Toby and Allan in Greece and Prague: Benaki Museum and a Demonstration!!

Saturday March 18 was another sunny day with a high of 17C. The weather keeps getting better and better- lovely spring weather- warm sun during the day and cool evenings. I took this picture of the Acropolis in the late morning before we headed out for the day.

Our view of the Acropolis from the deck of our apartmnet

Alain started his day with his first run in Greece. We are only a few minutes from the Panathenaic Stadium where there is a trail where the public can walk or run above the stadium. Alain did a 5.5 km run and took a few pictures of the stadium. I just read that at Hadrian's inauguration in 120 AD, 1000 wild animals were sacrificed in the stadium. The seats were rebuilt in Pentelic marble by Herodes Atticus. There are seats for 70,000 spectators, a running track and a central area for field events.

View of the Stadium

A happy selfie with view of Acropolis in far background

Our first destination for the day was the Benaki Museum, about a 20 minute walk away. We passed by the Presidential Palace and the Prime Minister's residence which are beside each other. Luckily for us, there was a changing of the guard ceremony in front of the Presidential Palace.

I really like the pom poms on the shoes. Very stylized ceremony.

The two guards ready to switch positions

An interesting ritual where a soldier made sure the guards were ship-shape

Presidential Palace

Prime Minister's Residence

The Benaki Museum was established in 1930 by Antonis Benakis (1873-1954) in memory of his father Emmanuel Benakis. The museum is housed in the Benakis family mansion. Antonis Benakis moved to Athens permanently in 1926 from his birthplace of Alexandria, Egypt. The museum houses Greek works of art from prehistoric to modern times. In 1931, the Benakis donated the family's house and collection of more than 37,000 Islamic and Byzantine objects which he had collected over a 35 years period to the Greek State. Benakis remained active in the museum until his death in 1954.

Many more objects have been added since and the museum now has two satellite buildings. The museum underwent a major renovation in 2000, after it had been damaged in an earthquake. It is the only museum in Greece that traces the history of Greek culture and history through the ages and recognizes foreign influences. The main museum focuses solely on Greece. There is now a separate Benaki museum of Islamic Art.

Entrance to the museum

Picture of Antonis Benakis by Panayiotis Tetsis (b.1925)

Another pic of Benakis by Dimitris Mytaras (b.1934)

Aphrodite seated with Eros offering her a necklace- 400-375 BC

Cypriot amphora of white painted ware- 750-600 BC

750-730 BC

Kylix of Bichrome ware 760-600 BC

Marble head of Athena with Corinthian helmet- AD 117-138

Head of Dionysos- late 4th century BC (from Port of Piraeus)

Grave marker- late 4th-3rd century BC

Marble Statutes of Athena and Zeus- 2nd century BC

!st century BC rings

Gold torque with Lynx head terminals

Mid 17th century earrings

Gold ornaments from Cylades- 19th century

Macedonian Reception Room- 18th century

Early example of Epirote jewellery-first half of 18th century

Naval battle of Samos

Costume- shoes with pom poms

Queen Victoria of Great Britain- mid 19th century

Poster during WWII

Flag with slogan Union or Die-belonging to a leader of the Cretan
Revolution in 1895

Dancing Bear in the Streets of Athens 1891

After the museum, we walked up the street to the Kolonari neighbourhood for some lunch. Lots of nice apartment buildings in this neighbourhood.

Balcony with a lot of plants. Apartments tend to be only 4-6 stories and often have balconies and awnings

We decided to have a coffee at Da Capo, a very buzzy place. One orders coffee and sandwiches at a bar and then takes them to a table. We each had a sandwich and a coffee and people-watched for a while. It is so nice to be able to sit outside in the sun.

Sandwich counter at Da Capo

Outside at Da Capo

After our lunch we wandered around Kolonaki enjoying the sunny day. Stores tend to close earlier on Saturday (around 4:00 p.m.), so we headed down to one of the main pedestrian streets and ran into a huge anti-Syrian war and anti-racism demonstration. [Alain and I always manage to run into demonstrations on our holidays]

March 18 commemorated the first dead of the uprising in Syria in 2011. It was a very large demonstration that was heading to the square in front of the Parliament Buildings. Most of the signage was in Greek, of course, but there were some signs in English. We talked to one demonstrator who gave us some anti-racism stickers.

Open the Border- Close All Camps

Europa Untold- the fall of Icarus-- very interesting message

Lots of anti-fascism messaging

Each group in the march had particular signs and slogans

No to Fortress Europe

After watching the demo, we headed to a recommended Greek wine bar- Heteroclito. I had a glass of a lovely red wine from Santorini (Kameni 2013) and Alain had a red (Filia Gi 2015) from Thessaly (central Greece). It didn't hurt that they were playing jazz from a Swiss internet station, which we later looked up back at the apartment.

With a lovely Santorini red

Outside of wine bar

After our wine, we went back to the apartment for a rest before dinner. We headed out to Mavro Provato ("Black Sheep'') for dinner at 8:30 p.m. We were very lucky in that the restaurant was only 10 minutes away from our apartment. It had been recommended by Carolina, our Culinary Backstreets guide, as well as the New York Times. Fabulous food at very reasonable prices. We had a table outside with a heater. We were served an amuse bouche of raki and salsa and bread. We ordered a wonderful fava bean (in Greece this is yellow split peas) and eggplant dips as appetizers and then shared a main of slow cooked lamb and potatoes. A nice glass of Greek red wine and espresso added to an excellent meal.