addition, she was taught court etiquette, Orthodox religion, drawing, painting, music, dancing and learned to play the piano. She also practiced horse riding, gymnastics and took singing lessons. As Maria's eldest brothers were already occupied by their studies, she grew up closer to her sister Alexandra and her brother Nicholas, who preceded her in age. She was short and dark, less pretty than her sister but more vivacious. Family reunions took her many times abroad. She visited Wiesbaden, Germany in 1882. In 1886, her mother took her to Russia for the first time. They stayed with the Romanovs at Pavlovsk, the home of her maternal grandmother. Every two years, Princess Maria spent holidays in Denmark, visiting her paternal grandparents. At Fredensborg Palace on the island of Zealand, Maria and her siblings met their Russian and British cousins in large family gatherings. She became lifelong friends with two of her cousins: Grand Duchess Xenia of Russia and Princess Victoria of the United Kingdom. A Princess of Greece King George I instilled in his offspring a great love for Greece. He used to tell them: "Never forget that you are strangers among the Greeks, and make sure that they never remember". As a consequence, she would remain all her life intensely Greek. As a child, she cried when she was told she belonged to a foreign dynasty and had no Greek blood. As an adult, she always looked at Athens as her home. In her book of memoirs, she described herself as: " A true daughter of Greece". The popular desire to unite all Greeks within a single territory (Megali Idea) led to a revolt in Crete against the Turkish rule. In February 1897, King George sent his son, Prince George, to take possession of the island. To support the Cretan cause Greek troops crossed the Macedonian border and Abdul Hamid II declared war. During the conflict, Queen Olga organized a military hospital and Princess Maria served as a nurse. The Greco-Turkish War of 1897 went badly for the ill-prepared Greeks. They were forced to give up Crete to international administration, and agree to minor territorial concessions in favor of the Turks and to a monetary indemnity. Since her sister Alexandra's marriage in 1889, Princess Maria became her father's favorite child and constant companion. She helped her father acting as his unofficial secretary as her mother, Queen Olga, suffered from bad eyesight.