Wednesday, July 6, 2011

The Acropolis Museum and a day of shopping!

July 3, 2011
Today we were able to tour the Acropolis Museum. Karen, Alli’s mom was able to join us. On our way to the metro, we walked down the road the Unity marathon was going on. Our friends, Clint, Jill, Rebecca and Daniel were running. We were able to see and cheer on Clint and Jill! We enjoyed the museum and it was fun to have Karen with us. The Museum held many of the original pieces of the Acropolis and the Parthenon. It was very cool to walk through the museum and see the Acropolis towering above it.
After we finished the museum, we had the rest of the day free until 6pm. Our group, Alli, Kim, Jordan, Karen, Sarah from NC and Skyler from Oregon decided to stay near the Acropolis. We ate at a nice restaurant that had good food. After lunch we walked around and souvenir shopped. It was a fun, relaxing afternoon!
This evening, we had our final group dinner at Goudi Park. It was a great dinner with delicious food. We had a “catwalk” show because everyone came in their native dress. The whole event was outside under the trees which was very nice.
Our friend Jill, from Oregon, running in the Unity half marathon.
 The Acropolis Museum
 The view of the Acropolis from the museum
 The area around the museum
 Joseph and Tanealya
 Our group at the Museum
 Where we were shopping
 One of the biggest things I stressed to our group was making sure they were safe on the Metro. A lot of people have gotten pick pocketed on the Metro so they did a "scared in the Metro" picture. A hilarious group of kids!!
 The area we had dinner in.

 Skyler, Alli and Sarah being goofy at dinner.
 US chaperones minus Laura
 The team from Korea 
 Team Oregon!! We love this guys!
 Alex from Romania, Hasnat from Pakistan and Jospeh from NC
 The US team!
 Pretty lanterns!!

More Sports and THE BEACH!!!

July 2, 2011
Today we were able to head out to the Hellikon venue which hosted soccer, gymnastics, softball, cycling, handball and badmiton. We were also able to see a demonstration of the Young Athletes program. The Young Athletes program was fun and it was great to see the cute kids participating in activities to get ready to participate in Special Olympics when they turn 8 years old. It was a great demonstration.
Our lunch with the Young Athletes was cancelled so we were allowed to go and explore the Hellikon venue. We went over the softball venue and had some lunch. From the softball venue we could see the Agean Sea and it was close. Kim had seen the soccer venue that was across the street towards the beach so we headed to the soccer venue but ended up on the beach instead. It was beautiful!! We are not allowed to swim but we all decided wading was not swimming so we walked in the Agean Sea. We had a blast! It was so nice to be able to just relax by the beach for a little bit. We then headed back to the venues and watched a little bit of rhythmic gymnastics. We were able to see a USA gymnast perform and she did great!
We returned to the hotel for dinner and then we had our final two sessions. Alli and Jordan had joined together with their North Carolina friends, Sarah and Joseph and put together a great power point on how to host a youth summit. They did a fantastic job. We had our final session which was “Making an Action Plan for when you get home.” Alli and Jordan put together great action plans and Kim is excited to see them implemented!
                                          The next few pictures are all of the Young Athletes Program...so cute!!






                                  Alli and her new friend Sarah from NC enjoying the Young Athletes venue.
                                      Jordan and Chris enjoying the Young Athletes venue.
                                     The view from the softball venue.
                                         The beach!



                                          Gymnastics venue

Our US gymnast
                                         Jordan, Alli, Joseph and Sarah presenting.

Hellenic Union and the Youth Rally!

July 1, 2011
Today we went the Hellinic American Union in Athens. We had sessions today regarding EKS day and SO College. The Shriver family was in attendance and Molly and Caroline Shirver, who are 13, presented about their grandmother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver. They shared about what their family did for EKS day and handed out pins and bracelets. Timbo Shriver then shared about SO College which was a program that he and Soeren started a few years ago. A few of our delegations then presented about EKS day and what they did in their schools. They were great presentations and every team showed such passion about Eunice and her mission!
We were then set free for lunch. We followed our Greek Youth leader who took us to Goody’s which turned out to be Greek fast food. Alli, Jordan and Kim each had a pork gyro and French fries. It wasn’t the best but it was an interesting cultural experience and cheap.
When we returned to the Hellinic American Union, we were able to hear a famous Serbian volleyball player speak to us about his sport and how he became involved in Special Olympics. We then heard from and SOI board member about the board and what they need from youth. Mathew Williams, an international global messenger from Canada, spoke to us about being a youth member of the SOI board and a global messenger. The youth were then given the task to decide amongst their region for who should be nominated to be leaders for the next Global Youth Summit. North America chose our friends, Sarah and Joseph from North Carolina to be our nominees. The voting will happen on Monday.
Tonight, we were able to watch the Global Youth Rally. Unfortunately, the majority of it was in Greek so everyone was pretty lost. The kids had a lot of fun at the rally when the Greek pop group came on. There were about 3000 people in attendance.

                                            Hellenic American Union
                                           Jordan and Chris presenting their ideas with Timbo Shriver
                                         Area near the American Hellenic Union

                                      Sunset over Olympic Village
                                        Youth Rally stage
                                          Youth Rally hosts and Eddie Barbanell
                                         Hosts and our team from Serbia, Philip and Luca
                                           Apollon and his guitar