The Trip So Far

The trip so far has been an absolute thrashing of the senses. The spirit is
willing but the body is weak, and thus far this trip has been a battle of the
will against the weak flesh. In other words, while everyone is aching, we will
still run from one monumental site to the next, and we are still wowed and awed
by the magnificence and significance of it all.

And we do not waste a second. From the very first day in Athens, after a
culmination of around 26 hours in flight time and very little sleep, we trekked
our way up Mt Lykevittos for our first night to be awed by the magnitude of the
city and the panoramic view. In our following days of Greece, we went about
exploring the museums (amazing wealth of material!) and richly historic ruins
dotted throughout the city. Some of these places can seem amazingly out of place
in the gritty streets of Greece, and it can be sometimes hard to visualise that
this was the place where an ancient society once thrived, just as we do now.
These historic remains are to be preserved and this is why you will occasionally
see them in seemingly out-of-place instances, such as Hadrian's Arch, right off
the main road, and a hotel forced to build around some ruins. The absolute
highlight of Greece, personally, has been the Acropolis, and with it the
Parthenon – awe-inspiringly amazing stuff. Photography does not justify its
magnificent and dominating presence. It is just astonishingly massive; the
pillars would require two people's arm-lengths to fit around, also being
octastyle (eight columns along the front). Consider the fact, too, that
historically it had been garishly painted, and housed an equally impressive
statue of Athena, some 18 metres high, whose golden radiance was supposed to
have been seen from the sea. Truly the pinnacle of Athenian prominence, and it
is definitely a life-goal to see it again in its full splendour, once fully
restored.
From our second day off at Delphi, a truly pure place, perhaps the best example
of the prenotion of Greek purity that we have today, the weather has not been
all hunky-dory. But everyone has been having the time of their lives, and
personally this has been a fantastic excuse to exercise my amateur photography
skills. From our exhilarating underground adventures in a bauxite mine, to
frolicking in the pure and mountainous ancient settlements, to which we were
running to and fro, everyone has been finding this an enriching and
contemplative experience. Take for instance, the difference in Roman and Greek
approaches to theatre, in which the Greek stage adheres to the laws of geometry
and nature, that is a perfect circle, as opposed to the Roman emphasis on
practicality and the focus on acoustics, which leaves a semi-circular stage and
a lessened focus on the orchestra area.

And through this all, in a few days, which with the sheer volume of events is
becoming something of a blur for a number of people (probably involving a lot of
running; one might even think this is a distance squad tour), there have also
been cultural enrichment and insight. Group bartering has been absolutely
hilarious, and the souvenirs will hopefully be treasured for years to come, so
too our pictures of random hobos. Indeed, one is also reality-checked with
sights such as these, alongside the never-ending graffiti everywhere. It makes
sense really, despite being a rather socialist government, the bankruptcy of
Greece comes to mind, and with it the frustrated unemployed youths obviously
responsible for such acts. Indeed, police presence is quite significant, and
riot pre-emption imminent; we could even hear the echo of police sirens when
ascending Mt Lykevittos due to the tall narrow nature of the streets in Greece
(the buildings that is). The events leading up to our ferry leaving Greece
involved: going down a street full of unemployed Moroccan youths (in a bus
thankfully), and upon waiting for the ship to set sail, we watched with great
amusement more (assumedly) Moroccan youths "casually" hanging around by a car
shelter with the intent of boarding our ship. As hilarious as it was seeing them
act like dogs to the waves on a beach, and upon their obvious failure, leading
them to literally climb some trees to jump the fence out, you can safely assume
that they will be there for the next ship, willing to try again.

C'est la vie, as it may be, it can really make you contemplate the world we live
in and again the imagery of ancient Grecian society pervades my mind and with it
my wonderment of their societal issues.
But for now, we advance on Rome.
— James Stannard