Thanksgiving

Dad and Michelle got here yesterday. We haven't done too much yet b/c it's been pouring the entire time. We walked through the National Gardens, saw the Parliament Building and the tomb of the unknown soldier with the guards, and walked around some of the city.
This morning we had a ton of people over for a big Thanksgiving breakfast. It turned out really well. I got up around 7 and made pancakes for about an hour. We also had french toast, scrambled eggs, bacon, pumpkin bread, some kinda pastry type thing, and baklava (yeah, i know, it's a dessert, but who cares)Today we're going to some art museum with my Humanities class then are having Thanksgiving dinner at Aphrodite's. We'll probably go to bed early since we have to get up rediculously early to go to Rome in the morning.
I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving! Be back next week.

i love my church

For those of you who don't know, the Bridge is the church service for young adults I go to at Calvary Fellowship Church in Downingtown. Their band is amazing and they're playing at World Cafe Live in Philly. That's so exciting! I know most of you don't really care, but too bad =P
Go check them out
The Bridge Band
Grassroots Magazine

i come home in less than a month

just to let you all know =P

anyways,
this week has been pretty good. i got 3 tests back and did well on all of them. not that it's a big deal since my grades don't transfer back to etown. i just have to pass.
we had a roomie weekend since none of us went anywhere. friday night we went to hard rock athens and saturday night we had a little absinthe that alicia brought back from prague and played truth or dare. that was pretty funny.
saturday afternoon i went shopping. i'm glad to say i am all done my Chrismas shopping and some birthdays as well. of course if i see anything else that i just have to get someone i will. you can never get someone too many presents =)
i also did my scheduling for next semester.
Mon: 5-6:20 Honors Leadership Development
Tues: 9:30-10:20 Water Aerobics
11-12:15 Honors Neuroscience
12:30-1:45 Research in Developmental Psych
Wed: 9:30-10:45 Theories of Personality
2-3:20 Honors Thesis Prep
5-6:20 Honors Leadership Development
Thurs: 9:30-10:20 Water Aerobics
11-12:15 Honors Neuroscience
12:30-1:45 Researh in Developmental Psych
8-9:15 Percussion Ensemble
Fri: 9:30-10:45 Theories of Personality

Unfortunately, band doesn't fit into my schedule =( It's going to be a busy semester, but it should be good.
This semester has flown by. I can't believe I come home in less than a month! It's going to be a busy couple weeks.

Istanbul was Constantinople

Now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Now it's Turkish delight on a moonlit night

gotta love They Might Be Giants

Anyways, Istanbul was beautiful. I wish I'd had more time to spend their and in Turkey. All the leaves were turning colors and falling. It was gorgeous. I miss fall b/c it doesn't look like fall at all in Athens. We stayed in the old part of the city. The streets were all cobblestone (sp?). We visited the Blue Mosque which was beautiful (I'm going to use that word a lot in this entry...sorry). We also went to Haghia Sophia, another gorgeous religious building which was both Muslim and Christian. That was really interesting to see the integration of the 2 religions...and kinda weird seeing Christian symbols in a mosque.
I'm not going to lie...we did a lot of shopping instead of visiting more historical sights. I got a lot of presents for people so that was exciting. And of course, a few things for me =) I got 2 beautiful scarves and a leather jacket. Yes, I got a leather jacket (sorry all you vegetarians/animal rights people). Selena talked me into it. She got one and a fur coat and I was like I really don't do leather or fur. And she was all happy and excited and told me she's buy me one. And I was told her I wasn't letting her buy me a leather jacket so she told me to just try one on. And I was finally like fine, but something simple. So I did and I loved it. And she talked to guy down to $90 which was how much she owed me for our hotel room so I told her she could buy me the jacket and I'd cover the hotel. I'm really glad I got it b/c I don't really have many warm clothes. Now I'll at least have a coat. Let's see...what else...the people were all very friends. I was a little scared it would be like Cairo and I definately couldn't handle that 2 weekends in a row, but it wasn't.
This one guy told us this joke they have about Americans. He goes "What's the difference between Americans and yogurt?" And we're pretty confused and he's like "yogurt has more culture" so we were a little indignant and stuff, then as we're laying in bed watching MTV Europe every night for about 4 hours we just look at each other and go "yogurt" it was kinda funny. It got dark early so we went back to the room and watched MTV to try to catch up a little on what's going on. Of course it was MTV Europe so they had some really weird commercials and stuff. But we got to see the MTV Europe music awards and if we have no culture, why are American bands winning most of the awards? lol.
I definately want to go back to Turkey again. I never realized how much is there. Troy is in Turkey (definately thought it was in Greece) A bunch of the churches Paul visited (Ephasus, Smyrna, Philadelphia, etc) are all in Turkey. They had a 3 day tour of the 7 churches that I would've liked to do, but we didn't have time since we had to get back for class.
It was just a great weekend and pretty relaxing.

flying back we flew over lesbos which was really awesome for me...quick history lesson...lesbos is the home of sappho, the first recorded female poet. it is also where the word lesbian came from b/c sappho was supposedly a lesbian

walk like an egyptian

this weekend was insane.
first of all, it was the end of ramadan so everyone was celebrating, the streets were full of people, etc.
we got to our hotel in cairo around 4am friday morning, slept til around 10, then went to the national museum. we saw all kinds of stuff from the pyramids. we saw the mummy of Ramses the Great, all the King Tut stuff...including his underwear and condom (yes, they had condoms thousands of years ago) anyways, the museum was pretty cool. we stayed there for about 4 hours, then took a nap. on our way back from the museum, we had these girls come up to us and point at our chests...i guess b/c our shirts were too low cut (and we were dressed pretty conservatively) so the rest of the weekend we wore sweatshirts. friday night we went to pizza hut for dinner. foreigners aren't supposed to drink the water, eat fruits and vegetables, etc. there b/c you'll get sick. our hotel turned out to be pretty decent which i'm glad of. i was a little worried b/c it was only $8 a night for a room with a bathroom and that included breakfast.
saturday was our big day. we got up at 4:30 and went to Giza. We wanted to ride camels, but our guide said "you ride camel all day your bum hurt and you walk like an egyptian" so we got 1 camel and 2 horses and rotated. and yes, he was right. i'm still a little sore...my thighs hurt, my bum's a little sore, and my back hurts from all the jolting. running on a camel is pretty scary. i felt like i was going to fall off. especially b/c there's no stirrups on the camel. riding a horse was better. anyways, we went out to this big hill in the desert and watched the sunrise over the city and got some pretty cool pictures of the pyramids, then went to the pyramids and went inside the biggest one. that was about a 4-4 1/2 hour trip. then we drove through memphis and went to the saggara step pyramids and a couple tombs. we took a nap in the afternoon, then went on a nile river dinner cruise. the food was delicious and then there were dancers. it was a lot of fun. sunday we didn't do much, mostly b/c we ran out of money and were exhausted. we slept in, then laid around and read. we went to the hard rock cafe for dinner and ended up staying there for 4 hours. on the door of the bathroom stalls was a sign that said "no drugs or nuclear weapons" it was pretty funny. (i have a picture) on the way back to our hotel we had this one guy say "you want for husband...i give you 200 camels and maybe even a horse" we all burst out laughing as soon as we passed him.
all 3 of us ended up getting diarhea. that was fun. sunday afternoon i got sick, then alicia started getting sick sunday night, and amanda got sick yesterday. i had it the worst b/c we ran out of toilet paper at our hotel, so we stole some from hard rock, then at the airport you had to tip the attendant to get toilet paper so i was trying so hard not to.
anyways, it was a good weekend, and i got some great pics =)

why every girl needs a little black dress...

b/c you just may randomly get free tickets to some expensive benefit concert which a bunch of very important people (like diplomats, ambassadors, presidents of big non-profit groups, etc) are attending.
it was a benefit jazz concert sponsored by the Athends Friends of Habitat for Humanity group and their women's rights group. The 1st half was awful. My high school jazz band was better than the 1st group that played. The lead guy played decent sax, the drummer had no rhythm and the bass player was ok. But then the lead guy sang. Capital OXI! (oxi=ohi=no) he was really bad. Then this chick came out with a pianist to sing. DO NOT SING JAZZ OPERATICALLY (yeah, i dunno if that's really a word) she was horrific. Then she tried to dance and tripped and almost fell into the drumset. It was almost comical.
After intermission, the bass player came out to set up his bass and I was like thank God it's someone not white. Maybe we'll get some good jazz now. And we did. It was amazing, wonderful, etc. After that group, they set up 2 grand pianos and i got really excited. These 2 guys did some improv on Autumn Leaves, Rhapsody in Blue, Summertime and another one i didn't know. I was in heaven. It was absolutely delightful. Great night.

I still can't believe I'm going to Egypt in 12 hours. That's insane! (mom and dad, I'll call Sunday night probably...I think we get back around 3 or 4am so it'll be at night)

more random stuff

toga party pictures are posted so go check those out.

stuff i forgot about my weekend:
i saw my 1st plate breaking at the party we were at thursday night. it was funny. they started out just throwing plastic plates that cracked, then someone threw a real plate. amanda and i were going insane b/c we wanted to clean up the mess.

last night our room had a collective mental breakdown. i threw my greek book & workbook & notebook across the room we all screamed. we played with fire and candles. courtney was trying different therapy methods on me. i was like i need therapy for a freaking greek class. it was pretty amusing.

i'm going on a last minute trip to egypt this weekend. alicia found cheap plane tickets and a cheap hotel/hostel room so we're off to egypt thursday night =)


current travel plans for the rest of the semester:
Nov. 4-6: Egypt
Nov. 11-14: Istanbul
Dec. 13-14: Amsterdam
Dec. 14-18: Paris
Dec. 18: HOME!