All day yesterday I kept saying “ACROPOLIS!” to myself, sometimes out loud.
We got to Athens the day before yesterday, several hours later than we’d expected, and were greeted by stifling heat. I think it was about 92 degrees farenheit when we got here, and quite humid. The guy we were renting an apartment from couldn’t meet us because our plane had been delayed and he’d had to go to work. We waited in the shady National Garden, near Syntagma square, and ate some cheese-filled flaky pastries that we’d bought on the street. I was extremely disgruntled about the weather.
Our apartment guy finally called after a little while, and informed us that his mother would meet us with the keys to the apartment. When we arrived, sweaty and wilted, we found her very annoyed because she had been waiting for a while, with a taxi running outside. Of course, we had no way of knowing she was there until the guy called us, so it wasn’t really our fault. She was immediately suspicious of us, and probably rightfully so, because we’d made a reservation for 3 people, then changed it to 2 people when my brother decided to couchsurf instead, but three of us showed up. We said “he’s not staying here, he’s staying with a friend.” She said “where does your friend live?” And he said “I don’t know.” Riiiight.
After we sort of convinced her we weren’t lying, she left and we showered and went out to meet Joe’s couchsurfing contacts for a “traditional Greek music night.” We arrived at a bar/restaurant (taverna?) near Kerameikos to meet some very friendly Greek kids in the general vicinity of our age, who were sitting at a long table in a somewhat empty, large place with a nice garden out back. Thankfully the place was lightly air conditioned. Some Mezedes were ordered and Raki was ordered. Turns out I do not like Raki, even the non-anise-flavored kind. I do, however, like a Greek beer called Fix. More people showed up. The place filled up. More food and drink were ordered and people were all sharing the food and passing it around and the table was improbably piled up with plates and cups and beer bottles. It was agreed that the music would start, and it became clear that it was our tablemates who would be producing it. They started playing greek music with string instruments, and it sounded a lot like Klezmer music I’ve heard all my life. It was really good, what I could hear of it. But the restaurant was still loud and crazy, so rather than a concert this was more of a jam session in the middle of a crowded restaurant. A insists that he cannot think of a place in NYC where this sort of thing could take place — a bunch of people just sit down at a table at a crowded restaurant and start playing music. It was pretty wacky and great, but I am sure that this could happen at various venues in NY. What do you think?
I was getting increasingly exhausted, since I’d only slept 4 hours the night before, our last night in Paris. We decided to catch the last Metro back to our apartment, leaving Joe (my brother) to his couchsurfing Greek traditional musician friends. He told us the next day that they moved to a large park and joined about 50 other people in a big circle and kept playing, and the music got better and better. Amazing. He was out until 5 AM and thus did not join us for the first half of our adventures yesterday.
It remains disgustingly, horribly, stiflingly hot in Athens and apparently throughout Greece this week. I have a really hard time figuring out ways not to get cranky in this weather, but I am working on it. Nonetheless, I’ve been having a fantastic time so far, and I’d venture to say my travel companions have been having a great time too. I am extremely, extremely glad that we rented an apartment with a functional, very strong, air conditioner.
