athens, part 2

while we were in greece, we also spent some time traveling to neighboring sites. we visited nafplion, this beautiful town on the aegean sea, with palm trees and flowers on every colorful building. it felt almost like balboa island, quiet and picturesque and kind of touristy in a good way. we also went to epidaurus and saw an ancient roman amphitheatre that was there. the acoustics were so impressive—you could stand all the way at the top and still hear someone drop a coin in the very center. we visited mycenae, with the famous lion's gate and fortresslike ruins. one of my favorite parts of the day was when we all, my directors' kids included, walked down into this really cool, ancient, dark tunnel to explore, but we came running back up screaming because we saw bats. we ended our day trip with a visit to corinth, which i was familiar with because of paul's writings in the book of corinthians. it was mostly a lot of ruins, but it was really neat to walk in the old marketplace and other places where paul walked and preached.

during our time in athens, we had a tour guide named costas, who was the most adorable old man. he had traveled with our directors and BYU groups before and he was so funny and sweet, and really interesting to talk to because he knew everything about athens. he wasn't LDS, but he took us on a special route to one of the museums one day so we could walk past the LDS church building. it was really sweet. that night we all walked together up to this beautiful restaurant that overlooked the city. it was in a really pretty area, with picturesque shops and restaurants and all these people just eating and talking outside. we got to eat authentic greek food cooked by the sweetest lady. she totally reminded me of the dad from my big fat greek wedding because she was telling us kalí órexi (bon appetit) and she explained how the word "anorexia" comes from greek (an orexis, which means "without appetite"). on our last night in athens we got to witness the greek orthodox celebration of easter. there's this big processional where everyone heads through the streets to the cathedral, singing and holding candles. visiting athens was a really neat experience. it was interesting because the city had such an ancient feel, but there were other parts of the city that felt very modern and european. it was also a little sobering, because the suffering state of the greek economy was evident. there were also stray dogs everywhere, which was one thing we didn't enjoy. athens was definitely not my favorite place we visited, but i had some really wonderful experiences and i'm so glad we went there. my friends and i also really want to go to santorini, so i definitely will be heading back to greece someday!