"Are you going to shower? If you don't, then I won't have to!"

After the first day in Santorini, I have remembered something which I had discovered after my first few trips to big cities and Europe: lunch is optional. Always optional. Aside from getting lost and running into temporary roommate Catherine on the way back from the museum, and exploring a little church and cemetery and backyard barnyard (inventory: a horse, a foal, a donkey, and one dog, probably part Irish spaniel, part Border Collie, from its looks), I spent my morning in quietude. Then, of course, we were lost together, and got ourselves ice cream. “At least we have ice cream while we’re lost,” she told me. “Adventuring,” I corrected. It’s all a matter of looking at things the right way.

It turns out we were headed in the right direction, anyway, and ended up following a couple of classmates back to the hotel. Class, of course, began as a lecture, and ended with a quiz based entirely on the lecture, followed by a trip to the Santorini museum, which had artifacts from all over the island. Cycladic-style artwork, Minoan-style frescoes, and Linear A were arranged in a highly structured fashion. That’s something I suspect the Greeks are quite fond of: structure. Strict rules and guidelines, which one must follow to a T. I remember a woman I sat next to on the plane from Athens to Thira, who, although the plane was landed and stationary, would not remove her seat belt until the “Fasten Seat Belt” light was off. Based on this, I would guess that the Grecian police (of whom I have seen none) probably do not have much work. I’ve seen some graffiti, but as far as theft and murder go, I’ve neither heard nor seen any of it happening.

I have lots of lovely pictures to share, most of which are on Flickr, and some on Facebook. I met the lovely Cats of Santorini, the feral felines which roam the streets, sitting under your chair at a restaurant, trying to beg scraps off of you or, rarely, acquire some attention. At one point, I had four surrounding my chair, even though I was giving no food. I guess I was more fascinating, or seemed like an easier target than the other tables, or maybe the people around me did. Obviously, they knew I wasn’t a big fan of meat dishes, because afterward, I threw them a few of the leftover ground beef from my mousaka to them. Ravenously, they attacked any and all scraps thrown their way, gobbling them quickly, to prevent other cats a chance. On the way back from the hotel, both temporary roommates and I walked together, Catherine and I accidentally showing Isabella the church we had explored earlier, as well as the added number of animals: 5 more horses and 1 more donkey. “I feel I’ve passed this dog before,” we giggled, the chill breeze beginning to come off of the sea.

After making it back to the hotel, we met another girl who didn’t seem to fit in with the people she ended up dubbing “the cool people” and “the middle people;” also a classics (and Poli-Sci—what?) major, she was here for all the learning, and seemed, like us, to want to try to get work done, and not play drinking games all night.

Having begun my museum assignment summation in the artifact journal section of my notebook, I realize that there will probably not be a museum every day. If there were, we would have approximately 120 artifacts to write into a four page paper; I’m not certain anyone could do that, really!

I am excited, though; it shouldn’t be too hard to find artifacts based on religion, since…

I believe I’m hearing an angry Greek couple fight…? It’s so loud I can hear it through my shuttered windows, though I don’t guess that’s much protection. It’s almost a relief not to know what they’re saying to each other. I’ve been in and around fights; and at the volume they were using, no one is being rational. No one cares if they’re being rational. At that point, they just want to yell until their throats are sore and their eyes burn with too many angry tears.

As I was saying (since they’ve called a cease-fire, I suppose), it shouldn’t be too hard to find artifacts based on religion, since more people are obsessed with faith-based knowledge than with science-based knowledge. Since rural people have always been the last convinced from one religion (usually into another), I’m certain there will be many votive offerings and burial sacrifices to analyze and even to photograph and sketch. As it is, I’m pretty sure I could just turn in the sketches I’m doing as the artifact journal and that would be alright by the doctors.

However, at this moment, it is 11:35 P, and I should be getting some sleep. We all have an early day tomorrow. And I’ll probably have to buy some disposable razors. And some soap (since I found out the soap I thought I’d bought was actually lotion. I comfort myself with the fact that many Greeks and Romans used little more than olive oil and a hot spring.)