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FIRST
THING
this morning we changed rooms. Those top floor rooms, we realized, are
great in summer but not in winter. We were given a large room below with
private bathroom and two balconies for 12,000 drachmas, complete with a
remote control heating system.
After
settling into our room, we walked around looking for a place to eat,
this time going in the direction of Syntagma Square, one of the main
squares in Athens and one that Joy hadn’t seen yet. It was a mess,
being dug up for reconstruction, with noisy jackhammers and shouting
workers making conversation between us impossible. We wandered back
through the labyrinth of streets to quieter Plaka and found a souvlaki
place, the same one where we’d had breakfast a few weeks earlier.
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The
area around the Adams Hotel
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Joy
admitted that she was getting tired of sightseeing, and since I’d
already seen the sights of Athens we decided to go to the airport and
pick up our stored bags. The easiest way, we were told, was to catch the
bus in front of MacDonald’s on Syntagma Square, so we headed back in
that direction, this time taking a different route, the boulevard
running alongside Hadrian’s Arch. The sun was out but we were both
shivering in the cold, biting wind.
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The
focal point of Syntagma (Constitution) Square is the parliament building which
stands at the highest point of the square. Built in 1840 under
King Otto, this monumental building served as the royal palace
until 1910, when it was destroyed by fire. It reopened in 1935 as
the seat of the National Assembly.
The changing of the guard (who
are dressed in traditional uniform) takes place in front of the
building every hour on the hour. This is performed by a larger
group of soldiers every Sunday at 10am.
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At
Syntagma, as we approached the royal palace with the traditional Greek
guards marching back and forth, I told Joy: “If there are ever any
demonstrations, here is where they take place, in front of the
palace.”
No
sooner had I said it, than large groups of teachers and students came
marching toward us from a narrow side street, carrying banners
protesting the new education system and the new Minister of Education.
(A fellow spectator gave us this information, as the signs were in
Greek.) We watched and waited for a while, but soon realized that any
buses to the airport would have to be delayed as they could never get
through the streets that were being blocked off by the growing crowds. I
suggested we walk against the stream to the end of the protesters.
Halfway down Joy began limping on her sore foot, so we stopped to sit on
a vacant bench and struck up a conversation with a man who told us he
was from Kurdistan now living in Greece.
There
were literally thousands of rioters and spectators streaming together
from an unknown point of origin. All else in this
part of town had come to a grinding halt, and I had a sudden urge to get
away from it all. Leaving Joy still talking to the Kurd, I took off in a
different direction, passing a battalion of uniformed policemen with
bulletproof shields before ducking down a side street. Within a few
blocks it was a different world with business being conducted as usual,
and I walked around for several hours browsing at my own pace and
reliving sights and sounds from my life in Athens twenty years earlier.
When
I returned to the room, Joy was sitting on the bed sorting out her
things. A strange odor permeated the room. She told me that right after
I left all hell broke loose. She had gotten caught in the riots and had
been sprayed with mace, which accounted for the odd smell. The
MacDonald’s facade had been smashed in, as well as a jewelry store
window, which had left the help
scrambling to collect all the valuable pieces that had gone flying. It was the top story on the news, with reporters and
television crews getting tangled in the fray as well.
*
* *
We
decided to give the airport another try, this time going in the opposite
direction to catch a bus in front of the Royal Olympic Hotel. After
successfully collecting our bags, we brought them back to the hotel,
repacked, and had our final vacation meal at a little downstairs taverna
on the nearby square.
Back
in our room we crawled into our beds and talked for a few hours before
falling asleep, reliving some of our experiences. Joy asked, “Why
don’t people want to talk about religion?” My answer?
“I guess they’d rather just talk about life.”
*
* *
CLICK
HERE TO RETURN TO CALENDAR
or
read on by clicking on any of the following
links:
1.
From Los Angeles to Amsterdam
2. The Flight to Greece
3. Ancient
Corinth
4. The
Citadel
5. To Piraeus
6. Hania on
Crete
7. A
Day in Limbo
8. Back
to Athens
9. From
Athens to Cairo
10. Cairo
11. The Pyramids
12. The Bus to Israel
13. Jerusalem
14. Bethany and Bethpage
15. An Old Palestinian Hotel
16. The Drive to Galilee
17. Capernaum and Environs
18. The Ancient Boat and Nazareth
19. The Golan Heights and Mt. Hermon
20. The Eastern Shore and Scythiopolis
21. Mount of the Beatitudes
22. Ptolemais and Caesarea
23. A Day in Piraeus
24. Santorini
25. A Rainy Day
26. An Eventful Day in Athensthis
page
27. Return to Amsterdam
28. Going Home
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