It's been awhile

hi people who read this,

i know it's been a while, but it's because i haven't really been in athens for a really long time. i had spring break for 8 days and then was in northern greece the week right afterwards. so i have a lot to talk about and i may spread it out over a couple of posts. you should definitely look at my pictures, because i took a whole bunch and i'm gonna eventually post them.

well first thing's first, i went to egypt. it was pretty crazy. i had spring break from the 7-16. i was in egypt from the 8th to the 16th. it was really really different. i thought it wouldn't really be that foreign, but it's definitely a different world. first muslim and african country i've been too. we flew a late night flight from athens to cairo. we got into egypt around 3. kind of inconvenient. from the get go i knew was gonna be different. arabic all over. a noose that warned against drug running. very different.

after a kind of sketchy cab ride that we later found out was a rip, we made it to the hotel. the group i went with was a good one. i went with andy, three hannahs, a jess, a nora, mandy and christie. the hotel was kinda seedy, but it wasn't terrible. we set out the next day. kinda weird b/c the hotel had a security guard and metal detectors. we wandered to streets for a bit. kinda dirty and run down. we struck up a conversation with this random dude. he led us to a seedy back alley store. they said it was a tourist shop, but most of us didn't want to go. we did though and the guy offered to hire us a car and organize our time in cairo.

i know, dumb idea right? i thought so, but what he said seemed okay. he gave us testimonials and even food. it was this weird rice, noodle, bean, food bucket. it was probably the best food i had the entire stay. we ended up agreeing to do a perfume/papyrus store visit and a nile dinner cruise at night. it was crazy and everything our parents said not to do, but it worked out. the papyrus/perfume/jewelery store were all right. and the dinner cruise was good and only 25 dollars (that's 250 Egyptian pounds) the conversion is 5.5 Egyptian pound per 1 dollars. it's crazy how rich you feel. a big bottle of water cost 1 Egyptian pound, that's 20 cents. crazy.

one other thing is the driving. it's insane. the drivers floor it at every opportunities. traffic lights are few and far between. the only one's i saw were blinking yellow. but the craziest thing is that donkey karts, horses, and god knows that else are on the road too. and there are all sorts of vendors on the streets. juice, meat, fruit. they'll come up to cars too. very different from back home. but i really got a vibe that this was really a city. more so than the buildings. there was so much going on streets. even though it may seem primitive, you get a melting pot and sense of activity. i felt that it was the most city-like place i've been in. makes sense i guess there are 20 million people in cairo. a lot.

anywho, i have a greek final tomorrow, so i'll finish up soon. i have a bit more time these days, although i'm thinking about going to some islands this weekend. we'll see. i 'll write soon. later dudes. you should look at the pictures. they show what i did better than my words really can.

Soccer Game

i finally made it out to a soccer game yesterday. i had to paper due today and i didn't end up finishing until 30 minutes before they were due, but going to the game was definately worth it. It was between two athenian teams (panathenakos and aek). i like panathenakos better b/c their colors are green and white. i know it's a stupid reason, but what do i know about greek soccer.


so i went down to the game with sasha, pat, kurt and kurt's friend carson to olympic stadium. it was really nice. they only built it 3 years ago for the olympics and it's pretty impressive. i'll put pictures up on the picasa soon. i didn't take my camera, but carson took pictures.



the actual game was also pretty cool. the stadium seats around 72,000 and it was like 3/4 full. they blocked off a lot of upper deck seat so it was pretty packed closer to the field. it was an aek game some everyone was wearing yellow and black. it was awesome. they all knew the fight songs and all the communal chants. it was kinda like a penn state game except like 100x more intense if it's possible. they love their soccer here. the game ended up in a 1-1 tie. but when aek scored the stadium went nuts. rivaldo scored on a penalty kick really really nuts. it also got dead silent went panathenikos scored. i might've cheered, but i'm pretty sure i would've gotten my ass kicked.

rivaldo scoring

anywho, i'm pretty tired from staying up all night writing my stupid papers. i did get seperated from everyone on the metro ride back, which was pretty cool. well that's about it. i'm leaving for egypt in a few day. super psyched.

oh and i almost forgot, i got the internet back at home. Amazing. By far the most important news of the day.