Month: March 2018

Having visitors is a great way to check off things to see in your city.  Erin, Demetri and I attacked Athens sites this week, logging some 70 miles on foot with good coffee and snacks and fun visits with cousins along the way.

The Acropolis and the Acropolis Museum are the obvious first site choices.  While Demetri has visited the museum many times, my first visit was this week.  I missed it in 2006 (not built yet) and then in ’11, ’14 and ’16 we opted not to do museums with tiny kids in tow.  But it was worth the wait: its collection and multi-media exhibits are  excellent.  And the Acropolis museum has a 5 for 1 ticket that gets you into several other sites and is good for 5 days.  As for the Parthenon and other sites on the Acropolis itself, everyone should go to the top and see it in person. While it’s visible from many points in the city and the night views (say, from a rooftop bar in Monasteraki) are definitely the best, there’s nothing like seeing the tree that Athena planted herself when the city was named for her.  Yeah, so not really but you still have to go see the tree and imagine Athena and Poseidon fighting over who should be the city protector.

The Museum of Cycladic Art is one of the newest museums in Athens and is located downtown in Kolonaki. Its benefactors are a couple who were sick and tired of all of the looting of antiquities on the islands. Naturally, its signature collection is ceramics, statues and other pieces from the Cycladic island group, but it has other prehistoric and ancient art, a great exhibit on Cyprus, and a temporary exhibit about coins and money.  Fun fact: the drachma, Greece’s currency before it adopted the euro in 2001, comes from an ancient word for ‘fist full.’   This may explain the exchange rate in the 1980s when two other little Fefes boys had hundreds of drachmas to buy $3 worth of ice cream. Fist full indeed.

The National Archaeological Museum, along with the Benaki and the Acropolis museum, rounds out the city’s top three.  Erin and I really enjoyed seeing the wall paintings and frescoes that were excavated from Akrotiri – some of which are in situ in a special exhibit in this museum.  The collection in this museum is so well laid out … from Neolithic to the Bronze Age to the Classical period and Byzantium, its collection is vast but somehow doesn’t feel overwhelming.  I think this museum is one that kids would like, especially with a guide who can tell the stories and myths behind all these nifty pieces. Aside from the Akrotiri frescoes, the museum’s best known pieces are two bronze statues – one of a horse with a jockey, the other of Poseidon, and the Antikythera Device, an ancient computer used to predict astronomical positions and eclipses for the calendar, and it also tracked the ancient athletic games.

When Athens became part of the (relatively unified) eastern part of the Roman Empire/Byzantium, Roman influence invaded the city — but in a peaceful way, except for maybe the religion part. The Flavian Dynasty (famous for the Roman Colosseum) in particular left a nice mark on Athens with Hadrian’s Library and Hadrian’s Arch, two giant monuments right in the city center.  There’s also the Roman Agora, a mini-Forum. The Ancient Athenian Agora, which was established, built and added to way before the Romans set foot in Greece, is really impressive. There must be 30ish structures that are/were in place.  One building has been rebuilt to give a sense of what the market was like and has a great little museum, and on the opposite side, the Temple of Hephaestus is incredibly well preserved. The Agora is perfect for a walk — with or without kids.

The sleeper of the week, the National Historical Museum, is an absolutely lovely museum in the old Parliament Building on Stadiou Street.  It is more of a modern political and cultural historical museum and after visiting here, you get a much better sense of the Greek struggle under Turkish occupation. This museum had a terrific World War I exhibit with political cartoons from the early 1900s.  I wish I’d taken pictures of those illustrations; they were one of the best visuals I’ve seen of the power struggles in Europe for domination across the globe.

One of the most astonishing themes in visiting all these museums is how many antiquities have been made off with by other countries.  Lord Elgin ‘took’ two marble statues from the Parthenon for the British Museum.  A Delacroix sits in the Louvre that should be in the National Historical Museum.  Greek authorities confiscated paintings and statues from Germany and they have recovered countless things from the sea, in transit outside the Mediterranean. And then of course, there are the Turks.

And now for something completely different, it’s Spring Break as of 2:30 yesterday afternoon. Disney Paris, here we come.

What is it about cousins just being instant pals?  It’s one of the marvels of the family unit in my opinion.  I didn’t grow up with a lot of cousins, and most of them are way younger than me, but when we visited each other, my siblings and I were always so excited and so happy to have them around.  It was like they were long lost best friends.

Demetri had the same dynamic.  He has four cousins that lived near him in New York — all considerably older than he and Michael were — and then he had cousins closer to his age in Greece.  He felt the same about them all.  He loved the older boys so much and when they would visit Greece, Thodoris and Anna were their best pals.  In fact, Anna took her first steps to Demetri at their house in Marathona.

Now that we’re all grown up, these cousins are our best friends here and with whom we most like to hang. But what I really love are the four kiddos: our two and Anna’s two. The dynamic is exactly the same as it was when Demetri was growing up: three boys and a girl, with the girl being the youngest.   And this ‘instant pal’ phenomenon was evident even when Michael and Giorgos were 4 years old and I realized that it didn’t matter that they didn’t speak the same language.  That trip, superheroes were the great cultural equalizer.  They would play at the house in Marathon, calling to each other in English and Greek, and Big Katerina (Anna’s mom, another cousin Demetri adores) would translate.  “We are on a mission!” “Let’s get the bad guys!”

The language barrier is getting noticeably smaller.  I hear Michael and George speaking Greek to each other when they compare soccer tags.  Peter, basically fluent at this point, runs around with Little Katerina calling and yelling to her.  And then sometimes they switch playmates.  George and Peter were riding scooters at the park together and talked to each other to coordinate what was next.   It’s so cute.  Living here has been awesome to connect the kids with their extended family — which was one of our hopes for our time in Greece.

This past weekend we spent all Saturday afternoon in the park with the 4 kids — Anna and me, that is, with special guest appearances by Katerina, Lampis and Thodoris.  Sunday we met a new friend, Rafael, at Vouliagmeni Beach and Thodoris and Mina came and met us for Sunday lunch and coffee. Next week for Sunday lunch, Aunt Ernie will be here.

Mina took the photo above. I love their happy faces.

Greek culture is diverse, rich in tradition and defines the national spirit.  Culture itself — having it, that is — is incredibly important to Greek citizens. Many prominent Greeks — Stavros Niarchos, Aristotle Onassis, Melina Mercouri, The Benakis and Lalaounis families  to name a few —  have founded and contributed to major philanthropic and educational efforts that bring Greek culture across the country and to other parts of the world. We have been stoked by the various ekdromis (excursions) that Kessaris school has for the children — from theaters and music to art and science expos, museums, olive groves and sea turtle refuges, Greeks want their children to embrace cultural activities and what makes Greece … well, Greece.

Demetri dubbed this first week of March, “culture week” in Athens.  Several of the museums in the city were free in honor of Melina Mercouri, one of the greatest women figures in 20th century Greece. She was an actress, activist, politician and stateswoman — often all at the same time.  Most famous for her role in the movie “Never on Sunday,” she was a vocal opponent to the military coup and the junta in the 70s, and was appointed the minister of culture in the early 80s. Mercouri is credited with supporting and helping to finish the Megaro Mousiki concert hall, organizing Greek art and cultural exhibitions on all five continents, and helping bring the modern Olympic games back to Athens. (She and others worked hard to get them here for 1996 – the 100th anniversary of the modern games, but that title went to Atlanta.  Athens hosted the Summer Olympics in ’04.) She also introduced free access to museums and archaeological sites for Greek citizens — an educational effort for the general population and especially children.

She died on 6 March 1994.  And for the last many years, museums and archaeological sites are free on this day or sometime this week. We went to the Benaki for free last week, in fact.  Last Sunday, March 4, entrance to the Acropolis was free, and though both boys have walked by, under and across many times, we realized they’d never been to the top. So off we went. It was a lovely Spring day and we walked and talked about the many myths about the Parthenon, the olive tree at the top, the various temples that used to stand there and how some brave youngsters climbed to the top in the middle of the night and replaced the Nazi flag with the Greek flag during World War II.  From there we walked down into Monasteraki and met Papou and Sandy for lunch outdoors.

This week we also visited Kerameikos, the ancient cemetery. The name comes from the greek word for pottery (like ceramic) and in ancient times was a community of vase painters and potters.  Some of this area was converted into a small cemetery which eventually grew into a large cemetery and a major ancient archaeological site.  There is a little museum on site that holds many burial artifacts from the excavations some of which date back to 2700 BC. It’s fascinating to see, just like art, how burials reflected the political evolution in Greece.  Places traditionally reserved for aristocrats were opened to ordinary citizens as democracy emerged. Historians learned a lot about Greek life and culture through the way people were buried.  It’s a nifty site that many tourists miss.  And – bonus – there were tons of turtles just hanging around.  It was awesome.

Next on our list was Plato’s Academy, a huge outdoor space in a now run-down Athens neighborhood.  Aristotle studied here before founding his own school.  It’s also on sacred ground for the goddess Athina, as her religious ‘cult’ was located here in ancient times. There’s a cool digital museum about Plato that looks like it’s made from storage containers — its design symbolizes the road to the light, and windows exist only in the entrance and exit of the building. Inside, you learn about Plato as a person, a philosopher, his travels and his writings. And there’s a copy of Demetri’s favorite painting of all time: Raphael’s “School of Athens.” The Academy grounds would be a perfect location for wellness retreats.  We pictured group yoga, horticultural therapy, meditation gardens and nature walks all year round.   Wonder how we can share this idea with the benefactor philanthropists from above?

And yes, the photo below of Papou and the kids is with a roasting lamb in the background.  It was boys night Saturday while the girls (Katerina, Anna, Sandy, me) went to the movies.