Greece: More Than Just The Musical Your Parents Loved

If the question is: Did I go to Greece for two weeks and stop in Istanbul for a day and make friends with an elephant and have my company pay for it all? Then the answer is: "Yes for the most part, but I did not make friends with an elephant."

I know you are excited for me to talk about Greece...

Is that the Acropolis or Parthenon? Continue reading below to find out the difference...

But I'm going to have to start from the beginning of my journey. It started in March. March 18, 2013. The day I started working at AirFastTickets. I'll pause here to give you time to check out the website....maybe book a flight. Email me for a secret coupon.



OK, so really that's irrelevant other than the fact that AirFastTickets is a Greek company....with an office in Greece.....full of Greek developers....yearning for my knowledge and leadership....which my company decided to provide to them.....in the form of sending me to Greece.

So I went to Greece

Which Greek God is that with such chiseled abs? Continue reading below to find out...

But, my boss is from Turkey, so he always stops in Istanbul to see his family on the way to Greece, so, I decided to go with him and check out Istanbul for a day.

NYC -> IST (Although I worked for a travel company, they couldn't get me a flight in Business class.....real classy)

The first thing that I obviously had to do when I got to Turkey was enjoy a big glass of authentic Turkish coffee.

Do you not see how happy I look? That is a smile that only Turkish coffee can create.

From there we ate some foods, saw some mosques and partied it up......

What was really surprising to me was that Istanbul was just like any other modern, westernized city.....with a bunch of mosques in it. I expected it to be very eastern and religious and poor, but it could have been any European and American city (other than the Mosques). The airport was pretty trippy, though. It was a total east meets west culture mix. This makes sense as Istanbul actually straddles two continents (can you guess which ones?). I was actually in three continents in one day....OMG (I checked with Guinness World Records and apparently this was not a record). In the airport I saw this group (you might call it a tribe) of African women carrying their bags on their heads. Some of them were actually afraid to get on the escalator because they had never seen one before.

We also stopped by a couple Bazaars to pick up a little of this and a little of that. They had a whole Bazaar dedicated to pets. PETS! And here was my favorite pet....

LEECHES!!!! Ok, they weren't selling them as pets, but actually for medicinal purposes. Ya know...get out the bad blood. And here I was thinking that this practice had been dis-proven 50 years ago. Silly American doctors and their lack of leeches.

A couple other quick comments before we move on....this was during the Syrian civil war (I guess its still going on...probably no matter what year you're reading this in) and there were many beggars holding passports proving they were displaced from Syria. I thought that was interesting. That's what was hot on the Turkish streets there. Oh, and get this....we're riding the subway to the airport on our way out. Sitting across the aisle from us is this family with a baby. This guy next to us starts speaking Turkish (or similar language) to them. He starts smiling at the baby and doing baby shit. Then the dad picks up the baby and hands it to the guy. I'm like, I don't think they know each other, so I ask my boss and he's like yeah that's not uncommon for people to hand their baby to a complete stranger. And we're not talking some upstanding looking gentleman. He looks closer to homeless than upstanding. He has stains on his shirt and bad teeth and is just all disheveled. WTF is that? The guy gives the baby back and continues smiling and winking for five more minutes. That mother fucker would be arrested in five seconds in the US for just sitting down next to that family. Bazaar-o land. See what I did there?

And of course no visit to Turkey would be complete without a picture of me pretending to pray in front of a mosque. God bless my sense of humor...

On to Greece....

IST -> ATH

I was in Greece for two weeks, but of course I was there to work. So, most of the time was not spent sight-seeing, but finding and studying odd things about the culture. Lets talk about some of them.

First off, everyone talks about "The Crisis". "Ever since the crisis", "People do [this] since we're in the crisis", "People no longer do [that] since the crisis."    Does anyone have any idea what they're talking about? I hear hear the Greek economy is in great shape.

Next, they have this insane custom....when its your birthday, you buy drinks for everyone else, instead of the other way around. At least they told me that....then told me to come back on my birthday.

Now we'll get to the real crazy stuff....basketball. Basketball is huge in Greece. They have some American ex-division 1 players. Like I said, huge. My company actually sponsored a basketball team there so we sat down after work one day and watched a game. This is what it looked like...

Completely empty!

But Matt, I thought you said that Basketball was huge there?

Well, I didn't lie. Here's what I was told was the reason for the empty arena. This was the first game of the new season and the home team had been in the championship the previous year. They had been losing so badly that the fans rushed the court and started kicking players and doing other shenanigans. As a result, they ended up banning the fans for three games the next season. Banning the fans. So strange.

And then we started talking about opposing fans at the games and they said that they are basically just not allowed. Anyone cheering for the opposing team or wearing their jersey will get their ass kicked, so no one shows up. Can't we all just get along?

I also feel like no one uses horns there. It's pretty much the exact opposite of driving in India. But they do have awful, awful morning shows on the radio. All it was, every morning in the cab, was sound bites over 80s music. It was the most cliche radio hosting ever. And at least once every five minutes they would play the "This is Sparta" clip from 300. Why would you do that?

So that was some weird stuff that happened. Now I'll tell you about the touristy stuff I partook in.

Athens - Gods, Rocks, Gyros, Greek Coffee (same as Turkish coffee), Tzatziki sauce, Pillars

So to answer the questions from waaaay above...

"An acropolis (Greek: Ακρόπολις; akros, akron,^[1] highest, topmost, outermost + polis, city; plural: acropoleis or acropolises) is a settlement, especially a citadel, built upon an area of elevated ground—frequently a hill with precipitous sides, chosen for purposes of defense."

So the Acropolis is that whole area on top of the hill and the Parthenon is just the main building up there.

And now you have learned something today.

And as for the nice naked man in bronze above, if you guessed Poseidon....you might be right. And if you guessed Zeus.....you might be right. Cause they don't know which one it is for sure (almost like they weren't real). And of course, as the racist quip goes....all Gods look alike.

Sooooo, the Acropolis is pretty freakin sweet.

Who is that Greek God?

Pillahs (my boy's wicked smaht)

In addition to the obvious mad old buildings, architectural secrets (no straight lines in the Parthenon, pillars are smaller at top, optical illusions, blah blah blah), and a nice hill to walk up for exercise.....this thing is on top of a giant hill with a ridiculous view of Athens.

Take your time. Stare at it for a while. I'll be here when you get back....

So that was nice, huh?

I know you're asking yourself, "Did Matt make it to a Greek island as well?". Yes I did! Even though it was cold and it was the last weekend stuff was open, I fought through it and went to Hydra just so I could report back to you fine people.

How do you get to an island? You take a helicopter. But if you don't have a helicopter, you take a boat. There's almost 100 Greek islands and so they have a fleet of ferries/boats/things that are constantly travelling back and forth between them. It feels like an airport and feels like a flight. Their boats even look like planes (kind of)...

The island was full of little cottages, winding alleys, donkeys and cats. So many cats. Get that shit under control. There are no cars allowed there, so everyone travels by donkey (or cat if they can train them). There is seriously a never ending maze of alleys between all the houses....seriously. Although cold and lonely.....the island will always have a special place in my heart (tear)

That's all I got. There's nothing more to say. Special thanks to Athena, Zeus, Poseidon and Hermes for showing me a good time.

And I will leave you with a picture of this glorious towel that I know you all are very jealous of. I am making this picture quite large to allow for full inspection.

Jamaica we have a bobsled team

In a remote part of the world, I once heard the phrase "a picture is worth nine words". I did not believe this until I took this picture in Jamaica several years back....

I think its clear what nine words this encapsulates; "Welcome to Jamaica and have a nice day....mon".

When my buddy Ethan says he wants to go to Jamica and I can get a discount for an all inclusive resort for $59/night through my company, it doesn't matter how white I am; I'm gonna go. So thats what happened this past May, 2013 (the year of our lord). We stayed at the Riu in Montego Bay. We were greeted by a nice lady handing out a cup with half sugar and half rum (my dentist was not happy). And from that point forward, not a waking hour passed without consuming some sort of intoxicant. There were red drinks and green drinks and shot drinks and  Red Stripe (hooray beer), and they were all included so we kept drinking them.

We made lots of new friends from all over the world. 

And we played with them in the pool. 

Everyone was not our friend however. In fact some people were not nice at all. That's cause they were local Jamaicans trying to rip off the white man. Which I can't blame them for considering how much money we have and how little they have. But, it still doesn't feel good. 

So, there were these locals at the far end of the beach at our resort who hung out there everyday (although they're not supposed to) and rented jet skis. So one day, I says to Ethan, "lets rent those jet skis". So we get hammered and walk over to the jet ski renters. We negotiate with them for a while and using our Hebrew instincts work out a price for one hour each. So we're riding around and having a grand old time, but after 30 minutes one of the dudes comes out and tells us its time to come back in. We argue for a while. I use my best Jamaican accent. But we eventually come back to discuss. Once we get back to shore they kick us off the jet skis and start making claims that we only paid for 30 minutes. I totally should have seen this coming as everytime I've bought something from locals in the Caribbean there seems to always be some kind of rip off. We argue for a while and yell drunken things, but to no avail. I'm still wearing their life jacket, so I tell them I'm keepin their life jacket. Yeah! I showed them. They said they didn't care, but I could see them holding back tears.

So we walk back down the beach to our resort and the dudes are down there chillin. They come up to me and tell me to give the life jacket back. I say no. He tries to grab it. I slap his hand away. He cocks back to punch me, but looks around at the resort people and back off saying "I'm going to find you on the street and get you." I tell him that he can't touch me cause I'm wearing a life jacket (see what I did there). But I quickly become terrified as I realize this isn't the US...its Jamaica. Mother fuckers get killed here. My fear is intensified by a local Jamaican guy walking by telling me that I shouldn't be doing that shit here cause there's no rules in Jamaica. So, for the next half an hour, I'm pretty scared for life, kicking myself for doing that. But, I talked to the staff and they tell me that no one touches tourists down there cause thats what they rely on. And in the end, he did not find me on the street and kill me. Whew.

Another good story happened that night. We took a taxi to one of the night clubs in the town. And by night club I mean Jimmy Buffets MargaritaVille. Yes! Actually it was really hard core and packed with people. There were prob more Jamaicans there but I assume they were there for the white peoples money. So we dance. We drink. We dance. All of sudden this tall beautiful Jamaican girl comes up and starts dancing with me. I think to myself, "wait this doesn't happen to me". But we dance for a while and do some talkin. At some point I say we should take a picture...

Yeah...my hair looks messed up. After we take this fabulous picture. She says (imagine this in a Jamaican accent), "ya know its customary in Jamaica to pay $20 to take a picture with someone." Can you believe it? That seems really expensive for a photo. But hey, that the rules. So I obviously paid and went on my way....I'm kidding. But I was pretty dissapointed cause I thought she liked me for me (tear).

So the night continues and Ethan gets waaay too drunk and takes a cab home on his own. I decide to leave at around 4AM and as I walk outside the club, I notice that I'm pretty much the only white person left. And then I'm mobbed by tons of locals. Cab drivers, prostitutes, people selling stuff. They start arguing with each other and working out deals...like a prostitute and a cab....or a necklace and a prostitute. You do the math. I'm just looking for a cab home, but obviously I can't pass up the prostitute and cab deal. I can't afford to not do it. Kidding. So the cab drivers start negotiating with me and with each other. All of a sudden one of them says, "I'll let you drive". Mind you, its 4AM, I'm hammered and their steering wheel is on the wrong side of the car. Great idea! FYI - I decided not to take his offer.

Other than drinking heavily and partying and trying not to get killed by locals, the other thing we did was go snorkeling. We went on this catamaran with a bunch of peoples and did some quality fish seeing. The highlight of that trip? The drinking...

So really, what I am trying to say is that we're alcoholics and I am going into rehab and this is my goodbye.

Another thing about Jamaica...they really hate the gays. On our snorkeling trip, the camera guy didn't like the fact that two guys were travelling together without any girls (I guess I didn't really like it either). Every time we tried to pose with like an arm around the other, he would take are arms and have us do like a fist bump instead. So we tried to get more and more hugging pictures.

So, good trip. But next time I would like to go someone place not so alcholy. Maybe somewhere in South America with some hiking and seeing cool stuff. We'll see. And feel free to reach out if you would like to go with me and appear on this awesome, ridiculously popular blog.

In case you were wondering...yes, we were the two whitest people in Jamaica.

Hello 911....Yes, there is a giant man burning in the middle of the desert

Yes, that's right. I couldn't stay away. I had to go back for round 3 of Burning Man. And this time....the desert won (I'm not really sure what that means...I just thought it was a good opener). Things got a little crazy this time...a little too crazy, if you know what I mean (prob not). And somehow I ended up going for a week. Yes a full seven days of dust, love, dust, things appearing to melt when they shouldn't be, partying, dust, tits, heat, cold, man tits, and the craziest, trippiest art of all kinds you can't even imagine. Do you understand now? Do you? Do you? No? Then perhaps this giant octopus car shooting flames out of its tentacles will help.

Starting to make sense? Good.

This time I went with people I didn't even know (friends of friends) cause its just too damn hard to find someone cool enough, that's willing to go from the east coast (yeah, I'm talking about you). But as always, the Burners (those that attend Burning Man) are the nicest people out there and things worked out amazingly.

You can't tell, but she's pinching my nipple hardcore there....

We stayed at the hoolihoop (sp?) camp and despite having a week, I still couldn't get it down. But there were lots of other peoples who were frickin amahzing...

 Oh yes....there was fire!!!

I hear fire looks cooler when you're on drugs....can anyone confirm this for me?

It really is impossible for me to describe what its like being out there....people are just so giving and so creative. Everywhere you go, people are giving shit out for free (nothing is for sale...its all gifting. Damn hippies). Alcohol, ice cream, pancakes, grilled cheese, massages, advice, body art, hugs, and love. People spend their entire year making crazy amazing massive artwork.

This entire thing is made out of zip ties....hah

And of course there is the man....                                                                             And the man burning....

But there's also just freedom. There's no authority telling you what you can and cannot do. Which may be a bad thing, cause I might drink a lot and climb up on a really high structure....

Gonna say that's not safe

And it's hot. And dusty. And there's not exactly the opportunity to clean yourself. And it's hot. And if you're extremely white and wear suspenders without a shirt (fashion statement), this might happen..

This is my artwork contribution

I actually got an even crazier sunburn on the front

No, that's just body paint

So, I'm just riding around on my bike and I come across this guy with a sign on his bike that says "Body art anytime/anywhere". So I says...."Where's anywhere?". He says "Right here". He breaks out a stool. Breaks out a shade umbrella. Breaks out a suitcase of body art tools and just goes to town on me. It's funny cause we're just sitting in the middle of this intersection getting body spray painted and people just ride by without even thinking twice about it. It's just perfectly normal for this environment.

One of the art projects was Wall St. Just a bunch of huge empty buildings. Not that cool.

Then they Burned It. BURN WALL STREET! Viva la revolution!

Despite everything, I did manage to survive the week. But I am forever changed....mostly because of the acid flashbacks. I'm not ready to give up though. I feel confident I can go back for round 4 and do something stupid enough that I will never return from the desert. Hooray! So, please come back in one year's time to read if I am still alive.

What Happens in Vegas....Stays on Matt's Blog

The land of hope and opportunity....where people fall in and out of love on an hourly basis. Where babies are made and.....disposed of daily. Where Matt Levin goes to celebrate his cousin's wedding, but spends the majority of the weekend getting hammered on the strip. Of course I am talking about the holy land. No, not Jerusalem....Vegas.

I mean don't get me wrong, the trip started innocently enough in the Mormon land of Salt Lake City. In case you care, my brother lives there....and he has a new baby daughter (I guess that makes her my niece). This was really my first experience of significant time with a baby. Those things are crazy. They move around and make a lot of noise, but don't really offer to help you in any way. But they make me seem more likable in pictures.

You know you want to say awww. But you shouldn't cause in the picture I'm actually in the process of grabbing my bottle of gin back from her (I dunno why I like to drink it out of baby bottles).

But I know you didn't come here to read about babies, so we can jump ahead to Vegas. But even after I got to Vegas, there was still some time to see family and only drink moderately.

So, here's another picture that makes me seem like a person you may want to be around.

And here's one of me, my brother and dad, after my uncle said something about the balls behind our head. Classiness runs in our family.

And then all hell broke loose.....

  

                                 

Hmmmmmm.....I was hoping that those pictures were gonna be crazier. But I wanted to convey that you can drink on the street, I am incredibly white, and that they have clubs in Vegas.

This was the general schedule of my nights: drink, drink, drink, drink, gamble, drink, club, drink, dance, food, gamble, drink, dance, puke, dance, drink. And at this point it was actually the next night and time to start over again at drink. 

Except for Sunday when we went to Wet Republic. Pool Party! There were turtle floaties and slip and slides......and the hottest girls I have ever seen in my life. This was our waitress,,,,

Look at her. She can't keep her hands off my tan body. And I'm pretty sure she was the ugly waitress.

I'm gonna go ahead and recommend everyone gets a Cabana at a party pool in Vegas, cause shit is sweeeet.  Typically cabanas have like a $1000 minimum. Lucky for me though, my bro got us a hook up and we had no minimum at all. Booyah. So, for five of us for five hours, we got away with only spending $775. What a fucking deal!

Life

is

Good!!! 

But I have no idea how we spent that much money. I'm guessing somebody bought a bottle of something behind my back. Of course my brother (who wasn't paying for anything) signed the bill to our hotel room and didn't think to check anything when the bill came out to that ridiculous amount. I believe his quote was..."well that's gonna suck".

I'm not sure what else to say, cause I can't remember because of all the alcohol. Ummmm, we stayed at Aria. Nice hotel. We went to the club there, Haze. Nice club. We got an $80 breakfast in bed. Nice breakfast.

So in the end, I spend shit tons of money. I lost shit tons of money gambling. And I have a void in my memory of the weekend cause I was drunk the whole time. Now that's money well spent.....or not.

Long Island (The most creatively named place since New England)

I know what you're thinking...."Where the hell has this guy been? I've missed his hysterical insulting rants of my and others' cultures." Well, I've been in NYC. But I'm not here today to talk about the city, I'm here to talk about it's friendly island neighbor, Long Island. I recently had the opportunity to spend a couple days in a couple different location, Babylon (somewhere in the middle) and Sagaponack (in the Hamptons). Both rich, drunken times.

Let's start with the Hamptons. Here's the shitty $4 million house I stayed at.

And, it's shitty backyard.

Don't get me wrong, the house is ridic. However, there are $30 million houses down the road. This is the Hampton's people, people use $4 million as tampons (I'm not really sure how that would work, but it sounds painful).

So, all we really did for the weekend was play beer pong, lie on the beach, drink bloodies, play beer pong and play beer pong. Oh, and drink a delicious, nutritious breakfast....

It's good to be rich...or at least know rich people. Someday, with your support (as in donations), I will be able to own a (vacation) house like this of my own (in addition to the three others)....and maybe I will invite each and every one of you out to experience how I live.

The other shitty place I visited on Long Island was somewhere around Babylon. And here is the resort like backyard of the house I stayed at....

My question is....when you have a backyard like this, how do you go on vacation? Don't you walk outside your resort and just shrug at the same scene that you see everyday? I bet the children starving in Ethiopia even feel bad for the people who have to go on vacation like this. Thank you children of Ethiopia, your concern is appreciated!

Oh yeah, I also went out on a boat...

You're lucky I'm wearing a shirt, cause I am very tan and ripped and you would feel bad about how you look if you saw me.

So we swam in the ocean, swam in the pool and grilled some delicious meat. Hooray. I came back nice and red and fat. I believe this is what every woman is looking for in a man. It must be my personality that's failing me.

I hope you all learned lots about Long Island and will consider visiting it for your next vacation. Or perhaps if you get rich, you can buy a house of your own there and invite me to come drink at it.

Love,

Matt

By the way, I am going to start trying to write on this blog more often as I pursue my career in comedy.

India and Amsterdam....together at last

Once again, work has sent me to my most favorite place on earth. A place where the curry flows like ketchup and the tap water will give you diarrhea for weeks. No not Gary Indiana (hey yo), but India. I know that is a little vague cause India is rather large....so I went to Pune.....again. Never heard of it? It's only the 6th largest city in India with a population of 3.5 million. That's it! That's all I have to say about Pune. All I did is work. I was there for 21 days, and I worked 21 days. That's why I'm paid the big bucks.

The most exciting part of my whole trip was the day the supreme court came down with a ruling on who owns some religious piece of land. This had been an 18 year court case in the making (started by some rioting and deaths) over a piece of land both the muslims and hindus claimed to be theirs. One side wanted to build a temple there, the other wanted to build.....a temple there. Personally, I thought they should have built a strip club, so no one was happy....well none of the religious peoples. Anyway, this was such a big deal that they were predicting riots throughout the country, banned mass text messages, and my company told me I should go home early. But did I? No! I risked life and limb for the job. I deserve a raise.

This is really the only picture I took while I was in India....

That's right, its a picture of a trash dump. Please don't take this the wrong way, but I really think this sums up a lot of what my experience in India is like. There is a very distinct smell to India that I recognized as soon as I got off the plane. It's a mix of trash, mildew, fear and a hint of nutmeg. Then, India is dirty. It's more like its just unorganized. Things are half built and not cleaned up. And there are stray dogs everywhere. And there are poor people everywhere. And that's why I took that picture. Like I said don't take it the wrong way....this is a lot of what I think of when I think of India (sorry Indians reading this).

If I was going back to India for three weeks, I had to stop somewhere fun on the way back. And what better place to have fun then the land of sex, drugs, and canals....Amsterdam. Since I was travelling by myself, I decided to stay at a hostel to meet more people....good decision. It was sooo much fun and I met so many awesome people. They had a bar in the hostel and a smoking room (ya know, cigarette smoking). Every night I would party at the hostel and meet a group of people, go out to bars, coffee shops (ya know, for coffee) and the red light district (ya know, for red lights), then go back and party more at the hostel, and go out with a different group of people. The downside was everyday people left and I lost all my friends (tear).

So, while I was there, I found out that the Netherlands elected some super right wing government and is closing the red light district and working on closing all the coffee shops. Basically they are trying to lose all their tourists. God I hate conservative religious nuts. However, the city is pretty cool outside all the partying. The city is completely made up of different alleys and canals.

There is unlimited amounts of restaurants and bars. And they sell fries on their own.

Hmmm...nevermind these are all just made for partying. I think this was the intention when they founded this city....to get high, get food and get laid. I for one say 'No thank you' to this. I came for the windmills and clogs.

Oh yeah....and they have delicious baked goods (ya know, with weed in them)