Another Weekend in Athens

A surprising amount has happened since I got back from Santorini. When everything re-opened on Friday after National Resistance Day, we all went to the Open Market to stock up on food for the week. It feels really nice to be cooking for myself again, rather than eating out all the time. However, I didn't buy nearly enough as I'm already running low on a lot. There will be a lot of creativity in the dinner department this week.

That afternoon, I went back to the National Archaeological Museum to fully explore the vase collection on the second floor. When you think of Ancient Greek vases, one particular form usually comes to mind - the black figures on a red clay pot. This is, of course, a very common form of pottery, but it's certainly not the only one. This was the first time I had ever seen such a wide range of pottery in one condensed location, and it put the scope of ancient pottery in a lot of perspective.

The Geometric styles of the earliest pottery is much more beautiful in person than in pictures as in the pictures it just looks like an overwhelming amount of design that doesn't fit together on a pot. In life, you are forced to look at the details one at a time and the geometry tells stories in and of itself. It's much easier to portray huge ships and immense armies on a pot where everything is tiny and repeated. Some of those designs look like epic battles straight from Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings movies.

As the Geometric style progressed, the figures began overtaking the repeated patterns, which begin to form a sort of border for various scenes. They also got more abstract, and you can tell that the artists were starting to have fun with their work, sometimes mimicking the pot's shape with the design on it, and sometimes anthropomorphizing their work.

Hello!

How are you today?

I don't recall if there was a purpose to this practice or not, beyond artistic expression (I know Professor McGowan told us this in Ancient Greek Art and Myth, but I can't remember!) but it's very funny to look at, and the faces instill an oddly natural happiness when you look at them. I can't tell you how many disaffected tourists smiled at these in the museum. 

Before going any further into Archaic and Classical pottery, which is the style of figures on either black or red clay that most people are so familiar with, I cam across something that I never expected to see.

Wood.

Real ancient pieces of wood with the paint still on them that had not decomposed since they were created in 540-530 b.c. I have no idea how that happened (the plaque didn't say) but they were still so beautiful after so long, and it amazed me that they are in such great condition!

Back to pottery, this plate of Herakles and Athena, which I love for its tenderness, is much more typical of many people's idea of Greek pottery. Look at the amazing detail in their hair and clothing, though. I cant imagine holding my hand stead enough to draw that in paint or etch it in clay.

Two lovers. This seemed, to me at least - based on what I was seeing elsewhere in the museum, to be unusual subject matter. The pose, the expression and the melding of the two figures into one with the drapery of their garments is all superbly executed, though. The ancient artists were much more prone to experimentation than I ever believed or understood.

A lengthwise view of one sculpture hall in the museum. There are about 20 of these on the first floor alone. This place is HUGE.

Young boy on a horse in bronze, with scale models. It's the largest piece in the museum that I had no previous knowledge of. The craftsmanship (not to mention the level of preservation) is astounding!

Friday night was the JF's birthday. her parents and brother were in town to see her and they took a large group of us out to dinner. It was quite fun, even though we didn't go to the Japanese restaurant for sushi like we had planned (JF is a bit tired of Mediterranean cuisine). We went to Applebee's instead. Rest assured my non-existent craving for American food over Greek food is still non-existent. Still, it was a fun and lovely night. 

Saturday morning I woke up to do laundry and spent most of the day planning out the Thanksgiving trip to Italy. Everything is set except for a place to stay in Milan (anyone have suggestions? Put them in the comments!) I'm pretty excited about that! I woke up far too late to go take sunrise pictures on the Acropolis and thus have missed my daylight-savings-time window. I'll just have to try again near the end of the semester when the sun is rising at 7:30 again. 

Saturday night, when I finally left the apartment, I went to the Greek National Opera to try to get rush tickets to Marathon-Salamis. I haven't seen much opera, but of those I have seen, I decided that understanding the words wasn't a high priority for overall enjoyment. I would have had no trouble getting a seat, but I got especially lucky in that, while waiting for the student rush line to open, an older woman walked up to me and gave me a ticket that she wasn't using, then left before I could do more than thank her. Pity, as I would have loved to give her something in return. It was an 8th row orchestra seat, so it probably cost her about 70€. 

The opera itself was phenomenal. I had googled the synopsis before going and found that I didn't need to know the individual lines beyond that at all. The singing was fabulous, the costumes were incredible and the set was overwhelming. It was very freeing not to have to pay attention to the words (in Italian with Greek subtitles) and just concentrate on the stage itself. There was an especially powerful moment in the third act where the main characters all traveled to Delphi to receive the famous oracle on how Athens could defeat the invading Persians ("Put your faith in your wooden walls" ie. ships). They recreated onstage what I believe to have been the creation of the Delphic oracle and the relationship between the god Apollo and the first Pythia who prophesied for him. The ballet at that point was mind-blowing. 

As an extra surprise, after leaving the opera, there was a group of accordion players just outside looking to catch generous, music-loving patrons. They did catch quite a few and some people leaving the opera joined in the song and dance with them. The whole scenario felt straight out of a movie and I couldn't stop smiling all the way home.

The four main accordion players

And from the back, trying not to be too obvious with my flash. They were quite friendly about the pictures.

I got back to the apartment around 11:30 to the great surprise of my apartment mates watching "Hocus Pocus" (with Bette Midler and Sarah Jessica Parker) while eating popcorn and homemade rice krispies. So I got to join in the last 20 minutes of that as well. M has a guest who she was showing around the town, and K's mom came in this morning right after I woke up (again, very late).

I have to go back to classes tomorrow, which will be good in that it will get me back on a regular schedule, but I will miss the freedom and exploration of these last two weeks. Also, I'm going to miss the lack of homework. Still, the semester must move on and Italy and London draw ever closer.

Happy Halloween from a country where the holiday isn't celebrated (though I'll bet All Saints day will be) and Καλημέρα!

Santorini... Sort of

So, Santorini. Santorini, in a very few words, was beautiful, exotic and touristy. The problem with the first two was that the weather only held out for a little while, and the problem with the second was that tourist season in Greece is basically over, so all of the tourist hot-spots, especially those that are a little out of the way (like Santorini) are basically shutting down. There was nothing to do.

That isn't to say that we didn't enjoy ourselves! It was a lovely trip and the island is impeccably gorgeous (where the inhabitants keep it that way for the tourists at any rate.) In reality, no human beings were ever meant to live on the hunk of rock that is Santorini, which has no discernible sources of food or drinking water. They manage by shipping in supplies with the tourist that feed their economy. This means that all food and water is dead cheap, but all housing, souvenirs and travel is through-the-roof expensive. A donkey ride up the steps was twice the price of a full meal. Needless to say we didn't take them up on that "offer".

All this meant was that our three day trip got cut a little short, but in the time we spent on the island, we explored everything that three museum-weary people could find on Santorini. And now, a chronology with pictures:

Monday morning M, G and I woke up at 5:00 am to race down to the port and catch our boat. Having only been in Athens about 12 hours since getting back from the Peloponnese, this was no easy task, but we managed with all the courage of the legendary heroes of old and made it onto the boat with time to spare. Once we got there...

...things got a lot less exciting very quickly. Having lost my companions, and unable to follow their lead, I set out to explore for the next eight hours.

The stunning sunrise over Athens' port of Piraeus.

The boat's first stop at Paros. We roused ourselves long enough to sneak into the more comfortable seating left by those who departed here.

We passed hundreds of tiny islands, some of which looked fully occupied, some completely deserted, and some which had only a large, blue-domed church at their peak. This was (unfortunately) the prettiest day of the trip.

Our second stop, at the island of Naxos. This was as close as we got.

And finally lovely Santorini.

We arrived around 3:30, and the very kind hotel owner picked us up right away from the port (which was about a 15-minute drive up and around the mountain) and took us to the hotel. We set out things down, walked around Thira, which is the main city atop Santorini, where almost all of the shopping, restaurants and lodging around Santorini is. After a full day on the ferry, and a week of travel previously, we were too tired to do much and settled for finding a quick dinner, planning for tomorrow and turning in early. Very early. 

The next day, we woke up as early as we had gone to bed, cleaned up and departed for one of the beautiful black beaches on the island, Kamari. Kamari beach is formed from volcanic ash and lava rocks. It looks like a complete inverse of any kind of beach we have on the Gulf Coast back home. I had thought that "black sand" would look like "dirty sand", and prepared myself to be unimpressed after having grown up by the shores at Destin.

Consider me dead wrong.

The beach was gorgeous, with the rocks jutting improbably all around and within it. The ash-sand turned from hard rocks to soft ash that didn't burn your feet like the gulf white sands and again into smooth stone polished by the beautiful Aegean. Mountains and trees surround the area, and it feels more like you leave a small mountain village and come to a stream until you see the water stretch forever in front of you.

I could hardly believe how lovely it was. The rocks were slippery and the tide was rising as we were there, but it was all the more beautiful for that. That's me on the rocks, by the way.

M and G resting on the shore, enjoying the view. We stayed there most of the morning and decided to push our trip to the other side of the island until later and eat lunch in Kamari.

Lunch in Kamari, plus G waiting impatiently for hers. That is a cinnamon-sugar crepe with whipped cream. It was phenomenal.

After a lunch that consisted mainly of dessert, we headed back to Thira for a little while. This was when we decided to cut the trip a little short (since we had already done half of the island*). We were also realizing that we were all a little short on cash after the Peloponnese trip. So we spent a bit more time lounging around Thira, then took the bus up to Ia.

Ia is that part of Santorini that all the postcards come from. It looks constructed purely for beauty and flows along the mountainside like a child poured it there from their toy box. The layout reminded me again and again of something out of Dr. Seuss (in the best possible way) or maybe Alice in Wonderland when she first looks through the keyhole of that tiny door. Curiouser and curiouser.

Looking down one of the many winding staircases in Ia onto a restaurant patio.

And down another private staircase. You can see how the colors outline everything and even the stairs curve to fit the mountain.

The other thing that Ia is famous for (along with many other Greek Island areas) the domed churches.

A cute restaurant sign. I love the attention to detail that the antennae are a fork and spoon. Mom, this one's for you!

My favorite staircase. :-)

The bells of one particularly old and lovely church.

The famous windmills on the island.

Another lovely staircase with the picturesque flower and white and blue paint that so embodies the island.

The church on every postcard. It is very lovely, though. 

The sunset on Ia is supposed to be the most beautiful in the world. Unfortunately, Tuesday night is when the bad weather started rolling in, and the clouds completely obscured the sky by the time the sun hit the horizon. We will have to try again someday. So we went back to Thira, grabbed dinner quickly, and once again turned in much early than we had planned. 

Wednesday morning was brutal. M tried to go running outside around 9:00 am, but was forced back inside, less from the rain and more from the sheer force of wind. It makes sense as were were basically out to sea on a mountain-top, but it was completely unexpected. After making sure the ferry would run and waiting for the weather to die down a bit, we set out to walk the steps down to the old port of Thira and see the donkeys. As already stated, we didn't ride them. I don't have many pictures, because the weather was still gray and drizzly and the stairs were not terribly picturesque, being covered in wet donkey and wet donkey droppings. But we braved the steps both down to and back up from the port and felt very good about ourselves afterwords anyway. We window shopped a bit, got lunch and bread and fruit for the boat, then drove back down to the port and got on. The boat ride back looked a lot like the boat ride there, with the exceptions that the water was much rougher and we stole nicer seats much quicker than we had before. I also had purchased a deck of cards as a souvenir on Thira - but not any deck of cards. A deck of racy ancient Greek vase-paintings cards. We played gin with them most of the way back to stares and judgment of those around us. It was completely worth it, although when G fell asleep, I admit to having played the most uncomfortable game of solitaire that I will probably ever encounter.

We had a small scare where we almost missed the metro and bus back to our apartment, but that turned out fine, and we all three walked in very happy to be home. We changed and checked our e-mail and to our shock, not five minutes later, SE walked in, back home early just like us! We exchanged hugs and stories, and I fell straight to sleep again.

Today was Greek National Resistance day (also known in Greek as Όχι day) when the Greeks celebrate their WWII refusal to allow Axis forces to enter their country in strategic locations and were promptly attacked. To the average American student, this means that every shop, office, and means of public transportation is down. So we sat in the apartment today eating what food we have. K is supposed to arrive back tonight as well, but so far no sign of her, and we're all beginning to think we are mis-remembering her schedule. Still, happy to be back in Athens and definitely feeling that this city is home. Tomorrow, I'm going back to the National Museum to explore the second floor more thoroughly and I'm going to try to get into the Opera. Who knows? It's always an exciting day in Αθήνα!

Καληνύχτα! 

Peloponnesus Days # 4, 5 and 6: Olympia and Delphi

The last two days the hotels both charged for their internet usage, so I decided to explore the towns instead of using my last bit of money to sit inside blogging.

So, Friday morning, far too early, we got on the bus and left Sparta for Olympia. The bus ride was much longer than anyone really expected, and we ended up getting to Olympia too late to do both the museum and the site in the same day, which pushed our schedule back a little bit for the rest of our time in the Peloponnese. I wasn't thrilled, as two full days in Delphi had been a very exciting prospect, but as it turned out, I wouldn't have spent a minute less in Olympia, so no worries.

The Bus ride took us over these mountains and gave some rather spectacular views when the rocking motion didn't want to make us close our eyes from fear and/or hypnosis.

Our quaint "rest stop" along the way. Not your typical tour bus pit stop. :-)

The spring where we all filled our water bottles. Also, the best water I've had in Greece yet!

 First view of the site of Ancient Olympia. The columns have been stood back up, but almost none of that is reconstructed stone work. Truly incredible!

For those who don't know: Olympia is the original site of the Pan-Hellenic Olympic Games, beginning in 776 b.c. This means gymnasiums (pictured above), temples (pictured below), stadiums (pictured far below) and lots and lots of treasuries and offerings from all over the Ancient Aegean world, including Grecian colonies in other areas of the world. The site is huge and splendid in every way, and we didn't being to cover it in the three hours we spent there.

Frontal view of what remains of the Temple to Olympian Zeus, plus reconstructed full-scale column and scale tourist (you can just see him in white on the left side of the picture if you squint.)

JK sizing up one of the column pieces from the original temple. That is a mid-size cross section of one enormous column. Many laying around us were even larger.

Across the way from the temple to Zeus was a temple to Hera, his wife. It was a little smaller, of course, but still very prominent. 

We actually were able to go a little inside of the temple to Hera and look around a bit at what the inner structure of an ancient temple might be (sans grass, of course).

This round structure (only part of which is re-stood-up here) is called a Tholos (which is Greek for "round thing"). No one knows what they were used for, but they seem to crop all over in the darnedest places. They're usually called "religious" and left at that.

The grand entrance to the Olympic Stadium. Even in 400 b.c. everyone's trying to out-do each other for showiness at the Olympic Games.

And the Stadium itself. We held a race where we all had to run barefoot across the stadium and back, just as they did in ancient times. Surprisingly, the guards were fine with this (apparently it's bad form to preform in a theater, but isn't to run on a track. Oh well.) The stadium is about 191.7 meters long, so I was a bit winded after that sprint, but I was proud not to come in last. 

We stayed in Olympia that night without much event or ado, got up early again and went to the Museum attached to the site on Saturday morning. The museum was fantastic, containing, very much intact, the friezes and pediments from the original temple of Zeus as well as some lovely roman sculptures, a great bronze collection and the famous statue of Hermes standing with the baby Dionysus on his arm (no picture because there were already quite enough in this post!) It was a lovely walk through and I would have liked more time there, but I guess I just have to go back later. 

After racing out of the museum around noon, we all grabbed our lunches in a little town called Nafpaktos on the way to Delphi. Nafpaktos, as far as I could tell is a town on the water that makes most of it's money trapping tourists with it's picturesque beach-front tavernas as they make their way toward Delphi. There is one main street and beyond that it gets a little run-down and shabby. There was also a creepy looking state-fair sort of attraction being set up, which did not help the general atmosphere. I was too busy thinking about Delphi to pay too much attention to the town, anyway.

We got to Delphi just in time to do a small portion of the site (which is so large that is divided into an upper and lower section anyway) and to have dinner before checking into the hotel.

The Tholos structure at Delphi. No one knows what this was used for either.

View overlooking the remains of two temples and a treasury, looking back on the Tholos.

I had a quick dinner that night and proceeded to walk around the town essentially on my own. The "towns" at these sites (with the huge exception of Sparta) all tend to be little tourist traps with hotels, shops and tavernas, and no real sign of the people who live there. Delphi, unfortunately, was no exception to this, but I did go into one store (and spent about an hour there) where the man running the shop was very surprised to find I knew a little Greek. He had the most lovely chess sets, which I would have gladly bought could I explain the 75€ to myself and figure out how to get one home, but we got to talking over the items (in Greek, whenever I could) and then about family life and what I was doing in Greece. He wanted to invite me to dinner, and was very sad that I had already eaten. I got to meet his precious daughter, Eirene (which means "Peace" at least in Ancient Greek), and we listened to Leonard Skynard and Johnny Cash in his shop together. His colleague also dropped by the store for a while and they explained their mission to find the Nymphs, Druids and Fairies on top of Mount Parnassos (the great mountain that Delphi is founded on top of), and showed me pictures of what I think were fireflies inside the caverns. It was fun to talk to them at least, and the colleague told me that I had a very positive aura and was no ordinary tourist. That made me feel good, even if it was a sales pitch, which I'm not sure of even now. 

Sunday morning was another early one, but with good reason. We had to complete the Delphi Museum and most of the site by about noon. The museum was fine, though nothing spectacular with a few exceptions of a Sphinx that stood about 8 ft tall, two very famous Kouros (young male nude) statues, and the friezes and pediments from around the temple of Apollo and the Athenian treasury. It was fun, but I'm glad for the sake of seeing the actual site that we only spent about an hour inside. 

Then there was Delphi.

For those who don't know, Delphi is the site of the most famous Oracles and Prophecies of the ancient world. People from all over Greece, the Byzantines, Italy, Egypt and as far as Asia and - I think - Gaul came to visit this Oracle for advice. It was said to be founded by Apollo himself, who was a god of prophecy among many other things, and a Pythia (a very special priestess) was chosen to sit on the tripod and receive Apollo's messages of the future. She would go into a trance (possibly induced by chemical vapors rumored to be on the site) and speak in tongues, which would then be translated by the surrounding priests into a prophecy in hexameter verse. Welcome to the ancient version of rock-paper-scissors. It also held athletic games similar in scale to the Olympic games every four years and was one of the best known sites of the Ancient world, often called the naval of the world in it's heyday.

First view going up the mountain. This site is immense!

Picture of the Athenian Treasury along the way up. This is a reconstruction, but from what I understand they had a fair bit left to work with while reconstructing the site.

The enormous altar of Apollo, with JK standing in for scale. It was less massive from the other side, but still looked more like a defensive wall than an altar.

 A special secret tunnel one level below the temple. No one really knows it's purpose (though it was probably something to do with the smoke or general mysticism of the Oracle). When we passed by there was no guard and no rope, so our professor encouraged us to go through which I did (twice). It was actually quite a mystical experience as, even though it is a short tunnel, the structure of it is such that there is a point with no light whatsoever. A priest/ess or messenger might feel truly connected to the god at such a moment, so we felt it might serve as a right of passage of sorts as well. The second time I went through, a guard very politely asked me to get out. I was disappointed, as the site still wasn't roped off, but I understand why they don't encourage people going through. 

 

The other entrance/exit of the tunnel. There is a third, but I don't seem to have snapped a shot of it. (I am told by a roommate that she got a picture of me exiting the tunnel, which I will steal from her in due time.) 

A small view of the site from within the tunnel. It's pretty cramped in there, but it's fun to crawl through. Reminds me of an ancient Discovery Zone or McD's Playplace of sorts. 

The immense temple of Apollo to go with his enormous altar. The ramp is still in just gorgeous condition.

Ariel view of the temple and its inner structure. This thing is so big. I cannot stress that enough. It's a fair minute-long walk to pass by it lengthwise.

The theater at Delphi, which is less impressive than that at Epidaurus, but still quite nice.

Some remaining column pieces at the far end of the site. We all got to explore on our own for about an hour between the lecture and time to leave. I was extremely grateful for that.

Looking along a drain pipe back towards the main site and JK, ES and LV from my group. Isn't the scenery overwhelming? It's hard to pay attention to the little ruins with the giant mountains sitting there.

Looking down on the Athenian treasury and surrounding ruins from the temple level.

We left Delphi around 12:30 and stopped for Lunch just a short while later in Arachova, which is another town which seems to make most of it's money from tourism. It did seem like more of a town existed that was readily available to tourists, however, which was a refreshing change, especially getting ready to come back to Athens, even for a little while, where tourism is only the norm in the summer.

Arachova from across a valley. We ended up picnicking, as we did for lunch most days.

We returned to Athens about 5:00pm (around 4 hours ago now) and I am very ready for bed. M, G and I are all going to Santorini tomorrow morning, and our boat leaves at 7:25, meaning we have to be at the port at 6:15, so we have to leave the apartment around 5:30 at the latest, so we have to be up by... by... early... *sigh*. I'd best go to bed now. I do not know at all whether or not our hotel/hostel will have internet, and may decide against bringing my computer entirely. We shall see. There will be pictures Friday at the latest.

I hope you all have enjoyed your virtual tour of the Peloponnese. Please gather all of your thoughts and exit the web-page carefully. Thank you again and Καληνύχτα!