classes are getting harder! we had quizzes today, but thankfully our memory verse was a church song i memorized a long time ago. galatians 2:20-21. i have been crucified with Christ nevertheless i live, its not i, but Christ who liveth in me, and the life which i now live by flesh, i live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave his life for me. ... and then verse 21. i think today was the first day that i didn't nod off in class. our classes are an hour and a half long. we are all crammed into one room, and there is no air conditioner or air circulation. therefore i fall asleep. .. greek class is my favorite class of all time, hands down. our teacher, Vicki, speaks english and is always cracking the class up with jokes and such. today we talked about dipthongs, mainly ones that begin with eu, which makes an f sound. good and easy. we ahd a quiz in this class as well, the first ten letters of the greek alphabet.

after classes and lunch i went to hike the mountain again with hunter, richard, justin and danielle. as we climbed the streets, we took a detour and wanted to head for the rocks. This meant we were to walk through someones yard. Easy enouhg until their dogs went crazy and gave away our position! but no worries, nothing out of the ordinary happened and we were on our way. we decided we were up for rock climbing, not hiking. that was the plan, and boy did we get what we asked for. we had an abundant amount of cliffs, lacking ropes, harnesses or any type of equipment. i think that it was the scariest moment of my life, hanging from a cliff about 30 feet in the air, and trusting the strength of my arms with no great holds. it was all mind over matter and then the ability to make yourself go through with it. hunter was motivating me all the way. he was gonna sacrifice his shoulder to catch my fall if i indeed did fall. i need to go back and take pictures doing this. rock climbing i think is my new passion. after we owned the first major climb, we came to a new one with less holds and straight up. danielle, hunter and i were like heck no! but hunter and richard went in for the tackle. i thoguht they were kidding, but... about forty minutes later or so they climbed over the ledge and reached the top. meanwhile, danielle, hunter and i were having a little chit chat at the top. it was great fun... many interesting topics arose. the thorns, relationships, and the such. hahaha....

danielle and i gave up waiting for the boys becasue we heard a scream up that mountain that could only have belonged to our dearly loved molly mccoy. we reached the top of the first moutnain and saw them so we headed over on over. they were on their way down so we decided to descend the mountain as a group. it was now molly, danielle, tillie, liz and i. on our way down we ran back into the boys, who were halfway up a new rock formation that looked pretty dangerous. we snapped a few photos and decided to meet them back at the artemis.

coming down a mountain has always been tricky for me. i have this tendency, i like to blame on gravity, to fall all the time. it just happens. and it doesn't feel so great when you are trying to decide in a matter of seconds if you should hold on to some thorns, fall on your booty, or just see where the fall takes you. what to sacrifice. speaking of sacrifices, the idea of jesus and a crown full of thorns came up as we walked down. it hurts when i brush up against them, barely touch them, and it really hurts when you have to walk through them. Jesus, on the other hand, had no such luck. he was forced to wear a crown of thorns, and im sure they didn't just slightly set it on his head. It must have been more gruesome than that. Beign in Greece has made my relationship with God see new levels.

After we found our way back down to the streets of porto rafti, we headed back for the hotel, just in time for dinner. i took a quick shower and then went to join the dinner table. justin and i went next door to get dinner at goodys, which consisted of fries and a soda. it was delicious! and surprisingly we filled up! there we so many fries! and then....GREEK DANCING!

there was a lady who came in to give the greek culture class lessons on greek dancing, but eveyrone was allowed to participate. i decided to check it out, as everyone did, and joined the circle. justin and i decided that if one of us stayed then the other had to too. soo we stood next to each other in line and checked out the grecian dancing. it didnt seem to bad so we stayed. i was between hunter and justin. we had to hold hands and do a step that had 7 beats to the right and then we did a little left then back right. the steps continually got harder. at one point we did one where we put out hands up and went forward and back, rocking like a boat in a hugh circle and hunter kept throwing me in the air like you do to a little kid. he got justin in on it and my feet lost site of the ground. it was great watching everyone else dance... a few people we couldn't help but laugh at. im sure people were laughing just as hard at us because we were making fools of ourselves. it was great fun though. i liked the one where you had to sit down and then kick back up. hunter kept saying HOP, ha. i guess you kinda had to be ther eto understand all the little jokes and stuff. after the cirlce dancing we had to partner dance. justin and i were partners and you had to do this elbow thing and make a window and then hop in a little circle. and then you have to let go and the girl puts her hands behind her and hops while the boy puts his hands on his hips and does the same hop step. this resembles a story of how two lovers want to be together but are not allowed, so when they dance by themselves they are like look i did not do anything, i am innocent. but then they dance togehter, which gives the story like romeo and juliet ish. the dance was called sousa! or somthing like that.

after greek dancing the teacher put music on and we just danced in a big circle. someone would go in the middle and do a move and everyone would join in and people just took thier turns. it was a lot of fun. i think the jewells disapproved because it was cut off pretty quickly and interupted with ice cream.

as we were eating our ice cream, somewhere out of the blue, pomegranites showed up. i love pommies!! hunter, stephanie., justin and i were trying to eat it and decided to go hide with our pomegranites to eat them. we ended up being chased by some of our friends and locked ourselves in the classroom so they coudlnt' get us. and then we devoured the pomegranites. it made such a mess but was completely worht it.

the night kind of calmed down after this. i went outside to play some soccer with cabot and seth, becasue i bought an awesome soccer ball in athens the previous day. that was fun and then i came up to the computer lab to blog and talked to a few freinds online. :) another successful fun day in greece! i love it here! sometimes it makes me not want to live in america. but i love it there too... i could be happy anywhere!

no, i dont speak greek

well today was full of many adventures. after lunch, and a rush through lunch duty chores i went to athens with seth, justin and richard. They were nice enough to wait for me to finish my job before we left for the big city, where greek is spoken and we are the stupid americans who come to a country without knowing how to speak their language. i dont' think i will ever do that again. languages should be learned before heading to the country. step one. hah.

so we went to the bus station right outside of the artemis and waited...and waited. and then we saw the orange bus...but it was on the other side of the road. while we were waiting, richard sat down on the bench. his hair is about as long as mine, and he went to flip it out of his face cause it was really windy today. little did he know that there was a pole right behind him. i was startled by a loud sound. seth, justin, and i could not stop laughing. man down, how? flipping his hair! tee hee... i love that kid! so thirty minutes later, it arrived. we were unsure how the bus system worked but we hopped on anyways. one person was driving while another came around after you sat down and figured out your fares. of course, this is hard, unless they speak english, (or the conversation involves one of the five greek words i know). luckily this nice gentleman knew english and told us that this bus went all the way to athens and that we didn't have to take the train. so i took a seat next to richard and we were on our way! we played on our itouchs for awhile, the penquin game is great! and then three of the four of us fell asleep. i was quickly awakened by the shrill sound of a vehicle laying down the horn. this sign, we were definately in athens. people here do not hesitate to use the horn. maybe this is because the lanes are one lane, but wide enough to make 2 and 1/2. therefore, cars make their own lanes and pass whenever and honk when you are in their way. being the fact that we were a gigantic bus, we were always in the way. and thank goodness for seth somehow finding his way around. we got off at a place called ethniki aymna. or something like that, and then headed down an elevator to the metro.

i love the metro. i wish that america had more of them, at least wherever im living. they are such a great idea, underground, out of the way, fast and easy. and cheap. we got on and made our way to downtown athens and then hit the streets. we found a strip where many shops were and wandered through. and, even though i was the only girl, i was not the only shopper. :) these boys know how to shop. or at least spend time in a store. we were at this one shirt shop forever because they were looking for shirts. i found a pretty sweet soccer ball and got it. it has the greek olympic sign on it, and some greek. its puma, and red. perfect. i also foudn a good gift for my dad... but im not gonna say what it is because it will spoil the surprise. and then i got myself a little bracelet. i tried on some shoes and they were really cute, and nothing like you could get in the states, but it kinda cut the circulation off of my big toe. therefore i did not get them. the man said the leather would stretch and im sure it will, i just have a hard time breaking shoes in.

we all got pretty hungry about this time so we went searching for the gyros shop we ate at the last time we were in athens. we kinda got lost and it was getting dark. we found some creepy allyways and turned around a few times and then found ourselves on an alley that had very nice restaurants and karaoke or bands. nto really sure. anyways we ended up making it to the lower key restaurants and found a gyros store much like the one we had previously visited so we just ate there. we ate in the middle of the alley circle way and while we were eating three people came sprinting by! followed by a cop. they knocked somethin down as they were running and dogs were barking. i think there were kids who had stolen something. still not really sure. it was quite interesting though.

after our tasty food was gone we went walking some more. we got a little further and made it to a place we recognized, but by then we were getting tired and had to leave to in order to cathc the last bus ride back to porto rafti. we had 45 minutes until that bus would leave us in an unknown city, with an unknown language, and no cell service. creeepy! but no worries, i was with people who knew what they were doing. and we had maps. :) so we got into the metro station and as we arrived at our stop, the lights of the tram went off and came to a halt for the night. we had caught the last train. how perfect. and then we had to stand outside and wait for the bus. it was beginning to sprinkle and the wind was picking up so it started to get chilly. i pulled out my soccer ball and we started playing with it while we waited but that wasn't really a great idea. so we stopped. and looked for our bus. at one point we saw one that we thought said rafiti. so we asked the lady getting on if it went ot porto rafti and we thought she said yes...but really it didn't. so we were standing on it like oh okay adn turned to get off. but the doors were shut and the bus started moving!! eek! the lady was nice though and realized what was going on and hollered up to the bus driver in greek that we needed off and they let us off right there. that was nice. so then we waited some more and caught the right bus. the ORANGE one. :) never will go wrong if you just wait for the orange bus. so we hopped on there and road back. we stopped at markopelo first and then got on another bus. this way was much shroter becasue it didn't make stops every minute or so. then seth, justin and i had second dinner cause we were hungry again. :)

reaching new heights

classes have began and the burden of homework is on my shoulders... but being that i am in athens i have found i do not have enough time in my days to accomplish all of the tasks desired. after classes and lunch duty requirements were accomplished a group of us decided to climb the mountain out front of the artemis. first up was a huge hill of a dirt road, which i think was the hardest part! we trudged through the streets and eventually found a spot that looked sufficient to begin our journey. there are not really and set pathways so we had to make our own. the group split into two and i went on the adventurous left side. little did i know what lay ahead.

chacos. they seem like the best idea for a hike right? at least from where i come from. but no.. not here. not in greece. i have one word for you: THORNS. i have never seen a thornbush as the ones that reside along most of the mountains in greece, awaiting to prick innocent americans. but no worries, thye did not stop us from pursuing our goal. the directors told us to continue heading upwards and left, and so we did; maneuvering up, over, around, through, and even on top of the dreaded thorns. (its a good thing i changed out of shorts and into jeans) i mainly hiked with mary b, calle, richard, and hunter. our hiking was accompanied by a dog i like to call shadow. as we went on, hiking turned into rock climbing. im not sure how we make it up some of the rocks, and still to this day i wonder how shadow made it up the rocks. amidst the laughing, hiking, thorn-ing, and chatter of the group we eventually survived and reached the peak of the mountain. well... the first part of the mountain. as we ascended over the last few cliffs, deep in the distance were two more peaks just calling out to set foot on. and so we did.

our journey continued after a little break in which we met up with the first half of our group for a photo opp. we enjoyed the view, and the breath-er, and then set out once again. this part of the plains was nice and pretty flat. (minus the rocks that jutted out all along the way) then we just ahd a slight uphill stride.

the REAL peak was beautiful. wonderful. magnificent. i marveled at the site as i looked across port o rafti, and onward to athens. the water glistened in the sunlight, and i wish i could have captured a real perspective of it on my camera. it was like nothing i had ever seen before. (im sure the dog enjoyed it too, trooper he is)

we then headed back down the mountain, at a little quicker pace because the sun was beginning to set, and when the sun sets in athens it takes a blink of the eye until darkness. of course, we woiuldn't want to miss dinner either. Fofi is the best cook ever ( but her plates are horror to clean!!!, greece does not have pan spray... eek!) well, on the way down we went back the way the first group came because it was more hiking, less rock falling. by the end we all had dirt covered bottoms, thorned ligaments, and hungry stomachs. i fell butt first on a thorn bush. one word. ouch! and to make me feel better richard did it too. just so i wasn't the only one. :) our group made it back as sunset was finishing its course. our trek took a total of approximately 3 hours. and dinner was served about 10 minutes upon our arrival. another great day in greece!

on the coast past the temple poseidon

at the top of mars hill

there is graffiti everywhere! i kinda like how it looks.

Eating my first gyros! (it costs to sit at a table to eat!!!)

i just love these girls!

Calle, Mary Beth, and I

Its a good thing im not afraid of heights!

It's all a matter of goodluck!

By the shore.

Temple Poseidon, on the rocks

A new day in Athens! the bus did not depart from the Artemis until 10 a.m. so we all had a chance to get some extra sleep and catch up from jet lag. As always, i was the last one on the bus because i forgot my whisper set in my room, which is on the fourth floor. :) so i got my work out for the morning. i found a spot in the back of the bus next to some missionaries from china who know our directors. They were really nice people, and talked alot of their travels and time in China. Currently, they are teachign english to students and then they invite them into their homes if they find interest of the Gospel. I love hearing about their work. Someday i would love to do something in this line of work.

Our bus, another mercedes bentz, dropped us off in the middle of Athens somewhere, where we were to attend church service. The congregation was mostly Greek, and had a few Russians. The directors translated the Greek into English while we were singing. The leader did not understand that we had a personal pa system and were already hearing the translation, so he translated at the end of everything that was said. :) it was great. Hearing the Greek sing was beautiful, so powerful. I could recognize the tune of some of the songs and a few times as a group we joined in with english. i cannot describe how it made me feel. it put a smile on my face and gave me the chills. We sang a few songs in English by ourselves as well, and then some Russian hymns were sang. I had a hard time understanding the message because my head set was cutting out.

After worship we had time to mingle with the members. and wait until you hear this story!!! Calle was like, i think i know that lady. But what are the odds right. so we walked up to her and she was like do you by chance have a daugheter...did she by chance go to libscomb? and SHE DID!!!! this lady is the ONLY greek lady that calle knew. and she was in the SAME CHURCH THE SAME DAY THAT WE WERE HERE!!!! it was sooo crazy! this lady has stayed at calle's house many tiems and now we run into her in Greece! God works in the most mysterious ways!!

sooo more about our day...

after church we walked through the streets in Athens and looked for sunglasses and watches for some people. note... do not laugh when around vendors. they think you are making fun of them. trust me. for awhiel we walked through the streets and observed until we came to this restaurant called zabbas, i think. it is here that i experience my first gyros!! and it was heavenly! gyros are pita bread with chicken or pork, (chicken is better) and a mayo sour cream sauce, onions, tomatoes, and a type of red seasoning. they were pretty cheap too. 1.8 euro. i could eat those all year long! calle, seth and i went to sit at a table to enjoy our prized meal and the waiter came over to tell us that it costs money to sit down and eat. sooo... we sat on a doorstep down the alley.

after our gyros we were given about 45 minutes to wander through the marketplace. i went with a small group and we looked through many of the shops and found lots of things we wanted to buy but withheld the urge to spend money. there was a beautiful leather bag i was determined to buy. i mustered up my best greeek and said poso... (forgot the rest of the sentence) and the lady said 65. as in 65 euro. sadly... i didn't get it. but ir eally do need to buy a satchel of some sort. i did not bring a purse, and i am a girl. please make the connection. idea gone wrong. im sure there are many places to buy bags along the way though, and then it will be authentic.

we maneuvered our way through the alleyways and foudn ourself back at the meeting place ahead of schedule. THATS RIGHT! calle and i were on time! better yet...early. this moment was marked down in history and noted by our directors. after everyone arrived, we were off to climb mars hill and the acropolis. unfortunatley, after our ascent of the mountain, the gate to the acropolis had closed ten minutes prior to our arrival. after the new year began the site viewing closed at 3 p.m. rather than 5 p.m. Therefore, we had to improvise and had time to make our tirp as itneresting as possible. Personally i like it better when we just go with the flow. We climbed through the mountain ish area and came to mars hill, which is where paul gave his address to the ariopagus. i believe it was in acts 17. apparently he moved, but the site is still historic. while on top of the hill we took many photos and then sat down for a devo. we began to improv sing praise to the Lord, and it was glorious! sitting on the same place that paul was, breathing the same air, worshiping the same Lord. Time is our only separation. I wish i could see it through Paul's eyes. As we worshiped, i was able to look out across the entire city of Athens. All i could see for miles, and into the distance were houses, buildings, stores: People. I wonder how many of those people know Christ, and the power of his healing. How many of those people have experienced the joy of His presence. And then the faces of the people i have been blessed to spend the next three months with. The voices ringing off the mountain top and escalating into the ears of others. We were surrounded by people. Many stared, and watched as we praised our God and our Father. Some filmed, and some came to converse with us after. How many people questioned God, or even understood the words that came from our lips?

I met a couple after our devo who are musicians from Greece. I forgot what town they are from, but we are travelign to it in march. Our director Rebecca invited them to come to our Hotel and spend time with us. The lady was played the piano and the man played the guitar. They could not fathom how we are all not musicians and could sing with such clarity, and such harmony. I don't know if they know the Lord, but how great would it be if just by our simple act of singing, they came to know Christ.

As of this point we made our way back down the hil in a different direction where our directors had not been before. Socrates prison was in one of the rock walls.

Group of friends who went for an adventure in Athens.

A picture of our octopus friend when he was a soldier.

Knocking the octopus with a stick for the cute old man.

Street in downtown Athens.

Mini Coop. This ones for you Dad!

Beautiful flowers in downtown Athens.

Overlooking the Port while eating lunch on a cliff.

Seth was pulling an Elvis style unbuttoned shirt while

we were waiting for the metro.

The old Olympic Stadium in Athens.

Today I woke up too early for comfort. Lunch duty had to report to the kitchen at 6:45 a.m. to prepare the table for sack-lunch making. All in all, I can't complain; we got first choice on sandwich selection. And considering I got up so early you would THINK I would be on time for our departure... but no. Calle and I cannot seem to be on time to anything. We were the last ones on the bus, where everyone was early for our scheduled departure.

I got to make a new friend: NEIL! We were seat buddies during our adventures in Athens. It was really great to put a personality to a new face. On the bus we were given whisper sets- which are devices where we can hear the director speak at a normal voice level and moleskin- to take important notes on. Our huge Mercedes bentz bus toured us through many parts of Athens and the surrounding cities. Most of the morning consisted of historical descriptions, stops along the way, and of course too many photographs. By noon we were all starving and stopped at a lookout over the water to eat our delicious sack-lunches. We ate on the top of a cliff and I enjoyed the company of Seth, Devin, and Calle.

And onward the day moved. We found our way to the middle of Athens. The massive group of Americans was able to form smaller groups and spend some time exploring the streets. I went with Calle, Cabot, Jordan, Seth, Justin, and Jane. As we maneuvered our way through the streets, we found ourselves at a Port. The beach was calling our names, but the water was cold. To our surprise there was a man beating a squid nearby. This was something we could not pass up. Attempting to greet the man in Greek were our hesitant “Yasas.” The man greeted us back with hello. Apparently Americans are easy to spot in Greece. Our style is three years behind the Grecian world.

The squid man started talking to us (while still beating his squid) and asking questions. He wanted to know facts about each of us and what brought us to Athens. His English was very precise. He had traveled to the United States before, but he had gotten kicked out and sent back to Greece. Twice. He invited us to go eat at a seafood restaurant by the sea. I got the memo that he sells his squid there, or that he is just really good friends with the owner. Im not really sure. Either way, he left us with the squid to go and talk to the cook. We were to beat the squid, (still not sure why, something about the ink, and the fact that it was still kind of moving) and Cabot, Seth and Jane took action. When he came back, he cracked invited us to the restaurant. There was a pile of dog poop right where we were standing and he kept saying “Watch out for the s***!” and then laughing. I’m not sure if he knew that it was a vulgar word for excrement but he said it about thirty times because we all could not contain our laughter.

On the way to the restaurant, which was right down the street, he warned us about “yellow cards.” He gets them from the owner when he is too loud, and he knew that we were gonna need to simmer down at times. We arrived and were seated at a double table. He offered us all beer but we refused, so he ordered coke for all. The table was soon full of fried calamari, squid, vegetable salad, and bread. The food was delicious, a bit different than American style calamari. Some of the squid was just cooked, tentacles and all. It felt a little spongy but was cooked well with seasoning and olive oil. We had a hard time downing all the food because we had just eaten lunch. Then the waiter brought out a pink pepdo bismal colored paste. I figured it was dessert so I tried it first, a whole whopping fork full. As it entered my mouth he said it was fish eggs… to my horror I was disgusted, not only by the taste but the idea of what I was putting in my mouth. I had a hard time getting it down because of all of this, and the fact that Cabot had me laughing like crazy. He wanted to know if it was bad, but I didn’t want to say it was horrible.. So he tried it too, much to his dislike. Apparently you were supposed to eat it with French fries. I missed that memo.

While we were eating the man asked more questions about America and told some of his stories. He sang some Stevie Wonder for us and we got to talk to his wife on speakerphone when she called. They talk in English. I believe he said that she was from America and a teacher. He met her when he was over there with a few of his (good looking) friends. He said they were all very good looking back then. He told a story of how one time his friend asked to say good morning in English and he told him it was f. you. EEK!! That caused some chaos. Which was funny because later I had asked him what the proper term in Greek was for good night, because we only knew good morning. He got a mysterious face and we all realized he was about to tell us something that did not mean what I was looking for. Laughter rang out across the table, and a yellow card was thrown from the waiter!

Our time was running short so we had to get ready to go. The man gave us his number and name (which I can’t pronounce) and told us to come back to see him and he would bbq for us the squid he had caught and then teach us how to Grecian dance. He was the cutest old man! Maybe in his 60’s, and had the biggest sausage fingers I had ever seen! He would not let us help pay for the meal either, that it was his treat and he had money. We promised to come back and see him and then headed back to meet the group at the Congo Palace Hotel, which is where Harding used to house their residents. I don’t know why we ever moved because the place was beautiful!

We all took our places back on the tour bus and made our way to the top of a mountain where the Temple Poseidon was located. I didn’t have words when it came into view. The structure was beautiful. I am not used to seeing such old architecture. Photo’s were being snapped left and right as everyone tried to capture its structure. We walked around and went down the other side of the mountain to the water front. It was very rocky but made for some great pictures as well. A devo would have been great down there but the wind was out of control and everyone was chilly.

A life of new and interesting experiences began on the morning of January 13, 2009. I woke up and headed to the Little Rock airport to depart for Greece. Traveling took an entire day, and everyone was exhausted. We finally seemed to arrive at the Artemis hotel, which would be our home for the next 3 months, with great relief. Jet lag, hunger, and the unknown were upon us. The first few days were consisted of accomodating to the Port Rafti area, with walks around town, getting to know each other games, and the like.

Devin, Calle and I in Port Rafti