Civilization at last!

Two Italians, eating pizza, watching Italian game shows and talking wildly. I wonder if they know how many stereotypes they are re-inforcing. OH! and I need to correct the record, I was confused, the one wasn't Alberto, alberto is HIS boss, his name is Emiliano. Right now they are watching the ubiquitous game show babes that makes up 99% of Italian TV. Now they are watching Bruce Almighty in Italian.

Another inadvertent long break, whew! Not that I intended it. Emiliano came over to talk to me and I had to stop typing. They were bagging it for the night since they had another 16 hour day at the Coptic Museum. They have been keeping up that schedule for about a month now, and probably have a month more left to go. Well, that got us talking and I told him all my troubles with the SCA and that got HIM talking, which made me feel better, since it appears that what I went through was all too typical. We laughed about it and then I said that Italy wasn't like this, when I worked at the Vatican. That's when Emiliano told me (emphatically)"The Vatican is NOT Italy." Hard to argue with that. So they we laughed and swapped stories about Italian inefficiency. Italians seem to know themselves pretty well.

Well we said our goodnights, but by that time I had to pack to leave Cairo and the driver came, I spent the next three hours in the airport waiting for my flight, but couldn't find a plug for my computer which was running low on battery power.

Earlier that day I had taken the bus back from Sinai, then did some brief Souvenir shopping to pick up some Saffron from the market. Got some deals, got sheisted on others, so all in all it was even. You always feel like you could have done better though when a shopkeeper starts at 85 dollars and you talk him down to five. I finaly got to take Jason, the American University Student here, to dinner, which was good. This time I had the meat, meat, meat, meat and eggplant. That brings us back to the Italians eating pizza and then the airport.

Since then it has been something of a whirlwind. The flight on Olympic Airlines was relatively short and then I had to get the American Academy. Arrived about 7 am, and all the usual characters were there, as if they had never moved since I left them. The nice ones were nice, and the snotty ones were snotty. Caught up with a few, but mostly caught up with Morgan, who had slept in that morning, but that was fine, I was in no rush to get to Thessaloniki. So I had a short chat with him and his wife and we were off by KTEL bus to thessaloniki by 2pm. The whole ride down to Thessaloniki it was fun chatting with Morgan. He and I share many interests and so we talked most of the way, about marriage, life, but mostly religion. He is a seminary student studying to be a minister and he was always curious where the Mormons came down on this issue or that. We talked about all the hot topics, eschatology, soteriology, the nature of God, the substance of the soul, simple economic and social trinitarians versus Homosouian classcial trinitarians, and every permutation in-between. Usually when I start..."As Athanasius formulated it..." eyes glaze over and that's the end of the conversation. For Morgan that keeps the conversation going for another hour at least.

Got into Thessaloniki and had dinner at the cafe below the hotel, a place I knew from 3 months ago. It was nice to have the sense of the land and whenever I travel to place for the second time, the overwhelming sense of dread is usually gone. This time the trip has been a hoot, and every down time was filled with the Morgan Campbell/Travis Clark traveling two-man seminary. I mean it was endless. People would look at us on the bus and stare, as if a bus to Ouranopoli was sme how an odd place to talk about the Protestant concept of "The Priesthood of All-believers". Well, that day in Thessaloniki, after we checked in at the Pilgrimage office, I got to play tour guide and show-off for Morgan and walk him all around the greatest sights of Thessaloniki, the arch and mausoleum of Galerius, the Church of the Virgin Made without hands, Hagias Demetrios. Back at a short stop at the hotel to pick up our luggage we ran into a friend of a Morgan's, Heather, from the Athens Classical School. She was actually studying in Istanbul and just happened to take a short trip here to see the churches and wandered into our hotel exactly as we were coming out.

This coincidental meetings with past-acquaintances thingy I've got going has some pretty serious mojo I'm telling you. I should hang out on the streets of Philly one day, just to see what old friend God will have me meet. This is like the umpteenth time it has happened this trip.

Well then it was off to Ouranopoli, the last secular town before Mt. Athos. On the bus ride over we sat next to a girl, Maria who was a brit, but here's the funny thing. She was born in England, but her mother, father and all her ancestors going back to Adam presumably, were Greek, yet she affirmedly identified herself as British, despite the fact that she looked Greek, spoke Greek, and even english with a slight Greek accent, and lived in Greece studying abroad for Oxford. Morgan and I commented that there are probably only two countries in the world where something like that could happen, America and England. If an American couple came to Greece, had a kid, raised him here, lived here, even if they totally identified with the place, became Orthodox, after 30 years they would never say "I am Greek". And if they ever did, the Greeks would laugh them to scorn. But here's this Greek kid calling herself "English" (though I am probably more English than she is!) and complaining because she has inherited all the Insular rivalries. "Braveheart" the movie, was one of the worst things to ever happen to Brits, she said, since it made the Scots all uppity again, and reminded them why they hate the English! And she has not one iota of English blood!! Yet I have no doubt that she is right, and that no one would doubt her "Englishness". Just to let you know how different Greece is, Morgan tells me that the Protestant congregation he attends as an intern, the Greek Evangelical School, is Greek, has a Greek founding, is populated by native Greeks, the pastor is Greek, yet in the phone listing, it is listed under "foreign" religions.

Well we pulled into Ouranopoli and found our hotel and had dinner at one of the three restaurants that were open. Ouranopoli is a seasonal town, and far different from the resort town I left three months ago. Most of the shops are boarded up for the season and what are left are there to service the pilgrims that come to the mountain. We found one restaurant though and Morgan suggested we take the time to find some good seafood, and since I rarely get the opportunity to get decent seafood I jumped at the chance. We got a huge plate of crawfish, shrimp, octopus and squid. Very good. We had no desire to hang out in the hotel for another four hours, so we walked the lonely streets of Ouranopoli and continued our never-ending discussion of Mormon-Protestant theological relations. At one point the conversation became decidedly one-sided as I stumbled on to the topic of "Intelligences" in Mormon Theology, for which there simply is no counterpoint in Protestant (or as far as I know) any Christian metaphysics. Morgan thought the whole thing fascinating and I suggested to him that if he really wanted to have a fun time, he should see the missionaries, and the second they sit down, say "Tell me all about the Intelligences?" and watch their heads explode.

The "Intelligences" BTW is one of those amazing Mormon doctrines that people either think is fascinating or bizarre and I won't dare to get into it here. There are only four verses in Mormon doctrine that reference them (if that is the correct pronoun for them) at all, and then a handful of commentary by early Mormon leaders. That's it, that's all we have to go on and yet it's really frustrating. Well that was as deep as I cared to get for the night.

The next day the trip to the pilgrimage office here to get our diamonitirion, or pilgrim's pass, was perfunctory but we did have a hard time getting on the ferry which was mobbed by pilgrims. In the end, they shut off the ferry and sent it away, what appeared to us, to be half full, and we, and a great many greeks were very annoyed and not quite sure what happened. Well it turns out there is not just one ferry to Mt. Athos, but that a fast boat would be heading out later at 10:30, but it was ten Euros instead of 5, and I half suspected they just wanted to milk the foreigners.

Well we got to Daphni, then the bus to Karyes, and spent some time wandering around Karyes until a sizable group of pilgrims were heading our direction to Karakallou, in order to defuse the fares. We stopped once at Iviron and took pictures of the spectacular seaside Monastery. Then the next stop was Karakallou, where as usual, were were greeted warmly. The Monks were in mass, so no one could come to the guesthouses, so we went to sit in back of the church to see the mass. On the way we ran into Father Forerunner, the very friendly, pale red-headed monk with blue eyes. In turn I met the whole cast from last time, Father Barnabus, the American who looks like Santa Claus, Father Ictarious, whose broad smile and bright eyes were the first I had seen last time, then Father Arsenios, the Chief cook and stand in for Hagrid, and of course, Brother Mark, the Scottish don that had given up his old life as a professor to be a novice, and the lowest rank person in the monastery. His beard was longer and grayer than last time but he was still very cheerful, at least at first.

We settled into the same routine as last time and after services, the monks took dinner, and we waited until after they ate to eat our dinner. Then we got a special treat. The church was still open, but since services were over, they took us into the church proper to have a look. It was the first time I had been allowed past the esonarthex. It was a simple cross in square plan with side apses for the choirs. There was a narthex as well, all with extensive frescoes and Brother Mark pointed out the image of Simeon Stylites in the main church, since he knew that was one of my research topics. The most incomparable thing was the large circular chandelier. Rather than a single chandelier with many arms hung from a single chain, this was a great silver circle, like a hoop, suspended from the rim and empty on the inside. The chains, which were more like large flat hinged straps, made of open-work silver, extended all the way to the dome, from which sat the bust portrait of Christ the Pantokrater, the Great Judge, looking down on all. The great ring had places for dozens of candles, and Bro. Mark said that on feast days, they set the ring in motion, so that it oscillates back and forth, filling the church with dancing lights and reflections. Must be something to see.

Later we got to our rooms and there was the turkish delight, just like last time, and Morgan agreed it was the best Turkish delight he had ever had. I mentioned the quality of the Turkish delight, and Bro. Mark warned me not to call it that here, then Father Ictarios was curious and poked his head in to see what was going on. Bro Mark explained to him that in America, this was called "Turkish Delight" and not the Greek term, which was "Lukome" (I think.) A moment later Father Ictarios returned with something he called "Greek Delight" Macaroons with almonds, pine nuts and honey. FABULOUS. It was a great joke and since I benefitted, I promised, I would never criticize Greek Pride again.

There's more to tell, but right now I am waiting for Father Ictarios so that I can see the manuscript so I have to go check on him for the moment, but I will return to last night and earlier today.

Ok, back now.

Well last night after services and "Greek Delight" we sat down for about an hour and talked to Bro Mark, the Scotsman, and he somehow unburdened himself to us. Seriously. He was talking about how recently he had been very frustrated with monastic life and had even requested a chance to leave the monastery. He talked about how he missed doing what he wanted, when he wanted, enjoying a paper or a walk or a night out with friends, of course he said it was all his mind playing tricks on him, or the temptations of demons, since he was utterly bored and unsatisfied with those things anyway, and that's why he left in the first place. It was an entirely different Bro Mark than I had remembered and I felt somewhat anxious at hearing a monk's "confession". It seems he had had a really difficult time of it lately and seemed very worn out and tired. Not at all the cheerful and pleasant person I had met before and it made me very sad in a way to see how much he had been struggling with the monastic life.

Well after that we went to bed, not long after seven and woke up around 2. Services begin here, during the winter at least, at 1 and last through the early morning, then after 7 and breakfast they all go back to bed for a couple of hours. Brother Mark had offered to come and get us, but since we are not orthodox we aren't allowed into the church except for the esonarthex or porch area. And since this was winter, the door from the church into the porch would be closed anyway, meaning we couldn't really hear a thing. But bro. Mark had a solution. A radio. Seriously. Seems that in a monastery there is always someone somewhere that needs work to be done, which means that not everyone can attend services because they will be working in the laundry or the kitchens. So there are microphones placed throughout the church that broadcast on a short-range transmitter, just big enough for the monastery. So you can tune into the liturgy on the radio. He loaned us his so that we could listen, and we listened to the liturgy from about 2-4. From time to time, Bro. Mark would drop by our room and give us the play by play, which was very fascinating, but not for long, since he had to head back to the services. The music is of course lovely, and with Turkish and Greek delight still left over it was feeling very posh to attend church this way, lying in bed eating treats, not having to go into the actual church.

Well around 5, halfway through the mass liturgy, they opened one of the doors for us so that we could listen in. We crowded as close to the door as we could to hear the services and to stay warm. Afterwards, as usual, we were not allowed to attend, but had to eat afterwards. After breakfast the place shut down so that the monks, who have been up all night, could get some sleep. This being Sunday, they were afforded an extra hour, which meant that no one would be stirring until 11 this morning. So I slept to 10 and then got up and wrote the entry above. At a little after 11, Bro. Mark and Father Ictarios came and got me to look at my manuscript, no. 20. Morgan decided to tag along and they took us upstairs to a nice circular waiting room usually reserved for VIP guests, and Ictarios brought out the Greek delight again. I managed to finally discharge my promise to Father Yanni, from Sinai, and gave the pilgrimage rings and icons from St. Catherine's to give to the Abbot. It turns out Father Ictarios knew Father Yanni and laughed a little when I mentioned his name. He seems to have a reputation for being something of a character, both here and at St. Catherine's.

Since being here last time I had looked at Spyridon Lambros catalogue and found the bit that was supposed to be Cosmas. Looking at the manuscript though, not even the Greek speakers could make heads or tails of the 2 paragraph passage. It seemed to be a very ordinary intro into the Gospels and otherwise unremarkable. Well, the main purpose was to make sure that the microfilms I had gotten from the Patriarchal Institute in Thessaloniki were adequate to work from, they were, but it hardly solved any problems and I am just as mystified by this reference to Cosmas as ever.

Well it didn't take long, and after consulting the manuscript Father Ictarios asked if we wanted a tour of the tower. Heck yeah!! I said, but not is so many words. So he tooks up some VERY worn steps up a tight spiral staircase. Some of the steps were so worn of as to be near non-existant, and I was constantly worried I was going to fall. The tower entrance was on the second floor, and they told me that in medieval times, the door could only be reached by ladder or drawbridge. The lower story was a cistern, the upper three storage. Every floor had a small chapel built into the north side, and the top floor was entirely a chapel. He walked us out on the battlements and stepped up onto the murder holes. Which is where I shot these shots!! (Bro. Mark shot the image of me and Morgan)

The tower dates to the eleventh C. and Father Ictarios pointed out that the monastery towers were placed within sight of each other so that when pirates were sighted the first would light their warning signals and the warning fires would spread from monastery to monastery all along the coast in both directions. Visions of Gondor came to mind.

Well right now it's our last day on Mt. Athos, but it's going to take a while to explain how I ended up in a hallway with the dueling snorers, so let's go back to Karakallou.

After the tour of the tower we went to the afternoon services for which, Bro. Mark gave us the play by play. Though this was Sunday, Byzantine time starts at sunset, so the Vespers service is always for the saints for the next day. Since yesterday's Vespers was made in preparation for the coming Sunday celebration, it was quite elaborate. This one was much shorter, but we had an additional surprise afterwards. Father Forerunner, the red-bearded monk came to tell us that the Abbot had invited us to Trapeza, or the dinner service. Usually we have to eat after the monks since the meal is a cenobitic rite, complete with readings. So we got to sit with the other pilgrims and instead of cold beans we got luke-warm beans and cabbage, and it was very good. More importantly it was a real honor to be in attendance and to finally get a chance to see the abbot as he passed through. The refectory at Sinai is barly big enough to feed a couple dozen monks if they sat shoulder to shoulder, Karakallou has a beautiful refectory with a large apse fresco showing the Mystikos Deipnos, or Last Supper. I pointed out the iconography of the various saints to Morgan and basically walked him through a lot of the artwork, most of which was rather late, 18th century, but still very byzantine in style. After meals Bro Mark met us for a Sunday walk, one of the few times he had all week to get outside and just enjoy the natural environment. Athos is a preserve of natural beauty. Most of the mountain is covered in pine and evergreen oak so it's green all year round, and it occasionally gets snow as well.

We walked up a forest path and Bro Mark seemed less despondent and shared nothing of his latest struggles or desires to leave. He spoke instead of his faith and the orthodox tradition, its humility and its traditions. He seemed his old self again. He had converted to Orthodoxy 10 years ago and only decided to become a monk only this year. He compared the monastic life to the married life in that you find God by totally surrendering yourself, in his case to God, and in the case of marriage to your spouse, and through your service to this other you find God. He said that the in the orthodox marriage ceremony crowns are placed over the heads of the married couple but what people don't realize is that these are the crowns of Martyrdom. A man and wife are literally martyred to each other, not a pleasant thought to most, but I got it in the way he meant it. It was all very odd because later Morgan and I talked about it and admitted that we couldn't stop thinking about our wives. I've been thinking about Jenn non-stop since I got here, and though I really like this place, heck I love it, It makes me think about how lonely and meaningless my life would be without Jenn, not to say a lot less fun. Truth is, if this is martyrdom, I'm loving it. Morgan felt much the same way about Emily, and it was funny, because from the Mormon and Protestant perspective there is nothing comparable to the union of Man and Wife, while in the Orthodox tradition, the celibate life is a union between an individual and God. In our own traveling seminary discussions that are so ubiquitous and enjoyable, we really didn't see it that way. There is one place where Paul makes the case for celibacy, but there are many more biblical endorsements of marriage. "Neither the man without the woman, nor the woman without the man". The celibate life hardly seems equivalent to me, and if two can get to God together, why go alone? But talking this all out to us seemed to be very good for Bro. Mark, as if in trying to convince ourselves, he was really convincing himself again, which was good, and he seemed altogether better.

One of the more interesting things we talked about was the nature of the body and the mind. Morgan was much better at asking questions than I was, and he got really interesting responses. It started with a discussion of a method of prayer in orthodoxy known as the "prayer of the heart" a method by which the supplicant hopes to enter a perpetual state of prayer by moving his self, his soul out of the rational prayer and into the internal intuitive part of the body, into the heart, praying with the whole body. Bro. Mark explained that the rational part of the mind, the part so extolled in the world, was that part most subjected to delusion. A person could wrap themselves in rationalizations, all internally logical, all equally false however. Only by accessing that intuitive part, that part that is in communion with God, can we see the reality of the world. It was then that he gave us the quote above, that all the most important decisions in life we don't make with our head anyway, but the heart. Which is largely true - for most. I have to say this because as cold as it sounds, the decision to marry my wife was utterly rational for me. Oh I loved her, tons, still do, and more all the time, but at the time I had followed my heart once too often and been hurt. I was praying about it and getting no answers and I was not prepared to go this one on faith, so I worked it out logically. Weighing everything I knew about her, her character, her attributes and her faults, and it was decided. It was clear that she was a superior choice to marry. (For added emphasis, say that last bit in the voice of Leonard Nemoy or Mr. Spock!) And being in love was her was just gravy. So here I stood, a living counter to Bro. Mark's thesis, but I largely agree with him. I think the rational mind is prone to delusion, but not because of any inherent flaw, but because of a lack of accurate information, which is so hard to find. I suppose if we could all access that intuitive part of man that knows God, we would always have that well of light from which to enlighten our reason, and our thinking would be a lot better, but without it, all we can do is describe the local scenery, with no sense of the horizons. I did like the way that Bro. Mark put it though, "If you could put God under a microscope it would be subject to Human Reason, it would be smaller than you, and who would want to worship that?" Who indeed.

All in all it was a great Sunday walk and one of the best Sunday School classes I have had in a long time, and it seemed that Bro. Mark had worked a lot out himself.

Well, then it was nighttime, sleep, then back up at four for one last morning service and then an informal breakfast tea where Father Forerunner, Ictarios and Bro Mark all said their goodbyes.

We had one last stop to make. Last time here I had made an attempt to find a rare icon, a Panagia Galaktotrophousa, or nursing virgin, in the Kellion of St. Savas. Last time I had never found the thing. It was associated with Hilander monastery, a serbian monastery far to the north of the peninsula, but the listing that Bro. Mark had said "Karyes" the capitol city so I had tried there. Everyone seemed to think it was there, but none were certain exactly where, so there was nothing to do but to go look again. Bro. Mark recommended we stay at the Skete of the Apostle Andrew, which would be having it's feast day tomorrow anyway, so we would get a chance to see a real spectacular orthodox service. That's where we are now.

A monastery is pretty self-explanatory, but a skete and a Kellion need a bit more explanation. Skete and Kellia are dependencies, usually associated with a larger monastery. Usually, a skete is a small hermitage, a hut or a cave, and a kellion is a bit bigger, a cottage for a few monks, living outside the order or rule of the monastery. In reality, the rules are very flexible and the distinctions are largely semantical. The skete of St. Andrew for example is one of the largest complexes on Mt. Athos, about four times the size of Karakallou. The largest church on the peninsula is the church of St. Andrew at the 'skete' of St. Andrew! Bizarre. The complex is a total state of ruin. The walk across the causeway to the second floor bathroom is terrifying, because the floor on the right hand side is falling in, and the ceiling on the left hand side is falling in. It started as a hermitage (or exile if you know the reality of it) of patriarchs in Constantinople during the Turkish period. Basically, a bunch of these guys were chafing the Turks rear and were sent into early retirement. After the fall of Byzantium in 1453, the only large imperial patron left was the Russian court. Over the years the Russians poured money into the skete, building the largest church on the mountain here in 1867, the final stone laid and dedicated in 1902. So most of the building is rather late. For those up on your history you already know the coming catastrophe. The skete of St. Andrew was at its height just before the Russian revolution. After that, the Soviet Union prevented the movement of monks or material to support the building. In time most monks, bereft of support, left for Mother Russia and no more came. One lone Russian monk hung on until he died in 1971. Finally in 1992, Greek monks from the monastery of Philetheou occupied the site and have been slowly, very slowly apparently, restoring the church.

Well we informally checked in and were assigned two cots in the hall. There were a number of pilgrims for the feast day, so many that some were sleeping in one of the smaller chapels.

After dropping our stuff we inquired of the guestmaster if he knew where the kellia of St. Savas was? He said there were two in Karyes and one had the famous image of the Mother of God. "The Galaktotrophousa?" I said eagerly, and he said "Yes." and I said "That's the one!!" in somewhat an over-zealous tone, but I was anxious to see it. This was a favor for my advisor, who, because she lacks a Y chromosome can't visit the island herself. This rare icon is one of her special interests, she wrote her dissertation on it, and has made the pursuit of Galaktotrophousa her special mission in life. She has done a ton for me and if I could repay her in this one small way I was anxious to do it. According to local legend the image was brought back from the Holy Land by St. Savas himself in the 12th C. The thing had last been seen by a Russian Art History some 80 years ago, who decided it was much later, 16th C. or so. Dr. Bolman thinks the guy was wrong and that the tradition was right, but there was no way for her to tell without seeing it, so for this trip I would be her eyes.

Well we went into town and asked at a bank, a store, and anyone we came across really. Stumbled through the half-deserted buildings and encountered two false calls and one lonely donkey along the way. Finally we doubled back to a place we had seen earlier but thought couldn't be the place. On close inspection we found that the inscription above the door had several characters that were neither Greek or Russian, meaning it was likely Serbian, and that made sense, since it was supposed to be a dependency of a Serbian monastery. So we rang the bell, and a monk came to the door in a apron. Everywhere there was painting and construction, there were two monks, painting frescoes on the walls in a traditional Byzantine style. We asked if we could see the Ikone, the Galaktotrophousa. He said "neh" which is Greek for yes. This was the place. He then asked if we were Russians, and we said no, Americans. He started walking down the hall and it looked as if finally this particular wild goose chase was over, then he paused and turned to ask one more question that had suddenly occurred to him as we were halfway down the hall.

"Orthodosio?" he said pointing alternately at both of us.

"Ohi" said Morgan, which is Greek for "no" and at that the monk looked down and gave a tense uncomfortable smile while he wagged his finger and slightly shook his head.

"Ohi...Ohi" was all he said. Well there was little to do after that. This monk wasn't even Greek, he was Serbian, and we could hardly communicate in the one language. There was no way to explain our situation or ask for special dispensation, so we said "Thank you" and leave. Well I was civil then but once outside I vented to Morgan. I was livid. It was in a sense, a taste of what women must feel like since they can't even come here. Their gender is so awful it would instantly contaminate the holy atmosphere. Likewise, the more I think about it, the more empowered I feel, since it's obvious my x-ray gaze could contaminate their icon from a distance of a few yards. Well, I tried to talk myself down from this, saying conciliatory things in my head, such as "Mormons don't let non-Mormons into their Temples" but it's just not the same. The temple is a ritual space in constant use, and we had been excluded from a lot of the ritual here as well. Still, it's been about a day later and I still feel like saying "eff them and their icon" but I suppose that's not really Christian.

Well that soured the mood, but the rest of the day was actually very entertaining. We went back to the guesthouses where we hadn't sat long resting, before a young monk came in and started barking orders at us to help. It was the feast day and there were lots of last minute preparations. I said, "We aren't Orthodox." "That's ok, he said, work is for everyone." Yes but apparently icons are not. So we hauled a number of things from the small chapel over to the big chuch, several candlesticks, big things, 30 lbs each, and walked them all across the courtyard to the massive church. Then they put us to work cleaning up, Morgan hauling trash and me sweeping floors in the back where they were still arranging flowers and candles for the big day that would start that evening. There was an older monk there that knew America and was delighted to find out Morgan was from Boston. They asked if we were orthodox and we said no and the older monk said "It's never too late" We laughed and I thought, after not being allowed to see that icon, hell would have to freeze over. Well then things got dicey, Morgan went one way carrying things and I was told to clean up, but ran out of things to do. Eventually, Apostolos, the young monk, who seemed to be in charge, handed me some old liturgical draperies, handed me a lighter and pointed me to the old pot belly stove and said, "here, burn this." Anything that once had been used in ritual had to be burned and couldn't just be tossed. These were certainly in need of burning but it was insane, the draperies couldn't be torn and when stuffed into the stove they filled the space so that there was no way air could get to the flames, so soon I had a smoldering mess on my hands and my face and hands covered in soot. I eventually convinced Apostolos to abandon the idea and we were put back on heavy labor. A large table, brass, full of wet sand, was in the small chapel. It was used for devotional candles. He wanted us to carry it the 200 yards to the big church. Morgan has had problems with hernias, so he enlisted two Greeks to help out. We had to carry it DOWN a flight of stairs from the smaller chapel, out of the dormitories and out across two courtyards and then up the marble steps to the church, avoiding the scaffolding as we went. Fortunately the Greeks dug up a wheelbarrow and we only had to balance it for most of the journey, but the stairs were awful. The heavy cast brass edges would dig into your palms and even with the water drained out, the wet sand had to weigh 80 lbs alone, not couting the solid brass table. What a bear. After that there were some smaller brass candle stands, and coming down the stairs Morgan almost dumped the wet sand into my shorts. But the Greeks were very good natured and we just kept saying "Efcharisto" Thank you, over and over again, and they were laughing at the whole situation the monks were in. It was all very funny, and a good distraction. Once on the walk back to the guesthouses a monk came up and shoved bread into our mouths, literally. Sometimes only the seal on the eucharistic loaf is consecrated, the rest is just distributed to the pilgrims as a blessing, but it doesn't contain the actual presence. I don't know if that's what he was shoving in our faces but it's my best guess.

Well, after a while it looked like they didn't need us so Morgan and I went on a walk around the town to see the scenery and take some photos, but mostly avoid Apostolos, should he need more mules.

I will finish out the rest of yesterday tonight, and hopefully get it posted tomorrow. Right now we need to get packed and head out for the bus to Daphni, then the ferry from Daphni to Ouranopoli, and then the bus from Ouranopoli to Thessaloniki, then Thessaloniki to Athens. Today is just all travel and not much to report.

Delta Flight 133, 1 hour out of NYC-JFK, somewhere over the Atlantic,
3:20 EST, (10:20 Greece time - yawn) Thursday, December 15, 2005

Well that was also a bigger break than I intended. Right now I'm sitting next to a girl named Ashley from Elmira, upstate NY. She's on her way back to the states for Christmas after a semester studying in Athens. She's anxious to be home and worried that since our flight was late getting out, she's going to miss her bus home. She keeps opening the shade to the window every five minutes as if she expects something to change, but she's been good company.

Leaving Mount Athos was not as memorable as I thought it would be. We stuck it out at St. Andrew's skite from 6 to 9pm. With six more hours to go with only a short break before it started again, we were really getting slap happy, not getting any sleep wasn't helping. "Feast" day is something of a misnomer, it is actually more of a "Slightly more substantial meal" day. Communal dinner was in the crypt of the massive church without about 300 other pilgrims. In addition to our calamari and rice we had chocolate truffles and oranges, but that is about the only thing that set it apart from a typical monastic meal. The real feast is the spiritual feast, the all -night services. The warm up is about 2 hours of solid chanting before they light the large chandeliers. Seeing them light these massive 200 candle-lit chandeliers is really cool, especially since they do it with a long pole. The glow and effect of the light is really impressive, but then they start the chandeliers swinging. We had been told about this by Bro. Mark and at the time it seemed fine, but seeing it now it didn't seemed awe-inspiring at all, it just seemed a little silly. When describing it, Bro. Mark made it sound as if it cast eerie and solemn shadows. In reality, it just looked like a giant 18th C. chandelier...swinging. Now keep in mind this church had been largely abandoned for 30 yrs, so we had no faith in the chains holding up these two ton examples of late imperial russian brassworking, so it was kind of eerie, but not in the way they intended. Even when they lit and started the second one going it seemed sorta out of place with the singing. Morgan commented that he couldn't imagine sitting at Christmas dinner about to say grace and he just says to his wife "hold on while I start the chandelier swinging". Just to make it more solemn.

At the third hour they brought out the icon of St. Andrew and began the antiphonal singing of Kyrie Eleison "Lord have mercy (on us)". It was breathtakingly beautiful and Morgan wished his wife Emily could be there. Then we started to crack jokes aobut all the problems that would cause if she suddenly appeared since women are banned from the Mountain.

"Quick! Throw a veil over her!! Look! It's the Virgin! It's a miracle!!"

Well that got us into the giggles. Please don't judge us too hard. We were operating on about 2 hours of sleep over the last two days and we were really getting slap-happy, so we checked it in and left the services. We tried to get some sleep in the hallway of the guesthouses, but between the dueling snorers and the pilgrims and priests coming and going it was next to impossible. Greek orthodox services are really formal in most respects, but really informal in others. Most everyone that doesn't have a job at that particular moment is free to come and go, and pilgrims and priests alike take it in turns to catch the really important parts. In a way, this makes sense really, who could stand for the whole 9 hours of services. Around three am it settled down and then again after 6 am when people went for the finale.

We took the opportunity to sleep in to 8 and then finally made our way off the Island.

My bedroom, Home, USA
7:37 am EST, Monday, December 19, 2005

Well there really isn't much to tell after that and it's been heck to put it all down. From Athos to home it was one long never-ending trip home that only now I am recuperating from. I could tell you about how Morgan left his coat and passport in a seafood shop in Thessaloniki, and about how we miraculously got "tentacles" on a stick and even more miraculously how he got it all back.

But I have something better. For those reading this regularly, they know that one impossible occurrence after the other happened just when it needed to happen, in order for me to be there. Of all the incredible timings and near misses that happened on this adventure, I thank God the most for this one, which happened the day after I got home.

one last surprise.