Pursuit of Happiness

I'm applying for the Peace Corps this time around...for real.

I'm getting a lot of heat from my mother about returning to life in Florida and its scaring the crap out of me right now to be honest.

The Peace Corps isn't a crutch for me, believe you me. I just don't know what is awaiting me at home.

I just want to be like my nomadic ancestors.

Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See Them

Last Sunday I went for a run and I began my warm-up walk through Figeroa and as I'm in my 3rd minute I look down at my watch and all of a sudden I felt this smack in the middle of my butt and out of reaction I put my left arm out and grab whatever the material is and this LITTLE BASTARD goes flying off his bike.

I threw him onto the floor and started yelling at him to never touch me again and that I would make his life a living hell if he ever tried anything like that again. All in English of course.

I didn't know if he was more scared because he knew he had done wrong or because he had no clue what I was saying. He didn't need to know English to get the hint though.

I felt like I had done all women a favor that day for all the times you ever feel inappropriately touched and you turn around to smack them in the face but they are either gone or its too big of a crowd.

The Ugly Truth

Today while walking into Sfera a little girl blocked me from getting into one of the doorways but Jackie got in Scott free. I told the girl in Spanish, "I don't know the password" and I tried to walk by her but she wouldn't let me in. She looked at me and with a frown said, "tienes una cara malapinta". This means, "you have a sketchy face".

I guess she knows me better than I know myself.

Ios & Athens

So Ben gets us to the town and we realize quickly it is super small. If you blink you might have missed it. The view was awesome from the hostel patio, and the tiny town was barely lit.

We got showered and ready to go by 10. We met 3 girls staying there as well: Nicole, Amy and Gina (NAG) and went to Fun Pub for a few beers, watch pool and play a stressful game of Jenga.

Laura and I split a chicken gyro for 2.50 (holler!) so we were feeling full and then went to Stella's for a millasec then went to Flames. It sucked but they were playing American music and we were greeted with shots (tequila...yuck) que asco. Laura and Jackie dipped and I should've too because of O'Clarkie (Charlie, Dingle Prick...) club promoter actually undid my bra right in the middle of the freakin' bar! I ran out of there completely freaked out and found my way safely back to the hostel.

Foggy...got up ready to start the day around 10. Ben was chatting away and met a Cali guy working on cruise ships, Phillip. We talked about crazy nights in Ios and the people that came to visit and Ben was especially fond of his "feral" stories too disgusting to mention.
Completely over the conversation we set off for one last day on the beach and took many, many shortcuts and followed a dog (appropriately named Andy...courtesy of Jackie) who led us astray and then dying of dehydration stopped at a little restaurant.

Its not cool at all to sing, "I'm on a boat" because being on a boat makes me want to vomit. Its only cool if its your boat, and your boat is a yacht and T-Pain is on your boat. Then you know you've made it.

After our meals we left for the beach and FINALLY found the "shortcut" (never take anything "short" in Europe) and took a steep hill to the bottom. We literally laid out for 20 minutes because the wind was throwing around weird sea wood and we decided to throw in the proverbial towel. The walk back was a little horrifying seeing as my legs were still on fire from the climb back to Fira and the volcano trek and now now I was hungover. So slow and steady wins the race and we began our trek back up to Ios. Once we got in we noticed that like the Spaniards they like their siestas so it was a ghost town except for the one restaurant in the center.

We decided to go back to the hostel to enjoy the view once more, relax a little and read up on Athens. Ben started chatting us up again about feral stories and we met a couple more backpackers. Ben tried to convince us to stay one more night but we were eager to experience Athens (oops, our bad). Ugh.

So we got on a bigger version of the Flying Cat and as soon as I decided to change out of beach wear of course were shifting around the ocean and I think I may pass out...standing up in the bathroom changing.

I like that the Greeks respect films in their original language and we got to see a bit of Erin Brokovich on the way into Piraeus. Around 10:30 we landed and we had directions how to get to the hostel. Easy. Or so we though. Tightly gripping our bags on the street we set ouf for the metro. Quite interesting there. You either pay the 1 euro or risk getting caught not paying and being charged 60 times the ticket. Its so easy to sneak through because at some stops you don't need to scan your ticket for entry.

It turned out that random stops on our line were closed so we got herded around like sheep from one bus to another to another metro until we finally arrived at Victoria Station. Laura and I wanted to make sure we were at someplace cheap but not by prostitutes and drugs. At midnight its unavoidable in Athens or broad daylight for that matter really.

The Victoria Square had great restaurants still open (lucky us because it was feeding time) and then an open square of the creepiest immigrants you have ever laid your eyes on..hissing at you saying shit in their foreign creepy voices. Hold on, let me drop my pants right now for you.

We ran to the hostel, dropped off our stuff and booked it back to a restaurant for dinner (we truly are on Spanish time) and then returned around 1 AM and passed out.

At 8 we welcomed the day, hopped on the metro to the Acropolis and instead of paying for anything historic we used our NIE's to get us in for free (I will be milking the student discounts for as long as I can pull it off). The Acropolis was cool and every historic site had some story but most were just a pile of rubble where something great once stood. The Greeks had no idea that their great civilization would ever come to an end, be filled with transients selling table cloths, plastic tomatoes that if you throw on the ground give a smashed effect or Japanese parasols (we need to get those guys better inventory, or they will never sell anything!) or dogs looking dead just lying in random parts of the city (and I mean...EVERYWHERE). Everything historic closed by 2:30 so we got a quick bite then went through the Athens Flea Market which housed a lot of camo and gun stuff (are Athenians packing a lot of heat?!)

Walking away in search of an H&M or Zara we clearly walked the forbidden route. There was the meat district which was 1.5 miles long filled with very dead animals and their completely gutted with their parts getting butchered after already being butchered. Laura and I ran out..the smell and scenery was....... feral. Next door was the fish market and well, you can forget about that...then we rounded the corner and people were selling random crap like bathroom mats, neon workers jackets, batteries, more rubber tomatoes and Jackie all of a sudden had a stage 2 emergency so we ran into Goody's. Baddy for us.

Never in my life would I have expected such a disgusting restroom. Men and women were sharing the bathroom and a shim was smoking a cigarette and then stood with her feet facing the toilet and then I decided I would wait outside.

We checked out a pet store - all the cases were open...pigeons were for sale. walked down the street a bit more - witnessed a drug deal, got hissed at a bit more and then we all agreed Athens sucked. We didn't stay out much longer and by 6 we were back in our hostel praying we'd be back in Spain soon. At 9 we wandered out to our same spot in the cutre square, got dinner and the waiters literally blocked off the guys that come to your table interrupting your meal to sell you crap.

These guys had better inventory than the ones with the rubber balls and parasols - Mr. Bean lighters, bootleg movies and cologne. We were reserving our last change for ice cream for the walk back.

The next morning we hauled ourselves to the Larissa train station and got on the train bound for the airport, or so we thought I think if you don't speak English you are screwed. Jackie pointed out an airport sign in the other direction and started to panic when multiple people were now saying that we were going the other way and that at the next stop the train only comes every hour. We jumped out and the train luckily came within 15 minutes and then jumped on the train bound for the airport (OK...the guy we purchased our tickets from neglected to tell us you have to go backward to only go forward. That makes so much sense!) and by 12:30 we were at the busy airport. I paid 6 euros for a pizza (slice) with no cheese on it at Sbarro (outrageous). Can't wait to be back in Spain. I realize that after every trip I can't wait to be back in Spain because of how cheap everything is.

I'm also glad I got the Ave train back to Cordoba because I'm sure I would've wanted to kill myself if we had to take the 1 AM bus in.

Home sweet home.

Sunsets in Santorini

He drove us to Kafieris on the Cliff and Nadja (not her name) greeted us. The place was nice and the view was rewarding. Absolutely gorgeous in fact. We were starved so we looked around and Laura spotted "Mama's", I had actually read it was good and boy it was! She was hilarious too. "U.S....best fucking country in the world!" she exclaimed. Then she turned to her other table..."Singapore, best fucking airport in the world!" Then stated, "I don't give a shit, I do what I want". Clearly Mama. We finally had the stuffed tomatoes and I ate a traditional dish sort of like shepherds pie. delish but rich. Then we topped off the night with some ice cream.

We got up early and Mama had told us to pay no more than 25 euros for a car and checked a couple places but none would come down from 30 euros so we agreed and then began our drive to the Read Beach. The beach was absolutely stunning and it was quite the marvel. We tried to go to the Ancient ruins at Akrotiri but of course they were closed?

We then went to the lighthouse at the tip of the island (which apparently has the best sunset...not Oia...) and got great shots and I felt like I was at the edge of the world from there. We then went to Kamari, a black sand beach and bronzed a little then drove to Perissa and walked the boardwalk for a bit then stopped for some girly cocktails and a great view of the desolate beach. Next on our list was one more beach to lay out on and then we began the drive to the other side of the island to see the sunset in Oia.

We got our seats an hour before and waited for the show to start. It really was beautiful. My camera couldn't even capture how cool the colors were and how the town shined when the sun hit it. It was more like a painting. We ran back to town to drop off the car in the nick of time and quickly changed clothes and then grabbed a bit to eat. We settled for this nice restaurant and we shared an appetizer of stuffed peppers (yum!) and I got a chef salad. After dinner we checked the internet at the restaurant (not weird at all) and went back to our place to read Cosmo! tops all night (ballin' on a budget). We got up that next morning and decided to check out the town of Fira.

We rode the donkeys down to the old pier and we noticed all of these ships with a lot of Americans on them. They were leaving for a volcano tour so we hopped on too! We explored 5 volcano sites and they took us to a hot spring which was actually freezing. I was feeling broke after that decision and decided to walk up the way we came by donkey while Jackie opted for the cable car (smart girl). Bad idea Alex. I was sweating like a whore on nickel night. I was breathing in donkey crap and couldn't feel my legs. 590 steps later Laura and I arrived slightly proud of ourselves.

We saw Danielle and Michelle again at a restaurant for lunch and they joined us and we had one last hoorah. We headed back to the hostel for our ride to the port 2 hours early. Ha.

We sat down at an outdoors restaurant just wanting bottles of water and the waitress came over saying that we couldn't just order water. I felt like I was back in the US. Jackie sweetly replied, "I hope somebody f****s you in your whore mouth". Five minutes later.

At 6 we got on our slow boat (yay, smooth sailing!) bound for Ios and got to see a beautiful sunset just as soon as we were docking. Ben was there to greet us. A guy about our age and we were glad because we had begun to notice it was the cutres (creeps) that were the hostel/hotel chauffeurs.

All My Friends Are The Ones I Chose

If I hear them knocking...I can't refuse. We'll face the winds and break the strongest of trees.

There was a knock on my door. It had been the conversation I had been fearing the entire day. I said, "yeah?". I wasn't going to back down in how I felt. As soon as the door squeaked open I could feel the tears roll down my cheeks. I broke down faster than I imagined.

Life has been different. Clearly different. I made decisions that I'm not particularly happy with but nonetheless I made them, its too late to go back. And thats just it isn't it? There is no going back, you can only move forward.

I kept bringing up the past. I'm not a good speaker. I'm not good at clearly explaining myself especially when the other person has a valid point and then I'm left stupefied. We agreed we had gone too long in silence. We agreed both parties were at fault. We agreed we needed to do something about it. And we will. We agreed it was poor communication. Its always the latter isn't it? We agreed we felt each other was slipping. I secretly knew it was just me.

I started closing myself out to the world. Hiding in my sacred space. Access, denied. I don't want it to be like this when life has its normalcy once again.

I'm not the victim; I just don't want to be wrong all the time. I just want to be understood.

I know I have a true and lasting friendship. I will not lose it. Not like this.

Greece-Bound Airports & Mykonos

March 25th:

I got on the bus bound for Madrid at 8 this morning. I got to sleep for a couple more hours and I was hoping that the movie they would play on the bus wouldn't be dubbed (as I've realized all they play in Spain are American films...just with Spanish accents. Martin Lawrence sounds ridiculous). Anyway, as fate would have it, they played an American film in English with subtitles (A FIRST!). It was corny and I had never heard of it but nonetheless pleased.

Got into the bus station around 1 and with the trusty directions Laura had written for me and my worn map of the metro, I began my journey to the airport.

I started on the grey line and got off at Avenida de America and from there had to transfer to the burnt orange line (4) going to Mar de Cristal and I told myself earlier that I wouldn't mess up line 7 with 4 (7 is orange and 4 is that damn burnt orange color) but I did anyway. I had to backtrack through the 7th circle of hell, which is the underworld, that is the Metro system and finally got on. I got off Mar de Cristal only to not follow the blatantly obvious arrows everywhere telling me which train would take me to the airport. As Heather says from time to time...you could be sent to the beach and if asked for sand you'd come back empty-handed (well, she says that to Andres; but I feel you too buddy).

So I eventrually make it down there and I'm on the train now and I notice I need a "supplementary fare" ticket to the airport (oh, yeah...Laura mentioned a 2 euro fee...but I only bought the ticket for the ride). Instead of being intelligent and waiting until I got to Terminal 1, I got off at the futbol stadium exit and then ended up using my metro travel pas up and had to buy a new one to get back into the metro and then buy the airport fair. Yeesh, I even shock myself sometimes in how I'm such a tonta (silly girl).

I got myself situated. Checked in and the lady at Lufthansa proceeded to talk to me in English but I just spoke to her in Spanish and ya esta. I've come a long way since September. Alex: 1. Spain: 0. Finally got on the plane at 5 and headed for Frankfort and as soon as I got on I passed out. I woke up around 5:30 to the smell of delicious food and the stewardess (is that politically correct?) asked if I wanted food and I looked at her and dead-serious asked if it was free and she just laughed at me. So naturally, I obliged. I was just in shock because on most flights I've been on while in Europe charge you if you want water. Lufthansa is the shit! I got hot meal and cup of coffee for only a 3 hour flight. Apparently first-class gets a 4 course meal; thats ridiculous.

Greece is upon the horizon!

How do you spot an American? They have Vera Bradley bags; and a lot of them. I think in groups they coordinate which printed bag they'll have so there are no repeats.

A German version of Shape magazine is 2.80 euros. The original in English is 10 euros.

I can't even attempt to try and pull the little German I know out of my my ace; everyone speaks English here. Do I hve a sign on my forehead that says "foreigner"? Before I asked for a kaffee, I got, "hello, how can I help you?" Pretty sweet.

We Americans and Brits aren't arrogant or lazy...were just misunderstood. Everyone in Europe must know multiple languages in order to advance, we do not.

I'm so claustrophobic on this effing flight to Athens. A large German woman to my left is definitely in my personal space and shes so close that I can fill out her sudoku puzzle. The plane people keep hitting me with the carts and the jerk in front slams his chair so hard it hits me in the face and now he is acting like he is having seizures and I can say the same about the guy behind me too. Eek! In other news...one hour left until Greece! Oh, and tortellini for dinner with a chocolate bar for dessert. Can't wait for that bikini!

So as soon as I got off the plane and picked up my bag I saw Laura and Jackie. We went to the kiosk and picked up our bus tickets and got on the X96 (which why pay because no one even validated the damn 3.20 euro tickets). After an hour of being I'm sure obnoxious doing Bon Qui Qui impressions we get dropped off by the port. There was a cutre taxi driver waiting and asks us where we need to go and then he tells us 12 euros. I quickly accept like a tonta (Jackie and Laura wanted to kill me) and he drives us there in a circle just for kicks and we get there 5 minutes later. Only to discover our hostel was in plain sight of where the stop was. Eff.

We get in, not awesome at all but its a place to crash for 2 hours. We get up and shower and don't really sleep because Jackie had crazy nasal issues.

We get up at 5:30 and walk to Pireaus in 10 minutes and pick up our tickets for Mykonos and get aboard the ship at 7:00 and after a coffee and muffin to help the Dramamine go down better we passed out for the better part of the 4.5 hours trip.

We were greeted by a man with a sign that read "Kymata" and he was super chatty, we will call him Tito. He was quickly pointing out landmarks and sights important and lost on us. I was trying to take it all in. It was completely mesmerizing and gorgeous. the homes were all white and the windows mostly some type of blue.

We finally had arrived and when we got out of the van before us stood the town of Mykonos below us and to our left were the windmills. We dropped off our luggage and began exploring the old town. It had narrow streets, scattered tiny churches big enough for only the Orthodox priest and was so windy! Little Venice was right on the water and had good spots for the sunsets and if you walked along the edge a bit more you arrived to the old port that had some cute restaurants looking down onto the water. We stopped by an "authentic" Greek restaurant for fried zucchini, rice stuffed grape leaves for lunch and had yogurt with walnuts and honey for dessert (yum!).

Then we went to Passos Doble for drinks a little later and after being there for 5 minutes a man came sauntering in. He had a crazy salt-and-pepper Bozo the clown set of locks, Canadian tuxedo with an unidentified woman sketched on the back of his jeans jacket , a Corona in one hand and a lily in the other. He looked crazy but harmless, like the Mad Hatter. He had music on but was singing along to Moby "we are all made of stars" beign played in the bar throwing around the top of a water bottle cap. He started chatting Jackie up and she started psycho-analyzing him. He said his favorite number was 5 and pointed out the number of buds on his flower and then called her a closed flower and said that he was an open flower. His name was Captain Markos (with a K...important). May I also tell you that we were "living in his world"...clearly.

Laura was begining to feel a little sick so we left and Jackie and I went out for groceries in the town. Damn! Hefty prices. We walked out with meager resources for 24 euros...ugh. The town was slowly coming alive at this time though, there were many people out. Quite the contrast from the ghost town we had witnessed earlier before.

Jackie and I went out for dinner 3 doors down from the bar we went to earlier and ate at this little place called Suisse. It was fairly priced compared to other places. I got the caprese sandwich and the friendly woman chatted us up. She was so sweet and we had the best seat in the place. this little enclave with a seashell chandelier and land of pillows. Jackie noticed these kids from lunch we had met earlier and they told us to come out since it was their last night on the island...they made a compelling argument so we agreed.

We went back to check on Laura and she got it together to get out: we also thought we could squeeze free drinks out of these guys . Well we went to the bar from earlier and who should walk in there but Markos. except he was zigzagging more than earlier and began conducting in the middle of the bar. He left after lighting his cigarette with a tea light and we knew it wouldn't get more exciting there so we left shortly after him. We went to another bar down the road and a woman approached us saying, "you are not wearing flip flops". Claro mujer. As soon as we found out a Corona and Bud Light was 10 euros....we dipped. We went to a bar with live music but sat out in the freezing cold because it was so loud and all of a sudden Markos stumbled in. He had a glass of water and was rocking out to the music in his head. He held good conversation in English for being so belligerent and lit a cigarette with his already lit cigarette and sucked down the first on so he could smoke the second. Jackie said, "you should smoke less hash and drink more water". He replied, "I'm just going to get more". Then when asked the age old question, "What is life Markos?". "Well, life is about having a good time". Can't argue that. And with that he was off into the night and we called it an early one too. No, we never found those kids.

The next day we went into town and rented a car. "You have license?" "Yes." "Know how to drive good?" "Yes." "Okay, fill up how you see it and see you in 24 hours." And with that we relied on the poorly directed map in the glove, our keen sense of directions and signs in Greek and Jackie trying to decode it from her sorority days.

We took off looking for the first beach we could find. We drove all around the island (not big...did it in a few hours). the towns were few and scattered and I needed to be slapped because I couldn't believe we were actually there). The Greek club music filled our car and hearts. We ended in the town of Ornos and found our first beach with life (and I mean 4 people laying out). Aside from cutre workers building stuff by us we were feeling pretty desolate. It was a cute town, but super small. We quickly made it back to see the sunset by the windmills. This couple sitting in front of us had white gloves on and it was truly bizarre. The sunset was gorgeous after that we returned the car and I swear each time we saw that woman she was always stuffing her face with some food.

We returned to our place and got showered and ready to go out to eat. Naturally we went to Suisse for some food on the cheap, great service and even better atmosphere. Had a delish Greek salad and caprese crepe and finished off with a dessert sampler of baklava, lemon cake and some chocolate thing. We went back to our room and spent the night in. Mykonos was too expensive at night. The next morning we woke up at 9:30 to start packing because Tito was melting us at 10:30 to pick our bags up. He knocked at 10:00 (early?) and we were not anywhere near done. "Uh. I don't know if you realized but there is a time change." We did know...but we can't get it together! He came back and we threw our stuff in his van. With a few hours remaining we just walked the town and got to see the Palm Sunday procession, bought some homemade jewelry from an old woman who was quite the hustler. We walked out to the old port and it was packed with people and who but who should show up...Markos! His crazy-ass was staggering down the road conducting music and enjoying himself. I had hoped we'd get to see him one more time. After recording him for a bit we stopped and kicked these 2 girls out of their photo shoot with the pink pelican and got around the corner we stopped for a nice lunch at a quiet restaurant that had a peek of the ocean in the distance. It was time to meet Tito to collect our bags at the old port and we got there, said our goodbyes then lounged at the top of the sun. We left to get a drink only to come back and see our tanning sport had been taken by 2 girls. I wanted to be up there too so we plopped ourselves in our original spots and not to be rude we started talking and they ended up being these 2 really sweet Loyola students studying at New Castle and were on Spring Break named Danielle and Michelle.

Then we met a girl working in Murcia. After waiting an hour for our late boat the Flying Cat 4 finally arrived. We got on and instantly we were sick. We literally were flying and it was the grossest 45 minutes of my life. Once we got on land again we said our goodbyes and looked for our sign. Jackie turned and said, "Man, Hamlin Hotel sounds really cool!" (Hamlin is her last name). Uh, thats us...