it's all greek to me

After two awesome weeks in Italy, it was time for Aman and I to move on to “country number 18” on our list, Greece.  It was just over thirty-something weeks on the road at that point, and Aman and I noticed that we had a natural tendency to get excited whenever moving on to a new country.  Even so, we were really, really excited about moving on to Greece.  The country from which my father immigrated to the United States, I have visited Greece several times throughout my life and feel a natural bond to the Fatherland.  For Aman, Greece was one of the countries on his “top five” list.  Both of us viewed this particular piece of onward travel as a meaningful milestone of our journey given how long we had been on the road, as well as what we had been through over the summer with my knee injury and talks about go or no-go.  Both of us were also pretty stoked about eating spanakopita (spinach pie) and Greek salads for a couple of weeks.  But, most of all, we were very much looking forward to seeing my parents who were joining us from the States for ten nights.

When the day came for us to get moving, Aman and I traveled by train (from Salerno to Rome, Italy), plane (from Italy to Greece), and taxi (from the Greek airport to Athens).  A very long day, it was well after midnight and dark by the time our taxi pulled up to the Makrygianni neighborhood where we were meeting my parents at an apartment that we had lined up for a couple of nights.  Stepping out of the taxi, Aman and I were greeted instantly by the heavenly scent of fresh bread wafting out from the bakery across the street, one of the best in town.  Seconds later, my parents emerged from the shadows of the sidewalk nearby where they had been sitting on the porch and waiting for our arrival. Despite the late hour – but thanks to a mixture of excitement, some wine that we had picked up at a duty-free shop, and jet lag, on my parents’ behalf – we all stayed up for hours talking.  It was a great first night reunion. 

We devoted the entire next day to exploring two must-sees for anyone who has not visited Athens before:  the Acropolis Museum and the Parthenon.  A temple dedicated to the goddess Athena (patron goddess of Athens), the Parthenon sits high above the city of Athens as the most historically significant building of the Acropolis and ancient Greek civilization.  Conveniently, both the museum and the Parthenon were within a short walking distance from our apartment.  Along the way, we easily convinced Aman that we should stop for one of my favorite drinks in the world – Greek frappe coffee.  It took more to convince Aman that the Greeks were responsible for inventing everything from democracy (true) to the marathon (true) to the word “ok” (not true).  Yes, for those familiar with the scene from My Big Fat Greek Wedding where the father tries explaining to his young daughter and the daughter’s friend that the root of every word comes from the Greek language, well, that is not too far off from my own memories of childhood.

Aman and Dad, discussing all things Greek over a couple of frappes:

Me, Mom and Dad, approaching the Acropolis Museum:

The new Acropolis Museum is an Acropolis-focused archaeological museum that opened its doors to visitors in 2009.  Given its relatively recent debut, neither my parents nor I had ever visited it before, but we had heard its good reviews and thought that it might be worth checking out together with Aman.  Located less than half a kilometer away from the Acropolis, the museum itself is built on top of an important archaeological site.  Through strategically placed sections of cutouts and glass flooring, you can see the excavations and ruins beneath the building when you walk in, which was pretty cool.

In the first upper gallery of the museum are some amazing archaic findings relating to the Acropolis and other important ancient time periods:

But the main draw of the museum is on the second upper gallery – designed as a configuration of stainless steel columns laid out in the exact same dimensions as the ancient pillars of the Parthenon – fifteen along the sides and eight along each end.  The architectural sculptures of the Parthenon – namely, the metopes and pediments (depicting various mythological subjects) and the Parthenon frieze (depicting the greatest festival of the city in honor of the goddess Athena) – unfold as you walk along the perimeter of the gallery.  And, from the floor-to-ceiling windows of the gallery, you can see the northwest side of the Parthenon in the distance.  It was all pretty well done, we thought as we wandered among the ancient relics that provide a glimpse of life, beliefs and traditions in a bygone world.

We saw everything that needed to be seen within the museum in less than two hours and headed, next, to the Parthenon.  Despite the fact that I was still on crutches and still in a knee brace, I thought I was holding up pretty well and insisted that I could ascend the rock (or at least, try).  But when we approached the turnstile at the bottom entrance, the ticket taker insisted that I would be far better off taking the elevator.  We agreed that it made sense to check it out given that the surface of the ground leading up to the Parthenon is incredibly slippery and uneven and involves somewhat of a good climb (it was about the same distance from the entrance to the elevator but no climb).  So Aman and I told my parents that we would meet them at the top and were quickly escorted through a restricted area on our way to the lift.  Previously unaware that the Acropolis even had an elevator, I am not sure what we were expecting.  Regardless, what we found was essentially a construction site elevator built onto the side of the rock slab (see picture above).  Oh Lord, I thought.  Not to be melodramatic, but the ride up the rock on this rickety contraption may have been the most terrifying moment of this trip for me.  Our teen-aged operator of the elevator – who freely, yet shakily, admitted that he himself was terrified of the thing – did not do much to assuage my fears. 

Here I am about to make the snail’s pace crawl straight up into the air.  Not sure whether I am laughing, screaming or about to cry, but it was probably all three.

My trepidations aside, we made it to the top alive.  There, we found my parents waiting and chuckling about my shock-ridden state.  We all had a good laugh about it and I rallied in time for a photo session, before we took a walk around the ruins.

For anyone who has never been, the Parthenon was virtually destroyed in 1687 and has been restored several times since (sometimes better than others; restoration efforts done in the 19th century were so bad that they caused more damage than they repaired).  It has also been badly damaged by pollution over the years.  Currently, the structure is under serious reconstruction so there are cranes and scaffolds aplenty.  But it is still a marvelous sight, and the views of the sprawling city below are amazing.

  

Thankfully, the rickety elevator ride down the rock was less frightening than the ride up.  We all regrouped at the bottom, where it was decided that some food was in order after the long day of sightseeing.  Making our way back in the direction of our apartment, we stopped along the way at one of the many tavernas in Makrygianni serving typical Greek cuisine – bread, salad, appetizers such as tzatziki (yogurt, cucumber, and garlic dip), melitzanasalata (eggplant dip), baked dishes such as moussaka or pastitsio, and grilled dishes such as souvlaki.  Some of my favorite dishes in the world!  Luckily, Aman is pretty fond of Greek food too.  We ate our scrumptious fare and continued to catch up with my parents before returning to the apartment and getting ourselves organized for the day ahead, which was scheduled to begin with a 5:40 a.m. flight from Athens to Limnos, the small island in the Aegean Sea where my father was born and where our group would spend the following week together.

Up next:  our adventures in three very different Greek isles: Limnos, Mykonos and Santorini.