Гεια σου! (‘Yia su!’ means hello in Greek)
Friday night, I made my first home cooked meal…spaghetti and fresh green beans and grapes from the market. Mmmmm. In our kitchen, we only have a refrigerator, a stove/oven, and a sink…no microwave. :P So, we actually have to cook. I think I will be eating a lot of spaghetti this semester. J
Saturday, we went on our first school field trip (it’s like we’re back in elementary school again with field trips). We went to Sounion in the southern tip of Attica to see the temple of Poseidon, a little over an hour away from our school in central Athens. It felt good to get out of the big city to see some scenery around Greece. The Temple of Poseidon stands tall at the top of a rocky hill and the sea laps against the rocky cliffs on three sides. The water was bright blue like the sky in the sunshine and it was HOT (95+ degrees Fahrenheit). Our next stop was Thorikos. Here, we saw an ancient stone theater and a mine. Because it was such a hot day, our teacher decided to skip the third stop and we headed to the beach for lunch and some swimming in the Aegean Sea. The beach was full of palm-leaf shade umbrellas and lounge chairs sitting on its rocky coastline. It looked pretty, but hurt your feet when you walked barefoot. The water felt so refreshing, but I was disappointed again to see garbage floating in the water, especially close to shore. The water is salty, so it is so easy to float, and you hardly have to tread water at all to keep your head above. We were exhausted by the time we got home that evening, and decided to eat Gyros at a nearby take-out restaurant. They were a little different than the gyros in the U.S., but delicious. I spent the evening sitting on the balcony people watching with Ashley and Sara. There was a wedding at the church down the street, so we got to see everyone all dressed up as they came and left. When the wedding was over, there was a processional of cars and the bride and groom drove away on a mo-ped decorated with white bows. We also went to a little bakery that night and got to talk with the lady working. She was from Athens and was so nice to us. We each bought a pastry for dessert, and she gave us a half a dozen free cookies! I had a croissant with cherry and cream cheese filling. It was sooo good!
On Sunday, I worked on homework…yes, we do have homework. For our culture class, we had to walk around the city finding different things and writing down the addresses in Greek. When we were near at the Parliament building, near Syntagma Square, we saw the changing of the guards. The men wear a white uniform with huge black pom-poms on their shoes and have an interesting march where they kick their legs high in the air as they step forward. Their faces are so serious it makes me smile.
Sunday evening, a few girls and I walked up Likavitos Hill and from the top, we had a bird’s eye view of Athens. The city sprawls in every direction as far as you can see! I could see the Olympic stadium from there (our school is right next to it and I live in that neighborhood). I knew the city was big (Population 4 million in Attica, Athens and surrounding area; the total population of Greece is about 10 million), but I couldn’t imagine just how many people lived here. We live and see only a small chunk of Athens in our neighborhood. The Acropolis and the Parthenon are also visible from the hill and they were lit up in the dark (we went in the evening so we could watch the sunset, but then it clouded over so we didn’t get to see the sunset anyway. I guess we’ll have to make another hike to the top). A little white Monastery church called St. George sits at the top as if it is watching over the whole city.
Monday Morning, I went grocery shopping and that is an adventure in itself. Suddenly, something so ordinary becomes a challenge because all the packages are written in Greek. I relied mostly on pictures as I slowly examined everything. I think I bought what I intended, but I guess I’ll find out when I try to eat it. The only thing I’m not positive about is the butter. We learned the word for butter (βούτυρο—vu ti, ro) today in class, so I’ll have to go home and check the package to see.
I’ve been practicing my Greek letters and their sounds. It’s difficult because some of the letters look like English letters, but they have a different sound. For example: Pp sounds like r. B sounds like v. v sounds like n. Confusing. Several of the upper case and lower case letters look different from each other, so that makes it difficult too. I’ve been trying to read and pronounce the Greek words that I see around the city, and I always try to say ‘thank you’ (Еυχαριστώ--ef kha ri sto), because, up until now, that is all I knew. I’m headed to Theology class next.
Аντίο! (a di o) Bye, for now!
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