Living in Greece Part 06

Wednesday, 08 September
Nativity of the Holy Theotokos

Last night Christos took us to see his good friends, Paul and Chara. Chara (pronounced roughly Kah-RRAH) grew up in Christos. Her husband’s real name is Panagiotis, but he lived 30 or 40 years in America, is an American citizen, and in America, acquired the name Paul.

Chara has bright red hair and brown eyes; she is small and very feminine, and I actually mistook one large color photo of her for Katherine Hepburn. She doesn’t resemble Miss Hepburn in person, but in that picture, in profile, hair tucked up inside a wide-brimmed hat, she’s a double for the actress.

Paul was born of a Greek family in Egypt, and grew up there. He was a banker, but was expelled from Egypt when Nasser came to power and nationalized the banks. He came to Greece, but found out that just as in Egypt he had been considered a Greek, so in Greece he was considered an Arab. So he thought the only place he could be whoever he wanted to be was in America.

He managed New York’s Regency Hotel for many, many years; also the Drake, owned by the same people. He rubbed shoulders with many of the rich, famous, and powerful, and he can tell you fascinating stories for hours on end. I keep telling him to write a book, and he says if he ever does, the title will be, It was Fun! He knew Aristotle Onassis and Jackie Kennedy Onassis; he was on very friendly (but not illegal) terms with the Mafia, specifically the Gambino family.

I asked him why Jackie Kenney married Onassis. He said, “The question is why he married her. Why she married him is easy: he gave each of her children ten million dollars and gave her twenty million. The question is why he wanted to marry her, and the answer is,she was a trophy wife. There was more to it, though. He and Robert Kennedy hated each other from the time Robert was Attorney General, because while President Kennedy was still alive, Jackie had had an affair with Onassis. So to marry Robert’s sister-in-law was a slap at him.”

He knew Maria Callas, too, and so many others.

And how did he come to be such friends with the Gambino family? Well, one day he heard an altercation outside his office, accompanied by a lot of obscene language. “So, I go out the door, I see a man about six feet three, and I say to him, ‘Please, step into my office.’ I pour him a little sherry, and I say, ‘You can use that kind of language in your own office or in your home, but please, my customers do not pay such high prices to hear it here.”

The tall man, more than a little surprised, said, “Do you know who I am?”

“No.”

“My height doesn’t impress you?”

Paul shrugged. “I can jump and punch you.”

At this, the man Paul later knew as Big Ed threw back his head and laughed.

But there was no more swearing in that hotel and Big Ed had elaborate gifts delivered to the hotel for Paul; and Paul treated him very well. Then the Gambino Family began frequenting the hotel, using it for meetings and so forth.

“One day the big man himself came. He says to me, ‘Paul, I want you to introduce me to the maître-d’ as Mr. Smith.’ Well, of course the mâitre has already recognized Mr. Gambino, from seeing his picture so often in the papers. So, I say to the mâitre, ‘I’d like you to meet Mr. Smith’ and the mâitre says, ‘I’m very glad to meet you, Mr. Smith.’ And out comes a hundred dollar bill, into the mâitre’s hands. ‘Thank you, Mr. Smith,’ says the mâitre, and out comes another hundred dollars. ‘So now you know my name,’ says Mr. Gambino, and the mâitre says, ‘Yes, I do, Mr. Smith.’”

Paul has met numerous heads of state, and Patriarch Bartholomew (for whom he has little use) and the Patriarch of Alexandria. In fact, his own spiritual father is going to be installed as chancellor (or something) in Alexandria next month, and Paul and Chara wonder whether we’d come with them for the occasion. We’ve never yet visited them when they didn’t invite us to go to Egypt with them, but it has never worked out. Maybe this time it will; wouldn’t that be a thrill!

With such stories as these we were regaled for several hours, until Christos said he wanted to go home, and I seconded the motion.