All we are saying, is give Greece a chance

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  Athens, Greece
Thursday, October 2, 2008

All we are saying, is give Greece a chance



Athens and I made up. We're not exactly friends, but we're not enemies
anymore, either. I've agreed to put my map away a little more often and just
wander, and it's agreed to be slightly less daunting and confusing.
This however does NOT apply to the people of Athens. Thanks to them, I
have become an expert shover and cut-in-line-er. Here, it's not "First
come, first served"; It's "hardest shove, first served." If you leave
one inch between you and the person in front of you in any line, this
is a direct invitation to another Athenian to step right in

Acropolis Rules

. "Mind the
Gap" at the metro station basically means, "Someone's going to push you
into the gap, so be ready to jump." I can proudly say that I have not missed one bus or metro yet due to being shoved (although the door did close on me one time).



I perked myself up on Monday (or was it Tuesday? I have no idea
anymore) by getting laundry done! What a luxury. It cost me 10 euros
for one load, but whatever. It's done. Since I was stuck dowtown
waiting for it, I took advantage. I strolled Plaka, the upmarket
shopping street (kind of a cross between Ste-Catherine, St-Denis,
St-Laurent and Crescent St in Montreal), feeling left out by all the
glam shoppers and cafe-goers. Felt good to see familiar stores though
(4 Zaras on one street!)...and...Starbucks!

Dionisyos Theatre

! I bought the biggest vat
of latte I could get my hands on. I think it was about 300 euros. Worth
every cent. Coconut seems to be big here for some reason (do they grow
coconuts in Athens? Is this a big export?) and I'm addicted to these
sticks of chewy coconut rolled in...well, coconut.  Just what I needed, to supplement all the pastries and fried things (and I thought Greek food was all about fish and grilled veggies?? Haven't seen either one yet).



I trekked up to the Acropolis late in the day when the tour bus crowds
were gone. It was a bit hard to process it all, to be honest. Here I
was, looking at a building (Parthenon) that I'd seen a million times
before in photos. But, in person. And with a lot more scaffolding and
construction equipment around it

Forget the name of this temple....

. What I truly felt I was observing was
man's desperate struggle to hang on to the past. There is barely
anything left of the original Parthenon. No paint, no ornamentation;
just some ancient crumbling marble shored up with new marble, wood,
cement, metal girders...every present-day material and tool man can
possibly employ to try to salvage this historical monument and keep it
from crumbling to the ground in a cloud of dust. I couldn't hear myself think from all the noise of the saws, cranes, trucks, and workers. I wonder what we are
truly holding on to? (I took a few touristy photos anyway and got into
a bit of trouble with security over the travel gnome. Oops.)



I found it more fascinating to move about the thousands of scattered
and forgotten bits of marble and stone lying everywhere around the site
that everyone else seemed to completely ignore

He's such a tourist

. Sections of columns
with inscriptions, blocks of marble with incredible carvings, reliefs,
filligrees, all just lying there, available to the touch. Someone's
labour of love from eons past, discarded and stepped over countless
times every day. This to me was the true work of art to behold.



The Theatre of Dionisyos (sp) was also very cool, mainly because I
could actually sit in it, on the very seats that they sat on, and
imagine a tragedy or comedy unfolding before me on the still-existing
mosaik marble floor. I think when it comes to monuments and such, I
need to touch them in order to truly connect with them (you can't get
to within 50 feet of the Parthenon).



It WAS refreshing to find one place on my travels that was
graffiti-free

It's all in the details

. One thing many countries seem to have in common is that
there is a generation who feels the need to leave their "tag" on
something public. Two-thousand-year-old cistern wall? That'll do.



While Croatia was a massively social phase for me, Greece so far is
proving to be very solitary. I am still jarred by the appearance and
disappearance of people in and out of my life as I travel. Like so much
buckshot we are packed in together for a brief time, feeding off one
another's energy....only to be blasted off in a thousand different
directions, all with our own targets. Then I am alone again, with only
the thoughts in my head, my tongue silent.



I have met but a handful of solo travellers so far on this adventure,
and only one female (Shannon from California)

Just some rocks...

. So far, nobody I have
met is travelling for longer than 4-6 weeks, except for Javier, but
he's a legend in his own right anyway (he LITERALLY had planned
NOTHING, and was travelling with the wind from day to day). I guess it
makes sense, as most people have jobs/school/homes/lives to get back
to.



And I just keep moving on.

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Lost City	Ok ok I did it!!	Outer wall of the Acropolis	Table for one
Temple Girls

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