Athens

I had to wait for some time in the stinking station at Rome before I could finally get on the train for the port of Bari, where I'd be crossing the Adriatic. I got there just after dark and would have been much confused were it not for the fact that I met four Aussie girls getting off the train and joined up with them. We made it to the ferry with little incident.

I vaguely remember the fery rides we took to Greece when I was a child. The ferries themselves were nowhere near this nice. Today, they are floating hotels, with restaurants, bars, shops, a pool, etc; then, they were much like troop transports.

At the time of my previous crossing I was but an obnoxious seven year old being dragged around the continent with my brother and five cousins by my oft- beleaguered parents. The ferry today takes fifteen hours; I can't fathom what it was back then. Mom and Pop chose to travel with seven kids, six boys and a girl, ages 7-17. Little wonder the marraige broke up shortly after we returned. The bonds of marraige can only bear so much it would appear (they said it was all my fault, but I'm sure it was the trip.).

At any rate, the only thing I remember from the trip is that as I did endless laps around the decks, I recalled a sad-looking, small child eyeing me and my stuffed rabbit I had in tow. Each time I would pass he would stare at the bunny longingly and his eyes would rim with tears.

Whatever evils and ills I've committed, whatever trespasses, I pray, come Judgment Day, I get to submit the act of giving that morose child the bunny as evidence of some ember of goodwill and charity that I once bore. I'm sure it would look better for me with the Holy Arbiter if I never said a word to anyone, but, alas, I have no faith in my past or current nature. Quite surely I must have told my parents, rather proudly I should think, just how selfless I had been and just how happy I had made the poor little scamp. Though I can't remember specifically, if I recall my father from those days, he most likely chastised me for giving away something he paid good money for. Secretly, I would bet he was thrilled his seven-year-old son, far to old for such a thing, had finally gotten rid of the damned stuffed animal.

We landed in Patros just after noon on the 28th. Five hours and two trains later and we were in fabled Athens. The girls and I, with an Equadorian-Californian now in tow, went to their hostel, which thankfully had room for me. The hostel was packed and had a bar in the lobby. The various Americans, Aussies (which the girls insisted I pronounce 'ozzies'), Canadians, and other backpackers packed booze away like Prohibition was starting the next day. I may have had a drink, just to be social...

A pretty fifth grade teacher from NJ, Jen, assumed command and ordered the group to a dance club across town. The motley, scraggly group cut quite the positive impression as we yelled and stumbled our way through the subway and streets of Athens.

For the first time this trip I unleashed the full splendor of my dance moves. For some reason, I always seem to save my best performances for strangers in foreign lands, though my fellow law students have caught glimpses from time to time. This may have been the best dancing I will ever hope to do. I don't know exactly why, surely not the meager liters of beer I'd consumed, but I got up on the stage where the band's equipment was set up for their gig later and let loose.

They say that VX gas causes people to spasm so violently that they break their own backs. Whatever I evidently got a whiff of was on par with that as I flailed, gyrated, and contorted my gangly fram in a fumbling of Bacchic ecstasy. I pulled up a girl from Boulder, CO, who'd been a professional dancer in France for the past four months (and no, Mr. Cleveland, I don't mean stripper), and she lent an air of grace and sophistication to my footloose insanity.

The next day, with sore joints and creaking vertebrae, the girls and I made our way up to the Akropolis. The girls asked me to be their tour guide and I hesitated for a moment, if only because I wasn't sure any normal people could withstand the torrent once the dam had been breached, but then gamely dove into it. I did my best to keep myself to the pertinent facts required to appreciate the marvels at hand but found myself straying "to put things into context." I was absolutely sure that I'd bored them to tears, but they insisted it was exactly what they wanted. Whether that was true or not I'll never know, nor want to, but I will say that I heard the professional guides appropriating much of what I'd said as they moved into the spots I'd given my spiels.

The rest of the day involved wandering through the thronging multitudes in the flea market, eating delicious and inexpensive gyros, and hiking up to the highest hill in the city. From up there, we looked down on the Akropolis, the maze of streets, and the mostly white tenement buildings that stretched to the sea. All the city before us was covered in a misty haze that gave it a dream-like, ethereal quality, though behind us all was submerged in an all too real mass of smog.