“Thank God we survived.” OUR Leonidas Kursoumis with this phrase, he condenses four difficult years, a constant uphill climb to tune in and endure Homeless Antique Bookstore. He says it slowly, but not half-heartedly either.

The speech is delivered by a man who has run his own marathon and continues to run. A humble fighter, if you will.

Work began exactly four years ago in a huge warehouse in Piraeus 132. There was no electricity, not then, not now. There they gathered about 120,000 booksall donations from people who wanted to support the project.

Four years later, on March 17 at 11 a.m., Kursumis, along with the people he works with, opened the door of his new bookstore for the first time, a permanent roof with the name “under anesthesia» at Messolonghi Square in Pagrati, after moving from Gravias Street in the center of Athens.

The idea came to Kursumis when he was homeless – he slept on benches for two yearsto choose from outside the center.

“I said to myself: “Since it all happened, I have to go through it.” I’ve been patient. On the other hand, I chose the theater: I did not show anyone that I was homeless. He was disappointed with the two or three attacks he made on his acquaintances, no one helped him. He lived in the shadows, but did not give up.

Shortly before their closing 69 years old, he was offered placement in a warehouse. There he began to put his plan into action.

“At the warehouse in Ano Patisia, I made a decision, the direction changed. It all started with the fact that I found a bed, a sheet, a pillow and a blanket. And work. You can change a lot if you have something to hold on to, if you know that at night you will find the roof and not the sky. Then you know that as long as you can fix something, you will.”

“These four years were very difficult,” he says when asked if this period of his life was exciting. And reveals what he hides in his soul: “You’ll never survive – I’m not – on the street. I slept on the benches, at first there was fear, then passed. I told myself what to do and what to do. We found a bed, a roof. With the base, you can change the scenery, do everything. But we have to look deeper – you have to make a decision that you want to change. If you do not make a decision, nothing will change, you will remain in the discussion forever.”