Food & Cultural Appreciation, Tuesday Third Period

[carbsliftthespirit]

"All right, folks!" Raiden said with an enthusiastic clap of his hands once everyone had assembled. "This week we're heading to my country of origin, although I've never actually been where we're going today, because one of my brothers is...dramatic." No, not that one. "See, I'm from Corinth, which is a little bit west of where we'll be going today: Athens, Greece! Athens is one of the oldest cities in the world, with a recorded history going back almost three and a half thousand years, and evidence of people living in the area going back to...like...thirteen thousand years ago. In ancient times, Athens was one of the most powerful city-states in what is now Greece, and it's considered the birthplace of democracy and the cradle of what we consider Western civilization. In modern times, the metropolitan area is home to almost a third of the population of Greece, home to numerous museums and historical sites like the Acropolis...and they've got some very delicious food.

"Greek food is a Mediterranean diet, which means that it's based on certain things: wheat; olive oil, wine, and seafood traditionally more than red meat, although these days meat is more common...though usually sheep or goat over beef, because the terrain in most of Greece isn't overly suited to cattle. Greece was one of the earliest wine-producing areas in the world, and the olive oil and yogurt from Greece are renowned worldwide. They use a lot of phyllo, which is very thin sheets of dough used for making pastries, both sweet like baklava and savory like spanakopita. Some other Greek foods you may be familiar with include feta cheese, moussaka, which is a delicious baked eggplant casserole with ground lamb, horiatiki, more commonly known in English as 'Greek salad,' tzatziki, a sauce made of that delicious Greek yogurt and cucumber, and gyros or souvlaki, the Greek version of fast food made from meat roasted on a spit. While we're in Athens I would also encourage you to try retsina, a wine made with pine resin that's been produced since ancient times, or ouzo, an anise-flavored spirit." If you did try both of these, you might be left with the suspicion that Raiden was secretly evil. Or you might like them. Who could say?

"I'm starving, so let's head through our portal to Athens and get started on our self-guided food tour!"

Comments

Sign In

[carbsliftthespirit]

Headed to Greece!

Re: Sign In

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

Arden Finch

Re: Sign In

[mustbeawitch]

Lydia Bennet

Re: Sign In

[moreofaponchoguy]

Cal Kestis

Re: Sign In

[giveittoyoursister]

Vi

During the Lecture

[carbsliftthespirit]

Get hyped to head to Greece!

(There is a scooter with a card propped on the handlebars waiting at the Portalocity office for one of you who knows who she is.)

Re: During the Lecture

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

Generals faced down battlefields with less determined expressions than the one that Arden was sporting when she got to class today. She was going to Athens and she was going to enjoy the food and she was gonna--

"Wait, what?"

...Ask a couple of questions, probably.

Questions that would probably be answered with this...card?

Re: During the Lecture

[carbsliftthespirit]

The card said:

Sorry I couldn't find one that would go up stairs
- C

"You get used to it," Raiden told her.

Re: During the Lecture

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

"Do you?" Arden sputtered. "Wait."

She pulled out her phone and pulled up a brief text message chain. The name of the other person was currently entered as Possible Stalker?!? as she showed it to Raiden.

"Is that Castor's number?" she asked. She hoped so. It made the promise of a surprise from a random number so much less terrifying.

Re: During the Lecture

[carbsliftthespirit]

"Oh, yeah, that's Cas," Raiden confirmed. "You didn't pick a color?" Bold move, Finch.

Athens!

[carbsliftthespirit]

It's a beautiful autumn day in Athens, with highs in the low eighties. Perfect weather to stuff yourselves with Greek food and, knowing Athens, probably stumble across at least three sites of ancient ruins without meaning to!

Re: Athens!

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

Arden trundled along on her scooter; she'd been a bit self-conscious, wondering what everybody else would think of it, but so far, most of the tourists and residents had just kind of assumed it was a mini-Vespa or something.

This was so much better than a Segway walking would have been and the sanctity of Lydia's salad remained undisturbed.

"...I think I need more stuffed grape leaves."

Re: Athens!

[mustbeawitch]

"Arden, I'm so glad you're feeling well enough to join us!" Lydia cried. "Would you like me to go fetch you some?"

Re: Athens!

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

"Oh no, I can--" Arden popped up to her feet and then immediately sat back down as her knees buckled. For no reason! Just to be jerks, apparently!

"I mean, um, yeah?" she amended. "If you wouldn't mind? Sorry."

Re: Athens!

[mustbeawitch]

Knees were jerks. It was known.

"Of course!" Lydia said, and hurried off to do just that. When she returned with the grape leaves (two orders, actually, one for herself as well), she asked, "How are you feeling? Did the police catch whoever poisoned you?"

Someone was...a little bit behind on the gossip.

Re: Athens!

[moreofaponchoguy]

Cal had been fully prepared to haul Arden around like a backpack on this trip, but he supposed the scooter was less obtrusive and kinder to his back.

"I can grab you more of anything you need," he offered. He had some of those on his plate already, and he could share, but then he'd have to get more for himself anyway. "How are you holding up?"

Re: Athens!

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

Arden knew better than to try to reach for something on Cal's plate.

"I'm good," she said. "My auto-HVAC is kinda struggling in the heat - guess it's not up to a hundred percent either. And...maybe some more of that good pita and hummus and spanakopita?" She pointed to the vendor with the good hummus, her arm showing the ugly, mottled bruises that remained where the nails had been.

Re: Athens!

[moreofaponchoguy]

This wasn't the first time Cal wished he had Force healing, and it likely wouldn't be the last. The bruises just convinced him to move faster to get the good pita and hummus, and two servings of spanakopita, because that stuff was amazing.

"If you need BD to be a fan when we get back to town, let me know," Cal said, setting the food down in front of her. "I think he'd be happy to be useful." Not that he knew what that felt like.

Re: Athens!

[noonedecidesmyfate]

"I'm so glad you're here," Belle said. "I'd feel terribly guilty enjoying the baklava without you."

She would not feel that guilty. A little though.

Re: Athens!

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

"But you would have brought me some back, right?" Arden asked, giving Belle puppy eyes.

Re: Athens!

[mustbeawitch]

Fancy just casually popping over to Greece for the afternoon! Georgiana would be ever so jealous.

The city was rather dirtier than Lydia had expected in her head, but she supposed that was to be expected. People lived here, after all, and even if you'd gone and built a city out of white stone you couldn't expect it to stay clean. But the food, oh, the food was splendid! She was rather sad they didn't have a Greek restaurant on the island now.

Talk to Raiden

[carbsliftthespirit]

Who is, you guessed it, stuffing his face with Greek food. And buying olive oil and olives and assorted other ingredients to take home.

Fun fact, a statistically improbable number of his brothers are from Greece! Seriously, the entire world for the fallen angels to knock up women in and they all went, "That peninsula over there looks good"? We could have had a beautiful rainbow of men, Osborn. We could have had it all.

OOC

[carbsliftthespirit]

I want Greek food so bad.

Re: OOC

[afraid_of_marshmallows]

If, at any time, you wanna do a hot rainbow recasting, I will be here for you.

Because that's what friends do.

Re: OOC

[carbsliftthespirit]

Bellamy is Henry Golding.

Or Simu Liu. It changes by the day in my head.