Day Two in Greece: First Business Meetings by Nikolai Onoprienko

 

Our Thursday in Greece started as usual.

We had breakfast in the morning, then by 10:00 AM, we all met at the hotel lobby to go on two business visits.

1st visit: Coffee Shop “Loumidis coffee.”

Our first destination was a trendy local coffee shop named “Loumidis”. From the street, the shop's interior looked beautiful, with a great combination of colors and matching equipment pieces. 

Workers told us about the history of the shop and how it survived through many historical events like world wars and the Greek crisis at the end of the 10s. Even though they had to sell their brand name to NESTLE, they still remained in business and prospered. They are expanding a lot in various markets like online shopping, candies, and coffee snacks. Overall, it was exciting to hear how small business copes with different economic disasters. 

2nd visit: Markou Wine Museum and Vineyards

The 2nd part of our program for today was a visit to the Vineyards and a Wine museum. We saw actual vineyards and even tried some fruit from them. Despite the extreme heat, the leaves of the plants protect the fruit from the sun, leaving it in their shade so it won’t spoil or anything. We learned that it is pretty easy to maintain one if you want to get one for yourself. 

After the vineyards, we went to a museum and were shown the step-by-step process of how the vine was made without the modern technology. Right after that, the best part of the business trip came - tasting the product. We tried three different sorts of their wine accompanied by the delicious cheese and breadsticks.

 

 

3rd part of the trip: The Beach

 

After being done with the business visits and taking time to rest, one part of the group went to go on a beach. The beach wasn’t that bad. With the extreme heat, the water felt cold and relaxing.