Human cost of Greece's crisis

This time last year the square would have been full, Konstantopoulos says, because "it is the best area in the Mediterranean." But nowadays, people are staying at home, he says; they have no money. "This is a problem."

Just down the road, past Athens' central Syntagma Square, the focus of anti-austerity protests over the past two years, is Psiri, an edgy area which was known as the "Soho" of the city before the crisis hit.

Here, restaurant worker Mario Makris simply drops his thumb down when asked how business is.

"Business has dropped by over 60%," he says.

But Makris says he will vote for New Democracy, because a swing to the left -- which has enjoyed as surge of support on the back of Greeks' despair after almost three years of austerity -- would take the country to hell, he says.

Austerity drives up suicide rate

Restaurant owner Paul Papageorgiou says the area has changed, but he blames immigrants -- another ferociously debated topic on Greek streets -- for the country's problems, rather than the financial crisis.

His family has spent decades here, and he has seen it slump from its vibrant years in the early 1990s to an area he says now suffers from crime and is home to drug dealers.

On Sunday, Papageorgiou says, he will vote for extreme right wing party Golden Dawn, one of several fringe parties to benefit from voters' dissatisfaction with traditional political groups in the last election.