My Big Fat Greek Day 6/6/09

Today was long and tiring, but pretty fun!

We had an awesome breakfast at the Reddy's of cereal (which I discovered is really expensive here), cheese pies, eggs, waffles, and German and Greek sausages. The cheese pies looked really good, but I didn't want to risk eating one and suffering the dire consequences during our hike up to the Acropolis/around other ruins.

A short bus ride took us back to Syntagma Square, where we saw another tomb of an unknown soldier (#3), that was being guarded by two guards with funny shoes. One of the features of this site is a massive flock of pigeons - tourists can buy bags of feed for one euro, and have these dirty beasts perch on their arms, hands, head, or whatever. Or for the more mischieveous soul, you can toss the feed into unsuspecting groups of children for a few seconds of entertainment.



I wasn't really in the mood to contract any bird diseases, but Michael bought a couple bags of feed and soon enough we were covered in pigeons. And soon enough, a group of school kids was screaming because Michael tossed a lot of feed toward their feet. What an awesome guy.



We took pictures with the guards after the pigeon experience, and found out that you CANNOT raise your hands in pictures with them (the other guard started to raise his gun) and you CANNOT throw pigeon feed at them. We didn't do this, but I'm pretty sure you can get shot for doing it.



After this little bit of fun, we split with the Reddy's who were taking Thomas and Sophie for a little park adventure, and headed to the Plaka. This is a giant marketplace that attracts tourists who want to buy souveniers. I'm still having trouble finding anything worth getting, so chances are that a lot of my friends and relatives are going to be disappointed when I come home. I have a bunch of pictures/stories to tell you though! Isn't that more worth it?

Unsuccessful at finding anything to buy, or George Nikopolis, for that matter, we headed up to the Acropolis. It was pretty hard to find at first (the theme of the day) because we walked up a hill that had an awesome view of the city, but unfortunately, a dead end.



By talking to another group of returning Australian tourists, we finally found the ticket booth (it was really hot today - 100 degrees). Student rates = 1/2 off = 6 euros to visit 6 major sites in Athens. And unlike Rome, you don't need to be a EU citizen.

We walked up the hill, saw the theatre of Dionysis (crazy wine god), and then through some ruins and pillars to the Parthenon. It's an amazing sight, even with the scaffolding around it for the reconstruction of one of the sides. We chilled up here for a little bit, taking in the breathtaking views, and started going back after we ran out of water. Luckily, we filled up our waterbottles before the trip because it was hot up there and there wasn't much shade.



On the way back, we climbed the Areopagus, a rock from which the Apostle Paul preached in Acts 17.



Then we walked to the Ancient Agora, the marketplace. It's amazing to see the history here; there are biblical sites and ruins of stores where pottery was actually sold. You can actually see the influence cultures that existed 2000 years ago have on our lives today, in terms of government, religion, architecture, and lifestyle. Gives you something to think about.

Going out the other side of the Agora led us to the Monastiraki Markets, where we got cheap 3 euro gyros (it was around 2 in the afternoon, and we had been walking all day). Luckily, I glanced up at the right time because I saw a sign for Aphrodite, the jewelry store at which George works (it's not in the Plaka, Mario!). We walked in and asked for George, but he was out for the day. Stratos, the other owner, recognized the name of my coworker when I mentioned it, and treated us like family when we told him how we found the store. He offered to buy us frappes (whipped coffee), gave us a 40% discount (the jewelry there was still way out of my budget), and told us to come back if we needed any help. He even gave us his business card and told us to call him if we ran into any trouble. I swear, I'm making friends all over the world and it feels pretty cool.



Per the recommendation of my other coworker, Matt, I ordered ouzo at a bar nearby Aphrodite, which is a licorice flavored Greek liquor. It's clear when it's warm, but when you add ice to it, it turns a milky white color. I didn't like it at first, but it slowly grew on me. I don't know if I'd order it again, though. It was pretty expensive at 4 euros for a small cup.

While sipping the ouzo, I bought two more paintings of Santorini (a beautiful Greek Isle), and we walked to Hadrian's Arch and the temple of Olympian Zeus (HUGE). What's interesting about these ruins is that they're monstrous, but some of the pillars fell/were knocked down. You have to wonder what force did it, and it makes you realize that nothing built by people lasts forever.



The last thing we wanted to see (we still had some tickets to sites from the original ticket we bought at the Acropolis) was Keramikos, which was reachable by metro. And a walk through a ghost town that seemed like it was probably thriving when the Olympics were held in Athens recently. A benefit of this is that there weren't too many tourists at this site, and nothing was really fenced off. Unlike Ostia Antica, however, we got yelled at for climbing on things and going into certain areas. Eventually, the worker got tired of chasing us out of areas, and started following us around so we wouldn't do anything worth yelling for.



One of the cool and unexpected things about these ruins is the amount of wildlife - there are stray cats and tortoises roaming the site, and they're not afraid of humans. It's unreal.



We left, probably to the relief of that worker, and passed by Hadrian's Library while trying to find the metro. At this point all the ruins that we saw started to look the same, but we wanted to use our tickets and snap a few pictures to prove that we were there. We were in and out in 10 minutes, and then took the metro to Evangelismos station. If you know Athens geography at all, you probably realize that we had no plan today because we bounced around the city and weren't efficient at all. It's not such a bad thing, though. I'm realizing the plusses to living life without plans.



Katie, one of our friends from Berkeley who is taking Greek here over summer, called us after we got to Evangelismos and we took the 608 bus to meet her at her dorm. We picked up some gyros (I'm starting to get sick of them haha), and took them over to Ron and Julean's house to eat.

Ron and Julean are believers who lived in Washington, and then moved to Athens to serve the Lord. It's interesting because we've met a lot of people in Europe who have done that, and you can really see how the Lord and faith supply them.

We sat around on their balcony after we ate (it was a warm, quiet night), and a young street performer walked by two stories below their flat, playing an accordion. Ron and Julean told us how they lowered their change to the young man in a cup with a bit of string, and we contemplated doing it tonight, but Katie took our change and ran it down to the guy instead. He waved up to us in appreciation, and then continued down the road to bless the other residents with his calm and slightly haunting melody. People here are really cool, and I love the culture in Greece.

Reminded because we all were handling the coins, Ron told us about the back of the two euro Greek coin, which has eerie biblical implications. If you read Revelation 13:1-2 and 17:1-6, it talks about a woman riding a beast, which typifies the Antichrist (the number of the beast is 666). The Antichrist comes out of the sea, which is the Mediterranean. This is a picture of the Greek two euro coin:



Where is Greece? In the Mediterranean. You can take it as a creepy coincidence, but I'm taking it as a sign of the end times and as a motivation to keep pursuing the Lord. Seriously. The people choosing the design could have used anything to represent their country - The Parthenon, Zeus, olive branches, anything - but they chose this.

It was getting late, so we left Ron and Julean's place and visited Tony and Tina Sapounakis with Katie. Tony, another believer, graduated from Cal in 2005 and moved to Athens to study here. He's pretty good friends with another brother we know from Cal, and he connected us with the Reddy family. Sadly, he's moving back to the states in two days, which is why we didn't stay with him here. We talked to him while he was packing up some things, and he recommended that in our few days remaining here we go to one of the isles. After doing a quick bit of research on his laptop, we decided to go to Aegina - it's an hour ride away by ferry, tickets are 18 euros round trip, and the hostel is only 28 euros a night for a private room with two double beds and a bathroom. I can't wait.

We took the bus back home so Tony and Tina could finish packing, took cold showers (it's still pretty hot and it's supposed to get even hotter tomorrow), and washed our clothes.

I'm falling asleep while jotting this down, but reallllly happy :)