Nana Mouskouri, wow! I haven't thought of her in years, but for some reason I once grew enamoured of one of her songs that she sang in French and that charted in France.

I don't know anything about Greek culture other than having traveled in Greece, mostly the islands doing the normal tourist things and learning that Mykonos was a foreign gay destination. I think it still is, but I'm not sure.

As a gay man, I've often been fascinated with ancient Greek history, including the stories of Alexander and his two male lovers. I was pretty surprised by the Greek government's reaction in the early 2000s when the blockbuster Alexander movie came out. It treated the subject of Alexander's sexuality rather frankly, and the government issued a very heated statement claiming that no historical evidence points to Alexander's bisexuality and that the film was "offensive to the Greek people."

Giving the overwhelming preponderance of evidence of bisexuality in ancient Greek culture, including in stories about Alexander, that kind of statement has to come from a deep-seated antipathy toward LGBTQ people. It made me realize that being gay and Greek must be a pretty tough thing sometimes.

Thanks so much for your story. I enjoyed reading it!