travel
As I have been writing this journal, I am on the plane flying back from Greece to London. My journey this time is unlike last time in Belgium as the towns I been to are different in many ways. However, I’ve been in Greece for 4 days all by myself. I started off from Athens. As of I landed, I was seeing the deserted and the orangish dried land. The first moment that I got off from the plane was that, oh my god, it was really hot!!! okay, then I got myself off the airport and sort out how to get into the central and the hotel. I had to take the bus as the metro has been under-constructed and I did not aware of that until I was standing in the middle of nowhere. Okay, I managed to get the bus ticket and got on the bus. It took almost an hour to get to syntacma ( something, I seriously could not pronounce and remember the name of each road perfectly ) anyway, once I got off, I walked my arse off to the hotel in Omonia station. ( I just recognize that the place is not very pleasant as I saw plenty of aliens and drug junkies!) but anyway, it took like 30 minutes to reach my hotel which was quite difficult as I am no capable of speaking Arabic. However, I got to the hotel which is very comfy and pleasant especially breakie ( they provide boil egg, ommlette, yogurt, a bundle of bacon and of course, an array of dessert ! After I got to the room and shower myself as last night I did not manage to ( shamed ), I headed off to Acopolis with a bottle of water ( according to the book said ) and Time Out guide book. It was so great, the weather was too perfect as I could see nothing but the super strong sun light!!! and the better thing was that I did not have to pay a penny as I am entitled as an EU student!! 555 oh,. I love this country because of this thing, otherwise, I have to pay every sights I went to. Okay, the journey up to the Acopolis was not easy at all. The weather was toooooo hot and I had to zip the water every 5 minutes and had to sit down under the shadow of anything every two minutes as I could not manage to walk up straight to the top. When I got to the top of the Acopolis, the view was stunning and all the ancient buildings are breathtaking as I had been studied about the ancient greek-roman for years and yes, here I am fronting at them. But it was too bad that I went there alone this trip ( again ) so I had to keep bothering anyone around the vicinity to help me capturing the photos. ( sorry ) still, it is worth walking/ climbing or whatever it is.. but once you got to Athens, this is a must destination to all norms. After I managed to finish up my first day sightseeing, I walked down to the flee market and in Plaka. They are nice but this time I did not plan to shopping at all. ( T^T) okay, I really finished the first day.
For the second day,
I woke so early as last night I slept at 7 pm in greek time but only 4 pm in UK! So today it would be my longggg day as I had to get off the hotel asap as I would travel to Santorini. It took around 25 minutes approximately to Pireues port. After I managed to get my boarding ticket, I bought my breakfast as the big bake donut like bun. I settled down my seat by the window for 6 ish hours ( which should actually be only 5 hrs) and yes , here I come, SANTORINI!!!!!!! the first moment I arrived was that oh my god!! not about the scenery but about where the heck with that bunch of white house with the blue dome!!!!!!!!!! so it turned out that I had to get into the bus to Fira fist then continued to another one to the OIA village. The overall time for these 2 buses are like one hour ish .. do not trust the local they said only 10 minutes to head to Fira as the matter of fact is that it is almost an hour!!!!!! and to Fira alone is 30 minutes long. So yes, I got only 30 mins OIA village * sigh * however, I managed to take sooo many pictures and I love the place sooo much as it was completely like a magical place. And then I took the bus back ( the bus was sooo crammed with sweat people T^T) to Fira and explored the place for 40 minutes. It is also beautiful but I was sadly not able to have dinner ( or proper breakfast-lunch-dinner all in one meal ) there. Because most of the cafe is on the edge of the island and the eater could see the sunset while they were having dinner.. awwww… it should be fantastic if I could make it. But hey, I could get back to the boat on time and I do not have to pay an extra ticket for that. ( phww ) . so I got back to Athens around 10 pm and took the train back to Omonia and yes, I was lost! Lost in translation this time!! so I walked in circle for half and hour and finally got the gut to walk in to another hotel to ask the direction and they were sooo kind as they helped me finding it and even warned that my hotel area is so dangerous so whatever happen , RUN! Gosh, I was so scared as I was there alone, yes, alone. And I saw many drunk people and many other kinds. But yeah, I got back to my-four-star-hotel where provide me everything but the SECURITY! However, I hurried showering and tuck in bed as I needed to sleep so bad.
Third day
today I was so lazy.. ( unusual when I travelled ) I had a left-over breakfast as I went down late and got back to sleep a little more. And packed myself a bottle of water again and headed off the hotel at 1 pm. I walked directly to Syntagma and the first stop was the parliament, seeing the changing guard and then went to National Garden, it was great but I sweated like crazy. Then I went to zappio, the yellowish exhibition something. It was kinda nice but I could not get in. then I walked to Temple of Zeus, the ruined pillar and arch things. It was again wow! How could ancient people get the building like this!!! and then I went to Met , the so-called nice colorful house area with the flower pots on their terrace. Then I could not resist for another icy bottle of ice tea, then I went to the grocery around there and talked to the local. It was so unlike me but hey, it is a good thing to talk to the local anyway. She is so nice helping me where to go around here and yes, she can speak english ,which is perfect! So I went to the first Athens Cemetery where buried many of a famous people and seeing the master piece of the artisan, She Sleeping. And then I went to the very first Olympic hall which was again reconstructed for Olympic 2004. it was giantic. And then I went on to the president + minister house which are also beautiful. And I talked to myself whether to continue or stop today but the deep inside me said I should go to the last destination today cuz I do not want to be sweaty tomorrow ( or today to be exact ) as I could not take a shower afterward. Then I went to Iriro station for the newest Olympic. It was BIG!!!!!! and it was remote and quiet 55.
Last day
I did not do anything much as I felt not very well today. I went out to strolling around and went to the mall, it was okay, not as fancy as Selfridges but yeah, it is okay. Then I went to some square and the central market. Finally, I been to everywhere I had to. And moreover, I spot the starbucks which is quite rare here. And yeah, I am on the plane flying back to the UK again 🙂
NB: this trip besides the hotel+flight+speedboat, I used less than 25 euros for everything!!
Mission accomplished
G.