Baciami Ancora

     So the title of this post is probably a little misleading, since its actually Italian and the title of a song we listened to in class last semester.  Its sung by a popular Italian singer, Lorenzo something or other, and translated to English it basically means “Kiss Me Now.” Now you’re probably wondering why I’m starting my first blog form Greece with an Italian song title, and I’m obviously glad you asked.  Its kind of a long story… (shocker, right?) 
     We woke up this morning to clear blue skies, the silence that comes from the motor being turned off and about 7 different ferryboats visible from my tiny little porthole window. We were in Greece! After a quick stop on Facebook to wish Georgie happy birthday (definitely worth the internet minutes!) I headed up to meet Katie, Megan, Alex, Candice and Nicole for breakfast. The six of us are traveling together this week, and we figured it’d be good to meet up and figure out our plans for the day. Just as we were finishing the announcement was made that we were clear to leave the ship, but our passports wouldnt be ready until early afternoon. Rather than waste the day waiting around for them to be ready we decided we would head into Athens, see the Acropolis and some of the ruins then stop back at the ship to get our things before heading to our ferry.
     The metro is closed today, and the taxis are on strike too, so we decided the best way to get into town was to take a bus. After about an hour we had successfully managed to buy tickets, find the stop, get on the correct bus and get off at the main square, Syndagma. I was a little nervous when I saw we were to be getting off the bus here, since the only advice I had gotten from a friend in Greece was that you’ll be totally safe “as long as you stay away from Parliament.” Now what building do you think was directly across from the bus stop? Yep, the one and only. There were also a bunch of banners and signs that we couldn’t read but we could tell were from the protestors.  Not to worry, Mom and Dad, it was a quiet Sunday morning and we were able to (promptly) follow my map towards the sights we wanted to see.
     We headed to the ticket window for the Acropolis and Parthenon and were excited to see that there was a 50% discount with your student ID.  For some reason I was able to get in for free while everyone else had to pay 6 euros.  Maybe it was because I have an International Student ID card that study abroad programs recommend you buy, and looking fast they thought I was a student in the European Union? Who knows. Either way I kept quiet and waited inside the main gates for everyone else.
     Keep in mind that its about 10:30 and already we’re dripping with sweat. It fortunately doesn’t seem as humid as Croatia, but now I know why they didn’t even tell us the weather report at preport last night, saying only that “Well, its not supposed to rain!”  We started the hike up to the top of the hill and after just a few breaks for pictures (and shade), made it to the Parthenon. The view is incredible from up there, and everything really does look just how you’d imagine it. The structures are huge, the marble is smooth and worn and theres dust swirling around in the breeze everywhere you look. As Candice put it, if we had to be dirty at least we were getting dirty in historically significant dirt!
     Nicole and I got separated from the other 4 in among the crowds and crowds of people, and after we searched around for a while decided maybe they had headed down to the bottom of the hill. Stopping every 100 meters or so we slowly made our way back to the enterance, but no sign of the girls anywhere. Luckily, just when we were thinking we’d have to come back and hope we could meet up back at the ship, we saw them walking down the path.  It was a classic case of us looking for them while they were looking for us, but we all decided to call it a day and start the trip home.
     A stop for delicious and really inexpensive Greek street food and pocket style sandwiches was just what we needed after all of our walking, and as we walked to the bus stop we thought would bring us back we all gave in and did a little window shopping. We liked this one little jewelery store in particular, where the owner promised everything was half priced and, for us, she’d throw in another discount. As I stood and tried literally every ring in the case to find on that might fit (thanks a lot Mom for the tiny fingers!) I realized that I knew the song that was playing. You hear a lot of American music in these countries (the best was when we had an entire tour bus singing along to Celine Dion’s My Heart Will Go On) but I was pretty surprised to feel like I knew this song that was clearly in Greek.  Enter the title of the blog post here. It was Baciami Ancora, or, in Greek, Filame Akoma. How random is that?  Maybe it was just the heat getting to me because now as I type it it really sounds much less exciting, but at least I felt slightly better for my failed attempts at speaking Italian in Italy knowing that I remembered at least ONE thing from Professor Vairo!
    We managed to make it to the right stop, get on the right bus and get off right near the port terminal in Piraeus shortly after 1:30, and after stopping to pick up our passports and fill our water bottles we’re all getting ready to get on our way! We take a ferry to Mykonos at 5:45 PM and will be there until about 3 PM tomorrow when we take another ferry to Santorini. We’ll be there relaxing and exploring for two days and two nights before flying back here on Wednesday. Hopefully all goes according to plan and we’ll be back in plenty of time to do some last sightseeing, shopping, picture-uploading and get back on the ship to leave for Bulgaria!