Tag: family

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The Theatre

The amphitheatre at Epidarus supposedly has nearly perfect acoustics.  We walked up to the top and indeed we could hear people speaking down in the center.  Evidently the sound waves flow up the hill and then some bounce off the stone seats in back of each audience member.  Given the speed of sound, this is not enough to produce a discernible echo, but prolongs the sound.  This is not perceivable and our brains make the necessary corrections so the whole thing enhances our senses.  At least that is what I heard.  This is one of the birthplaces of drama.  It started out as story telling and gradually developed into the kinds of things we would recognize as a play. 

This theater is still intact because it was isolated and people didn’t have as much incenitive to steal the stones.   Many ruins are not wrecked by time, but rather by salvage.

Epidarus started out as a healing center dedicated to the god of healing, Aesclepius.  People would come here to make offerings to the gods.   After a while the priests developed a modicum of physician skills and you can trace the origins of medicine to these places.  Of course most of what they did had little more effect on actual sickness, other than the value of the rest and psychosomatic benefits.  The ancient Greeks were profoundly superstitious people.  All pre-modern people were/are superstitious because they don’t have any scientific alternatives.  Even those of us who should know better still fall for faith healers, shamans and other charlatans.

The natural setting is beautiful and if you got to hang around here watching plays and not having to work, I bet many people did recover their health, so I suppose it worked.  The proximate cause is not always the apparent one, or that one advertised.  I remember reading that in the 18th & 19th Centuries many of the very young women who married old rich guys were evidently barren.  Their husbands sent them off to “take the waters” at some spa, where lots of young men worked and the miracle of the spa restored their fertility.  

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The Workers – United – Will Close All Museums

I would have to tell the story of today by telling what we didn’t do.  We didn’t go to the Archeological Museum.  We didn’t go any other museums.  We didn’t even go to the park.  All these places were shut because of a strike/demonstration by government unions.  We DID see them marching and chanting.  It was very 1930s except the banners are more colorful: less red, brighter pastels. 

Demonstrations are always the same.  You get the big march and the chanting in simple words and cadences that the cognitively challenged can repeat w/o too much trouble, something like “The workers – united – will never be defeated.”  We saw on the news that some fire bombs and tear gas were used after the main demonstration.  The protestors looked peaceful enough when we saw them.  I think most were just ordinary people, but there are always some of the violent guys who take any opportunity to make trouble.  

We walked a lot, since the Marriott shuttle couldn’t drop us or pick us up in town. I had a good time being with Mariza & Espen.   Above is one of the steep paths we climbed.  Since I didn’t get to go to the museums, I have rationalized it away.  It is true that actually seeing the real thing is sometimes less satisfying than seeing a really good photo, since you can usually see more detail in the photo and there is more explanation.  That is what I am telling myself anyway.  It is not entirely wrong.  I recall when Chrissy and I saw the Mona Lisa in Paris.  It is smaller than you think and farther away than you would want.  The same went for Stonehenge.  On the other hand, even on this short trip the Acropolis and Mycenae were more than I expected.

Anyway tomorrow we have an island cruise day and then the kids go back to America and I go back to Iraq.  They rhythm of that reminds me of Davy Crockett’s campaign slogan.  I will recall as best I can.  “If you reelect me, I will serve you well and honestly; if you do not, you can go to hell and I shall go to Texas.”  I felt funny not being in Iraq for a few hours, but I came to my senses.  Still I have to go back so I may as well make the most of it. 

Espen has decided he will look angry (and tough) at all the photo sessions from now on, so whenever he notices the camera…well you see.  Who knows why?  But I will post in any case.

I did get him when he wasn’t looking, however.

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Cyclops’ Wall

The ancient Greeks thought that giant Cyclops built the walls of Mycenae, since they could not understand how such big rocks could be brought to the site and stacked.  When I looked at the place, I could see how they were astonished.  The rocks are big and the hill is high, but with simple tools and a lot of persistence the ancient Mycenaeans did not need the help of Cyclops. Nevertheless, despite all the monumental precautions their civilization was destroyed and Mycenae abandoned.  These Bronze Age warriors were no match for Iron Age weapons of invaders.

BTW – it is not true that a man armed with iron weapons was so much superior to one armed with bronze, but iron is more common and so more men could be well armed. Of course the most famous representatives of Mycenaean culture were Achilles, Agamemnon, Menelaus & Odysseus.  The Iliad makes it sound like these sorts of heroes were the only guys who counted on the battlefield and they were.  With bronze weapons and kit, only a few can have complete armor, horses and chariots AND even fewer have the talent and time to develop the skills of an expert fighting man.  The Homeric heroes were a lot like tanks on a battlefield.  They could mow down the opposing infantry until they ran into a hero from the other side, hence the importance of single combat.  Besides, it makes a better story.  The later Greeks developed the phalanx, where they all stood in lines with spears and shields and pushed the other side until somebody broke.  Individual valour was merged with the larger group. It was an excellent war machine, but not as cool as Achilles v Hector. 

The 19th Century amateur archeologist Heinrich Schliemann used the Iliad to find both Agamemnon’s Mycenae and Helen’s Troy.  When he found a body in a tomb and took off the death mask, he thought he had looked on the face of Agamemnon and the gold death mask is still often associated with the face of Agamemnon, but modern historians think that the king with the golden mask predated the Trojan War period by a couple centuries.

We still take much of our understanding of the period from Homer, who wrote centuries after the events based on oral tradition, which tends to be corrupted.  The Mycenaeans had a written language.  There was great excitement when it was deciphered, about 50 years ago now, but all they wrote about were lists of who owned what and where things were stored.  It did prove that they were indeed Greeks (or proto-Greeks) but there is no literature or sense of history.   Knowing that Agamemnon owned a dozen sheep &  three cows in a particular local valley was probably really important back then, but fails to capture our imaginations today.  Mycenaean civilization remains pre-historic in the practical sense of the term.

Nevertheless, Mycenae is impressive even today in its ruined state.  The Lion Gate you see in the picture is sort of a reverse arch, with the triangle in the middle bearing and spreading the load. 

The natural setting is beautiful.  Most of the scenery we saw as we drove past Corinth into the Peloponnesus was beautiful.  The mountains in Greece go right down into the sea giving the country an unusually indented coast and long coastline.  Greece has more miles of coastline than all of Africa and no place in Greece is very far from both the mountains and the sea.  Little fertile valleys sit next to barren rocks and all have access to the sea.  It is a unique combination and scenery is not the most important consequence.  Geography helps explain much of Greek history and achievement.  

The picuture is a fish farm, BTW. Sorry for the blurr. I took it from the moving bus.

It has been really great to see the geography of the places and people I studied since I was a kid.  I realize how little I understand.   It is possible to know lots of facts and understand little.   When you put your feet on the ground, it is easier to understand the history.

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Things Are Getting Better

I talked to an English guy named Joe, who evidently made a lot of money selling prosthetic and orthopedic devices.  Exciting as that business was, he preferred history and knew a lot about it.  He said that he had been coming to Athens for more than 20 years and had seen a lot of improvements.  That is why I didn’t find the smoggy, dingy Athens I had expected, he explained.  He pointed out that 20 years ago you couldn’t look out from the Acropolis and expect to see the mountains because they were usually obscured by smog.  The green space had been much less green and was filled with garbage back then.  The Greeks had made significant progress.  He also confirmed that much of the forest I had seen coming in was a recent improvement. 

Contrary to what you might think watching the news, things have generally been getting better, especially in Europe and North America, where forest cover has increased and water and air quality has improved remarkably.  As a teenage environmentalist, I recall reading all those books that predicted mass famines by 1985, resource depletion and general collapse of the environment by now.  Instead we get this (see below).

What a beautiful place.   That is not to say our problems are all finished.  China is already making our pitiful attempts are planet wrecking look like a junior varsity effort of a class C team, but if we in the West can make such progress, I suppose they can too.  If they work really hard, maybe the athletes at this year’s Olympics in Beijing will be able to breathe deeply as they compete and that temporary improvement might be the start of something bigger.

Below is a parade next to the Greek parliament.  I just happened on it.

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Kids Arrive in Athens

Mariza & Espen arrived about an hour & a half late. They were tired, which was good since they arrived late and could go to bed soon.  We had supper at a place called “Goody’s” a fast food place.  Even with all the money I get for being in Iraq, we cannot afford (or at least I cannot tolerate) to eat at the restaurants in Marriott.  It would be costing around $50 a person.  It is expensive around here in general and it is not only the strong Euro.

I let the kids sleep late and we had the Euro tourist breakfast of bread & cheese and then headed down to see the Acropolis.  Marriott runs a shuttle bus to the downtown.  We walked up the steep path to the Acropolis.  This place is not handicapped friendly and the rocks are worn smooth, shinny and slippery but it is worth the trip.  Actually, there is not much left of the monuments on the Acropolis, but standing amid all this history and at the origins of our civilization is a special experience.  Espen and Mariza enjoyed it too and that made it a much better day for me than yesterday when I scouted it out alone – and yesterday was a good day. 


I have grown old and softer especially my feet.  I walked all day yesterday and most of the day before and on the third day my feet hurt.  Tomorrow we plan to go to Mycenae.  It is a bus trip, so I figure I will walk a bit less and the old feet will recover. 

Mariza got sick.  We don’t know why.  She ate all the same things we all did, but she threw up a little.  As I write now, she is feeling better and I hope she will be in shape tomorrow.  


The irony of trying to eat in Athens is that the gyros are not good or not available.  They just don’t have those rotating meat things I saw in Turkey or that I remember from the Greek restaurants in Madison.  I had a poor imitation of the legendary Zorba’s of Madison gyros. It was actually just little pieces of meat with the bread and sauce.  I may never again enjoy the total experience.  Last time I went to Madison, I found only one gyros place and it was run by Mexicans.  Evidently there are not enough Greek immigrants anymore and these guys were way too polite.  I recall the Zorba’s experience as something like the Soup Nazi on Seinfeld.  YOU! They would say and if you didn’t answer quick enough “no gyros for you.”  Well, not quite that, but the feeling was the same.  

As important as gyros is to human happiness, there is much more to the country.  I expected to enjoy Greece, but I have been pleasantly surprised so far. My disappointments are that I will not see it all.  For example, I will not go to Thermopylae.  It is not on the beaten track, even after the success of “The 300”.  As I understand it, silt and erosion has widened the pass since the time of Leonidas, so it is hard to picture the battle anyway.  Maybe it is best to keep it in the imagination.  I saw the old movie “The 300 Spartans” when I was in 5th grade and that is what started me reading about the ancient Greeks.  Forty years later I know that movie was not accurate in most details and the real Greeks were much more interesting than those in the movie, but I still acknowledge what started me down the path.  After so many changes, I guess we sort of stay the same, or more correctly I think we circle around the same places.  

I was worried that the kids would get sunburned.  I am a little tan from living in Iraq – and I have a hat – but they are still pale.  Sunblock is expensive and harder to find around here than I thought but we got some.  It cost 20 Euro or around $30.  Note to self – bring sunblock.

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Little Boy Gone

Check-in was “passenger only” so I couldn’t go in with Alex.  Instead, I watched through the glass for an agonizing forty-five minutes while he waded through a disorganized gaggle that passes for a line around here.  He has grown into a man, stronger than I am, and it is silly of me to fret about him.  Still, I see the little boy even as I look at the man.  I am profoundly sad to see him off.  Separation from family is easy to contemplate but harder to live.

I had a good time with him in Egypt and it is hard to go back to Iraq.  I traveled again through Kuwait.  Ali Al Salem is not a nice place.  The chow hall in not as good as Al Asad and tent living is intrinsically difficult.  This time was worse.  I got in late so they put me in a big barracks tent with bunk beds.  All the beds were full except one top bunk.  I took it.  It was drafty and uncomfortable.   I was worried that I would fall out, not that I usually fall out of bed, but it is like standing near a cliff w/o a guard rail.  You can walk close to the edge of sidewalk w/o a thought, but when there is a drop off, you just feel less secure.

From Kuwait, I flew on a C17.  It is a flying warehouse.  We were packed in like sardines, but the flight to Al Asad lasted only an hour.   I had my gear on my lap and pressed against the seat in front of me, so I could not take a deep breath, but as long as I did not try to move around, it wasn’t so bad.  I slept most of the way.   The funny thing was that when I got back to my can at Al Asad, it felt like home.  You can get used to anything.

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Great Pyramids

We saw the pyramids.  They are magical and more impressive than you would think from pictures.  The sphinx is smaller, however.  We rode up on camels to see these wonders.  It cost more, but it was a good experience and now that I have done it I will never have to do it again.  The camel is a horse designed by a committee.  They are truly odd looking and unpleasant animals.   They burp, spit and stink. 

We had a good guide who had relationships (i.e. gave money) with the guards to let us “park” near some of the pyramids and we had the pleasure of being almost alone in the quiet near some of the smaller pyramids. It makes a big difference. We could see the thousands of people in the distance touring the macro sites. When we went down to see the sphinx we had the crowd crush experience. There is always somebody around who wants money. It detracts.

Below I am sitting with our guide. He spoke good English and claimed to have spent his whole life near the pyramids, at first as a child selling little tokens.

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A Long Way From Graceland

Memphis was the capital of Egypt for hundreds of years.  Today there is nothing but palms trees and a big monument area in the nearby desert.   This is Saqqara.  In some ways it is more interesting than the pyramids at Giza.   The first pyramids are here.  At first they are just a pile of rubble, but then you get a step pyramid (pyramid of Djoser) that is the precursor of the pyramids we all know.

We got to Saqqara early enough to avoid the crowds.  In fact, we were just about a half hour ahead of a bus caravan of Germans.  They were hot on our heels throughout the area.  Going in tour groups has some advantages.  You get some lecture by the guide and the numbers help dilute the effect of the ubiquitous pseudo guides who show you how to get into a monument or point you to the clearly marked path and then want money.

I do not believe that the average guide furnishes accurate information.  Just listening to those around me I heard all sorts of conflicting stories.  The guides’ main goal is to make the listeners happy so that he will get a bigger tip, so he tailors history to suite what he thinks the audiences wants to hear or a narrative that is easier to tell.  I am not sure it really matters very much anyway.  I cannot believe I just wrote that.  Those who know me know that I am very particular about historical accuracy, but in this case the person is going to remember only that he saw something very old.  The details will be buried in the sands of time, shrouded in the mist of antiquity or lost like a drunk’s car keys on a dark night, depending on the metaphor you like best.   This is tourism, not scholarship.

After Saqqara we went to the probable site of Memphis. Layers of mud had covered the place, but they still sometimes dig out interesting things.   There was a giant stature of Ramesses laying on the ground and they built a viewing area around it  Ramesses was evidently the vainest man in world history.  He wrote his name on everything, including the statues of previous pharaohs, but this was supposedly really him.   We got to Memphis a few minutes ahead of the Germans, but that is about all the time it took to see the place. 

Our driver took us to a carpet “museum”, i.e. a place where they show you an exhibit of carpet making for a minute and then try to sell you carpets for the next hour.  Drivers get a kickback and I don’t begrudge them this.  We went to a papyrus museum yesterday, same thing.  And they tried to draw us into a perfume factory.  We were immune to these enticements, however, having already been already fleeced at papyrus and perfume museums near the Egyptian museum.

For me the most interesting part of the day was a visit to the Coptic area.  Copts still make up about 10% of the population.  The churches are reminiscent of the Romans & Byzantines.  I like that history.  According to the narrative at the museums, Egypt has more relics of early Christianity than anyplace else because the climate preserves them. Besides, Egypt was a center of early Christianity.  It is interesting to see how Islam so obliterated Christianity in all but a few pockets in what really was its homeland in Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor and of course the Holy Land itself.   

We wanted to go to a nearby restaurant, but the driver told us that we would get food poisoning if we even walked in.  He took us to an authentic tourist buffet restaurant.  Those Germans who, had been just behind us all day, were now in front and already sitting at the restaurant.  We had the Egyptian meal auf deutsch. 

It was a busy day.  Back at the Marriott we went to the restaurant that called itself Egyptians and called ourselves content.  Then a strange thing happened.  It rained.  People are accustomed to water flowing in the river and are a little surprised to see it falling from the sky.  The waiters were all exercised & talking about it.   After living in Al Anbar for a couple of months, I understand.I will post pictures of all the things above when I get back to Al Asad.

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Q8

I cannot load a new picture of Alex & me, but I have a very old one.  He has changed a bit (me too). 

Three times a year they open the gate and parole us inmates for regional rest breaks.  The State Department is very generous.   They drop you in Kuwait of Amman and you can go anywhere you want with the caveats that you pay for your own trip and come back a week later.

For my first break, I am going to Egypt to meet Alex and together visit the treasures of the Nile. Alex likes history and it is fun to travel with him to these sorts of places.  I still recall with great fondness the trip we made to Rome together when he was thirteen.  But the road to Egypt runs through Kuwait.

They have an enormous tent city at Ali Al Salem base and I got a nice bed, with a real mattress and blankets in a tent barracks.  I arrived aboard my C-130 just in time to miss evening chow and too early to wait for mid-rats, so I went to McDonald’s.  This is the first time I have paid for food in more than three months.  The Big Mac Meal was filling, but I did not feel that I had missed much by not having it these past months. 

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First Day in Cairo

Above is Alex at the Hotel with Cairo behind

Egyptians have been very friendly.  Some are just the trying to sell something, but others seemed genuine.  We are staying at the Marriott, where I stay whenever I can all around the world.  The Cairo Marriot is more opulent than most.  It sits in a beautiful garden area on an island in the Nile in a palace built by the Egyptian Khedive to host Euro-Royalty during the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869.  Among the guests were Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Josef and Empress Eugene, wife of Napoleon III.  I suppose they had really nice rooms.  Today the rooms are typical Marriott.  I like that.  I feel at home. 

Outside the Egyptian Museum

Alex & I walked to the Egyptian Museum, which is just across the river not far from the hotel.  It is full of artifacts, perhaps over full.  The place has a little bit the feel of a warehouse, with artifacts stacked in rows.  After you have seen one mummy, you have pretty much seen them all, kinda dry and depressing.  But I enjoyed seeing all those things I have seen pictured in history books.  We saw the King Tut stuff, for example.

The desert preserves things that would have long ago turned into dust or compost in any other environment.  I especially like the little wooden figures showing ordinary life and people working in brewing, baking and textiles.  I prefer these kinds of things to the death obsessed culture of the tombs.  How they lived in more interesting than how they died.   The gold and art from the tombs is spectacular, but it was a waste of for the people of the time to literally slave away their lives to fill monuments to the dead.  I don’t much like the jackal-headed gods either.  

Old & new

We tend to think of Egypt only in relation to those who built the pyramids but there is a lot more. Roman and Greek history was always my specialty and I am more interested in Egypt under the Greek Ptolemy and the Romans.  This period lasted more than 1000 years, but we often telescope history and move from the pharaohs to the caliphs, with only a brief glace at Anthony & Cleopatra, usually even forgetting that Cleo was a nice Greek girl descendents from one of Alexander the Great’s generals.   Cairo was built on a Roman city called Babylon.  It is a little ironic that I had to travel FROM the country of the original Babylon to see one.  The Christian Copts, descended from the original inhabitants, still live on the site.

This is one of the narrowest buildings I have seen.

Parts of Cairo are pleasant, but it is never peaceful and walking around is not much fun.  Drivers pay no attention to crosswalks or signals.  You have to run for you life to cross busy streets and there are lots of busy streets.  As Alex and I waited to run across one busy street, some guys on the other side actually mocked us for being timid.  The funniest thing I saw was a bus turn a corner too sharply and three guys literally fell out.  They landed on their feet and just chased the bus to get back on.  Cacophony is the word to describe roads.  Everybody feels it necessary to beep his horn just like a bored dog has to bark at everybody who passes.  We did a lot of walking nevertheless.  It seems like everybody wants to talk and invite you back to their shop for free tea. Of course, it is not really free.  If you stop more than a few seconds, taxis pull up and ask if you need a ride   I have to admire their energy, but I would prefer to have a little more peace.