The more things change, the more they stay the same

It's been awhile. What have I been up to?
First I was depressed,
then I got robbed,
then I was traveling,
then I got sick.

Now I'm back and kind of better.

It's easy to see that the only fun thing I did was traveling. First I went to Paris for a week and then to Thessaloniki for 4 days.
Things Paris and Thessaloniki have in common:
a. I studied in both cities,
b. I have a close friend living in each city,
c. They are damp, cold and dreary places in the winter, hot and humid in the summer, but wonderful all other times,
d. They are both far more beautiful than Athens.

In Paris I stayed at my good friend Amin's place. We had two years of catching up to do! I met his cute new boyfriend and said hi to his nice ex's - that boy sure has good taste! Apart from catching up with people, I meandered around the city. Actually I did a fairly good impersonation of an emo (or is that a goth?); I visited graveyards (I had never bothered to visit Pere Lachaise before) and a walked by myself in the hail and rain without an umbrella (not my fault the weather was foul and my umbrella was stolen!). Paris is lovely, yet depressing if you're single. I tried to cheer myself up with shopping (which only half-worked since I didn't have enough money) and taking photos (which was hard, because I was using a borrowed camera.)

As soon as I returned to Greece, I was off again to Thessaloniki, with my sister and my friend Voula this time. Thessaloniki was almost just as I left it. The only difference is that they're finally begun work on the long promised metro line, and the center city looks like one big construction site. (In other words what Athens looked like the years before the Olympics.) In Thessaloniki I took my friends for walks in the cold and we did a lot of eating. Thessaloniki is famed for it's food! I realised, yet again, that I know Thessaloniki like the back of my hand - far far better than I know my hometown of Athens.

And upon returning home, I realise that like most Athenians, I share a strange love-hate relationship with my city. It's easy to love her when I'm away, and very very easy to hate her when I'm home.