Athens - Early one morning

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Guided by second hand accounts we'd never intended staying in Athens.
We still weren't, but arriving at Athens airport at 8.00am for our 3.00pm departure to Dubai left us a yawning gap to fill. Our hosts in Dubai, Dan & Anthia have a 3 year old son. Kids always need more toys and we would go shopping in downtown Athens. Not wanting to be complete consumerist slaves we decided to see the Acropolis on our way to the mall.
Leaving our bags in storage we left the terminal and stepped onto the railway.
The railway is Lego set brand-new. It looks great but is deathly slow. The journey into the city took 40 minutes. But it would've looked great for the cameras during the 2004 Olympics.
The Olympiad may lock the population in a naïve thrall chanting “World Peace, World Peace!” at the opening ceremony whilst the developers count the cash out the back and the city will count the cost for much, much longer. But at least here a few more thousand cars are off the roads and we only paid 12 euros each to get to Athens and back.

Deciphering the subway map proved testy. Of course the English translation bore no relation to actual Greek characters, but neither did the English words written bear resemblance to the PA's exclamations as we lumbered into each stop. There were hardly any maps offering reassurance as we travelled, changing lines along the way. They knew where to put the subway stops though.
Up a flight of stairs, walls tiled white, down a street lined with apartments, round a corner and there before us loomed the Acropolis of Athens.
Misappropriation of Greek history by modern classical scholars resulted in the common belief that the Romans invented what the Greeks did. Standing before you are the Doric columns of the Parthenon, built by the Greeks, the name confused by the rest of us. It's the Parthenon, not the Acropolis. The Acropolis is the hill it stands on.

Passing through the ticket booth around 10 am we started the trudge up the hill, the temperature rising, becoming uncomfortable in minutes. Onto a small rise we spotted the remnants of the Theatre of Dionysos. Marble seating, broken & cracked bleaches under the sun. Pillars, Statues, columns & walls lie about as if a giant box of Guylan seashells have been tossed out of their box by a petulant god. The authorities have decided to restore, rather than protect the ruins.
Empty scaffolding sat along walls sporting bright, fresh stone, mortared into place. The sun would take care of the rest. Given a few years and the restored ruins will looked fab.
Both of us were getting tired and hungry. Yes the ruins were pretty unique and special but we wanted to get it over with. Especially when the crowds slowed as they thickened as we climbed up and round onto the Acropolis.

Good on the Greeks for doing the place up. But I felt a pang of disappointment.
Damn the Turks and Venetians!!
Back in 1687 the Parthenon was badly damaged by an explosion. Johnny Turk had wisely decided to place an ammunition dump IN the Parthenon. Turkish controlled Athens came under artillery bombardment form the Venetians (guess what happened next?). So today not only is the Parthenon badly damaged, but when we were there it had scaffolding everywhere. Only 321 years late of course. As you mill around the ruins, moving in and out of the various tour groups you can grasp Athen's proportions. Atop the hill you see the tall & narrow Cyprus trees growing on the neighbouring hills amongst more ruins. The hovering smog below guaranteed by more hills surrounding the city. Acid rain from pollution threatens to undermine restoration attempts.
If there's another disaster and the Parthenon were to be destroyed you could mourn the loss or go to Nashville,Tennessee. They have a complete replica, built in 1897.

Making our way to the exit a kitten lounged on the white gravel path. The bright, new collar around it's neck telling us it was someone's pet or a pampered stray. It wasn't shy. Sinking teeth into my hand as I attempted to pet it. Claws dug into my arm, it's eyes expressing a bright ferocity despite its dimunitive size. After a couple of minutes of sado masochistic fun with tiger we set off back down the path. The crowds had swelled even more, we found it difficult making our way out. A minor fracas started at the gate out into the street. Young immigrant boys selling bottled water jostled for business. A couple fought over us. We flicked a couple of euros at the nicer behaving one, got our water and left. Florid accusations in Greek (or was it Albanian?) started flying, the boys stepping into each other. The tone changing as a police car sidled by, the bored cops could do with a little excitement. The boys, best of friends again slipped-away.

Soon, walking back the way we came we found a lunchbar selling Gyros.
Gyros, another name for Kebabs are a little different here. Of course you get the warmed pita bread filled with meat & salad but you also get french fries shoved in the middle. Not what you expect, but they taste good. Parked outside the foodbar was a monstrous quad, unlike the puny 150cc model we had in Santorini. This thing looked like it could drive up Mt Olympus. Was this a status symbol peculiar to Greece? It seemed odd to spot a couple of these in downtown Athens but then again you see hundreds of 4wd's squander the roads everywhere else you go in the world so these were a refreshing suprise.
A young security guard had provided useful information on shopping in Athens. A couple of subway stops away where the shops. Back onto the perfectly adequate subway we went in search of Ermous St. It was like Queen St, well sort of.

Ermous St starts at one end with dingy apartments overhanging a long series of second-hand shops selling stuff just as useless here as anywhere else. Taxi's and moped's hurtle up and down the road.
The smoky 2-stroke moped exhausts mix in with the dust, caking the sides of the buses driving by.
Higher rents push out the bric-a-brac merchants as you walk up the street. Soon we were passing shoe shops & department stores. We now had the challenge of finding gifts.
Our first success was in scoring a pirate ship from the Duplo shop which we knew would go down well for their son. In the end we found one shop that had what we were looking for. Dan & Anthia would be the pleased recepients of a bright red salad bowl. Or so we hoped.

All this time we'd been nervously looking at our watches. If we were on the subway back to the airport by 12.00 we'd be alright. The clock was sitting on 12.00 as we left Syntagma square to reverse our way back down the subway to the airport. On the last train we had to catch Michelle counselled a distressed old man adamant he'd caught the wrong train back to the airport.
Luckily this was not so. Off the train, back into the terminal we collected our bags and waited for our flight to board.
Everyone knows a meal is so much better with industrial-level air quality. Handily, most of the food outlets in the international departure lounge were full with smokers. No fun police here to save them from themselves. Although it did save us from some gruesome looking catering; buying some gum which turned out to be cigarette flavoured instead we continued on to the final security checkpoint.

I had been playing a game since our travels began. 'Test the security' works best if you place a sharp object, preferably a knife shaped one in your carry-on baggage and forget it's there. See how many checkpoints you can saunter through? Whose been smoking crack before their shift starts, checking pissed-off travellers bags for offending utensils? Do they really care?
I lasted until Athens airport. A security guard asked me if this was my bag. Yes it was Mr security guard. He rummaged through it and couldn't find anything. Bemused he passed it back to his eagle-eyed colleague operating the amazing see through everything machine. They passed it through again and despite my 'please, please be blasé' prayer finally found my little cordura pouch.
Now it was time to play the ignorant fool. I couldn't manage dribbling but pulled an impassive face.
The guard pulled out the spoon, then the fork and finally the knife.
Rushing over to his supervisor he brandished the knife. Some tut-tutting followed and he hooked his finger at me beckoning me over. Now it was time to become an english second language speaker.
“I no understand!” “Only breadknife, cut cut!” I motioned with my hands like I was cutting up a 5 years olds dinner for them. The supervisor with his peaked cap shook his head and said sorry.
I couldn't keep the knife. Feigning disappointment, I slunk off leaving the knife to it's indeterminate fate. Whilst I caught up with Michelle heading to the depature lounge.

Now it's no fun in economy class. It was before I became an adult, my pesky legs growing, putting me at an unreasonable 5”8 if I'm optimistic. First you're cruelly exposed to the possibilities (or impossibilities, it's a half-full, half-empty thing) as they make you walk through business class to the plebian seats.
Then you kick yourself you hadn't thought of bringing a couple of small children with you (they invariably get the bulkhead and emergency exit seating) to get some leg room. Next, you find out your overhead locker is already full, necessitating delicate negotiations with a threatened looking Farsi speaker as you make room in their locker.
But so far, it goes without saying if you're going to be unfortunately poor; Fly Emirates. The Boeing 777 we flew on was very new. Cramped and modern is better than squashed & dingy like the KLM 747 we had flown. The seat pitch wasn't bad and the inflight entertainment was top-knotch. Some of the movies were blander than the curries they served though. But there were plenty of films to chose from. Enough for the 4 hour flight to Dubai. The hot face-towels at takeoff were a really nice touch as well. At one point during the flight, they lit up the cabin like it was Aladdin's Cave.

Would we a soon be experiencing a wondrous Arabian experience in Dubai?

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Photos

Vote Kennedy
Ermous Street

The Crowds
10am at the Acropolis

Down with AETEPIA!!!
Athenian graffiti

'The World'
Every single landmass except for NZ had some activity. Don't they know we shag sheep?

Bric a Brac
Ermous Street

Doric Columns
The Parthenon