Tim Ho -- Daily Life in Greece

After endless counts of gypsies and Moroccans, 2 chicken Souvlakis, 3 stray dogs (probably with rabies) following us half way through Athens, over 50 Euros spent, millions of buskers, 470 photos taken, bone-dry lips (toilets are a luxury when you’re travelling-so very little amounts of water is consumed), I’m positively relieved that I’ve made it onto the overnight Ferry to Italy in one piece.

Athens was, well, different. Although the city itself was fully functional, the heavily graffitied and often abandoned or in a state of disrepair buildings reminded me of the poorer and undeveloped parts of rural China. As we got off the plane through ‘customs’ (she just gave me “the eye”), I was so immensely overjoyed by an hour-long bus ride that I automatically popped 2 Sea-legs. (overdosing now are we) Walking along its streets, I found out that the amount of stray dogs and cats were overwhelming and that “dodgy-looking” people were everywhere. (well I thought that everyone was dodgy) So I swinged my bag forward and held my security pack tight. (thinking back that probably wasn’t a very good idea as that made obvious the fact that I was an elementary traveller) The busier parts of Athens were also overpopulated by rich (surprisingly, as they were using iPhones and alike) Moroccans selling fake Ray-bans and Nikes. It was difficult trying to navigate my way through busy streets, looking at potential souvenirs and avoiding being pick-pocketed in the Athens flea-market. The city, although dangerous and slightly run-down, had very cheap prices. With a chicken Souvlaki costing an average of 7 Euros and a statuette of Nike for 8, I thought I have made a bargain in this country.

Since this tour is indeed the Western Heritage Tour, perhaps I should talk more about the arts. Although all of the ancient buildings were magnificent, most of these buildings were in a serious state of ruin. However the Greek government really tries to conserve this that some of the modern buildings were built in this ancient style, (with colour, yay!) which really helped with my imagination of how grand the ancient ruins would have been if they were still in one piece. My favourite site in Athens was probably the Acropolis. Although most of Parthenon (the temple of Athena) has been bombed, the sheer size of the few remaining columns of the temple only fuelled my imagination of the grandeur of the ancient city. My favourite piece of art in the city was the Kritios Boy which was BEAUTIFUL, I honestly could not believe my eyes and I pondered how such soft skin could be brought out via this incredibly hard marble.

Currently I’m on the overnight ferry with gigantic eye bags as I’m slowly typing away on Mr B’s laptop. I’m feeling quite queasy (even though I overdosed again) so I am going to end this here. I’m out. :D