Under the Acropolis

Yesterday I talked on the phone with a colleague of mine. She sounded so worried because it is heard that dozens of layoffs are about to come in my work.

But I don't want to think more about it. One thing I brought back from my trip to China is a proverb that says "when you still can change something there's no need to worry. When there's nothing to do about it, there's no need to worry too". So I took a long walk to one of my favorite spots in Athens: Monastiraki.

Monastiraki is located almost under the Acropolis and is one of the oldest neighborhoods in town attracting tourists from all over the world. "People look but don't buy" told me Antonis a tourist shop owner.

Most shops were totally empty. It was so sad seeing their owners all alone, watching and waiting and hoping that today would be better than the day before.

I kept on walking and looking around. Fortunately, the Acropolis is still there.

And even more there are still people that would fly from the other side of the world just to visit the Acropolis.

Chance, Tyler, Lina and Bri came all the way from Michigan, USA. They are 14 years old and have heard so much about the ancient Greek civilization. They told me that the majority of students in class voted to visit Greece on an educational trip with their teachers.

"Today we visited the Acropolis. It was more than I expected" says Bri.

"Athens is different but beautiful. We talked a bit about the economic crisis earlier. But I see no crisis. Everyone is in very good condition. I thought it would be different. I don't feel like something bad is going on here".

" I've seen it on the news and today our tour guide talked about it. I wouldn't know otherwise. I doesn't seem like it at all. It seems perfectly fine" says Tyler.I think it's really fun for the first time being out of the country so it's good coming here first. There's so much to see".

I walked back home enjoying the peaceful evening. In fact most of the evenings are peaceful lately. Streets are not crowed as they used to and traffic is less. One would guess that everyone's on vacation but the truth is that Greeks go out and use their cars less than before due to the current lack of money.