Athens, Georgia
24/03/08 15:06
I don’t really know
what I expected from Athens. It’s often described as
an intellectual town, a center of arts and
creativity. And that isn’t wrong, it’s just that it’s
so much more. We took the Greyhound from Atlanta,
basically because we wanted to try and travel by bus,
and the Greyhound is the archetype of that kind of
travel.
The trip from Atlanta isn’t much to write about. The road is surrounded by a vast amount of trees, making it virtually impossible to see anything beside adumbrations of the multitude of townships and apartment complexes lying along the route. Funny thing is, that you hardly even notice that you’ve reached Athens until the bus takes sharp left turn and stops at an anonymous building and the driver says “Athens, Georgia folks”.
The station is
empty, I’ve never seen anyone in there but the stout
southern gentleman behind the counter. But his
“How’re-y’all-doing”, instantly puts a smile on my
face. The rhythm of the southern accent - as far as I
know, the “Southern Drawl” - just makes you feel
welcome.
When you walk out the main entrance and hit Broad Street, just turn left and follow the road up the hill. It really has a small town feel to it, and the five minute walk to campus is a lovely little stroll (If you turn right and walk down hill, you’ll get to a lot of cheap motels).
After five minutes walking (if you turn left for the scenic route), you will get to an intersection with a small Starbucks on one corner. At this point you’ll wanna turn right and cross the street (or quickly get a cup of coffee in Starbucks, and bring it along). After crossing the street you’ll be staring directly at the University of Georgia Campus.
At this point (providing you have the good fortune of arriving on a remotely sunny day), I recommend that you sit down in the middle of the small park and just relax. It’s like stepping into a movie or maybe even a dream. The buildings are well kept, the architecture aspires to be classical in it’s greco-roman style. For me it brought connotations to how I’ve always imagined it must have felt sitting in Aristotle's Elysium, sipping whatever the heck they served, and just learning through debates. It has an innocence to it that I haven’t seen before - and the students have an unspoiled appearance, and an admiration of learning provided by the curiosity of youth, but also inspired by their surroundings.
We sat there for an hour or so until Eric picked us up - he no longer resides in the campus dormitories, but instead shares a flat a few miles from the Downtown/campus area in a lovely apartment complex called “The Athens Lodge”.
Living at Eric’s was excellent. He had two couches we could crash, and he had the kind of TV that wars are fought over (I myself have started lesser conflicts over the right to watch Soccer on a 20’ TV, so I suppose larger scale skirmishes are a definite possibility with this TV). He spent the entire two days with us, driving us to and from shops, restaurants and even took the time to give us a four hour tour of campus, on saturday.
In Addition to all this, he invited us to meet his friends, and I actually got half through my serving of chicken nugget without noticing that the others were saying grace. Luckily they have a sense of humor. Sunday Eric brought us along for the Easter sermon at The First Baptist Church of Watkinsville, which was an amazing experience. Coming from a Lutheran Protestant church, in which the basic premiss is Original sin, and all the joys you can get out of that [Insert Irony marker], a baptist sermon is very uplifting. It’s about the individual celebrating his faith and his love for Jesus. I’m not a Christian myself, but I find the baptists’ ways of celebrating their faith a bit more inviting than the “Ye are all profoundly screwed” of the Lutheran Church. I once got whacked on the back of the head by a senior citizen sitting behind, me for not saying the correct Grace in church (in her defense the grace I was saying was waaaaaay off). At this sermon people fell to their knees, stood up, yelled ‘Amen’ at will - whatever they felt appropriate, whaterver they needed to do to express their faith. For me, that’s a big plus.
After the sermon
we went back to Eric’s friends apartment along with
some more friends and family. We had a big lunch with
(a kind of) creamed corn, grilled chicken, macaroni
and cheese (should you ever find yourself within arms
reach, I suggest you try some of Megans homemade
Mac’n’cheese). It was a wonderful afternoon, a lot
like a traditional danish family gathering (almost
missed the ‘Akvavit’, but only almost). They were
kind enough to say grace before I got the food on my
plate, which saved me form embarrassing myself again,
so the afternoon passed without any bloopers from my
side.
Unfortunately, we are unable to get a rental car in Athens, and will be traveling back to Atlanta to spend the night. Tomorrow we'll pick up a car at the airport and head south for Mexican Gulf, and some seafood. I'm very excited about that, as food is my favorite dish :p
The trip from Atlanta isn’t much to write about. The road is surrounded by a vast amount of trees, making it virtually impossible to see anything beside adumbrations of the multitude of townships and apartment complexes lying along the route. Funny thing is, that you hardly even notice that you’ve reached Athens until the bus takes sharp left turn and stops at an anonymous building and the driver says “Athens, Georgia folks”.
When you walk out the main entrance and hit Broad Street, just turn left and follow the road up the hill. It really has a small town feel to it, and the five minute walk to campus is a lovely little stroll (If you turn right and walk down hill, you’ll get to a lot of cheap motels).
After five minutes walking (if you turn left for the scenic route), you will get to an intersection with a small Starbucks on one corner. At this point you’ll wanna turn right and cross the street (or quickly get a cup of coffee in Starbucks, and bring it along). After crossing the street you’ll be staring directly at the University of Georgia Campus.
At this point (providing you have the good fortune of arriving on a remotely sunny day), I recommend that you sit down in the middle of the small park and just relax. It’s like stepping into a movie or maybe even a dream. The buildings are well kept, the architecture aspires to be classical in it’s greco-roman style. For me it brought connotations to how I’ve always imagined it must have felt sitting in Aristotle's Elysium, sipping whatever the heck they served, and just learning through debates. It has an innocence to it that I haven’t seen before - and the students have an unspoiled appearance, and an admiration of learning provided by the curiosity of youth, but also inspired by their surroundings.
We sat there for an hour or so until Eric picked us up - he no longer resides in the campus dormitories, but instead shares a flat a few miles from the Downtown/campus area in a lovely apartment complex called “The Athens Lodge”.
Living at Eric’s was excellent. He had two couches we could crash, and he had the kind of TV that wars are fought over (I myself have started lesser conflicts over the right to watch Soccer on a 20’ TV, so I suppose larger scale skirmishes are a definite possibility with this TV). He spent the entire two days with us, driving us to and from shops, restaurants and even took the time to give us a four hour tour of campus, on saturday.
In Addition to all this, he invited us to meet his friends, and I actually got half through my serving of chicken nugget without noticing that the others were saying grace. Luckily they have a sense of humor. Sunday Eric brought us along for the Easter sermon at The First Baptist Church of Watkinsville, which was an amazing experience. Coming from a Lutheran Protestant church, in which the basic premiss is Original sin, and all the joys you can get out of that [Insert Irony marker], a baptist sermon is very uplifting. It’s about the individual celebrating his faith and his love for Jesus. I’m not a Christian myself, but I find the baptists’ ways of celebrating their faith a bit more inviting than the “Ye are all profoundly screwed” of the Lutheran Church. I once got whacked on the back of the head by a senior citizen sitting behind, me for not saying the correct Grace in church (in her defense the grace I was saying was waaaaaay off). At this sermon people fell to their knees, stood up, yelled ‘Amen’ at will - whatever they felt appropriate, whaterver they needed to do to express their faith. For me, that’s a big plus.
Unfortunately, we are unable to get a rental car in Athens, and will be traveling back to Atlanta to spend the night. Tomorrow we'll pick up a car at the airport and head south for Mexican Gulf, and some seafood. I'm very excited about that, as food is my favorite dish :p
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