Greece Day 4- The Acropolis!!!

So this morning Mom and I got up early to trek up to the Acropolis, hoping to beat the heat and the tourists. We succeeded in defeating the latter but not the former. Today was the hottest day Athens had experienced all year, and we were fortunate enough to be climbing up a big hill with no shade. We took the metro to Akropoli and apparently climbed up the back entrance. I was actually amazed at the number of senior citizens who hiked up to the top of that hill until I saw the wide, gently sloping path where the tour groups entered. How come I can never seem to take the easy road?

The Akropolis was amazing. It took a lot (and a stern glance or two from the tourist police) to keep me from running up and hugging the caryatids on the Erychthion. How real history seems when you visit the places and sites where it happened. I was awestruck as I sat there and thought about the famous Greeks that had preceded me in that place. I consider myself somewhat of an expert on the Parthenon since I have visited the replica of the Parthenon in Nashville many, many times (haha). I was surprised how gleaming white the Pentellic marble was and felt great sorrow for those who had to haul those big blocks of stone from the mountain quarry several miles away up the hill of the Acropolis and into place. It is quite a feat of engineering and logistics considering there was no sort of electrical augmentation in the process. The Acropolis museum was closed, and as I sat with mom after I had taken a plethora of pictures, I turned over two thoughts in my mind:

1. 1. To restore or not to restore: I took several snapshots of archaeologists restoring parts of the buildings atop the Acropolis. You could also tell where parts of the Parthenon had been rebuilt to give the visitor a better idea of the mammoth size of the Parthenon. (Interesting side note: The British archaeologist who rebuilt the Parthenon columns erected them upside down. The columns of the Parthenon were hewn to be an optical illusion. If you stood at the base of the column and look up, it seems to be a straight line; however, the original construction had the base of the columns larger and slowly became smaller at the top). Should archaeologists leave ruins as ruins and build models of what it would have looked like in ancient times? Or should archaeologists do their best to reconstruct the buildings using original stones were possible and augmenting it with concrete or material similar to the original? The ancients copied things all of the time- statues, busts, urns, etc. , but I wonder whether the tourist appreciates the site more if it is a bunch of rocks with a story that is left to their imagination or a reconstruction of something that is not as “authentic.”

2. 2. The Elgin Marbles- The statues from the friezes of the Parthenon (the statues in the triangle parts at the top) are commonly known as the Elgin marbles, named after the British guy who took them from the Parthenon in order to “save” them and then later placed them in the hands of the British government. For many years there have been questions about who actually owned the Elgin marbles, the Greeks who built them or the British who “stole” them in the name of preservation. When the Olympics were coming to Athens, the British government promised the Greeks that they would return the Elgin Marbles to their home on the Acropolis to be housed in a swank new museum. Much red tape ensued, and then the British said that they would not “give” the Elgin marbles back to Athens but instead put them on some sort of permanent loan. Apparently, they then offered casts of the marbles to the museum allowing the originals to remain in Great Britain. (Side Note: Nashville has casts of the Elgin marbles) Needless to say, don’t go to Athens looking to see the Elgin marbles in the Acropolis Museum.

After our engaging tour of the Acropolis, mom and I trekked off in search of some more ancient ruins, where we again got lost and ended up in Thissio. (Don’t ever let me be the navigator). We then returned to our hotel and crashed until it became cooler.

We had arranged for two special trips on our tour of Greece- one to Delphi on a tour bus through Chat tours tomorrow and a private tour by car to Olympia a week from Friday. I am generally anti-organized tour (because I read so much I can practically give the tour- as I did to several tourists today on the Parthenon), but we shall see how these go. Perhaps I missed my calling- I should be a tour guide through Italy and Greece in the summer. It would be a great gig except I would have to learn some more Italian and Greek and it would be H-O-T.

Later we stopped by Mirabella, the Greek fast food shop that Mary E.B. had taken us to on Tuesday, and this time we ordered Chicken souvlaki pita. It came with French fries wrapped inside of it, and was by far more delicious than the pork we had had earlier in the week.

I have had several angry fights with the Internet at the hotel. Mary E.B. was unable to log on with her laptop the whole time she was here, but I thought it was just the operator rather than the computer. However, I have been unable to hook in to the wireless myself which leads me to horrible fits of frustration and email withdrawal. Such is life! Most of you know that I am very anti text msg/ blackberry/PDA because my ADD tendencies would have me preoccupied doing that all day every day rather than important life things like eating, working and sleeping. It is bad enough that I have 24/7 access to email and chat at home.

Enter in the best Mother’s day present I ever gave to my mother: the iPod Touch. Thankfully, I have figured out how to hop on the hotel’s wireless with this wonderful device and can check my email with relative ease. The only problem comes in when I want to send an email and have to type it in one letter at a time. The iPod touch is not two finger typing friendly which makes it much slower to type in an accurate message. It is better than no access at all. I hereby apologize to all of you who may have received an email that may have looked something like “weorhewoirwr.” Little did my mother know that her present was a gift to her in more ways that one- she can check her email and listen to her music and I can check my email and therefore be a pleasant human being (with the addition of a bit of coke). Currently, I can only get a signal in the hotel lobby which is usually full of old Greek men smoking and drinking wine, but at least it is interesting people watching.