You've come about the toilet, haven't yo(Simon Willis) A nubile creature darted out of the half-open door and shouted 'Yassou' over her shoulder into the hall she was leaving. A chorus of 'yassous' wafted from within. The fire door closed shutting out all other noise. Dressed in a chiton that left very little to the imagination, she was startled when she saw me. Her cornflower-blue eyes and honey-blond hair in ringlets made me forget why I had come in.
‘Are you here about the toilet?’ she asked.
I replied that I wasn’t, but I did ask if I could have a look around.
‘Well, this place closes in 20 minutes or so.’
She noticed the splotches of raindrops on my yellow T-shirt, understood, and disappeared along a corridor. I waited for the slap of her bare feet to fade to nothing before I gently pushed the fire door open.
As I passed by a nude statue of Andromeda I was captivated by the sight of a dozen or more women no older than 30. They were all wearing diaphanous, loose-fitting garments. Two curvaceous females knelt, resting their heads on the lap of a third. Their hostess stroked the pair’s shoulder-length hair intertwined with bejewelled ribbons. Six others were reclining on leather upholstered couches, resting a cheek on long-fingered hands. Others stood in groups of three, imitating the Graces and conversing animatedly in a language that bore a resemblance to what I heard around me in Cyprus, where I had been on holiday the year before.
Dying to strike up a conversation with these chicks, I started to frame a question.
‘Poios…erm…apó esás…erm…morá…’ I began.
The hubbub in the hall gradually subsided. My audience wondered what had induced this middle-aged man in a damp T-shirt to address them. I was scratching around for the word for ‘posed’.
‘He’s calling us “babies”!’ giggled a long-throated woman.
‘Don’t you mean “babes”?’ tittered one of the recliners.
‘You can use English with us, can’t he, girls?’ said one who had the bearing of a leader.
Flattered by the attentions of a man, the women spoke all at once.
‘What do you want to say?’ the leader asked.
Above the excited tumult, I tried to make myself heard. I repeated my question. The leader turned to her companions and shushed them with an impatient gesture.
‘Which of you babes posed for the Andromeda statue?’ I said a bit too loudly now. One of the women raised her hand.
‘It was me who actually made the statue,’ she said confidently.
‘You did that, Helen! I didn’t know you were such an artist.’ squealed another.
The artist clasped her hands in front of her and looked downwards for a moment.
‘Thank you.’
She looked up and nodded in the direction of another girl. ‘But Helen over there did the final touches.’
Helen of the final touches started, almost dropping her milk shake.
A woman with jet-black hair called out across the hall.
‘I designed the ears!’
Next to the ear designer was an elfin creature wearing what looked like a net curtain, through which not only was her navel visible, but other erotic features as well. She playfully pushed the ear designer in the upper arm.
‘Oh, Helen! You do exaggerate!’
‘And the earrings! They’re modelled on mine!’
The last speech was by a chiton-clad popsie with a slightly turned-up nose. She turned her head left and right a few times, making her ear ornaments tinkle and sparkle.
‘Point taken, Helen. You’ve found your way to immortality,’ the leader said as if to bring an end to the call-outs and ragging.
‘Excuse me,’ I began. ‘Is everyone here called Helen?’
‘Can’t you read, sweetie?’ retorted the leader, jerking her head towards the half-open door. A white Perspex sign bore the following legend in Arial black:

Hellenic Hall

‘We’d ask you to join us, but I don’t think you’re a Helen, are you?’
‘Quite. I understand.’
I did not understand. I thanked for their time and made for another hall, where the hubbub was several octaves lower than in the Hellenic hall. Two dozen middle-aged men in ancient Greek costume engaged in recitation. All of them had yellowish complexions, tiny noses and a few strands of wispy hair over their bald pates. A loose wooden tile of the parquet flooring clicked when I stepped on it. Immediately, the recitation stopped, but the men did not look round to see who it was. Their ears homed in on the presence outside. A voice piped up.
‘Are you here about the toilet?’
‘N-no, not really.’
‘This is the Homeric Hall. If you want the toilet, it's next to the Mycenaean, it’s on the next floor.’
The recitation resumed. I went upstairs. I could hear sitar music. The sickly-sweet smell of marijuana floated with the music out into the corridor. Several couples in various states of undress were intertwined with each other on the floor. A near-naked girl with the peace symbol tattoo’d on her breasts blew with conviction into a chillum. A bearded man with a leather headband sidled up to me.
‘Hey, anthrope, theleis ligo maradzouana?’ he said, offering me a spliff. I declined the offer. Just then, one of the couples on the floor climaxed.
‘MacDonald’s!’ the girl shrieked ecstatically.
‘Not my scene, Ian,’ the bearded man retorted. He broke into uncontrollable giggling. ‘Not my scene, Ian.’
I tried to tell him my name was not Ian, but I was interrupted.
‘Greggs!’ another couple bawled.
A little chorus of hippie types responded.
‘Not my scene, Ian.’
A fresh-faced youth with gimlet eyes cackled wildly and proffered some small white pills stuck between two strips of transparent sticky tape.
‘Hey, anthrope, theleis a tab?’
‘Naah, acid ain’t my scene.’ I replied in a bid to blend in with my hosts.
‘Acid ain’t my scene, Ian,’ corrected the youth with slight irritation.
‘Look, who is this Ian, then?’
‘Hey anthrope…Ian, he’s this…erm…presence, anthrope. Can’t you feel him? He’s here, y’know, anthrope.He’s a kinda spirit. He pervades this room. Can ya hear us, anthrope?
‘N-no. Not really.’
'You must be here about the toilet,' the youth said. 'It was next door, but I think it's in orbit now.'
His companions snickered loudly and rolled on the floor.
The youth dropped a tab. The bearded one took a hit. I slung my hook.
‘Not my scene, Ian!’ I sneered.
I peered into a half-open pair of doors opposite the Mycenaean Hall. Inside, of the ten seats arranged in a horseshoe, six were occupied by adults in baseball caps and sweatshirts bearing the names of transatlantic universities. They were stifling yawns with varying degrees of success.
‘Judging by the look of you,’ began a bald, stocky man with his thumbs in the pockets of the waistcoat of a tweed suit, ‘you seem incapable of understanding the principles of rhetoric.’
Five of the audience bridled, looking daggers at the speaker.
‘It’s all right. What I just said was an example of sarcasm.’
The audience breathed sighs of relief.
‘Gee! I thought you were being serious.’
‘Of course not, Mrs Dupree. No one would say anything like that to you at home, would they? By the way, Mrs Dupree, where is home.
‘Orange County, Californ-eye-eigh.’
‘Well, slap my thigh! I woulda sworn you were from Gosport!’ the speaker exclaimed. His false grin and drawl suddenly gave way to dead-pan.
‘Sarcasm? Was that an example of sarcasm?’
‘You mean the one in Illinois.’
‘Mrs Dupree, was does Illinois have to do with rhetoric?’ lapsing into a fake American accent, the speaker continued, ‘A little announcement here: Mrs Dupree is gonna give us a gee-ography lesson, ain’t she?’
Mrs Dupree was at a loss how to respond. The speaker asked if his last remark was an example of sarcasm.
‘A portly, red-faced man with a talent for sweating uncontrollably raised his hand.
‘Yes, Dr Steinberg?’
‘I still ain’t sure o’ that other thing you was a-gibberin’ on abou’ earlier.’
The speaker arched his brows interrogatively and inclined himself slightly towards Dr Steinberg.
‘Like when yew use words what’s the opposite of yer real meanin’.’
The speaker threw his head up and grinned, saying that he saw. Then speaker went on to tell the story of the next-door neighbour’s 10-year-old kid, who borrowed his father’s welding kit to make what he called a space rocket out of six dustbins and four inverted buckets.
‘If you say to the kid, “When’re planning on telling NASA about you bid for the moon?” That would be sarcasm. “I don’t think the hardware store does liquid oxygen. You’ll have to nick them from the hospital.” Sarcasm?’
‘Sarcasm,’ Dr Steinberg echoed.
‘Let’s imagine the little guy gets all his friends to watch the launch. He climbs into the top dustbin. He calls out “Ignition sequence.” Lashed to the base of the ‘spaceship’ are ten thick rockets saved from Bonfire Night. His friend lights them. They fizzle and go bang. There is no lift off. If you said, “That was fantastic!” or “What amazing display of aeronautical dexterity!” or “You have made history, all right!” you would be using…?’
‘Sarcasm!’ a gangly 20-something male called out.
Dr Steinberg threw his hands up in despair.
‘Did you know the multi-stage rocket idea was thought up by the Russian scientist, Mendeleyev?’ Gangly went on, ‘He invented the Periodic Table so the higher up the table you go, the more unstable the elements are.’
Gangly looked around for a reaction to his general knowledge.
‘Did Mendeleyev invent a person who would shut up?’ Lenin sneered. Suddenly, he became aware that the discussion was being overheard. He turned to face me.
‘Yes?’ he said.
‘Sarcasm!’ I retorted with a smile.
‘Indeed! Well, you live and learn! I never knew that. I always wanted someone to enlighten me about stuff like that. Excellent!’ he said, clapping his hands slowly.
‘What you’ve just said now was an example of ir—’
‘Don’t help them!’ he barked, jerking his towards his audience. ‘You here about the toilet?
I said I might be.
‘Up the stairs. Next floor. Mind your head.’
Lenin resumed his dialectic. Now, iro…..’ his voices faded as I went up the rickety stairs, not before I caught a glimpse of the sign on the door.

Ionic Lecture Room

The staircase led to a garret. I opened a door, truncated at the top left-hand corner to accommodate the slope of the roof and promptly banged my head on a rafter. A group of fifteen or so men and women turned around in unison to watch me rub my forehead. One of the women smiled sympathetically and invited me to join the huddled mass in the dimly-lit room.
They were a mixed bunch. Some were in ancient costumes. Two of the women looked as if they had popped in on their way from the shops. They were both knitting scarves with reindeer and stars over Bethlehem. Two graduate-types persisted in butting with references to what Plato said in Republic and quoted Thucydides and Aristophanes, who were said to be bitter critics of democracy. Two other men were furiously taking notes and occasionally waved their jotters to ask for clarification from the speaker, who was scarcely visible in the subdued lighting, and whose voice was hardly audible over the practiced debaters and clicking of knitting needles. As I left the room, I banged my head again. The Attic Lecture Room might boost your Athenian-influenced intellect, but bruise your forehead.
I made my way downstairs to the foyer.
I flipped through the visitors’ book and read the following:
What do you call a parrot that is well-versed in several academic subjects? A polymath.
What is an idol? A god that doesn’t do anything.
What is 800 metres long, contains nuts and is covered in chocolate? A marathon.
Did you hear about the athlete who continued his education for two extra years? He ‘staydion’ at school.
What’s the difference between an anthropologist and a gynaecologist? The first studies the whole man, whereas the second studies the hole — Quite.
What did Plato say after he had written 'The Apology?' Sorry.
As I was groaning at the last one, a man rushed in. The heavy glass door closed behind them, shutting out the sound of torrential rain. He was wearing a dark grey overall and carrying a leather bag of tools.
‘’Scuse me. They tole me to come an’ fix a toilet somewhere ‘ere.’
I was extremely helpful and my reply was concise and to the point.
‘Oh?’
‘Any idea where it is?’
‘Dunno.’
‘He took out a greasy smart phone from his overall pocket and tapped in a number. He turned on the speaker.
'Bit deaf, y'see,' he explained. The dialling tone began. Someone answered and launched into a monologue in a foreign language, which resembled what I heard around me in Cyprus, where I had been on holiday the year before.
‘What is this place, anyway?’
‘Dunno,’ I said. ‘’S all Greek to me.’

PHOTO: https://scarlettentertainment.com/acts/greek-priestesses

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