Greece, Bavaria, Ukraine: When you talk to Apostolos Kotsis, you gallop across Europe and through the centuries. The 52-year-old was born in Piraeus, came to Bavaria almost 30 years ago and, like many of his compatriots, has been stunned for weeks at Ukraine, where Russians are killing people and destroying cultural sites to which Greeks feel particularly attached. Tens of thousands of Greeks lived in Mariupol before the war; more than anywhere else in Ukraine. The Black Sea and Greece – a cultural space. “I’m a European with Greek roots,” says Kotsis, who of course also has in mind the blue-white connection between the Greeks and Bavaria: antiquity, the Greek fan King Ludwig I, his son Otto on the Greek throne, the Propylaea in Munich. “Munich is little Athens,” says Kotsis.
In Germany he met his wife, who is Greek. He has lived in Haar since 1998, where his three children, who are now adults, grew up. Ten years ago, Kotsis founded the Greek community in Haar, which helped many compatriots to find a place to live and a job in the Munich area during the economic crisis. Now the Greeks in Haar are helping the Ukrainians. Three times a week, two married couples, in which the man is Greek and the woman is Ukrainian, organize counseling sessions at the Poststadel training center. At the Sunday meeting of the Greeks, Ukrainians are present today. The Greek community is not a ghetto, says Kotsis. “We did it for the Greeks, but now we’re doing it for everyone.”
Apostolos Kotis is a fun-loving, cosmopolitan doer. He learned German because he wanted to integrate quickly. The Greeks in Haar give German courses for Greeks and Greek courses for Germans. And if you want to learn Greek dances, you’ve come to the right place. Is he good at dancing? “Very good, yes,” says Kotsis, “it’s in the blood. Either you have it or you don’t.” Kotsis can show his dancing skills next Sunday. Then the Greeks will organize a Greek-Bavarian festival on the Haarer Anger, where ouzo and beer, souvlaki and sausages will be toasted to ten years of the Greek community of Haar and 200 years of Greek-Bavarian friendship. “I’m here, I live here,” says Kotsis, “and I want to do my part to make life better,” says Kotsis.
In Haar, Kotsis tries to implement this in the municipal council, where he sits for the SPD and always emphasizes impartiality. He feels hair connected as a whole, he says. With around 200 members, the Greek community is alive and kicking, despite the corona pandemic. “We wouldn’t have made it if not for the support of all the people in the community.” A great Haarer and a great Greek in Bavaria will be honored on Sunday. Haar’s former mayor Helmut Dworzak receives the medal of the Greek community of Haar. And so is Stavros Kostantinidis, who is chairman of the Greek Academy in Munich and chairman of the Europa Union Munich.