Athens Day One

 The acropolis is slammed during weekends so I resolved to see it tomorrow. In the interest of exposing myself to some sort of culture, I went to the car museaum. Typically these are hosted in vast garages outside of the city center so it’s a rare treat to have one by the metro. This collection was incredible. Ferraris for days and lots of less common rare cuts. Badges like Packard, Voison, and Facel Vega.

Not in the museum but who doesn’t love a battle Lada?

I strolled the gardens near parliament but did not find much there for myself. The most interesting thing was a beggar I passed on the way. A woman lying prostrate on the ground, one hand covering her face. At first I was very taken with the dramatic stillness until I saw her hand was attempting to conceal her holding her phone in front of her head. Everyone needs a hustle.

Peaceful, if dull

For dinner tonight I went to a Sephardic restaurant. These are exceedingly uncommon and I was excited to see such a rare menu available to me. Unfortunately it was not meant to be. This was Sephardic dishes for the Ashkenazi palate. For the uninitiated, that means anything that could be perceived as flavor should be treated with extreme suspicion. The quality of the meat was good but I found the dish of mayo that came with my roasted chicken to be highly suspect.

My night ended at a pool hall. I’m hungering to act like an American and they have pinball here. At a Euro a game I was a happy man. There was a group of five racking up next to me and I managed to peel one of them off for a game of straight eights. He’s an ECE student at the local university. He echoes a sentiment a lot of people on the sciences have, to go to the US. This is a land of good living but, for the young, not a land of opportunity.