Thursday, September 27, 2012

Walk like an Athenian...

We have had a great day today on Matt's birthday and hope to toast him with Ouzo tonight! We started with the hotel's complimentary breakfast (not exactly the powdered donuts-type of complimentary hotel breakfast we have back home)! Then we caught our 1/2 day tour and saw many ancient relics and sites as well as the Olympic stadium built in 1895 (a newer structure by Greek standards).
We spent a lot of time walking around the Acropolis - seeing the 4 remaining temples, including the Parthenon. We saw the place where St. Paul preached Christianity and we thought about the gospel readings, as in a Letter from the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians (Corinth is only 2 hours from here and we will stop there tomorrow). We also saw "the Assembly" - that place where Democracy began! We toured the new Acropolis Museum - built on pillars over some ancient ruins, and all the floors were made of glass so you could look down and see the ruins below your feet - excavation is underway. After the tour, we traipsed around the Temple of Zeus and also the Agora, where a few cool guys used to ponder human destiny, free will, etc: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Pericles...we did that, too, and decided that if we didn't love all those special people I mentioned a couple days ago, we might choose to stay here! Oh - and there are no protests today! All the streets are very narrow, the vespas own the road, the sidewalks are made of marble. Lots of smokers. Going shopping and out for Spanakopita and Gyros tonight! Democracy, literature, philosophy, medicine, politics, astronomy, art, and so much more! It gives me chills to think it all started here! Love from Athenia!

2 comments:

  1. Jen, you look great - very fit! And bro, about that picture of you standing in front of the Acropolis: I hope you're not thinking about that as your next remodeling project!

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