Repeated Racial Profiling by Police

South Asian male solo traveler here. I recently traveled to Greece to explore the archeological sites the country has to offer. But unfortunately the local police made it very difficult for me to enjoy my trip.

Each and every day I was in Athens, I was singled out and cornered by a group of police asking for ID. This even happened in line for Acropolis among other tourists (white) who weren't questioned. My passport wasn't enough, I had to show proof of my tickets. Similar incidents for the remaining days in Athens. When I asked why I was singled out, they didn't want to respond. It came to the point that I would make conscious decisions to avoid areas where there was heavy police presence. Not a pleasant way to spend my vacation days.

I've traveled across Europe solo many times and while I experienced bouts of racism, it never compared to the intimidation of police I experienced in Greece.

Wanted to share my experience for other non white solo travellers who aren't going to the islands and traveling mainland instead. While the country is beautiful, be aware of unwarranted police checks.

in GreeceTravelby mojo-jojo-999

74%

17d

TheRealRabidBunny

Greek Resident (but not Greek)

17d

Unfortunately this is a real issue for travelers in Athens. It’s been commented on here before and I’ve heard the same from non-white friends in Athens. I’m never targeted - not once been stopped in 4 years (middle age white male) but non-white friends, especially younger ones are stopped all the time.

Sorry this happened to you. It’s a reality in Greece at the moment. An unpleasant one but something to be aware of for sure.

hmm138

17d

I’m so sorry. I have noticed a pretty strong anti-immigrant sentiment in Greece, and that turns into racism and racial profiling because anyone with darker skin is “obviously not from here”. However I do think it’s more anti-immigrant than straight up pure racism. If you are a group of obvious tourists who have darker skin I don’t think you get the same treatment as a “working age single male”. Not at all an excuse, just more information based on my observations. The sentiment is just as bad towards Albanians and Bulgarians but they’re harder to profile.

PumpkinBrioche

-2

17d

It's definitely racism. This guy most likely has a Canadian accent since he's a landlord in Canada. They're not worried about immigrants, they're worried about brown people.

anypomonos

17d

Lol wtf. Plenty of landlords here in Canada have accents..

PumpkinBrioche

17d

Yeah, Canadian ones.

Watching_William

-5

17d

Brown people? Have you been to the beach in Greece? All the locals have a deep Mediterranean tan.

PumpkinBrioche

16d

Those aren't brown people lol. Those are white people with a tan.

ouchfinger

17d

Another solo traveler from S.Korea, female, young looking, I lived in the states as a child so I am fluent in English and I sound like an American. I go into restaurants and of course I don’t know the protocol. Where I live now is normal for you to order at the counter and pay first, whereas in Athens you grab a table and wait… The staff are extremely rude and condescending and I see that they don’t talk like that to white tourists. I also got asked for tickets and ID (I carry EU id which surprises them) a few times by the museum staff. Nothing from the police as I look pretty harmless to them (skinny E.Asian girl with a tiny handbag and nice shoes huh) but I got so many catcalls, people shoving me on public transport on purpose.. they think I’m Chinese and I know that because I can hear them say China (and so what if I am Chinese?) … and when I start talking in English they hesitate a little but stay rude :) I got so pissed this morning, decided to stay in and go on Reddit and vent.

sparkling-spirit

17d

i’m so sorry :/ that sounds really rough.

Fecknugget69

17d

I’m an East Asian girl from Canada that solo travelled to Athens, Santorini and Mykonos the past week and I didn’t get a lot of catcalls, but I did notice that the service wasn’t as “nice” at some restaurants in comparison to Caucasians. Some of the servers were nice until they get you to sit at a table then they were rude. Maybe it’s cuz they don’t think I’m likely to tip? Idk. But I definitely didn’t feel that safe walking alone especially at night in between monastiraki and omonia stations.

nerdyandgirly123

17d

u/ouchfinger can I DM you? I'm going to Greece later this summer.

ouchfinger

15d

Sure :)

Mammoth-Creme-471

17d

Just make sure you’re carrying your passport on you. Also be careful in the metro people have got the pick pocketing down to the T. I You wont ever know what you hit you or how. They are pros. If you see people playing instruments on the street (specifically around the Acropolis) be careful with pulling out your phone and recording. I had an old man start yelling at me because I was recording the walk and got a very short snapshot of him while he was playing music and he raised hell calling me a thief and that “you think its okay to record me without paying?” - it was all in Greek which made things worse because the locals turned heads thinking I stole from him. What that old geezer didnt know is that I was raised in Greece and speak fluent Greek… I go back every summer and will be moving home for good in a few months… I was PISSSSEDDDD. Haha once he heard me confronting him about his scheme in Greek he chilled out. You just have to be street smart in certain places… I’ve never had something like that happened to me so that was a first… & im from Greece. With cabs make sure you tell them to turn on the meter , and never accept any “gifts” from randoms on a street saying “Here my guy! present for you try it on!”

WitnessEntire

17d

That’s awful. Sympathies.

DepInLondon

17d

Unfortunately this is the reality of Athens and a lot of people who live there have to face it daily. It’s less bad in the islands.

Few-Giraffe-5588

17d

Athens Local here.

I have always carried an identity card since I was a teenager. I did not want to spend a day at the police station until they confirmed who I was.

The police attitude in Greece is highly controversial. In the Athens centre, there have been constant police patrols and checks over the last few months. From what I have witnessed they are primarily focused on illegal immigrants.

Racial profiling yes. However, the tourist dream of Athens excludes the less fortunate and are treated as outcasts.

The lovely tourist side of Athens has its disadvantages and brings social and economic racism.

nerdyandgirly123

16d

u/Few-Giraffe-5588 do you know if a photocopy of passport would be sufficient to not get detained or if it has to be the actual passport? i've always left my passport at my hotel and just carried around a photocopy when travelling, but I have never been asked for ID.

Also, in some countries there are scams where scammers pretend to be police officers...is this a thing in Athens? If so, how can tourists tell the real police from fake?

User deleted comment

16d

mojo-jojo-999

16d

Thanks for sharing your experience here too. Often the reality of these experiences are drowned out over the trendy, travel hype type of posts

It's a shame you had to cut your trip short but I'm glad you didn't just accept it and tolerate it.

mojo-jojo-999

16d

Oh man you deleted your post! Wish you kept it here for awareness!

Moderator removed comment

17d

mojo-jojo-999

17d

Very flattered to be considered a criminal by just standing in line minding my own business.

Anyway, what you describe above is exactly what racial profiling is. I understand the argument to use "statistics" to defend national security. But if they are doing it at the cost of alienating/intimidating innocent people that comes with a cost too. Eventually it will converge in one way or another. I mean, I've already labeled it as a country I would not be revisiting in the future, and I'm sure if this pattern continues, others will too. At the same time, it looks like the police already have some spotlight on them for brutality, etc.

GreeceTravel-ModTeam

15d

We're all here travelling, learning and exploring. Your content was removed because it was not civil to other users. If you don't have anything supportive to add, just pass by.

Use of racial slur.

Adventurous_Novel151

17d

As a Greek (living in the UK) I’m very sorry to hear about your experience.

If I may try to offer a possible explanation - which by no means looks to justify racial profiling- has to do with millions of illegal immigrants from M.East, N.Africa and SW Asia passing through or living in Greece, quite often causing issues.

Also, keep in mind that Greek laws allow stop and search, randomly asking for ID, etc activity from the police, without necessarily witnessing suspicious activity.

Hope your experience other than that of the Greek police was good !

nerdyandgirly123

17d

u/Adventurous_Novel151 I would be interested in your advice related to the fact that stop and search, asking for IDs, etc. is legal. How should a tourist handle being stopped by someone who looks like a police officer without getting scammed?

In my previous travels through a few European countries there were places where someone pretending to be police was a pretty common scam, so the advice was to just ignore them and not give them your ID. but it seems in Greece that real police officers do this. Does this mean that there aren't scammers pretending to be police? Or if there are also scammers, how can tourists tell the difference and how should we handle the situation?

Adventurous_Novel151

I’d advise to never carry a passport with you, instead keep it safe to your hotel or AirBnb - just carry a photo of it on your phone. Vast majority of police in Greece is in uniform- if for whatever reason you feel uncomfortable ask validation from a passer by or ask them to back to your hotel.

nerdyandgirly123

u/Adventurous_Novel151 thanks! in my past travels i never carried my PP with me, just a copy....but some of the comments about Greece said to actually keep the real passport with you or you might get detained by the police. thanks for your suggestions!

mojo-jojo-999

17d

Unfortunately that policy opens the door to systemic racism.

There was a disproportionate number of black people being stopped by cops in my country too, until they made this practice of "carding" illegal more than 10 years ago.

Adventurous_Novel151

Agreed, as mentioned I’m not trying to justify what happened rather to explain it. In my experience Greeks are racist against “Brown” people not “Black” people

gerlstar

17d

Hmm i traveled with people from Sri Lanka in Greece last week. Theyre a couple. They didn't experience this. I wonder if you were with another person would it have made a difference?

BokaPoochie

17d

I was in Athens a few days ago with my wife (we are both of South Asian heritage) and didn't feel any animosity at all. Though in Santorini they were a bit cold but I feel like they are just like that to tourists in general. But in general, people in Greece have been very friendly and accommodating.

AchillesDev

17d

I was just in Athens for 2 months with my brown (Hispanic, not South Asian, but she often gets confused for South Asian) wife, and it wasn't something she experienced at all either on her own or with me.

usermane22

17d

Same here. Didnt face anything like this luckily.

sisterlymite3961

17d

Huh, I was in athens a couple of weeks ago, and we (two non white males) never experienced this. We even asked cops for directions when trying to find the cable car.

emma279

17d

Same here. I do think countries have reputations based on how majority of tourists from there act. Americans and Chinese not having the best.

blarryg

17d

I can pass for "white", but I'm Jewish, sort of look like Woody Alan if he worked out a bit more with formerly curly hair now much graying ... let's just say I've experienced more than a few bouts of hate from many directions. However, back in grad school I was driving my very white friend in his car and police pulled us over. He didn't register his car for 3 years he'd been in the state, had no tags at all on the license plate, who knew? The police officer was nice, told him he could impound the car but just gave a verbal warning to get a proper license plate and tags and off we went.

Next time I was in my car driving my Indian roommate who looked like every brownish stereotype there ever was. One guy called him an Arab, another guy asked if he was from somewhere in Africa and of course India, Pakistan etc. I had ordered a license plate tag, but had not yet put it on. I somehow forgot and it was like 4 days out of date. Got pulled over. Police looked in the car and said "I'm sorry, I have to tow it!" Of course, I asked if the tow truck driver can just give us a ride to his place so we could pay the fee and then rush back to put on my tag. He said "sure". And as we pulled away, I asked "how much to just tow my car home?" $50 (half tow price) under the table. So he did. Put the tag on and that was that. This was many years ago now, joked about it for years.

PimsriReddit

17d

Oh! I was 5 days in Athens (solo traveller, SE Asian, but I look S Asian) and never encounter this! I was afraid of this, and even made a post asking about it before and I was told I have nothing to worry about. So sorry that happened to you.

nionios_k

16d

I dont believe it was done on purpose, not because there is no racism in the country, but because in general police does not care at all. Maybe they were on the lookout for someone with similar characteristics. As a white Greek, I have been stopped numerous times on the road, mainly because of my motorcycle, they just id check me because e.g. "there was an ATM robbery and the thieves left the scene on a similar bike" and similar events. However they do profiling, for example, if you are in a group of tourists where they are all wearing suits and you are wearing a t shirt and shorts, in that case you "stand out", thinking you maybe as a pickpocket or sorts. My point is I dont believe it was done on purpose just because you are asian, because they simply dont care..

Efficient-Data5248

10d

I don't think it's racism per se, but rather a reaction to massive floods of illegal immigrants since the 2008 Syrian War and the ongoing waves of illegal immigration funneled through Turkey to Greece, many from SE Asia.

The Greek economy has been in tough shape for 10+ years.

The average Greek salary is circa $1100/month, nearly 50% below what it was in 2010.

The unemployment rate for Greeks under age 35 is circa 40%

The Greeks facing such difficulties don't particularly want to be competing with recent immigrants.

If by chance, you match one of the groups who have been entering the country illegally en masse, you can probably expect more scrutiny than compared to other groups.

I am a (legal) immigrant to Greece myself, and I occasionally get extra-hassled due to the fact that I am obviously not Greek.

And it neither surprises me nor offends me. I feel fortunate the country has let me spend time here.

anonymous-rebel

17d

Damn sorry to hear about this. I just landed in Athens and luckily I haven’t had much experience with police here but I make I do look quite different from other Asians, I’m Filipino but people occasionally mistake me for Hispanic. Hopefully this isn’t a common thing here because if it is then I’d rather go back to Turkey where I didn’t experience any racism.

3verythingIsPossible

16d

My half American, half Filipina girlfriend often gets mistaken for ‘the help’ in Greece :(

anonymous-rebel

15d

Yeah that’s unfortunate, but do you mean half white? American isn’t a race.

3verythingIsPossible

15d

Yeah you’re right. I was listing her nationalities but she is half white half Asian.

anonymous-rebel

15d

Yeah not everyone is aware of the difference between nationality and ethnicity/race. As a Filipino American, I was taught the difference from a young age but I noticed in more homogenous countries, they don’t always realize there is a difference.

[deleted]

-1

15d

dafaq is "South Asian"? Dont be ashamed to mention you're Pakistani/Bangladeshi

dont drag us Indians/Bhutanese down with you mutts