Bulldogs, bulldogs, bow wow wow! Yesterday another Yalie arrived! Well actually...a former Yalie ('06, just graduated). Her name is Eleni (she's half Greek) and she grew up in Wilmington (near Storrs)! CT, represent! She's been studying Greek for a few years now (so she actually got the fellowship), but we're in the same class (mmhmm...it's interesting). She's super cool and all. We have some mutual Greek friends from Yale (yeah...can you guess who they are?).

We also got a couple from Italy, bringing the tally for this week up to...hmm, gotta think about this one:
6 from Spain (2 new, 4 from last week)
5 from the US (David & Sandra, Eleni and myself, and a new woman from California)
3 from Germany (Margit and a new couple, Dieter and Gisela)
2 from England (both new, Lesley [m] and Pat [f] - not a couple)
2 from Italy (hmm...can't remember their names right now)
1 guy from France (Pascal)
1 girl from Russia (she's new...Maria/Masha).

It's basically one big Amer-Euro fest all day long, with lots of different languages flying around all the time. Plus the beach. And this certain variety of Special K that has flakes of dark chocolate in it that's quite divine. Needless to say, I'm enjoying myself.

Monday night, we had a πανηγύρι (paniyiri) in Αρέθουσα (Arethoussa, our village). A paniyiri is like a big local festival where everyone comes out and eats and drinks and dances on the town square. Wow. It started at around 7 or 8 and lasted til 8 in the morning (although myself and a few others cut out around 2am). First, of course, we needed to have another dance lesson for the new people. Then we all set off on foot (no one really wanted to drive, of course), and when we arrived, staked out three of the massive banquet tables just for our group. Katziki (goat meat), patates (seasoned French fries), salates (salad), and alcohol abounded. The band would keep playing the same song for half an hour because no one wanted to stop their dancing. We, anxious to show off our new skills, joined in - I'm not sure what the locals thought of the mini-NATO that crashed their dance party, but they were certainly accepting enough. Probably the funniest part of the night - well, I don't know how funny it will seem now, because our laugh-reflexes had a lot of help from tiredness and red wine at the time - was when a slightly tipsy Mixalis usurped Socorro's really high-tech digital camera for about half an hour. She had given it to him to take a picture of our side of the table, but when she motioned for him to give it back, he just looked at her and shook his head, smiling a little. He started to weave his way around the tables, taking pictures of anything that struck his fancy. Every time he pressed the shutter down, he would look back at us with a sheepish grin - he looked just like a little kid with a new toy. It's especially cute because he has an interest in photography. Maybe you had to be there...but we absolutely could not stop laughing.

Things got increasingly more raucous, although most of our group left by around 3. Apparently, at 8:30am Tuesday morning when Mixalis drove down to Evdilos to pick up the Spanish people staying there, a drunk guy on his motorbike almost crashed into Αριστοτέλης (Aristotle, our beloved minibus). Aie aie aie.

Sooo yesterday was a pretty quiet day cause we were all exhausted. Being in the advanced class is going well - I have a lot more work to do on my own now, but I don't mind it so much. The days are going by so quickly - is it really Wednesday the 19th already? I have 10 more days on Ikaria, then it's back to the mainland on the "express" (read: only 7.5 hours) ferry. Well...time to go do a little studying and then to the beach! Γεια σας!