Staring into the abyss: Inside a despairing Greek nation where families queue at soup kitchens and women threaten to jump to their deaths as job losses mount

Last updated at 4:23 AM on 18th February 2012

When Eleni Nikolaidou agreed to help a university research project, she was asked to plough through 6,000 newspapers from World War II.

Life was so difficult for the Greeks under Nazi occupation, she discovered, that papers printed ‘Recipes for Hunger’ on their front pages to help readers survive the deprivations of a dark chapter in history.

These included recipes for fried radishes and greens scavenged from parks, along with tips such as grating an aubergine on top of boiled rice to give the look of meat.

One item especially disturbed her: a suggestion that families collect the crumbs from their table after eating to make into a meal at the end of the week. ‘These were terrible times and thousands died of hunger, especially in Athens,’ said Nikolaidou, who is also a teacher. ‘But it struck me as outrageous that people were so hungry they had to keep the crumbs from their table to survive.’ She was so moved she turned her research into a book, reprinting many of the recipes and suggestions. To her surprise Starvation Recipes has become a big hit — a chilling symbol of the stark times confronting Greece once again.

What is so shockingly evident as you walk around Athens are the awful parallels between that war-time era and today. The soup kitchens, the beggars, the pensioners picking up discarded vegetables after street markets close, the homeless scavenging for food in bins. These are the signs that can be seen.

Less noticeable is the quiet desperation of dignified people who turn off heating despite the cold and share dwindling savings with jobless relatives. Or the workers unable to afford fares home and the children fainting in school from hunger.

It is three years since the financial tsunami struck Greece with dreadful force, exposing the most shocking example of a country living beyond its means. Three years of savage austerity — of sudden new taxes, salary cuts, job losses, rising prices and falling demand — have left the nation shattered and its citizens locked in a spiral of despair.

‘There are so many similarities between these periods,’ said Nikolaidou. ‘Of course, it was the Germans then, and once again the Germans are the dominant figures in our crisis now.’

Greeks seem torn between outrage at their venal politicians, anxiety over the future and the fierce anger they direct at Germany for demanding tough measures as the price of a European Union bailout to allow their country to continue to function.