Ariana Couyutas Duarte ’26

The following post was adapted from a conversation between Ariana Couyutas Duarte ’26 and “Maya” Yiyang Ma ‘29, an intern with the Global Engagement Office (GEO).¹

Ariana is a double-major in English Literature and Classics who spent a full academic year abroad with College Year in Athens (CYA). In this conversation about her time in Athens, Ariana reflects on her academic learning, her deeper understanding of her cultural heritage, and the feeling of truly “living and existing abroad”.

How did you choose CYA for Study Abroad?

Language and culture were huge factors for me, and being part Greek played a big role in choosing CYA. I wanted to learn Greek, and I believed that spending a full year in Greece would give me the best results. 

As a classics major, I felt there was no better place to study this material than where it originated.  And the CYA experience is known for how it uses the entire city of Athens and local historical sites as a classroom without walls.

What was your day-to-day experience like in Athens?

I loved studying abroad in Athens. I lived in an apartment and walked to class. We lived in Pangrati, a small, young neighborhood with many college students. This made our experience especially enjoyable in a country with a large elderly population. Even though I shared the apartment with someone who also went to the program, it was very independent, which was very different from the American college culture.

Classes are all held at the CYA Center in a single academic building surrounded by cafés and restaurants. It felt more like a local experience than a typical study-abroad program. There are other schools around and our classroom building was pretty close to the city center.  

It really felt like the experience I was looking for, though it wasn’t for someone seeking a traditional campus. The most special part of CYA is the immersion aspect of it.  It didn’t feel like going to a traditional college. My daily experiences weren’t just part of school life, but rather part of Greek life.  This gave me a deeper sense of the culture and a clearer insight into what I wanted.

The surrounding community all knew about “the American school” and actively helped us integrate. The nearby community of cafe owners really made an effort to host us. It was definitely living abroad and existing abroad, rather than just studying abroad. 

Earlier, you mentioned “Classrooms Without Walls,” what did this mean for your experience?  

Since there isn’t much of a traditional campus culture, most professors have no interest in holding class in a regular classroom. We would have class at the Parthenon or at museums, which made everything hugely interactive. 

For my Art and Archaeology or Mythology and Religion classes, we would just go to the museum to see the actual statues instead of looking at a PowerPoint. In my history classes on ancient Greek sports or Alexander the Great, we would go directly to the historical sites and ruins. It doesn’t get any better than that for a classics student!  Having expert archaeologists as your personal tour guides of the city is an invaluable experience.

One of the best examples was having an Art and Archaeology class at the Parthenon itself. Without a strict time slot, we could really spend as much time as we wanted. Once, we stayed for two full hours while our professor taught the entire lecture right there.

For my mythology class, my professor took us on three field trips to different mystery sites, like the elusive Dionysian mysteries, where ancient religious cults would perform. We visited three different sanctuaries or temples dedicated to these cults. While in class, we discussed the mythology and the very few cryptic texts that are left behind; the trips let us actually see those places in person. We got to experience the topology and the areas that inspired the mysteries, and better understand how the whole tradition came to fruition.

Athens is so known for archaeology and ancient history, what insider knowledge would you share for visitors?

Everyone knows Athens from the major museums around the world, but its own museum culture is surprisingly young. The city has always had its ancient ruins and temples, but organized museums are a more recent development. The famous Parthenon Museum is actually still relatively new – having only been built in 2009.

In terms of museums, I would first recommend the National Archaeological Museum of Athens. It’s incredibly worth it and doesn’t get enough credit. The collection includes artifacts dating back further than most museums I’ve visited, with some of the most amazing and well-preserved statues I’ve seen, especially from the Archaic period and earlier. There’s also a powerful story behind it. As Greece suffered greatly during World War II, many of these statues were lost, hidden, and took a long time to recover. The fact that they were found and brought together in this museum adds to its beauty.

Everyone visits the Parthenon Museum, which is cool but limited to artifacts from that one site. For a truly expansive look at Greek history, go to the National Archaeological Museum. You won’t regret it.

What places outside Athens were you able to visit?

Through the CYA program, I got a fantastic overview of the entire country. The mandatory field trips took us to Delphi, Crete, Olympia, Thessaloniki, and the Peloponnese. 

Athens, with its tourism and classical focus, feels very different from the rest of Greece. The islands are drastically different, and Northern Greece, with its mountains and colder climate, has a completely different culture. The program did a really good job of showing us all of Greece, not just the tourist version of Athens.

I’d heard a lot about Thessaloniki as the second-largest city and a younger college town. It’s up north, so it’s strangely cold and not like Athens at all. I wasn’t prepared to like it as much as I did, but it’s really special. While Athens is expertly curated to showcase its classical era, in Thessaloniki, you see every era the city has been through. There are real remnants of Byzantine art, Roman art, and Ottoman architecture woven throughout the city. Seeing that layered history all throughout the city was a shock, but also a true gift of history I hadn’t found anywhere else in Greece.

You mentioned that your Greek heritage played a big role in choosing CYA. Did you connect to your heritage as you hoped? Any surprises?

Greece had always felt elusive to me. While the culture, language, and my name were part of my family life, I had never built a personal connection of my own. Going to Greece gave me the chance to discover it on my own terms and understand how it connected to me.

I completely fell in love with the country and would live there in a heartbeat. It felt very validating. Learning Greek was incredibly hard, but I had such a fun time. The CYA instructors who teach Greek are amazing. They’re the kindest people, and they love the language and love teaching it. That kind of love is infectious; it makes you want to learn and be better.

I’ve always felt a hesitancy to call myself Greek. But in Greece, if you tell someone you have even one per cent Greek in you, they get so excited. The local community was super welcoming. They insisted, “No, you’re Greek, of course. You should say that. You should be proud.” That was really beautiful.

I understand you were able to pursue an internship as part of your experience, why was this meaningful for you? 

I had the incredible opportunity to intern at both the Blegen Library and at the Wiener Lab of the American School of Classical Studies, experiences I hold very dear to my heart. 

The Blegen library is one of the largest classics libraries in the world and is usually private, reserved for scholars and PhDs. As an undergraduate, just being there, using these rare books for my own projects, was a privilege. My work involved the everyday tasks of helping the librarians run the place, which gave me a real appreciation for how such an important institution operates.

My time at the Wiener Lab was even more unique. It’s a lab for forensic anthropology and archaeology, and I got to work on cleaning and identifying Bronze Age human remains. You simply cannot get that kind of hands-on job anywhere in the U.S. I thought that combination was perfect for my Classics brain.  I was able to assist anthropologists, archaeologists, and pathologists in the entire process. 

This has made a lasting impact. It clarified what I want to do for grad school, showing me how Classics can connect to fields like Forensic Anthropology.

Any final takeaways to share?

I spent a full academic year in Athens, and it felt like three months. No amount of time is ever enough. 

It’s such a privilege to go abroad and further your education in such a direct, immersive way.  Somehow, being there made me enjoy learning even more. 

I think everyone should go abroad; and I am grateful to take all of this with me: the language skills I can now practice with my family, the academic clarity, and the informed decisions about my future. 

1. The views and/or opinions represented in the GEO blog belong solely to the student(s) and do not represent Swarthmore College; students are not liable for any errors or omissions in the personal experiences they share. ↩︎