Cafés were busy; streets were clogged with traffic.

The impression of business as usual was illusory. The new government may have stepped back from the impending rift with its creditors, but its readiness to go so close to the edge has hurt the economy and brought the state close to bankruptcy. Worse, there is scope for more damage to be done this spring, since nothing has been settled between the Greek government and the IMF, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Commission (the institutions that speak for Greece's creditors). Fleshing out the thin list of reforms the government has presented so far is bound to be an agonising process.