My First European Soccer Game

After a long hiatus, due to traveling through Israel, I am back.  We just got back from Israel yesterday; however, this blog post is going to be about what we did the night before we left for Israel. 

After about two weeks of living in the Artemis with no real travel under this semester’s belt, the students were anxious to do something big.  So, the night before we were to leave for Israel, just about all the students found something big to do.  Probably not the best time to go out and do stuff, but no one could resist.  About 5 students went with Vicky (our receptionist and Greek teacher) to go see a play in downtown Athens.  In addition to that, 17 students and myself went to the AEK football (American soccer) game in Athens. 

Those of us going to the game first went to the mall in Athens.  We had a couple of hours to walk around, shop (if you so chose) and eat dinner.  One of the students and I split a bucket at KFC in the Athens mall.  It tasted great!  It was almost identical to the KFC back home.  A bunch guys went to the Ruby Tuesday in the mall and ate a ridiculous amount of ribs. 

The stadium is just one subway stop from the mall, but we decided to walk it because the time on our previous tickets had expired and we didn’t want to have to pay another 1.40 euro (yes, they have raised the price of subway tickets, while we’ve been here this semester!) just to go one stop when we would have to buy tickets again after the game.  Also, I wasn’t exactly sure where the subway stop was around the Olympic complex (the game was being played in the 2004 Olympic Stadium).  It only took us about 15 minutes to walk there from the mall. 

As we entered into the stadium complex many from our group bought scarves and other AEK paraphernalia.  As our group purchased items at the stands entering the park we were told a very colorful (to say the least) story of a drunken fan’s favorite AEK football victory… 

Our seats were amazing.  We were about row 19 I believe, from the field!  We were right even with the goal line.  If you bisected the corner-kick corner that line would just about hit us.  Needless to say we got to see a great game on our end of the field. 

This was my first soccer game to ever go to, even though I played the game from kindergarten through 10^th or 11^th grade.  It was so much fun.  If we were about at 11 o’clock in the stadium, on the ground level, then AEK’s “super-fans” were at about 6-7 o’clock in the upper deck.  They were really something to watch.  They threw toilet paper and flares and yelled songs all game long.  The stadium was really empty.  In fact there was only maybe 20 people in front of us, in all the 18 rows below us in our section.  Only half of the stadium was being used, and it was not very full at all.  I should also tell you that this was some sort of a rivalry game, from what I’ve been told.  The team name was Aris (after Ares, god of war) and they were from Thessaloniki (you may know it as biblical Thessalonica). 

After the game we walked back to the mall’s metro station and got on the rail to head back home.  As we waited on the platform for our metro, fans were there, chanting and singing, even though AEK lost 2-1.  Even once the metro got there the fans were singing on the actual metro as we zipped across Athens and into the outlying areas.  Dr. James met us at the Koropi metro station since the buses had quit running for the night.  He took all the girls back and then came back for all us guys. 

Even though “our team” AEK lost, we didn’t care.  It was still an awesome cultural experience and I hope that this group will want to go back for another game.  I’m always down for a game.  Especially since the ticket for our great seats only cost 20 euro, not a bad deal… I guess.

Soup Kitchens, Bon Fires and Fashion Shows...What a Week

Alas, it feels great to be writing about what just happened in the past few days and not from what happened over a week ago.  Monday was our first chance to help out with the soup kitchen.  Dr. James drove 8 students and myself into downtown Athens via the big white passenger van (more on why I wasn’t driving the van in a minute.)

We left the Artemis about 5 pm and it took us an hour an half to get to the soup kitchen in downtown Athens.  The reason it took so long was because the metro was on strike that day so everyone had to drive.  Traffic was crazy!  I was in charge of navigating, via Dr. James’ iPad. 

We made it to the soup kitchen, which was on the 8^th floor of the building, at about 6:35.  We sat up there until about 7:30, once the preaching finished, and then began to serve the soup.  Let me step aside to explain.  The 8^th floor overlooks the 7^th floor.  The 7^th floor is a large room with rows of tables and a small stage at one end, like you would see at an elementary school or something. 

I went down to the 7^th floor to serve all the round tables that hugged the two perpendicular walls.  The longer of the two walls had huge windows that looked out onto…wait for it…the Acropolis, which was all lit up.  It was an amazing site!  It truly looked like a picture.  After my group served our tables we went back up to the 8^th floor to begin washing the bowls.  We had to do this because another group was coming in as soon as the first group finished eating.  So, all in all, we washed every dish, some multiple times.  At the end of the night we found out that we served about 400 people, which is more than they’ve had in the past year.  Before we left, we went up to the roof, the floor just above us to get a nice look at nighttime Athens, especially of the Acropolis. 

Afterwards, about 9, we meandered our way through the windy pedestrian streets of the Plaka to make our way to Sabbas, many a HUG students favorite gyro place.  It was astounding how empty the Plaka was.  What was even more astounding was the view we had once again of the lit-up Acropolis.  As we looked up the narrow streets we could see the well-lit Acropolis, a very cool excursion all around. 

Tuesday was an interesting day, the first day I practiced driving stick.  The only downside was that there are not really any parking lots around here I can just go to and practice.  Instead, I had to learn on the back streets of Porto Rafti.  Actually, to get the white van (now you see why I couldn’t drive the students into Athens in the van Monday) out of our complex I had to back out and circle around (almost a 3-point turn) which probably was not the best thing to start on.  I definitely killed it enough for my first time. 

That night, a group decided we have spent enough time watching movies at night so instead we were going to have a bonfire down at the beach.  After dinner I took 4 other students with me, along with firewood, and drove down to the beach.  The rest of the group, basically all but 5 students took about 30 minutes to walk to the beach.  It was ridiculously windy and took forever to start a fire, however, once we got it started it was a great fire!  I had to ferry most of the students back because it was so cold.  I took about 5 car loads back and then a few students decided to walk all the way back.

When I went to pick up the last group, I rolled up on them singing.  It was a great time with about 9 students.  We were the only people on the beach except for two people that walked up.  The started to talk to us and we found out that they were here on a mission trip from Florida.  Weird!

Wednesday I spent some more time that afternoon practicing driving stick.  I killed it much less than the day before, so that’s always good, slowly improving.  That night, some students were planning to go to a fashion show in Athens, however, the tickets they thought they had fell through.  So, we decided to have our own fashion show here at the Artemis.  Naturally I “SUITED UP!”

Everyone who participated in the Fashion Show.

Thursday it rained all day, really hard.  The students decided to watch movies all day; the first one was Hercules.  Great choice!

Today, Friday, we just chilled around.  Doing work.  Typical day of class.  I did payroll for the students for the first time.  I think they were excited to get paid.  I also helped plan out a soccer (European football) trip tomorrow.  We are going to watch AEK vs. Aris at the 2004 Olympic Stadium in Athens. 

This may be my last post for a while.  We are leaving on Sunday for a trip to Israel.  I’m taking my netbook with me, but we’ll see how much Internet I actually get there. 

Talk to you guys later.  Thanks for following along.  

Playing Catch-Up: A Week in Review

Today I’m going to attempt to do the impossible, catch up on my blog.  (An eerie silence falls over all the blog followers.)  Yes, even though it is over one week after the last day I wrote about in the previous blog post I shall catch up, mainly because nothing of great touring importance happened, but maybe you’ll still be interested in following my life here. 

Sunday- We woke up whenever we wanted to (Lazy Sunday wake up in the late afternoon call Parnell just to see how he’s doin’…..Anybody?  Ok, anyways).  We left for church at 3:30 to give us a while to walk around and explore Glyfada.  Glyfada is like a suburb of Athens that is really nice.  Our church meets in the Kong Palace Hotel, the place that HUG used to live in during the early days.  Church meets at 6, but it takes about 30 minutes to get there and then we were just going to chill until church.  There is a Starbucks a block behind the church that most of us went to.  At church we are the majority.  There were about 20 others.  This is an English speaking service.  It’s somewhat of a church plant, for lack of a better word, of the church in downtown Athens.  The same preacher, Dino, preaches.  He is also the boss of Aristotle Travel, the travel agency we use here at HUG. 

Looking down on Porto Rafti from the mountain.
You can see the HUG building about in the dead middle.

Monday was the first day of class.  After class, we took a group of kids to the Koropi metro because they wanted to go into Athens.  Dr. James drove the large passenger van and I followed with the small blue sedan behind him.  After we dropped those off at the metro station the other 5 students continued with Dr. James and I on to the Greek equivalent of Best Buy.  It was a fun little adventure, seeing where Greeks buy their electronics.  Then we went to the “Famous Brands” factory outlet mall.  It’s not like an outlet mall you would think of in America.  It was a huge building, like a Wal-Mart or Sam’s, that had little half rooms, or dividing walls, where different stores had their own room.  We saw stores such as Nike, The North Face, Tommy Hilfiger, New Balance and many, many others. 

Then I drove back to Porto Rafti with the students in my car.  We drove all around Porto Rafti.  We took a right at the “Y” and went all the way to the paid beach and up the mountain to look back on Porto Rafti.  Then we went back to the “Y” and went to the left and drove a while, eventually up a mountain to a fort.  We found out later that the fort is a nice restaurant.  Then before coming back to the Artemis we stopped for ice cream. 

The road to the right of the "Y."  Far left is the parking for the
private beach.

The first group of the semester to hike the mountain.

Tuesday- I finally led a group of students on a hike up the mountain across the street.  Even though it had rained nearly everyday since we’ve been here, we decided to go anyways and hope the mountain wasn’t too slippery.  It was only slippery in a few places.  
It took an hour from the front door to get to the top.  Coming day was pretty rough.  It was very thorny!  It was thorny on the way up too, of course.  However, I guess we came down a different way because it was even worse on the trip down.  My right arm was scratched to shreds.  I turned around to see those behind me and slipped into a huge thorn bush.  That wasn’t the funnest fall I’ve ever taken.  However, one of the students was laughing at my fall and not 30 seconds later she fell into it herself.  I told her that I took out most of the bush for her so she wouldn’t have so much pain.  It is my job to look after the student after all. 

That night, Slagle and I had dinner with the James, Mrs. Ragsdale and Dr. Hopper.  It was a great night to catch up and visit.

The Golden Mask of Agamemnon.

Wednesday was just a typical class day.  
Nothing super special. 

Thursday we took the group to the National Archaeological Museum in Athens.  Once again, we had our tour guide from Saturday, the Ancient Athens tour, James.  He walked us through the museum.  I especially loved seeing the Golden Mask of Agamemnon, the Statue of Zeus and the actual arrowheads from the battle of Thermopylae again for a third time.  That was Thursday.

Friday was just another day, until…The Power went out.  The James left, taking a group of students to the outlet mall again and left me in charge, with the Thompsons (the visiting professor) here too.  The power went out and Meitek, our handy man, had to show me where all the fuses were and how to open the back gate into the campus manually because he was about to leave.  I walked out to the gym only to find that its alarm was going off.  I had to call Meitek on his phone to figure out how to turn it off.  After about an hour and a half in the dark, the electricity came back.

Famous Statue of Zeus.  Possibly
Poseidon, but most think it's Zeus.

Saturday was nothing noteworthy; except that Matt Gulley came to tell us about the Soup Kitchen work that we can help with every Monday.  That night we all got to go out and eat on our own.  I went with a group to To Misos, the place that Matt Parks and Justin Jones thought was run by the Greek mafia.  It wasn’t as good as Dimitris (the one just down the street) but it was good to try a different taverna (yes, that is taverna, not tavern).  

Sunday we chilled and were able to sleep in.  Breakfast crew made pancakes, and they were awesome.  I had five.  Church was once again that night in Glyfada. 

Now I am caught up with this week.  Monday was interesting since it was this groups first time at the soup kitchen in Athens.  I will post about that soon.