Tastes of Bites for Those Who have Passion the Best (said the menu)

We are on the third floor of this house at Anatolia College

We were at the travel agent in downtown Thessaloniki and were making arrangements for the train to Athens.

"But wait", said the travel agent, "the trains may be on strike tomorrow and then you can't travel".

"How will I know if they are going on strike?" I asked, figuring I would just have to be caught in the midst of gridlock.

"Oh, I can make a phone call."  the agent replied with a helpful smile.

"You can make a phone call and see if there is going to be a strike? You mean these things are scheduled and a phone call will tell you the answer?'

"Yes, of course!" she replies, like everyone knows that you just make a phone call to see if the railway is going to strike. (I remember in my college days when I worked on the railroad and the railway workers kept striking and even I didn't know when we were going to strike. No one ever phoned me.
She makes a phone call.

"It's OK! No Strike!" she says with a smile. "Have a nice journey!"

We spent the day wandering the modern city of Thessaloniki. It is right on the Mediterranean and has a long promenade along the shore and a long traffic-clogged two lane street next to that and about a thousand cafes along the street. Even yesterday with its mid 40s temperatures with sun brought out a lot of the locals. There really aren't too many tourists this time of year. It is winter and jackets and even gloves are the order of the day. It is apparent that in the summer this part of town is totally crowded. A few of the cafes were packed. If you are male and want to look like the locals (first off, don't wear an Eddie Bauer jacket)....wear black. The blacker the better. Black jacket or coat...a black leather jacket (no, don't think James Dean) is the preferred color thus far in our trip. Women...if you are young and modern....boots. Boots with heels, calf length, knee length. Boots. By the way, lots of people do indeed wear Nike and Adidas and athletic shoes like Americans even though everyone told us not to wear them. But, frankly, no one is that concerned with what you wear and they have pretty much the same clothes that we buy at Target (though the young and hip are dressed in black and boots)

There are Greek Orthodox churches at every turn, jammed in between modern office buildings and apartment complexes. Actually it is the modern buildings that are jammed in. I wanted to go into a couple Orthodox churches but they were locked up tight with gates and all. Many had small prayer chapels on the street outside the main church. Inside were some icons and candles to light for a small donation. I went inside one and lit a candle. The faithful had been there and many candles were lit and placed in the sand/water tables. The city has Byzantine era churches and portions of an ancient wall.

For lunch we wandered one part of the city not far from the water. Many small restaurants had clustered in this quarter. Along the water one can find many American named restaurants like Applebees and Starbucks, but the local ones in this area were in a couple small streets.

It was noon and not yet time for the locals to eat, so we had an easy time choosing. This was, what seemed to us, to be an authentic Greek restaurant. When we said, "Hello" the Greek menus were whisked away and English menus place before us. We chose a salad with some kind of balsamic vinegrette and "ghoast" cheese which they explained was lamb cheese. (Is that possible?). They also had a large-bean salad with some sort of sauce and was tasty and seemed similar to the bean plate in Istanbul.

On the bottom of the menu was a recipe for a "Beet Root Salad of Byzantine Thessaloniki." In America, we are lucky if we can get a recipe from our Aunt which was used in the 1950's but here in Greece, they print recipes for salads from 1500 years ago.

The shelves were filled with bottles of Ouzo, or however it was spelled, the liquor. A group of professionals came into the place for lunch and everyone ordered a shot of Ouzo and one man stood to propose a toast and I was all ready to hear him exclaim, "Oophah!" which I never quite understood, but they kept shouting it in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" and they shouted it about every five minutes in this Greek restaurant in Chicago where I once ate.

So here I was in actual Greece, with actual-live Greeks and they had actual Greek booze and and I am getting pumped to hear this traditional Greek toast....the man stands, raises his glass and exclaims, "Cheers!"

"Cheers!" shout all the Greeks in the restaurant.

Peace,  Bob