Greece (Day 1)

Many college students have the opportunity to spend a semester abroad much as our son (Pat) did when he was in college.   He spent the fall semester of 2004 in Volos, Greece so we (Mom, Dad & sister), took this opportunity to visit him but first we booked a 10 day bus tour, which we would follow up with a visit to Volos for a few days.

    As you probably know Greece has many beautiful places with an interesting history and many historical sites with dazzling stories.  But the truth is anyone who has visited Greece can give you the same information that I could, so what I really want to tell you about is our unique experiences in Greece. 

     We arrived at Athens Airport in the morning and proceeded to customs with our bags.  My daughter Maureen and I skated easily thru customs with no questions, my wife (Mimi) however was sequestered over to a separate custom lines, I guess it was for all those suspect people that looked dubious at best.  Now, if you know Mimi she could not be more white bread than anybody, so why did they choose to pull her out of line, I have no idea.  She gets nervous if the parking meter runs out of time before we get back to the car.  Maureen and I were through customs on the Greece side anxiously watching what was going on with Mimi, we were not allowed to stand with Mimi as we were cleared and approved while she was taken away.  All of a sudden she appears on the hallowed Greece side of customs and is apparently cleared, without explanation, well maybe there was an explanation but we don’t know what since we don’t speak any Greek.  They don’t even use the same letters of the alphabet that we use.   I guess they just came to realize that she couldn’t be a threat to anyone.

     Now that we are all safe together with our bags we go out to the taxi stand to catch a cab to the hotel.   The bags are loaded into the cab Mimi and Maureen sit in the back seat and I sit in the front with the driver, by the way the driver speaks very little English, miniscule really.  This is always a good combination, tourist that speak no Greek and a Greek Cab driver that knows three English words (yes, no & smoke).  A couple things to know about Athens is the drivers must be in training for the demolition derby because they make the bad drivers I’ve seen elsewhere seem like driver training instructors.  Secondly everybody smokes, I mean all the time and everywhere so much so that there is a haze over the city from the tobacco smoke. 

    So we are racing our way to the hotel, dodging motorcycles, running lights and cutting people off when the cab driver turns to me and says “Pretty Good Huh” referring to his skill at driving in a highly populated city.  Well now I have learned that the driver knows 6 English words, Great! but, that’s six more words than I know in Greek so I guess I shouldn’t be critical.   Now literally less than 1 minute after he proudly exclaims his excellent driving skills we come to an intersection, which is kind of like a free-for-all with cars (note previous comment about demolition derby) well we proceed through the intersection quickly and "BAM" we run directly into a motor scooter.  Well when it comes to cabs and scooters the cab will always win.  So now sprawled in the middle of the intersection is the scooter and the driver.  The traffic is now stopped and we pull over to the side of the road.  The cabbie gets out and the police show up meanwhile someone drags the scooter to the side of the road, then the driver is attended to, someone helps him up and walks him over to the curb where he sits awhile, he then gets up and staggers over to a building and leans against a wall.  He appears shaken up but not hurt badly.  Then it happens, he reaches in his pocket grabs a cigarette and lights up.  Apparently all is well, the magic tobacco will cure his ails. 

A new cab is called to take us the remaining distance to the hotel which is just mile or so away.  We arrive safely get to our room with out any incident.  Pat shows up with his friends and they and Maureen go out to check out the city of Athens.

Mimi and I go down to check in with the tour guide and get a glass of Ouzo.   Holy crap! Where's the Tylenol!