Day 6 - Afternoon

Big day yesterday. I started my Monday/Wednesday classes (I have 4) - Ancient Greek, Modern Greek, Ancient Macedon to the Death of Alexander the Great, and Achaeology of Athens, and then went to the Hadrianic Arch and the Temple of Olympian Zeus, and THEN went to taverna, and THEN pregamed in my room and THEN walked half an hour to a club in Monstraiki and THEN danced for hours and THEN walked home at 4 in the morning, meaning we did not arrive back in our apartment until 5 AMish.

So a more detailed breakdown: My classes seem really good, even though I'm a little nervous about Ancient Greek. It's just, I've never done scansion before (reading Greek poetry and noting where syllables are stressed) and that's one of the main focuses of the class. Also, get this - Bowdoin has a renowned Classics program. Who knew? I mean, I love my professors at home and I always feel challenged, but I never really though my old British Greek professor would make that comment to me when I told him where I went to school. So suck on that, Bio Majors. Classics is hard too.

My Ancient Macedon professor is an absolute baller. I cannot desribe him any other way except to tell you that my friend Kate calls him "the silver fox". He's attractive, enigmatic, bawdy and sooooo coool. He says we're all going to drink Macedonian style at some point and say innapropriate things and murder our king. It'll be awesome.

Archaeology was also neat. We went to the foundations of a Roman temple up behind the Olympic Stadium (which is literally RIGHT next to our classroom buildings), and then walked around the other side to a ship shead from a pan-Athenaic festival. To clarify, the Olympic stadium was originally a stadium in the ancient world, which later became a quarry when it fell into disuse. The main road outside of the stadium used to be a river, down which the boat would sail with a dress for the statue of Athena that the pan-Athenaic festival kinda revolved around. The dress was knitted by young women of noble birth (any by young I mean like 10), and was placed upon the statue at the end of the procession. The ship was stored after the festival up above the stadium. I'm really wondering how they got the ship up above the ancient stadium but that's a question for another class period.

After Greek I was standing outside with my friend Paul and these two guys I had met previously (Taylor and Andrew) and I asked them if they wanted to go try to find the Hadrianic Arch with me. They did and so we went on a bit of a wild goose chase through the National Gardens, and made some dog friends. HERE IS THE ANIMAL SITUATION IN ATHENS: Athens decided to take in all the stray dogs that roam the area around the National Gardens and neuter them, treat them for fleas/ringworm/ect. and release them back to their home in the Gardens. Anthens in general has dogs and stray cats EVERYWHERE. The cats moan at night and sunbathe on people's SmartCars in the daytime, and the dogs protect certain areas of the city that they deem their territory. There is a stray dog outside of our classroom building, and there was one by the club last night who almost followed us in. These dogs have no fear of the crazy drivers in Athens, and they live within an inch of death I'm pretty sure every day. However, Athens people love these dogs and cats and feed them and take care of them better than they do the homeless. An old lady feeds the cats that roam the allyway we take to school every morning, and two fierce greek women (about to go clubbing) stopped to bend down and pet the dog who follwed us to the club. Seeing her pet the dog without fear made me less nervous, so I started petting him too, which is probably why he followed us to the club. He was so cute. soooo cute.

So we finally found the Hardianic Arch (which was enormous and tall and beautiful) and I was so happy. We walked by the site of the Temple of Olympian Zeus but the sun had gone down by that point so we couldn't go inside but it was HUGE. I guess monuments always look smaller in pictures. On our way back, we stopped by a cafe to get a snack (because dinner here, as I've said, is late), and I got a piece of Chocolate Pie (which was actually chocolate cake but I'm not picky) and a sparkling lemonade. It was so good, exactly what I needed after that long walk.

Later that night we went to a taverna for dinner and then bought some wine from a local convenience store to play kings with in our room. Paul doesn't drink and I think that's amazing. Especially later once we hit the club and he was bustin it out without any liquid courage. The club we went to was about a 25 minute walk from our room (but downhill mostly at least - but again, uphill on the way home), and was essentially an American club with a European feel. The bartender was American, and so was the dj, but basically this is how the Greek club scene goes down: Greek women don't dance, so Greek men every so often like to go to American clubs in Athens to see women dancing and maybe dance with them, becuase Greek men like to dance (sometimes). They weave in and out of groups of Americans (in a suprisingly non-predatory way) trying to dance with as many people as possible, and it's fun to dance with them becuase they want you to mirror their moves. It's silly, in an awesome way.

Tonight I think the plan is to go to the port (Piraeus) and look around there. So, wish me luck on Greek Weekend Round 2.