Clean Monday (Athens, Greece)

Today it is Clean Monday in Greece. This day represents the start of the Orthodox Christian days of Lent before Easter. In Athens we celebrate this day by lovely picnics and flying kites at one of the green and beautiful hills surrounding the city: Philoppapou. The bakeries are traditionally open this day and sell on this day only Lagana, a delicious large flat bread sprinkled with sesame seeds. The bread is so popular, a huge line formed in front of our neighborhood bakery while the baker was handing out Mastic spirits (mind you, this was early morning) and small pieces of Lagana bread, hot out of the oven to the hungry crowd. Yum!