5/30/16,
“Athens 1896”
Athens,
Greece
Athens is a
city with 3000 years of history, but, for me, it was here, 120 years ago that
the most significant event in Athenian history occurred. The first Modern Olympic Games were hosted
here, in this very stadium where I sit.
When I go to Rio in August, it will be to witness the 27th
such Games to be hosted since the ones in Athens in 1896. Those Games are the direct continuation of
what occurred here in 1896, hosted every four years, with only three exceptions
for wars, over the course of the past 120 years. By the end of this year, I will have visited
all 27 Stadiums, and I hope my readers can await with as much anticipation the
entry that will be written on December 31 (or 30), 2016, entitled, “Sydney
2000”, but, for now, I will be writing about Athens 1896.
I’ve been here before. Or, more accurately, I have seen this Stadium
before, but I have not been inside. Like
so much of what I do today, I will be reliving my 2004 trip to Greece. I’m even staying at the same hotel we stayed
at when we were here in 2004. Back then,
Greece was literally number one on my travel list. I was completely obsessed with Greek
mythology and history. I could name all
the Greek Gods and Goddesses and Heroes.
I knew it all. The idea of going
to visit that country was as awesome as could be imagined, and, to go in 2004,
right before the Olympics, that made it even more special. Now, here I am, reliving some old
memories.
What is number one on my
travel list now? Without a question,
it’s Rome. Greenland and Iceland are a
distant second, Mongolia right behind them.
I will be going to Rome for my birthday, and it will be a relaxing trip,
much like this one has been. There are
only three destinations in Rome that count for me: the Olympic Stadium, the
Coliseum, and the Vatican. Daytrips to
Pompei and Pisa also appeal to me, but it is the three sites in Rome that matter
most. I love the irony that I am
beginning the summer in Athens and ending it in Rome.
I have about five hours before dark, and I
intend to use each and every one of them preciously. After I am done here, I will make my way to
the Acropolis, stopping at some modern civic sites along the way. Then, who knows what? I will make tonight epic. I have a long plane ride to sleep tomorrow,
and I fully intend to take advantage of everything the city has to offer before
I get on that plane. I’m sure my reader
knows what I would most love to do, but I don’t know if people still do that:
find a symposium, where I can drink and talk philosophy until sunrise.
Okay, so what happened after I closed last
night? I worked on figuring out how I’d
watch Game of Thrones with my mother.
HBO has a regional block on streaming, so that meant I had to go with
Plan B. My mother would turn the camera
on her computer from our video chat at the TV, and I’d watch that way. We tested it.
It worked. Not well, but it
worked. I published my entry and passed
out, waking up around when she got home from dinner. I lit up my OpusX, and we watched.
There were plenty of bugs, but it was a
boring episode, so it didn’t exactly matter.
And when I call a Game of Thrones episode “boring”, that means it’s a B-
episode, that’s how good the show is. Since
I was facing east towards the harbor, I was able to see the sunrise from my
seat, and it was even more beautiful than the sunset. As soon as the episode was over, it was 6 AM,
and I messaged my friend who had finished watching an hour earlier.
We messaged back and forth about the episode
for three hours, almost non-stop, as I packed, ate breakfast, and got ready. For three hours, we dissected every plot
point from the episode and debated every theory either of us had going
forward. We do this every week, for
three hours every Sunday night. That was
one of the main reasons I wanted to watch this morning, so that we would not
miss out on our weekly analysis.
Oh,
right, breakfast. That wasn’t half bad,
actually, especially since it was free with my cheap hotel room. It was all cold food (plus coffee), so I got
meat and cheese and yoghurt. It was
great. After we were done with our
discussion, I took a taxi to the airport, lighting up a Joya de Nicaragua,
which I would continue to smoke outside the gate as I wrote my personal entry,
the companion entry to this trip’s Travelogue entry. I breezed through security, and we were soon
boarding, a big plane this time, with jet engines. I slept most of the short flight to Athens,
and I took a taxi to the hotel.
When I
got to the hotel, I recognized everything.
It looked exactly like it did 12 years ago. Exactly.
I went to my room, overjoyed that I could see the Acropolis from my
window, and I relaxed a bit as I charged up my phone. As soon as I felt I had enough power on my
phone, I headed out to the Olympic Stadium, a short enough walk. As I walked, I was shocked to see such a
police presence, including ceremonial guard, as I walked by the Parliament and
Presidential Palace. I was also shocked
to see so many high-profile embassies en route.
Soon enough, I was at the Olympic Stadium, and I got my ticket and went
inside. I took some pictures from the
track and then went up to the stands, where I took my ceremonial pictures. I was home.
I found a spot about quarter of the way up the stands, where I sat down
and proceeded to write this entry, which I will now close so that I can run a
stadion and then start exploring Athens.
“Dear Old
Athena”
There was a
reason I was willing to spend so much for this hotel room, and it was not just
to relive some childhood memories. It
was for this view. I can clearly see the
Parthenon, the Ancient Greek temple dedicated to the goddess Athena, yes, the
same Athena who lent her name to this city.
It is a marvelous view, even better than the sunset view I had when I
wrote yesterday evening. I will be
heading out for dinner shortly, and I know not what the night will entail,
though I want to make sure I leave here with a full charge on my phone.
I am sipping some complimentary house Greek
red wine and smoking my Ardor as I stare off at the Acropolis. I am in heaven. This Ardor has been all around the world with
me, and, at the end of the summer, I will smoke it in its home, Italy, but,
tonight, I am smoking it here in Greece.
It has been an exhausting five hours since I closed at the 1896 Stadium,
and I mean so physically more than anything else.
The first thing I did was go down onto the track
and run the stadion, a 200-meter (approximately) race that would serve as the
marquee event of the Ancient Games. It
is meant to be the length of the stadium, so the runners would run straight
from one end to the other, rather than around the track. Usain Bolt could it in 20 seconds. I did it in 40, and it left me
exhausted. I got some water before I
went to recreate my picture from 2004 that I took out front.
12 years apart, same picture, same person,
same Stadium, yet both the Stadium and I look so different. I then went to light up my Montecristo, which
I planned would last all the way through the civic buildings at to the
Acropolis. I went to get my keychain,
which is a cigar cutter, and it wasn’t in my pocket. Ruh roh!
Did I leave it in the hotel, or did it fall out on the track? I hoped it was the former. I used a canine to poke a hole in the cigar
and lit it up.
The first stop was the
Presidential Palace, followed by the Prime Minister’s Palace. I was soon at Parliament, which was far more
mobbed than I expected, but all of Athens is just one big tourist trap. I expect Rome will be likewise. I went back up to my room to drop off my bags
and souvenirs and give my phone a little more of a charge. I knew it would be a tight bet if I’d have
enough charge for the rest of the afternoon.
I meandered my way through the Plaka towards the Acropolis, trying to
use as little battery as possible, and trying to avoid the souvenir shops,
which proved futile.
I soon found myself
on a street that must have had close to 50 souvenir shops over a few
blocks. I told myself I would not be
buying anything until I was done with the Acropolis, and then I would only get
a few things, the bare minimums, just one shop if possible. I got a little lost, but I knew I was going
the right direction: up. I soon got to
the Acropolis, and I was almost done with my cigar by the time I got to the
entrance.
I wasn’t allowed to bring it
in, anyway, so I took my ceremonial picture there. I headed up more steps to the Parthenon,
which was magnificent and slightly more restored than it was in 2004, I
think. I took some pictures of the
building, and I decided I needed a picture with the cigar, even if it meant I’d
have to leave right away.
I lit up
another, different Montecristo, a slight break from protocol, and took my
ceremonial picture before heading out.
On my way down, I was told that I needed to put out my cigar. That was fine. I relit it when I left the gates. My phone was almost dead at this point. I stopped at the first souvenir shop I saw
and got everything I wanted. I continued
back to my hotel, finishing my cigar once I saw the Parliament. I then went up to my room, and my phone was
literally on 1% when I plugged into the charger.
I then relaxed a bit before I decided I’d
have to write an entry with this view before it got dark. I also inquired if the wine was
complimentary. It was. I got set up with the wine and pipe a view,
and I sat down on the couch, where I proceeded to light up my pipe and write
this entry, which I will now close so that I can add some more to my personal
entry before I head out again. I
thoroughly enjoyed my afternoon in dear old Athena, and I look forward to an
even more enjoyable evening, whatever it may entail.
“Everywhere
and Nowhere”
The Acropolis
is lit, and so am I. It has been an epic
evening, and I am ready to go home in the morning. My summer of travel has begun right. Do I ever get lonely when I travel? No, not really. Maybe when I’m back at the hotel, and I’m in
a different time zone, and those closest to me are asleep, or when I’m driving,
then, yes, sometimes I get lonely, but, when I’m out and about, no, I never get
lonely. Why?
Because I’m everywhere and nowhere. Never has that been more evident to me than
tonight, and it was not until tonight that I was able to put it into
words. The parents and the daughter at
the table next to me, I’m the brother.
The couple behind me, I’m the third wheel. The group of college kids at another table,
I’m part of that tour group. Then, I’m
not. I’m everywhere and nowhere. I listen to one conversation and then another
and I observe one couple and then a group of friends, and then I leave without
them ever realizing it.
I’m everywhere
and nowhere. I’m the mysterious stranger
who spent an hour at the Olympic Stadium writing on his laptop. I’m the person who sits in a corner while he
sips his coffee and observes everyone else interacting. I’m the person who walks around the group of
straggling tourists. Who I am? As I jested in Rhodes, I’m no one. And, when you’re no one, you can be
everywhere and nowhere. That is why I
don’t get lonely.
After I closed this
evening, I headed out to find the restaurant.
It was called Platanos Taverna, and I’m convinced we ate there in
2004. The menu looked very familiar,
too. I wound up sitting down next to two
parents and their daughter. This family
was possibly the most self-absorbed and arrogant family I had ever seen in my
travels. The father was one of the
biggest assholes I ever encountered in my travels. The mother and the daughter kept talking
about these startups, and the mother talked about this free trip to Dubai she
had gotten as part of a business venture that fell through.
I ordered what the waiter recommended,
classical Greek specialties: spinach pie, roasted lamb, and, of course,
ouzo. Everything came out very quickly,
and I lit up a Camacho after my first course.
Meanwhile, family went on yammering.
At one point, I thought I heard the word, “Scarsdale”, mentioned, but
surely that couldn’t be right. I am in
Athens, one of the world’s foremost tourist destinations. Surely, the family I had been eavesdropping
on all night could not have been talking about Scarsdale. That wasn’t possible. Then I heard the word, “Rye”, no they must
have been talking about rye whiskey.
Then, “Rye Playland”. That was
too much. I had to interject. “I’m sorry,” I asked, “Did you just say Scarsdale?” The father gave me a very dirty look and
said, “No.” The daughter, however, gave
me a sly look and contradicted him. “That’s
where I’m from,” I told them. The mother
said they were from “New York” and were making a joke about suburban
housewives. Lovely. That’s why they wanted to joke about, people
like my mother. Did I mention how
arrogant and stuck-up this family was?
It gets better. The father was
convinced that they had received a personal invite from the owner or chef and
that the meal was meant to be on the house.
He expressed this when the check came.
The waiter did not understand and went to check with someone. This caused a bit of a rift among the three
of them. Meanwhile, my lamb came, and I
was enjoying this far more than my lamb, which was quite tasty. The mother said that it was a small,
family-owned restaurant and they should just pay it. The daughter just wanted to get out of
there.
The father said that he didn’t
mind paying, just that he wanted his free meal if that was what his host had
intended. The mother said it was their
last night here, and they should just pay it.
The father went inside to talk to the waiter, hoping to pay with his
card and then perhaps have the charge voided later. I knew the restaurant was cash only, so I
eagerly anticipated him learning that.
He went to his wife and sharply asked for some cash. He insisted they shouldn’t leave a tip
because he was upset the meal wasn’t comped.
She insisted they leave 20%, clearly not understanding the Greek tipping
system. In the end, he left 10%. Meanwhile, the daughter (about my age I’d
guess) was playing with the smoke that was blowing from my cigar, the wind
taking it directly to her.
Then there
was discussion if they should take the remaining water with them. They did not.
They left, and they were out of my life forever. Did they comment to each other on the guy
smoking the cigar at the next table over?
I know not. I asked for a Greek
coffee, which they did not have, so I opted for a glass of ouzo instead and
turned my focus to the tour group of college kids at the other side of the
restaurant. I was everywhere and
nowhere.
I made my way to a coffee shop,
my cigar done by this point, and I sat outside and ordered a Greek coffee. I lit up an Avo. I ordered a second round before deciding it
was time to head back to the hotel. On
the way, I stopped at another coffee shop for a third coffee. I’m positively addicted. I was soon back at my hotel, and sat down on
the couch, in view of the Acropolis, lit up an Ardor, and proceeded to write
this entry, which I will now close so that I can publish, pack, and get to
sleep. I’ll do the reflective entry
tomorrow.
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