GREECE!

I would say hello in Greek, but I don't actually have any idea how...Greek is pretty much impossible, I can't even read the alphabet to try and spell anything out! In any case, just got back from a wonderful weekend in Greece a couple hours ago. Laura and I went and stayed with Anna Kephart, our friend from Kenyon, and had great fun! We left thursday night, taking a flight to Madrid, with our sleeping bags in hand. Yep, it was time for another night in the Madrid airport, always fun. Fortunately, we were in terminal 4 of the Madrid Barajas airport (which is huge, by the way), which happens to be the super big and nice one. Thus we were able to locate a cafe (everything was closed, as it was like midnight), with some cushion-y sofas, where we set up camp for the night. Laura managed to go to sleep pretty quickly, but I had had a nap earlier so spent some time getting a bit of work done on my laptop (which I brought a long as it is so light and awesome), before trying to sleep. Definitely not the best nights sleep I've ever had, but not bad as far as sleeping in an airport goes. We woke up very early the next morning, surrounded by people eating in the cafe, and sulked off to relocate and free up some space for a couple hours. Then it was time for the flight to Athens, which was through Iberia, very exciting! We are used to flying Ryanair, the cheapest airline ever that has the bare minimum in commodies, so we were very very happy when we got drinks on the plane, and even a meal!!! We felt very spoiled. The flight was almost four hours long, a good amount for a little nap, and then we were in Athens! We walked out and looked around for Anna, who was going to meet us, and after a bit of worried searching we managed to find each other. After much hugging and greetings, it was off to find the bus that would take us the hour-ride into the city. We settled in for the ride, Anna warning us about pick-pockets on the bus, which was then followed by an announcement asking us to look around as someone had "lost" there wallet and passport...eek. We didn't have any problems though, and it was a nice drive into the city, spent catching up a bit and getting our first glimpses of Greece. After we got off the bus it was just a short walk through the market to Anna's flat, which she shares with three other girls. We headed up to her place, which was very nice, with a little balcony with a cool view. We set down our stuff and relaxed for a little bit, catching our breath and figuring out the plan for the rest of the day. As Laura and I had had a pretty tiring travel experience, we decided not to do anything too intense, and headed out for a walk along the city to do some shopping and exploring. We stopped in at a couple shops before heading to a pastry shop, where Anna treated us to some AMAZING baclava, so good. Afterwards we continued on our walk, stopping in at our favorite shops. We went to H&M, a must-do at every city I go to (Santiago doesn't have one ;( where Anna bought some new clothes, and I got myself a beauuutiful dress that I am slightly obsessed with. We had a good time chatting and walking around, and we saw quite a bit of the city which was super nice. When we got tired we headed back to Anna's place, catching a taxi as they are unbelievabley cheap in Greece (like one euro per person!!!). We headed up to the apartment to drop off our purchases, and then headed back out to the little grocery store down the street to get our dinner supplies. Turns out Anna, like Laura, is a very good cook, so she made us these delicious greek dish consisting of eggplant stuffed with a ground beef/cheese mixture, plus some dipping sauce that we ate with pita. I took a nap while dinner was being cooked. Dinner was splendid; we finished late, so Laura and Anna went to bed; I stayed up a little longer and got some work done, before dozing off myself. The next morning we got up early and headed out to the port (about an hour away). We stopped in at a cafe and grabbed some food, and then headed over to find a ferry that would take us to Aegina, an island about an hour away. We got our tickets and not long after boarded the ferry, which was a lot bigger than I had been excpecting. The ride was super cheap, less than 20 euro there and back, but the boat was super nice! I felt like I was on a cruise. We went all the way up to the top deck, where we got a bench and settled in for the hour ride. It was so nice, sitting in the sun and chatting while sailing through the beautiful ocean. When we arrived at Aegina, we got off the boat and walked over to the beach area. The water was crystal clear, absolutely incredible. Anna is into archaelogy, plus Laura and I both wanted to be paleontolgists when we were little, so we followed her around a fence to get further down the beach to look for pot shards. It was really cool, there are soooo many shards half-buried and scattered around; we spent a long time searching for some and by the end had quite the collection. It was kind of funny though, there was this middle-aged guy sunbathing naked over there when we came over, but fortunately he decided to put some clothes on after he realized we were going to be hanging around for a bit...awkward. In any case, we spent a long time exploring, and then headed over to check out some awesome remains of the ancient city. First we browsed the archaeological museum, which had lots of old ceramics and such, and then we went and walked around the ruins. It involved a little climb, which gave us a beautiful view of the Island of the top; so picturesque. After we finished exploring that we decided to walk up the road a ways to get to another section of beach we had seen from up top. We managed to find it, and explored it for quite a while. I ended up just laying and sun bathing for a long time, while Laura and Anna continued to do a bit of searching for shards. It was ridiculously nice out; laying there in the sun was truly heavenly. Once we had had our fill of the beach, we headed back towards the port, stopping in at a restaurant along the way to get some lunch. We picked a place right on the water, with an incredible view, and started off the meal with some fried octopus, which Laura and I weren't too crazy about. We all ordered another eggplant dish as our main meal, basically an eggplant lasagna-delicious, plus some white wine for the table. It was an excellent lunch, we took our time eating and enjoying the atmosphere, and then we headed more into town to look around for a bit. There wasn't reallly a whole lot to do in the town, but we stopped in at some little shops, sampling some of the pistachios that Aegina is famous for, and then just walked around. We had some time to kill, so we went and found another cafe on the water and got some drinks. We hung out there for quite a while talking, and then headed over to our boat when it arrived. A couple hours later we were back in Athens, where we walked around for a while, grabbing a Gyro for dinner and then returning to Anna's apartment. Again, we were all pretty tired, so Laura and I finished watching a movie on my laptop and then we settled in for the night.
The next morning we got up early again, and headed to the metro to get to the Acropolis. First we grabbed some pastries for breakfast, Laura and Anna partaking in a popular coffee-drink, and we made our way to the entrance. As we waited outside the entrance we actually ran into someone that went to Anna's high school; small world! When we were finished with our food we made our way in, flashing our student ID's and getting in for free, yes! The walk up wasn't too bad, and there was plenty of things to stop and admire on the way. When we finally got to the top the view was breath-taking, we felt like we were on top of the world. Anna gave us a little tour of the various ruins, which was very nice, and we spent a while exploring and admiring on the scenery. It was really crazy though, on the way down we ran into Kate Blanchett! She was litteraly an arms-length away from us with her two little boys. One of the staff came up to her and asked is she was a famous actress, which caught our attention. She was very nice, replied "yes", and laughed when they asked if she was Kate Winclet. Pretty crazy! We continued on our way, not wanting to be annoying, and from a distance i took a quick discreet picture. Crazy! In any case, we then made our way out of the Acropolis, and began to walk a ways in the general direction of the Agora. First we stopped in at this awesome sandal place, where all the sandals are made by hand. They were super nice, it's a famous place where the Beatles even went and got sandals! The women who runs it is the granddaughter (or daughter, i forget...) of a famous sandalmaker/poet, whose books are apparently very well known in Greece. We spent a long time there, and all left with a pair of these great sandals. Laura and I actually got the same pair of Gladiators...soooo cool. After that, Anna took us to check out this great flea market, where we wandered around and admired all the random objects on display. By this time we were running out of time, so we made our way quickly to Ancient Agora, which we explored for a bit before grabbing one last gyro. Then it was back to Anna's place to grab our stuff and make our way to the airport, and so ends my stay in Greece. The only sucky part was that our flight to Madrid got in late, and Laura missed our flight (I had already checked in online, as I'm a European citizen and can do that). It really sucked, she had to call Mar, who figured out a bus she could take at midnight, arriving in Santiago 9 hours later. Poor girl! But other than that we both had a great time; one day I definitely want to return to the Islands; they were just so beautiful.
So yeah, my time abroad is winding down. The weather here is TERRIBLE right now, it has gotten cold and rainy, typical Santiago, but it is good in that I am more productive without the tempation of the park. I'm getting my work done slowly but surely. We're also all keeping an eye on the swine flu, kind of terrifying! For one thing, we are all worried we will have trouble getting home, which would be awful. But I'm sure it'll be fine; everyone stay safe!
Love,
Brit