One of my battle buddies treated me to some ice cream. Although I really didn't need it, I couldn't resist the ice creamy chocolatey goodness. And its an american ice cream bar, or something, because it has an American Flag printed on the side. Or maybe its a wannabe american icecream, to capatalize on that which is America.
YOu know, I really didn't need that Ice Cream Bar.
Then we headed back to the Ruins via the Ampatheater again, and I saw these ruins behind me and wanted another picture (complete with Ice Cream Cone thingy)
I just thought this archway was way cool :)
This be the reconstruction effort that is currently underway to restore parts of Philippi, I just thought it was cool and took a picture of it. And its one of the few where I'm not actually in the picture!
I think every time I saw a piece of Philippi sitting there with lettering still etched in the side, I got a picture of me with it. I don't think I could resist, or something
This is a partial greek statue that resides in the northern part of Philippi that still stands, and has weathered over 2 millenia of snow, sleet, rain, the ottoman empire, and tourists.
So what's one more going to do?
I'm sorry, I just looked at this thing and all I could see was CLIMB ME
I think when you think of ancient ruins, you think of pillars. I saw some more, with ruins strown about behind me, and so I took this as a sign.
Um, you might get sick of me posing for pictures, but I'm sorry, I ain't done yet.
This is all that remains of Bascilica B. Just ruins, but these are actually pretty impressive, I saw a drawing of what it probably looked like and I thought that was pretty dang sweet. So anyway, you have this entry way type place and thats pretty much the main gist of Philippi. This place is literally in ruins.
And right before the Bascilica, stood a pillar with something written in Greek on it. I hope I didn't desecrate anything by taking a stand and posing for pictures.
Some more. . .
Behold, the private water closet for the supreme beings that ran Philippi. Unlike the puny underlings, who had to share the public toilet (and a few priveleged folks that had indoor plumbing!) this is where the great ones urinated and defecated! Alexander the Great may have even once stood on this very throne!
Um, hold on for just a moment.
By the way, the following are the public toilets.
I managed to sit on one of those too.
The highlight of my trip, sitting on an ancient Greek Toilet. I think they are better then some of the common european toilets, let me tell you. But thats a post for day Four. (which was the shortest day of them all)
I love these walls. We crawled all over them.
Um, don't mind me, acting like, once again, a dork. I just saw this broken pot and said "that looks like an egg!"
I'm just curious how long these ones have been around.
What, you think I would pass by a perfect opportunity to take advantage of these old pedastel type thingees just laying around?
Just over from under my left foot, the second line. It says Philip. See! Something discussing how Philippi is named for King Philip of Macedonia. Or something. Anybody speak Greek?
Tis ancient coffins. Made out of concrete. Which tells me that unless I want my bones excravated in a thousand years, don't get buried in anything fancy.
Greek Kitty! I'm telling you, cats are everywhere here, man!
A monument simply known, as a three niches. You can sort of make out the left one, but its hard to see.
And I had to climb up into it.
Um, about this time, my camera started freaking out and I thought I had dropped it, or something. Which made me a tad bit frustrated. And as you can see, I took a lot of pictures.
Of course, then we went to the Site of Lydia's Baptism, and for you Christians out there, she is the first European to be baptised into the church as described in Acts 16 as well.
It was a really pretty and quite a relaxing place. It wasn't very far from the ruins of Philippi, only about a mile or so away.
Because my camera was freakin' out, I didn't get any pictures of the site with me in them, but I did manage to get a shot of it.
One of the soldiers even got baptised while we were there. I think it would be pretty cool to be baptised in a place such as this, but being in a religion that believes in Baptism by full immersion, its a bit shallow and that would actually be difficult here.
But still, it was a very neat experience, and I probably would have been a lot more spiritually inclined if I had a functioning camera that I wasn't fretting over. I mean, I seriously thought I had broken it or something.
Turns out, it just ran out of batteries. I put regular Double A's in and discovered this thing chews them up and spits them out with no more thought about it.
Anyway, there is a Greek Orthodox Church on the site and we went in there and had a small devotional and sang a couple of Hymns. One I had never heard before, the other turned out to be one of my favorites. (which for the life of me I don't remember, I would have if I wasn't trying to recount these events two weeks later, my feeble mind is fickle on such matters! I guess I shall consult the tape, I video taped us singing a verse within the church.
They had a little shop at the site of Lydia's Baptism where you could buy an assortment of various different items of religious nature and I picked up a little picture of Paul. Since this was a trip about him and his journeys, I thought it was appropriate.
After spending an hour in Lydia, we headed back to the hotel, where we were treated to Dinner. I had chicken, it was good.
Like my hat? I picked it up at Kavala the day before and started wearing it around. We also got back to the Hotel pretty early that day, around fourish, and I spent the evening walking around on the beach and getting into my PTs and diving into the swimming pool. See, I had no swimming suit so I had to make do with what I had.
No pictures. Just a recount in a journalistic fashion.
But this day really was one of the highlights of my time here in the Balkans in general. Philippi was particularly amazing, just to be able to see all of these ancient sites was pretty sweet in my opinion. And it got a traveling bug going within me, see? I really would like to take advantage of my youth and see the world.
I'm doing it little by little!
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