The Greeks, the originators of Western science and rational thought, are also prone to outbursts of irrationality (though they are not alone in that). The inhabitants of a land with sparse resources and an unforgiving climate, they are hardy and independent, but four hundred years of Turkish occupation have left them with an ingrained suspicion of authority, and the two combined have resulted in a population which sometimes seems near to ungovernable. It has led to the twin national sports of tax evasion and illegal building, which persist despite successive governments’ attempts to curb them, and it is revealed in the public suspicion of many government measures ostensibly designed to make life easier or safer for the ordinary citizen.