Athens, Greece by Mick

We arrived in Athens after an hour flight from Crete, Greece.

We took the X95 bus from the airport, and arrived an hour later at our bus stop. Right as we got out of the bus, we saw a huge protest taking place in front of the Hellenic Parliament building in Syntagma Square. There were loudspeakers shouting stuff in Greek, that we couldn’t understand. There was violence between the police and a group of angry protesters on the steps of the parliament building trying to get through. The violence gave me a good scare and I decided I did not want to be anywhere near it.

We hurried to our Airbnb, getting somewhat confused with navigation, and checked in. The neighborhood we were staying in was called Plaka. Agreeing we were all hungry, we got lunch at a vegetarian food place, called Avocado.

After, we walked around the National Garden, and out the back gate we looked at the Presidential Palace.

In front of the establishment, there were guards. These guards are different, and I think they are even more silly looking than English guards. We finished walking in the garden and I came home to relax, while my parents walked more around the downtown area.

Our place had a jacuzzi. That’s why we booked it in the first place. So, when we arrived we were eager to try it. Long story short, it didn’t work and we only figured it out two days later. Disappointed, my dad and I went to get dinner. I ordered a club sandwich and my parents had a salad and pizza.

The next day we walked around the downtown area, seeing more protesters and riot police everywhere, because it was the anniversary of a police shooting of an 15-year-old student in 2008.

What we were really doing though, was just looking for a Rubik’s cube. I wanted one because they are good time-killers for when my parents are researching and planning and I can’t go outside and I have nothing to do.  Anyways, we had Greek street food for lunch called souvlaki. I had not only one, but two of these souvlakia.

We then walked around, stopping at a shop, where I got a sticker-less Guanlong cube (basically a really smooth Rubik’s cube) and I was totally excited. We walked home and relaxed for a while before having dinner.

On our third day in Αθήνα, we went to see the Acropolis and the Acropolis museum, the highlight (other than souvlaki) of our stay. First, we went over to the Acropolis museum, where we saw marble sculptures of Greek gods and goddesses, ancient pottery, and marble decorations which were once on the Parthenon and the surrounding monuments. The museum was cool and all, but what we were really exited to see was the Acropolis itself.

We walked out of the museum and towards the Acropolis, smiling at a couple of street performers playing festive Christmas music. We scanned our tickets and walked through the entrance, proceeding to the monumental entrance of the Acropolis, called the Propylaea.

We took a great deal of pictures, and then finally, we walked through the entrance. As we walked through, there was a sign saying, “DO NOT TOUCH MARBLE”, and of course we touched the marble. If there’s a sign saying WET PAINT, you have to touch it and find out for yourself: is it indeed wet paint? In this case, the marble was indeed marble. We emerged on the other side of the gate, and there it was: the Parthenon.

Somehow as I looked at it, it seemed as to say, “THIS IS MY HILL” and looked right back at me. There are 17 columns stretching the length on either side, and the width only eight. Using the very sophisticated math skill called addition you can figure out the total: 50.

ARITHMETIC: (from the Greek ἀριθμός arithmos, “number”) is a branch of mathematics that consists of the study of numbers, especially the properties of the traditional operations on them—addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

The fact that the Greeks built the Parthenon in just nine years, with their primitive technology, just blows me away.  We continued walking, reading information signs and stopping to take in the amazing view that we got atop the Acropolis.

I decided to sit down and sketch the Parthenon for a while before we left.

As we walked out, we passed my mom’s favorite monument on the Acropolis: the Erechtheum. The columns were all female statues called caryatids.

We made our way out and I got a strawberry and lemon slushie. We made our way home and finally figured out the hot tub, now able to take a satisfying jacuzzi.

The next day, I slept in late and took another amazing jacuzzi before my dad and I went to The Pitta Company again and had souvlaki. This time I also had amazing, one-euro, fresh orange juice! My mom got lunch at a different place, and we set off through a dense market, selling everything from shoes (lots of shoes) to squishy stress balls. My mom and I wanted to shop for a while and my dad wanted to keep walking, so we split up. My mom bought (much needed) new walking shoes and I had my own interest in squishy splat balls and all kinds of Rubik’s cubes.

We walked to the end of the market and turned left, walking along a park, and the metro line.

I stopped and bought Hubba Bubba bubble gum (try saying that ten times fast!!), and we headed home. Again I explored the Jacuzzi, this time with goggles, seeing a large rubber eel that produced bubbles and a fat albino abalone that emanated heat (this trip is really hard on me). After, I went to bed.

On our second to last (but not least) day we walked and saw the Panathenaic stadium, the place where the modern Olympics started, in 1896. We walked less than a mile and bought tickets, and were given free audio guides. Only my dad and I went in and my mom got coffee.

The Zappeion, en route to the stadium, has an interesting history and connection to the Olympics.

We walked around, listening to the audio guide and sat in the royal throne, where the king or queen sat in the front row to spectate whatever games were being held. The stadium could hold 50,000 people comfortably. We walked further still, seeing the old set of royal thrones that were used at the end of the stadium. Our audio guide directed us into a tunnel which led up and out of the stadium in the old times, but now It leads to the Olympic Museum. In this museum they have almost every Olympic torch on the walls. I even saw the most recent torch, from Rio 2016. We headed out of the museum and the tunnel, where I went on the field and did one full lap around the Olympic track. After, I walked up the side of the stadium, getting a stunning view of the Acropolis and the Parthenon.

We exited the stadium and decided to get a better look at the funny guards, at the Presidential Palace. They weren’t doing much, but they still made me chuckle to myself.

We all walked home and took a jacuzzi. My dad walked and got pizzas and a salad for dinner. My mom made us watch a documentary about food called In Defense of Food (by Michael Pollan). I (grudgingly) watched the documentary as we had our delicious meal.

On our final day in Athens, Greece we decided to take the metro out to the port, where all of the big ferries come in. Immediately it was utterly and completely different. As we stepped out of the station, people started trying to sell us junk. It was like Morocco, with goods laid out on the street and people haggling over prices.

I decided that I wanted to get out of there, and that’s exactly what my parents wanted as well. We started walking towards a smaller port that housed smaller boats (with a couple of exceptions for yachts).

We walked along that and found a great place for pictures. We kept walking, seeing beaches, a pool for water polo, and a couple of tennis courts.

We made our way to a metro station, passing a couple of mangy cats on the way. We rode back and I got a souvlaki (again).

After lunch, we walked through the crowded markets ending up at a long stretch of shops on the street. We walked up that street, hoping to find a Christmas festival that our Airbnb host had recommended for me.

We had walked a long ways, and my legs were tired, and we were almost going to give up… when my mom made me stand up and keep looking 🙁 We walked on and finally, FINALLY, found it. We got tickets and went in. It wasn’t at all what we had expected. It was kind of a festival/amusement park. We basically looked around, did the bumper cars once, got a bag of candy, and left. We took the metro home and went to bed for the last time in Athens, Greece.

See you next time, Mick

Some more cool pictures…