Stealing wireless connections...

So, I finally turned on my laptop here in Athens and realized that I can see a couple wireless connections. They're faint, but they're there! So, here are my observations from the past couple days...

8/9/07 5:00am Paris time

As I write this, I sit in Orly airport waiting for my flight to Athens. In the last couple days I have met a lovely older British lady that saw Ian McKellan play Macbeth, been rebuked by a French waiter for putting my napkin on my plate after I had finished eating, and slept for about a total of three hours. Now Danielle and I are on a serious mission to find some caffeinated product before taking off for Athens in about an hour.

The flight over from Seattle was a very long, relatively uncomfortable flight. The British flight attendants acted like they were doing us a favor by even asking us what we would like to drink, and the British couple behind us saw no problem with letting their young son continually kick my seat for almost the entire 8.5 hour flight. I am SERIOUSLY considering paying whatever it takes to upgrade to Business Class on the way back. However, I did get to watch Becoming Jane (great flick, made me cry!) and shut my eyes for several hours, even if I couldn’t sleep. At Heathrow we had to go through security again to get to the second leg of our flight, at which Danielle got her deodorant taken since it was a “paste” but managed to get her 5oz. container of lotion through.

During the flight to Paris Danielle managed to sleep, though I still stayed up reading. Then we went through French customs, which consisted of a lady asking if we had anything to declare, we said no, she asked me to open my carry-on bag, she glanced in, and waved us on. Apparently we don’t look like the type to smuggle illegal products in (sorry Rob, no stories of body cavity searches!).

This is Danielle’s first trip to Europe, and my second (though, I was with a school group the entire time before, so this is my first time “on my own”). So far, it has been an interesting ride. We managed to brave the Paris subway and bus system, and Danielle received her first proposal, of what I’m sure will be many. Most of the people we have spoken to have been from places other than Paris. The gentleman who proposed to Danielle was from a small island near Jamaica. The kind hotel man that drove us to Orly was originally from Morocco. He is in the last year of study for his PhD in Economics and has had to work doubly hard for it due to the intense racism that exists for individuals from Muslim countries.

Danielle is rather amazed by how people just stare at us. I told her that after a few weeks in Europe she’ll be able to spot Americans from a mile off as well. She understood that, but not why they just STARE. I said “they’re French”! In my mind, that explains it all ;).

So, wish us luck on our search for caffeine and I will write again once we are settled in our hostel in Athens!

8/10/07 1:30pm Athens time
The only way to describe the last couple of days is "wow". After flying for three hours and wending our way for an hour through the amazingly clean Athens subway systems, we arrived at our hostel. Granted, it's a hostel, but relatively nice considering. It has an amazing location, only two blocks from the Acropolis and the Temple of Zeus, plus it has a fun little roof bar.
We arrived at noon, filled out the requisite paperwork, promising to think that "Gareth [the hostel owner? manager?] is amazing", and then wandered over to a little picturesque cafe where we had mousaka and watermelon. SO good! We returned to the hostel after that since our room was ready, and moved in. There were a few girls in our room, nice youngsters from Australia and they invited us to dinner later. Then we were off.
We walked a couple of blocks until we reached the outskirts of the Acropolis complex.
Un-freakin-believable.
We strolled through the Theatre of Dionysos and other ruins, wending our way up the giant hill, until finally reaching the top of the Acropolis. We were both so exhausted by that point that the only exclamations of excitement were occasional grunts and, if it was especially good, the whispered "wow". I swear, it had to have been 120 degrees outside, and walking up the side of a mountain in the baking sun is a bit rough, but it was still amazing. Just looking around and realizing that this has been standing since the 5th century BC is very humbling and exciting at the same time. Seeing not only the Parthenon, but also the Erechtheum that I remember from my Greco-Roman Cultures class, was so much fun.

By the time we got back down, we were both praying that our red faces were from the heat and not horrible sunburns, and so thirsty that I felt like lapping up the water that was trickling down the hill from the hoses watering the plants. We walked over back by our hotel and found some gelato, sat down and enjoyed that, then came back to the hostel where we checked our email and promptly came upstairs and passed out. We slept for about three hours, then woke up and headed up to the rooftop bar. Once there we drank a couple of Mythos beers (only 2 Eu!) until 8pm when we returned to our room to meet up with our new roommates to head to dinner. Claire, an 18 year old from Brisbane, led the way, walking through the maze of streets to some place she had found the night before. Danielle and I ordered another beer, some dolmades and saganaki, the MOST amazing fried cheese, and we split a gyro. Towards the end of our meal, some guys from the hostel that the girls we were with knew walked up and started chatting. All of a sudden, one of them starts salivating over all the food on the table, and before I know it, picks up my fork and starts eating my dinner! I was slightly stunned, of course, but just kept my mouth shut, and after he walked away I used Danielle’s fork to finish my meal. SO weird. After dinner we came back to the rooftop bar at the hostel where we met this guy from Seattle. He had decided we looked familiar and after talking for a few minutes, Charlie and I realized that he’s actually in my program in Siena! Random coincidence…

So, Charlie wanders off, and up walks this guy who had eaten some of my dinner. He apologized profusely, so forgive and forget, right? He starts chatting with us, and he seemed to have an interesting life. Unfortunately, he thought so too. Anytime Danielle or I started to tell a story of our own, he would be distracted by something else, then suddenly would turn back and start talking about himself again. Lemme tell ya, this guy LOVED himself!

Finally, at 11:30pm the rooftop bar shut down. Mr. I’m-in-love-with-myself invited us with a bunch of his friends to go to this bar around the corner. We politely declined and came back to our room where we were out like lights. I will say, we lucked out when we got this room. It has a kick ass air conditioner that keeps it probably the coolest room in the building, and since it’s off another room, we don’t hear a darn thing, it’s completely silent in here. We slept until about 9:30 this morning when we headed down to breakfast, which consisted of a hard-boiled egg, some toast and some tea. Not the best, but, hey, it’s free, who’s complaining? After breakfast we came back upstairs and said our goodbyes (all of the girls in our room were leaving today), washed up, then headed back out. After getting some great iced cappuccinos, we wandered over to Hadrian’s Arch and the Temple of Zeus. Yeah. That’s right. You know, the one that’s one of the few remaining 7 wonders of the ancient world that’s still standing? Completely awe-inspiring. The columns were ENORMOUS! Just beautiful. After taking a million pictures and exclaiming incessantly over how incredible they were, we finally left and went to the Zappeion, which was built in 1888 and was one of the first buildings in Europe specifically designed for exhibitions and conferences. It was very pretty, with a gorgeous courtyards and beautifully decorated dome. Outside we also got a bunch of pictures of military exercises going on. These kids couldn’t have been much older than 18. They were so YOUNG! We wandered back through the gardens and saw their “zoo”, or a bunch of domesticated birds, some goats, and a donkey in an enclosure, finally ending up at the Byzantine museum. Incredible art and sculptures. I was continually gasping and moaning with delight wandering through there.

At this point, we were starving, headed back, got a gyro, and walked back to the hostel where I sit now. Athens is such an amazing city. Around every corner there’s more history, more ruins. Which, if you know me, you realize that means that I’m having something akin to an orgasm every two minutes. I would love to come back to Greece again in the future, maybe branch out from Athens, but I have greatly enjoyed my time here.

Now, off to Prague!