The Greek pocketbook snaps shut

    By Botziolis's count, 22 retailers, including a local Sephora, have shut their doors in this neighborhood alone, along a stretch of about 10 blocks. Many shopkeepers, he says, simply can't keep up with operating costs or pay their rent as sales decline.

    Seeing the storm coming, many small businesses have retrenched. Tasos Prapidis, the owner of Fashion Market, a tiny clothing shop on a side street, says he closed one of his two stores a month ago to save his business.

    "It's too early to tell if my strategy worked," he says. "But I expect now that I only have to pay one rent and one utility bill, it should help."

    It's not all doom and gloom, of course. Metaxia Rori, a saleswoman at a Swarovski shop across the street, reports that the boutique moved to this smaller space, with a lower rent, a couple of months ago. Since, sales have held steady -- a sign perhaps that Greeks won't let even a severe economic crisis depress them too much.

    "We are doing ok. Greeks still buy gifts, thank God," Rori says with a smile. "We are going to get through this. One crisis isn't going to destroy us."

    Old habits -- and attitudes -- die hard, it seems, even with smaller amounts of cash at hand.