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Today we spent a pleasant day with Julie, from
The Plaka district is the older part of town which has Turkish influence, windy streets and runs up the hill to the Acropolis. No traffic except motor bikes can go in most parts because, as part of the pre-Olympic fix ups, these areas were changed to pedestrian promenades, linking the main archaeological sites.
On each side of most promenades, tiny shops sell souvenirs, fashions, tattoos, jewellery, handbags and novelties. Further down, the street widens and accommodates both cafés, a wandering band and the flea market – stalls with an odd array of second hand items, tourist souvenirs, religious bric a brac, CDs etc – like a Sunday market in Australia. Julie and I went in to look at scarves, leaving Keith to watch the passing parade, and I met Nick. He was so impressed that
It was a day of visiting 11th Century Byzantine churches. Every now and then we would come across a most beautiful little church - the building cross shaped with a dome over the centre and rosy, rounded terracotta tiles for the roof. They were often set in the middle of an intersection with a little walled garden, which sometimes included olive and lemon trees. Inside, every surface was covered in icons or paintings. Some of the decorations depicted scenes in silver or tin, with a gap for the head of the people, Jesus, Mary or the saints to be drawn or painted in.
There were boxes of metal tokens such as boys in sailor suits and single legs for sale for 5 Euros, along with slim candles. Most of these churches had seating for only about thirty people. In the hustle and bustle of the city, each of these little churches was an oasis of calm and continuity, and had a hushed atmosphere. I wondered if they originally served small village groups that have now joined to become the city of Athens. One slightly larger church had designs of birds on its windows, but discouraged real birds by installing long spikes along all its ledges. It sat in a square between beautifully restored buildings on one side and a tumble down set of buildings on the other. Perhaps
A really special treat was the 
The museum houses a collection made by musicologist, Fivos Anoyanakis over a forty year period. He also collected music and anecdotes of how each instrument was used and in which contexts they were used in different parts of the main land and islands. For each case of a type of instruments there was a set of ear phones with an example of those instruments being played. Alongside were photos of the instruments being played in the past. From downstairs came the hauntingly beautiful sound of music being sung in solfa scale by an elderly man and then the same music being played on one of the ancient stringed instruments by a student of about ten years old.
After walking up the street beside the gardens, in the hope of being in time for the botanical museum, we attempted to enter the gardens but we were turned back by the police. Even the words ‘botanical museum’ did not produce an ‘open sesame’ so we continued on. Apparently there was a demonstration and a big police presence. Someone said it was to do with the Kosovo/Serbia situation but it was actually related to pensions.
When we reached Parliament house they were not changing the guards but the two guards were doing a duet of ritual moves. They were dressed in blue jackets and pleated skirts with cream tights and black shoes longer than their feet with black pompoms on the toes. They carried rifles over the shoulders. The steps they performed were so like the ones done by John Cleese in the Ministry of Silly Walks sketch for the Monty Python Show. High kicks, step, lunge, kick, stamp, touch feet with the other guy, balance, come down, two stamps, stay still for 43 seconds, more of the same etc. All done stony faced. Most interesting of all was the regular soldier who was there to assist them. He cautioned a heckler, checked that all the tassels on the guards’ outfits were vertical at the end of the session, invited tourists up to have photos with them, responded when a guard banged his rifle on the ground because a tourist’s shoulder was touching his and told the tourist to maintain her distance, and generally coached them. Apparently it is a very high honour to be selected for the role of guard, something similar to the Beefeaters in
As we moved off I met an American man who was watching his school’s basketball team players feeding the pigeons on their arms. He teaches at the
Later we met with some of the other hostel residents at the free internet section and two of the Chinese students studying in
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