My friend Yanni is an immigrant from Greece. He came to America as a teenager and lived with his uncle until he finished high school. Then he was off to college where he majored in International Studies. He could speak English as well as Greek and his family, in both Greece and America, had "connections", so he had no trouble getting a job at the Greek Consulate in New York and wound up settling in our area.
The American Greek community is very active in trying to keep the culture alive. They are known for their food festivals which are usually sponsored by the church. Yanni and I met one at one of those food festivals.
The local Greek Orthodox Church was having its Annual Food Festival over a 4 day period from Thursday through Sunday and my band, was hired to play on Friday and Saturday nights for the social. We are well known and very popular in the Greek community. I play bouzouki.
I'm a second generation American of Greek and English heritage. My mother was English, so I never learned the Greek language because it wasn't spoken at home, but I always gravitated to my Greek heritage. However, love knows no ethnic boundaries, so I was dating a fair-skinned, smiling Irish eyes, red headed beauty named Lauren.
Lauren was a little above average height for a woman, and had more of a straight body line. I'd describe her as wispy. Her hips were narrow, with a slightly smaller waist and modest but perky 34 B breasts. Yeah, I knew the exact size of her tits.
On Thursday, Lauren and I went to eat dinner at the Festival. We arrived and quickly got into line to get our food. We went through the line and had our plates filled with of a variety of foods like Souvlaki, Spanakopita, Mousaka, and, of course, Baklava for dessert. The hall was packed and we looked around to find some place to sit. Lauren spotted a couple of open folding chairs at one of those long paper-draped tables set up in the church hall. We hurried between the long narrow rows of tables hoping that no one would grab those seats before we got there. We made it and as I was sitting down my foot kicked under the table into to the foot of a young guy sitting across from me. I made my apology and he said that it was "not a problem". I noticed that he had an accent.
As we sat and ate, he and I struck up a casual conversation. He said his name was Yanni. We introduced ourselves and also our girlfriends. His girlfriend was Katrina or Katherine in English. She was Greek, but second generation like me, so she was really an American of Greek heritage β but she had the look of a native Hellenic beauty β olive toned skin, large deep brown eyes, thick dark brown hair and a somewhat but not too prominent Greek nose β "not a problem". She was average height for a woman, and had a nice body β kind of pear shaped, but with larger breasts. And she had this sultry sexy look.
Yanni is tall and lean, with black hair and is clean shaven. He'd be described as tall, dark and handsome by the opposite sex. He didn't have that typical big black porno moustache that you'd see Greek men wearing at the time. I, however, did have the "porn-stache" since I was trying to be as Greek as possible to compensate for the fact that I looked more like the Limey side of me.
Both Yanni and Katrina were really nice and we exchanged some small talk. I ended up telling him that I played in the band that was performing for the dance on the weekend. He said that he'd like to hear my band, so he said that he and Katrina would be there Saturday night, and asked Lauren if she was coming. She said that she usually didn't go because she hated to just sit there alone while I was playing. Katrina said that she hoped Lauren would be there because Yanni would usually leave her alone and wind up talking to someone at the bar β and drinking Ouzo. For those who don't know, Ouzo is a sweet Greek anise-flavored drink. It's around 80 proof and actually tastes like licorice, so it's not hard to swallow.
Katrina liked to dance the Greek dances like Sirtaki, Pentozali, and Tsamiko and said that she could teach Lauren how to dance them. Greek dances are primarily line dances so you don't need a partner. Yanni said "Come on, Lauren. Come with us. Please. We'll pick you up. Katrina and you can dance and β I Promise β you'll have a good time". It seemed that Yanni had somewhat of a gift. He had this really friendly manner and a way of asking you something that made it hard to refuse. Lauren agreed and said she'd like to learn some of the dances.
On Saturday, Yanni and Katrina swung by and picked up Lauren since it was on the way, as I had driven separately because I had to be there early - and we had to tear down after we were done. We all had a good time at the dance. I was playing, and when Yanni wasn't at the bar, and when Katrina wasn't showing Lauren the Greek dances, the three of them sat together.
I noticed that Yanni would place his hand on Lauren's shoulder when he was speaking with her, and lean towards her in order to hear over the music. Maybe it was that open European, and particularly Greek, culture that made Yanni comfortable enough to put his arm around a woman he had only recent met. Or maybe it was the fact that Lauren was so different than Katrina that prompted him to be so "friendly" - the attraction of opposites. Katrina was apparently OK with Yanni's attention to another woman, and Lauren didn't seem to mind either.
After my band played our last song, Yanni and Katrina came over to say goodbye and said that they would drop Lauren off on their way home so she didn't have to wait. They also said that we should get together when I wasn't playing.
Katrina and Lauren seemed to really hit it off and Lauren said they had exchanged telephone numbers. They had talked about going out to dinner some time β for something other than Greek food. Katrina and Yanni seemed to be nice enough and I said sure, I wouldn't mind. A couple of weeks later the girls arranged for us to get together and we went to an American fare restaurant. We all talked, ate and had a really good time. Yanni and I had a couple of Martinis while Lauren and Katrina each had a glass of wine. Lauren isn't a drinker so she usually just has a Coke, but she ordered Riesling, a sweet German wine. Yanni and I talked about his job at the Consulate and Greek music and generally got along real well. Since we all enjoyed each others' company we agreed that we should do it again soon. We gave each other a hug as we were getting in our cars to leave. Everyone hugged. It's pretty common in our culture. Yanni and I did the manly "slap on the back" side half hug and the girls gave each other a full friendly hug, after which Yanni and I hugged each others' girlfriends. I made sure to give Katrina a full hug. I figured Yanni had been pretty "friendly" with Lauren at the dance, and I didn't want Katrina to think that I wasn't being "friendly" towards her.