Written by Italy & Greece Students, Elizabeth R. & Liam S.
We arrived on Crete! Over the past ten days, we spent time in a small village on Eastern Crete! We started off the week with Greek language and culture lessons from our teacher Manolis. We learned the essentials of the language as well as Greek history and Greek dancing, which we all enjoyed! Then Carly taught us all about Minoan history- even taking us to Gournia, Azoria, and Mochlos. We also had pottery classes and spent time working on Vassili’s olive farm, prepping for the olive harvest. And each day was not complete without a trip to the beach- even for sunrise and sunset! We had delicious meals and spent lots of quality as a group these past few days, which was very refreshing! We are now in Athens for a few days before leaving on our student directed travel.
Our Highlights of the Week:
This week we had so many highlights that couldn’t just choose three!
1. 🇬🇷Our Greek lessons! We loved getting to learn the Greek alphabet and being able to spell each other’s names in Greek! And our teacher, Manolis, made every part of the class so fun!
2. 🏖️The beach! Over the course of the week we went to various different beaches, all of which were so pretty. Our two favorites were the pebble beach right below our village with cool rocks and the Via Palm Beach surrounded by hundreds of palm trees and cliffs.
3. 🌅The sunrise! On our last full day on Crete a few of us went down to watch the sunrise on the pebble beach. A beautiful, peaceful experience capped off by a morning sunrise swim! A mermory we won’t forget.
4. 🥗 The food! We had spectacular food from the local tavern. Our personal favorites were the zucchini fritters, lentil soup, tzatziki, and Greek salads.
5. 🏺Pottery classes! We went down to Alex’s studio where we learned how to make pinch pots and other ceramic items. We then got to paint and glaze them. Each one of us made unique pieces that we are very excited to bring home!
But growth always comes with challenge … how did you grow this week?
One of the challenges we had this week was planning for our week of student directed travel on Aegina. We needed to plan location, transportation, accommodation, and activities all within our budget. Agreeing on a place to go as well as finding activities and accommodation was challenging because we had so many good options to pick from. We settled on the island of Aegina, and we’ll be staying at and Airbnb near town. We are so excited to go and can’t wait to see what’s in store next week!
What are you grateful for this week?
We are so grateful for being in Greece! While we loved being in Italy, coming to Greece has been a refreshing change of pace! The weather, food, and scenery have been so great so far! Additionally we have gotten to spend a lot of quality time together through various CDLs that Meg and Mary taught and our dinner games! We have shared many laughs and interesting conversations that we hope to bring into the rest of the trip!
