Week One, flowers amongst the ruins

Well, today marks week 1 here, although it feels like a month has passed.... I'm left marveling at how quickly the human spirit adapts to change, even heart breaking changes, like losing family members, homes, countries....how resilient these people, especially the children are. People are making Syrian bread, falafel stands, barbershops on the road...if there are businesses to be made, they will find the way. There's nothing certain here: the police come daily to round up people to go to " military camps". Some kids the other night made an attempt at crossing the border to Macedonia....I've heard the UN has an assylum process that is long, ridiculous, and gives false hope. One thing that fascinates me is the interweave between the little Greek villages and these massive numbers of people. I'm sure you've heard about the Greek 90 year old granny who is making dinner for some at her house. They let them put their tents ( picture thousands) up around gas stations and hotels, but then charge them to use the bathrooms. We got gas yesterday at one of the gas station camps, and some of the refugees milling around yelled for the guy to come to give us gas, and chatted quite casually about the weather. I imagine the refugees are helping the depressed, Greek economy. Just fathom there's one group of volunteers called the banana brigade who buy and give out 4,000 bananas EVERY day...and much more.......