some italian girl tried to fight me!

greece. is. fantastic.
i am in heaven.
it was crazy for me to even come down here in the first place, but its working out well. marion and karl heinz were talking it up so much, and then there was that lost jude law lover boy in rome, and i figured that if i couldnt have him i might as well come to the country that produced such a creature and try my hand there.
i flew into athens from berlin, giggling, as i said, about strangling someone and feeling a bit queasy from da club the night (morning) before. i had no plans, no hotel, no reservations, no map, no concept of the language, no idea where to go...nothing. in my head i was hysterical, cursing myself for not planning ahead a little better, but outwardly i was cool as a cucumber...i got off the plane, boarded a bus to piraeus (the port city), found a pension by the boats, and snuggled in for the night, ready to hop a ferry to the islands in the morning.
i woke up at 8am, and found a ferry ticket office. the only problem was, the earliest ferry had already left, and the next one wasnt departing till 5:30! piraeus is not a very nice town, even in the wealthy sections...it is dirty and buisy and there are no sit down restaurants and its hot...i had to kill time all day and managed to get myself royally lost wandering around the city with my stupid, huge backpack on. at one point i just snapped: my backpack and all of my belonging were just too much, i had brought too much stuff. i sat down and took inventory, dividing piles of 'want', 'need', and 'can do without' (this is all taking place on a busy sidewalk...im sure people thought i was some hobo who had robbed a traveler). the pile of "can do without" included my marc jacobs perfume (i'm ok, i'm ok, i'm ok), my sparkly high heels (garh!!), my thick anthropologie sweater (probobly will need that...), 2 pairs of old shorts (have newer nicer CK ones), 3 tshirts and one nicer but older shirt, my hairdryer, 4 books, a 5star notebook, my hair brush (??), an old pair of headphones (not the nice ones), and a slew of makeup, batteries, and other heavy trinkets from the bottom of my purse. all of these things that mere minutes before i had held dear, i arranged neatly along the street, a grab bag for some lucky girl (extremely fucking lucky...damn i loved that perfume and those heels). i said a little prayer, and walked away, my pack a good 10lbs lighter. made all the difference.
the ferry to naxos was amazing. the mainland drifted away from us like a light grey cloud fading into the mist, and the sun set casting a red hue over the shimmery blue water. we sailed forever (i thought it was like a 2 hour boat ride? no, like 5 hours), and it got dark, and all around us was absolute blackness, nothing but the moon and venus there to guide our way. we docked in naxos and, once again, i had no idea where to go. i gathered my stuff and walked through the town, bustling and bright and calm, music spilling into the streets and people dancing and children running about. i walked into the first hotel i came to and asked for a room. the guy said that he didnt have one, but his friend did, and 3 miutes later this man came in, grabbed my bag, threw it into his renault, and drove me 1 minute down the road to another guest house. the area was even quieter and i could hear the ocean. it was too dark to get a good look at the area, but he pointed left to the town and right to the beach, and i said that that would be fine. the hotel is by no means nice, but it is quaint and charming, with a bright pink bathroom, my own balcony, a big bed that takes up pretty much the whole room and AIR CONDITIONING. its a 2 minute walk to town and 2 minutes to the beach. all of this for just 25euro a night!!!! is to amazing, thats like, a semi-decent dinner in rome.
the town is so cute and the people are all extremely kind and funny and talkative. i went to a little bar last night, just to have a beer before bed, and while i was reading my book studiously ignoring the loud americans singing bryan adams kareoke, this cute cute little guy comes up, and sits down. he told me his name is antonio (another one...) from milano, and he speaks like, zero english. he can speak german and spanish and obviously italian, though, so we managed to piece together a conversation and it was good for me to practice my italian. he said that my accent is perfect, and i think i scared him cause i would be like, "hm, no i dont understand, i cant speak italian" and then id bust out with some flawless yet scripted sentence like, "mi piace vado al disco con mia amica sabato sera" (e.g. "i like to go to the disco with my [girl]friend on saturday night"). he'd wheel around wide eyed and say, "so wait...you do speak italian? are you just joking?" he turned out to be some sort of breakdancer or something which i found hilarious, and at every lull in the conversation hed start like, disco dancing and bopping his head. was weird. anyway, later, this other girl next to us who was very loud and obviously a lesbian started talking to him, and he told me that she was italian too, from firenze. she had been giving me evil looks all night, i have no idea why, and then she said "ok, well, its obvious that you're american, but where in america are you from?" and when i said georgia she snorted and said "ok, thats all i needed to know", which i thought was rude. i responded something snippy and she freaked! started yelling at me kinda and going on and on in italian to her friends (who were german, im sure they thought she was crazy) about, as antonio put it, how "difficult" i was. he seemed concerned and eventually wouldnt translate what it was she was saying anymore. was v akward, and i eventually decided to go home. scared though, now, cause this town is small and im sure ill see her again...
anyway, the beach here is beautiful and relaxing and the food is FANTASTIC and everything is wonderful