Thessaloniki and Beyond: Grave-Turning Catechists and the Greek Joe Pesci

The city of Thessaloniki is a real treasure.  It has everything any vacationer could want, particularly if you like history and food and clearly, the four of us are very fond of both.

Yesterday, we took an all-day walking tour of the city (with a two hour lunch in between) beginning at the top of the town’s hills and working our way finally to the sea. As we listened to the importance of this port city to the Romans, the Ottomans and its role during the Byzantine Empire, we came across a large group of Americans with their own guide, with the guide finishing his talk by saying, “Let us all take a moment to pray.” It really took me for a loop to be standing on a hilltop in a northern Greek city and see and hear 50 people, all Americans, put their heads down and begin to pray.  Our guide, JoAnna, (said with a “y”) told me that this is very common, as there are many tour groups that specialize in visiting locations visited by St. Paul, the Apostle, one of the most important figures of the Apostolic Age.

As a Roman Catholic, I have attended mass on most Sundays of my life, but in my 63 years, I had never paid much attention to the second reading of every mass, which always is taken from the Acts of the Apostles and regularly includes readings from Paul’s letters to Thessalonians.  As all those Americans continued to pray, a huge light bulb went on in my head. I turned to JoAnna and said, “Wait a minute, is this where Paul  was sending all those letters when he was writing to the Thessalonians?” JoAnna said, “Of course!”  At that very moment, I felt about 9 or 10 of my former catechism teachers literally turning over in their graves over because it took about four dozen praying Christians and a very patient guide for me to figure this out.  Clearly, Hercule Poirot, I am not. 

We had another unbelievable meal at a local tavern later that night that had us all raising the white flag to stop the food madness. There appears to be a never-ending supply of delicious Greek salad made with scrumptious tomatoes, cucumbers, feta and “rusk,” a traditional “twice-baked” bread, often made from barley or carob. There are too many dishes to describe, but I did love the grilled anchovies with bulgur and chopped tomatoes.  It was so fresh, so simple, but truly unforgettable  

While the food was the evening’s top attraction, the couple behind us got nearly as much attention from our crew.   Mark and Judy are married 51 years, and we are  married nearly 40 years. We have covered a lot of territory over those years and frankly, it’s easy to get distracted when something interesting comes our way. Case in point-this couple.  

The woman was young and attractive and dressed ready to go out on the town, even if it was a Tuesday night.  The man was significantly older than the young woman and if I didn’t know better, I could have sworn I had seen him in of the Godfather movies or the Sopranos, except that he spoke Greek. His shirt was unbuttoned a little too low and he kept leaving this young woman alone to take calls, as if attempting to act like Joe Pesci in “Goodfellas.”

Doris joined us for dinner and the five of us spent most of the evening first, identifying where the couple was located in the restaurant. They had moved tables once and in order to keep us all up-to-date on their whereabouts, we spoke at great length in code, such as, “They are now at seven o’clock, but don’t turn around!” Once their whereabouts were clear to each of us, we then considered whether or not she was his daughter.  We tried to give them the benefit of the doubt, but our hopes were dashed when Bob and I, as they were directly in front of us at twelve o’clock, saw him feeding her.  It was not what we wanted to report to our group, because it only added to our continuing, in-depth analysis of this relationship, which we knew nothing about except that he was likely not her father. As we left the restaurant, we all tried to take one-last look at the May-December couple without being obvious. Sadly, we were unsuccessful. 

Today, we spent a glorious day learning about and seeing the untouched tomb of Phillip, the father of Alexander the Great from four centuries before Christ, and then proceeded to our beautiful mountain retreat at the foothills of Mount Olympus, the home of Greek mythology. 

And by the way, the eating continued today….