Chilling with the Monks in Greece!

I woke up at 5.30 in attempt to head to a monastary far in the north, made everyone sandwiches and thn woke the others. It usually takes about three or four times of me yelling and hitting them to finally wake them up.  After about thirty minutes of that, they finally got out of bed and caught our bus from the bus station. Weirdly, we were the only three on the bus but it was a gorgeous ride through the countryside. The golden sun was just rising, the mountain range stretched along the distance, and my ipod was playing my favorite music, Yonder Mountain String Band. We were dropped off in the middle of nowhere, all around us was lush green grass and mountains back dropping the crop fields. We walked up to an enormous monostarie and silently creeped our way in. It was empty but so beautiful and nothing like I’ve ever seen in my life- it looked like an enormous princess palace, something you’d only see in Disney fairytale movies. We walked into the church and heard the chants and prayers or the monks, They ignored us but we sat and watched their routine for a while, admiring the old, majestic beauty of the church.

Then we walked out the courtyard door that had a sand path leading into the wilderness far in the distance. IT was breathtaking and the air was cold and clear and flower beds and trees crowded the perimeter of the path. I felt completely content and at peace because my favorite pastime ever is walking through nature, exploring unknown territories and feeling one with the earth. I couldn’t help but take a shit ton of pictures also. We got to a dead end and had to walk back to the monostarie. On the way back, a dog that was tied to a tree started barking insanely at us, so we went over to pet it and give it some water. As we were petting it, we heard whimpering sounds coming from behind the tree and five little puppies emerged out of a hole in the ground scrambling out to us, still blind and vulnerable from a recent birth. It was the cutest sight I’ve ever seen. We pet them for a bit, had a photoshoot, and walked back to the monostarie. 

Turns out, we were at the wrong monostarie that we wanted to be at. The one our tour guide told us about was 10 km away! It was completely deserted and freezing and we had seven hours to kill before our bus would pick us up, so we started walking to it.  After about an hour of walking in the freezing cold, an old woman drove by and kindly picked us up and brought us a bit closer. The rest of the hike was epic and the view was magnificent. We saw goats and many different types of birds. We stopped for sandwiches and apples at a tree stub, and then after another hour up a steep mountain, we finally made it. This monostarie was even more beautiful then the last. We explored around for a while but the monks were busy and no one came out to talk to us. We were hoping to meet and talk to a monk and even get a tour from one of them, but they would walk right past us like we were invisible.  Five more hours to kill. The wind picked up and my regret for wearing a skirt in that weather escalated. We all huddled together in a corner waiting for time to pass to finally get on a warm bus and head back to our hostel. I was a little disappointed in the monks. Why wont they greet their visitors? I assumed they weren’t very kind people for allowing three shivering travelers to sit and rot. After sitting and shivering for about 45 minutes, a fifteen year old boy comes out and hands us two mini cinnamon cakes. “This is a gift from the head monks,” he said, then turned and walked away. I smiled and thought to myself, “maybe they are hospitable after all..”. We demolished the cakes and continued to shiver.  A little bit later, the boy comes back and with the little English he knew, he invited us to go inside to warm up. We immediately accepted his invitation and followed him into a big, old fashion room full of couches. He brought us a tray of water, candies, and lit up a primitive fireplace for us and then left to go pray. I was so in amazement by this gesture and felt guilty for having bad thoughts about their community earlier. We hung out on the couches for a while and about an hour later, he came back and said, “Would you like to speak to English speaking Monk?” We greatly accepted and walked across the courtyard to a Monks room. The warmth and generosity they showed us already was unbelievable. We walked into the room and saw an old man with a black church robe and silly hat in a wheelchair. His voice was broken and raspy but he explained to us that he has an illness called ALS which paralyzes and eventually kills you. He had a hard time talking but said he was so happy to be able to speak English because he was originally from New York. He was raised by greek-orthodox parents but didn’t go to church ever because he was a hard core athlete. As he got older, he started seeking out god and explored Buddhism, transcendentalism, meditation, and eventually made his way back to the greek-orthodox community and moved there to be a monk. He spoke slowly but with so much passion and truth. He asked us tons of questions and said  were lucky because our age allows us to be open to new things and were not yet set in our ways. We asked him lots of questions and one thing that I asked was, “Do you feel that your illness was put upon you from god? And why would he do that to you?” and he replied that his illness was a blessing from god because it allowed him to look inward rather then focus on his physical body like he did growing up. He said the only thing that his illness doesn’t kill is his mind and spirit which is the most important thing for him. Right then I realized that he is a hero, a beautiful admiration to me and such a strong human being. He was happy when I told him I was Jewish and didn’t try persuade me to change my ideals to his like I assumed he would when we first walked in. He ordered tea and cookies for us after talking to him for a couple hours, his friend happened to be driving back to Chania where our hostel was so we got a free ride back! What an experience! I’ve been so fortunate to have been able to connect to so many different sorts of cultures this year and each community has let me in and hosted me wonderfully. I’ve only seen grace and compassion from all different types of people this year and each time, my heart swells with my pride in humanity.