Study Abroad - Thessaloniki, Greece: April 2012

Cannot believe it's already here! I feel like I've been waiting for this day forever! I finally have all of my stuff together, printed out all of my confirmation letters (TWICE!) & have my passport, copies of my passport, etc.! Also, my chargers for my phone/camera, my ipod, the essentials. Everything I need hopefully. I've been trying to pack & surprisingly it's going pretty well for only bringing a carry on. I even have extra room so I can bring things home! Can't wait! I won't see anyone from Thessaloniki for 2 and a half weeks, so weird!

Anyway, so here are my plans:

Friday morning (tomorrow!) I'm going with my friend to Halkidiki (it's supposed to be the beautiful beaches close to Thessaloniki) because I'm not leaving for my real spring break until Sunday & everyone else will be gone, so we decided this would be a good idea. Plus, he has a house there & it's only about an hour drive. Plus, I'll get some sun before spring break!

Sunday, I leave for Paris around 10:30 am. I arrive in Milan at 12 & have an 8 hour layover...so I'm gonna have to do something to occupy myself (guessing that won't be too hard!). Then I leave for Paris around 8 & arrive around 10. I will be staying in a hostel (by myself...ugh) because Natashya is staying with her host family. I'm just going to try to make her come stay with me a couple nights...I mean my hostel has a bar. Just saying. She also has classes still while I'm there, so some of it I will be exploring myself, but she is gonna skip a day to show me around too.

We both leave Thursday night around 8 pm for Barcelona! We get to Barcelona around 9:30. We are meeting up with our friend Craig & his girlfriend & his friend. We leave Sunday at 6 am. Yes, I said 6 am....so I'm thinking we're just going to pull an all nighter? So much easier...

Sunday we leave 6 am and head to Rome. We'll get there around 7:30 am. This is definitely one of the cities I'm most excited for. There's so much to do and see in Rome, I'm going to go crazy! It'll be just me & Natashya from here on out...wish us luck!

We leave Wednesday morning at 9:45 for Cinque Terre by train & we will get there around 1:45 pm (after 2 stops I think it is). Not many people have heard of this, but it's supposed to be everyone's favorite place to visit. Literally, I've talked to like 5 people & they all said hands down this is the best place. It has 5 villages all in walking distance & supposed to have some good hiking. We'll see if we get around to that...otherwise it has beautiful scenery. Only problem is that it's kind of hard to get to. We get dropped off from Rome at La Spezia Centrale & then we are supposed to try to find a local train into Cinque Terre. I'm hoping someone will be able to help us when we get there. It better be worth it!

We leave Cinque Terre Saturday by train at noon & arrive in Venice around 6 pm. Long train ride with 2 transfers...Thing I'm most excited about for Venice? Gondola. I'm making Natashya do a romantic ride with me, I don't care!

We finally leave Venice by train Tuesday around 8 pm. This is giong to be an awkward way back, but there are no (cheap) flights from Venice to Thessaloniki. So, we are taking the train to Milan (we will arrive there around 10;30) then we have to leave Milan at like 6 am for Thessaloniki. I think we're just going to stay out all night instead of getting a hostel (just thinking about saving money mom!) We will finally arrive back in Thessaloniki around 9 am, just in time for me to run back home & catch a bus to my classes (well, depending on how long it takes I might miss my first class).

Natashya is going to stay with me until the weekend I think then. I'm not sure what her plans are yet. But, I'm excited to show her around & to be reunited with my roommate for 3 full weeks! Unreal! After spring break, I have 2 weekends back in Thessaloniki, one in Amsterdam, one climbing Mt. Olympus & then the last weekend in Thessaloniki & I'm off to the islands for 13 days & finally back home. Can't believe how fast this trip is going. From here on out, it's going to fly by!

I am not bringing my iPad with me, it's too delicate to try to carry around with me all day & I would not dare leave it at the hostel (in a locker or not!) So I'll have my iPod to quickly update my facebook to tell my sister I'm alright so she will hopefully relay the message to mom. I have a free-text app too that I'll probably be frequently letting my mom know I'm okay. If you don't hear from me every 3 days though, call someone! Just kidding! :)

So Friday we left bright and early at 9 am for Delphi. Friday was pretty much a whole day of travelling, with lots of pit stops (I don't know why we stop so much?). But we finally got to Delphi around 6. There was supposed to be this beautiful pool, which we were all expecting to get into as soon as we got off the bus, but it was empty! So disappointing...So we relaxed a bit. Then, we started playing games around the hotel (like 8 year olds). We played Sardines (which didn't work out too well because Dimitris, Stefanos & Alex didn't understand the point of the game...we found Dimitri who was supposed to be hiding & when he saw us he ran...haha). Most of the time we just played cops and robbers, which was surprisingly just so much fun. We were such dorks. After that we went to the village of Delphi and grabbed something to eat. We went back to the hotel & just drank some wine and watched TV (which was in English!). We had to wake up at like 7 am the next day so we didn't feel like going out...plus Josefina and I went out Wednesday & Thursday & were kind of tired.

We woke up bright and early the next morning to leave for the museum of Delphi. I was actually really into the museum because there were so many things that I have been learning about in Greek History that I finally got to see in person! But, mostly just a lot of naked men sculptures. My favorite was the Dioskouri of Argos because we literally just learned about it in class the day before we left. Then we went to the archaeological site, which by the way was such a hike. Delphi is supposed to be the site of the Delphic oracle, and where the Greeks would praise the god Apollo. It's best known as being the "navel of the world", meaning they thought it was the center. It's the point where 2 eagles were released by Zeus met. They also had this huge stadium at the top for their track and field. After Delphi, we left for Athens and arrived around 6 pm. We went straight to the Acropolis Museum. There they had all of the findings of the ruins in Athens. It was weird because so many things were broken apart, that you'd see an arm & leg, but missing a body, and so forth. The museum was so cool, it was very futuristic. You walked on glass so you could see below you the ruins. There were little dots on the glass to focus your eyes, and the whole building had that "dot" style. It was just so cool to look below you and see the ruins of the Greeks. What I still find amazing is the fact that they could find so much after everything Athens has been through. The Persian empire set it to fire, and you would expect nothing to be left of it, and yet there's so many sculptures and remains that are there. I mean the Parthenon is still standing & it was literally attacked! After the museum we went to our hotel, went out to eat, then went out in Athens. We weren't in the center of Athens because of some incident that had happened last year I guess. We only went to one bar then just went back to the hotel and drank on the steps...pretty lame. But, Josefina and I decided that since we're leaving for our island hopping from Athens, we should just spend a night or two there before we actually leave for the islands, to get the real Athens! It's supposed to be really fun!

The next morning we woke up around 7 am again....so hungover I may add. We left for the Acropolis. We had a short tour, then had like 45 minutes to look around and take pictures. 45 minutes was definitely not enough time, I could've stayed there forever. The Acropolis is the highest point of the city, and it overlooks everything. Athens is so huge and packed together so tightly, it was nuts looking down on the city. The Parthenon was under construction, which made some of my pictures look stupid. They're trying to reconstruct it to what it looked like inside. In my opinion, I feel that they should just leave it alone. It's one of the oldest sites still standing, and it has overcome so much. I say let nature take its course, it's come this far. But, that's my opinion. Then we went to go watch the changing of the guards in front of the Greek Parliament. The soldiers have to stand there in front of the building for an hour. They change the soldier every hour each day. They were wearing the funniest uniforms, honestly I think they look kind of Russian? They walked really funny too, what's with European armies walking weird? And dressing funny. They had like little taps on the bottom of their shoes & did little dances (okay, not dances, but in my eyes it was like tap dancing). The first thing I noticed was that they all looked really tall. Most Greeks here aren't that tall (like 6 feet at the tallest), but these guys were huge. Their legs were so long & I had never seen so many tall Greeks in one place. I asked Stefanos about that and he said that there's a height requirement of like 185, which I think is like 5'11? He said that they also have to be 100% Greek and "good-looking". His words, not mine. Not sure what he meant by that, but the one guard I have a picture with had blonde hair and blue eyes....not sure how that's 100% Greek?! Haha, I asked him and he goes "Well....I guess that can happen? Rarely...." Haha! After the changing of the guards, we went to Panathinaiko, where they held the first Modern day Olympics. Then we headed home, finally! It was about 8 hours total to get home, but we stopped twice and also stopped to eat for an hour. Everyone talked about how sketchy Athens is, but I didn't think it was any worse than Thessaloniki. Then again, we didn't go into the center as much as I wanted to, which maybe is a good thing?

Every day we had a free lunch, which was so delicious. I literally ate my weight in food this weekend, there was so much food everywhere! So much good food! I forgot what it's like to get good food and not just pasta everyday! Ate way too much bread too. One guy that owned the restaurant said "Bread will make women fat, and pretty". Not sure how you can be fat and pretty, but I think I would rather be skinny and ugly. I need to stop with the bread!! When we stopped to eat on the way home from Athens for lunch, there were fishermen fishing. I decided to take a picture, but he turned around and saw me and posed! Then we talked to him for like 10 minutes, he was so confused when we said we were from America. But, I mean a Greek, a blonde, a Spanish, and an Asian altogether is usually a weird concept to understand. He was funny though, and very nice. Well, now I have a paper/presentation due Tuesday, a test Tuesday, and a paper/presentation due Wednesday. Way too much if you ask me. And, of course I haven't started any of it...not like I'm going to tonight, I got home around 8 pm, and it's already 12:30 now. I skyped Natashya, Clair, and Holly finally! It was so nice to catch up with them! Can't believe that Clair is leaving us...and that I'm not there for her last semester! I will be so jealous if she moves to New York, ever since I got to Thessaloniki, I've changed my mind, and want to live on the east coast for sure. It's calling my name! I'm nervous that I'm going to go back to Minnesota/Wisconsin and just be so bored...it's nothing compared to Greece. Only things I do miss are sushi, my wardrobe that I had to leave behind, and maybe my family/friends/boyfriend. Only maybe.

I leave next week for Spring Break! Still can't believe it!!! I'm supposed to be registering for classes over spring break, but I'm not quite sure how I'm going to do that. For right now, I'm leaving it in the hands of Brandon (someone please help...). But he has the same major as me, and should know roughly the classes that I need. Besides, I literally change my class schedule five times within the first week of classes. So, I'm not too worried. Anyway, here are some pictures from this weekend: