Cultural References

I've noticed that when I travel alone, I tend to hide a bit. I read up on all the Lonely Guide picks for best restaurants and cafes. Of course, these dining establishments have been chosen as the fabulous few for good reason, and as such, they are inevitably crowded. I seek them out on my highly crumpled Athens map, and cruise by only to be intimidated to actually go in.

I feel much more comfortable finding the quietest cafes and generally just walk around a lot. Having a second person seems to boost my confidence, adventurousness, and fearless attitude 10-fold, and makes for a much more interesting traveling experience. And there is of course, the added benefit of having an arm nearby to punch when finally looking up and seeing the Acropolis floodlit at night to say, "Wow! That looks way more majestic at night now that all the restoration cranes have been blocked out by the light."
So, I whiled away the hours at the pool today until my next traveling companion will arrive, reading McMafia, until it closed and then marched myself down to a cute little bar off a side street on Monastiraki square, to read some more and nurse a very large Amstel beer. Henekin and Amstel are the main two beers to be found in Athens; they're considered 'local'. This is funny to me since they are both decidedly Dutch beers.

The music mix they were playing at this bar is worth noting; they started off with a very cheezy French pop artist and then dove into a succession of 70's musicians.
*Sounds of Silence-Simon & Garfunkel
*Friday's Child-Nancy Sinatra
*Jackie-Scott Walker
*And then Willi Nelson!

I'm sitting in a bar in Athens, Greece, and they're playing Willi Nelson! Musical god of Austin, TX! Different parts of the world, all listening to the same music.

I just finished reading John Peel's biography, hero of British Radio 1 who was the first to play death metal, grime, British hip-hop, and reggae on the air. He also hosted the famous Peel Sessions that had live sets from PJ Harvey and the White Stripes. He talked about traveling to different countries, devouring records from local music shops, and taking them back to England to play on his shows. And at the time, because there weren't quick and easy ways to travel in between different cultures, nor was there the Internet or satellite TV, being exposed to something created in Asia or Greece was exotic and wholly different. Now it all kind of blends together; and now it's almost impossible to find contemporary music not sung in English, from which ever country you go!
Athens, when I'm being honest with myself, it's actually not that alien in terms of cultural references. They played all this music that I know, McDonald's is around the corner, Ikea can be reached on the metro, and there are 2 H&Ms here.

One of my couch surfing hosts had a small dinner party comprised of two Greeks, an Australian, and me. We all sat around discussing cartoons that we all grew up with-why is this a typical bonding practice among kids of the 80's? Some of the cartoons were all the same across the board: Captain Planet, Fraggle Rock, SheRa. Then there were others, imported from Japan, that the Greeks and Australian could bond over; those were lost on me.

Amazing. Various parts of the globe, all watching the same Saturday morning cartoons.