From Athens, Sofia Down
ATHENS
I'm on the road - Sofia a morning memory, the Acropolis on the fly this afternoon, and now a smoky internet cafe on a side street off a spur off Omonia Square.
I'll work backwards from now...
Utterly uneventful flight Sofia>Athens, seen off by big and little Chilov men - with a cup of tea overlooking the tarmac and explicit instructions about which one of the 4 gates would be mine (not a tricky airport). Passport control perfunctory - as easy to leave Bulgaria as it was to enter (no forms, no questions - a stamp).
Olympic Airlines threadbare, surprisingly un-gussied up for the carrier of an Olympic host country. Crummy seats with the carpet puckering and tearing around their base, darkly surly stewardesses, no in flight magazine and "Business Class" consisting of a tray wedged in the middle seat of a three-seat row. Slept with many seats to myself, ignored food and drink.
Had thought to take a taxi to hotel but pushed towards thriftiness by the tourist info woman who gave directions for a bus then metro - for just 2 euros. Felt like a traveling champ, Let's Go veteran as I watched the tourists comfy in their cabs go by while I waited for my overcrowded bus alongside earnestly dishevelled backpackers and less fortunate locals.<
No incidents en route to Hotel Rio. A pretty exterior, a lovely but unfathomable name, and tiny room with two tiny beds and a hospital tv suspended above. Hand shower, shampoo/bodywash as one, and no pulls on the drawers - but clean! safe! and you can walk to the Acropolis! (This may be a standard selling point for all Athens hotels, I recall it being championed by each I considered).
Briefest of touchdowns in the Rio- just enough time to realize my radio shack uber-international adaptor doesn't do Greece - then to the ruins! A 12 euro ticket covers all -managed to see about 90% of ruins on offer in 2+ hours. Metamorfossis - zoom, Agii Apostoli - zoom, Stoa of Attalus - zoom and upwards to the giants of the show. Heart stopping to finally see the Parthenon and Temple of Dionysis.
They do not disappoint and the Parthenon columns do bell out at the bottom - it's all there just like the school books said. Also whizzed through a museum of statues and fragments - wrenchingly beautiful and the animals (horses and dogs mostly) so vivid and full of character and timeless. And the toes of a warrior - beautiful beautiful toes.
Felt silly but of course had to photograph as I went - the view out over Athens, the clouds hovering over the Aegean, the Temple in silhouette as the sun sank on ancient - blah blah.
Since Acropolis closed (5:30 with whistles) have wandered Athen's streets and bazaar alleys. Withstood the temptations of mashelas, prayers beads, marble relics, crap jewelry, Olympics 2004 leftovers and traditional blouses. Did not buy Ruslan a Greek soccer shirt but tempted by the lovely light blue colors.
Sort of nice city - reminds me of Turkey with the smell of olive treas and doner kebabs. Olive trees everywhere - with olives!
Back to this morning - and the days since I left NYC.
SOFIA
A wonderful three days with Ruslan and family in Sofia - what a send off! Miss their warmth and the city and odd now re-entering familiar guise of solo traveler - figuring out how to fill the evening on my own in Athens without attracting undo attention or whiling away hours in front of CNN at the hotel. Internet cafes just the thing for the female on the road - techno, coffee, ashtrays.
The Chilovs were the loveliest of hosts - treating me, only son's (only) girlfriend - like a princess. I drank only from an heirloom Meisen tea cup (gilded!), mother Chilov gave me a small wardrobe's worth of fabulous 70's pieces she could no longer wear, father Chilov drove R and I out and about and through the capital - paid for museum entrances and then hung back to read the paper,
bought us walnut cookies at the monastery on the hill, and R took me out with high school friends for big nights of the town.
Sofia a handsome city - with some of the facades and colors of Rome. Stately layout of broad boulevards, byzantine churches dotting, stooped old women in thick hose and headscarves next to fiercely chic twenty-somethings in skintight stretch jeans and towering stilettos. Out first night out was a whirlwind through the city's hotspots. First drink at Tabacco (Bulgarians favor single word names, other hotspot - missed this go - Lipstick - hangover from mid-80's perhaps.) - a glass vestibule (green house?) off the chapel of the king's summer palace. Then to Opera - formerly a Swedish restaurant (?) now re-imagined as a shiny, stunning, towering black space of baroque mouldings and light fixtures fresh from the latest euro design fair. And hip bulgarians of course, smoking of course.
And then to a club that might have been any club in any country (anywhere) but made special by being with R and friends of course.
And last night a delicious meal at a typical Bulgarian mehenatta - in a former bomb shelter now bedecked with plastic grape vines overhead and textiles on the walls and tables. And bulgarians smoking. Then onto The Piano bar - just R and I - and a night of Bulgarian favorites from the '70's - Uriah Heap. As the bar filled piano guy and sidekick pleased the gathered, and filled their brandy glass of tips, with rousing covers of Bulgarian local favorites. R translated what he could - universally shmaltzy.
Sad to say goodbye to R, the Chilovs and Sofia this morning.
NOTED:
The rest of the world is still smoking, lots. Commented on this to R as we sat in a coffee shop with smokers on all sides (2, 3 even 4 to a table - all, amazingly, simultaneously smoking). He noted that Hungarians smoke far more - for instance, they also smoke on public transport whereas Bulgarians abstain.
All Athenians speak english - learned en masse for the olympics?
Route to the Parthenon surprisingly vaguely signed. It's been there for a while, yes?
They have olives on their olive trees in Greece!
Bulgarian food is wonderful - hybrid of heavier northern cuisines with the lighter Mediterranean ones.
Dollar not strong.
Bulgarians drink a lot, but never appeared rowdy or drunk. R says that's the way they are.
Sofia a very very chic city - buy property now before it enters the EU in 2007
I'm on the road - Sofia a morning memory, the Acropolis on the fly this afternoon, and now a smoky internet cafe on a side street off a spur off Omonia Square.
I'll work backwards from now...
Utterly uneventful flight Sofia>Athens, seen off by big and little Chilov men - with a cup of tea overlooking the tarmac and explicit instructions about which one of the 4 gates would be mine (not a tricky airport). Passport control perfunctory - as easy to leave Bulgaria as it was to enter (no forms, no questions - a stamp).
Olympic Airlines threadbare, surprisingly un-gussied up for the carrier of an Olympic host country. Crummy seats with the carpet puckering and tearing around their base, darkly surly stewardesses, no in flight magazine and "Business Class" consisting of a tray wedged in the middle seat of a three-seat row. Slept with many seats to myself, ignored food and drink.
Had thought to take a taxi to hotel but pushed towards thriftiness by the tourist info woman who gave directions for a bus then metro - for just 2 euros. Felt like a traveling champ, Let's Go veteran as I watched the tourists comfy in their cabs go by while I waited for my overcrowded bus alongside earnestly dishevelled backpackers and less fortunate locals.<
No incidents en route to Hotel Rio. A pretty exterior, a lovely but unfathomable name, and tiny room with two tiny beds and a hospital tv suspended above. Hand shower, shampoo/bodywash as one, and no pulls on the drawers - but clean! safe! and you can walk to the Acropolis! (This may be a standard selling point for all Athens hotels, I recall it being championed by each I considered).
Briefest of touchdowns in the Rio- just enough time to realize my radio shack uber-international adaptor doesn't do Greece - then to the ruins! A 12 euro ticket covers all -managed to see about 90% of ruins on offer in 2+ hours. Metamorfossis - zoom, Agii Apostoli - zoom, Stoa of Attalus - zoom and upwards to the giants of the show. Heart stopping to finally see the Parthenon and Temple of Dionysis.
They do not disappoint and the Parthenon columns do bell out at the bottom - it's all there just like the school books said. Also whizzed through a museum of statues and fragments - wrenchingly beautiful and the animals (horses and dogs mostly) so vivid and full of character and timeless. And the toes of a warrior - beautiful beautiful toes.
Felt silly but of course had to photograph as I went - the view out over Athens, the clouds hovering over the Aegean, the Temple in silhouette as the sun sank on ancient - blah blah.
Since Acropolis closed (5:30 with whistles) have wandered Athen's streets and bazaar alleys. Withstood the temptations of mashelas, prayers beads, marble relics, crap jewelry, Olympics 2004 leftovers and traditional blouses. Did not buy Ruslan a Greek soccer shirt but tempted by the lovely light blue colors.
Sort of nice city - reminds me of Turkey with the smell of olive treas and doner kebabs. Olive trees everywhere - with olives!
Back to this morning - and the days since I left NYC.
SOFIA
A wonderful three days with Ruslan and family in Sofia - what a send off! Miss their warmth and the city and odd now re-entering familiar guise of solo traveler - figuring out how to fill the evening on my own in Athens without attracting undo attention or whiling away hours in front of CNN at the hotel. Internet cafes just the thing for the female on the road - techno, coffee, ashtrays.
The Chilovs were the loveliest of hosts - treating me, only son's (only) girlfriend - like a princess. I drank only from an heirloom Meisen tea cup (gilded!), mother Chilov gave me a small wardrobe's worth of fabulous 70's pieces she could no longer wear, father Chilov drove R and I out and about and through the capital - paid for museum entrances and then hung back to read the paper,
bought us walnut cookies at the monastery on the hill, and R took me out with high school friends for big nights of the town.Sofia a handsome city - with some of the facades and colors of Rome. Stately layout of broad boulevards, byzantine churches dotting, stooped old women in thick hose and headscarves next to fiercely chic twenty-somethings in skintight stretch jeans and towering stilettos. Out first night out was a whirlwind through the city's hotspots. First drink at Tabacco (Bulgarians favor single word names, other hotspot - missed this go - Lipstick - hangover from mid-80's perhaps.) - a glass vestibule (green house?) off the chapel of the king's summer palace. Then to Opera - formerly a Swedish restaurant (?) now re-imagined as a shiny, stunning, towering black space of baroque mouldings and light fixtures fresh from the latest euro design fair. And hip bulgarians of course, smoking of course.
And then to a club that might have been any club in any country (anywhere) but made special by being with R and friends of course.
And last night a delicious meal at a typical Bulgarian mehenatta - in a former bomb shelter now bedecked with plastic grape vines overhead and textiles on the walls and tables. And bulgarians smoking. Then onto The Piano bar - just R and I - and a night of Bulgarian favorites from the '70's - Uriah Heap. As the bar filled piano guy and sidekick pleased the gathered, and filled their brandy glass of tips, with rousing covers of Bulgarian local favorites. R translated what he could - universally shmaltzy.
Sad to say goodbye to R, the Chilovs and Sofia this morning.
NOTED:
The rest of the world is still smoking, lots. Commented on this to R as we sat in a coffee shop with smokers on all sides (2, 3 even 4 to a table - all, amazingly, simultaneously smoking). He noted that Hungarians smoke far more - for instance, they also smoke on public transport whereas Bulgarians abstain.
All Athenians speak english - learned en masse for the olympics?
Route to the Parthenon surprisingly vaguely signed. It's been there for a while, yes?
They have olives on their olive trees in Greece!
Bulgarian food is wonderful - hybrid of heavier northern cuisines with the lighter Mediterranean ones.
Dollar not strong.
Bulgarians drink a lot, but never appeared rowdy or drunk. R says that's the way they are.
Sofia a very very chic city - buy property now before it enters the EU in 2007
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