St. George Greek Orthodox Church, Albuquerque of New Mexico

Some believe the most notable Albu­querque event the first week in Octo­ber is that Bal­loon Thing. But true Burqueños know the real event is the Greek Festival.

St. George’s Greek Ortho­dox Church has been putting on their annual Gre­cian Fes­ti­val for, like, ever. It always falls the first full week­end of Octo­ber (and in 2011 started Sep­tem­ber 30, so appar­ently Fri­day doesn’t count as “the weekend”).

For $5 (or free if you’re a kid under 12, mil­i­tary, police or fire­fighter with ID, or before 5pm on Fri­day) you get entry to the church grounds, includ­ing the gor­geous chapel, the grounds and the church hall, where there are booths sell­ing all man­ner of Greek stuff. There’s hand-made jew­elry, funny Greek tee-shirts and of course Chris­t­ian books to get you through depres­sion or alco­holism or what­ever other dark night of the soul you may need to fill. There are dance lessons, arts and crafts, music and, to the delight of every­one, food demonstrations.

The major draw of the Greek Fest is, of course, the food. Instead of deal­ing with cash reg­is­ters, St. George’s has set up a ticket sys­tem — each ticket is worth $1 and is used in place of cash at the food ven­dors. These tick­ets are non-refundable, and you can always buy more, so pace your­self. Just make sure you grab some of these tick­ets at “the banks” on your way in so you can imme­di­ately get some baklava, psito arni, dol­mades, and a cold glass of retsina to wash it down. If you’re feel­ing like the Greek fever has hit you, take some notes while watch­ing one of those food demon­stra­tions, and make your own at home later (if you can).