( Where in the world? )

The day typically begins to a soundtrack of rich and multilayered birdsong. I don’t know if the same is true all over Greece, but the birds in Vrahati are particularly vocal. If they weren’t sufficient for an alarm clock, the sunlight would be; most nights I leave the back door in my room open, so the day creeps in long before I’m awake. Greek mornings in May are still cool; if I can, take a quick run before the heat of the day sets in.

As my housemate Ben observed, Greece has (in varying degrees) nearly everything one would expect of developed countries – plumbing, hot water, lifts (elevators), electricity, groceries, posh shops (“lifts”… “posh”… one begins to see that I am surrounded by Englishmen…), even imported goods – they’re just not quite as readily available or in such vast quantities as a westerner is wont to demand. For instance, the morning routine consists of getting up in enough time to turn on the water heater, wait the requisite 30 minutes for it to generate enough hot water for a shower, suffer through the occasional sputter of insufficient water pressure during said shower, and turn off the water heater again when you are finished lest it overload the circuit breaker and shut down all electricity in the house. From time to time the block or the town will have a black-out and candles are a great danger in such a dry climate. Luckily Greece is largely sunny.

Perhaps most notable among the sundry differences is the septic system. My first encounter with a Greek toilet was somewhat disconcerting; there was a colorful placard above the toilet paper showing a cartoonish toilet making a "blech" face, under which was written (fortunately in English as well as Greek) "Don't put papers in the toilet!" Naturally I associated "papers" with toilet paper... but it it truly mean that? Was I not supposed to throw toilet paper in the toilet? And if I don't, where do I put it? And for that matter what then do I call this paper? Somewhat inexplicable. So I used one tiny square and went to ask a Greek native. My suspicions were confirmed! The majority of Greek septic systems - even on the mainland - stay operational by virtue of a small covered trash can beside the toilet proper into which used toilet paper goes. Hmmmmm. Dare I say, "Yuck?"

Anyway. Breakfast for most Greeks is a simple affair – coffee and a cigarette (Greeks are profusive smokers) – but for me it is more likely to involve a cup of yogurt (see the Epicurean Entry for details) and a fresh orange from one of the two trees in the yard:
which are decadently sweet and juicy. If I’m feeling ambitious, sometimes I’ll give one of the trees a good shake and gather up the fallen oranges to juice by hand.

If the day’s tasks necessitate a visit to the baker, we inevitably walk away from the shop with a little extra change in our pockets or a heaver bag; it may be because of the relative lack of tourists in Corinth and Vrahati, but the storekeepers in both places are readily and merrily generous. Supermarkets excepted, neither my housemates nor I have paid full price anywhere. Frequently an extra item is pressed upon us. We accept graciously; what else is there to do?

By 8:45 AM we’re on our way to Corinth proper – past ancient Corinth situated at the foot of the Acrocorinth, a sheer limestone outcropping crowned by medieval ruins that soars above the plain – for a long (and, for my purposes here, irrelevant) TEFL workday.

On breaks we often negotiate the streets of modern Corinth, which is much easier said than done. Downtown Corinth has no real lane delineations or stoplights and parking is a free-for-all. In the early morning it’s not uncommon to see cars (all small, mostly of European make; none of these behemoths we’re so accustomed to in America) double-parked on one or both sides of the roadway, leaving only a narrow strip for oncoming traffic. The going can be - by all indications - rather slow, but by most urban standards the volume is light.

Due to the lack of traffic direction (there are occasional stop signs which are largely disregarded), I would imagine driving is something of a test of fortitude; while there are implicit rules of priority (Peter, the Via Lingua Corinth director, leads us to understand that right of way is quite literal), those appear to be disregarded also. Fortunately, in the city, drivers make their way slowly (the same cannot be said of the streets of Vrahati, where young and old alike floor it, narrowly missing pedestrians, animals, parked cars and garbage receptacles) and use horns liberally, but Greece didn’t earn its stature as the leading country for traffic accidents for naught. I hear the insurance rates on rental cars are astronomical. After a day or so in Greece, one begins to understand why.

Needless to say the state of the driving affairs tends to make Corinth a treacherous place for pedestrians. There are occasional crosswalks, mostly over the larger streets, but people afoot are left to their own devices elsewhere. If you intend to get anywhere, you must be assertive. Given the lack of stoplights, there are no breaks in traffic, but sometimes the cars will pile up and allow someone afoot to weave between them. Otherwise, the rule of thumb is just to intimidate a driver into stopping by gradually creeping out into the street and staring him or her down. Generally this works well, though sometimes you find yourself waiting several minutes for an impressionable driver.

The city itself is almost universally panned by the guidebooks; it is, for all intents and purposes, a working city, and does not put on any airs. Nevertheless it has its charm; there are many quaint shops (as well as some inexplicably high-fashion shops), food markets and pedestrian streets lined with cafes and restaurants. Occasionally you’ll come upon a pair of particularly gregarious elderly women in the park who kiss you affectionately on the cheek as if you’d always been friends, or a solitary man window-shopping and accompanying himself on an accordion. Like much of Greece, I would not call Corinth beautiful:
though with time the eye begins to disregard the less attractive parts and pick out the colorful produce stands, luxuriously shaded cafes, and well-kept storefronts.

Greeks still honor siesta, the tradition of resting in the afternoon. It’s remarkable how the bustling early morning city falls eerily silent around 3 PM until 5 PM. Some stores close for the day prior to siesta; others re-open at 5 or 6 PM until 8 or 9 PM. Greeks start their day late, so they eat lunch after noon and dinner closer to 8 PM. Restaurants are primarily open for dinner between the hours of 8 PM and 10 PM and it's not uncommon to see families or groups of friends talking over dinner on their patios well into the night.

The evening is when Greece shines; sunsets are pink and purple and gold over the tourmaline water and green hills. At twilight the coast begins to sparkle with lights and on the way home the storefronts, cafes and homes glow warmly. Twilight forgives many things, and the Greece I’ve come to know becomes the Greece I saw from afar when the sun goes down.

On some days, if we get home before dark, we can take a stroll down to the beach, where the water is crystal clear:
I’ve been led to understand that most beaches in Greece are stone; there are few truly sandy beaches except perhaps on the islands.

At night there is a small carnival set up on the beachfront and the local bars and clubs (generally small, mostly outdoor) do a booming business, especially on the weekend when the Corinthians and Athenians come down from the “big city” to enjoy the beach. Aside from the beachfront, Vrahati’s main street is situated around the church and boasts various shops, a supermarket, and restaurants/cafes on a small scale.

Back on the homefront, dinner for us is an informal affair. If we cook at all, we turn on the gas tank under the stove (making sure to turn it off again after!) and light the burners by hand. Fresh produce is the rule of the day. Typically I wind down the night talking with one of my housemates over a cup of local wine (the area around Corinth is Greek wine country, meaning only that local wine is less wretched than the majority of Greek wine; the Greek vintages are not well-regarded in the worldwide wine market, but may perhaps see a resurgence) out on the front porch.

It is a calm life, full of simple pleasures.

( Where in the world? )
In a true coup by Irony, the weather - which has been universally sunny and beautiful throughout last week - turned cloudy, rainy and cool on Saturday morning. Nevertheless, we set out in the intermittant sunshine on "the archeological tour" through Greek's wine country in the upper Peloponnese. Our resident guide, Angeliki, took us through the winding country roads to the first stop - ancient Nemea, nestled among the vineyards:
( Nemea: A Short History )

The site itself is mostly a jumble of rocks with the barest ghostly foundations of various buildings (the xenon, a hotel-of-sorts, oikoi and public spaces). The bath house and the Temple of Zeus are the only recognizable remains to any but an archaeologically trained eye. Towering columns of the ilk that one might come to expect of ancient Greece dominate the site of the Temple:
A quick perusal of old photographs or a spin through the museum reveal that the (Doric) columns on the right as well as one from a secondary collonade are the only ones that survived the centuries; the pillars to the left have been meticulously reconstructed from scattered debris by archaeologists:
The sunken bathing chamber (only part of what was once a much larger complex that catered to the Nemean atheletes), protected now by a modern roof that is supposedly the approximate height and dimensions of its ancient predecessor, is eeriely well-preserved:
The baths (circa 4th century B.C.) were equipped to draw water from a nearby spring via a reservoir system; the 8-meter deep reservoirs and terra cotta aqueduct are also in the kind of remarkably good condition that condenses time and makes the ancient past seem almost immediate.

It's remarkable, reading any of the literature about Nemea and the classical world, that modern scholarship has been able to deduce so much about the day-to-day life of ancient people and interpret from what amounts to piles of rubble meaningful patterns of learning, worship, mourning, celebrating... living.

We also made a stop at the Nemean stadium, notable primarily for the ancient graffiti preserved on its vaulted entry tunnel, the earliest known of its kind in Greece.

After an attempt at Mycenae which ended in being driven away by a torrential downpour (unfortunately the ruins are best seen in the sunlight), we made our way to Nafplio, Angeliki's favorite place. It is billed as "the prettiest town in Greece," and not without cause:
The town suffered through a number of occupations, among them Ottoman and Venetian, from the vestiges of which, ironically, it draws a considerable amount of charm. From 1829 - 1834 Nafplio was the first capital of liberated Greece and - somewhat notoriously - the site of the assasination of President Kapodistrias in 1831. The Venetian-facaded lower town (dotted with quaint cafes, shops and shuttered wrought iron balconies overgrown with bougainvillea riotously in bloom) is dominated by a jutting rock outcropping crowned with the ruins of several medieval and Byzantine fortresses. After a quintessential Greek lunch in one of the small restaurants, we skirted the peninsula on which the Akronafplia, the site of the original town, lies in ruin using a precipitous - no railings whatsoever! - if well-maintained path. The sea kept us company:
as we approached the entrance to the 999 stairs leading up to the Palamidi fortress, a huge citidel-composite of Venetian and Ottoman ruins sprawling across the summit:
The ascent was long and hot, although the view from the top was well worth it:




The Palamidi is an adult's playground, composed of seven Venetian forts (on which gun slits, interestingly, were cut to face each other as well as outward in the even that the enemy penetrated the defenses by degrees) and one Ottoman ruin on the uppermost summit. In more recent history it was used as a prison, and close cells are networked throughout the complex, beckoning the curious explorer with coyly hidden secret stairs leading to cisternal oubliettes, echoing and dark:

The extent of the place merits at least two hours' exploration and the vistas demand a working camera:
We concluded our somewhat truncated archaeological tour with a homemade ice cream on Angeliki's recommendation, watching the children play football (soccer) on the marble square at the center of Nafplio proper.

The trip only whetted my appetite for travel in Greece and I spent the rest of the evening pouring over my guidebooks, picking where I'd go next...