ATVS on Aegina: Part 3

So, this is shaping up to be a story of many parts... time is rather limited right now because classes are wrapping up. I come home in less than 4 weeks!

When we last left off, I had just felt my phone ring. I pulled it out, and saw that I had a text message. Now, my phone here is pretty basic and it doesn't tell me things like who my missed calls or text messages are from, so all I had was a text message saying "You have one new voicemail." I didn't have very much money left on my phone (it's all pre-paid here), so I just called Aubrey since it seemed pretty unlikely that anyone else would have been calling me. She answered with a rather upset, "Where are you guys?" A brief back and forth ensued in which it turned out that they had missed the gas station and run out of gas somewhere behind us. Aubrey called me back so I'd still have a little bit of time left on my phone, and while I was waiting for her to call me back, I tried to explain what was going on to everyone else. Once we had all the details from her, we realized pretty quickly that we'd need to go back and find them and then go get some gas for the ATV. The other two pairs decided they didn't want to waste the time it would take, so it was just Matt and I who headed back to find them.

It actually didn't take us very long at all to locate Sara and Aubrey -- two girls sitting on the side of the road with an ATV wasn't hard to miss. They weren't all that thrilled with the situation, so Sara and I ended up switching places so it wouldn't be the same people stuck on the side of the road for the whole time. Sara and Matt headed off in search of the gas station and Aubrey and I settled in to make the most of our stranded time. We were very good stranded people and went through the random things we had in our wallets, did a little modeling on the ATV, and had a karaoke session with Aubrey's ipod, but the whole time we were dreading a call from Matt and Sara saying that they ran out of gas too and were stuck. At this point, we'd realized that Aubrey and I were the only one with cellphones and a good amount of cash -- Matt's stuff was with Carly, who'd left and Sara had left her phone in Athens and was having trouble with her ATM card, so they'd taken Aubrey's phone with them just in case.

Of course, as luck would have it, about 20 minutes after they had left, my phone rang again. It was Matt -- apparently they had made a wrong turn at some point and were out of gas at the top of a hill. The two of them were going to try to roll the ATV down the hill and then carry it to the gas station, so they wanted to let us know it would probably be a while longer before they got back with the gas. I hung up and relayed the story to Aubrey, and the two of us decided to gather up our stuff and start walking into the little town that was up ahead to see if we could find a gas station, since it seemed like the most logical way to solve the situation. We passed a house with an old man in the yard and attempted to use our very limited Greek to ask the way to a petrol station, but we're pretty sure we actually ended up just confusing them and ourselves, and we think they might have given us directions to a bus station. We didn't know the word for gas in Greek, so we were saying things like "For the car" and gesturing -- it was actually a pretty amusing experience in a less than ideal situation. We thanked the men and continued down the road, not really any more informed as to where a gas station might be when my phone rang again. It was Matt again, and he exclaimed "Where are you guys??" He and Sara were back at the ATV and were pretty surprised not to see us there. We turned around to head back, and as we walked, Aubrey and I commented on how quickly they made it back -- it couldn't have been more than 5 minutes since we left. It wasn't until then that it hit me that it was entirely possible that they hadn't actually run out of gas and had been playing a trick on us. From living with Dad and his jokes for 20 years, I had sort of suspected it when Matt called, but it just really didn't seem like a situation where they'd do something like that, so I figured it was true. We got back to them, and Aubrey goes, "You guys better have been telling the truth about running out of gas!" to which they both started laughing a little bit. She was furious, and I was torn between annoyance and amusement, but annoyance was definitely winning. We stalked past them, grabbing the container of gas on our way. After pouring most of the gas into the tank and some of it onto the seat, and cleaning up the spill with hand sanitizer, we got on, and Aubrey tried to start it. We were going to explore the island on our own and that was that -- who needs people who play tricks on their friends? Of course, it wouldn't start, and as we sat there, Matt and Sara were walking closer and closer. They were actually standing right next to us and going, "Guys, please forgive us, we're really sorry. We'll follow you guys for the rest of the day if you want" and Matt was saying, "At least let me start it for you and then you can storm off if you still want to" when Aubrey finally got the starter to catch. We pulled away and zoomed off down the road, leaving them standing on the side of the road fairly far from their ATV. They knew we were headed to the Temple of Aphaea and we figured they could follow us if they really wanted to be with us. We were having a great time, enjoying the sites and still fuming a little bit, when all of a sudden, it happened.

ATVs on Aegina: Part 2

So, we paired up on the ATVs and Matt and I headed off down the road in search of the hotel. Now, Aegina is a pretty small island, and the hotel was along the road on the water, so maps and navigation weren't really a problem, as long as we could remember the name of the hotel and spot the sign. We ended up going on our own, as it took a while for everyone to get the explanation of how to drive. As Matt and I were getting ready to leave, the man mentioned that there's a gas station about 4 km down the road, and that we should stop and fill up before heading out to explore the island.

Without any major mishaps, and only one dilemma about whether or not to turn, we arrived at the hotel with the other pairs close behind. Check in, changing into clothes for the weather, and getting rid of everything we didn't want to carry with us didn't take long and soon we were back outside and ready to go explore this island. Sara, Aubrey and I talked about wanting to see the Temple of Apheia while we're there, and I mentioned the gas station to them in the room. There was also talk of a beach, and we all definitely wanted some lunch -- it'd been a long morning already and we were starting to get hungry!

Back at our ATVs, we got settled, the guys handed off things they couldn't fit in their pockets to girls with bags, and we tried to figure out how the kick start works (or, those driving do so... I just sit patiently waiting, as I had no intention of driving at any point. I know it's strange, but it's really not something I miss here, I guess because I do it so rarely at home.) As each pair got started up, they headed off down the road. I assumed they'd all heard the same thing about the gas station that I had, and that we'd meet up there, so I didn't worry about it too much. Matt and I were finally ready to go, pretty close behind the other two pairs, and we figured Sara and Aubrey would be right behind us. As we were driving, I was keeping an eye out for the gas station and also trying to enjoy the beautiful scenery. This ATV thing was turning out to be a lot more fun than I expected! As we followed the road along the coast, I glanced back and realized that I couldn't see Sara and Aubrey anywhere, which was a bit strange. The next thing I know, we fly pass the gas station, and I said to Matt, "Um, the guy said we should stop and fill up on gas before going to explore." The response I got was, "Yeah, we should probably stop at the next one we see. I can't figure out if there's a gas gauge on here or not, so I've got no idea how much we have in the tank."

A few minutes later, we came to an intersection and found the other two pairs waiting for us so we could figure out which way to go. We picked a direction and I suggested that maybe we should wait for Aubrey and Sara to catch up, but the guys thought that it was just that they were going slow because Aubrey was scared and that they would be fine, so we continued onwards, when I felt my phone vibrating...

To be continued...

ATVs on Aegina

It's been quite a while since my last update, and while there are still a lot of stories I have to share, I think I'm going to skip over the last month or so to update with some more recent adventures. I spent April 19-20th on the island of Aegina, which is just an hour ferry ride from Athens. Earlier in the semester, there was a contest sponsored by Arcadia and a Greek organization known as Smile of a Child among the program participants. We raced to assemble sections of the world's largest puzzle (each was 6,000 pieces, for a total of 24,000) and the finished product was donated to Smile of a Child to be placed in one of the homes they have for needy children. It was quite an intense battle, as the prize for the first place team was a free trip to a nearby island, and in the end, my team lost by a margin of about 30 pieces. Because the finish was so close, it was decided that both the first and second place teams would win the prize, so about 20 of us headed off to Aegina.

We left pretty early in the morning to make the most of the one day we had there and enjoyed a sunny, but extremely windy ride on the roof of the ferry. Note to self: it's WINDY on the open water, especially when the boat is moving -- always wear pants and bring a sweatshirt! The view was beautiful, and if you could get past the cold, you could tell it was shaping up to be a warm late spring day, complete with blinding Greek sun. We were psyched for a day of exploring the island, seeing the ruins of an ancient temple, and hitting one of the many beaches. A brief while later, we disembarked from the ferry and I rejoiced at the fact that the wind seemed to have kept any motion sickness away. Our hotel was almost a kilometer outside of town and we had wanted to rent ATVs (aka four-wheelers) to explore the island anyway, so we decided to do that first so we could drive them to the hotel. Now, I was a bit skeptical about the whole ATV thing -- it seemed way too close to a motorcycle for my liking but after seeing them in person and realizing that traffic on the island really wasn't bad at all, I decided to listen to the part of me that was saying, "You're only going to be here as a student once -- have fun!" After a little bit of wandering and a few inquires at places that looked like they might rent them, we tracked down 4 ATVs. Aubrey and I advocated adamantly for helmets -- despite the voice telling me to stop worrying so much, there was absolutely no way I was getting on one without a helmet securely on my head, and I chose the most padded helmet I could find -- and all of us walked outside for the tutorial on how to drive, oh so fashionable helmets in hand or on head. We strapped our bags onto the racks using bungee cords, listened to the man's directions, and headed off in the direction he said would take us to our hotel and a gas station.

Next up: Do we make it to the hotel?

Two Top Ten Lists

Well, I'm almost halfway through my time here, and while this is not an update on my travels (Sparta/Mycenae/Nafplio take two, Hydra, Carnival, Athens, Rome, the strike here, and an update on classes coming shortly, I hope! Eek, that list is longer than I thought it was...), I thought I'd share with you all a few of the things I miss most from America, and that I think I'll miss from here(people excluded, of course).

Top Ten Things I Miss From America, in no particular order
1. Grocery stores (or stores in general) that are open on Sunday and holidays
2. Spices and Hot Sauce... things are improving on the spice front, but hot sauce seems to be a lost cause.
3. Watching the news (even though I never do this at home).
4. Canned beans and tofu.
5. Going home for dinner
6. Georgetown professors
7. Readily available recycling
8. Being able to read the ingredients at the grocery store
9. Reliable trash pickup, electricity, and public transportation service (more on this in the strike section)
10. Eavesdropping on conversations when out in public!

Top Ten Things I'll Miss From Greece, also in no particular order
1. Greek dairy products... mmm, yogurt and REAL feta cheese!
2. Two euro chicken "salad" sandwiches from the bakery
3. Sitting at a cafe sipping one drink for 2 hours.
4. Amazing house wines at reasonable prices
5. Going to the laiki (weekly fresh fruit and vegetable market).
6. Traveling almost every weekend to some amazing historical site.
7. Walking past Hadrian's Arch, the Temple of Zeus, the Acropolis, and the old Olympic Stadium on a regular basis.
8. Fresh baked bread from the bakery, and living on top of a Greek-style mini-mart (which means LOTS of fresh fruits and veggies, and trashbags)
9. Olive spread
10. Cheap public transportation

Hmm... lots of those are food related... guess you know where my priorities are now!

In the next week, I have a midterm, an essay, my honors thesis application, course registration, and summer internship applications due, so no promises on rapid updates. So sorry! As a teaser, Rome over Easter weekend was amazing, but VERY soggy.

Delphi (Day 3, Finally!)

Our last morning in Delphi, we decided to wake up fairly early and see the rest of the historical site, then make up our lost sleep on the bus ride back to Athens. Our first stop was the Kastelian Spring, where pilgrims used to stop to cleanse themselves before visiting the oracle. The waters are supposed to have healing powers. Frankly, it was less than impressive when we visited, partially because of the season -- we couldn't actually see any water, and partially because you can't actually get close to it due to the danger from falling rocks, and there's a big tree and a fence blocking your view. Despite my slight disappointment, I (of course) took a photo for your enjoyment. Below, what we decided was the real spring. We saw a woman filling up water bottles from it later!


Then, we made our way to the remains of the ancient gymnasium. In antiquity, a gymnasium wasn't just a place where you went to get exercise. It was also a social gather place and the site of mental training, in forms such as philosophical discussion. They often had their own baths and were really more like our conception of a villa than a gymnasium. There's not a whole lot left of the site, and it's kind of difficult to tell what was what. Since it's one of the less important sites, there's no entrance fee, and thus, very few signs explaining the site.

After wandering through the gymnasium and pausing a couple of times to contemplate its use, we made our way to the Temple of Athena, which was one of my favorite sites. It has a round tholos, and they have reconstructed a few of the pillars. The foundations of the Temple of Athena itself and other auxiliary buildings surround it. From the ground, it's quite impressive, and when you start climbing up the hill to leave the site, you get a view that gives you a good idea of how the site is laid out and what the buildings would have looked like. I found it to be a very elegant building, and of course, I loved the columns. They're just so beautiful to me!



On the way back to the hotel, we walked through the pathway next to the main site and this time, since it was only cold, not bone chillingly freezing and windy, we stopped to look at some of the artifacts along the way. My favorite was this piece of a mosaic. Having seen all of the outdoor site in Delphi (we skipped a few museums in the town), we were ready to go, but the bus wasn't for another hour or so, so we headed to yet another cafe to get a snack and while away the time. On the way back to Athens, we drove through the ski resort town of Arahova and saw this view.

The Ancient Site of Delphi and a Mini-Trip to Itea (Day 2, Part 2)

After finishing up in the museum, we headed outside to explore the ancient site. It was still pretty chilly out, but everything was so incredible that I didn't really mind the cold. My hands did get pretty cold because I'd forgotten my gloves and I was constantly taking pictures because I wanted to try to document every bit of the ruins. Seeing a photo is nothing like actually being there, but I'll do my best to describe the experience. You enter the site and follow the Sacred Way through the remains of the Treasuries. Each Greek city-state had one where they stored valuables. Most of them are in ruins (left), but they've reconstructed the Treasury of Athens as an example (below). Of course, when they do reconstructions, they only restore the stone elements, leaving off the wood-beam and tile roofs, the brightly colored paint, and all of the interior decorations. It gives you a basic idea of the form, but in reality, these reconstructions are pretty far from what the actual buildings looked like in ancient times.

We took our time making our way through the ruins and attempting to imagine what it must have been like during its prime. After weaving along the Sacred Way, we finally made it to the Temple of Apollo, where the Sybil (the Delphic Oracle) made her predictions, probably in a haze induced by gases from the ground. Her ramblings were interpreted by the priests, and the answers were rarely straightforward. Really, it's a rather cleaver approach because if you're vague enough in what you say, your predictions will always come true. My philosophy teacher likes to tell us a story about a general who went to ask for advice about whether he should go to war. The seer responded "A great empire will be defeated," which he took to mean he would be victorious in battle. However, it turned out the empire which was defeated was his, not the one he attacked. Punctuation also makes a great deal of difference in interpretation -- another of the oracles predictions read: "You will go you come not in war you will die." Depending on where you place commas and periods, this could mean either you'll die in war, or you won't, which pretty much covers the oracle from being wrong. Regardless of the validity of the predictions made in the temple, even the remains are imposing -- it's easy to see how intimidating and impressive it would have been when fully constructed. Below is the view from above -- it's much easier to get an idea of how the buildings were laid out from above than from ground level.


One of the other important ruins at the site is the outdoor theater, where performances were held as part of the Delphic festivals. Processions came from Athens to Delphi to perform these important religious rituals, and later to perform the plays of famous Greek playwrights. The roots of ancient Greek theater lie in rituals about the transformation of things rooted in the worship of the god Dionysos. We marveled at the construction (and preservation) of the theater, and were trying to figure out how we could get a picture of the three of us. There was a group of Chinese women nearby and I listened in on enough of their conversation to realize they were speaking Mandarin, so while Kelly and Aubrey were debating rotating pairs and such, I decided to put 9 years of classes to use in Greece of all places and walked up to one of them and said, "Excuse me, could you take our picture?" My grammar was a little off -- I think I said it as a statement rather than a question, but she definitely understood me. She looked up, stared at me in shock for about 20 seconds, and then said (in very good English), "You speak Chinese?!?" I said yes, and she shouted in Chinese to her friends, "She speaks very good Chinese!" and then took the picture for us. It was definitely exciting to finally get to use the Chinese that keeps popping into my head when I try to speak Greek (and not in the "I accidentally answered the question the woman in the bakery asked me in Greek in Chinese" way!)

The weather finally began to warm up as we began trekking even further uphill (the whole site is built on the side of a mountain, so as you walk through it, you're getting higher and higher, and the view becomes more and more impressive). The last site we wanted to see was the stadium. You can't enter it, but it was neat to see. The stands on one side, gates at one end, and the outer walls are fairly well preserved. After taking many pictures, and a video (hopefully I'll upload a few of my videos to youtube and post them here later, when the internet isn't abysmally slow), the three of us began making our way back down through the site. We took a slightly different route and just tried to soak it all in. We also had a bit of fun with the self-timer on our cameras, which eventually resulted in the picture below.


We made our way back towards the hotel, stopping to grab a sandwich from a cafe on the way, as we were all starving at this point. After hanging out at the hotel for a bit, we met up with Amanda, Caitlin and Katie and went searching for the bus station to buy tickets to take a daytrip to the seaside town of Itea, which we could see from our hotel balcony. We went over about an hour and a half before the bus was supposed to arrive, and the bus station was closed. Luckily, there was a very cute cafe across the street, so we settled in on their comfy couches and ordered hot drinks to try to warm up. I had a delicious (and beautiful) hot chocolate. About 10 minutes before the bus was due to arrive, we went back to the bus station. It still wasn't open, and while we were waiting a guy showed up and started banging on the doors. It turned out that his luggage was locked inside and he needed to catch the bus to Itea. He was running around trying to find someone who could let him in, and I'm not sure what ended up happening, as at this point pretty much everyone else in our 43 person group showed up to get on the bus as well. A few minutes late, the bus showed up and we piled onto it. 45 minutes later, we were deposited in Itea, where we quickly realized there is very little to do in the winter. The town was dead: hardly any stores were open, the cafes were empty, and we were all pretty glad the next bus back was in about an hour and a half. Kelly and I wandered around on our own for a bit and found a playground, and then ran into the rest of our mini-group and decided to go sit in another cafe until it was time for the bus.

Back in Delphi, we napped for a while and then headed back to the same taverna we'd been to the night before with a larger group. Another group of Arcadia kids ended up going there as well, based on our recommendation. I got the pasta Aubrey had gotten the night before, as well as the stuffed peppers, which were just as delicious the second time around. The special that night was an artichoke dish, which several of the girls ordered along with soup or an appetizer, assuming it would be side-dish sized. It turned out to be a huge portion, but it was delicious: artichoke hearts, potatoes, and carrots in a lemon, caper, and dill sauce baked in the oven. I had quite a bit of that as well, since they were having trouble finishing it. After spending a few hours stuffing ourselves there, we began to head down the steps to the hotel, but a few of us got sidetracked by a little cafe that had desserts. Three of us shared a waffle, which only came with one set of silverware -- it's hard to eat a honey-covered waffle with just a knife! There was a traditional Greek music performance going on in the restaurant which was attached to the cafe, and we could see older Greeks dancing and singing along through the door, which was very cool. After dessert, we made our way to one of the two dance clubs in Delphi, which was full of kids who seemed to be of about middle school age. There's no restrictions on who can enter a bar/club in Greece, and while the drinking age is technically 17, I've had several Greeks tell me that it's perfectly okay for children to go to the store and buy alcohol for their parents. We'd seen the kids around town and the archaeological site earlier in the day and they seemed to be on a school trip of some sort. It was definitely a bizarre experience to be out at a club and turn around to see someone who looked like they were about Lizzy's age standing behind me. After a few hours of dancing to a mixture of techno, Greek music, and American music remixed to have a techno beat, we headed back to our hotel -- thanks to the tiny size of Delphi, this took all of 2 minutes and I was soon snuggled in my bed and asleep after a very long day.

Archeological Museum at Delphi (Day 2, Part 1)

The next morning we awoke to the same windy, cold, and dreary weather as the day before. Undeterred and determined to make the most of our time in Delphi regardless of the weather, we began the walk to the ancient site. It's located about 10 minutes outside the modern town. Along the way, we passed a statue and flags -- we think they're the flags of all the nations that helped excavate the site. As you can see in the photo, it was really a pretty stormy day.

Freezing cold, we arrived at the site and decided to tackle the museum first, in hopes that it would warm up at least a little bit as the day went on. We walked up to the ticket window and handed the woman our Arcadia IDs. She asked us where we studied, and we did our best to answer her in Greek. Apparently, the combination of the IDs and our speaking Greek to her did the trick, and she let us in for free! Hurray for being an "EU" student! The museum had some amazing artifacts, although it was a bit difficult to fully appreciate them with groups of high school students from assorted countries streaming through the rooms on a regular basis. A few adult tour groups came through as well, but while they still took up space, they weren't as loud as the kids. It makes me feel a bit old to be writing this, but the whole experience made me begin to understand why adults so often look at middle and high school students (and even college kids sometimes) with a little bit of frustration. I saw one kid (part of the American group) reach out his hand and drag it along one of the friezes on the wall, and there were more flash photographs taken by that group than by any other group that came through. Apart from the tour groups though, the museum was absolutely stunning. One of my favorite pieces was a small "column" that had three female figures supporting it -- it reminded me of Jenny and Lizzy.

It was really interesting to see how the artistic style evolved over time, starting from a very stiff Egyptian style that included a sculpted sphinx into the flowing style that we associate with Greek sculpture most of the time. I can't possibly do justice to the collection in the museum here, but for me the highlights included a plate with a harpist on it, a small bronze statue of a piper, an incredible realistic bronze foot, the column of the dancers, the charioteer -- one of the best preserved bronze statues from antiquity, and the remains of ivory and gold statues of Apollo and Artemis which were damaged by fire and buried in a large pit. Below are pictures of these in order. The pictures really don't do them justice, as goes for my pictures of the site. All I can say is if you ever have the chance to go to Delphi, don't think twice about it. It is truly an incredible place to visit.