Welcoming mom and her jetlag to Istanbul [YQrtw Day 48 May 25]

Location: Istanbul, Turkey

As I mentioned in my old post talking about Turkey, my mom has joined in on my round-the-world trip during the Turkey leg (lol) of my trip.

This is the first time that she’s travelling to Europe so I promised to pick her up when she arrives. The hostel I was staying at had a 5:15am shuttle for 5 euro and I gladly paid it so I do not need to figure out the public transport.

Since there was not much traffic at 5:15 am, the bus reached the airport in 15 minutes time. That was majorly fast.

When the shuttle bus dropped off passengers at the international departure hall, I asked the driver if he was going to the international arrivals, thinking that he would pick up the other passengers.

Mom didn’t come out into the arrival halls until an hour after the plane landed. We took the tram from the airport back to my hostel.

We got off our tram one stop too late because I didn’t remember the stop correctly. However, we were in luck as the famous pastry shop, HafIz Mustafa 1864, was just in front.

We breakfasted on three buns, Turkish tea and a cafe latte. The food in the display window looked more attractive than our brown buns but no one was buying the Turkish delights that early in the morning.

We got back to my hostel. I quickly packed my things and we shifted to another hotel down the road. The new room was huge and has three beds. How awesome is that.

The next thing I had on my to-do was less awesome. Remember how I bought a new SIM yesterday? Turns out, even though I paid 25 lira for 1GB internet, the data package was never linked to my phone. (I found out from the guy working at Turkcell in the airport.)

Despite being confrontation-phobic, I had to go back and plead for my 25 lira package.

When I got back, the lady who served me wasn’t in. None of her Turkish colleagues spoke enough English but one of them have the bright idea to bring up Google Translate where we “chat” with translations.

After they found out about my problem, they had a heated discussion and even called someone up. However, they did give me my 1GB data back so I am very thankful.

List of places we visited:

When was the last time you travelled with your mom? How was the experience?

Caturday: Caterpillar-in-training in Florence

Location: Chiesa di Santa Croce, Florence, Italy

This kitty was napping at the little garden of a church. It ignored me all the time I mew-ed to it.

(Caterpillar is the actual name of a cat.)

Find more Caturday posts on this blog.

The 3 labors in Istanbul [YQrtw Day 47 May 24]

My trials weren’t over when my long-distance bus stopped in Istanbul’s terminal. My 3 labors were:

I had no Turkish money
I had no idea where I will be sleeping tonight. (This will totally freak my father out, so thankfully, he’s not reading this.)
I had no mobile internet

I remember reading that long-distance bus companies would provide shuttle service from the terminal to the city center. None of the signs on top of the buses said Sultanahmet which was where I planned to find a place to say.

Despite being a ‘fraidy cat when asking strangers questions, I asked one of the employees where the bus to Sultanahmet was. He pointed to an empty space, surrounded by other people waiting.

So I waited. The second bus that parked at the mysterious space was the bus I had to go.

Of course, I did not know where to stop. It wasn’t until the last stop when everyone got off the bus that I asked the driver, “Sultanahmet?”

The man who looked 40-years-old spoke a lot of Turkish loudly, throwing his hands in the air. I translated this as, “Stupid foreigner, why didn’t you get off when I asked about LOCATIONNAME?”

I had to put on my Stupid Tourist face the whole while and smiled brightly.

The driver continued driving and said something that had the word “Metro”. I wasn’t sure if he was referring to the bus company “Metro” or the metro system. I nod my head anyway. The driver looked pleased.

While he drove, he pointed to neighborhoods and said things in Turkish. I tried as hard as I can to decipher, getting it right some times.

I figured that a particular neighborhood was where rich people lived, since the driver said “doktor”. He also said that the lane was small, or narrow.

We amused ourselves with this guessing game. At one point, he stopped by the road, pointed to the clock and showed me 9 fingers. I nod.

He showed me mobile phone photos of his five-year-old. I smiled and nod my head. He rolled some dried grass into a square of paper and went out to smoke.

Just a minute before 9:00am, a call came. The driver had finished smoking and picked it up. It seems to be that the head office was asking where he was. He grumbled loudly and drove to a Metro branch to pick some people up.

He told the young lady who came in about the stupid tourist. I caught the word “Sultanhmet.”

When the bus reached the tram station, the driver stopped the vehicle and pointed to the metro. I thanked him and got off.

In search of an international ATM and SIM

Despite the driver’s helpfulness, I was still cashless. ATMs that accept withdrawal using foreign ATM cards were difficult to find.

It took me a damn long time, passing at least 6 ATMS, before I found one that had the CIRRUS sign. Turns out, it only accepted Cash Advance.

I moved to the other ATM nearby and successfully withdrew 300 Turkish lira (TL), thinking that it would be sufficient.

Just across the street, there was a Turkcell shop. I head in and waited a while before the other customers were done.

The lady in the shop, with bleached blond hair and heavy eyeliner, told me that it would cost 35TL for a SIM card and 25TL for 1GB internet.

35TL for a SIM was the most ridiculous price for SIM card. It was equivalent to about S$30, with 5TL credit.

I almost didn’t want to get the card but I knew that I would regret it. So I did pay 60TL in the end for the card and data connection.

I felt like one of my limbs had regrown as I searched for information using my mobile data. Now to find a place to stay!

Snow White and the Seven Grown Men

I chose a hotel that had dorm rooms, thinking that I needed to save since SIM cards ate up half of my daily budget.

Following Google Maps, I walked down slopes from the restaurant to the hotel. The staff was still cleaning up so I had to wait a while. I didn’t mind waiting since my bag was off my shoulder.

At last, I was shown the dorm room. Inside, about 7 beds were arranged messily. The hotel person pointed to the beds and said it was occupied by which nationality.

I decided to choose one of the beds but the hotel person asked, “Do you want to change rooms?”

Come to think of it, I don’t really want to stay in a room with 6 other men. Even if they were gentlemen, it’s just plain weird.

My budget was blown through when the hotel person showed me a double room with an attached bathroom. Oh well.

Later, after a half an hour nap, I was thankful for the private room and its air-conditioning.

All’s well that ends well, I suppose.

Post script: My 14-hour bus ride has sapped a lot of my energy away. It’s only 9:40pm now but I feel the need to get back into bed. Plus, I need to pick up mom from the airport tomorrow at 6:00am. See you tomorrow!

Athens to Istanbul by bus [YQrtw Day 46 May 23]

Location: Mykonos -> Athens -> Istanbul

When I was planning my journey from Greece to Turkey, I didn’t think of doing a bus trip. I wanted to take the train or even a ferry to reach Istanbul from Athens.

But I found out that there is no direct train from Greece to Turkey. I will need to take two ferries to reach Turkey and take another bus ride to Istanbul.

In the end, I chose to buy a bus ticket from Athens to Istanbul.

Figuring out how to get the tickets was a pain in the buttocks. The web page for Crazy Holidays’s Athens to Istanbul was a jumble and there was no way to figure out how to get the tickets.

In the end, I found out how to get tickets from Athens when I stumbled upon this page. Silver Star Agency’s location was easy to find with Google Maps.

How to get to Al Travel Metro

The directions to the bus terminal was a little confusing since Google Maps couldn’t interpret the full address that was given to me.

The right address to search on Google Maps is Leoforos Athinon 222.

From Larissa station and Metaxougnio, there are buses A15 and B15 which stop at ΠΑΛΙΑΤΖΙΔΙΚΑ‎. Walk with the direction of the traffic and you will reach Al Travel Metro.

Being the scatterbrain that I am, I was too excited about the bus ticket spot check that I did not stop at the right stop.

Instead, I got off at one stop after. I had to walk on a overhead bridge that was parallel to the huge highway. The journey felt a lot longer than it was as the sun was hot and my bag was heavy.

I reached at 4:00pm. My bus was to leave at 5:00pm. I hung out at the stuffy lobby until the departure time.

At Al Travel Metro, there is a toilet behind the lobby. It’s in a warehouse and looks dark and creepy–you never know what you’ll step into.

The 14 hour bus ride

According to Google Maps, my journey was about 1,000km.

Thank goodness the seats were comfortable and I didn’t have anyone sitting beside me.

Throughout the night, I experimented with different sleeping positions. I was a pretzel, The Thinker with knees to my chin, a cushion with my head on the seat.

I never figured out what was the best position for sleeping. The position I want to experiment was hanging my legs out the aisle having my whole upper body on the two seats.

Bad backseat mates

I am blessed with a magical ability to attract the worst behind-seat mates. Last trip from KL to Singapore, I had a lady who crossed her legs through out the journey and whined loudly when my seat even reclined that just little bit.

This time, it was a pair of Brazillian buddies. They could not stop talking from across the aisle!

The only time I realized that there was no sound coming from them was at 11:00pm. I peeked at them and found that they were trying to sleep.

Rest stops along the way

The rest stops in Greece looked more like nice coffee shops that are generous with their toilet.

In Turkey, however, it cost 1 euro to use the toilet. Just as bad as it was in Italy.

Land border crossing and the smuggler

I’ve only entered another country through the borders in two places: Malaysia-Singapore and Malaysia-Thailand.

I was curious how the border crossing was for Greece and Turkey.

Leaving Greece, everyone had to get off the bus, pass their passport to the customer officer who was at the bus lane. The officer asked a few questions to suspicious people (like someone with a Malaysian passport). Those who have suspicious baggage had to take things out and unwrap them.

The passports were later passed back when we all got back on the bus.

For Turkey, the inspection was a bit worse. My luggage inspection was fast since I only had a backpack. The officer still put his hand into my bag and felt around.

There was a man who brought two tall boxes wrapped with newspaper and taped with brown tape, inside which was cognac, at least according to him.

The Turkish customs folks tore open the wrapping. In one of the boxes was a tall alcohol bottle that was about the height of my knee.

The man was detained and our bus left without him. It’s pretty scary to be him.

I drifted in and out of sleep on the bus. Most of the time I had my feet on the other seat and rested my head on the my seat. (Later I took a 2 hour nap when I got to Istanbul).

The bus was surprisingly on time and we all made it to Istanbul at 8:00am.

What was the longest bus ride you have taken?

Glutton in Italy

[Every Friday is Food Friday here at YQ travelling. Let’s feast.]

Last week, we had a taste of food in Florence in the Glutton eats with Florence Food Tour.

Today, I want to show you the other food I ate while in Italy. Before I went to Italy, the only Italian food I know of was pasta, pizza and Italian-named coffees. I never ate much gelato back home because it’s always more expensive than ice creams.

Italian coffees

Italian breakfast of cappucino and cornetto

Italians don’t seem to drink bad coffee–the coffee at the breakfast buffet of my mid-priced hotel in Pisa was rather good and even the cappucino served at IKEA (famous for its burnt coffee) was excellent.

IKEA Italy's coffee bar. How awesome is that? — IKEA Italy’s coffee bar. How awesome is that?

While in Florence, I had a favorite coffee shop right at the Palazza Duomo. The place serves good coffee and has a view of one of the walls of the very beautiful Duomo.

In Italy, coffee is usually drank at the bar. It seems to me that only tourists sit at tables, and are charged more for it.

Gelato

I have to confess. I cannot actually tell the difference between gelatos of different shops. Apart from the flavors, they all taste the same to me: milky and cold.

I did have an extra nice pistachio-flavored gelato while in Rome. It really tasted of green pistachios.

Strawberries

Strawberries were in season when I was in Italy. For my first two nights, I ate only strawberries for dinner because I was too tired of going out and deciphering menus.

Pizza

Pizza used to be my favorite western dish back when I was growing up. We only had Pizza Hut but I loved it anyway.

I had the most amazing pizzas when I was in Rome. I was walking around the neighborhood of my AirBnb place, trying to look for the restaurant recommended by the houseowner. I didn’t find the restaurant but I found a pizzeria.

Pizza there sold by weight, not slice as I was used to. On the first day, I ordered a small slice. But the next day, I ordered double the volume because it was just too tasty.

Special dishes in Florence

I spent 5 night in Florence, making it the city I spend the most time in. The Chinese hostel owner brought me to the streets on the day I arrived, even before I put my bags in the hostel, and showed me a Florence street food.

Lampredotto

The lampredotto is made from the fourth stomach of a cow. It’s cooked in a sauce and served either on its own or squished between a hard bun.

The taste was alright but I always appreciate entrails (even though my cholesterol is on the higher side). The bread that came along was a tougher challenge and made me feel like a cow that have grazed too long and hurt my jaw.

Porchetta sandwich

Porchetta at Florence's Tuesday Market — Porchetta at Florence’s Tuesday Market

At the Tuesday Market, there were food trucks selling lampredotto and porchetta. How do you know if the truck sells porchetta? It’s easy. They have a whole roasted pig on display.

The porchetta sandwich I ate had a hard bread. The meat wasn’t moist so it felt like I was gnawing through tough cardboard.

Florentine steak

I had this special dish in Florence one rainy evening. It’s less of a steak and more of a great slab of meat cooked crispy on the outside and bloody in the inside.

Even though I was feeling melancholic during that meal, I must say that the meat meat tasted great. However I wasn’t able to finish my 700gm slab of steak so I took it back to my hostel where the hostel mates polished it off.

That’s what I call team work!

Odd one out: Chinese dumplings

This is a rather odd entry in my Italian food list. Since I was staying in a Chinese-run hostel, I had the chance to have dinner there for an extra 5 euro.

One night, the owner served Chinese dumpling but it had a strange filling. There didn’t seem to be any meat and had glass noodles and cabbage instead.

Day trip to Delos, the birthplace of Apollo [YQrtw Day 45 May 22]

Location: Mykonos, Greece

Today was the day of the day trip to Delos, the sacred island where the sun god Apollo and his twin Artemis are said to be born.

To get to Delos, you need to take a boat, run by Delos Tours which has a counter at the docks. Without a tour, the price of the return trip is 17 euro.

The guided tour package is 40 euro for a 1.5 hour group tour and the return tickets. I chose the tour group because I haven’t done my reading on the island. The tour was booked through my hotel.

The boat for the guided tour leaves at 10:00 am. The lady at the hotel told me it would be better to reach at 9:30 am so I had to call for a cab.

Along with the booking fee, the cab fare was 7 euro from the hotel to not-even-near the Delos dock. The meter seemed to jump really fast. Each 3 meters, it jumps by 1 cent, leading my heart to jump along with it.

With my voucher, I collected my boat ticket and a sticker that signified that I was on the guided tour. The boat that went to the island was quite large and had two levels.

I really wanted to stay in the shaded lower level but felt that it looked odd when everyone else was on the upper deck. So I head up and sat under the sun.

The trip to Delos seemed to take forever as the sun gave my left shoulder a good sizzle. Even covering my shoulders with a shawl didn’t seem to help much as the heat still soaked through the thin synthetic fabric.

Tour of Delos’s residential area

The boat finally landed at Delos. Everyone swarmed out and there was a slight confusion as no one really knew which area to gather for their own tour group.

There were two English tours that day. One had a Union Jack as a sticker while the other, which I was on, had a half smiley face sticker.

Our tour guide was Joanna who wore a Beatles t-shirt and a baseball cap.

Our first stop was the residential area of Delos. The only remains left of the place were stone walls with stones stacked high without using any cement. This was the Greek way of building walls: stacking stones with smaller stones in between so everything would stay put.

The walls that we saw were mostly stone but in the past, the Greek would put a layer of material outside of the walls so that the surface is smooth.

At the House of Dionysus, we saw a replica of a marble mosaic that had a head with wings, floating on a tiger.

The head and wings belonged to Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, entertainment and theater. Dionysus was popular among the common people because everyone likes to partaaay.

In the same house, we could see the remains of a stone staircase heading up and also a room with a drain which functioned as a private toilet.

At another house, we saw a window with marble frames. On the marble, there were holes. Back then, there was metal railing in the window and the room was a bank of sorts.

Next stop, Joanna brought us to the ancient theater. Most of the marble seats were gone but some of the front row seats were intact and even had backs.

Our visit to the residential area ended after looking at the House of Cleopatra where two statues were found. One of the statues had the name Cleopatra so the house was named that way. This wasn’t the same Cleo as the one who died of a snake bite.

Apollo’s temples no more

Next up was Apollo’s sanctuary and his alleged birth place.

Here on Delos, there wasn’t much left of Apollo’s sanctuary. There were marble foundations and some lonely columns lining the paved road to the temple but it required a very good imagination to see the things as it was in the past.

In the distance, a single palm tree marked approximately where Apollo was born. There used to be a lake there in the past but the present archaeologists filled the lake up because it was breeding malaria-carrying mosquitos.

There were also a line of marble lions near the temple. The replica lions were rather slim and had the same ravaged looks as the original.

When the tour ended, we had time to spare. There was a boat leaving at 1:30pm but I decided to stay on the island and leave on the last boat at 3:00pm.

When the boat that leaves at 1:30 pm left, I was worried that I would be bored with the island. In the end, I wasn’t bored at all.

I went around exploring after I took a look at the museum’s rather sparse collection. I had wanted to climb up the tallest hill but I gave up. It was a little embarrassing that I couldn’t make it to the top as I saw many retirees sprinting up.

Halfway up the hill, there was a temple with the sign Temple of Isis. The half broken statues of a goddess inside didn’t look like the Isis I know. It had a flowy robe.

I took a wrong path on my way down. The path might have led somewhere in the past but I only had plants that clung to me desperately and an end that required me to jump down 2 feet to the ground.

Many lizards lived on the island. Most of them were colorful with stripes of bright green or blue.

The boat back to Mykonos sounded its horn 30 minutes before departure.

When we left, Delos turned back into the empty place with all but the archaeologists, birds and lizards staying back on the sacred island.

What staying at a Chinese-run hostel in Europe is like

The first time I was in Europe in Barcelona in 2009, I stayed at a Chinese-run hostel to save on accommodation.

This time in Florence, I did the same since accommodation in Italy isn’t that cheap.

A Chinese-run hostel is unlike the usual international hostel that you see:

The business usually doesn’t advertise on hostelbookers or similar sites (but I’ve seen one advertise on AirBnb).
The clientele is mainly Chinese-speaking people (as you would expect).
The hostel is in an apartment.

In Florence, I stayed in the Chinese-run hostel for 5 nights since it was one of the cheapest option around.

I paid 25 euro for each night I spent in the dorm and paid an extra 5 euro for dinner. The price includes a Chinese breakfast every morning.

Back in Barcelona, I booked a double room for myself and was given a room large enough for 6. This time in Florence, I wasn’t able to be as generous with my money so I opted for a bed in the dorm.

On the night I went, my dorm which had 6 beds (including one unoccupied upper bunk) only had 4 residents. One of the beds was occupied by the other lady who helps out at the hostel.

However, on the busiest night, there were 8 people sleeping in it (with extra beds stuffed into the large space). The lady who helped out at the hostel had to sleep in the kitchen, along with the owner of the hostel.

What does a Chinese-run hostel look like?

First off, it’s usually in an apartment with rooms boarded up to make smaller rooms or in the case of dorm rooms, a large room with a few beds pushed against the wall.

The Florence hostel I stayed at had 3 large rooms with multiple beds and a smaller room with a double bed. One of the large rooms was used as a dorm room while the other 2 were rented out as doubles for couples.

There is a kitchen/dining room where everyone has their breakfast.

If you are lucky, there are more than one toilets/bathroom. If you aren’t lucky (like me in Florence), there is only one bathroom/toilet.

I had to share that one toilet/bathroom with 13 other people on the busiest day in Florence but it wasn’t too bad because everyone was polite about doing their business quickly.

What I like about a Chinese-run hostel is that the guests are less random people: everyone is Chinese (either from China, Taiwan or less likely Malaysia). Since we share a common language, things get friendlier easier.

The dorm owners are usually very generous about travel tips in their cities. The lady in Florence took us out for a walking tour of Florence while the lady in Barcelona had a notebook filled with travel tips.

The people you meet at a Chinese hostel in Europe

The people I’ve met at the hostels were usually from China.

A lot of them were students studying in other parts of Europe, taking time off for a weekend holiday at a nearby European city.

Most of these Chinese kids are spoiled.

Two of the people I met in Florence were studying in Switzerland. They took the train down to Italy the night before and came to Florence to “do some branded goods shopping”. The transport for each of them were 300 euro for a return trip but it wasn’t much of a problem for them.

But I did meet one not spoiled Chinese student who was studying in France and was visiting Florence.

In Florence, I also met a newly wedded couple from Taiwan who were more rational beings. I’m thinking it’s a combination of being Taiwanese and being adults that made them so much more pleasant than university kids. (I sound like a cranky old lady.)

I’ve only stayed at Chinese hostels run by ladies from mainland China. I’ve read about those run by Taiwanese families but not stayed there before.

I never sat down and asked the ladies why they decided to leave their country and come to Europe. And if running a hostel was their ambition when they left home. I feel that it’s too personal to ask such questions, although they do make good stories.

Food at a Chinese hostel in Europe

The Chinese hostels usually provide breakfast. The food is likely mainland Chinese-styled breakfast with buns and noodles as dishes. I did eat a seafood paella once in Barcelona.

For some extra euros, the hostel owners would prepare an extra serving of dinner for you. The food is still Chinese.

In Florence, I got the chance to eat dumplings–something I haven’t seen for a whole month. The filling of the dumpling was odd though, there was glass noodles and some vegetable with soy sauce. (I like dumplings with juicy meat fillings the best).

Other dishes include stir fry dishes such as this. On the upper right is Chinese-style pork knuckles. They are divine!

Would I stay in a Chinese-run hostel again?

It would depend on the price and the country.

For example in Athens, there was a Chinese hostel advertising on online forums. However, the price for a dorm bed was exactly what I paid for a single room.

In Rome, I e-mailed a Chinese hostel to ask about their bed prices. The hostel didn’t have any dorm beds left and only had a 60 euro private room. I decided to opt for an AirBnb room instead.

I do like Chinese-run dorm better than international ones because I get anxious interacting with too many people. In a Chinese dorm, the number of people is limited to the rooms they have, which makes it easier to interact since there’s not as many people around.

Mykonos, effortlessly beautiful [YQrtw Day 44 May 21]

Location: Athens -> Mykonos, Greece

When I was planning my RTW for Greece, going to the Greek islands wasn’t in my list because

I do not like getting sunburnt
I do not like warm sea water
I do not like to party

In short, I’m a terrible island tourist.

But when I was in Athens, I found out about some cheap island packages to Santorini and Mykonos. It was cheaper than me trying to cobbling up everything from scratch so I decided to give one of the Greek islands a try.

That, plus my 1-week Athens transport pass was expiring.

The travel agent picked Mykonos for me to fit my bus schedule. I’m kind of wary about Mykonos because I heard that it’s a party island.

But when I arrived in Mykonos, I realized that I like the island is not just about partying.

Follow the black tar road to Mykonos

My hotel is quite far from the city center. It’s a 1.5km journey, according to the hotel. There are buses to town but they come at an hourly interval.

After checking into the hotel, I took a long rest before heading out at 4:00pm. I thought that 4 hours in town would be enough and I would be able to head back before sunset.

The road to town was easy enough. I just had to follow the coastal road till I reach the populated area.

The walk was lovely. On the right were the cliff and the beautiful multi-coloured Aegean Sea. On the left, there were hotels built in the white Mediterranean style.

Of course, I would get jealous of people riding their monster scooters or driving their cars past me. I had to rely on Bus 11 (my two legs) instead of a private transport.

Beautiful Mykonos town

Mykonos’s town center is painted with a limited selection of colors. White was predominant as all walls were as white as bleached cotton. Doors, door frames and window frames were painted blue while churches had red dome roofs.

The limited color made the whole town beautiful. No building was competing with others for attention. Some buildings had green vines while others had bursts of bougainvillea framed by its green leaves.

The streets were narrow. All the time I did not know where I was going but it didn’t matter because I will find my way when I get to the sea.

I did want to find a particular restaurant that was recommended on Tripadvisor. My Google Maps took me into tinier and tinier lanes until I finally saw the shop.

I ordered two pitas: pork gyro and pork souvlaki, since I did not have lunch.

The restaurant owner must have thought that I was getting a takeaway for someone else as well because he had my order tucked into a aluminium wrap.

I was too embarrassed to say that I was the only one who will be eating the two wraps so I paid my bill and went to find a picnic spot.

Maybe having the picnic was a better choice since I had the view of the sea while I munched away at my pita wraps. That would keep me satisfied till tomorrow morning.

After my meal, there was more walking. I eventually stumbled upon the famous windmills and Little Venice. This means that I will have less to tick off my check list tomorrow.

No swimming in the sea

I decided to go swim in the sea when I got back to the hotel. There’s a tiny patch of seawater in front of the hotel, near the yatch docks.

When I got to the water, I realized that the sea was freezing cold. The sun was about to set so there was no rays to heat up the water.

In the end I just looked at the bottom of the sea. The water was so clear that I could see tiny fishes swimming about.

There were also some sea plants so I figured that not many people swim in this part of the sea.

Same as always, I head back to my room as night fell. Tomorrow I’m going to the island where Apollo was said to be born.

Have you been to Mykonos? What do you recommend doing here?

Changing of guards at Syntagma Square [YQrtw Day 42 May 19]

Marching ceremony at Athens's parliament

Locations: Athens, Greece

In front of the Parliament building, there are guards dressed up in fancy costume, guarding the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The guards are sort of like the those at Buckingham Palace–standing straight with no expression.

At the start of each hour, they have a changing of guards thing going on. The guards march with high kicks.

But on every Sunday at 11am, there’s an even more elaborate “show” with band music and many guards marching down the street.

Since I’ve not caught any of the changing of guards, I thought I should head down today to catch the most awesome of the show.

When I reached the area, I saw that many people were already lined up at the square in front of the Parliament. I went closer and looked between other people’s shoulders to find that the guards were already doing their lining up.

I had to look between others’ shoulders for a part view of the procession.

Then something caught my eyes. It was the very good looking face of a young policeman.

Why are Greek policemen so handsome?

I think I now sound very much like a creep. And based on the photo above, you’ve probably removed the bookmark you had for this blog.

But I have to ask: Why are the young Greek police people so good looking?

Since coming to Athens, I have been stunned by how good looking the younger police officers are. (The policewomen are also gorgeous but there are more policemen around to look at.)

How is it statistically possible for this place to have so many good looking police people? Do they have a “good looking meter” that recruits have to pass?Someone, tell me!

Anyway, after the marching, I didn’t linger around for more stalker shots so that’s the one and only photo of Clark Kent that you’ll see here.

Benaki Museum and lunch on the rooftop

The Benaki Museum was just around the corner. Since today was International Museum Day part 2, it was free entry to the 3-storey museum.

The collection in the museum was great. Finally I get to see art that wasn’t related to Christianity (those are great too but there is a limit of how much Marys one can handle in a week).

Since Museum Weekend was on, there were a lot of events for children as well. I wished I had those when I was a kid but then I might rather stay at home than hang out with a crowd of stranger kids.

The Benaki Museum has a nice rooftop restaurant that is shaded by umbrella. I decided to treat myself to some nice lunch since I’ve been keeping within my budget in Greece.

Lunch was moussaka–which I dub eggplant lasagna–and a pricey frappe. The creamy moussaka took a lot of effort for me to finish.

Damn you Google Maps

Next stop, I thought of going to the Byzantine Museum, to see the wonderful…Christian art. (Wait, who was it that said she cannot stomach more Marys?) I like the Byzantine Christian works because the characters are deliberately stiff.

So using my trusty Google Maps, I mapped out my route. Hmmm… A 40 minutes journey? OK, I do have a lot of time.

I waited for the longest while before bus 132 came. The bus went through a long route before I got off.

Following Google Maps’s direction, I arrived at a residential area, in front of a house that did not look like a museum.

I got out my phone and checked Foursquare. The app told me that the museum was just next to where I got on the bus, near the Benaki Museum.

DAMN YOU GOOGLE MAPS.

Other things that happened today: Got back to city center; sat at a nice cafe, reading; went to see the public cemetery of Athens but the gates were not open; saw creepy lady in cream blouse and skirt while walking away from cemetery; got back to hotel; bought club sandwich for dinner; read Jezenbel.

Greece day 4: Let’s go shopping at the Ancient Agora [YQrtw Day 41 May 18]

[I just spend a good part of the past hour reading up comments on Game of Thrones! Let’s get some work done.]

Location: Athens, Greece

Today’s my fourth day in Athens but things are still exciting.

In the morning, I decided to see the Central Market and maybe try out some tripe soup recommended on TripAdvisor.

I never saw the tripe soup stall but I did enter the market’s meat, fish and vegetable zone.

There were so much seafood on display. My heart longed for the huge squids lying on their bed of ice. Sadly, I do not have a kitchen I can cook the squids.

Next on my To-Do list was the Temple of Zeus. However, I wandered to the wrong place and visited an ancient public bath.

The public bath was housed in a small house. The inside of the place was cool, a great escape from the heat outside.

There wasn’t any water around but they showed some marble washbasins and benches.

I was disappointed to see that the women’s section was much smaller than the men’s.

Shopping at the Agora

Just down the road from the bath is the Ancient Agora. My tickets to the Acropolis covered this sight as well so I dropped by.

Turns out I didn’t need my ticket. It was International Museum Day and it was free entry to the sight.

At the Ancient Agora, I followed Rick Steve’s brilliant walking tour.

Halfway during my tour, an older American couple followed my route with their audio tour on speaker. It was so annoying having their audio tour on so I waited until they left.

The Ancient Agora was where the ancient people met for town meetings, theaters and so on. Most of the buildings were turned to rubble so having the audio tour helped make more sense of the place.

I tried to look for the Temple of Aphrodite Urania but couldn’t find it.

It was past lunch time when I finished seeing the Ancient Agora. I head back to the Central Market area where I had spotted souvlaki shops.

For lunch, I had a delicious meal of kebab in pita with a cold Coca Cola for only 3.30 euro. The pita bread was still piping hot when it came to me but I wolfed it down rather quickly.

The afternoon sun was too punishing so I head back to the hotel for a quick shower. Despite having coke for lunch, I finished a tin of carbonated lemon to cool down. I think it was worth the calories.

In search of a bus station

When it was past 5pm, I headed out again. This time, I needed to find the bus station where my Istanbul-bound bus will leave next week.

The directions given by the travel agency where I bought my bus ticket was fuzzy. Even with the help of the Internet, I couldn’t figure out exactly where it was.

I followed the advice of the travel agent and took bus A15. Luckily, Google Maps helped me narrow down the area and I spotted the bus station.

Since I had nothing planned, I continued my bus ride until its last stop. The bus stopped at a residential neighborhood on a very steep hill.

I tried walking up but gave up before the last staircase. Even standing on the pavement made me feel imbalanced.

While I walked down back to the bus stop, I passed by a family of a grandfather, a father and two twin toddlers. They were playing baby football (the ball is kicked gently to the kids). The boys followed the father’s cheer “GOAL” when the ball reached their feet. It was so adorable.

The bus back to town was uneventful. We passed many shops that were closed. Maybe it’s a Saturday so everyone’s out.

The bus eventually ended near where I boarded. Luckily for me, that’s very near my hotel.

At Carrefour, I did a little shopping for feta cheese (Greek cheese is so yummy!), milk (equally yummy), body lotion (I hadn’t tasted it yet) and a big bottle of lemon soda.

The rest of the evening was spent on the internet. Good night!