The theme of ALPHA's "Autopsy," show on Wednesday with host Anthony Schrotter was how to survive on 50 euros of food for one or two weeks. The idea was to see if Greek MPs had a concept of how a a typical Greek family lives and struggles to make ends meet in this economic crisis. The news show kicks follows two housewives who are set to do their supermarket shopping for the next two weeks. Their budget: Only 50 euros.
They introduce themselves and speak about how the economic recession has affected their day to day lives and the sacrifices that they make by depriving their children of basic necessities. The first housewife is a maid with an income of 360 euros a month and expenses that go beyond this (rent, utility costs, upkeep of the family, food, etc.), the second housewife is unemployed and married to a temporary public servant who is also suffering cutbacks. When asked how they make ends meet, unfortunately the two women brake down and admit that they receive aid from soup kitchens, from family and friends, and sometimes they even skip payments in order to make ends meet.
Together with Mrs. Mpatzeli (PASOK), Mrs. Kontouli (eco-Green party(, Adonis Georgiadis (New Democracy Party), and Paul Kontogiannidis (with the Independent Greeks party), the housewives and the parliamentarians split up in teams and go shopping.
The goal is to make the parliamentarians see that 50 euros does not stretch far when shopping for a family of four and that oligarchs cannot (and do not have a concept whatsoever) of how their policy decision making has affected our day to day lives.
These woman are but only one example of how the crisis has affected the general population, (this writer included). Something the mainstream media fails to show, since they prefer to fill their airtime with images of dance parties in Mykonos, or entertainment news from the US. Congratulations to ALPHA TV and its reporter Schrotter for coming up with the concept of this show.
Editor's Note - At one point in the second video, one housewife tells Kontogiannidis that even fabric softener. This is what they have belittled us to. Silly example... but it is just shows that while some people stroll around a supermarket in other areas of the world a pack of spaghetti and a pack of rice feeds a family for a week. - Kissinger must be proud... they stripped us of our very dignity.
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