National Archaeology Museum - Athens

Being the culture vultures that we are, Alison and I spent the afternoon in the National Archaeology Museum.

Ah, what a fantastic work of art!!Pretty as a picture!

This guy was salvaged from a ship wreck. Not quite sure exactly what was going on with the 2 halves - was one half stuck in an air pocket and so did not rot, or was the good half just a recreation to show you what the sculpture might have looked like.

Way cool octopus pot

Hmm seems the ancient greeks might have invented table tennis, and here we have the world's first table tennis bat - then again, maybe not!

The cyclades are the island group that we were heading to, consisting of Santorini and Mykonos amongst others. Above is a typical Cycladean sculpture. Although you are allowed to take photos in the museum, apparently not of this sculpture, so I was viciously assaulted by a guard for taking this photo, but in my defense, I hadnt seen the sign.

Most cyladean statues have the arms folded, or, like below the bodies have a typical violin shape.

Original Greek football star

Looks like this guy might have had one too many.

Oh dear, looks like this guy had way too many!!

No-one is sure if this god is supposed to be Zeus or Poseidon, because whatever he is holding is missing. If he was throwing a lightning bolt, then its Zeus, but if he's holding a trident, then he's Poseidon.

Now for some weird reason, you can take photos in the museum, but you are not allowed to be in the photos yourself, otherwise Alison would definitely have been throwing her own lightning bolts around here.

We tried of course, but the guards all dress in civvies, and leap out at you, hurling abuse the moment you try take a photo of yourself! Crazy Greeks!

We did meet one really interesting guard who accosted us, and proceeded to ask us all sorts of questions about Greek mythology, and shouting "Bravo Bravo" if we got one right, and was always trying to come in for the hug, but would back off at the last minute.

We did learn some fine facts:

- Uranus was the Greek god of the sky, which is where the word urinate comes from - basically its Uranus pissing on your head when it rains! Uranus was the mate of the earth goddess Gaia. One of their children, Cronos (time) chopped off Uranus's genitals, and flung them into the sea, and the Goddess of love, Aphrodite, rose from the sea as the offspring of Uranus's genitals.

- The word comedy derives from the Greek word "komos" meaning village, where the locals used to sing and drink and have fun

- The word Tragedy derives from the Greek "tragos aeidein" meaning goat song. Something to do with the sacrificing of goats.