Well, I skipped a day or two of blogging, but you didn't miss too much crazy excitement.
As I mentioned in my previous post, we had spent the weekend in a small village called Vitalo. Only 250 people live there, and it's where our professor was born and raised as a young child. We visited the beach, Tsilaro, on Saturday and as you probably saw from my previous post, it's quite heavenly there.
The weekend was one of the best weekends I've had in a long while--peaceful, relaxing, delicious food, incredible landscape, and most of all, wonderful people. Check out some more pictures:
Earlier this week, I went to a cafe and bought an Espresso Freddo. It was one of the most caffeinated drinks I've ever had. I had to keep adding water, but it was nice to use their free internet and video chat with my parents on Skype. :)
Then tonight, since we didn't have a group dinner again, Maggie and I went out to Plaka and had dinner at a nice little restaurant. I wasn't all that hungry, so I just ate a club sandwich, but it was pretty darn good. So was the German beer. :)
This week has been our first week of more intensive work. As I've probably inadequately explained already, my program in Athens is one focusing on ethnography and gathering data from interviews with local residents in the neighborhood in Athens where a series of violent riots took place in December 2008.
For the past few evenings, we've been going out in our teams of two and interviewing random people in English. For the most part, many people speak English. Our questions have to do with their thoughts and ideas on Greece, on the riots, and on education (since I'm so interested...:D).
Each of the past few nights, I have seen Greek culture out in full force. One major thing I've learned is that Greeks love to take care of guests--even if they are complete strangers. Each of the past three nights, my last interviews have turned into my interviewee treating me to a Fanta or a beer.
Tonight was no exception--and my interviews were some of my favorite so far. I met Doros, who I had simply approached since he was just standing by himself. He was very open and willing to answer questions even as he was waiting for a friend.
In the middle of my interview with him, his friend, Nos, arrived and--although it makes my life transcribing these tapes much more difficult--chimed into our conversation. Soon enough though, Nos was tired of kneeling on the ground, so he suggested I join them for a drink since that's why they were meeting up anyway.
Why not?
I'm very glad I joined them because by the end of the night, I had also interviewed their friend, Thanos, who joined us later, and together, we had one of the most interesting conversations I've ever had with young Europeans. Our conversation topics ranged from higher education and the research questions about the riots to just spur of the moment questions like, "What do you think about Turkey joining the EU?" and "What are your thoughts on citizenship for second- and third-generation immigrants?"
To these questions and more, they were some of the most open-minded Europeans I've talked to. Very globally-oriented, and very much in favor of a multicultural Europe and a multicultural Greece. Then again, our interviews are in the area of Athens that has long had a history of being more left-wing.
Our conversation actually lasted for more than 2 hours, and I had to leave to catch the Metro before the last train left. I was in no mood or physical shape (I'm still sore...) to walk all the way home to the Acropolis. Before I left though, I asked them if we could take a picture, so check it out--me and my three new Greek friends who are now going to be Facebook friends with me (just like the two previous interviewed groups from the nights before who took me and Jordan out for drinks as well after we interviewed them).
Ok, I'm heading to bed now. Still need to write the rest of my Fulbright proposal in the next day or two. Yikes!!
Sam
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