June 21: Ssssstoa stoa stoa

Today we went to the Lysykrates monument, there wasn't too much that was special about it, except that it marked the tripods of the games and contests that were won by the Athenians. The one we saw in Plaka , Rachel did her presentation on this monument by the way, was preserved only because the monks used it as a library when the Turks took it over. We then walked through Plaka to the Roman Agora and the Greek Agora. All these ruins tend to blend together after awhile and I am so scared of forgetting everything. But this is such a beautiful place! History is all around you wherever you walk. Pieces of marble that are built into houses and floors came from ancient times and are being reused. The Roman Agora was huge, possibly the size of a football field. Arranged similarly to a forum. The Greek Agora was much more open with all of the temples than the Roman Agora. The Zeus Elietherios which is a temple dedicated to Zeus is here as well as the Temple of the Twelve Gods. The preservation of this civic area was incredible depicting a drainage system and Simon the shoemaker's house. Hephestus' temple is the most preserved temple in all of the ancient world and although you can't go inside of it, the outside looks as if it has only suffered minor erosion. My favorite part of visiting the Agora was taking pictures in the Stoa of Alltus. We all lined up behind a column and peeked our heads out for George our guide to take our picture. After the stoa, we ate lunch at ΣΑΒΒΑΣ ( Sabbas) avin Manisteraki a downtown suburb of Athens. It seems as if it is one of the most congested districts similar to that of Mons or another European district filled all kinds of shops, restaurants, and anything you could ever think of needing. Plenty of entertainment as well as churches and mosques are here. I ate Pita and Tzatziki and was so proud of myself when we ordered in Greek. I said: Boro na eho mea pita ke tatziki parakolo. I think I could literally live off tzatziki sauce this stuff is amazing. The yogurt and cucumber and garlic combination is so delicious, plus it is affordable for the budget I am putting myself on. I want so many things here that it is difficult to find time to look for them! Kerameikos was our next stop, an archeological sight that served as a sanctuary and burial ground for the dead. We however could only stay for 15 minutes; 5 minutes in the museum and 10 outside on the grounds because they closed at 3 pm and we thought that they closed at 5pm. It was sad yet the development although huge couldn't quite be established unless you had an creative imagination. It depicted the sacred gate as well as many public and private tombs. The Eleusian mysteries are said to have originated here and went 13 miles. On the way back we pasted doctors without borders medic trailer. Then tried our luck at bargaining for our desired loot. They have these necklaces for 5 Euro where you can get your name inscribed in Greek or they have clothes that are made of a shimmering cotton made into dresses and shirts. Perri got these beautiful blue earrings for 3 Euro and I tried my hand at scoring scarves for 8 Euro. The cheapest ones that we found were 4 Euro a piece. I came up to the deck when we got back to the hotel, this had become our usual routine and wrote most of this, it's hard to find the time to wrote everything down. Diana has a friend who also goes to UNC as well whose a freshman and studying abroad here with a different program in Greece. She is taking a language immersion program and living in an apartment in Syntagma until August. I don't think I would like that as much as traveling around all of Greece and learning the culture of all of the ancient tribes and civilizations that lived here as well as the rest of the islands. So we had dinner with her in Plaka and we heard her horror story about how she got her ipod stolen on the metro. And what do you know the this was the first time that our whole group wasn't eating together, Brian wasn't here. He had been trying to get us to buy Ouzo for all of us for about a week now and the one time that he isn't here we all randomly decided o try it. I heard it burns when it goes down and tastes like licorice. So when the waiter brought out drinks, naturally I was apprehensive about trying it but thought that I might as well try it while I can. So I chugged it. All of it. It went down smoothly and had a slight sweet taste but it wasn't until afterwards that I felt the after burn. I only had one shot but I was definitely tipsy after that. We went to the roof after dinner and talked for about an hour, usually these talks get become very specific, they are more like debates really. All the while the acropolis is in our mists shining down upon us. What could be better than this?

Quotables of the day:

Alien Boy playing a guitar like object : I love money

McCoy me too

Perri said she wanted to go shopping at the parakalo…( parakalo means please)

Jenn-Indian/Albanian/ Serbain cotton argument. A Greek store keeper told us that all the other stores cotton is like plastic, we had heard this several times already so Jenn asked if the ones that felt like cotton like hers were made by: the Serbians? The Albanians? Indians? Chinese? This woman obviously couldn't take a joke that we were making saying that the shirt she was trying to sell us came from a sweatshop as they can be seen on every street in Athens.