Greece 2007 | George Filev

Greece is the word.

25 Apr 2007 02:01 Filed in: Greece 2007
Tikanis from Athens.

When in Greece do as the Romans did and go to the Acropolis. It is an incredible archaeological site and currently under restoration to try and bring it back to it's former glory as a temple to honor the goddess Athena.

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A word of warning if you do go, make sure you wear good footwear. The pink marble on the ground is uneven and quite slippery and wearing sandles, like I did, was not a smart idea as I found out very quickly after landing on my arse.

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One of the technique they are implementing for the reconstruction work is making a plaster cast of the piece that needs to be replicated in marble and then using this machine that follows the curvature of the plaster and carves out a copy in the marble.

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You can see the plaster mould on the right and the marble being cut here on the left. This speeds things up when you need copies made of the same piece. There was a Museum at the top and it had the usual artifacts that you would expect like these,

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and then there are some more unusual pieces like the man with a cow for a scarf. I didn't think it got that cold here.

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The Theatre of Dionysos was a wonderful space.

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They still use the space for performances every now and then and as I walk around these ruins I wonder what it would have been like all that time ago when this place was filled with people watching some special event.

When I was born I was nearly named Dionysos by my god parents and it is interesting to find out more about the name and the god most famously associated with it. Dionysos is the god of wine and madness, vegetation, and the theatre. He is a male god, but he is always surrounded by women, his chief worshippers. His worship involved transvestism and the blurring of sex roles. Men and women both dressed in long robes covered by fawnskins, and women, as bacchants, left their normal sphere of activity, the home, and danced madly on mountainsides.

Sounds like he might have been gay, got people drunk and had some wild parties. Now that is my kind of god!

Dionysos was said to look somewhat ambiguous sexually. You be the judge.

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Frankly, I don't see it.

I went and checked out Kerameikos which was the cemetery of ancient Athens and now an open air gallery. To my surprise, among the artifacts, there were tortoises feasting on weeds and in turn tending to the grave sites. Their shells on their backs and that slow pace at which they moved somehow fitted in well with the surroundings and it seemed appropriate to have them in this space.

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It was really tranquil. The last time I was in Athens for any length of time was in 1989 and I remember it to be a dirty, polluted and a noisy place that I was in no real hurry to get back to. This time around it has been cleaned up and I am guessing that the Olympics here in 2004 had a lot to do with that. The parks are sanctuaries where you can escape the hustle and bustle of the city and people on the street look well. Almost everyone speaks English and the scenery is stunning with views of the Acropolis from nearly every vantage point around town.

All this sight seeing and you might be mistaken for thinking I am on holiday again but I am here to work. I am doing a gig for Vodafone and we are performing in Syntagma Square in front of the parliament buildings in the heart of the city. Our first performance is tonight and we will be doing shows over the next couple of days before heading home again.

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I'll let you know how it goes at the next installment.

Till then, have some wine and go mad.

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