I'm only here for the food

Today I'm fasting for Yom Kippur, and Athens is quite possibly the worst place to be doing that. I know that the minute I walk outside, I'm going to be hit with endless opportunities for cheese pies, pastries, breads, gyros, frappes, etc. Eek.

Services last night were good, even though none of us had a clue as to what was going on, since it was all in Hebrew and very fast. We got there late, since hailing a cab here is an event in and of itself, and as we were walking in we got stopped by a security guy, who asked us for ID. I was a little taken aback, but, remembering all the security measures at our synagogue at home, I showed him my passport. He commented to us that he could usually tell who was Jewish by their name, so I guess I passed the test. My friend Erika, who had been on a field trip to the Jewish museum that day, told me later that this synagogue, along with every other synagogue in Greece, had at one point or another been the victim of anti-Semitism, which explained the security.

Temple was much more crowded last night than it was the night before Rosh Hashanah. However, I was still very taken aback by how the women dressed and acted during services - some were dressed up completely, and others were in jeans and t-shirts. Everyone talked during services, although we were upstairs so I guess it didn't really disrupt services. Almost no one had a prayerbook, and people were arriving and leaving at all times. However, Erika also told me that their guide at the museum had said that Greece is a very hard place to be a Jew, and that most people in temple that night probably had to travel very far to be there. Thinking about it that way, it made sense that it was more like a social gathering (at least upstairs) than a service.