Thessaloniki: Day 2

We got up at 7:30 today and a laundry service came to pick up all of our dirty clothes. It was the best news yet this trip! I can't wait to be clean. Seriously though, I'm wearing my last clean pair of underwear. Breakfast at this hotel was pretty good - croissants, eggs, Nutella, and of course Greek yogurt with peaches. But they had hot chocolate too, so I made a mocha ... yum!

We called for cabs and took them in groups of fours up to the American College of Thessaloniki, or ACT. It was about 20 minutes and 2 euros/person away ... also easily the most dangerous cab ride of my life. I was pretty sure that when we were speeding up the right-hand lane towards the parked garbage truck, it was going to be the end for all of us.

We had a lecture with the good friend of Katula who is a professor of political science at ACT. He talked about the history of Thessaloniki, which is much different from the rest of Greece as it is so far north. Quite honestly, the five hours of sleep took its toll on me today and I could not keep my eyes open. I tried lots of things - drinking water, rubbing my eyes, fidgeting - but it was a struggle. After the break and an iced tea I woke up a bit and was interested because he was discussing the major controversy between Greece and Macedonia. It was really neat to hear because while I've grown up knowing I'm Macedonian, I've never really known anything about the country itself. I learned a lot today and understand the independence struggle much better now. We have another lecture tomorrow at the same place and time and with the same professor. Argh! But last lecture of the whole trip! Yay :)

Around noon, we caught the public bus up to an area with some places to eat. A bunch of us just went the cheap and quick route at Goody's, a Greek fast-food chain. It was actually far better and healthier than any fast-food in the states and I very much enjoyed my parmesan chicken burger. Afterwards, my friend Meghan and I went to a pastry shop and split some kind of chocolate tart. We thought it looked good so picked it out of the display, and the guy insisted on serving it to us on a plate with all kinds of additional chocolate decorations. It was like a cookie with fudgy, chocolate icing and then the middle was softer like cake, with chocolate ganache. So delicious!

We caught the bus back to our hotel downtown and had a couple of hours to rest, because I think everyone was really exhausted. At 4:30, we went over to Agia Dimitrios, the largest church in Greece, where St. Dimitrios was stabbed to death because he refused to renounce his faith. It was very ornate and beautiful and again we had to cover our knees and shoulders. While we were there, Sarah felt something run over her foot, and when we all looked we saw a huge, black rat the size of my dog Oreo. It was so gross! It just scurried under all of the chairs. Unfortunately the Greeks lied to Katula on the phone and closed within fifteen minutes of our arrival, so we didn't get to see the actual site of St. Dimitrios' death. Bummer, I kind of wanted to see it.

Some of us shopped around for an hour or so but the clothes were expensive, yet cheaply manufactured in materials like rayon and polyester. Ew. In fact, four stores in a row next to each other had all of the same selection, so we were disappointed four times and stalked by four different sales people. Oh I probably should have mentioned that everyone in Northern Greece hates Americans and don't speak much, if any, English. When we walk into a store, they stare and sometimes follow to see if we're stealing anything. Yesterday my friend Dawn's bag from another store beeped on our way out and I thought the security guard was going to hand-cuff her on the spot for not having her receipt as proof!

I came back, showered, then laid in bed for a couple of hours to relax. We met Katula and the rest of the group in the lobby at 9 PM and took cabs to the old wall of the town, or the Kastro, as the Greeks call it. We found a taverna overlooking the entire city and ate Greek salad and calamari -which wasn't nearly as good as the one we had on the beach a few days ago, but still tasty.

Dinner didn't end until 11:30 or so and then we all chose to walk the 30 minutes back to the El Greco. It wasn't bad though ... got some post-meal exercise and had nice conversation. We just got back about 12:30 and now I am so excited to finally go to bed -- especially after Katula told me I looked tired all day today. I think out of the past 16 days, I was the most tired today. So I'm off to bed until the 8 AM wake up call ... think of me when it's 1 AM for all of you back home!

Kali Nikta!