June 30, 2007 Greek Traffic - Eek!

It is a good thing that I trust Theodosia when she is driving the car! Streets are not terribly narrow in all places but people park wherever they can find a place, both sides of the streets and on the curbs and sidewalks. And where do the people walk then? Why, in the street of course. So our car dodges not only other cars, but motorcyles, scooters, trucks, buses, huge repair equipment, dogs, people, open car doors - you get the picture. Because the view at intersections is often obstructed, the practice is to move into the intersection so you can see if there is oncoming traffic. When there is, they pass within inches of your front bumper.
The narrower streets are not all one-way, so there is much backing up and horn honking and squeezing by and poking one's car into the traffic hoping that the other cars will let you in.
The large main thoroughfares are a challenge just getting into the traffic. There is so much traffic that the center of the city allows cars only on odd or even days depended on your license number. Otherwise you have to go around or use the back streets. There are street signs but the names are long and in Greek characters, and we have gone by before I can even glimpse the name.
There will be no car driving for me! But there is a local bus that stops just at the foot of Theodosia's street and it makes a loop of the Haidari district - for free. That will be my first foray. At the top her street (she lives on a hillside) there is a city bus which will take me down to the center of Athens when I get brave enough and oriented enough to try that.
For now I am satisfied to explore the area on foot. Theodosia and Christos live on the outskirts of Athens. Probably we could call it a suburb. Athens reminds me a little of Albuquerque, NM, because the center is ringed by "mountains" but here they are closer to the center than in Albuquerque. My friends' house is on a street so steep it just stops and does not connect to the street above it which one gets to by a series of steps. They drive their car up the street, park in front of their house and when they leave, they back down the street to the next level. No worry about through traffic!

June 28, 2007 Haidari, Athens, Greece

Well, I worried for nothing. The plane was on time and we made the connection with no problem. We even had time go to McDonald's. (Mia and Marco did not think much of airplane food; can't say I was impressed either but it was adequate.)
We got through customs in Athens with no hassle and then went to get our luggage. Visitors are not allowed in the baggage area in the airport so we had to struggle with our heavy bags ourselves. I offered to get a cart, but I would have had to exchange some dollars and the children were so eager to see their father, they could not wait, so we towed our heavy bags as best we could, not too far, and then we were through the door and greeted enthusiastically by their father and by my friend, Theodosia.

Father and friend exchanged some rapid-fire Greek, I turned over passports to him, and gave him a phone number where he could contact me. We parted company with a promise to get together sometime in the summer. Then we walked out of the airport into a blast furnace! Athens was in the middle of the worst heat wave in thirty years. It was 89 degrees and not a cloud in the sky!

Theodosia had exciting news. The day before she had presented her thesis for her Masters Degree in Mathematics and received many accolades. It was the culmination of two and a half years of work and she was overjoyed to be released from a very hard year, but we needed to go to the University so she could get one more important signature for her accreditation. We spent as little time in the sun as we could and rested and drank lots of water and still I was near heat exhaustion when we got home. (She still drives the old Datson car she had two years ago and it has no A/C.)

The first thing I did was take a cool bath, but even then it was a long time before the heat receded from my face. The heat wave continued yesterday and is beginning to abate a little now. The TV advised people to stay inside or go to "cooling centers" if they did not have A/C. My bedroom has A/C. I slept most of yesterday, rising to eat a little, visit a little and then back to bed. My head was "thick" and I could not think well. Today I am myself again.

Today Theodosia and Christos' son, Aris, set up my laptop to connect on their wireless system, so I will be able to readily post to my blog. More later.

June 24, 2007 Seattle - Off We Go

Several calls to the airline finally convinced them to give me and Mia and Marco seats closer to the front of the plane to speed up disembarking in Newark to make our connection with the plane for Athens. The time between flights is only an hour and 45 minutes and if you fly, you know that all kinds of things can eat away at those precious minutes.

Having missed my connection in New York, because my plane had landed but sat on the tarmac and could not get to the gate, on my last trip to Athens, I will not breathe easily until my charges and I are on the plane headed out of Newark. My son, Jon, requested an electric cart to move us from one gate to the other. That will help if it actually turns up at the gate; the airlines is loathe to commit themselves that it will be there. "We will put in a request for it" is the usual response.

Jon made sure I have the proper converter to plug my laptop into the wall outlet once I am in Greece so, if I can connect to my friend's phone line, I can send email. If that doesn't work, there are always the internet cafes where for a few dollars you can get online to receive and send email.

Mia, Marco, and I will all meet at the airport at 5:30 tomorrow morning, Seattle time. We will arrive in Athens 10:30 a.m. the next day. I don't know about the younger set, but I will be ready for a long nap when I get to Christos' house. I don't sleep well on planes.

Next blog will be from Athens!

June 21, 2007 Travel Notes

My daughter-in-law, Beth Whitman, who wrote the book, "Wanderlust and Lipstick: the Essential Guide for Women Traveling Solo", upon hearing my travel story, said that I should share it on my blog.

I bought my Town and Country van upon my retirement for the express purpose of having a place to sleep in the event my genealogy research needed one more day in an area. It is aggravating to drive miles to a motel when one is doing research in a small town off the beaten path.

Just such a situation presented itself in Allegany County last Monday. I was in the area where I wanted to be, and I needed one more day to do research. Folks told me there was a motel just off the state highway in the small town where I needed to see the town clerk. I located the motel set off in a field, on the outskirts of town, but I was not impressed and knew I would pay too much for what I would find. Just across the street was an ice cream stand and I stopped for a cone. Behind the stand was a small RV park, lawns nicely manicured and obviously not full.

I inquired of the manager, told him I only needed access to the washroom and would sleep in my van. He said I could pull in right next to his trailer and I would be only a few feet from the washroom. Since I needed neither water nor electricity, his camping fee was $10! Best of all, the washroom was the finest I have every found in a campsite. It had seats and foot pads in the showers, was light, clean, neat, well supplied and it was heated!

It took me five minutes to shift the van's back seat to the side, unroll my pad and sleeping bag. Then I went for a long walk in beautiful countryside. Bright and early the next morning, I bypassed McDonald's and had breakfast in the small restaurant in town where I got pancakes, sausage, eggs and home fries for $3.97. Tables there were shoved together so patrons could sit and visit. I inquired of these local folk about the Benham family and got not only clues but specific directions to a family home. This is my kind of fun!

June 19, 2007 Genealogy Sleuthing

For some time I have wanted to research in Cattaraugus County in the southern tier of New York State, so yesterday I drove west from Cortland. It took nearly all day to get to the County Clerk's office only to learn that the records I wanted were with the Town Clerk, back 20 miles from the way I had come. By the time I got to Hinsdale, it was 4 o'clock. Didn't matter. The Town Clerk didn't have an office anyway.

I knocked on the door of Lila Cooper, the local historian, a 95 year old former school teacher, who could rattle off names and relationships faster than I could write them down. She phoned the Town Clerk and got me an invitation to come and look at the town records at her home. Lila also told me the family I was interested in settled 7 miles further east which put me just over the county line into Allegany County. No wonder I could not find any of the people I had been looking for!

Bright and early this morning I visited the local restaurant, so popular that the owners have just pushed several tables together so that the regulars can sit together and chat. Visiting with folks there I got several more "leads" and spent the whole day happily looking up records, taking photos at the cemetery and visiting two other ladies in their nineties. Now that I have had my genealogy "fix", I can turn my attention to the next leg of my journey. Tomorrow it's off to Seattle!

June 16, 2007 A week in the north country

It's hard to believe that it was a week ago that I last wrote. Some of the time I have been unable to access the internet. But I have enjoyed the slower pace and seeing siblings and cousins I seldom see. My dad's birthday party was lots of fun; we had balloons, cake, ice cream, and gifts of course. My niece, Debbie, had printed up song sheets in large-size print, with lots of the old songs sung 60-70 years ago and the residents at the assisted living home where Dad stays enjoyed trying to sing them. My sister commented that one thing they found out about our Lee family is that none of us can sing! But we had a good time anyway.

I visited my father daily at the Adult Home. The second day I arrived right after he had taken a tumble. He evidently turned his foot under when he fell and had a slight bruise on it, and hobbled around for a couple of days, but by the time I left, he was walking much more normally, though he still wore a slipper on that foot. At 95 years, he still can play three bingo cards without missing a number!

Tomorrow I start wending my way south again by way of Cortland, NY, and then Cattaraugus County where I will take the opportunity to do a little genealogical sleuthing. New York state is beautiful in the summer. Lots of deer, birds and small critters, all shepherding their young at this time of year. Everything is so green and verdant. Greece is nowhere near as green but it has it's own charm.

June 9, 2007 The First Leg

As I closed the door of my house today, I paused to breathe a prayer, enveloping the house in a golden aura of protection that it would remain safe while I was away. I remarked to a friend last week that this will be the longest continuous time that I have been away from home since I left to go to college. I like being home. I usually get homesick if I am away more than three weeks.

But just as when I went to college, I am sure Greece will hold many new experiences as well as the opportunity to grow and have a good time. (I must have an affinity for Greece as I took a term of ancient Greek in college to fulfill one of the classics requirements. The sum total of that semester is an ability to recognize and write the Greek alphabet. Period.)

However, first I will pay a visit to my father who celebrated his 95th birthday last week. I will see him tomorrow in northern New York, where I will spend a few days visiting family.

June 2, 2007 It's all Greek to me!

While one of my Greek friends in Athens speaks fluent English, she should not have to translate everything for me. I have been working hard - about 4 hours a day - to learn more Greek. I'm using a variety of methods. I have some tapes from the library I use in my walkman, a Pimsleur language course on CD, a grammar text, vocabulary software on my PC and I have labels on my home furnishings showing their Greek names. (You'd be surprised how effective that last method is. It's the same as we used for early readers in the pre-school.)

Sometimes I feel like I am oozing Greek from my pores. I wake up in the morning with Greek phrases running through my mind and find myself automatically translating everyday conversations into Greek in my head. That's a good thing - unless I become too distracted. Right now I have two more days of office "temp" work and then I start packing.