If you haven’t read the first post in this Grecian journal, please look below and do so before continuing with this one. I’ll wait.
Wednesday night we went to a local taberna (tavern) for dinner and there were traditional Greek dancers and music. They had some pretty good moves. I was not able to show them my stuff however… I didn’t want to show them up.
Thursday: we went to Corinth. On the way we stopped at the canal between the mainland and the peninsula Corinth is on. The canal was very deep and boats and ships pay between 50 and 3000 euro to pass through, usually pulled by a tugboat. There was a bungee-jumping site as well! When you see how high above the water the bridge is, you’ll understand why they allow jumping there! We also had a spitting contest, and I counted that it took about 15 full seconds for my spit to hit the water. Then we went on to the ruins of ancient Corinth, where paul visited and stood before the court and was allowed to go free. The found objects were just amazing and I can’t wait to show the pictures of the jewelry and the tweezers! There were also clearly visible footprints of the buildings and several tombs. We had a lovely lunch by the Aegean Sea which is, according to our greek tour guide Lula, a gorgeous shade of “turkwahs”. We again spent the night in Athens.
I have taken to noticing the symbols on the doors of each WC we have visited – each lady is dressed quite fancily and carry some beautiful accessories like a parasol and a lovely hat. I have taken some excellent photos of these signs and look forward to sharing them when I get back.
***this post is very long… if you’re busy you might want to print it out and save it for later***
Friday morning we got on the road to Thessaloniki very early – 6:00a.m. (11:00 p.m. Est, you all were just hitting the hay). On the way we were fortunate enough to visit the tomb of Phillip II, king of Macedonia and father of Alexander the Great. You will not believe the condition in which this tomb and its contents has survived the millennia – it was only discovered in 1976. The gold and silver it contained was pretty impressive. We were not allowed to take photos in this place. Some fabric wrapped around the ashes of Phillip’s wife-to-be was there too- purple and gold. We spent the night in Thessaloniki after touring the city in the bus. Our hotel was excellent – it looked like they left the roof open and shook an IKEA store into all the rooms. Cute stuff. About 8 of us stayed up to 12 a.m. drinking Macedonian wine (only 2 small glasses for me, thanks) and doing our very best celebrity impressions. For those of you who understand, I’m saving my “Elaine” for another night.
This morning, my roommate Enuma and I woke with a start at 7:25. We did not receive our 6:00 a.m. wake up call! We quickly showered, our nice friend Lindsay (the roommate of the girl I met at the theater – see previous posts for that story) realized that we weren’t at breakfast, so after she made sure we were up, grabbed some rolls, apples and dried apricots for us to eat on the way from Thessaloniki to Amphipolis, the site of an ancient church dating back to Paul’s visit to the area in 49 A.D. There was a small museum there where we saw more artifacts from the early Christian and Byzantine eras, some cool jewelry and a neat example of a comb. Our drive continued after lunch and we stopped quickly for pictures at Kavala, formerly Christopolis, formerly Neopolis, where Paul arrived in Greece from an island in the Aegean having come from Syria. Our bus driver Dimitris expertly navigated narrow and winding streets with this behemoth bus we are in. Then we continued on to Philippi where Paul baptized Lydia, the first Christian in Greece, commanded the demon to leave the fortune-teller and was imprisoned. The site believed to be his prison was accessible to us, as was the rest of the city ruins. More than once have we marveled at the fact that we can just freely walk around these places (Corinth included) and sit on the marble, stand in the place where Paul faced the Magistrate and hop all over fallen columns. We were able to make a quick stop at the riverside where it’s believed that Lydia and her family were baptized by Paul (as well as the jailer and his family). I dipped by hands in that cold water, and then one of the little boys traveling with us fell mostly in!
I’m typing this on a friend’s laptop while we’re driving to Larissa to spend the night. I will hopefully post this tonight, (Saturday) but may not be able to until tomorrow when we return to Athens to the same hotel we stayed at the first three nights. Monday morning we’ll go to the airport at 8:30 a.m. for our 12:00 flight to New York. I’ll have a 4 hour layover and will be in St. Pete (if all goes well) by 11:20 p.m. est. Timon, Henry, and Chad will have completely cleaned the house and have a hot meal prepared for me (like a nice turkey burger or something).
Thank you for sticking with me for this very long post – as a reward to the faithful few who made it to the end, I give you this: Ef Karistopoli! (thank you very much)
Wednesday night we went to a local taberna (tavern) for dinner and there were traditional Greek dancers and music. They had some pretty good moves. I was not able to show them my stuff however… I didn’t want to show them up.
Thursday: we went to Corinth. On the way we stopped at the canal between the mainland and the peninsula Corinth is on. The canal was very deep and boats and ships pay between 50 and 3000 euro to pass through, usually pulled by a tugboat. There was a bungee-jumping site as well! When you see how high above the water the bridge is, you’ll understand why they allow jumping there! We also had a spitting contest, and I counted that it took about 15 full seconds for my spit to hit the water. Then we went on to the ruins of ancient Corinth, where paul visited and stood before the court and was allowed to go free. The found objects were just amazing and I can’t wait to show the pictures of the jewelry and the tweezers! There were also clearly visible footprints of the buildings and several tombs. We had a lovely lunch by the Aegean Sea which is, according to our greek tour guide Lula, a gorgeous shade of “turkwahs”. We again spent the night in Athens.
I have taken to noticing the symbols on the doors of each WC we have visited – each lady is dressed quite fancily and carry some beautiful accessories like a parasol and a lovely hat. I have taken some excellent photos of these signs and look forward to sharing them when I get back.
***this post is very long… if you’re busy you might want to print it out and save it for later***
Friday morning we got on the road to Thessaloniki very early – 6:00a.m. (11:00 p.m. Est, you all were just hitting the hay). On the way we were fortunate enough to visit the tomb of Phillip II, king of Macedonia and father of Alexander the Great. You will not believe the condition in which this tomb and its contents has survived the millennia – it was only discovered in 1976. The gold and silver it contained was pretty impressive. We were not allowed to take photos in this place. Some fabric wrapped around the ashes of Phillip’s wife-to-be was there too- purple and gold. We spent the night in Thessaloniki after touring the city in the bus. Our hotel was excellent – it looked like they left the roof open and shook an IKEA store into all the rooms. Cute stuff. About 8 of us stayed up to 12 a.m. drinking Macedonian wine (only 2 small glasses for me, thanks) and doing our very best celebrity impressions. For those of you who understand, I’m saving my “Elaine” for another night.
This morning, my roommate Enuma and I woke with a start at 7:25. We did not receive our 6:00 a.m. wake up call! We quickly showered, our nice friend Lindsay (the roommate of the girl I met at the theater – see previous posts for that story) realized that we weren’t at breakfast, so after she made sure we were up, grabbed some rolls, apples and dried apricots for us to eat on the way from Thessaloniki to Amphipolis, the site of an ancient church dating back to Paul’s visit to the area in 49 A.D. There was a small museum there where we saw more artifacts from the early Christian and Byzantine eras, some cool jewelry and a neat example of a comb. Our drive continued after lunch and we stopped quickly for pictures at Kavala, formerly Christopolis, formerly Neopolis, where Paul arrived in Greece from an island in the Aegean having come from Syria. Our bus driver Dimitris expertly navigated narrow and winding streets with this behemoth bus we are in. Then we continued on to Philippi where Paul baptized Lydia, the first Christian in Greece, commanded the demon to leave the fortune-teller and was imprisoned. The site believed to be his prison was accessible to us, as was the rest of the city ruins. More than once have we marveled at the fact that we can just freely walk around these places (Corinth included) and sit on the marble, stand in the place where Paul faced the Magistrate and hop all over fallen columns. We were able to make a quick stop at the riverside where it’s believed that Lydia and her family were baptized by Paul (as well as the jailer and his family). I dipped by hands in that cold water, and then one of the little boys traveling with us fell mostly in!
I’m typing this on a friend’s laptop while we’re driving to Larissa to spend the night. I will hopefully post this tonight, (Saturday) but may not be able to until tomorrow when we return to Athens to the same hotel we stayed at the first three nights. Monday morning we’ll go to the airport at 8:30 a.m. for our 12:00 flight to New York. I’ll have a 4 hour layover and will be in St. Pete (if all goes well) by 11:20 p.m. est. Timon, Henry, and Chad will have completely cleaned the house and have a hot meal prepared for me (like a nice turkey burger or something).
Thank you for sticking with me for this very long post – as a reward to the faithful few who made it to the end, I give you this: Ef Karistopoli! (thank you very much)
1 comments:
so excited for you! you're really there... or are you? :) take care! -amy
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