Party at the Monastery!

Right now, I am sitting in the courtyard checking my usual favorite websites (facebook, hotmail, etc) when I paused to look up at the moon. The crisp white moon sends a glowing haze that illuminates the ocean which glistens off in the distance. Then I realized, the last time I saw the Grecian moon shine this brightly was Sunday night which I completely forgot to blog about! So here I go:

Sunday afternoon began with quite the adventure as we piled into a rickety old van and made our way up the giant hills of Serifos. We drove through the very narrow and windy dirt road while my eyes tried to soak in every aspect of the scenery. As we climbed higher and higher, my ears popped but I didn't care because the view of Serifos' numerous beaches, large patches of wild flowers, the low valleys and high cascade terrains were completely worth the mild discomfort (and slight ping of terror as we drove extremely close to the edge!) We arrived at this beach, ate dinner, and drank some white wine (pretty much the only thing we were able to communicate to our waiter as no one could speak English). After chatting it up and taking pictures next to the ocean, we drove to the very top of the island and arrived at a 15th century Greek Orthodox monastery to celebrate the Pentecost. The chapel was absolutely beautiful. Slim candles illuminated by worshipers lit the room and light flickered on this large golden altar that displayed images of the last supper, Jesus crucified on the cross, and his holy resurrection. It was the most beautiful and holy experience of my life. Then, my friends and I made our way inside this tiny room and scrunched ourselves onto this tiny bench where Greeks attempted to ask is if we had eaten anything. The only problem was, no one spoke English and no one could understand what little Greek we knew. Thankfully, the members who worked at the church graciously brought us bread, potato/minestrone soup, and the most bitter wine I had ever drank. It pretty much tasted like (and had the similar effect) of brandy. Being in that room, eating authentic Greek food, drinking authentic Greek wine, listening to authentic Greek musicians, and being surrounded by people who could only speak Greek, I felt like I was finally submerged in 100% Greek culture. As the night progressed, familiar faces from our group came into the room and sat by us as we all listened to the four men strum their guitars and sing. Around midnight, it was time to dance. I looked up and realized that this older man was telling a young Grecian boy to ask me to dance. "Ohee," or no, I repeatedly said. I tried and I tried but the Greeks weren't having it, they cheered and they begged for me to dance and so before I knew it, I was dancing with this Greek guy. I could feel my face burning up and turning red as I kept my eyes on the floor, trying to copy his steps (right left right, left right left) with our hands extended into the air. When I looked up, I realized all of the Americans were taking pictures and videos of us, laughing and cheering me on. It may have been my most humiliating moment while being in Greece but hey, I tried to make the most of it by laughing it off and pretending I knew what I was doing. Soon, we had a group of our friends dancing with us like that last scene in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," with everyone in a circle laughing and having a great time. The most eye opening experience of that night though was not my 5 minutes of fame, but discovering that there was NO BATHROOM up there! I asked an old man where one was and he said "There is no water closet up here. You must find a place with no light and go on ze side of ze road." Oh. My. GOD! EEK!! Anyways, after our group decided we had celebrated enough, we left the festival. Before arriving at our apartments, we stopped at this beach and walked across the sand and looked at the moon, it's reflection sparkling in the ocean. Waking up the next morning at 8:45am for Greek class after sleeping for barely 4 hours was extremely rough but completely and 100% worth every minute of sleep I lost by being up at the top of the Serifos mountain.