Our flight from Athens left today around 1:30pm and we got into Amsterdam around 4:10pm their time (they are an hour ahead of Athens). Our flight to Houston doesn’t leave until tomorrow morning so we had the evening in Amsterdam to see and do as much as we could. We got an Uber to our hotel to leave our bags and then our first stop was the Anne Frank House. Unfortunately, the picture below was all that we were able to see of the house. Apparently, you have to book tickets online like 3 months in advance! Huge bummer, especially since would could have booked them if only we had known. Ah well, what can you do? We flirted with the idea of doing a canal cruise but then just ended up exploring both the sites and tastes of Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a GORGEOUS city with wide canals separating tall, pointed brick buildings stacked right up next to eachother for as long as you can see. Once the sun sets, white lights outlining the canal bridges light up. And bikes. So many bikes! It is the most romantic looking city I’ve ever been to. And don’t even get me started on the food. Earlier on in our exploring, we found a bakery that had loads of different kinds of sausage and cheese samples including cumin cheese, smoked gouda cheese, etc. We bought a piece of cheese bread and white chocolate cheesecake that were absolutely TO DIE FOR. Later, we tried a warm stroopwafle like the one the main character eats off of the movie, “The RM.” I’ll tell you what, they are just as good as they look! Man, I wish we had more time to explore the city but the time that we did have was a blast! We finished off the day by watching, “La La Land.” Here’s to gearing ourselves up for 14 hours of flying tomorrow! Bleh.

Today we were bound and determined to make it a better day than yesterday. We had a pretty chill morning and then around 11am we went out in hopes of seeing the Palace of the Grand Master. It was open. Whoop! The castle was INcredible. I couldn’t believe the sheer amount of living space there was as we explored room after room. And that’s not even taking into account the secret passageways that were barred off. I don’t think that I really realize that castles like that actually still exist in real life rather than just in the movies. SUCH a cool experience. At 12pm we met up with an outdoor adventure company to go rock climbing! I can’t say I’ve ever rock climbed with the ocean at my back. It was a pretty stunning view/experience. This company usually takes out a lot bigger groups but not surprisingly, we were the only two. I thought that maybe it’d be a little awkward but the two guys we went with were good company and super funny. After climbing 3 routes and eating lunch, we hiked up to the top of the mountain and did a 100 foot rappel into a cave. Yeah, it was legit! Definitely the highlight of the trip to Rhodes! One of the outdoor adventure guys dropped us off straight at the airport which was super convenient. We got back into Athens around 7:30pm and made our way to Monastiraki for a yummy dinner of hummus with crackers and vegetables. And of course, we also stopped by our favorite crepe place for dessert. Our crepe guy made it extra special tonight… it was loaded like twice as thick as it usually is and of course, he gave us a discount. We couldn’t leave without taking a selfie with him (see picture below). Crepe guy, thanks for making Greece great. Heather and I will never forget you! Hahaha tonight after grabbing a few groceries for tomorrow, we also said goodbye to Shimshu. In his broken English, he told us that he’d always remember us in his heart. AWWWW 🙂 We stayed up super late tonight packing and cleaning but it’ll worth it because it means that we can have a relatively relaxed morning tomorrow. I can’t believe things are really coming to a close!

Wow, what a day. Our plan for today was to make our way to Faliraki beach and hopefully do some bungee jumping and/or snorkeling/scuba diving. We made our way to the bus station around 8:45am. Our first indication that something was amiss was the conversation that we had with the ticket office guy. We asked him if he knew about where exactly they do bungee jumping at Faliraki and he responded by saying that we should be asking when not where and that they don’t start until May. Bummer. Well, we figured we’d still be able to find something fun to do since the internet promised a variety of high adventure things. We got dropped off and our first order of business was to find some food for breakfast. Heather’s been craving pancakes for a long time so we found a restaurant that seemed to make pancakes. When we tried to order, however, they told us that they only had sandwiches around this time of year. Weird… but since we’re accustomed  to Athens where food shops line essentially every street, we left in search of a different place that could deliver on the pancakes. I found a place on my phone and navigated there but it was closed. Come to think of it, EVERYTHING WAS CLOSED. We both knew that it wasn’t tourist season but we had no idea that meant that ALL of Faliraki beach shuts down. Literally, there were innumerable amounts of restaurants after excursion scheduling places all closed with plastic and dust on the seats. Oh, and not a soul in sight! As it turns out, we should have done some more digging into the time to visit Rhodes. Haha in the seemingly 30 blocks that we walked in search of food, I think we saw about 5 people and they all gave us this look like, “Joke’s on you!” After walking for over an hour, Heather and I were a bit hangry. I saw an aloe plant and commented to Heather that I think the inside of the leaf is edible! So funny. Uber as well as Beat (Athens’ more popular Uber equivalent) don’t exist on Rhodes so Heather searched online for a taxi service. It’s a good thing too because the taxi ride back to the happening part of town took about 20 minutes. We would have been walking for hours! We didn’t really know where we wanted to go but our taxi driver told us about a big party going on and we figured that meant finding somewhere to eat so we told him to take us there!  We sat down outside and ordered some lunch. Things went from bad to worse when, shortly after ordering, Heather had no idea where her phone was and figured that she must have left it in the taxi. Ahhhh. We both started praying that somehow, some way we’d be able to get it back. Heather found the webpage with the taxi service number on it but my phone wouldn’t call it. (Apparently miracle number 1 was that Heather was able to call it in the first place to request a taxi). I found an email for them and tried that but I got a message back saying that it was an invalid email address. Unsure about what to do at that point, we asked our waitress about whether we needed an area code to call the number listed on the website. She told us that my phone wouldn’t work and then kindly used her phone to call the number and talk to the taxi service who then contacted the driver and HE HAD HEATHER’S PHONE! After giving our server lots of thanks and a nice tip, we headed around the corner to meet up with our taxi driver. He told us that luckily, he hadn’t given anyone else a ride yet or most likely someone would have stolen it. So true and wow, that is an honest man! I gave him a nice tip as well and Heather retrieved her phone. WOW, seriously such a miracle! Heather and I sat down on a bench and sent an audible prayer of thanks to God for answering our prayers. We also had a mini powwow about how to salvage this trip. Naturally, the next thing we did was get some ice cream. So apparently today is national day for Greece. Because of that, there were hundreds and hundreds of military men doing a parade for all of the onlookers. We wandered around to a little pier and ran into the spot where one of the 7 wonders of the world use to stand, the Colossus of Rhodes. Super cool! While there, we also met this super nice lady from Denmark who educated us about loads of things about Rhodes. One of the cool things that we learned is that the mountains we were looking at in the near distance is Turkey. It only takes about an hour boat ride to get there. Crazy! Our nice Denmark lady also told us about a beach about 5 minutes away so we made that our next stop. After spending a few hours there, we thought we’d try to check out the archaeological sites in Old Town where we’re staying. We got to the Palace of the Grand Master and found a sign on the gate saying that all the archeological sites are closed on Monday because of the holiday. Swing and a miss! Apparently today was a terrible day to visit Rhodes haha. So originally our plan was to spend a day on Faliraki beach and then spend the next day in Old Town… and in one day, both plans were foiled! Ah well. Dinner time rolled around and we decided to head back to the beach where there was a restaurant that our Denmark friend raved about. We had a salad, lamb, and the most divine garlic cheese bread with feta cheese dip. YUM. At one point, all the lights in the restaurants shut down for a good 15 minutes and I felt like waiving down one of the waiters and personally apologizing because I’m certain that we were the ones that brought bad luck into that establishment! After dinner, we miraculously found a grocery store that was open so that we could avoid having to eat out for all three meals tomorrow. When we got back to our apartment, I had to smash a massive spider with the same cup that we used to entrap our cockroach yesterday. Phew, can’t saw I’m going to miss our apartment! After seeing all the boats in the harbor just right outside of Old Town, we figured it was fitting to watch Pirates of the Caribbean. I only made it about 40 minutes before falling asleep but hey, Heather enjoyed it! So yea, definitely not how we thought the day would go but I mean, we did get to spend some time on the beach so it couldn’t have been too bad 🙂 

We found out today at church that pretty much everyone (including the branch president) thought we were just another set of missionaries this whole time. Super funny. I mean, I guess it’s a good thing that we still look young enough to be missionaries. Or is it? I’m still not sure. It’s funny because a couple of Sundays ago when we had the temple dedication in replacement of church, Heather left to the bathroom before the dedication started and I kind of had this thought like, “Should I go with her?” We had a good laugh about it later. Hahaha so I guess the members here aren’t the only ones getting confused. It’s just that we’ve literally been together 24/7 for almost a full month. I have no idea how she has dealt with me for this long! Bless her heart. After church we rushed back home to make some lunch really quick and pack. Had we really thought things through then we would have brought lunch and our packed bags (since the airport is actually pretty close to church) but ah well. I really thought that we were cutting things close when we arrived at the airport at around 3:50pm for our 5pm flight. Turns out we were just fine. We got through security in 5 minutes, no joke! It was incredible. The flight got in around 6pm to the most ghetto airport we’ve ever seen. I’ll have to take some pictures on the way back. Anyway, we’re staying in what is called Old Town. Literally it’s like stepping back into time to the Renaissance Era with cobblestone streets and lanterns. Super cool! Our apartment is VERY cozy. As in it’s tiny. It’ll do the job for two nights but I think I’d pull my hair out if it was all the space that I had to live in longterm. It’s very musty smelling and I may or may not have had a battle with a cockroach that ran over Heather’s hand while she was in bed (eck!) so yea, I suppose the similarities to mission life continue! Here’s to praying that I don’t sleep next to any critters tonight…

I can’t believe it but today was our last day. This morning we had a bit of a struggle getting to Oinofyta Camp. To explain, the regular train that we take to get to Oinofyta or Malakasa broke down last week so we’ve been riding a smaller temporary train and it seems like the intercom system that announces the stops  doesn’t work very well. We heard it announce the station two before ours but then the system stopped announcing the stops and we got distracted by talking. All the sudden we realized that the train ride was a lot longer than it usually is and that the countryside we were seeing didn’t look familiar at all. The intercom system started working again and we found out that we were three stops past ours. So funny! We would do this our last day. You know, it only seems fitting since we got lost our first day in Greece. Apparently we’ve come full circle! We had to wait about 35 minutes, but we caught the train coming the other way and arrived at Oinofyta Camp at 11am. Pretty much all the chopping was done so we jumped right into cleaning. On the menu for today was an Afghani dish of rice and beans. For the kids activities I was in charge of the makeshift bowling station. I say makeshift because the bowling pins are five big water bottles filled with colored water and the bowling ball is a rugby ball. The kids LOVE it. Anyway, we always do the same warmup and cool down routine with the kids that includes things like the Macarena and the hokey poky. It felt surreal doing that for the last time. Saying goodbye to the kids and walking away from the camp to the train station was kind of sad. We’re definitely feeling bitter sweet about finishing up. Saying goodbye to the FoodKind director was also sad. I really look up to what’s she’s doing here. She told us that she really appreciates when she has volunteers that come and are just able to jump in instead of having to be micromanaged and she thanked us for all our hard work. It was nice to hear that. One of the refugees (who was also the chef today) walked us to the station again. He opened up to us about why he had to leave Afghanistan… apparently, culturally it’s not accepted to date in Afghanistan. He had to leave because his girlfriend’s brothers were threatening to kill him for dating her. Her own brothers did kill her for the same reason. Wow, I just can’t even begin to imagine that things like this still happen in 2019. I know the American culture isn’t perfect but it’s makes me super grateful that the situation I described is not something that I would ever have to deal with. After eating dinner tonight we said hi to our favorite crepe maker and asked him about whether he will be working on Tuesday. He does work so we’ll have him make our crepe on Tuesday one last time. In the same crepe shop they have frozen yogurt so we got some. Our guy gave us a pretty big discount just like he did last time on the crepe. I guess it pays to become regulars? Haha today Heather and I got talking about the things that we will miss and other things that we won’t miss. Here’s our list!

Miss 

-The refugees, specifically the kids!

-Shimshu, our mini market owner that always has a smile on his face.

-Our closet elevator. Sure, it could put any claustrophobic into a straight up panic attack but it’s kind of become homey.

-Fresh cheap veggies and fruit. It’s fun having mini markets practically on every corner.

-Eating kiwi every day. Yes, this deserves its own category outside of the fresh fruit.

-Mousaka, our fave Greek food.

-Walking down homeless street. There’s a street right by our house that we call homeless street because pretty much the whole block is full of homeless people. Yes, it’s super sad, a little scary, and smelly but it’s an experience everyone should have.

-Crepes made by our guy. This is an obvious one. Heather and I have given up on finding bueno and white praline but homemade recipes exist so we bought loads of hazelnuts and a fancy crepe maker. As you can see, we are quite serious about trying to recreate the masterpiece that is this crepe! Haha

-The nice weather. Here’s to hoping it’s not frigid in Utah when we return!

-The beach and proximity -t o it.

-FoodKind’s Director (she’s legit!).

-The waking city.

Not miss

-Second hand smoke.

-Bad smells.

-Trash everywhere.

-Pee square. The homeless street that I mentioned has a little corner that we endearingly (perhaps that’s the wrong word) call pee square because it always reeks of pee. We think this might be the designated bathroom spot for all the homeless people that live there.

-The f word. Everyone uses it! All the time!

-Trying to clean the massive pots and getting covered in soot. Weird that we don’t have any pictures showing us being covered in soot, but it was a thing!

-Loud noises at all hours of the night.

This has been such a great volunteer opportunity and learning experience and we feel super grateful that it’s worked out the way it has despite the little hiccups. Our flight leaves on Wednesday so we’re taking the last couple days of our trip to visit the island Rhodes!

We got a message from the FoodKind director this morning asking us if we could go to Malakasa camp to run Refugym. Usually the director and a few other people do Refufym on Fridays and then the rest of the group cooks for the unregistered refugees in Malakasa Camp. We had been planning on cooking but she sent us instead to do Refugym because the van is still in the shop so they only have one car to work with. In the morning one of the refugees ran a Zumba class. Getting the music to work was a bit of a mess but it eventually worked out. I helped man the kid watching station while Heather worked out with the class. It was a lot smaller class than normal apparently because of Islamic New Years. After Zumba, we played volleyball until lunch and then it was on to ping pong. It’s interesting because I feel like I’m doing more for the refugees by providing a meal for them rather playing sports with them. It’s certainly easier and more quantifiable to address physical needs but I need to remind myself that sometimes the things that we can do to most help other people isn’t something grand but rather pretty simple. I’m not sure I understood how important play is for adults until I read a book by Brene Brown where she touches on the research regarding play. Anyway, at 2pm we had the ‘women’s party’ where the girls get together and do makeup and hair. It turns out that all of us volunteers somehow became the models as the girls practiced on us (hence the crazy bright lipstick and different colored fingernail polish). I certainly didn’t expect to get a makeover in Greece!

Today was a cooking day in Oinofyta Camp. The director and interim director had to have an admin day so Heather and I were in charge. Number 1 goal was to not burn down the place or the food… I’m happy to announce that we reached both! We made an Afghani rice dish today called kabli palou. It was super yummy! Definitely made it into my ethnic cookbook. Today is actually Islamic New Years. I didn’t know but apparently they use the lunar calendar. Our chef today was saying that it just became 1998 for them. I’m not really sure how that works but anyway, there was suppose to be a big party at the camp today with a live band. We were going to distribute the food there and also nix the kids games because of it but apparently they all partied a ton last night so they were still sleeping/hung over. Super funny. So yea the party got postponed! We just distributed food as normal and then winged the kids activities. On Thursdays we pack up the cooking supplies (it usually stays in a storage room at the camp) to take it to FoodKind’s accommodation because we cook at home on Friday for the unregistered refugees in Malakasa Camp. Unfortunately, our big van is in the shop so we only had a small compact car to transport everything. It took a couple of trips and some finagling but we worked it out! I can neither confirm nor deny that after dinner we staked out our crepe shop again… our guy was there! He told us that he thinks that his crepe has become our addiction. You’re right about that my friend! We told him that we leave next week and that we may just have to come by one more time. Four times in four weeks… hey, it could be worse!

Today was a Refugym day at Malakasa Camp. I went with the guys again to play soccer. The weather was loads better than last week! It still wasn’t sunny but the jerseys are long-sleeved and super thick so the slight chill was appreciated. Course my face still went instantly red anyway… darn that red hair curse! At one point one of the guys asked me if I was okay. Haha I just don’t think he’s ever seen a white girl turn into a tomato before! I’m so glad that I could culture him in that way. I pulled my hamstring near the beginning of the game so my right leg feels a bit like jello while walking but it was definitely still worth it. Instead of doing Refugym, the other half of the crew went to Oinofyta Camp for some manual labor. One of the longterm FoodKind volunteers here is trying to start a food garden in the camp so they did some clearing of the land. Anyway, for dinner tonight we went back to the Greco Project for their delicious mousaka and Caesar salad. After the first creamy bite, these were Heather’s words: and I quote, “Wam, bam green eggs and ham.” Couldn’t have said it better myself! From there, we made our way to the crepe shop to stake it out. Our crepe guy wasn’t there so we forwent (is that a word?? nope, don’t think so) getting one. I’m not sure I’ve mentioned this before but Heather and I have been on quite the wild goose chase for these two hazelnut spreads called bueno praline and white praline. Both are key ingredients in the life changing crepe that I’ve talked about a few times. I just think this crepe is a bit like the gospel—after trying it, you just feel the need to share! That’s why we want to get our hands on a jar of each of these but as it turns out, they are quite elusive. The mini markets, the super markets, and even the super super markets have failed us! Heather told me today that she would resort to canoodling with anyone that handed us over the goods (I definitely would too) which I think is a pretty hefty payment… we just need to find a dealer!

Today was a cooking day in Oinofyta camp. My roomies will laugh at me for this but I figured I’d do a good ol’ fashion play by play of a typical cooking day for us. Heather and I get onto the 8:51 train. It takes an hour to get out to the area so this has become a great time for us to read our scriptures. We show up in the morning around 10am and first tackle the cooking area by giving it all a nice disinfecting scrub. We also squeegee the floor of the washing room since it can become a bit of a swamp in there. After making the cooking area acceptable, we unpack all the food/cooking supplies and set up. When everything is ready, we’ll have about 6 different chopping stations and two massive pots being heated up over an open flame with huge propane tanks that are about as tall as I am. Then we chop, chop, chop. Potatoes, onions, peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, you name it. It all just depends on what the food of the day is. After the chopping is done we usually split up- some of the group will continue cooking while the other part starts with cleanup. The meal is usually ready around 2pm. Obviously, next comes distribution. We line up cafeteria style with one person ladeling portions for everyone. There is another person at the front of the line asking how many adults and kids they are getting food for so that we can keep track of the amount of people we’re feeding and also know how much food to give them. We also have another person handing out bread, one for each person. Meanwhile, the rest of the team is cleaning. The big pots that I mentioned are a bit tricky to clean. Sometimes it seems like it’d almost be easier to hop in to clean it! haha They also get super sooty at the bottom so it’s easy to make a big mess. Distribution and cleanup usually finishes around 3:00pm and then we pack up and start with the kids activities. Heather and I usually catch the 4:51pm train back to Athens which means we return to the city around 6pm.

Heather and I woke up today with a text from the FoodKind director saying that they wouldn’t be needing us today. LAME. We aren’t really sure why since today is one of the days we do Refugym but oh well. Here’s to an unexpected two day weekend! We spent a good majority of the morning tying up some loose ends with work and studying the scriptures. In the afternoon we made our way to the beach. It was a beautiful day! Perhaps it’s a good thing there isn’t a beach close to me in Utah. I think I’d be tempted to become a beach bum… it’s just so calming and peaceful. I’m especially enjoying it during this time of year where it’s too cold to swim meaning that it’s quiet and not crowded at all and so it feels like more of a nature experience. Anyway, for dinner tonight we ate some delicious lamb and then visited a candy shop that looks like the epitome every child’s dream (see picture below). Overall, it was a relaxing day but we’re ready to get back to work!