1st day

15 december 2019 - Athene, Griekenland

Finally here! 

Yesterday morning I left at around 8 am to travel to Schiphol in Amsterdam. there I caught up with Martin, my travel buddy for the next 6 weeks. After a delay of 20 minutes, we could finally board the plane. We talked to a guy who was sitting next to us (sorry, I forgot his name) and he told us about the traditions of Greece, for example how they celebrate New Year's Eve. Did you know that shoot with guns in the air when the clock strikes 12?! This will be an interesting evening. Also, in the plane, the stewardess gave us a very nice gift, to wish Martin and me good luck at working at the refugee camp. That was really sweet of them, all of them came to talk to us about it, they seem really interested.  

At the airport, we got into a taxi, which would bring us to our apartment. Let's just say that driving in Athens goes a little different than what we are used to in The Netherlands.  Catching up on the right lane, motorcycles passing through it, people walking on the street and parking at a corner. It's all normal here. The taxi driver gave us some names of some nice restaurants we should check out to get a Greece experience. Afterward, he gave us his business card, so maybe we call him again when we have to travel back to the airport?

The apartment is nice, it has all the facilities and seems to be an okay condition. We also have another roommate, a girl from France. She has already been volunteering at camp Eleonas for three weeks now, and this upcoming week will be her last. Then she will travel to Lebanon to visit her friend there. She told us about a party that some other volunteers were throwing that night. Of course, we wanted to join her. And good thing we did.

We walked through Athens and went for dinner at Sabbas. It is a well-known restaurant here in Athens. You get all kinds of dishes there so we decided to get some different dishes and share them together (this is also a typical Greek thing to do). The food was so much but also very delicious. We decided on a doggy bag and bring the rest of the food to the party, so other people could enjoy it as well. 

After a walk of 30 minutes, we arrived at a small apartment, that was filled with people. A lot of volunteers from all over the world. Germany, Spain but also some Dutch people! At the party were also a few residents from the camp itself. They work closely with the volunteers and friendships grow out of it. This is a really nice thing to see for me. We learn about and from each other and have a lot of fun as well.

We played beer pong that night, but not the type of beer pong you are used to. They put some paper cups on a drying rack and made a ball out of paper foil. In the beginning, we would make teams, but eventually, everyone would join and before you know it you were playing beer pong with like 20 people. But the bigger the crowd the more fun it is. With all the different languages in one room, it was sometimes hard to understand what one was saying, but I soon notice that non-verbal language is quite the same, so we made it work.

But soon the sleep would catch up and at midnight we decided to go back to the apartment. Walking at night made me realize that Athens is also a city that lives at night. Shops were open and so were restaurants. You could still find a lot of people on the street and it is of course totally different then what I'm used to. But I can get used to this.

Temperature: 17ºC

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