General News
Meropi Kyriacou Honored as TNH Educator of the Year
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
The ushering in of 2021 was more subdued this New Year, with municipalities in the largest Greek region of Attica trying to cheer up residents living under coronavirus restrictions with short videos of carol-singing, town bands playing seasonal songs around the town, and services distributing food and medicine to households.
Services related to financially distressed families distributed "packages of love" to the most vulnerable of their residents, collected through public drives and handed out by municipal workers and volunteers, while almost all cities activated help lines for people spending New Year's alone and those who need emotional support, especially if forced to spend time away from their families.
In towns where there is no philharmonic band, municipalities called on teachers and students of music schools (odeia) to help, with short videos produced and distributed through official city pages and the social media.
Throughout Greece, each locale observed their own traditions, with the most frequently shared customs nationally being the breaking of a pomegranate at at the threshold and "podariko", or entering homes with the right foot forward.
In several towns, for example, the father of the family enters the home after church services by breaking a pomegranate – an ancient symbol of good luck and fertility – as soon as he enters the home. "Podariko" also calls for the person entering a household for the first time, whether as member or visitor, with the right foot, in order to bring luck for the year. This tradition is prevalent in larger cities as well, including Athens.
Other homes hang on the house's door a bulb from a plant such as onion to bring abundance to the household in the coming year.
On New Year's Day – and celebrated throughout January by associations, work places and even ministries – a new year's cake with a hidden coin is cut at a simple ceremony, bringing luck to the finder, while in some areas of Greece like Arcadia, food is left out for the Fates, bringing good luck to the entire community if it has been consumed by the day after.
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — More than 100 long-finned pilot whales that beached on the western Australian coast Thursday have returned to sea, while 29 died on the shore, officials said.
CALIFORNIA - The University of Southern California canceled its main graduation ceremony and dozens more college students were arrested at other campuses nationwide Thursday as protests against the Israel-Hamas war continued to spread.
NEW YORK — The third day of witness testimony in Donald Trump's hush money trial concluded Thursday after Trump's lawyers got their first chance to question a witness on the stand.
ATLANTA — As Donald Trump seeks a return to the White House, criminal charges are piling up for the people who tried to help him stay there in 2020 by promoting false theories of voter fraud.
ATHENS - Voters should see the whole picture when they go to cast their ballot in the European Parliament elections on June 9, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in an interview on Thursday.