The Results of Thought: Day Five: A picture of somewhere to which you have been

The ancient library in the background? Hot. The girl in the foreground? Not.
It's the backpack straps. They're messing up her posture.

Two years ago, I went to Greece with one of my teachers and a few members of the Latin club. I was one of the younger students there; and I had obviously spent a lot of time with my classmates in the club meetings, but I didn’t really get to know them until I spent time with them on this trip. We all had a really good time. Unfortunately, most of my fellow travelers had graduated that year, so I haven’t seen them since.

This particular picture was actually from the day we stopped in Turkey to visit the ruins of Ephesus. The building behind me used to be this huge, comprehensive library.

We mostly toured the ancient ruins, such as the Parthenon and the Oracle of Delphi. The rest of our time was spent walking around Athens. It was nice because except for the tours of the various sites, and the fact that we had to be back in our hotel rooms by curfew, we were mostly unsupervised. The only rule was that there had to be at least one male in our group. Our teacher told us that in heavily patriarchal countries, unescorted females are assumed to be prostitutes. I am not sure whether the perception there is actually that severe, but none of the girls really wanted to take that chance.

We were allowed to consume alcohol there. The drinking age is lower in Greece, so as long as our parents signed the alcoholic consent waiver, we were permitted to have a glass of wine with dinner. Some of my classmates took a lot of liberties with this, and I found their obsession with obtaining alcohol odd. On the last day of our tour, I had my first glass of wine. To say it was a disappointing experience would be inaccurate, as that would imply that I was expecting it to be a positive event in the first place. The wine tasted like a mixture of cough syrup and liquefied potato bread.

We also went on a four-day cruise around the islands. Everything was beautiful: the bright, whitewashed buildings; the calm, deep-blue water; the clear sky; the sunsets; and we were shown to sights that we would never have seen back home.

Rhodes is a walled city on an island of the same name in the Mediterranean Sea. While on the island, I swam in the sea (which was salty enough to make swimming quite easy), I went to a nude beach, and I went shopping in the city. At least, I think it was a nude beach. I saw a lot of topless women, but I don’t know if that was the lax rules of the beach, or if that’s just how they roll in the area. I wouldn’t put it past them. All the major cities we went to sold pornography in the newsstand right out in the open between the soda and the postcards.

Anyway, my point is that the city was much more interesting than the nude beach. This is a vague memory, but my teacher told me that it was established by northern Europeans during the medieval times. This is evidenced by its architecture (it’s structured like a typical medieval castle. That city was really the only place in the islands that wasn’t painted white), and the fact that there were suits of armor standing on practically every corner.

And on top of walls.

Members of our group could go on an optional excursion to see the monastery of Saint John on the island of Patmos. Anyone not going there could have free time on the beach. There were about 17 students in our group. Six of us went on the excursion.

I know it’s free time on the beach, but come on, it’s both a monastery and a castle. It had been partially converted into a museum for ancient religious artifacts, but it was actually still a working monastery. In fact, we saw a monk talking on a cellular phone. Now, I know that monks are people just like you and me, but this guy was wearing long black robes, had a long white beard, and was wearing a hat that can only be described as incredibly pious. Also, he was standing in the entrance to a building that was both a castle and a monastery.

It's a castle. And a monastery.

I apologize if I’m a little hung up on that detail. We don’t have castles where I come from.

My main memory from Santorini was not the donkeys, nor was it the ridiculously long set of stairs we had to descend to get back to the boat. No, my strongest memory was the gelato. This gelato did not taste like a combination of liquefied bread and cough syrup. It was perfection. It was heavenly. Some angels work in children’s hospitals, some in rehabilitation centers, some on the freeways, and some work in bars, and then some worked in this gelato shop. I don’t actually remember the people who worked there, mind you, but I do remember their gelato.