Acclimating in Athens

I have the privilege of leading a team of women to Greece this summer to work with refugees in the island of Lesvos through an organization called Gateways2Life.  More about that in future posts.   It’s actually not true that our team is entirely made of women, for Gateways2Life requested we bring a man to serve as gatekeeper at the center.  So Terry agreed to come along as our bodyguard, door opener, bag carrier, driver, etc.

After leaving town at 3:30 am, we arrived with rather bleary eyes at the international terminal.

We immediately realized we were supposed to go to the domestic terminal instead, but we're sticking with this photo since the other terminal is under construction and not nearly as photogenic.  You know you're with a good group of women when nobody minds being photographed without makeup!

Our group is headed to Lesvos but to get there you have to first go to Athens. So we took advantage of our 30 hours there to take in the sights and start bonding as a team. In this first part of thus trip that bonding was facilitated by getting lost either as a group or individually, jet lag, trying all sorts of transportation including bus, subway, and passenger train,  sharing a single shower, long walks, taking in iconic sites like the Parthenon, Hadrian's Arch, and Mars Hill, eating some great meals, and even getting to church on time (so maybe NOT on time, but we made it). The bonding has begun!