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June 26th 2008

Published: June 26th 2008

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hu5om

sunset

too beautiful

Well, my procrastination has apparently sunken to a new low. I'm finally finishing this deal. I've been back in the States for over 5 weeks now so I suppose this should be finished.

Looking back on Greece, despite Brad's accident, it was a really cool experience. Athens was slightly disappointing; the city was pretty dirty and not much to see besides the Acropolis. Also, the Parthenon was covered in scaffolding which is understandable since the thing makes the buildings in Spain look like they are in their infancy, but still kind of less cool than I had expected. We also walked to the Temple of Zeus which is only about 14 columns of what used to be over 100. It was kind of cool though and from there I got a cool picture of the Acropolis. The old Olympic Stadium was neat, but only to the extent that you look at it for 3 minutes, say it's neat, take a picture and keep walking. From Athens we took an early ferry to Mykonos which was fun. We got to sit out on the deck of the ferry and it was a gorgeous day. The water is ridiculously blue in the

Everybody

this is the group that was in Athens as we were walking up the Acropolis

Aegean. It kind of looks artificial. When we got off of the ferry a bus from our hostel was there to pick us up. The rooms weren't much to look at, essentially sheds with two beds in them and one light bulb, however, the beach was only 3 minutes walking from the sheds and gorgeous. We would just spend the days sitting on the sand and soaking in the last few days of the trip. We rented ATVs and mopeds here also, which went fairly well considering the Santorini saga. I was so damn frightened being on the back of the moped though, I kind of thought I was going to die. But it was really cool to just explore the island. We got into the city and explored and drove along the sea a little bit too.

From Mykonos we left part of the group and went to Santorini. Everyone on Mykonos said that Mykonos was beautiful but Santorini was really, really beautiful. I was thinking, how could this get better? But it did. Santorini is shaped like a crescent moon with a volcano off on an island on the inside of the arch. The inside is all

Acropolis

from where we were in the last picture, this was the view behind us

towering cliffs with pristine white cities clinging to the top edge. the outside is all beaches. It was totally better. Again, a shuttle from our hostel picked us up. The rooms here were nicer, actual rooms and ours even had it's own bathroom, kitchenette, and balcony. Not too shabby for 7 euros per night. I think that the 3 nights I stayed there cost less than my hostel in most other cities for only one night. We made dinner in our kitchenette the first night and just hung out and then rented ATVs and went exploring the next day. From our base location in Perissa we went south to a red sand beach, which was really interesting. I didn't really know there were red sand beaches. From there we drove to Fira, the capital, for a little shopping and lunch. By this time, I was sick of gyros so I had pizza. After Fira we drove to Oia to stay and watch the "most beautiful sunsets on earth." So we stayed there for a long time just taking pictures and then waited for the sunset which did not disappoint. On the drive home, we were very low on gas. We

parthenon

the other side was all scaffolding, but still cool

did not see a station in Oia so we started going towards Fira. We weren't sure we would make it. We got to the first station on the Northern outskirts to find it closed. We had to drive through the whole city, which involved a lot of coasting for us, to find one on the Southern edge of town that was open. The ride back was freezing! I was wearing sandals, my board shorts, a tee shirt and a thin long sleeve shirt. Less than festive, but we made it back. We went to a club right on the beach called, oddly enough, Beach Bar. They actually played really good music including a song I hadn't heard since I was in grade school, Connected by Stereo MCs. The next day we just hung out on the black sand beach outside of the club, where they will bring you drinks from inside on your chaisse lounge under your palm umbrella. May I recommend the Mythos Red. Then later that day Brad's crash went down, which I already discussed so I won't get into too deeply.

The next day we got on our night ferry, took our motion sickness pills and

Temple of Zeus

these columns were enormous. crazy to think that there were over 100 of them back in the day

just slept to wake up at 6 AM in Athens. FYI there is nothing to do at 6 AM in Athens. We tried to find a hostel to get a little sleep, but the one we went to earlier was booked up. So we went to, as Alex refers to it the American Embassy, McDonald's. We would get a few things off of the Euro menu and just go upstairs and sleep. In the 3 hours we spent there, we made 17 individual trips to the register to justify us being there. Then we took the subway to a hospital, one that was closed for some reason, and then Brad and I just went to the next one which was really cool. The doctor was young and spoke pretty good English. Also, socialized medicine made it a lot nicer since Brad didn't have to open his wallet despite getting some X-rays, additional bandages, and all kinds of stuff. They didn't even ask for any info beyond just his name and country of origin. Brad and I were tired so we went back to Omonia Square where our bags were locked up and where we were going to meet the rest

Olympic Stadium

the picture I snapped in our 3 minute stop there

of the group again and went to Starbucks to just chill out and reflect on the whole experience.

That night we were parting ways at the Berlin airport. The flight from Athens to Berlin was fine. In Berlin we got our bags within 3 minutes of being off of the plane, gotta love that efficiency. Brad stayed at the airport to catch his first plane home. We got to our hostel on the incredibly efficient train and just crashed. The next day we met up with Adam and did the whirlwind tour of Berlin. We went to Alexandplatz to see the big space needle and then started walking towards the Brandenburg Gate. I know pretty much nothing about anything we saw, but Berlin was an awesome city. It was perfect weather. We then walked through a huge central park to a column thing with canons on it. The park was incredible. I felt like I was walking down a trail in a state park in Wisconsin or something, not through the center of a European metropolis. We tried to find the part of the Wall that was still up but we pretty much failed. We saw a marker deal

greek island, not sure which one

super blue water, aye?

but not much else. That night we just relaxed at the hostel since our flight in the morning left at 6:40 AM.

We got to Milan and got our bags locked up and took a 40 minute train into town. We had about 5 hours in Italy. We walked to the Duomo which was fairly ridiculous. There are just statues on every single inch of that thing. Also there was a cool shopping area that was kind of enclosed but not really. I 'll put up pictures; it's hard to explain. We stopped for some Italian food, which was decent. I think our 2 pasta dishes weren't made from scratch, but the pizza was for sure.

We left Milan and landed in Sevilla which was nothing but drama. We tried to go to a resteraunt that ALex and Laura liked, but it was closed for renovations. So we tried to take a bus toward our hostel except we don't really know much about the bus system so we ended up taking a really round about way past the soccer stadium on a game night so the bus was packed and we had all of our bags. We got

Paradise Beach

This was the ridiculous beach at our hostel on Mykonos

close to where we thought our hostel was but slight problem. The guy who made the reservation didn't write down the street name or any directions beyond the fact that it's behind the bull ring. We wander, can't find it and eat some kebabs to think it over. We meet our other friends to presumably go out one more time but we still have all of our bags so we can't. they take us to there hostel which sounds awesome, no vacancy. we end up going to a pricier hostel right by the cathedral but i don't care, i just need sleep. I woke up early wand walked past the cathedral into barrio santa cruz where I just sat to take it all in one last time. I remember writing about how I felt like Sevilla felt like another home now and i was sad to leave but also excited to be back. we're out of our room by 11 and we go to the school to get the rest of our stuff. But, we have nowhere to go with all of our bags until our 10 PM flight. We spent about 7 ours in plaza alfalfa just chilling with

Red Sand Beach

Santorini, the rock formations were crazy all over this island

our bags. we would take turns watching the stuff as the others would go out in the city for various errands.

Our flight landed in Madrid at 11 PM and our next one left at noon. so we slept on some nice benches. I took a picture of the skyscrapers in the morning as the sun shined on them. The flight was fine. Jumper was a really stupid movie but it kept me distracted for a while if nothing else.

It was so weird to land in Chicago and hear English spoken all around. I felt fairly out of place. We stopped at the Belvedere Oasis for some much needed Taco Bell. Adjusting to being at home again has been weird. Even now, it feels weird. I miss a lot of things about last semester, friends, the city, the language, the history, a lot of other things. The other day at Milio's I explained the menu to a customer all in Spanish and it felt good just to speak it again.

Summer is good so far; Bonnaroo was unreal and Jack Johnson was good at Alpine, too. Frisbee league is really helping the weeks go fast although

The inner cliffs

It's hard to tell how high up we are, but you can kind of see in the size of the waves

I just got a pretty nasty cut on my knee Tuesday and probably shouldn't play today. Work is decent, not too bad but there's a lot of summer left.

It's really hard to find the words to describe the semester. I'm nervous that I will be too hasty and just write something that really doesn't do it justice, but also I kind of realize that I'll probably never really be able to explain how it changed me and how just incredible it all really was. All the friendships, memories, stories, pictures, new perspectives, etc. are really hard to quantify. I guess I'll just say that it was incredible.

Thanks to everyone who read these entries, looked at pictures, sent letter, messages, packages, skyped with me, etc. It was hard to be away but it helped having friends and family that stayed in touch and especially those who visited. I was glad that you could share part of my experience with me.

Well, I suppose that's it. No one really wants to read blogs about me taking tee times or making subs so I guess this is my last entry, until I save up enough money to spend