly available, xAI made a bold statement. Musk initiated an era of more collaborative innovation, by democratizing, as is believed, access to advanced conversational AI tools to the public.
As developers, researchers, enthusiasts, and the general public overall begin to engage with Grok, we can certainly anticipate foundational and groundbreaking implications and advancements that will shape the future of human-AI interaction in ways we can only imagine.
The Temple of Hephaestus next to the Ancient Agora is the only ancient temple in Greece that remained almost entirely intact. Credit: Storeye/ Wikipedia Public Domain
There is an ancient temple in Greece that is almost entirely intact, standing at the top of the hill of Agoraios Colonos, which borders the Ancient Agora of Athens.
According to the traveler and historian Pausanias, Hephaestus, god of fire, patron of metalworkers, and Athena Ergani, patron of potters and housework, were worshiped together in the temple next to the Ancient Agora.
Its identification as a temple of Hephaestus was confirmed by the excavation research in which metallurgy workshops were discovered in the wider area of the hill. This negates earlier assumptions that Theseus, Herakles, or Ares were the deities worshiped in the temple.
Architectural style
The construction of the temple had likely taken place between the years 460 and 420 BC by an unknown architect to whom other temples in Attica with a similar construction style are attributed.
The temple had a pronaos and an opisthodomos with two columns in front. Externally, it was surrounded by a peristasis, a Doric colonnade, with six columns on the narrow sides and thirteen on the long ones.
The entire temple from the floor to the roof was made of Pentelic marble, while the architectural sculptures that adorned it were of Parian marble. Inside the nave, there was a two-toned, Π-shaped colonnade. At the bottom of it, there was a pedestal on which the bronze cult statues of Hephaestus and Athena stood. These were works of the sculptor Alkamenes, according to Pausanias. They must have been crafted between the years 421 to 415 BC.
Sculptural decoration of the ancient temple
The temple had rich sculptural decoration. Of the architectural sculptures, the metopes, which adorned the eastern side of the peristasis from the outside are of particular interest. The peristasis represent the labors of Hercules.
In continuation of these, on the northern and southern sides, are the four labors of Theseus. These are scenes from which the popular name “Thiseion” for the temple was adopted. The frieze does not run along the four sides of the nave but only the front and back.
The pronaos sculptures depict the victorious struggle of Theseus against the claimants to the throne, the fifty sons of Pallas in which six gods of Olympus are also present.
In the back, across the width of the nave, the Battle of the Centaurs is represented. Remarkable sculptural works also adorned the pediments of the temple. In the west, the Battle of the Centaurs was depicted, and in the east was the welcome of Heracles to Olympus or the birth of Athena.
Some of these sculptures are recognized in statues found in the area of the temple, such as the fragmentarily preserved complex of two female figures. One of them carries the other on her shoulder as if trying to save her. The other is the torso of a clothed female figure with a strong element of movement. Both are exhibited at the Museum of the Ancient Agora.
History of the temple
During Hellenistic times (323-31 BC), shrubs or small trees were planted around the temple in parallel rows in pots. This came to light during excavations.
In the 7th century AD, the temple was converted into the church of Agios Georgios Akamas and functioned thus until the liberation of Greece from the Turks. According to archaeologist Kleio Tsoga, during the eighteenth century, many prominent Protestants who died in Athens were buried in the building.
In 1834, the welcoming ceremony of King Otto was held at the ancient temple. Since then, the temple functioned as an archaeological museum until the start of excavations of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens in the Ancient Agora in 1930.
The temple of Hephaestus, as seen from the Ancient Agora, Athens, Greece. Credit: public domain from Wikimedia Commons
Zominthos is the only mountaintop Minoan settlement ever to have been excavated and is still yielding groundbreaking information. Credit: Archaeological Institute of America
The ancient Minoan palace of Zominthos on Crete located about 1,200 meters (nearly 4,000 feet) above sea level shows that Minoans were not just seafarers but highlanders too.
Discovered in 1984 and nestled in a plateau on Mt. Psiloritis (or Mt. Ida), Crete’s highest mountain, it lies on the ancient route between the palace at Knossos, the Minoans’ primary administrative center, and the sacred Ideon Cave, where many believe the legendary god Zeus was born and raised.
Zominthos is the only mountaintop Minoan settlement ever to have been excavated and is still yielding groundbreaking information.
A gold sheet showing an embossed likeness of a ship was one of the treasures unearthed on Crete’s Palace of Zominthos in 2021. Credit: Archaeological Institute of America
Professor Yannis Sakellarakis discovered the site in 1982, during his first day of excavations at the nearby Ideon Cave, when a shepherd told him about his pastures and sheep in an area called “Zominthos.” Intrigued by the pre-Hellenic place-name, he began small-scale excavations the following year, which revealed the Central Building.
Zominthos seems to have been occupied beginning in the 17th century B.C. Credit: Archaeological Institute of America
Zominthos may have been used as a rest stop for visitors making their way from Knossos to the Ideon Cave, the great sanctuary cave near the peak of Ida, as is mentioned in Plato’s Laws (book I, 625B):
“I dare say that you will not be unwilling to give an account of your government and laws; on our way we can pass the time pleasantly in and about them, for I am told that the distance from Knossos to the cave and the temple of Zeus is considerable; and doubtless there are shady places under the lofty trees, which will protect us from this scorching sun.”
A double-headed bronze axe used in religious rituals was recently found at the site of the Palace of Zominthos on Crete. Credit: Archaeological Institute of America
Spectacular finds at the Zominthos Minoan Palace
The Minoan Palace at Zominthos seems to have been occupied beginning in the 17th century B.C., with an extensive settlement and a monumental Central Building that covers an area of 1,600 square meters (17,000 square feet).
Beneath the Central Building, which was gradually developed from the 17th century onward, the remains of several earlier structures have been identified.
A number of spectacular finds from this period were found under the slabs, including a tablet with symbols written in Linear A, along with plates, trays, bowls, and cylindrical vessels called “snaketubes.”
Because of the severe climate conditions on the mountaintop—including snow during the winter months—the site may not have been used throughout the entire year, but rather as a seasonal habitat.
During the summer months, people likely moved their flocks of sheep here, to higher altitudes, while exploiting natural resources, such as minerals, herbs, and pharmaceutical plants.
These products, along with woolen textiles and olives, were the goods most commonly exported from Minoan Crete to Egypt and the Middle East.
Some of its walls still stand at a height of 2.2 meters (7.2 feet). Credit: Archaeological Institute of America
Zominthos was likely also a religious and crafts center
The Central Building is extremely well preserved and some of its walls still stand at a height of 2.2 meters (7.2 feet).
However, creating the foundation of such a huge building at this altitude is quite a complicated issue. Its unlikely location and size, as well as its careful construction, indicate the existence of a central authority that intended to control the region’s resources, including its flocks and pastures.
Zominthos may therefore be considered a well-organized administrative complex—built on a strategic spot for the control of the area—that fully adapted to the inhospitable Cretan mountains.
Its location on the ancient route to Psiloritis and the wealth of pottery found at the site indicate that it was likely also a religious and crafts center.
The accounting archives in the Linear B script from the palace at Knossos—about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Zominthos—record thousands of sheep along with shepherds’ names. However, the location of the land where these sheep were grazing has always been a mystery.
Zominthos and the neighboring regions have very prosperous pastures, so it could be that the sheep recorded in the Knossos tablets were mainly concentrated here at Zominthos.
Important ancient finds. Credit: Greek Ministry of Culture
The Central Building’s importance is confirmed by its asymmetrical facades and orientation to the cardinal points, which are well-known characteristics of Minoan palaces.
Zominthos was destroyed by an earthquake around 1600 B.C., which resulted in a fire that devastated the vast majority of the building’s structure. However various finds from the Central Building indicate that the site continued to be used in Mycenaean, Archaic, Hellenistic, and Roman times.
Archaeologists have unearthed many treasures from the Minoan palace over the years showing the great refinement of those who lived there, many of which are in the Archaeological Museum of Rethymnon, Crete.
The palace of Zominthos is a candidate for inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List, along with Greek sites such as Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, Zakros and ancient Kydonia.
The 2023 Metropolis Laity Awards Banquet, at which 2023 scholarships were awarded. Credit: Metropolis of Boston
The Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Boston is offering 2024-2025 academic year scholarship opportunities for US and Canadian students who are of Greek descent or of the Greek Orthodox Faith.
The scholarships will be offered to students entering their second, third, or fourth year of undergraduate studies.
The annual scholarships are provided by endowments generously gifted by the Charles C. Condes Trust of Illinois (four, one-time scholarships of $8,000 each) and the Society of Tsamantas of Worcester, MA (one, one-time scholarship of $7,500).
The Charles C. Condes Memorial Scholarships were bequeathed by Charles C. Condes, a lifelong philanthropist who was a great believer in the power of education and an admirer of all things Hellenic.
His endowment demonstrates his pride in the Greek American and Greek Canadian students who represent the future of Hellenism and Orthodox Christianity in the United States and Canada.
The St. George’s Hellenic Benefit Society of Tsamantas Scholarships was established in memory of the pioneering sons and daughters of the village of Tsamantas, Epirus, who settled in Worcester, MA at the turn of the 19th century. The 2024 scholarship award is named after Stavros Bellos, the greatest benefactor.
Applicants must be enrolled full-time in an undergraduate two or four-year degree program at an accredited college or university located in the US or Canada. Students can apply online through the Metropolis of Boston Scholarship Portal.
Applications will be accepted beginning March 1, 2024. The deadline for applications is May 6, 2024. Awards will be announced beginning on Monday, May 20, 2024.
Hi Eminence Metropolitan Methodios will recognize the scholarship recipients and make the awards at the annual Metropolis Lay Ministry Awards Banquet on Sunday evening, June 9, 2024.
The Metropolis Scholarship Committee urges youth to apply for this opportunity and looks forward to recognizing their achievements this year and for years to come.
The Metropolis, whose offices are located in Brookline, Massachusetts, consists of 63 parishes that minister to the needs of approximately 200,000 Greek Orthodox faithful.
Methodios, Metropolitan of Boston, is the spiritual leader of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Boston which includes all of Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont and the Connecticut towns of Danielson, Enfield, New London and Norwich.
Methodios was enthroned as the Bishop of Boston on April 8, 1984, following his election to that post by the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Phanar, Constantinople, Turkey.
In July 1989 Bishop Methodios also assumed the Presidency of Hellenic College and Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology in Brookline, Massachusetts. He held that position till 1995.
In 1997 the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate elevated Bishop Methodios to the office of Metropolitan.
Josef H. Blechinger or Elias Kokkinos worked as a Byzantine iconographer and died in 1995.Public Domain
Josef H. Blechinger was a German soldier who turned out to be one of the greatest heroes of the Greek resistance and saved a town from destruction.
Blechinger came to Greece as a conqueror with the German army. A few years later, after the war, he became Greek, changed his name to Elias Kokkinos, started a family and died in Greece.
Elias Kokkinos was in Dresden. His mother was Czechoslovakian and his father was Austrian, but officially he was a German citizen.
When World War II broke out, he had to enlist in the German army. First, he served in occupied Poland. Then he was transferred to Greece.
Greece was under German occupation and Blechinger was appointed as switchman officer in the Lamia railway station. Blechinger was not a Nazi and soon he started helping Lamia residents who were wrongly suffering under Nazi rule during the occupation.
The German soldier helped several Lamia residents avoid execution, helped others steal food from German wagons and, more importantly, collaborated with the Greek resistance providing information on German actions.
Blechinger (second from right) during a ceremony to honor heroes of the Greek resistance against the German occupation. Public Domain
German soldier saves the Greek town of Lamia
However, his most important action was his brave contribution in literally saving the town of Lamia. On October 18, 1944, when the German troops were leaving Greece, the Lamia commander had given orders to destroy the town’s infrastructure by blowing up as many public buildings, institutions and warehouses as possible.
Five German soldiers stayed behind with the mission to blow up the buildings. Explosives were put in the army camp set up to explode in the morning.
Blechinger found out about the plan, and the night of October 17, along with an Italian resistance fighter named Mario, went to the army camp and cut the wires connected to the explosives.
Then, with the help of resistance fighters, he fled and hid in the Avlaki village. On the morning of the 18th, most Lamia residents gathered in the church to celebrate the feast of St. Luke.
The news that the Germans were about to burn the village down after their departure was spread and many people left their homes. Only a few scattered explosives detonated throughout the town and hundreds, if not thousands of lives, were saved.
After that, Blechinger made Greece his new home and never left again. He took the name of the first Lamia resident who was killed in the Greek-Italian war and started a family with Angeliki Karakosta, with whom he had a son.
He worked as a Byzantine iconographer and died in 1995. Humble to the end, he never spoke about his brave deeds. He never wanted to speak to reporters; he was getting rid of them saying, “Just write that I am a Greek democrat, nothing else.”
The peach orchards transform the Imathia region of Greece into a pink wonderland. Credit: George Vergados
In the region of Imathia in northern Greece every Spring turns into a spectacular quilt of hot pink and vivid green due to the blossoms of its famed peach trees that line the entire plain.
Everyone on Earth has seen the splendor of the flowering cherry trees of Japan, which give such delicate beauty to the landscape every spring there.
But the huge carpets of pink blossoms from peach orchards, which transform the Imathia region of Greece into a pink wonderland, are equally as stunning and are among the world’s best-kept secrets.
The sight, seen especially well from the foothills of Mount Vermio, equals or surpasses any other springtime floral display anywhere in the world.
Balloon captures the peach blossoms in Imathia
This year the spectacular sight was caught by a a heart-shaped balloon that rose at sunrise on Monday over the pink blooming plain of Veria.
There was also a photo contest “High in the Blooms! Peach Trees & Hot Air Balloons Photo Contest” organized by the tourist agency of Veria. Hundreds of people from all over Greece, including both amateur and professional photographers, participated in the competition.
A hot-air balloon captures the magic near Veria. Credit: George Vergados
Veria is located on the eastern foothills of the Vermio Mountains, one of Greece’s largest mountain ranges and it’s now the country’s largest forest-owning municipality with orchards producing peaches, apples, cherries, and other fruits.
The city is situated in ancient Imathia west of the ancient Macedonian town of Mieza and the site of the ancient School of Aristotle. The area, according to Herodotus, was where the fertile Gardens of King Midas were situated.
Imathia promotes tourism
Inspired by Japan’s way of promoting tourism featuring its emblematic famous cherry blossoms, Imathia residents have begun to promote the annual blooming of their treasured peach trees.
The region is already known as a popular winter destination, as it is home to two of Greece’s best ski resorts, Seli and 3-5 Pigadia.
The region also holds a yearly 17-kilometer ”Bicycle Ride Through the Flowering Peach Trees,” which offers participants an opportunity to discover and admire the spectacular display in an entirely new way.
The peach flowers are in bloom for approximately twenty days in northern Greece, and the beautiful event occurs between late February and mid-March.
Photo of the peach groves of Imathia, Greece. Credit: Alexandros Malapetsas /AMNA
Imathia’s peaches are well-known all across Europe. They are one of Greece’s most successful export products, and thousands of people work in the agricultural sector in the region.
