The Kitchen of our apartment, Ayia Paraskevi, Greece.

Greek Salad- my new favorite meal.

Tonight some friends and I decided to prepare a full course meal (for the first time) and then dine together.

Ana, Connor, Jordan and Yawen.

The product of tonight's grocery shopping and cooking.

Athens, Greece.

The base of the Acropolis would be just to the right side. Ana from Chicago/Serbia, and Lauren from Arizona.

Lauren and me in front of one of the 7 peaks in the city of Athens.

μουσακάς! (Moussaka!)

Ayia Paraskevi, Athens, Greece.

The view from our balcony, right outside my bedroom.

Hydra Island, Greece.

Swam in the Aegean for the first time in my life and it was incredibly clear!

Yawen, me, Anna and Debbie on the roof of a museum overlooking the main port of the island.

Carissa, me, Debbie, Yawen, Courtney.

The port in the evening, just before getting coffee at a nearby shop.

 

Madison, Anna, Debbie, Courtney, Carissa, Yawen.

Photo by Litsa, with the ferry that took us 2 hours out to the island.

The wall of great Greeks, in a museum on the island.

 

Mt. Hymettus, Athens, Greece.

Fire watch tower on the top of the mountain, a 45 minute hike from the student residence. Me, Carissa from Maryland, Brianne and Ana from Chicago.

Standing on top of Athens!

 

Red at night sailors delight, red in the morning sailors take warning. The next day was a picture perfect blue-sky day for our trip to Hydra Island.

 

 

The apartment, Ayia Paraskevi, Greece.

Made a recycling area in our apartment and now all of my roommates use it as well!

So far the language barrier hasn't dominated my time here. A ton of people speak English, or I can use hand signals to explain what I want to say. One time that this was not the case was my search for lactose-free milk. After searching 2 stores and failing I spent 20 minutes reading labels in the 3rd. None of the words made any sense until finally I came across the words "free-lact" and I went with it. More likely than not it is the kind of milk I wanted, but then again I cannot read the labels to be sure.

Another big time consumer was laundry detergent. The clean, fresh scent led me to the correct isle, and the shape of the bottles gave away which section I wanted to be in. What my senses could not help me with was determining laundry detergent from fabric softener. After 30 minutes of browsing labels with my roommate Brianne, I came across some words in French, of which I happened to know a couple, and it revealed that we were looking at softener. We bought a bottle from the shelf below, hoping it would be detergent. After arriving back at the dorms we asked a Greek-speaker who confirmed it was what we wanted. Learning to turn on the Greek washing machines was a whole other story....

Orientation (photos taken by other people.)

Spontaneously learning a Greek dance in the streets of Plaka, Athens. Taught by a restaurant employee that we met on the street.

First tour of the "quiet" neighborhood that I live in. If this is the "quiet" part of Greece, I can't even imagine what the other parts are like. Can't wait to find out!

Parliament building in Athens.

On campus at Deree.

The National Garden of Greece.

 

Athens, Greece!

The National Garden of Greece.

A walking tour of Athens led by a couple of locals.

The Zappeion Olympic Hall of the first modern Olympic games, used for fencing matches. The building was created for the revival of the Olympic games and took from 1874 to 1888 to be constructed.

Inside the hall with  fellow foreigners.

Panathenaic Stadium, the host of the first modern Olympic games (1896).

Ruins in central Athens.

This might look like a lot of graffiti but it is a normal amount. Normally, though, it is more artistic.

Near Plaka, Athens.

Near Plaka, Athens.

Aghia Paraskevi, Greece!

My room in the residence. The room space is fine, and we've got a huge balcony that makes it feel a lot larger. The closet space is quite limited (only in our room--not any other person's) so unfortunately I am still half-way living out of a suitcase.

The view of Athens on an evening hike with some other international students. This is the view from a mountain right behind our school. On the mountain we discovered a women's monastery and also met an English teacher (by coincidence) from the college while he was on his volunteer fire watch. His volunteering helps catch fires before they burn what undeveloped areas are left, because developers try to take advantage of any new land to build on.

Ya sas, Athens!!

Jessica from Utah, Debbie from South Dakota, Carissa from Maryland, and me.

The sunset view on our hike down from Mt Hymettus.

London, England, United Kingdom.

Potatoes picked the very same day, for a lovely dinner at the Bordass's; old friends of my grandmother.

Lunch at my uncle Alexander's.

The best strawberries I've ever had in my life.

The view of London from Hampsted Heath.