Sunday-Monday-Tuesday-Athens

February 6-7-8-Athens

Sunday

I’d seen an ad on Friday about a “Walking Tour” of Athens.  I’d contacted them on Saturday asking if they would have a tour on Sunday or Monday and was told they didn’t have anything for this weekend.  When I woke up at 8:45 a.m. I saw I had a message from the owner saying she was going to have a tour today and Monday and did I want to join.  By the way, the tour starts at 9:30 a.m.  I wanted to go today because I knew the Acropolis and all other open ruins were free on Sunday and I had that on my schedule.  Her tour fee (36 Euro) didn’t include admission to the sights and every other day the entrance fee is 12 Euro. 

I called her and she said “don’t worry you can join us.  Go have a coffee and meet us at the changing of the guards at 10:00 a.m.  All you will miss is the explanation of the ruins in the metro station.”

O.K.  This was great news.  I jumped in the shower, threw some clothes on had a cup of coffee and something to eat and off I went.  The walk to the metro is about 7 minutes and it’s only one stop to Syntagma Square (which I learned means Constitution which is why it’s also known as Constitution Square) so I was good.  

Despina

I was able to easily find Despina (the owner of Athens Walking Tours) in front of the changing of the guards.  There were 5 others in the group, all from Australia, but two are living in London.

I had seen the changing of the guards yesterday but Despina  explained the costume and the history of the Parliament Building (which is where the changing of the guards takes place).  

One of the most interesting things was the guards have pom pom’s on their shoes.  They are more than decoration, they were put there to hide a knife so that if they were attached they could kick the attacker and hurt or kill them.  Interesting.

Despina http://www.athenswalkingtours.gr/  was a wealth of information about historical Greece/Athens and current Athens.  She has been a tour guide for over 25 years and started this walking tour about 4 years ago. If you are planning to come to Athens I highly recommend you take this tour.  It’s a good thing to do especially at the beginning of your stay.

After the changing of the guards we went to the National Park, which is just beside the Syntagma Square.  We did not walk through the entire park but she did show us the Zappion Building. Which is a very important building in Athens.

The Zappion was built in 1878 and donated to the nation by the Zappas brothers from Ipirus. This building was the first to hold an indoor Olympic event, in the 1896 Olympics. In fact even though credit as the founder of the modern Olympics goes to Pierre de Coubertin, and his name is mentioned in every Olympic ceremony and in the media, in truth, Coubertin only founded the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The founders of the modern Olympics were three people. In 1833 Panagiotis Soutsos wrote about the revival of the Olympic Games in his poetry 'Dialogue of the Dead'. In 1850 Dr William Penny Brookes founded annual games in Much Wenlock, Shropshire, UK. In 1856 Evangelis Zappas wrote to King Otto of Greece offering to fund the revival of the Olympic Games. The first modern international Olympic Games were held in Platia Kotzia, Athens in 1859, sponsored by Zappas. In 1870, when Coubertin was just seven years old, the first modern Olympics to be held in a stadium took place in the ancient Panathenaic stadium of Athens which had been rebuilt by Zappas. So the Zappion building is an important place to visit and acknowlege the true founder of the Modern Olympics, even if the International Olympic Committee does not want to.

It was at this point she also told us to be very careful with our purses/bags as there are many pick pockets in this area and for that fact all over Athens.  She said to be careful in the metro too.  I didn’t want any more problems in this area.  I was hoping lightening wouldn’t strike twice so I have been extremely vigilant.

Zeus Temple

After our stroll through the park and a bit more of a history lesson we walked to Zeus’s temple, which only took 700 years to finish.

The building of the Temple of Olympian Zeus actually began in the 6th Century by Peisistratos but work was stopped either because of a lack of money or because Pisistratus's son, Hippias, was overthrown in 510 BC. The temple was not finished until the Emperor Hadrian completed in 131 AD, seven hundred years later. 

In this same area is Hadrian’s Arch because he was the one who finally finished the temple so something had to be built to honor him too.  Don’t ya think.  

Our journey continued to the pedestrian only path, that was spearheaded by Melina Mercouri (a famous Greek actress), that leads to the Athens Acopolis.  

Statue of Melina Mercouri

Unfortunately Ms. Mercouri didn’t live to see the street completed.  

tourist train

They have a funny little tourist train that will take you to the entrance to the Athens Acropolis if you don’t want to walk.  Despina made it very clear that she gets bothered by people who say they want to see the Acropolis as though the one in Athens is the only Acropolis.  No, this is not the only Acropolis but the Athens Acropolis. She then explained that Acropolis means hill.  There are hundreds of Acropolis’ (not sure what the plural is) in Greece.  Actually I was glad to learn this since I was a bit confused when I was in Rhodes and the lady in the tourist office told me there were three acropolis on Rhodes.  Now it made sense.  O.k I didn’t admit my stupidity to Despina.  

On our walk to the Athens Acropolis, I asked Despina if she knew where the street Nikos was and she said yes, but the Jewish museum isn’t open today.  She’s a sharp cookie.  She told me where the synagogues were and suggested I walk over to that neighborhood after the tour.  

The Parthenon

We entered the Athens Acropolis from the southern side, which is the side closest to the New Acropolis Museum.  She said she likes to use this entrance because usually there aren’t as many people entering here because it’s a bit steeper of a climb.  However, on this side you are able to visit the Dionysus theater. Dionysus was the god of wine and the patron of drama.  Here Despina explained the difference between the Greek and Roman theaters.   (I did get this lesson in Ephesus but it’s good to hear it again.  With my aging brain I don’t always retain all the information)  Basically, when the Romans came to Greece they changed what the Greeks had created, from the shape of the theater to the seating.  When I think about the Greek Theater in Los Angeles or Berkeley, now I’m not sure they really are Greek Theaters.  Then there are the amphitheaters.  It’s all too confusing.  Anyway it’s interesting to see the remains of these original ones.  

The Theatre of Dionysus is a major open-air theatre, one of the earliest preserved, in Athens. It was used for festivals in honor of the god Dionysus. It is commonly confused with the later and better-preserved Odeon of Herodes Atticus, located at the southwest slope of the Acropolis.

Continuing up the hill you see the much more beautiful Odeon.  Despina told us that an Odeon is only used for Music performances never for drama and the original Greek theater was just for drama performances not music.  We’ve got it all mixed up now.  But does it really matter anyway?

We continued our walk up the hill and I thought about how I had been here in 1976 and that now I couldn’t remember a thing about where I entered or how I got here.  There was absolutely nothing familiar to me.  

When I told this to Despina she said it’s totally different now and this side wasn’t even open then.  She said I would have come in what is now the main entrance.  I really want to find the slides I took when I was here then.  I hope I still have them.  

When I was here in 1976 I stayed at the Funny Trumpets hotel, after spending 3 weeks living on the beach in Corfu.  Gina and I had driven from Corfu and wanted to sell the van we had bought in Amsterdam.  Finding a buyer wasn’t as much a problem as getting the Greek government to take the “van stamp” out of Gina’s passport.   The law at that time was if you came into the country with a vehicle they stamped it into your passport and you couldn’t leave the country without the vehicle.  You can only imagine the bureaucracy back then.  It took a week of many visits but finally the official took it out of Gina’s passport and into the buyers passport.

I hadn’t planned on coming to Athens for this trip but must admit that after all this time I found the Athens Acropolis incredibly amazing.  Although I will say that going to the acropolis museum first really helped.  Despina spent a little bit of time with us here but this was also where the tour ended.  She pointed out the other sites to visit in the area, The Agora, the original hill where democracy started etc.  

She also recommended a traditional Greek restaurant, Attalos, which was in the neighborhood at the end of the Agora.   

I spent another half hour walking around the site and gazing at the incredible view from the Acropolis; you can see the sea both in the west and the south, the snow covered mountains and all of Athens.  

view from acropolis of zeus temple

By the way, even in winter, there were lots of people here.  This was a time I was glad I was here in winter and not the summer.  Despina said in the summer there are so many people you can smell the sweat.  She is not a fan but it’s good business for her.

I walked down the hill and visited the Agora and the area around it.

The Agora, the marketplace and civic center, was one of the most important parts of an ancient city of Athens. In addition to being a place where people gathered to buy and sell all kinds of commodities, it was also a place where people assembled to discuss all kinds of topics: business, politics, current events, or the nature of the universe and the divine.  The Agora of Athens, where ancient Greek democracy first came to life, provides a wonderful opportunity to examine the commercial, political, religious, and cultural life of one of the great cities of the ancient world.

All these sites close at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday and it was around 2:30.

I walked about of the Agora and on to the street Despina had told me the restaurant was.  Well this was restaurant row and buzzing with people.

Attalos

I found Attalos, which Despina said would be filled with 70% Greeks and she was right.  It was such a beautiful day and they asked if I wanted to sit outside but I just can’t stand the smoke (and they all sit outside) so I chose to sit inside.  Funny enough there was another woman by herself right next to me.  She was Greek and didn’t seem so friendly so I didn’t attempt to talk with her.

flea market

The food was great not to mention I was starving.  It was 3:00.  This was very authentic food.  I had this incredible eggplant salad (roasted eggplant with chopped peppers, scallions, oil and maybe chopped cucumber not sure)and then cod with garlic mashed potatoes.  Unfortunately the cod was fried but I just took off the fried part and ate the fish.  I really would have liked to order moussaka here but it has minced meat.  There were 6 Greeks at the table in front of me and several of them ordered it.

No dessert now I was too full.  

After lunch I started to walk in the direction of the synagogue but what I saw on the street was a flea market with so many interesting people.  

I ended up hanging out at the flea market so long and got onto a different street so I didn’t make it to the synagogue.  Instead I found myself on another side of the Athens Acropolis and ended up walking back to the hotel.  

I wasn’t hungry for dinner because I’d had such a big late lunch.

Monday

Today on my list is the Jewish Museum.  

First though I needed to take care of some business.  I was changing hotels (thanks to my sister and brother in-law Steve and Janine.  They gave me points for two nights at the Hilton), and I needed to go to the post office so I could mail some things home.  

I packed all my things, checked out of the Divani (bye bye incredible view of the Athens Acropolis) and walked over to the Hilton.  Well my wonderful sister in-law has earned so many points at Hilton that I was not only put on the executive floor, but I got FREE internet too.  

Hilton

Oh the little things that make me happy.  Having internet access at the Divani cost me $80.00.  I call that highway robbery.  I will definitely look into why these high end hotels charge so much for internet access.  I don’t know why any hotel today is charging for internet access.  O.k. enough of that rant.

my room at the Hilton

My room at the Hilton didn’t have the incredible view but I wasn’t going to complain.  I was happy to be here.  In the executive lounge they offer food and drinks from early morning until 11:00 p.m.  I had breakfast, afternoon snacks and dinner here.  What I spent at the Divani I was saving at the Hilton.  It all balances in the end.

Then I made my way to the post office.  

post office

This was an interesting experience.  I walk into the post office and look around to try and figure out the system.  First I see there are lots of people sitting in chairs not in lines.  This is new.  Next I see signs over the clerks stations with digital numbers like at a bakery or deli counter so you know when it’s your.  So now I look for the machine where I can get a number.  I find the machine and there are two options, A or B and the instructions are in Greek.  I take a chance on “A”.  Also, the information on the signs above four of the clerks stations say, “all services except for parcels” and there is one station with a sign that says “bulk mail and parcels”.  So I wait at this last station because I want to buy a box (parcel in my mind).  When it is my turn I say to the lady behind the counter that I need (and point) to the boxes behind her.  She tells me in Greek and points I need to go to the counter.  There is a very nice woman who is able to translate and tells me I need to go to the other counter, even though it says it’s not for parcels.  My translator says something to the “parcel” woman, I’m sure saying that it say’s everything but parcels, but she is insistent that I go to the other counter to buy the box then come back to this counter.   Good thing I had taken a number and even though it was past my number I went to stand in front of the counter.  

The woman at the “everything except parcels” counter spoke some English and was very nice.  She not only got the box for me but put it together and after I inserted my things taped it up for me.

I decided to send home a pair of shoes and lots of pamphlets and entrance tickets I have collected along with way from all the museums and historical sites I have visited.  

Is that my friend Robin on her Vespa

just a shot on my walk

After all this it was after noon and I knew the Jewish museum was only open until 2:00 so I got myself over there as quick as I could.

Jewish Museum

  

I was very impressed with this small but very well put together museum.  They have collected materials from Greek families that show the strong Jewish history in Greece.  The largest amount of Greek Jews came from Thessoliniki but there were Jews in Athens and many other islands most importantly Rhodes and Corfu.  As well they have parts of  a synagogue that was destroyed.  They also have a very powerful exhibit about the Holocaust.  They not only show the Greek Jews who both died and survived but honored the righteous “gentiles” who helped the Jews.  I was very glad I made this visit.

After the Jewish Museum I got something to eat then walked through the shopping area of Syntagma Square.  

Really

Oh I caught a girl on a pay phone.  Why am I so amazed that people still use pay phones?  Do we have any in Santa Barbara?  Maybe I just don’t notice because it seems everyone has a cell phone.  

I decided I needed to buy a warm vest for my journey to South America.  I know it’s going to be cool in the south and I don’t think the jacket I have is going to be warm enough.  I had seen a “puffy” warm vest at an Espirit store in Rhodes and was sorry I didn’t buy it then.  I see another Espirit store here on the shopping street and find the same puffy vest (not down but poly) and buy it.  

I think I have enough energy for one more museum and I know the Cycladic Museum is on my way back to the hotel.  

The Cycladic museum, by the way is half price on Monday, got a good review from this web site I found (athens-museums.com) but after the Bernaki museum it wasn’t very impressive.  It contained many of the same items that I’d seen at the Bernaki museum and not nearly as good.  I also may have been slightly tired.  The best part of this museum, which I almost missed because it was in another wing was the exhibit of Vasso Katraki--Giving Life to Stone.  I was very interested by her stone carvings and prints made from the stone carvings.  There were other examples of her work as well.

The exhibition Vasso Katraki–Giving Life to Stone at the Museum of Cycladic Art presents representative works from the entire artistic production of this great engraver −one of the leading figures of twentieth-century Greek cultural expression in its entirety, with international recognition. 

Another full day.  I walked back to the Hilton where I indulged at the executive lounge for some evening treats and a drink.

Tuesday

I’m all ready to go to the mother of all museums in Athens, the Archeological Museum which houses just about everything dug up all over Greece.  The girl at the New Acropolis Museum told me I needed a few days to go through the museum and it was a MUST see.  So I saved it for today my last full day in Athens.  

Metro

I’m so proud of myself that I’ve figured out how to use the subway and I know exactly where I need to go the get to the museum.

I walk to the metro station and, what, the gate is closed?  O.k. maybe just this entrance is closed so I walk around to where I know there is another entrance and, what, also closed?  Do the metro’s not work on Tuesday?  I was confused.  

I walk toward Syntagma Square thinking I could get the metro from that station.  On my way I see a policeman with those same plastic barriers I saw in Istanbul.  I know something is up but still not sure what it is.  I take out my camera, because I think this is a great photo op, take a photo, and oops, the policeman didn’t like that.  He walks over to me and makes me erase the photo I took. I was glad he didn’t take my camera away.  O.k. no more photos of policemen.  

I continue walking and decide I can go into the Grand Bretagne (a fancy hotel in Syntagma) to ask about the metro and or other transportation to the museum.  I am told the metro is on strike until 4:00 p.m. I ask how I can get to the Archeological museum.  The man tells me it’s about a 20 minute walk or I can take a number 5 or 12 bus.  

I buy two bus tickets from the corner kiosk and walk to the next bus stop.  I get on the #5 bus and ask if it’s going to the Archeological Museum.  (I have learned to double check any information I get.) The bus is moving and the driver says no he doesn’t go to the museum.  A nice girl standing next to me spoke English and explained that I needed to get off in two stops and then walk the rest of the way.  On the way I see out the window two fantastic buildings and asked what they were.  This girl told me one was the National Library and the other was the original university.  Lots of demonstrations going on in front of these buildings and not sure if they are related to the metro strike or not.

I get off the bus where the girl tells me to and she says I need to turn left at the first street and walk for about 10 minutes.  It’s interesting how people give direction in time not distance.  This part of town is not nearly as nice as where I have been.  I’ve been told that I would be walking through parts of the “red light” district but that it would be fine during the day.

Archeological Museum

I arrive at the Archeological Museum and the girl at the Acropolis Museum was right it is gigantic.  Just looking at the building was intimidating.  I saw a sign for a guide and asked if one was available.  The woman asked how many people and I said just me.  Oh that will be 50 Euro for a private tour.

No thank you.  I didn’t think it was worth nearly $70 dollars for a tour.  

I hadn’t realized the time but it was nearly noon by the time I got to the museum.

This museum, as I mentioned, was set up the worst.  There were so many display cases with numbers next to the items but no corresponding information on the display cards.  There was way too much to see and absorb in one day.   

I walked through the middle of the first floor which were things mostly taken from three grave areas in the Athens area dug up by some Englishman.  Besides the usual things there were lots of gold masks that were supposedly put on a dead person when they were buried.  Where did all this gold come from?  Very thin sheets of gold.  Why did these people need a mask to cover their face when they were dead?  Strong belief in the afterlife.

When I get to the end of this hall, I turn to the left and go to the side hall.  This part is an entire Egyptian wing which had a time line and location of where these things came from.   As I walked out of the one room  I was told, thank you the museum is now closed.  It was 2:45.  I guess the museum was closing at 3:00.  So that was the end of my visit.  

Billboard across from the Archeological Museum

I walked back toward my hotel and stopped at the area around the National Library and University.  

The demonstration I had seen earlier was by people from Afghanistan who are seeking asylum in Greece.  They are sewing shut their lips for a hunger strike to make their point.  Ouch.

outside the Library

Athena beside the National Library

I was very hungry and remembered Mariella had told me about her favorite restaurant in the Kolonaki area.  I’d looked up the address before I left the hotel and with a little bit of luck I was able to find it.  It was only 3:30 ish and it was  open.  

a store in the fashionable Kolinaki Square

Mah Jong (a clothing store)

I found this restaurant Kafeneion and it was fabulous.  The waiter was very kind to me.  This seemed like a very fancy, white table cloth kind of restaurant but the food was very down home.  I ordered their signature salad which was a chopped salad and then I ordered a warm eggplant dish that had tomato, tomato sauce and some Greek cheese (not feta) on top.  All delicious.  

As I was finishing my meal I noticed that all the other patrons had left and the waiters were cleaning up.  I was the last one in the restaurant as it must have been the end of the lunch day.

Well it was 4:30.

I walked back to the hotel and went to the executive lounge to write for a while.

Before I knew it it was 8:00.  I wasn’t hungry and knew I had to pack as tomorrow was a big travel day.

Bye Bye Athens, next stop Santiago, Chile and summer here I come!