Dora Stratou Dance Company in Athens I am sitting in a quiet wooded park area at the foot of Philoppaou Hill near the Acropolis in Athens Greece. It’s a warm September evening and the air is fragrant with pine. Overhead the night sky is littered with stars. On a stage in front of the tiers of seats, a group of musicians take their places and begin to play. The melodic, soulful sound of ... Read Full Article
Rescuing the Cats of Athens
Rescuing the Cats of Athens They haunt the ancient temples of the Acropolis like lean ghosts. They scavenge through piles of plastic garbage bags in the narrow streets of the Plaka. Their tormented yowls and chilling screams are the night music of suburban alleys. They are the cats of Athens. It is impossible to estimate the numbers of them. They roam as free and wild as their ancestors in the ... Read Full Article
Old Athenian Hangouts Take a Modern Twist
Ancient Athens’ golden glory may be the reason why the city’s vibrant present is often overlooked by visitors. Its inhabitants, though, don’t like to dwell on the past. Well, sort of.. It’s been a few years now that the city’s modest old neighbourhoods, like the once unwelcoming industrial Gazi (Gas in English), have been given a new lease of life courtesy of a vast choice of modern restos ... Read Full Article
Anafiotika: The Hidden Village under the Acropolis
The great city of Athens, Greece is made up of numerous small villages that have melded together over the years. Plaka is the most ancient, original part of the city where most of the archaeological sites are located. Just up on the hill above Plaka, under the flank of the Acropolis (“the high city”) there is the tiny village of Anafiotika, unique because of how it came to be. Find Hotels in ... Read Full Article
Walking in the Footsteps of the Philosophers in Athens
If you are wandering the ancient agora in Athens, at the junction of the SW corner near the Boundary Stone that marked the sacred precinct of the square, you will find a row of dwellings or shops. A cache of hobnails and a black glazed cup bearing the name “Simon” was discovered here and the site is marked “The Shop of the Cobbler Simon.” This is apparently where the philosopher Socrates spent ... Read Full Article
The Jewish Museum of Athens: Recalling the Past
In a small, privately owned building just at the edge of Athen’s old Plaka district, all that is left of Greece’s Jewish heritage is displayed with artifacts that have been collected and restored since the 1970’s by tireless museum curators and volunteers. It is because of their dedication that the Jewish Museum of Greece now ranks among the top Jewish Museums in Europe. The idea of a ... Read Full Article
Uncovering the Past in Athens’ Metro Stations
Along the rail track near Monastiraki train station in Athens, a team of young archaeology students are digging for treasures. I was told they had discovered a ‘painted stoa’, a popular meeting place during the time of Plato and Socrates. I stand by the fence and watch in fascination as they dust, scrape, and carefully handle pieces of the ancient agora. Finding treasures like these in Athens is ... Read Full Article
Heinrich Schliemann’s House in Athens
I’m sitting in a beautiful garden surrounded by classical sculptures and exotic foliage. Brazilian jazz is playing as I sip my glass of sangria. Who could imagine I am in the middle of downtown Athens or that this garden is at the former home of the explorer Heinrich Schliemann. This “Garden of the Muses” is part of what was the Schliemann estate, located just a few blocks from Syntagma ... Read Full Article
Greece: Hadrian’s Athens
The Roman Emperor Hadrian is best known for building Hadrian’s Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. He also rebuilt the Parthenon and constructed the Temple of Venus in Rome. In addition to these contributions to Rome, Hadrian built several important structures in the city of Athens. Hadrian was an ardent philhellene and lived for several years in Greece. He was archon of ... Read Full Article
Athens Acropolis Museum Combines Ancient and Modern Worlds
The Acropolis Museum, next to one of the most important historical sites in the world, holds a stunning collection of artifacts from ancient Greece. Thousands of statues and sculptures, temple carvings and household goods are displayed on three levels of the modern glass-and-marble building, which opened in 2009. If you visit the museum before walking up the sacred hill, the Acropolis, to ... Read Full Article