Rejuvenation in Athens

I need to be honest. On my flight from Krakow to Greece, I was mentally and physically exhausted. I had just experienced another crappy travel experience (we'll get to it in a later update of The Blog), which brought my frustrations to a head. I was tired of living out of a bag. I was tired of cold showers. I was tired of the damn Euro. I had had a great trip, and I was satisfied. I was looking forward to going home. Then I landed in Athens.

I stepped off the plane and simply smiled. My first thought was, "Wow. This place reminds me of San Diego." The weather was perfect. I had gone from rainy, cold Krakow (which had been a far too re-occurring theme during my travels) to the warm breezes greeting me in Athens. I was immediately rejuvenated.

I arrived at Athens Backpackers around midnight, and met up with a girl named Michelle for dinner at the local 24 hour restaurant. After my first Greek feed exposure, I hung out with a number of the hostel guests before heading to bed.

The next morning we went on the Athens walking tour put on by the hostel. It was underwhelming, but for 5 euros we saw a decent portion of the city. We paid a visit to the old Olympic Stadium, the origin of democracy and a number of the ruins. The sites were cool. Our tour guide sucked. Regardless, it was worth it.

After checking out more of the city with a number of the other guests, I ventured over to the hostel's happy hour for 1 euro Mythos, the local Greek beer and 50 cent shots ouzo, a black licorice-tasting Greek liquor. Good, cheap, drunk times had by all.

Once happy hour ended, a number of us went to dinner at God's Kitchen where I enjoyed my first authentic Greek salad and Moussaka. Greek salad: delicious. Moussaka: overrated. After dinner we were treated by the owners to a free shot of ouzo. Little did I know this was the beginning of quite a trend. More on this later.



After checking out the Athens nightlife and learning that drinks are exorbitantly expensive, we headed back to the hostel relatively early.



The next day turned out to be National Museum Day, meaning all the sights were free for all. NICE. I hiked up to the Acroplis ("high city", or "sacred rock") to check out the Parthenon, Old Temple of Athena, Temple of Athena Nike and all of the other amazing ruins. The weather was absolutely perfect, the views were fantastic and the monuments breathtaking, but the scene was lacking one thing. A lot of the history and importance of the area was lost on me because of the lack of textual information. Each site was labeled, but the script only discussed the renovation of each. Instead of reading how many times Athena Nike has undergone reconstruction, I would have much preferred to learn about its cultural significance. This was one of the few times I wish I had paid for a guided tour. Oh well. For 0 euros ($0) I couldn't even come close to complaining.




The day was so pretty I decided to walk back to the hostel, throw on a pair of shorts, grab my iPod and go for a run through Athens. I often like doing this to get a better feel of each city, but it has been harder than I had imagined because of the cold weather. My run turned out to be extremely productive - I got a good workout, saw a side of Athens I would have otherwise never seen, found a place to replace my broken earphones and most importantly, stumbled upon a deli which served me the best spanakopitta of my life. Oh. So. Good.

That night the same group went out for dinner in Plaka, the main eating and shopping street in Athens. The street is lined with restaurant upon restaurant, so there are guys trying to woo groups as they walk by with special offers. We stopped walking when one of the woo-ers offered us a free bottle of wine. This is when I saw my opening. It was time to negotiate. By the time we sat down, I had pulled off the steal of the century. It was settled upon that our group of 7 would receive 3 free bottles of wine, free dessert and 15% off our bill. It was not a fluke I received an A in my Business Negotiations class a couple semesters back at Berkeley.

After dinner, we made another valiant attempt to enjoy Athens nightlife. This time we were resourceful by searching and finding the cheapest way to drink.



The next day was more of the same. I did a little sight-seeing before heading over to the same Gyro stand I had been going to nonstop for the past 48 hours. For 1.70 euro, I was treated to the best gyro in the history of time (this is actually official). I had to be back at the hostel by 4pm to meet up with my friends, but I had to take care of some essentials beforehand. I did not bring a pair of shorts to Europe, and until now I really need any. 10 days in Greece yielded a different story. I figured my search for shorts would be short and sweet, but it turned out to be ANYTHING but. Most shorts were too small. The ones that weren't too small were ugly. The ones that weren't ugly were prohibitively expensive. After about TWO HOURS I found an adequate pair of shorts.

Next on my list was a Greece hoodie. Remember in an earlier version of The Blog I mentioned that I hadn't brought a hoodie to Europe, and that I LOVE hoodies? Well, there has been more to the story. I loved Amsterdam and bought a really cool hoodie there, but this story has a very unhappy ending. So unhappy that I'm not yet ready to talk about it. Regardless, I was in love with Greece. It was pretty, the weather was great, the food delicious and the people overwhelmingly friendly. To give you an idea how friendly the people were, most of the souvenir shop owners remembered me from a number of days prior when I had been perusing their stores. When their respective stores did not offer what I was looking for, they pleasantly pointed me in the right direction. Yes, Athens is very touristy, but I felt like their kindness was legitimately genuine. I eventually walked into a souvenir shop which happens to do custom prints. I had a problem with every single one of their hoodies, so I had to take matters into my own hands. I debated for a while about the color, pattern and graphic schemes until I churned out a masterpiece. I am officially satisfied with my hoodie search.



Excited, I headed back to the hostel to meet my new friends for our ferry to the Greek Islands. Little did I know that my trip was just getting started...