A Few Days of Excitement Later...

So. I am alive - I just got a little lazy, as was bound to happen eventually. Sunday involved homework and little else (this is, apparently, an Academic Program), but Monday was much busier. Classes were fine - Modern Greek in particular is clipping along fantastically! - and I've been carrying my camera around to catch all the little moments of Athens that exist between my apartment and the Academic Center.


These two street musicians thought my camera was pretty funny. They were very sweet to stop while I fumbled in my bag for it, and they laughed a bit at my broken Greek. Very typical of how people have been reacting. :)

Monday ended in a CYA-sponsored Garden Party at the Program President's house (read "manor"). The ambiance was lovely and it was admittedly fun to dress up and eat a good dinner with friends (also, the President's wife was hysterically funny), but nobody really wanted to be there because we'd all had exhausting weekends and needed to do homework. When it hit 10:30 (and we'd been there for 3 hours) a couple girls started walking back to the buses, just to see if they were there, which created an unanticipated mad rush to the exit. The President had to fight his way through the crowd to say goodbye to us. We felt really bad when we realized that it hadn't actually been time to leave at all, but I partly blame CYA for giving us loads of work and then taking away the only time in which we have to do it. Still, no lasting harm seems to have been done.

I had to wake up early this (Tuesday) morning to go to a mass hospital visit at 9 am. This had been pre-scheduled for all students with the old visa (the Greek government is in the process of changing their visas right now, so some students got 4 month, multiple entrance visas, and others got 90-day, single entrance visas. Those of the latter sort - of which I am one - need to get tested for TB, have a chest x-ray, pay 160€, and all around jump through hoops to get a visa extension. CYA isn't covering the extra cost for those of us whose consulates had not changed over yet. Needless to say, I'm not pleased about the situation.)

Anyway, I had to visit the local English-friendly hospital with another group of students this morning to have the TB test and x-ray. The walk was very pleasant (though early and rather long), and was uneventful until I was about 5 minutes away from my destination. I had been smiling and singing as I walked and one elderly woman in a habit saw my smile and hurried over, muttering in Greek. I've already been asked for directions twice, so I thought she might be going to say something like this, or ask what I was singing or who I was, so I started running through all my Greek in my head, ready for a response. I could hardly hear her for the traffic beside us (those motorbikes are LOUD!) and I didn't catch a word she said. I told her (in Greek, ha ha!) that I didn't understand, but knew English. She replied "English? Ah, πως σε λενε;" and trailed off into Greek again. She pulled me over muttering all the time and took my map from me and starting pointing and jabbering (I couldn't catch a word), all while I tried telling her "I know where I am. I know where I'm going. I'm almost there." Eventually, she pulled over a middle aged man and must have explained to him how dreadfully lost I was and how worthless my map looked, because he started jabbering away in Greek pointing at the map, too! I managed to tell him I spoke English and knew my way. He sighed, winked and started leading the woman along her way. They both waved as I kept walking. In New York, I would have thought I was being swindled. In Athens, I think that woman just really wanted to help someone with something. I almost wish I'd needed it.

The hospital itself was uneventful if time consuming. I knew I'd have to miss a class for the visit (I have to miss the same one tomorrow for the TB follow-up, which is the really annoying part they don't tell you about beforehand), but I didn't realize I'd be standing there for almost two hours waiting for them to call for "Marha Mishil". Everything turned out fine, and I even had time afterward to find my way to the Athens Cultural Center and get tickets for Euripides' Trojan Women at the Dora Stratou Theater (it's tomorrow night, so more on that soon!). After that, I walked back to the apartment via the National Gardens (since the most direct route back was straight through) and luckily had my camera for a few cool shots:





Statues and ruins everywhere make Mattie a very happy classicist. Back from that, there was more class and now there is more homework. Tomorrow holds promise with a Modern Greek Quiz, some Traditional Greek Dance lessons and Trojan Women all in one day. Hopefully I'll be awake enough to update right after I get back. For now, Thucydides calls in a rather persistent (and unending) voice - déjà vu.

Also - Biology and Herbology People - can anyone tell me what sort of flower this is? They're everywhere right now, in various pinks and whites, and they're so lovely! Unlike most flowers I've seen, when these wilt they don't turn brown. Instead they wrinkle into a tube and turn periwinkle and lilac. I've never seen a wilting flower so beautiful!


Kαληνύχτα!