Ancient Greece
It was a cold, early morning and the classes were becoming restless. A select few were running late,which didn't sit well with Mrs. Hamilton. She is not a big fan of lateness. We finally had everyone loaded onto a bus and all the luggage tightly packed underneath. The bus ride to SFO wasn't too bad and went by surprisingly quickly. It took about an hour to get everyone through security and to find our gate. We still had about half an hour until we started boarding so everyone dispersed to find Starbucks/McDonalds for a quick breakfast. They announced our flight number to signal we were boarding and everyone began to find their seats next to their friends in the class. I slept the whole flight and magically woke up in Greece. We took the shuttles to our hotel and were given an hour to settle in. We were only in Greece for a couple days, so we made use of our time and grabbed lunch on our way to the first leg of the trip; the Acropolis. We were assigned a tour guide at 2:20 and met at the beginning of the long path leading up to the huge pile of stone buildings. As well as many others in the class, I began to tune out the tour guide and started to explore on my own. My expectations were completely off considering the Parthenon was about three times the size I had imagined it to be. I took so many pictures of the most important buildings such as the Erectheion where Poseidon and Athena fought for the title of Athens(evidently Athena was successful). After posing a million times in front of the Parthenon, the classes made their way back down the pathway, to the base of the acropolis, and down to the Areopagus. The Areopagus was not much of a site to see. It was the pile of rubble down at the base of the Acropolis' hill. It had once held many of the important buildings for democracy in Ancient Greece. All that you can see now is a large pile of rocks. Once at the Museum, we toured the building looking at all of the different Greek leaders. We learned the different contributions to democracy of each leader including Draco, Solon, Cleisthenes, and Pericles. Once, after filling in  our note taking guide on each leader, we were off to visit the Agora. The Agora was located under the Acropolis, even further below the Areopogus. The Agora was the highlight of all Ancient Greece culture. it was the center of all life for the Athenians. It seemed to look like a small town, with large buildings all found in a tight cluster. Our tour of the Agora was short and sweet, due to the lack of time we had for dinner. We had cancelled our reservations in town, and stopped for whatever was quick on the shuttle bus back to the hotel. We packed our things and prepared for another long flight ahead of us the following day. Next stop;Rome!

Contributions to Modern Democracy:

• Jury System
• Federalism
• Allowed citizens to propose laws
• Three Branches
• Written Laws
• Law Courts
• Assembly of representatives
• Paid public officials
• Court has final say
• Right to vote for male citizens 18+