Sunday, June 18, 2006

Changing of the Guard

Today, like paper to burn
Like powder and gun and iron red sun
I'll wait, I'll stay here and wait

Today, like bending to break
Like water and sand curling on land
I'll wait, I'll stay here and wait

I'll sit and watch the changing of the guards
Iron and granite fleur de lis on the gate house
Green copper curtains, faces of stone

Sometimes I'm floating
A puppeteer's soldier
Over the plaza with paper wings and porcelain eyes
I'll wait

Today, like falling to stand
Like timing and tongue, a hero unsung
I'll wait, I'll stay here and wait
 
Today, like waiting to strike
Like staring at planes, I'm calling your name
I'll wait, I'll stay here and wait

 I'll sit and watch the changing of the guards
 Iron and granite fleur de lis on the gate house
Green copper curtains, faces of stone

Sometimes I'm floating
A puppeteer's soldier
Over the plaza with paper wings and porcelain eyes
I'll wait

 I'll sit and watch
 I'll sit and watch
 I'll sit and watch the changing of the guards

Sometimes I'm floating
A puppeteer's soldier
Over the plaza with paper wings

Sometimes I'm floating
A puppeteer's soldier
Over the plaza with paper wings

With paper wings, with paper wings
I'll wait
I'll wait

We began and ended our day with the Changing of the Guard in front of the Presidential Palace.  We walked up a little before 11 this morning to watch the big ceremony and parade that occurs every Sunday at that time.  There were massive swarms of people congregating to watch the Guard file in and out, doing their funny step-dance dressed in traditional Turkish costume. 

I got most of the performance on video, which will be edited together with Changing of the Guard by Rosebud playing in the background, accompanied by a description of the event recorded at a Jay Clifford concert.  I'm quite excited to get that worked out. 

We spent several hours afterwards wandering the flea market in Monastiraki, which occurs every Sunday from 8am to 3pm.  It basically consists of any person who can find enough junk to sell to people willing to buy it and is one of the craziest and coolest things I've ever been to-its great.  We found all the little stores that Sarah and I shopped at last year; the place I bought my Greek Adidas, our jewelry shop where I bought my cool ring, and the place where we stocked up on imitation Greek vases. 

Its odd how things are exactly the same yet totally and completely different.

I bought a pair of imitation Chanel sunglasses, mainly b/c they looked good on me and that is nearly impossible to find, but its also fun to buy black market goods every once in a while.  Adrienne and I bought little canvas slippers as well, Caitlin had bought some in Chicago so I was excited to find them here-they are adorable and v. comfortable.  I'm going to stock up before going home because they are super cheap. 

We took a glorious three hour siesta before getting up to head down to Sounio to watch sunset at the Temple of Poseidon.  Unfortunately we left too late to catch the bus so we ended up wandering around the National Gardens, which are only a few blocks walk from the apartment.  It was scorchingly hot today, so it was a nice comfortable way to spend the evening.  The Gardens are really cool, we didn't go in there last year so I was excited to see them.  We climbed a tree and took pictures, found a cool spot with Roman ruins, and spent about half an hour at the miniature zoo trying to coax a male peacock to open his feathers for a photo-op.  He never did but it was fun anyway; there were also baby goats which kept climbing all over things and an Ostrich!  We basically turned into five year olds at the sight of the animals, it was quite funny.

On our way back home from the gardens we walked right past the guard station at the Palace so we stopped to have our picture taken with them since there were no crowds.  Since it was only 10 till 8 we decided to stay and watch the smaller hourly Changing of the Guard performance, which turned out to be a good idea because I got a fantastic video clip of the entire thing.  It really is a cool ceremony and I love the idea that they still honor the Turkish traditions, its a perfect example of how the two cultures blended and can never truly be separated again. 

We ate dinner at the apartment and I baked brownies.  Sounds pretty normal except we had to mix the brownie batter in a pot and bake them in a skillet because we have no bowls or baking pans.  At least we now know that you can bake a plastic handled skillet at 175 degrees celcius without the handle melting off.  And the brownies tasted fantastic, so it all ended well. 

I'm headed to bed a bit early, in hopes that I will wake up a bit early tomorrow (aka before noon) and not feel like I've wasted my day before going to class at 3. 

Kali Nichta.

~RLM

GotD: poso kani - how much is it?
one of the most useful phrases to learn