don’t call me a backpacker…

I remembered some things I forgot from previous posts, ahem…

In my post about Dubai, I forgot to mention the most interesting part of it’s magical transformation of the city: “why” it’s happening.  Why would they be unlike any other muslim country in the region, and turn it into the “Las Vegas of the middle east?”  Dubai is predicted to run out of oil in 10 years.  How you like them apples?

The other interesting part of that story is that most of Dubai has been built, of course, by labor imported from some of the countries I just visited, India and southeast Asia.  The sad part is they make them pay their own way there, pay them incredibly little compared to what the Arab Emirates have, which means they essentially work 6-12 months for free.  But then they work another year and take home more than they could ever make back home.

Back to Athens now.

More followups – The other amazing thing about the Acropolis is the view! You can see the city for miles in each direction.

I forgot to mention Thing #2 and #3 that cheered me up after arriving in Athens.  While strolling the busy cafe scene, I came upon a crowd gathered and laughing.  I realized that these cafe clowns in Europe actually do exists, not just in the movies.  So I watched for a few minutes, he was pretty good.  Then I tried to sneak by and keep moving but he got me.  He came up and grabbed my bottle of lemonade, took it over to some old ladies lunching at a table, replaced her plate of grilled prawns with my lemonade and handed me the prawns.  Everyone laughed and it cheered me up to.

Thing # 3 was just how nice the people at my hotel were, or the manager anyway.  They loaned me a jacket, offered me many opinions on places to go and how to get there.  Excellent service, a highly recommended budget bed and breakfast place if you go to Athens.

Lonely Planet (yes I’m back on Lonely Planet right now, but it’s making me realize how much better Rough Guide is) said to expect a rock bottom budget of 40 euros per day on food and lodging in Athens.  I think actually pulled off 2 days at around $38, making use of my free breakfast, and their halfway decent fast-food snack places where you can eat for around 4 euros.  But many of the cafes were totally overpriced, which is why you see the locals only drinking the coffee, haha.

The euro hates our dollars right now, but from all accounts it’s not been an easy conversion for the Europeans that live here either.

At the end of my stay I finally made a Greek friend, Maria.  She’s a journalist working both in radio, music, and magazines so we had a lot to talk about.  She reiterated what my hotel manager had said, that since the country converted to the euro, it’s been very difficult for a lot of people and many people have to work two jobs.  Like before the euro being a waiter was good money, and now it’s not.

Anyway we went to the hipster part of town, Psiri, and it was great to finally get some insight into Greek life.  Thanks Maria.

In Madrid. I’m not feeling it. I’d like to see more of it, but it is waaaaaay crowded with people and tourists at the moment for whatever reason, and generally overpriced.

I’ve seen/heard more Americans here in 24 hours, than the entire rest of my trip COMBINED!

So I will hop the train south to Cordoba manana con rapidez.

Right now it’s midnight, and I’m watching Madrid’s most beautiful march in a fashionista parade up from the Metro to the endless number of bars and clubs around here. Mucho free fun.

The one thing I did was visit the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, the modern art museum. I know the Prado is world famous, but I wanted to see the Picasso’s and Dali’s. The Dali’s did not disappoint, it was magical standing in front of a couple of them, despite the crowds. Oh yeah, it was free too, on Saturday afternoons. Anyway, can’t wait to get out of here. I might also take a blogging break, I need to focus on my tasks at hand and I’m not sure anyone’s reading my boring drivel anyway.

As you probably gathered I was not feeling so well when I got here. I felt 100 percent fine on the plane, and the minute I got off, wearing a t-shirt, and felt the chill of the Mediterranean winter air, I knew I was going to get sick again. Yes, I’m a moron for not taking the time to check the weather before I left India. All my clothes were in my checked bag too. heh.

Since the Acropolis was within spitting distance of my hotel, and I was up early from jetlag, I decided to head there right away. Thing #1 that made me feel better: since it was a national holiday, the Acropolis was FREE! (i’m such a cheap bastard.) and I beat the crowds that came later.

My 7th Wonder of the Ancient World visit lived up to the hype. It is in pretty sad shape, it’s been under constant reconstruction for 23 years, lots has been removed, but it’s still very impressive when you consider it’s getting close to being 2500 years old. That’s a long long time ago.

What amazed me personally, aside from the obvious stuff, was the enormous marble mountain that the Acropolis sits on. Multi-colored and slippery from years of feet trampling on it. And also just the sheer size of the walls and foundation made up of thousands of bricks of different sizes. incredible.

I was told the holiday after Halloween was like “kite flying day” or something. Also everyone cleans their houses as it’s the first day of Lent, but I don’t think they call it Lent in Greek Orthodox… anyways. In several parks to the north of the Acropolis many families were out flying kites, strolling around, and sitting in cafes.

Sitting in cafes seems to be something the Greeks excel at in the 21st century. There’s also no escaping the cigarette smoke… anywhere.

So I’ve just done a lot of walking around and tried out the sitting in cafes bit too. I’ve seen some awesome mullets! I will try to get some ninja pics.

Athens is a great eye contact city. Everyone looks at each other. I love that. It’s one of the things I hate about some American cities.

Unfortunately the internet situation here kinda sucks. There’s very little wifi, and all of the internet sit-down places tell me I can’t plug in my laptop. I hate that. That’s happened a lot around the world. They lose money if you’re using a fast mac and not their piece-of-sh*t PC.

I walked past the Parliament building just in time for the changing of the guard. That was pretty fun. But it was also just in time for my camera batteries to run out, so I ran over and bought more. I got one picture of the fruitcakes as they were marching away.

So here’s what I decided to do… since I was feeling under the weather, and was told the weather on most islands would be colder and wetter than Athens, I decided just to stay here and take it easy for a few days. This is also because my plans when I reach Spain are pretty ambitious and I want to feel rested and good.

On another day I visited some other city sights, including the National Gardens and Temple of Olympiad Zeus. And yesterday I visited an art museum that was featuring Dali sculptures and sketches, and modern art from Italy. good stuff.

More pictures up.  Greece, the last part of India, and a lost roll of film from Hong Kong.

(ok not really a roll of film, just got mis-categorized.)

Things are still a little buggy with the photo gallery but i’m doin the best i can.

(You have 5 new posts to read before we get to the Acropolis…)

Plane crash in Java right after I leave Java…

New Years Eve bombs in Bangkok shortly before I go there…

Train bombs in India just after I leave India…

anyone noticing a pattern here? The reality is these things happen anywhere and everywhere.
But what I really wanted to say here, is I have felt totally safe traveling alone in just about every place I’ve been.

Truth be told, I was a little nervous at times in Java, but nothing happened, and the people from Java that I met were some of the nicest along the way. I did choose Mumbai because it is well known to be much safer than Dehli, the capital, and I felt very safe there.

The American media and government seem to want to make you believe that the rest of the world is this wild and dangerous place. It is not. Many people I meet in Asia think that everyone in America carries guns and you’re likely to get shot if you visit New York City. Now you and I know that is not reality (but not that far from the truth either, haha.)

Obviously if a country is at war, like India/Pakistan, there are greater dangers in those areas. But everywhere I’ve been has been fine. So there’s that.

Yeah it is kinda funny how many people warned me about how difficult India would be, a notoriously difficult place for some people, and I hit the ground running and didn’t stop.  No problem.

First off… Greece was not a place that was at the top of my itinerary of this trip, or any trip.  But I needed to stop somewhere between India and Spain.  My first choice was Tanzania, but that added like $1000 and numerous other airplanes to the itinerary.  Second choice, Turkey.  If I remember correctly, I still would have had to fly through Greece or Rome to get there from India, it’s cold now, and it would be my 5th “developing country” in a row.  The Middle East?  I would really love to, but it just doesn’t seem like a good time to be there.  Italy?  More cold and more expensive than Greece, so Greece > Italy.

So Athens it was.  Shortest stop on my trip, just long enough to check it out.

Arriving in Greece, has been difficult.  I’m angry that I had to leave India.  I spent over 24 hours in airports or planes to get here.  It’s ridiculously cold and I don’t have a coat, again. (Ok, not that cold, but I spent the previous month wringing sweat out of my clothes every day.)  Everything is expensive.

I get out of the subway near my chosen budget hotel on a Sunday afternoon to find Athens deserted.  I really have no idea where I am.  I don’t see any street signs.  The streets are almost empty, an occasional taxi drives by.  What the hell???  Oh no I bet it’s a holiday.  My good sense of direction and crappy compass lead me to the right street, that’s a start.  With some struggling I find my hotel… closed.  You’ve got to be kidding me.

It’s not like this surprised me all that much as the guide book is pretty clear about Greece’s high season and low season (winter) are pretty drastic.  So whatever, I grab a taxi, driven by a guy who looks like a classic movie criminal, and his scary girlfriend in the passenger seat.  They explain that it’s Halloween here, or as I figure out what they mean, the end of Carnival… and that tomorrow is a public holiday.  So I settle into Acropolis House, choice number two, with no problem.  I even bargained the room down to $25 Euros.  It’s closer to the Acropolis, the only thing I really want to see here, and touristy stuff.

I’m pissed off. cold. sleep deprived. lonely. depressed.  I hate it here.

Who planned this f*@king trip?

I miss my Indonesian friends.  I miss my Vietnamese friends.  I miss my Thai friends.  I miss my Indian friends.

But between then and now when I’m writing this, I’m feeling a little better.  I try think about what an enormous shift this was, two continents, massive climate change, and a 3.5 hour time change, the largest since I started.

I also think about what Sarah (American in Hong Kong) told me about… how the real shock and depression will come when I get home, and that I should mentally prepare for that.  I guess being back in Western culture now is a taste of that.

One thing that’s funny is the natives here walk up to me without hesitation and start speaking Greek (I don’t know a single word.)  That never happened in Indonesia, or India, or anywhere in between. Haha.

The hotel staff is very nice and helpful.  They gave me a map, loaned me a jacket since most everything is closed today, and give advice on what to do.

Last night the Plaka (neighborhood next to the Acropolis) was full of people for this “Halloween.”  Lots of families, people old and young, lots of costumes and silly things, horns, balloons, silly string… and almost everyone had these ridiculous plastic bats, and would hit each other (and me) with them.  Apparently this is a long standing tradition.  I just picked a cafe table for my dinner, gyro and greek salad, and watched the parade of mayhem.

I would have loved to have gone out to partake in the famous Athens nightlife on a holiday like this, but I was tired at 9 PM.  and did I mention it’s cold?

So my mess of trying to extend my India trip also resulted in a $75 wasted plane ticket.  Well I have a voucher I can use if I go back to India soon, hah.  I couldn’t go standby on the plane I had bought a ticket back to Mumbai for, a mistake, so I had to buy a more expensive one from another airline.

F*#k Qatar Airways.  F*%k Go Air.

Arrive in Mumbai around 9pm, apply mosquito repellant so I don’t get malaria, and shuttle over to the International airport.  10 pm.  Hmmm, my flight is at 5 am.  Guess I’m spending the night here.  It really was not as bad as I had anticipated as they had free wifi.  Haha.  That’s where I posted my last posts and photos.

Our stopover is in Doha, Qatar.  Embaraassing, but I wasn’t even sure where this was, but apparently it’s next to Kuwait.  But they had a super nice new airport, also with free wifi.  Qatar and Dubai have become these nice new “peaceful” destinations of the middle east.  Dubai is flat out nuts with money! It’s decided to shun it’s religious principles to become the Las Vegas style playground of the region for Arabs and foreigners alike.  I thought about stopping there, but realized that would be ridiculous.  There’s a short story about it in my travel book I mentioned earlier that Tom gave me, and apparently it’s amazingly beautiful, totally clean and new without any of the Vegas low-brow element, but totally surreal.

We boarded the plane to Athens, only to get off 10 minute later because something “minor” was wrong.  Hopefully it was minor, because we got back on the same plane, and made it to Athens only one hour late.

There I was…

trespassing, drinking 80 rupee ($2) brandy and soda, holding hands (!!!), laughing it up, with men from India.

How can you beat that?

Tell me where in Lonely Planet or tourist desks the experts show you how to do that?

I don’t forget for a second how I’m extremely lucky I am doing this trip while I’m still in my 30’s, and most people tell me they can’t believe how old I am (even when I lie and say 33.) I don’t know if I’ll always have this ability to be able to mix comfortably with the wide variety of people I have on this trip. You can always mix with tourists your age, but locals? dunno.

I was lucky enough to meet Unni and some of his crew across the street from Biju’s hotel while I was going out exploring. This band of troublemakers go to the “notorious” (as they said) Government Law College in Kochin. He just hailed me over to chat me up. At first I thought they were clowning me a bit cause I was a tourist, but I just went with it. I remembered, even at the moment, the time when I was wandering the streets of Yogyakarta Java, and a group of guys hailed me over to have a drink in their yard. But I was scared, for various reasons, and didn’t do it. I had kinda been kicking myself for that ever since.

So somehow this led to me hanging out with them on the roof of the tallest building in town, still under construction. Yes, things like that are possible in a small town in India. One of the friends, Jet, was asleep on the roof when we got there! Jet was not one of the students, but was another one of the call-centre generation, living in Bangalore, and on holiday.

A good time was had, but I had made plans with my Israeli friends to go see the festival at a temple that night, so I had to go. Probably a good thing before anyone fell off the building.

The festival was good, and it was the real deal. I think the Israeli’s were impressed that I knew what to ask to get us to such a performance. The first night of 5 days of elephants, music, and dance. Apparently the size of a festival performance is based on how many elephants they have. Night 1 was only 1 little elephant, and we just caught the end of his parade so I was a bit sad. It was too dark to really get a good picture of him. But the next day I saw a huge decorated elephant getting ready for a parade, so I felt better.

The following day, the guys wanted to hang out again, so we decided we would visit Fort Kochin and I would get the tour from locals. Unni, Jet, and I took the ferry over to the old part of town. We had a good time hanging out, but Fort Kochin was a bit of a disappointment. We saw the cathedral where Vasco de Gama was buried, before his body was excavated and taken back to Portugal.

The end of this trip was unfortunately ruined, and I guess I only have myself to blame. Long story short… for various reasons I waited too long to talk to Qatar airlines about extending my trip. They told me every seat in my class was booked through March. I refused to believe this was true of course, so for these last few days, I made several phone calls, talked to my travel agent, took a 30 minute motorbike ride to the Qatar airlines office to see if there was any way to get a seat, including upgrading. One lady on the phone said unless I want to chance getting stuck in India, I should be on my plane. Nothing would work.

I was so mad, and sad.

The motorbike ride was provided by Collins, one of the law schoolers, who decided we should stop and try some toddy on the way home. This was another experience you’ll never get from staying on the tourist path. We turned down a dirt road and parked where it hit a canal. I had no clue where we were going. We walked around a corner to a shack, with corrugated metal roof, and about 5 big wooden tables and benches. It was about 11 AM. A few old, working class Indian men sat alone. They would have their 2 glasses of toddy, and then leave.

Collins went in and came back out with a milk bottle of what looked like, well… milk, and two glasses. I asked if he needed any money and he said no, it was cheap. I learned on our backwater trip, that toddy only lasts a short while before it turns to vinegar, so I kinda knew what to prepare for. It tasted like milk, with maybe a couple of lemons squeezed in it, with a slightly alcoholic tinge going down your throat. Pretty nasty stuff. Collins joked how long it was taking me to drink it. He said it usually takes about two bottles to actually get buzzed, and we weren’t going to do that.

This was the real deal. Thanks Collins.

On my last night I decided to hang out with them again and drink. This time I treated them to 284 rupee ($7) whiskey, which I’m pretty sure was a treat. We had to wait in a long line at the ONLY liquor shack in town, due to this being a majority Muslim city. Not a lot of nightlife here at all. This time we broke into the campus of the notorious government law school to do our drinking. A few more friends joined, but some didn’t drink, which I thought was strange. Then I found out they were Muslim, heh. Of course.

Unni and several of them made it very clear how cool and unusual it was that an American tourist was hanging out with them. I thought that was nice.

India was a whirlwind of activity, it just flew by, and I didn’t get to do many things I wanted to do. /cry.

Kerala was really a good choice to see more of India.  Kochin (which is actually the area made up of several towns) is quite a busy city, but still small enough to get a feel of more normal Indian life.

I’ve had better luck with getting my hotel rooms in India, despite it supposedly being a busy time right now.  In Mumbai I got my room Bentley’s very late at night and without reservations.  Same thing in Kochin, I got my first choice of rooms which was Biju’s Tourist Home.  Clean (for India,) super nice staff, very nice priced rooms and very popular place so I met fellow travelers, including several who went on my backwater trip.  Biju’s is highly recommended if you go to Kerala.

(Hmmm, right now I’m writing this in the airport, it’s 2 AM, and I can’t focus… I can’t even remember much about the trip at the moment because I’m thinking about other stuff.  I’ll have to come back and finish this up later.  I’m on my way to Greece, more on that later too)

I did the backwater tour that Rough Guide recommended, which includes two boat trips, lunch, and visits to island villages to see interesting things.  Those things included the converting of mussel shells into calcium carbonate (if i remember correctly), which is used for a wide variety of things.  That was really interesting.  We saw the huge variety of plants that grow in the region, including fruit, spices, medicines including insulin, and the mangoa.  The mangoa, looks like a nice orange fruit, but has enough poison in it to kill 300 people.  Occasionally people use it to commit suicide, but it’s used for real as a natural pesticide. Interesting.  We also had coconuts right off the tree, and watched women make rope out of the threads of the inside of a coconut shell.  Wow!  (see the photo gallery for that stuff.)

The food was great too.  We had the option of buying a dish made of the fresh freshwater mussels.  When he asked who wanted, I was like the only one that was ready and willing, but then after I said yes, more people raised their hands, haha.  The traditional Keralan vegetarian lunch was also fantastic.

If I had had more time I would have taken another public ferry ride on the rivers.  Highly recommended.