The gnarly trees are—were—these kind of ugly trees that are planted all over the streets in neat little rows. Turns out that they magically sprout lots of little branches overnight and then go green. Of course, they’re not the only things coming back to life around here (it’s Orthodox Good Friday today and Easter is a huge deal—according to our Greek teacher, because the idea of rebirth in heaven is far more interesting to the Orthodox than just the birth of Christ; the celebration of Christmas in these parts is purely a Western import).
Thus ended the first three weeks of life in Greece, and the end marked the beginning of spring break…. I don’t know how to explain how excited I am about going to the islands. Especially Santorini—well, we never really did the tourist destination thing, since all our money went to India trips and also for a whole host of other reasons, including that my parents didn’t really see things like conventional Americans. But anyway, this is going to be so AWE-some! I demand snorkeling, in addition to ruins, museums, and inscriptions (ah, it’ll suck a little to not have anyone around to read anything to us…).
I have done a number of things here that are landmarks in the U.S. (hookah, wine with dinner, club, bought my own alcohol, hmm…I think that’s it). Makes one realize how stupid the age restrictions there are.
Everyone seems to either be going to or coming from church right now...they do have a noon service; well I didn't get too many funny looks, and I think most of them were what the hell is a chick with a laptop doing sitting on a bench near recycling bins. So far, a random old man (possibly a hobo) came over, looked at my screen, and left, and a couple of women said hello and I said happy Easter back.
I bought an egg from an old man at the farmers' market! It is red, hand-painted, and says "Happy Easter" (the other one had "Christ is Risen") on it in Greek. (I would put it here but it isn't letting me paste in Symbol font...how annoying.)
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