The Two Faces of Athens

To set the stage, Athens “is the historical capital of Europe . . . and the birthplace of democracy, arts, science, and philosophy of western civilization. Home of Plato, Socrates, Pericles, Euripides, Sophocles, Aeschylus.” Source: http://visitgreece/gr/mainland/attica/athens/mainland)

But the city is a real mixed bag.  Even though the population is only a little over 4 million people, Athens is so densely built that the metroplex appears much larger than it actually is.  With a natural abundance of stone and marble, nearly all buildings in Athens are white, and they pack the city’s 1100 square miles, claustrophobically snuggled in the Attica Basin between mountains and the Saronic Gulf on the Aegean Sea.

To say Athens is old is an understatement.  Think 5,000 years old.  The area has been inhabited since 3000 BC, and by 500 BC, the Parthenon and other temples were already standing on the Acropolis.  Even then, Athens was rich and populated by 600,000 people.

It is not a beautiful city.  Today most of Athens’ apartments, stores, and office buildings are from the 1960’s and more recent eras.  Like an epic contradiction that is difficult to comprehend, Athens is a city of quasi-modern buildings, most of them in need of a good power wash.  It also has stately palaces, busy streets, and green city parks.  But like alien time capsules dropped in at random places, magnificent ruins thousands of years old are found here and there throughout the city.

Because the city has been built and rebuilt over lands inhabited for millenniums, work on new construction projects is often halted and delayed until archeologists can complete a thorough dig to rescue and save the ancient artifacts buried so long ago.  You will see fenced-off digs everywhere.  There is so much yet to be discovered.

Like most major cities, Athens is a very busy and noisy place.  Even this late in the tourist season, it is difficult to walk in the city center.  Streets are full of cars, and sidewalks and pedestrian streets are literally teeming with people.   In the city’s center, crowds of seemingly dumb-founded tourists, many wearing their broad-brimmed tourist-hiking-hats (you know the ones . . .  ones you wouldn’t dare wear at home) inanely stand together in a clump comparing notes and blocking the walk or a doorway.  Some mosey along sometimes three or four abreast dumbly following the tour-guide lady with holding a red umbrella.  Arrrgh!!!  Maneuvering the city center takes patience.

To be fair, though, many tourists visit Athens by cruise ship with only one day in town to see everything.  It is easy to be stunned by the fast-paced city and even more so by the immense beauty of the temple ruins on the Acropolis overhead, the curiosity it inspires, and the random appearance of ancient ruins here and there all over the city.  Hadrien’s’ Library and grounds, for example, are found just off the main souvenir shop street.  Hadrian’s Arch, circa 300 AD, stands on a multi-lane boulevard.

Cars?  There are far too many in Athens!  And worse, parking facilities are completely inadequate.  Wisely, most visitors don’t drive.  Locals, though, park their cars anywhere and everywhere, this way and that, anywhere the car can be squeezed in. Why Athenians even drive cars is a mystery to me.  Athens City’s transportation system is a network of modern and clean trams, subways, and buses that move people quickly and efficiently through all parts of the city.

Ok, that’s the ugly step-sister side of Athens, now here is the beautiful princess. 

Like standing with each foot in two different worlds, high above all this mad streetside chaos is the mind-boggling collection of ancient columned temples standing on top of the white stone 500-foot-tall acropolis overlooking the city.  In the right light, The Acropolis looks as if could be Heaven peering down on Earth. 

Before arriving here, I always thought the Acropolis was a place solely in Athens where famous Greek gods were honored and worshiped.  Not true.  The word acropolis translates to “a citadel or fortified part of an ancient Greek city, typically built on a hill.”  In short, an acropolis is a high hill.  There are many of them.  Athens has two such hills, the world-famous Acropolis and another, the slightly taller Lycabettus Hill.  People visit the top of Lycabettus Hill to enjoy a panoramic view of the city’s coastline and see the white Agios Georgios church that can be seen from afar from almost any point in the city.

On our first day here we took a guided walking tour to all the main highlights of the city . . . Presidential Palace and the Academy of Athens part of the Neoclassical Trilogy founded by Plato with the Academy, the University, and Library buildings   After walking through the National Gardens, we watched the changing of the Presidential Guard outside the Hellenic Parliament.  These select and honored young men called “Evzones.”  have the privilege of guarding the tomb of unknown soldiers and the Presidential Palace.  Like a ballet, the changing of the Guard is a precise routine in which each complex step movement is significant.

One of Athens’ beaches is just across the street from our apartment.  We have taken advantage of that convenience and have enjoyed the afternoon Grecian sun several days as we count the many cargo and cruise ships going to and from Athen’s great ports.  There in the warm sand, we relax, listen to audiobooks and people-watch.  Ahhh, one of my favorite kinds of days.

Almost totally destroyed by time, weather, war, and people, these relics are being partially restored using modern techniques such as employing titanium rods to provide stability to pieces rejoined together.  Like working an intricate jigsaw puzzle, the restoration effort is reassembling original marble and stone pieces of walls and columns so that today we and future generations can have a hint as to what these structures were like 3000 years ago.  My friends, the Athens Acropolis may be the most beautiful place I have ever visited, especially as the afternoon sun casts its golden glow on the ruins.

The grand highlight of Athens for us was a late afternoon guided tour of the Acropolis.  It took nearly 500 centuries to build the temples on this magnificent hilltop.  The three main buildings honor the Greek goddess Athena, the city’s namesake.  The Parthenon, dedicated to Athena in 438 BC dominates the Acropolis eight columns at the façade and seventeen columns at the flanks.  The Temple of Athena Nike (Athena’s Victory) built in 420 BC is the earliest temple on the site and the Erechtheion is the other distinctive temple.  It too is dedicated to Athena and is most often recognized by the statues of six women supporting a portico roof, and finally, there is the monumental gate to the Acropolis, the Propylaea.  The majestic beauty and mystery of the enormous temples is astounding.  To be there made me feel like falling on my knees in awe. It is incomprehensible to me that all these relics were built during the 5^th century BC when the city of Athens was a newborn.  I can see these ruins  I can walk around them, They are real.  They once were new.  Still, it boggles the mind.

Yes, Athens is a mixed bag.  But because of its antiquity, and its significance to the development of our civilization and democracy, it is the number one city in all the world that everyone who travels must visit.