greek salad+souvlaki+beach+birthday=amazing!

well hi everyone...
it's been awhile so i will try and get you up to speed in about 15min...otherwise, my internet will cut me off.

IM FINALLY IN GREECE! It's been a long journey but totally worth it. We left Rome on a train to Bari, Italy...while on this train, we met a italian, professional soccer player on the division II league in southern italy, that decided to sit in our section. immediately started talking to us and asked if we spoke italian...it was so funny because jodi claims he had checked me out while walking past our car..anyways, it was fun to try to communicate even tho he knew no english and we knew no italian.kinda communicated with the spanish since it's so similar to italian. but it was funny because he said "i love you.. then said..i mean, are you single?" to me and then jodi. it's so much fun to speak with foreigners! anyways, we traveled a long way to greece on a ferry from bari to patras greece, then from patras to athens...we met a guy named steven on our ferry from edwardsville, and he was alone traveling, so we played cards and chatted with him. he helped us find our way along the long journey (trying to catch buses/trains from port to station, etc.) our boat ride from athens to paros (cyclades greek island)took longer than we thought..5 1/2 hrs and got in around 2am with no place to staybecause everythng online was BOOKED! I have a friend, Ilias, from Paros who I met in Chicago who told me that we would have no problem finding a place to stay since all the hostel/camping places hold up signs when all the tourists come in. Ilias used to work at Camping Koulas in Parikia which is right down the road from the port, and he said look for that sign. Sure enough, we saw a sign for the place and they had room! we were so excited, but it was camping in a tent, which was totally fine by us...jodi's first time camping! anyways, we had alreayd booked our camping place for the next few nights at a different town on the island, naoussa...camping is so much cheaper! anyways, my birthday was the first full day we were on paros and we went to the beach, had fantastic greek salads (love the feta) and met up with Ilias' brother Billy and his cousin Adi. They took us out on the town for my birthday and it was fun to see the excitement on their faces because they were excited that I knew Ilias and had recently seen him (they haven't seen him for a few years).Anyways, we have hung out with them the past few days actually...We played beach volleyball with them a few days ago, in addition to meeting some other cousins and another beautiful, beshku brother, Augustino-doesn't speak much english! Anyways, my legs got a bit cut up from the sand, in addition to Jodi getting some blisters from the hot, hot sand!! It was so much fun! After, the boys invited us to come over for dinner, that Augustino cooked...Greek Salad, a kind of pasta, tsatkiki (sp?)-yum!, and bread. He kept refilling our drinks whenever they would get half full and would not let us help out at all!! Ok, so I might just marry a Greek! :) Anyways, we played some 500 Rummy and then went down the street to play some pool. Very Fun Day!

Yesterday a few of them took us to Punda Beach on the other side of the island (right across from the Greek Island of Naxos) and it had a pool, loud music, and of course the beach. All the boys were doing all kinds of dives and flips into the pool...boys being boys! Anyways, we ended up going out last night in Naoussa with Billy and his cousin Robbie and danced it up..even Jodi danced and she loved it!! Anyways, today we just stayed around our camp and went to the beach across the street which is pretty low key...I can't believe that I leave a week from tomorrow! We are headed to Berlin, Germany on Thursday...excited, but will miss the great island of Paros. Off to go have a crepe and then take the bus back to our camp! miss you all! can't wait to post more pics! :)