E?

Then we went to the Delphi Archaeological Museum, which is another one of those museums where every room is filled with priceless cultural artifacts. This, for example, is the charioteer of Delphi. You may well have seen pictures of this statue before- it's quite famous. The French found it after the earthquake of the late 1890s, because he had been buried before that. It is made of bronze, and you can tell from the style (the facial features, the fact that he is clothed, etc.) that it is from the early classical period.
This inscription is really really cool, my music friends! Can you see how there are lines of text, and the occasional letters between those lines of text? Yes? Those are notations of music of some sort. What they actually mean in turns of tune, I am not entirely sure- I'm not, by any means, an expert on ancient musical notation- but it's pretty cool. It's like ancient sheet music! Only on rocks.
This is the omphalos! I did say that Delphi was the center of the universe, right? This is the stone that marks the center of the center of the universe.

To my science friends- no, you aren't allowed to say anything. If I choose to believe that Delphi is the center of the universe, in spite of a semester of astronomy, nothing you say is going to dissuade me. NOTHING.
This is a part of the pediment sculpture of the treasury of the Athenians. I'm not entirely sure if we were supposed to be in this room- there were ropes blocking off the entryways, but the guard let us in happily enough when we said that we were archaeology students. It depicts one of the labors of Theseus- he's killing an Amazon woman in this part. According to my archaeology professor, he has also just realized that he loves this person. I think that this is indicative of a somewhat dysfunctional relationship. There are lots of those in ancient Greek mythology- see "Atreus, House of".
This one is really cool, guys. That face is part of a statue- want to hazard a guess what materials it is made of?

If you guessed gold for the shiny gold metal, good job! The black part, however, is interesting- that's ivory. You might be thinking that black is an awfully interesting color for ivory to be- that's because it was damaged by fire at some point in time. This statue is "chryselephantine"- literally, gold and ivory, though the term also refers to a specific sort of cult statue. At some point in time, this statue (and some others) was buried, leading to this impressive state of preservation. I think we think that this statue is of Artemis, Apollo's twin sister.

ΕΓΓΥΑ ΠΑΡΑ Δ'ΑΤΗ

Delphi was an important site where the god Apollo was worshipped. That picture below is of the temple of Apollo, which is an exciting place because it is where, I believe, the Pythia (that's the priestess who gave oracles at Delphi) would have sat on her tripod, answering people's questions in hexameter verse. Now, the subject of the Pythia and her temple is a very interesting one- some people believe that the priestess did not write verses so much as make a bunch of funny noises that other people interpreted. Some accounts of the temple record a smell there. The question is, does this mean that the air was full of some sort of fumes? Delphi is located on a fault line, and higher than usual amounts of some chemicals, like ethylene, have been found in nearby springs. Was the Pythia hallucinating? Obviously we can't say, but it's interesting to think about.
Me with an inscriptions. This is a late inscription- you can tell because of the style of some of the letters (like the omegas- note how they are written like curly ws, rather than the Ω that you're probably used to seeing.) No, I'm not going to translate it.
The theatre at Delphi! It's a late addition to the site- 4th century BC, I think- but is quite the theater- from this spot on the mountain, you can get a lovely view of the rest of the site. It must have been really neat back in the day, when all of the treasuries were still intact.
The treasury of the Athenians! Reconstructed, clearly- when they excavated it, the French archaeologists found enough of this treasury that they could put it back together. The friezes from the building are inside the archaeological museum at Delphi, and depict the labors of Theseus, an important Athenian hero. At the treasury, the Athenians would have displayed war trophies- for example, the arms captured from the Persians during the Persian Wars. The road up to the temple of Apollo was lined with treasuries like this from different cities- near the Tholos, there is a treasury from the city which is modern day Marseilles.
Looking back over the nearby mountains!

ΜΗΔΕΝ ΑΓΑΝ

The tholos again! The original building had a bunch of columns, but only three of them have been restored. According to wikipedia, a source that I reference far too often, this is the most photographed building at the site.

Well, add me to the list of photographers, ok? It's cool looking.
After that we went to the modern city of Delphi, which was a very exciting place to spend time. Really. There are about three roads, it was cold, and we had nothing to do. So, we first checked into our hotel, which, as we discovered, had a very nice view.


And then we discovered that Molly and Stefanie were staying in the room right below us, which was very exciting.

ΓΝΩΘΙ ΣΕΑΥΤΟΝ

So, after we had finished with Hosios Loukas we made our way to Delphi, which, in case you weren't aware, is the center of the universe. It is also the site of the Delphic Oracle, which was, of course, the most important oracle of the ancient Greek world, and is a pretty nifty place in general.

A warning before you start reading these posts- classics nerdiness will be abounding. Trust me. I think it is physically impossible to go to Delphi and not be a bit nerdy. (Or is it? Perhaps this problem is unique to me.) The site of Delphi is located on the slopes of Mount Parnassus, and is in general a very pretty place. Once upon a time, the area of the site was occupied by a village, Kastri. This is a common problem in Greece- many valuable archaeological sites have been built over in later times, and it is difficult to excavate if the current inhabitants refuse to move away. (There are many areas of Athens that haven't been excavated either.) Unfortunately for the inhabitants of Kastri, but fortunately for all of the archaeologists involved (and, I should add, anyone who has visited the site) there was an earthquake in the late 1800s that encouraged the villagers to move away and made the excavations possible.
This may not be Delphi...
But this is! See those columns over to the left side of the picture? That's the temple of Apollo! And that white building in the middle of the picture? That's the treasury of the Athenians! I may have been dancing in a giddy fashion at this point of the trip. Whereby "may have" I mean "definitely was." Some of the less classics-enthused people on my bus may have been alarmed. My professors may have been looking on in amusement. My friends were too busy dancing to much care.
This is Delphi too! That's the tholos, which is a round building at the site of the Temple of Athena Pronaia. Our first day on the site (we spent a whole weekend there) we only visited the lower site, which means that we spent a lot of time looking at the tholos. It is a very recognizable building, in part because it is round. (There aren't a whole lot of round buildings from the ancient world, and generally the ones that exist are called the tholos. I have visited three while here- the tholos in the agora (subject of my exciting presentation, "The tholos and the monument of the eponymous heroes") the tholos at Epidauros and this one here.)

Hosios Loukas

On the way to Delphi we made a stop at Hosios Loukas, a monastery located in Boeotia. This monastery, founded in the tenth century, is one of the many UNESCO world heritage sites located in Greece. The monastery was founded by St. Loukas, a man who predicted the conquest of Crete and whose body, still at the monastery, was reputed to heal people. This is, I believe, how the monastery funded its buildings, which are architecturally really interesting, and the decoration of these buildings, which was well known throughout the Byzantine world.

The monastery was undergoing some restoration work while I was there, so I unfortunately don't have pictures of the outside of the churches. There are two at Hosios Loukas, one from the 10th century (the Theotokos) and one from the early 11th century (the Katholikon.) This is a picture of some arches, which were not covered with scaffolding.
For this next picture- I would like to make it known that I do not generally take pictures of the insides of churches. Obviously, one does not want to take pictures with flash, since that could damage the paintings and that would be a bad idea. Also, I'm under the impression that in many cases this is considered rather rude, and I generally like to respect other people's religions. However, in this case, we were told that it was ok.

This is the inside of the Katholikon, and I would like to direct your attention towards the ceiling, or, specifically, the way that the dome is held up. The Katholikon is the earliest extant example of a kind of church called a "domed octagon" church, which means, essentially, that the naos has eight piers and that it has a dome. There are some architectural gymnastics that must be done to build a dome on top of an octagon, and you can see some of those in this picture. Also note the decorations- the insides of Greek Orthodox Churches are beautiful.

Next- off to Delphi!

Nisaki

So, off of Ioannina there lies an island which is called "Nisaki." You might be thinking that this is a nice name. I mostly think it's funny that they named the island "little island." I mean, it's a bit literal, isn't it? I feel like this isn't a good naming pattern to follow. Next thing you know, they'll be naming mountain ranges "large mountain range" and "medium sized mountain range" and lakes "big lake" and "little lake". And then where will we be?

Anyways, Catharine and I went there via ferry, and spent a day wandering and buying souvenirs and having picnic lunches. It was quite nice and idyllic. Nisaki contains many, many monasteries. They were generally very pretty and very closed, so we didn't actually go in to any of them, but they were nice from the outside.

Painting from the outside of a church. Considering the state of repair that it is in, I'm going to assume that this church hasn't been in use in the recent past- most of the churches I have been to are kept in very good repair.

The village on Nisi! It was a nice place, though very small. Ioannina is generally known for its silver production, and the island is full of very many cheap silver shops. This was nice, in that I bought many Christmas gifts while here, but also vaguely irritating, since you get attacked by anxious shop owners trying to convince you to look at their wares. Seriously. To get away, it is sometimes necessary to run a bit. Or feign total incomprehension.

On the plus side, I've been told that my face of total incomprehension has improved greatly over the past three months. I'm now able to not react at all when people speak to me, even in languages that I actually understand.

Since Catharine and I were feeling like stretching our legs, we took the path that goes around the outside of the island and enjoyed the nice views of the lake and the mountains. It was also very windy on this day.

This is inside the enclosure where Ali Pasha was killed. Next to this building is the building where he was actually shot, which is now a museum. Apparently they still have the bullet riddled wooden floors and stuff. Unfortunately, this museum was closed, which was tragic. Perhaps because it was off-season.

And that, my friends, is the end of my fall break. After this, we returned to Athens, which was nice, since by this time Catharine and I were willing to go back to our apartments, sleep in real beds, and shower. Also to change clothes. And stop living out of backpacks. And not eat gyros for a really long time. It was an adventure, and I'm glad we stayed in Greece.

Ioannina- I'm Running Out of Captions

So, after we returned from Metsovo we went back to Ioannina and continued to explore. This is a view of Ioannina from partway across Lake Pamvotis- it's a nice place. As always, Catharine and I found cats.

The other mosque in the Frourio! I have forgotten its name as well.

Interesting statues on the water front.

And the view out towards the Pindos mountains.

This was one of our last days of fall break, and it was interesting because it was the first day when our modern Greek absolutely failed us. This was unusual- between Catharine and I, we usually were able to communicate in any situation that we found ourselves in. It was definitely an accent issue- we were buying tickets, and while the man at the counter could understand us, his responses might as well have been gibberish. Or some language with which I am absolutely unfamiliar. When we got back to Athens, we asked Leda, our professor, why this was the case- she confirmed that it was because of the peculiarities of the northern Greek accents, and told us that there is in fact a linguistic barrier somewhere between Athens and Thessaloniki. It was interesting.

Another one of those Hopeless Quests for something in my guidebook...

So, we continued to wander around Metsovo for a while after lunch. We were ostensibly looking for a monastery (which we never actually found) but we saw a lot of the town, which is cute.

Little winding streets. I think that a car would be less than useful inside Metsovo itself, though probably you would want one so you could leave on occasion. There is no train system in this part of Greece- they're building one, but because of the mountains and stuff it's a long and expensive process- and the bus system is patchy.

Cat on piece of machinery!

These are chestnuts in a chestnut tree. I had actually never tried chestnuts before I came to Greece, but my friend Chris is a bit obsessed with them and so I've had them a few times now and must admit that they are tasty.

In Which We Leave Ioannina to go to Metsovo

So, after our first day in Ioannina, Catharine and I decided to make a trip to Metsovo, a town in the Pindos mountains that is pretty and known for its cheeses and its interesting festivals, which take place during the summer and therefore went unseen by us. I could say that we went because we had heard that it was nice, or because we had fallen in love with the KTEL system and wanted to spend another three hours with it, or because we had grown tired of watching "The Young and the Restless" with Greek subtitles on the tv. (It was for one evening, ok? Such things happen.)

But the real reason, I have to say, was our general lingustic nerdiness. Metsovo is the capital of Vlach culture in Greece. The Vlachs are a linguistic minority (they mostly see themselves as ethnically Greek) who speak a language called Aromanian (also known as Vlach), which is a close relative of Latin. Cool, isn't it? To be fair, Metsovo is also really pretty, and since the Vlach speaking population is quite small, we knew that the chances of us hearing any spoken Vlach were small. It's in the Pindos mountains, which are very nice mountains, and when we were there the leaves were turning colors.

Fog rolling over the Pindos mountains!

The village of Metsovo. It's a lovely place in part because it had some benefactors who donated a lot of money there- specifically George Averoff.

It was Halloween when we were in Metsovo, but they don't do Halloween here at all. They were having some sort of celebration that involved footraces, though Catharine and I couldn't figure out exactly what it was. This was ok, we watched it while eating a pleasant lunch at a nice restaurant that my guidebook reccomended and then later while we were waiting for the bus.

The Map of Where Caroline Has Been in Greece So Far

Purple= where I have gone.

For your viewing pleasure, and so when you go, "wait, where is Thessaloniki?" you can find it on the map.

Adventures With Money

So, I was looking to see if I had any extra pens this morning, and I was ransacking my backpack in case I had left some in there from last semester. (Don't laugh. My lack of office supplies is a chronic problem here.) Anyways, I didn't find any pens. What I did find was my small supply of American money.

And it was so weird! It...looked so strange! It's all green and the same size and the coins are so thin and there aren't any two dollar or one dollar coins. (Or, for that matter, 50 lepta or 20 lepta coins.) And American money feels so different from Euros, which are in fact paper, not some strange other material.

I say it now- when I get back home in December, there will be culture shock.

About All Those Demonstrations That You Might Have Been Hearing About...

Dear All,

I have been contacted by several people who were concerned by some of the coverage of yesterday's events in Athens. I would like, first of all, to say that I am fine, all my friends are fine, everyone I know is fine, my apartment is fine, the city of Athens is generally fine, etc. Let me stress. Everyone is fine.

What you heard about (blown, from what I can understand, way out of proportion) was the typical demonstration that takes place in Greece every November 17th. 35 years ago, many students at the Athens Polytechnic University locked themselves up on their campus, made their own radio station, and were protesting the military junta that was in control of Greece at the time. This did not go over well with the fascist government, and on November 17th, after several days of tension, the army broke down the gates with their tanks. About 50 students died. Many more were injured, arrested, and tortured. It was generally quite bad.

The demonstration that happened yesterday occurs every year in memory of the heroic acts of the students. It started in 1975 as a peaceful demonstration, but over the years has become considerably more violent than it used to be. It starts at the Polytechnic university in Exarhia and goes down Vas. Sophias (yes, that is the street that I cross to get to school) and ends in front of the American embassy. (All protests end in front of the American Embassy. This is a general rule of demonstrations.) It usually starts off pretty well, but by 4 or 5 pm someone usually starts throwing molotov cocktails, blowing up trashcans, etc. The police sometimes break out tear gas. It gets unpleasant.

Because this event involves some anti-American sentiment (the United States, alarmingly, was actually involved in getting the junta in place) we were warned to try to stay away from the protest, or, if we chose to go, go early in the morning and not identify ourselves as Americans. I didn't go- I did see some of it on my way to and from the apartment, but didn't stay and watch- but I have friends who did, and from what I can understand it was actually pretty tame this year. I repeat, no one was hurt. We're all ok. Mostly, it was just another chance to learn about modern Greek history, a subject that most of us know appallingly little about.

So, to repeat, we're all ok. Greeks, while they may not always love America, are lovely people who generally like Americans. Thank you for your concern.

Pictures at last!

Hello all!
As you have probably noticed, there are now some (note: some- I'm not done yet) pictures of my fall break up. The internet is being reasonably fast today, and I'm procrastinating, since I have a big paper due in about a week that I don't really feel like writing, but am still working on because it's 15 pages long and does need to get written some time. Anyways, at some point there should be more pictures (in addition to the rest of the fall break pictures, there should be some of my recent trip to Delphi) and hopefully there will also be captions, though I should warn you that due to work considerations they will probably be slow in coming up.

Ali Pasha: An Interesting Person Who Came to a Bad End

So, one of Ioannina's claims to fame is Ali Pasha, an Albanian ruler (in power from 1787-1822) who had his court in Ioannina. This guy was crazy. He basically was loyal to whoever could help him at the time, and I think his goal was to have some Albanian-Greek empire. Or something. I am going to direct you to the wikipedia page, because it seems to be more or less accurate and I don't feel like typing out the whole story. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Pasha
So, much of the Frourio of Ioannina is taken up with ruins (or non-ruins) from the time of Ali Pasha, though there also are remains from the Byzantine period.
A mosque! This is one of two mosques in the Frourio, and I am sorry to say that I have absolutely forgotten what it is called. Sometime when I have my guidebook or my notes with me I will edit this out.
I believe that these are the ruins of Ali Pasha's harem.
The view out over Lake Pamvotis towards the Pindos mountains. Nice, isn't it?

The tomb of Ali Pasha. Note- I did not actually climb inside the tomb to take this picture. While I have been called on to scale some fences over the course of this semester, I haven't started tomb-robbing. Yet.