Yassas!

I finally have something interesting to write about! At the end of March, my friend Marika and I did some travelling in Greece and Spain during her spring break. Our first stop was Athens for 6 nights.

It was very strange travelling in a country where, not only do I not speak the language, but the language does not resemble any that I do speak and the alphabet is completely unintelligible. You are completely reliant on people speaking English and universal symbols (the sign for the toilet etc.)

Our first day there, we saw ruins! Lots and lots of ruins. We started with the Acropolis, which was a convenient 10 minute walk from our hostel. The site itself is on top of a small mount so it is very visible from the city below.

Me in front of the Parthenon:
The Erechtheion. The caryatids on the left are replicas; 5 of the originals are in the Acropolis Museum and the 6th is in the British Museum.
Below the Acropolis is the ancient Agora, which is mostly ruins in a more ruinous state than the Acropolis. There is the Temple of Hephaistos which is in pretty good repair. We impressed another family by knowing who Hephaistos was and who he was married to (Smith God, equivalent of Vulcan, and married to Aphrodite. Bonus fact: he was lame).
We also saw Hadrian's library, nearby but a different site, which had a very friendly cat and some turtles. Marika and I liked the 'smaller' ruins, where one could walk through the grass and touch the less important stones, rather than the Acropolis which was much busier and where you couldn't get as near to the actual temples.
Greece (or Athens) had a large population of stray cats and dogs; however, they were the best fed strays I've seen in my life. The dogs in particularly were practically fat! They were a bit of a mystery because they were docile, well fed and had collars but very clearly did not belong to anyone. In the afternoon, in the shade of every pillar and column, one was apt to find a medium to large sized dog, sprawled out and asleep.
I have lots and lots more pictures online here. If it asks for a password, use dunbar. If that doesn't work, comment or email me so I can try to fix it.

Part Two of Greece (Grecian Islands) and Barcelona coming soon!