Mykonos

since I haven't had internet connection in a few days, here are a few posts that i've saved up:


June 23, 2009

I just arrived in Mykonos and we’re waiting in the hotel lobby for our room to be ready. We left Athens via the port or Rafina on a hydrofoil this morning at 7:45. Luckily, the water was relatively smooth except for a few rough moments when I thought my stomach was going to fly up my esophagus and out of my mouth. Didn’t happen though. Alhamdullilah

The coach bus ride to the resort/hotel was also rather interesting, as the roads are about 1.3-1.5 lanes and up, down and around hills, mountains and cliffs. There was one point in which the tour bus was going up a 45-degree incline, no exaggeration. The 20 minute ride felt like a slow motion rollercoaster.

Since I arrived back in Athens from Turkey, Georgia and I took a few days to go to Thessaloniki, a few days to explore Athens nightlife, and a few days to sit around the apartment.

Thessaloniki is a city about 4.5 hours by train north of Athens. It has a lot of history, as it was a stop along the ancient road from Constantinople to Rome. There are two great museums –the Byzantine Museum and Archeological Museum—in Thessaloniki which display the city’s history beginning with prehistoric homes all through the Byzantine era, the Schism and the changes in Greek art. The city center is located right on the sea, and for that reason I liked it a little more than Athens-aesthetically speaking at least. Otherwise it’s pretty similar to Athens.

Georgia and I stayed in a hotel, but met with her family friend, Dino. He is a really nice guy who used to coach Greek pro basketball, but now has is own sports clothing business. We spent one afternoon swimming in the pool at his house on a hillside a little ways outside the city center. Another too-good-to-be-true experience, as we sat at Dino’s private inground pool, sipping freddos (a popular coffee drink which is basically sweetened espresso added to whipped milk over ice), looking over Thessaloniki and the gulf of Thermoaikos with the outline of Mount Olympus in the background.

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June 25, 2009

I wish there were other, stronger descriptors for “gorgeous,” “beautiful,” “stunning,” and “amazing” since I’ve used those words so many times. I feel like I’m at the point where these words have totally lost their meanings. I’ve said them so many times at so many different locations that I don’t even believe myself anymore. But really, what other words are there to describe the Foro Romano in Rome, the Nile in Upper Egypt and the clash of the blue sea and eggshell white buildings on the rocky sand-colored slopes? Let me know if you have any ideas for me.
I suppose I could take a picture or movie, but even still its hard understand the beauty from a picture or a movie because you’re not physically in the environment—you’re not feeling the sun and the sea breeze and seeing the colors of the clouds against the rocky mountains against the beach against the blue-green of the sea.

There are so many picture perfect moments on this island, as you’ll hopefully be able to understand from my pictures. I am not a cat person normally. In fact, normally I think cats are either too fat or too skinny and disgustingly furry. But here on Mykonos, there is something about the street cats that make them cute and make their black fur or sky blue eyes picture perfect against the whitewashed buildings and bright blue doors. I may have just lost about 15 coolness points for saying that, but its true!!

Otherwise, I don’t really have a lot to say about my time here in Mykonos. All we are doing is sitting by the beach and pool, alternatively, and heading into town for dinner each night. Our hotel the “Royal Myconian” is about 30 minutes by bus away from the city center. It’s a five star hotel, but we get a deal on the normal room rate because Georgia’s dad has a environmental engineering conference here. Its very well the nicest hotel I’ve ever stayed in. Continental breakfast is included in the room rate and has everything type of breakfast food you could imagine, including any made-to-order coffee drink and even non-breakfast foods like champagne. If you know me, you would guess that I would stash food to last me the whole day so that I don’t have to buy the 14 Euro pizzas or 11 Euro smoothies from the poolside hotel restaurant. When I was at breakfast this morning, I approached the table to sit down and one of the cute young Serbian servers swooped over to pull out my chair for me. This is great!

Today we are leaving the five star resort to stay in a hostel in Mykonos Town-the main port city on the island. It will be quite the change from this luxury paradise hotel, but it will be fun to go out on the town tonight. Apparently, Mykonos has great nightlife.

June 26, 2009

Sadly, the only African people that you see in Greece are men selling fake bags or ripped DVDs on the street and women cleaning bathrooms and sweeping floors. On Mykonos, I saw a group of 3 African (I’m guessing Nigerian) women and in Athens I saw a handful of African-American tourists. But that’s about it. Anyway, back to my main train of thought—if the African men selling fake bags on the street (on top of a blanket rigged to make a sac to pull over their shoulder should the police come) can afford to make it all the way from Nigeria (the country from which many of them come) to the island of Mykonos and acquire the plethora of faux Gucci handbags, why would they not just take all that money and do something a little more productive with it? I don’t know the economic situation of Nigeria (and that’s something I’ll need to look into) but it must be a pretty crappy if thousands of men and women come all this way to sell bags and clean bathrooms.