The Carnation Cafe

Well, I'm home now, but I've not said all I have to say so I'm going to keep writing. Things got rather backed up when we started bouncing around - not to mention the social life in Dubai! So...

Sometimes it's the simplest things in life that deliver the biggest punch. We tend to forget that in our over-stimulated consumer-driven world. If you can step out of the craziness of your own life, I think its possible to rediscover the simple things. Traveling really helps me do this.

Also, it’s sometimes hard to explain or even pinpoint why something appeals to you. Perhaps it was our exhilaration after seeing the amazing sites on the Acropolis, maybe we were exhausted and starving, or maybe it truly was the delicious food and charming atmosphere, but Stan and I were completely taken with the Carnation Café.

We toured the Acropolis on a Sunday morning, and this particular Sunday was a national holiday of some sort, so we were having a bit of a time finding a place to eat lunch. I remembered seeing a little neighborhood cafe a day or two earlier, with tables spilling out onto the sidewalk, but I wouldn’t have been able to find it. Stan also recalled the same place, so we were thrilled when we popped around a corner and there it was! The Carnation Café!

Try to imagine an old-fashioned, mom and pop, neighborhood type of place (they don’t exist anymore in the US, I’m convinced) that serves simple home-cooked food using fresh ingredients. That’s the place. A Greek mom was cooking in a TEENY kitchen. The refrigerated case below her workspace chilled fresh octopus and calamari (oooh, soo sorry Buddha!) One cute little Greek boy of about 25 sporting a shirt with a big red carnation embroidered on the back (bet he loved that) hustled in and out of the kitchen, waiting tables. Neighbors stopped in for lunch, a group of young people appeared to be refueling after a hard night, expat-types were reading the English daily, and a handful of tourists, like ourselves were fortunate enough to have stumbled upon this place.

We enjoyed a delicious lunch of grilled octopus (octopus is a Greek specialty) Stan’s choice, and a Greek salad, my choice. Greek salad in Greece is nothing like what we have at home. Greek Greek salad is FRESH local (not pink) tomatoes, chopped cucumber, red onion, fresh peppers, a pepperoncini or two, and a hand full of olives, all sprinkled with fresh oregano, dressed lightly with olive oil and lemon. A thick slice of amazing feta always perches on top.

A colored aluminum pitcher (like those glasses your grandma used to have) of house white wine (Greek – better than the house Turkish wines in my opinion) and a basket of that yummy Greek bread accompanied our meal. I don’t remember the particular figure, but the bill was ridiculously inexpensive. Was it our hunger? The food? The ambiance? I can’t say and it doesn’t matter. What mattered was the beauty of the fresh flavors and local ingredients. Life should always be so simple.

Athens II – The Acropolis + Mini-History

On Sunday (free admission day!) we spent the morning exploring the Acropolis archeological site. The Acropolis is the rocky mount in the center of Athens upon which the famous Parthenon (as well as other monuments) sits. It is a winding climb of at least 200 feet to the base of the Acropolis. The Parthenon (the famous temple honoring Athena) is massive up close, and truly is the impressive classical Greek structure so often imitated. Built around 450 BC, it covers the ruins of an earlier temple. The formula dictating the design of classical Doric architecture called for dimensions with the number of columns on the narrow ends (i.e. 6) to be doubled then add one (i.e. 13) to get the number of columns on the wide sides.

Sideline on history (Stan blogging now): The Parthenon would be more intact than it is today if it weren’t for the Venetians. Who knew? In 1687 Greece was part of the Ottoman Empire and the Venetians, then still a formidable world power, attempted to retake Athens, which was formerly under their control. Unfortunately at that time the Ottomans were storing their gunpowder in the Parthenon. Thus, when the Venetians commenced shelling the Acropolis from a nearby hill, a direct hit on the Parthenon ignited the gunpowder and the Parthenon was severely damaged. Subsequently, the Venetians held the city for less than a year. Serves them right! One can’t help but wonder how much more of this magnificent structure would remain intact if the Ottomans had stored their gunpowder elsewhere!

OK, 450 BC, that’s almost 2500 years old. Whoa. Kinda tough to wrap your mind around the fact there was an advanced, sophisticated, democratic society functioning at such a high level that many years ago. It’s amazing really. Here’s a way to try and put the concept into perspective: every generation a handful of people live to be 100 years old, not often, but it happens. So think about someone who was born in 450 BC and lived to be 100 and passed the baton, so to speak, to the next centurion, and the next and the next, etc., etc. So if that happened only 25 times that gets us to today. Thinking in those terms we really haven’t been here all that long.

Here’s another perspective on time to keep it all in context. Back in the early-mid 90s I (obviously still Stan!) was reading a biography of the famous US Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. One of his judicial clerks in the 1920s and 30s was Alger Hiss (later a notorious figure caught up in the McCarthy red-scare witch-hunts of the 1950s.) The author of the biography (I’ve forgotten his name) was pointing out the fact that a man who was still alive today (Hiss at least in the mid 90s) had worked with and been a confidante of a man (Holmes) who had fought in the US Civil War, and whose grandmother could recall as a youngster the days of the US Revolutionary War. Only three lifetimes take us from the founding of the country to the present! We live in a young country indeed.

Here’s an Athens bonus round: there were no touts or tourist hounds harassing us on the grounds of the Acropolis or any other Athenian tourist sites for that matter, at least not on this particular Sunday. Apparently the Greek authorities have taken a hard line on this (perhaps only since the 2004 Olympics?) Tout free is a good thing, a pleasant surprise, and truly made the experience more enjoyable and authentic.

Another historical point: so there existed this fantastic and impressive society in classical 4th and 5th century Greece. What happened after that? Aside from the Venetian pyrotechnic display, not a lot more went down. During the days of the Roman Empire Athens continued to be an important city. But after 300 AD or so Athens found itself a largely irrelevant provincial backwater in the Byzantine and Ottoman Empires. In modern Athens, other than the Acropolis and a few other ancient structures, the buildings and architecture are of relatively recent vintage. A few neo-classical buildings from the early-mid 1800s stand but most of the structures that comprise the sprawling modern city of Athens are less than 100 years old, and pretty non-descript, to be honest. (Lisa says they are ugly.)

Traipsing around the ruins for a couple of hours was pretty tiring. We made our way back down to the Plaka area for a coffee. Somewhat energized, we wandered the peaceful Agora, or ancient marketplace (more ruins.) A fabulous lunch followed. Lisa will fill you in on the Carnation Café, in another post.