After getting into my hostel around 11 a.m., I met up with one of our group members, Robert, who is an American ex-pat currently living in Athens. He's a retired electrical engineer now volunteering at the American School of Classical Studies, which funds much of the American research in Greece.

Once we'd successfully found a SIM card for my cell phone, Robert took me to have a Nescafe Frappe (with ice cream--a Greek and Cypriot favorite) at the Numismatic Museum. The house that the museum is in now formerly belonged to one of the early figureheads of archaeology, Heinrich Schliemann.

Schliemann was the archaeologist who "discovered" the site of Troy, though he plowed right through all of the stratigraphic levels at the site until he found gold. (The Bronze Age Troy he identified was actually about 5 levels too early--that didn't stop him from dressing his wife in "Helen of Troy's" jewelry.) Schliemann was obsessed with finding the remains of the mythical sites mentioned by Homer, and Troy was only the first.

Schliemann also excavated at Mycenae, the legendary home of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, both in the Iliad. Mycenae is a Bronze Age site on the mainland of Greece with a huge citadel overlooking the surrounding area.

It was completely fitting to spend my first afternoon in Athens with Schliemann and Nescafe!