As Mama Beth would say, 'tis beautimous. (OK, to be fair, she probably would not say "'tis".) This is the Catholic Church (St. John's) in Fira - probably one of the most photographed buildings in the town.
We were still heading up to the Petros Nomikos Conference Center to see the apparently extra-cool reproductions of the wall paintings of Akrotiri. But first, we had to take a gazillion pictures. The sunlight was amazing - softly illuminating everything in a completely indescribable way. Plus, the arches and lines and jagged delineations between colors made for pictures that just begged to be taken.
And doors, too. We began to see why every little souvenir store we saw in Greece (though admittedly, our geographical experience of Hellas was sadly limited) sold calendars of "The Doors of Greece".
The exhibit at the conference center turned out to be interesting and informative, as billed. There were the famous boxing boys of Akrotiri - it seems that my art education was lacking, since I was unaware of their existence before seeing them. (Yes, I'm blushing at my own ignorance.)
I did feel pretty brilliant and knowledgeable two months later, when a live version of the boxing boys did a lap of the Olympic opening ceremony in Athens! "Ooh, ooh, it's the boxing boys!"
The murals were amazingly reproduced - as you can see, they were done in three dimensions. A lot had to be filled in by restorers, though.
(If you're interested in the subject of the Akrotiri wall paintings, here's a lesson on them that goes into waaaaaay too much depth for a casual observer, along with a fairly detailed discussion of the timeline and impact of the earthquake and subsequent volcanic eruption that buried these paintings and the buildings they were in.)
There were renderings of animals, like these beautifully graceful gazelles:
Perhaps most interestingly, there was a giant mural of these adorably engrossing blue monkeys!
girlie want! (Seriously - someone wanna paint this for us? Hmmm?)
This is most interesting because (if I remember correctly) modern understanding of the Minoan civilization posits that there's pretty much no way the painter of these murals could have seen an actual live monkey. Also, (again, if memory serves me correctly - notes, girlie, notes!) that monkey on the middle right who's staring directly at us was a very, very early example of direct face-on art, if that makes any sense. Normally, all figures were shown in profile at that time.
The more abstract compositions were really attractive as well, also in a way that made them seem way more modern than I would have guessed prior to seeing them.
No way this looks like it's almost 3700 years old! To me, this has a timeless quality - it could have been wallpapered onto a wall at almost any time in the last 200 years.
This exhibit was more than worth the few euros we spent. Unfortunately, we didn't get much time to stare at the murals, since the conference center was closing. We were just in time to take some pictures of the shifting light as it hit the town of Fira, though!
The town turned golden as the sun began to set. Here's a picture which should give you more of a sense of just how high Fira sits over the port of Skala Fira, at seaside.
That port at the bottom is where cruise ships used to dock - now the bigger ships dock at a larger port a little further from town. There is a cable car you can take down the side of the mountain... but, for the exact same price as the cable car, you can hop on a donkey to make the journey that much more enjoyable (and hysterical). Later in the week, we did just that - cable car down, donkey up. I've even got pictures - but those are for later. Tease.
Long day - time for dinner! Yes, definitely time for dinner. We headed to a taverna recommended highly by all of our guidebooks - the Taverna Nikolas (aww, no good, informative links - but some very good reviews!)
What an awesome restaurant. The menu is only in Greek, written on a chalkboard at the head of the restaurant; the owner, or one of the mostly dour men hanging out back by the kitchen, will come and recite an edited version of said menu to you in English, whether you want it or not, and then stand there while you quickly try to figure out what to order. It's a wonderful time!
Luckily, I looked at our Greek phrasebook before we headed out to the restaurant; between that, and my year of Russian (the Cyrillic alphabet being somewhat similar to Greek, with at least a few of the letters making the same sound) I was able to puzzle out a few tasty-looking items which we would have otherwise not heard of.
The greens are "horta" - whatever's local and in season, basically. The yellow puree is fava, a specialty of Santorini - very similar (if not identical to) yellow lentils, here served with onion, olive oil, and lemon. The white is melitzenosalata, smoked eggplant salad which I can still taste (with longing) if I concentrate hard enough. Everything was amazing.
Also, note that the food was served with a thick bread - not pita, which is what most people think of when they think Greek food.
We heard that it is rude in Greece to finish a jug of wine - it implies both that you haven't been served enough and that you're a big ol' lush. Husbear and I had a bit of a debate on whether we were going to follow this tradition closely or not...
So, when am I going back? Not sure. I think I'll go look for prices now...
girlie
Comments