Last Moments in Athens

I had a nice time in Athens. It was great to hunker down with my grandparents for a while. It was definitely a discipline to not do a trip the way I would want to – I didn't stay in a fancy hotel, or live in the city center, or spend all my time near the water, but on the other hand, I got quality time with my grandfather, probably the first time in my life. We mostly played gin rummy.

So, overall, thumbs up on Athens – I'm sure that an American or European on a 'grand tour' would enjoy a short visit to Athens, I used to tell people 'don't bother,' but now I'd say two to three days in Athens would be nice. Don't spend more – I'd rather be on the islands, or in Rome, personally, unless I'm hanging out at Tavernas with my family.

Back from Final Dinner

Just got back from a last dinner with Voula, Papou and Aris. I sent a bunch of pictures using my phone, but the photoblogging seems to have stopped working.

I'm pretty sure Voula is going to drive Aris crazy.

"Tell me something, Aris, what did you have for lunch?"

"I had pasta at an Italian restaurant."

"You had Italian."

"Yep."

"That's funny, because I smelled grease on your sweater in the car."

"Well, I didn't have anything with grease on it for lunch."

"You didn't go to Italian for lunch, you went somewhere with fries."

"I didn't have fries for lunch, I had Italian. You probably just smelled smoke on my sweater."

"I didn't smell smoke! I smelled grease."

Aris was reasonably nice about it, and maybe lying, who knows? But, he's 30 years old. (And an only child). Ten minutes later.

"Tell me something Aris, what time did you go to bed last night?"

"Oh, 3 am." (This is a pretty normal weekend bedtime for Greeks; they eat at 10 to 11 pm on a weekend).

"And what time did you wake up?"

"10:30, 11:00 why?"

"Because I can see from your eyes that you did NOT go to bed at 3 am, you went to bed 5, 5:30."

"My eyes are red because I've been working 70 hour weeks, mom. Not because I went to bed at 5 am."

"You went to bed at 5 am!"

That, in my opinion, is a lot of pressure. I'll try and send up some pictures before I fly back.

 

at dinner with the family

I am pretty sure that Voula is driving Aris insane.

FW: olive log fire

Today I witnessed an argument in which one side claimed there can't be fireplaces in america because we can't buy olive logs.

olive log fire

Today I witnessed an argument in which one side claimed there can't be fireplaces in america because we can't buy olive logs.

Third Day Roundup

Crazy day yesterday – We went to that taverna I took some pictures of. Wow, what a great place. There is also an outdoor pool which Voula told me the parents send their kids to in the summer. Kids swim, parents eat – genius.

Then we went home. Leaving the parking lot, I witnessed a truly spectacular marital spat / high stress moment. Imagine you're an 84 year old man, and your 62 year old wife took the keys away from you a few years ago, so you can't drive. Now, imagine that, although you are 84, you know your wife is not a very good driver. Now, imagine that your wife gets her car stuck in a Greek taverna leaving the lot so that owners of another car must be found in the restaurant so that they can come move their car.

I don't mind telling you that I thought a walk would do me good after that high stress experience. Aris says he's worried Papou will have a heart attack from stress about his younger son. Parking stress was enough to give me a heart attack…

So, I went to the local 24 hour Internet café a few blocks away. On Saturday night. I think I would have been pretty happy to have an internet café as a kid. It provides a social structure for geeks, and a place for them to go. There were even a few girls (I think just updating myspace pages, they left quickly). The boys played and played. I got there at 11 pm, and stayed until 3:30. Greek teenagers came up to me, quite friendly, and asked things like "What Server?" referring to the World of Warcraft server I was playing on.

I inhaled about a pack of cigarettes due to secondhand smoke (really, my throat is raw this morning), my clothes smell like ass, and I've memorized the 200 ways that greek teens can use "Malakas" with each other during repeated matches of counterstrike.

I must apologize, dear reader for not getting a picture of this stellar 24 hour location – its beautiful purple-hued lights will need to remain a picture only in your mind.

the CleanSeat(tm) washes the seat top.

where are the japanese? I love this thing!

kanakis garden taverna. yow!

yes,that is an indoor pool. yes,that is a wedding cake next to a walkway over the indoor pool. yes, I am loving the taverna.

Lunch with Aris

Had a fun lunch with Aris today, we went out somewhere a little bit more modern near Athens. There were restaurants, places to walk, and a Starbucks!! (See previous photos of me enjoying American imperialism.) The Americano was not quite like America, but close. In Greece, they still sell 'short, tall, grande,' no 'venti'. At least they know what their product strategy will be over the next five years – get those Greeks to fatten up and order the Venti Frappuccinos!

Aris is a businessman, like Papou and my dad. It was fun to hear what's happening with him. I'm sure he'll be owning a number of restaurants in the future. It's nice to catch these family synchronicities – hard work, entrepreneurialism, etc. Finding out Papou at one point had over 100 employees was quite a surprise too. I learned yesterday that he lost his business due to a tragic accident killing one of his workers while he was in Greece. Clearly a turning point in his life.

mm, starbucks.

viva l'globalization

uncle Aris

going out with Aris soon

going out with Aris for lunchsoon,I have to admit I am disappointed it's not for drinks,since it is onlylunchtime. more soon.

Voula

Third Morning In Athens

I had a lovely half-hour interlude with Georgia and Costa this morning; they came to see me and get some shopping done with Voula. It was really nice to see them – they're so obviously pleased to see me. I realized last night that I'm having trouble being taken care of here – I never really had grandparents; I'm not good at being babied. In Greece, where there is something like 1.5 grandchild per set of four grandparents, grandkids are made much of, apparently.

At any rate, I realized that I'm starving for some intellectual conversation – Costa and Georgia are very engaging, very educated. It's much more what I'm used to in Bosotn. The people we hang out with in Boston are typically so smart they don't even need to show it. I think I hadn't realized what an impact on our quality of life that is. It makes me think that if we live elsewhere, we should take into account education levels; I just sort of immediately perked up this morning to get to talk language, economics, stuff like that.

So they made the hard push that we should come visit them, and I think we should. To be clear, Athens is still a pit in my mind, it's truly horrible. But, I think I could understand how we'd spend a good amount of time on the island with our kids in a few years. Watching Papou makes me realize there isn't a lot of time left; I think Chelsea and I should probably decide if we're going to regularly come to Greece with our kids, or just once or twice before Papou dies.

Georgia said in Greece they call the last child the "Benjamin". I love it, it's so cute. I told her in America we say "youngest daughter." I guess "Baby" is the more common term. In any event, come on Vess Baby 3! We're waiting for you.

I got a little video with Costa and Georgia. He told me if I came for six months he would speak English perfectly. I told him my Greek would be much better as well. It's weirdly nice to be liked just because I'm family – it's never really been my situation.

 

Second Day in Athens

I went downtown with Voula today. Bus -> Subway. It was fine. I'm used to a pretty convenient life in Boston, I think. Athens is just terrible. It's like a Middle-East city trying to Europeanize itself. So, on the one hand, Athenians seem better dressed, there are more of them, they look much more 'European' than before, albeit with far more dark hair (and the light haired ones showing roots). On the other hand, it's still totally polluted, there aren't really the city squares that make so much of Italy just awesome. Overall, in the last 13 years, it's much nicer. Much nicer. But, still, just not as nice as almost any other major city in Europe that I've been to.

So much for Greek blood loving the paterland!

I bought the girls and Chelsea presents downtown, that was fun. It's deep-discount sale time; things are remarkably cheap here. It's kind of funny to see all these clubbing outfits and hipster-type sweaters on sell in shop after shop for like 20 to 40 Euros. Suits for 75 Euros. No wonder Greeks can wear suits all the time – they cost less than a shirt in Boston!

The salesperson was nice, very flirty with me, dressed in this weird combination of like club clothes and salesclothes; pointy toed boots, white and black overlaid tops. She was super friendly until I guessed her age at 28. After that, I got pouts and the cold shoulder. Hah! We all age, baby. I thought the whole thing was hilarious.

This trip has meant some serious quality time with Voula. I mean a lot of time with Voula. Wow. We're spending like eight hours a day, it feels like. Papou can't really go out, certainly not to go shopping, so we had quite a bit of time together. She's really incredibly sweet, in every way, and she's totally devoted to Papou. It's quite remarkable how hard she works for him, and she's not bitter at all – she just completely loves him. I mean, they fight, loudly, but every possible danger to him she points out, and worries about.

I got some amazing footage today of Papou and Voula, unfortunately Voula was off camera, talking about Papou's surgery. I didn't want to move because the story was so intense. I hope it came out well on camera, we'll have to see.

It's midnight in Greece, I'm just getting going. I'm going to get to work editing my book.

First Hours in Athens

Voula picked me up from the airport, which was really nice of her. I've learned from my book about Greeks to not thank her too much – I don't want to remove the obligation I'd have to do the same thing by being too grateful. Got it. The new airport is closer to Glyka Nera than the old one, so I got a (pleasantly) shorter car trip than I thought I would. It's interesting to see how the neighborhood has changed since 1993; this was a pretty new development then, no trees, no pavement. Now there are real streets, some with trees. The corners are a flashier version of what I remember with a few more global brands; sort of late '90s era glass and steel streetcorner buildings.

Greece so far is a funny mix of Europe and the middle east: civil servants at the airport were noticeably less hostile than in places I've been in Africa, but I've just finished reading a Brit's book about moving to Athens, and am chock full of stories of local favors, bribes, toadyism and etc, so I think I'm wary of thinking I'm in Europe. If Europe is typified by, say the Dutch, then I'm definitely not in Europe.

All this makes me wonder what Europe really is. People have been thinking hard about this for a long time, and intensely since Turkey has asked to join the EU. I didn't really care very much about the stories I read on this at the time, but being here makes me think the question is more relevant to me than I'd expected.

Papouli is pretty old, moving slowly. He's now 84. I'd say Yaya seems in much better shape for her age, although Papou might have a few years on her, I'll have to ask dad. He loved seeing videos of the girls, I wish that I'd brought more. Perhaps we can send him some later; I could also download that youtube one of the kids that I've got.

He pointed at Olivia and said "you were in your mother's tummy last time I saw you!" It was very endearing. I talked to Aris and will see him sometime in the next few days, hopefully to go out with him. That should be fun – Athens with my uncle Aris. I can't wait. Resolved – no complete drunkenness.