It may be oceans away, but watching the news from his residence on Queen Elizabeth Drive in Ottawa, the Greek Ambassador to Canada is on edge, “I know inch by inch this road,” Dimitris Azemopoulos points to the burnt out wreckage on TV, “riding my bike, it’s my childhood.”
Azemopoulos’ family summer home is in the village of Mati, about 30-kilometres east of downtown Athens, the region hit hardest by the wildfires.
“We grew up in that place, so when I saw it I said ‘I cannot believe it’, it’s something I could not imagine happening,” says Azemopoulos, “I saw my house surrounded by fire. I cannot describe with my own words the way I felt.”
Incredibly the Ambassador’s home is still standing, “by the Grace of God everything is okay.”
Azemopoulos says Mati, a popular area for Greek families to vacation in the summer months, is close-knit, many of the families have been there for generations. He worries some of the 74 people killed will be his friends and neighbours.
“You do know many of these people because these are not tourists they were Greeks, ordinary Greeks.”
The Greek government has committed 20 million Euro ($30million CDN) to help with the immediate efforts. Greek communities in Ottawa and Montreal are also starting to mobilize to find ways to help.
