It is worth wandering around the little paths which encirlcle the Acropolis of Athens. There you will find many cute little houses perched on the slopes. I hope that they are allowed to remain, because the modern Greeks have destroyed almost everything on the Acropolis which isn't classical ancient Greek. Drawings of the Acropolis made a hundred and fifty years ago show it covered in a riot of interesting buildings of many styles. Today, the top of the Acropolis is mainly flat and rubble-strewn. I have photographs of this place taken over about a twenty-year period. In that time hardly a thing has changed. It is still a building site, covered with toppled columns and the like. Just how long it can take to get a crane and stack up a load of columns I don't know, but the ancient Athenians were a great deal quicker than the modern.

It was on the slopes of the Acropolis that I heard one of the most inept attempts at chatting up a girl I have ever witnessed. A group of us was walking up from the Agora, and as we did so, the Acropolis reared higher and higher, until half the horizon was dominated by this vast swelling rock. "Is that the Acropolis then?" asked he (British) of she (Greek, and rather pretty). "Yes," she said, not knowing a more appropriate answer, and somewhat surprised to be asked. He then saw the opportunity for his killer line. "Is it nice?" he asked. "Yes," she replied, not terribly impressed with his efforts. It was some while before I stopped laughing.

A couple of years later, I was there again, and I heard a woman screaming. I tried to fool myself that she was an actress, and a play was in progress. From the moment I heard her, though, deep down I knew that no one could act that well. It was the sound of a soul in torment, and it went on and on and on. I made my way to a vantage point and looked around. I saw a figure running, and another following, and the second fired a few shots from a pistol. I'd never heard real gunfire before, and haven't since. An Albanian had tried to rob someone at gunpoint in the Agora. I saw him apprehended not many minutes later, up by the entrance to the Acropolis site.