So long, Greece. Part 2

After our donkey ride, we got dinner and headed to the airport for our flight back to Athens. The next morning, we got up early to go to the New Acropolis Museum, which was cool to see. Then we walked around Athens for a little while until we grabbed a taxi to take us to get one last gyros before we had to be on the boat. When we got into the taxi, we told the driver we wanted to go to a really good, cheap gyros place. He didn’t seem to understand English really well, but he seemed to get the gist. He kept muttering, ‘good food, we go to seaside’…okay, sounds good.

On the way, our driver, whose name was Pol, told us all about his 28 year old son named Socrates. Pol asked us how old all of us were, and since Brianna was sitting up front, I decided to gush about what a coincidence it was that Brianna was 28 too! Fyi-she’s 19. Pol thought it was so great that she was his son’s age and continued to tell us about Socrates and how he looked just liked David Beckham—unlikely considering what Pol looked like..but we went along with it. Pol seemed to take a liking to Brianna and told her that his son would really like her. She laughed and gave us the ‘oh God, what have I gotten myself into?’ look as Pol told us that Socrates would be visiting America soon. He asked if any of us lived near New Jersey, and Brianna said she did, since she’s in Connecticut. Pol’s face lit up and said that that’s where Socrates was flying to. He then proceeded to ask Brianna if she would meet him at the airport. At this point, Carmella and I were almost in tears laughing in the backseat. In ten minutes, it seemed as though Brianna had managed to find herself a potential husband.

After passing a billion great-looking gyros places, Pol stopped at a nice restaurant and told us that was where we should go. We all nodded our heads, knowing that as soon as he drove away, we’d walk to one of the other places he’d passed up. Before we knew it, though, he parked the car, got out, and made his way into the restaurant. Is he seriously coming in to eat with us?! The three of us had no idea what to do…so we followed him in. He was weird…but harmless. He asked for a table and sat down with us to eat. Although this wasn’t what we’d wanted, we figured we’d at least get gyros finally. Once we got the menus, we quickly saw that, unlike every other restaurant that we’d encountered in Greece, apparently this one didn’t serve gyros. Great. At this point, we gave up and just ordered food.

Pol kept talking about Socrates and how much he would like Brianna. He also told us how he knew good Greek boys for Carmella and I. Thank God…because I was getting jealous. Pol ordered octopus and insisted that we try it. After a few minutes of cajoling, we all took small bites…and then proceeded to spit it out into our napkins when Pol wasn’t looking. It was absolutely disgusting. When we got the check, Pol told us he’d go start the car…yep, he split. So we were stuck paying for his disgusting octopus. We got back in the taxi, and he took us to our port, and we were all so happy to finally be back. We figured since we’d bought him lunch, the taxi ride wouldn’t cost us much. Before we got out, though, he said, ‘15 euros each’ (fyi-a taxi ride from the main area of Athens to our port was about 15 euros TOTAL)…is this guy SERIOUS!?! We bought him octopus and listened to his stories about Socrates for over an hour, and now he wants us to pay another 15 euros for the stupid taxi ride!?! Ughhhhhhhhhh. We didn’t really have much of a choice, though. Note to self: you’re all idiots.

In other news, we’ll be in Istanbul tomorrow! And I’ll be staying on the ship every night, so I’ll be able to keep up-to-date with this thing way more frequently!  Hopefully I’ll have some good stories!