Firefighters from the Alpes-Maritimes have been deployed to the Greek island of Evia to assist in battling blazes that have claimed 56,000 hectares over the past 10 days.
On Sunday evening, 23 firefighters from the Alpes-Maritimes left Evia to help try and contain the fires that have decimated large areas in the north of the island.
Evia, or Euboea as it is also known, is the second largest Greek island after Crete and also boasts the second largest population of any island. It is separated from the mainland by a narrow strait and is about 180km long and a mere 200km from Athens.
Dozens of homes and acres of forest have been razed to the ground, whilst hundreds have been ordered to evacuate to escape. Some refused to go, leading to rescue missions where villagers were picked up by sea on Monday morning.
The Riviera-based firefighters first crossed the Italian border at Ventimiglia where they will reach Greece by sea. They will have a short stopover in Bari, Italy to take a ferry which will carry the personnel and machinery. The region is sending four water tanker trucks in addition to manpower and general equipment. Other French firefighters from Bouches-du-Rhône have already been on site for a few days. https://twitter.com/PompiersFR/status/1424102371563540484?s=20
In Greece, public anger has grown at the government’s slow response to this summer’s spate of fires, brought on by record-breaking heatwaves and strong winds, and made worse by a lack of proper equipment to stop the flames from marching steadily into more towns.
“The fire was our destiny, no one could have put it out,” Vangelis Katsaros, who lost his entire farm to the blaze, told the BBC.
Kleilia Dimitraki, president of the Evia village of Monokaria fears her town and the island will never recover.
“Ιt is a holocaust. All the villages, the whole area is finished, finished,” she said.
“All we are saying today is that we are fortunate to be alive.”
Firefighters worked until dawn on Monday in the village attempting to stop the flames from reaching the nearby town of Istiaia.
The villages of Kamatriades and Galatsades were to be the priorities of the firefighters on Monday. Because “if the fire passes by there, it will be in a thick forest and difficult to extinguish”, according to the firefighters quoted by the ANA.
Over 1,000 firefighters, planes and extra equipment have been flown in by other countries, including several EU states, Russia, the UK and US. The EU has said it was “one of Europe’s biggest ever common firefighting operations.”
Photo by Filippos Sdralias on Unsplash
Hashtag Monaco: “Influencers add the human touch to luxury”
They document their lives and passions online, and with that comes a new way to showcase Monaco. Olga Lavric and Milana Chigridow are digital influencers, giving their hundreds of thousands of followers a unique glimpse of what life looks like in the fabled Principality.
It’s the perfect destination to post about. Famous architectural masterpieces, luxury superyachts in the harbour, and all those fast cars. Of course, we’re talking about Monaco.
The Principality is a favourite when it comes to social media. On Instagram alone, there’s more than seven million posts with the hashtag “monaco”. But if on the one side there are occasional vacation posts by the hoards of visitors each year, on the other there’s a community of influencers who work all year around to share all-things-Monaco.
Five years ago, Olga Lavric found herself with no job and a suggestion from her husband: “You are following a lot of fashion/beauty bloggers. Why not start your personal blog?”. At first, she was indecisive, not knowing how her work situation would evolve, but then she knew she had to take the risk. “In the end I said: ‘Why not? Better to try than to regret later’. Now I’m more than happy to do what I really love. For me this is a dream that came true,” Olga tells Monaco Life.
Olga’s job goes from answering emails to organising photo shoots, preparing outfits, editing photos and videos or attending events. Apart from that, she drinks her coffee in the morning and spends time with her family and friends, just like everyone else. “I have a normal life as everyone else does, with little exceptions,” she explains. https://www.instagram.com/p/CRZZDOylm17/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
But she does not have a regular job. Being an influencer, or content creator as some people prefer to call it, is far from the typical career path. Even though it’s becoming more common, some people still don’t know what it is that Olga and so many around the world do for a living. “For example, my parents are far away from the digital world, they opened their accounts on Facebook and Instagram only because of me, to see my photos. In the beginning it was hard to explain to them what I’m doing,” says Olga, who has 343,000 Instagram followers.
The easiest way she could explain was to say that her job involves doing publicity for some brands on social media and that she’s receiving products to then test and post about with her personal review. Olga considers this the simplest way to explain to someone who doesn’t know a lot about the digital world what an influencer is.
But technically, it is a little more specific. Influence marketing, as it’s known, is different from other forms of marketing because of the target. In this situation, the main focus is on a specific group of followers, with similar interests, and not everyone. Meaning, a beauty brand who has a billboard in a street may reach the desired public or not, depending on who walks that street. But if the brand chooses to work with a beauty influencer, they automatically know that that person’s followers are interested in the topic, making all of them potential consumers.
When it comes to Monaco, Olga says that many brands are keen to collaborate with influencers in the Principality. “Of course, the brands are interested in working with influencers from Monaco. Here you can create very cool content. The place is amazing. We have breath taking views, fabulous architecture, beautiful nature, turquoise sea and white beaches, luxury hotels, luxury cars in the background, so the photo shoots are always spectacular,” she says. Supporting local business
Swedish-born Milana Chigridow is currently living between Monaco and Paris and has 138,000 followers. The 26-year-old first came to the Principality to do a master’s degree in Luxury Management at the University of Monaco and is now working “with various brands within the luxury segment as a content creator and social media consultant,” Milana tells Monaco Life.
On Instagram, her career started over a decade ago when the platform had just launched. “I always had this profession in between my studies, and I find it a valuable portfolio for me to lean on when I present myself. I was 16 at the time so it is my first and only career so far,” she explains.
And the way she does that is close to magical: “I like to imagine the world as the books I read and the movies I see.” https://www.instagram.com/p/CQAqkEXph_C/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
Milana chooses to share the ordinary things in life, believing that “people don’t want to see something extravagant or showy, that they can’t relate to.” Her content is simple and familiar. She uses her Instagram account as her diary, a place where all her memories are saved, which results in a combination of places, people, food and architecture.
According to Milana, every place in Monaco is good when it comes to creating content, especially for people with a creative mind. “Personally, I like the old town, and also the polished buildings around the Casino. The view from the Exotic Garden is also spectacular,” she says.
Olga also has some tips when it comes to the best places to create content in Monaco. “Around the Monte-Carlo Casino, Hôtel de Paris, Hôtel Hermitage and Metropole. Also, an option is up at the Prince’s Palace where you have breath taking panoramas. On the one side you have the view of Fontvieille, on the other side the view of Port Hercules. The little streets in the old city also are a good place to find cool content.”
When it comes to the social media market, it looks like there’s a lot of space available, even with so many visitors. “I’d say there are not so many local influencers which is an advantage, for me at least,” says Milana. She believes that “tourist influencers are not essential to Monegasque business owners, it’s better to work with local talents.” She says the ones who live in Monaco already have a community of followers who are also from the Principality, so “strategically it’s better to use them for advertising than someone who is big and international”.
When it comes to partnerships, the Swedish influencer believes the big potential is in promoting hotels and restaurants. “People who wish to experience this want to see what is in store for them, therefore using influencers to share their brand story through posts and videos is a huge advantage.”
Her academic path combined with all the knowledge that she has gained from working as an influencer for so many years has given Milana the right recipe to know how to deal with brand partnerships. Talking about the luxury market that Monaco is known for, the influencer has her own way to do it. “Showcasing real luxury should focus on the feeling and the ambiance a client will achieve,” she reveals. “A clever influencer will transmit this message in a more ‘warm’ and less corporate way than a commercial post made by a company. Influencers add the human touch to the luxury aspect.”
But Milana also has space for smaller businesses, since she believes that “they have the opportunity to grow a lot through word of mouth, more so than big brands”. MOCO Society is one example of a partnership she has done, with the brand sharing its products with her for free in return for exposure. But in Monaco, Milana thinks that “every new startup can earn big awareness by targeting the local influencers”.
Even though this career looks accessible to everyone, it requires a good amount of dedication, creativity and work. Seeing Milana’s daily routine, it can get a bit busy. The day starts with a look around Instagram, then she starts planning her timings for the day when it comes to posts. After that, it’s time to snap some pictures. No, not some, all of them. “I also snap photos of almost everything I do and therefore update on stories. Sometimes I have more material than time to post.”
In the middle she answers emails, comments and propositions. The love she has for the business side of it keeps her away from finding an agency to do that work. She also finds time to work on a consultancy basis for several brands.
But the fun side of Instagram for Milana is “creating a diary that everyone has access to”, something that she likes to call a “come to life book”, that is always available for people to read and be a part of.
The IPCC has just released its 2021 report and the big takeaway is that time is running out for the planet unless policies are enacted now to halt climate change.
In the past, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been a sort of early warning system, telling the high-CO2 emitting countries they needed to change their ways or face consequences.
Whilst baby steps were and continue to be taken to improve, and thus stop climate change, the actual threat of possible human extinction seemed like a far-off sci-fi nightmare. This is no longer the case. The IPCC has made it crystal clear the future is now and that we have only decades to stop the damage before it hits the point of no return.
“Climate change is already affecting every region on Earth, in multiple ways. The changes we experience will increase with additional warming,” said IPCC Working Group Co-Chair Panmao Zhai.
The commentary shows that greenhouse gas emissions from human-related activities are directly responsible for the mess the planet is in. The planet warmed 1.1°C between the years 1850 and 1900, and the next two decades will bring that up to 1.5°C or even 2°C, the point at which food growing will decrease dramatically, water levels will rise significantly, and unpredictable weather events will affect humanity in unforeseen ways.
The call for “rapid and large-scale reductions” has officially hit critical mass, according to the IPCC.
“This report is a reality check,” said IPCC Working Group Co-Chair Valérie Masson-Delmotte. “We now have a much clearer picture of the past, present and future climate, which is essential for understanding where we are headed, what can be done, and how we can prepare.”
The IPCC has proposed drastic action on behalf of every government in the world in order to stop the continued deterioration. They advise every government of every country to read and agree to the changes suggested by the report, with overseers vetoing any governmental proposals that are political rather than scientific.
The idea is that by outing any country that is trying to colour outside the lines, accountability and action will replace the current lip-service being paid to the environment by most countries. Focus on clean energy
The primary culprit for the state of the planet is being placed largely on continued reliance on fossil fuels and methane.
“This report must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet,” said UN Secretary General António Guterres. “If we combine forces now, we can avert climate catastrophe. But, as the report makes clear, there is no time for delay and no room for excuses.”
The IPCC’s Panmao Zhai added, “Stabilizing the climate will require strong, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and reaching net zero CO2 emissions. Limiting other greenhouse gases and air pollutants, especially methane, could have benefits both for health and the climate.” Accountability is key
The cries for action have been only partially heeded for decades, with many countries citing costs as a reason to do nothing. The report has made clear that the world has hit the point that not acting will cause far more damage and the IPCC report may well be the catalyst to start taking legal action, in courtrooms, against polluting culprits.
“By strengthening the scientific evidence between human emissions and extreme weather the IPCC has provided new, powerful means to hold the fossil fuel industry and governments directly responsible for the climate emergency,” says Greenpeace’s Kaisa Kosonen. “One only needs to look at our recent court victory against Shell to realise how powerful IPCC science can be.”
With all the doom and gloom prophesised, is there hope? The answer is yes…but only just. Firm actions must start moving exponentially faster than the impacts say the experts, and whether this can happen is yet to be seen.
The next steps to this global shift will be explored in November at the UN Cop26 summit being held in Glasgow. All eyes will be on world leaders to save us all, and perhaps for the first time, they will have to follow through or face the music.
Monaco will have a new 120-bed care home for dependent elderly people by 2025, easing pressure as the aged population continues to grow in the Principality.
The home, which will be located between Boulevard du Larvotto and Avenue de Grande Bretagne, will serve the over-65s in the Principality, providing space for 120 people.
“Several sites for the installation of this public facility have been tested, because the constraints are numerous in terms of available space (size/configuration), land situation and operational requirements to be reconciled,” explained Monaco City Hall. “This development operation will preserve an unbuilt garden in the north-eastern part, including high-quality and generous plant treatment. Particular care will also be taken in the revegetation of the cover of the nursing home base.”
The decision to move forward on this project comes after an actuarial study was carried out at the request of the Department of Social Affairs and Health to look at projections for the over-65 population of the country in 2049 and what care options will be provided for them.
“Thus, from 2030, 118 beds will be lacking, then 359 in 2040 and 515 in 2049. Also, to deal with the issue of long-term care in establishments, it is imperative to identify new potentials, making it possible to build essential reception structures,” said the municipal council.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates the average Monegasque woman lives to be 85 and the average man to 78. This is significantly higher than the global average of 73.4, and therefore shows a need to be met in Monaco.
The new facility will be a good mid to long-term solution for the necessities of an aging population.
Photo by Micheile on Unsplash
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