i am now readjusting...

...to my current singular existence. m left yesterday morning, on the 02:45 ferry to be exact, and now my travel buddy, my partner, is back in the nyc. after you've had a companion for 2 weeks straight it seems strange at first to not think of another person's wants. minus one "discussion" that was not too heated, some tense moments (me) when dealing with tiny, crowded streets the time was marvelous. and most of all fun. i decided to just 'backwrite' instead of going back and editing previous posts.

athens i was not too impressed with. aside from the history, the plaka, all of 'the givens' of course, there is not much to be drawn to. astounding amounts of the city is in ruins and/or abandoned, the city itself is rather dirty and unkept, graffitied.

we started our trip out like this:
i kid. i kid. m was quite the trooper actually. after an overnight flight with lack of sleep and loud french boys kicking his seat we went for our first of many, many cappuccinos/freddo cappuccinos/frappes and started the day.









these are our very failed attempts at achieving the cute art of 'timer self-portraits'.



















we're both, happily, very good wanderers. we didn't make it to acropolis until the last (of 3) days actually. instead, we stumbled upon things like this.

there is a lot of turmoil going on in athens right now and one of the unique experiences was being there while the immigrant workers were on strike. our hotel was in omonia square, 2 Fashion House (it's good and relatively cheap if you are looking to stay in a clean, central location) which happened to be where the workers were planning their day long (beginning at 5am mind you) rally. it's not too often you get to experience that on vacation...or be woken up by it.


also, as a side note, m and i were enjoying a lovely evening sitting in omonia square (post rally) and were approached to purchase 'any drug we like. you snort, you smoke, you inject' we kindly refused the oddly attractive drug dealer(s). about 20 secs later they were coming back to us. i suppose we had been kind enough to them to evoke a protectiveness towards us. haha. they informed us like this, "you(pointing to m), you good, you(pointing to me), you good. here, (gesturing around) no good. you see? all bad people here, bad things" he then proceeded to mimic old, drugged men...i had wanted to ask him to mimic himself then, yes?...but thought it to be in poor form. although m and i felt fine we obliged and took the local's advice. upon departure he tried to tell us either...if m was not there he would take me home for himself...or that if m were not there i could make a lot of money whoring myself out...either way, flattering...? huh? we all had a laugh. aren't misguided comments fun.



we did have the best meal of our entire trip in athens, however. i feel confident speaking for m with that statement. it was at The Butcher Shop in the neighborhood of Gazi.
(Persefonis19,Gazi, Athens 11852, Greece, Tel: 2103413440) it consists of basic meat dishes, but they are all delicious. honestly. believe me, we tried almost all of them. haha. i bought some things from the flea market and m was turned on to a new brand of cigarettes(to us), George Karelias& Son, by a tobacconist.

we soon realized that we loved how detailed greece's 'warning' signs are so you will see a number of them on this blog at some point i'm sure.








once we did make it to acropolis it was very spectacular. the place was filled with people (i can't imagine what it's like in the high season) and because we were there in spring they were doing a lot of restoration. there were many signs stating how the previous restorations (in the late 1800s and the 1940s) were incorrectly done and were now having to be rectified. i must say there was sort of an air of pity and ineptitude in the postings towards the previous restorers. haha. this may be fair enough, but can you imagine trying to restore the parthenon in 1890?!































this picture sums up athens to me.