The first day in Athens

 

As I mentioned in a previous post, I've got in touch with other girls from the university via a big groupchat at Whatsapp that was created for all students coming for studies abroad. Most of the students had already been in Athens for a few days or weeks even, and I reached out to all the girls that I could find. In total I probably reached out and wrote to about 10-20 girls, and out of all of them there was this one girl who wanted to meet up for brunch on my first day in Athens: Mia.

So after waking up and packing up my things, I typed in the adress to Ergon House on Google Maps, braided my hair and went out. I didn't put on any makeup and I didn't dress up, since I didn't want to draw any attention to me. And as always, I was early, so I walked around in the city while I waited for her and all that I could think about was that I would never be able to find something without a map in this city. The traffic was crazy and at every street, in every corner, there were bars/cafés/restaurants/clubs full of people.

When Mia arrived, she said "I'm sorry, of course I had to pick the most expensive place... but I've passed it several times and thought I really want to try it!". We walked in with our masks on, showed them our proof of vaccination and was amazed of how beautiful it was. And then I looked at the menu, and couldn't believe my eyes. A big peace of fresh sourdough bread with avocado, cream cheese, salmon, egg and salad for 9€!? And the most expensive thing that they had didn't even cost more than around 10€! For someone who's used to Swedish prices, this was really cheap! 

We walked around in Atens and Flea market for the rest of the day and bought iced coffee from Starbucks. Everyone we met were so friendly and became so glad when we introduced us as exchange students. In the afternoon we said goodbye in order to go home to take a shower and to change clothes, and then I walked to her place in order to see more of Athens. 

Before coming here, I had only heard bad things about Athens and my expectations were as low as they could be. I thought that it would only be houses, junkies and trash - but the streets were full of orange, lime and citrus trees and most of the balconies were pure flower gardens. 

From Mia's place we walked together to the University to pay for our student-card, the trip to Mykonos and for the Greek dinner-event. At the university we met both exchange students as well as some of the Greek students and we got a recommendation for a restaurant near by called Ama-Laxei. In total that day, I had walked over 30,000 steps. 

And as I got back to my hostel, I decided to go up to the rooftop at my hostel to have a look. There I met two girls who had moved to Morocco to work as a teacher there, and I ended up spending the rest of the night with them.

Coming here, one of my biggest fears was to be alone. And now I had just spent the entire day meeting new people. And Athens was so much more beautiful, interesting and welcoming then I ever could have imagined. And as I went to bed, I already had plans to meet up with new people the next day...

With love, Elsa ♡