ATHENS — Last Sunday, I got in line for a National Bank of Greece ATM in Kaisariani, an Athens neighborhood not far from the Acropolis. The National Bank of Greece had the only machine around with cash still left to issue; dozens of us, many on mopeds, scoured the area to find it. We herded into line under a drizzle of rain. The sense of doom was tempered by small instances of what Greeks call philotimo — “selflessness.” A pregnant woman arrived; she was whisked to the front. Teenagers helped pensioners decipher the ATM screen. After 45 minutes of waiting, the bank ran out of cash, and the majority of us dispersed without having withdrawn anything.
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