Athens

Athens

As our three large blue buses drove into Athens I was surprisingly reminded of Mexico City. After the beautiful natural landscapes of Meteora, and Delphi seeing so much gray was truly shocking and a little bit dissappointing. I almost felt cheated, as if in between so much beauty someone had decided to make a gray patch filled with cars, buildings and shops just for their own benefit. I suppose this is somewhat true, which is slightly sad but of course necesary since Athens holds a third of the population of Greece and is the main big metropolitan spot. Although after three days of seeing Greek on all the signs I was already a bit nostalgic for my own alphabet, it was actually really cool to see the grafitti in Greek on a lot of streets. I guess I never really thought of ‘alpha’ and ‘stigma’ as letters that one would use in street slang grafitti.
Fortunately though, the city was not all a huge patch of gray dissappointment. After settling into our hotel, we were told to meet in the center of the city for our first Athenian lectures. After following the hard street names (our own street was Karageorgi Servias Str. all in the Greek alphabet for example) and avoiding the Athenian drivers (which are very similar to Roman drivers) we all met up in the center and then made our way to the Pnyx.
As we settled unto the Pnyx, the reality of it settled in us as well. This was the very rocky stone where one of the world’s earliest democratic legislatures, the Athenian ekklesia met. The Ekklesia was the popular assembly composed of all the Athenian citizens and was one of the very factors of the Radical Democracy in the Archaic Age of Athens. So we sat on this huge stone, looking down on the Agora and we could see the Acropolis at a distance as we listend to some lectures as well as some students’ reading of Pericles’ Funeral Oration. It was powerful to say the least, to hear such a strong appeal for democracy, which would later inspire great leaders, like the American Founding Fathers, at the very spot where it was first exposed.
We then walked to the Areopagus hill, where the highest governmental council would meet, overlooking the entire city, but still with the daunting image of the Acropolis to the west. We were all getting very anxious to finally see the Parthenon.

Climbinb up the Areopagus

To climb the Areopagus, most of us decided to go up the slippery marble stone steps which St Paul once climbed on, which was just another small cool feat of the hill. Above the Areopagus we listened to more lectures and had another student performance of Aeschylus’ Eumenides. This was perhaps the most memorable performance since all seven actors were extremely committed to their role, especially the ‘furies’ who all kept writhing and making angry faces the entire time. This of course kept us entertained, as well as many other tourists who decided to stay to watch even if they probably did not understand anything.

The 'furies' performing -with our guide dog in front.

(It was actually really weird. At many times, one or two dogs would cling on to us and just follow us and bark at anyone who was not part of our group. How they knew who wasn't part of our group, we had no idea. Why they were so protective of us? No idea. But they really followed us around the Pnyx, and the Areopagus, and when a group went at dawn to the Areopagus the next morning, a new set of protective dogs followed them and barked at the 'strangers'. Truly remarkable.. )

There is something really nice about writing all these memories down: (even weeks late, which I apologize for) the more I write the more I remember, and the more I can make eternal. Fortunately I kept a journal throughout the trip, but I can’t help but wonder at all the moments which are lost or hiding in memory, and when they will come out.

Anyway believe it or not, that was only our first day in Athens. It concluded with a nice group dinner and an early night for most of us since we had not slept much the previous night in Delphi and had to wake up early again for the Acropolis!

The second day in Athens was probably one of my favorite days of the whole trip (though it might be beaten by Nafplion, which I’ll write about hopefully soon). It was filled with everything the Greece Trip is supposed to be. First we visited the entrance to the Agora, and the Agora Museum, and then we made our way around the Agora, seeing each site as something special. One of the coolest places was the Prison. The very prison in which Socrates spent his very last days! Of course as a good UD Greek Trip experience, out came Plato’s Apology, and some students read it aloud. Although every time we read something ‘on site’ I got a very cool almost transcendental feeling, as if we could bend through time, listening to “Socrates’ last words” was possibly the one time I really appreciated the power of reading, teaching, learning and traveling all together.

The prison

After that amazing experience, we made our way (finally) up the Acropolis steps. We sat before the Parthenon as Dr. Lisot explained all the artwork in it and around it (all of which would then land on the midterm...), and Dr. Hatlie explained its main purposes. We then looked at the Erechtheum next and then we were free to go about Athens.

On the west side of the Parthenon

This next bit of the day is also the reason I loved this day so much. My friends and I decided we would visit the Acropolis Museum, which held so many artifacts bits of stones, pediments for about four floors. We then made our way into the center of the city in search of “gyros”. There is apparently a UD tradition between the guys to see who can eat the most gyros during the greece trip (which are very similar to the Turkish Kebabs but with pita bread), so they went at it. My friends and I found a cheap store and sat on the street across from it to enjoy our gyros and a shared baklava. We were all very happy and quite carefree, knowing we had hours before the next lecture or appointed site, just enjoying Greek food purchased for the first time by our account, sharing our thoughts and laughing with each other. It may seem like a very typical thing, especially next to having seen the Parthenon in person, but truly this is something I know I’ll always hold dear to me. Just sharing gyros, baklava and laughter with my friends in some unpronounceable street in Athens.
We continued through the street after our most enjoyable lunch, going into every souvenieur shop trying on things and looking at small artifacts, really just hanging out with our free time. There was an optional hike up the tallest hill in Athens, Mt. Lykabbetos, and so I decided that wasn’t something I wanted to miss out on. Halfway up this huge betraying hill, which did not look that tall from the hotel, I decided maybe it was something I did want to miss out on... but after an hour of hiking up, it was all worth it. The view was incredible. Although you could see the patch of gray I had initially disliked, you could also see the great ancient structures from a new perspective, as well as mountains and the ocean far away. We stayed there for a really long time, taking pictures and talking, and I took the time to write a little on my journal, wondering what it was that made this sight, as well as all the previous ones that week, so beautiful and so enchanting to all of us.

The view from Mt. Lykabbetos

Dinner that night was once again “on UD”, which was appreciated after our wallets had had to come out for lunch and were not really that eager to stay out in exchange for food for a while. It was as always perfectly coordinated, and after that we all set out to explore Athens at night. Or to go to sleep early again jaja.

The next morning we unfortunately had to leave Athens. We didn’t get the chance to see the Archeological Museum of Athens, which truly saddened Dr. Hatlie, and he told us we had to come back to Greece even if only to visit this museum. The reason was that there were major riot threats and we had to leave the city. Looking at the newspapers later that day we saw pictures of one of the most violent riots in Greece on the very plaza where we had loaded everything on our buses just hours before. So it was good that we got out of the city, even if a little earlier than unexpected. An on we made our way, in hopes of reaching Mycenae if it was not closed, before arriving at Nafplion.