"My hands are frodding. Are we waiting for something? Where are the Germans?"

Lea, you're hands are freezing, not frodding. 
Hahah tonight, I went to the Labyrinths at the Buda Castle. My friend, Lea, got a little tongue tied with her English and it was quite entertaining! The labyrinths are part of the Castle Hill caves system. They are this maze of dungeons and chambers that were used as a bomb shelter during World War II. They were caves at one point  but the Turks turned them into tunnels and chambers and whatnot. It was cool, it's pitch black dark in there and they give you old fashioned lanterns. We found a chamber that had a wine fountain haha! It was like the Hawaiian Punch fountain in Mr. Deeds. In every couple of chambers, there would be someone who worked there, to supervise I guess. They didn't try to, but they scared me every single time I saw one of them! Imagine just seeing a dark outline of a person next to you all of a sudden. One of the workers we found who was sitting behind a corner was wearing a phantom mask, she actually got us pretty good. And there were statues that looked like people all over the place too, and those made me jumpy. I didn't think we'd get out of there, man. And no, mom and dad, I did not start asking questions to see if a ghost would answer me. Sorry.

me at the wine fountain

Cecile, Anne, and I

creepy

ahh!

So lately, I have been missing my brother. Scotty comes in handy quite often, ESPECIALLY when I find a big SPIDER in the BATHROOM. He's really good about getting up, even if it's 1am and he was sleeping, and squishing it for me. Here it seems like there's a spider in my bathroom every week. I keep a shoe in there now to have a weapon on hand. Mom should buy him a plane ticket to fly over here. 


As for the rest of this week, I didn't do too much. I'm done with my travelling on the weekends- I had to cancel my Prague trip because that is the only weekend a Belgian friend of mine can visit and then after that the rest of my friends who are studying in Rome and Madrid will visit, so there's no time. This fall has completely flown by, it's crazy. I'm a little sad now that I only have four weeks left. I've gotten to know lots of different people from all over the world. 

Sorry for the short entry. Honestly, nothing really happened this week. I had a presentation to do, a paper to think about writing (I'm in the process of procrastination still)....Of course I went to our Monday night bar, a birthday party, another party. Ok maybe I didn't do anything because I went out too much and was too tired haha.. I'll try to be more interesting next time. 


Seacrest, out.


Haha bad joke. Have a good thanksgiving! Wish I could be there... Oh mom and dad, put colored lights on the tree?? 


xoxo, Gossip Girl.


Another bad line! I can't resist it tonight. 

Wind Vortex

Ah! I'm sorry. I'm way behind on updating anything! I finally got my personal travel log updated, and now, this one, for my colorful, yet not as colorful, commentary on my trips :-)


I went to Krakow, Poland last week. I had to get up at 6am to do it too. It takes anywhere from 7-9 hours to drive from Budapest to Krakow by bus. Annnnnd guess how many miles away Krakow is??? Hmm? less than 300. Crazy!  But once you drive North and hit Slovakia, there is no highway, all you have his a narrow, two lane road the twists and winds through the hills. And Slovakia is really hilly. On the bus, I was so tired. I kept sleeping, waking up, sleeping, waking up... And I kept having this dream/weird semi-awake thought that I was looking for the Slovankian NHL players' houses and wondering if they had once been where I was now. Weird. I dreamed I was about to meet Tomas Kopecky's and Marian Hossa's families, but i woke up before I could. Haaahaha and at a gas station I found a magazine with Miro Satan on the cover looking all prettied up. Can't stand that guy.


Anyway, 8 hours later we arrived in Krakow. There was some time for us to go exploring, and we hit up the market. I had never seen so much cheap amber jewelry in my life. It was really pretty too. Don't worry, I bought some. The part of Krakow we were in was very nice, clean, old-ish, and rockin. There were bars, clubs, cafes, restaurants, shops, and people everywhere. And the main square in Krakow is HUGE! I think I heard it was the biggest square in Europe? I'd believe it. Looming over the square is St. Mary's Basilica. It was gorgeous. That's the church that the famous Trumpeter of Krakow plays from, if you've heard that story.


I'll tell that story anyway! I hadn't heard it before I went there, so you might not have either. Hundreds of years ago, when Krakow was still the capital of Poland, the city was mostly made of wood and Poland had to watch out for many enemies coming to invade, like the Tartars. So it was the job of the trumpeter to sit in the highest point of the city, which was at the top of the Basilica, and keep watch for fires or invaders and when he saw anything he had to start ringing the bells to warn the city. Also he was supposed to play a hymnal in each direction on the hour. Well one night, the Tartars decided to invade, and the trumpeter was this boy who started ringing the bells and then playing the hymnal. Right before he finished the hymnal, like on the third to last note, he was shot and killed by the invaders. So now, the trumpeter always leaves off on the broken note that the other was killed playing, the hymn never gets finished. It was really cool to hear that.

Market

St. Mary's Basilica

Trumpeter of Krakow!

The next day, we took a tour of the castle, of St. Mary's Basilica, of the old town, and of the Jewish quarter. That's where I found dinner with Erika and Laurel. Polish food has got to be some of the most filling food I have ever eaten! I was full just looking at it. I tried this beet soup that had a kind of ravioli in it and pierogi, which is a thin dumpling thing stuffed with potato and cheese and a little cabbage. Ohmygoodness I need to go back for more. The three of us found a cute little bar that night too. It was underground and in a part of the town that we were pretty sure not too many tourists would hit up, so we think we found a good local place. It had fabulous hot wine. Have I mentioned the hot wine yet? Wow. I'm going to make it when I get home, don't worry.

Castle

Marcel, our program director, and a dragon

Pope John Paul II, cuz he was Polish!

castle

heads on the ceiling of the thrown room hahah

We went back to the hotel kind of early with the intention of going to bed kind of early because we had to get up kind of early to leave for Auschwitz, and no one wanted to be feeling zoned out for that tour, if only out of respect for the place. But of course I stayed up with Erika and Laurel in their room, since Kinga, my roommate for the weekend, had already gone to bed. We watch this Polish soap opera. Oh man. It was in English, but it had this voice over in Polish. And the voice over was a man...doing the voices for every character...even the girls... It was probably one of the more funny things I've seen this whole trip.


Ok the next morning, I heard another funny story. One of the French guys got home and went into the wrong room and tried to go to bed. Oops! That sounds like something that would happen to my brother. Anyway, we left early on the bus to go to Auschwitz, which is a town about an hour south west from Krakow that unfortunately is home to one of the biggest concentration camps. I couldn't have had a more sobering day. the place just looked... I don't know, I can't think of a word to describe it. On the outside, some of the buildings looked like they could have been normal apartment buildings in the US, but the amount of barbed wire all over... I don't know, it was really unsettling. We walked through a lot of displays that just.. they showed things that shouldn't have ever happened. One room was completely full of plaits of hair that had been cut off women. Another room was lined on either side with enormous piles of shoes. Another with suitcases... glasses... kitchen items and dish sets that women had tried to take, thinking they were simply being relocated... Baby clothes. We learned that Auschwitz-Birkenau was a death camp, and not all camps were death camps. The only thing that made a camp classified as such was a gas chamber. At Auschwitz-Birkenau, people were gassed upon arrival if they were put into the wrong group when they got off the train. We went into one of the gas chambers. Stupid stupid invention. There are few things in this world more senseless than that. The Birkenau part of the camp was even worse. It's gas chambers had  been destroyed, but the ruins were still there. At this part of the camp, you could see where three trains at once could be brought in full of people. The barracks to sleep in were made of wood, the beds looked like they could fall down and crush people on the lower bunks (which happened), and it was just so big... 

Work Makes You Free

Infamous Birkenau Gate

The Memorial

On the way back on the bus, we watched a short film about a man who escaped from Auschwitz. He and three others were somehow able to sneak out as a fake work group, get a hold of some German uniforms, and a car (one of the prisoners was the main mechanic) and they just drove away. It was hard to watch though, because that man just had the roughest life, his youth completely stolen. After the war, the communists put him in jail for 10 years. Devestating story. But he and his wife travel and volunteer a lot now, so.. It's good he got a chance to live. The whole day until that point had been depressing, I really felt like all the happiness had been sucked out. The next film we watched then was Disney's 101 Dalmations. hahaha


It was a really great trip overall. I got to hang out with a lot of the European students who I rarely get to see. I just wish we'd had this trip earlier in the semester so I could have had a chance to meet everyone sooner! 


Theennnn the following night, the French girls hosted a dinner :-) They made yummy yummy crepesssss omg I love crepes! Most of the people from the Krakow trip were there, so I had another chance to get to know them. I ended up staying there with them way too late... 2am on a Sunday night? But it was so worth it! :-D 

I donno dude, it's all Greek to me...

Sorry, I've been pretty bad about updating lately. I'll start with two weeks ago! The weekend after I went to Madrid, I stayed in Budapest. It was a much needed travel break, though I guess I didn't take much of a rest. I actually went for an 11 mile run one day, to the World Photo Press Exhibit another day, and then out to a little village called Eger which is known as wine country. Oh wow was Eger a cool village! We visited a castle and the Minaret, which is a Muslim tower built by the Turks during the Ottoman Empire era. We went up that... it had the steepest and narrowest stairs ever, I'd never felt claustrophobic before that! Really though, a normal sized guy couldn't get up there easily, the walls were touching my shoulders on either side! Ah and the wine! Eger had amazing wine cellars. Oh it was so good. And very cheap to taste :)


The rest of the week went by extremely fast, like always. Class on only three days a week makes time just fly. Or teleport, that's faster. Time teleports. But anyway, I had a flight to Athens last Wednesday night. I was supposed to get there at about 2:30am. That was a little inconvenient actually because I didn't want to book a hostel, only be there for half the night, and have to either wander around Athens at 3am with a suitcase or pay for a taxi. So I decided that I was just going to be homeless for the night and wait it out until morning at the airport. However, I ended up sitting next to a Greek girl on the plane, Christina. She had just finished medical school in Hungary and was going home finally. I talked to her the entire flight, she even taught me the Greek alphabet and vowel combinations. Somehow, my plan of sleeping at the airport came up, and she wouldn't have it. She said she would rather know I was safe, so she and her mom took me home with them instead! Her mom was probably one of the sweetest people I have ever met! She couldn't speak much English, she was the classic Greek mom. She loaded me up with food upon getting to their house at 3am and then again the next day she gave me tons of food that lasted me the whole weekend! 

Christina and I on salsa dancing night :-D

Christina's mom and I

Christina took me directly to my hostel the next day, she said she wanted to see it to make sure it was a safe area. She knew a lot of good restaurants too and she kept saying she wanted me to have a great Greek experience, so I know I got authentic food :) She met up with me each night I was in Athens and took me out with her friends. Once we stayed in Plaka, a famous district in Athens with lots of bars and restaurants. It's located right under the Acropolis. Wow it was crazy to see that hill everywhere. Another night she took me to Gazi, a clubbing district where a lot of Greek people go. The last night she took me salsa dancing! She and her friends are very very good at it- it was nice of them to teach me! I'm so grateful I met her. It's crazy, because I was so nervous about going to Athens all by myself, but I ended up not being alone at all.

Eleftheria and I drinking Rakomelo 

Christina, me, and Eleftheria on salsa night

Athens is a different kind of city. It didn't have office buildings or very big buildings like you can find in most big cities, even in Europe. It was very hustle and bustle and crowded. Everyone seemed to live above their shop or the place they worked. Even Christina's parents lived above their own doctor's office. I liked it though. The weather was nice and the ruins were amazing! The only thing it it's kind of a dirty city and now I have a cough.


The Friday I was there, I got up early and took a walk. I was trying to find the Acropolis, but you can't just walk towards it. The streets kind of wind... So it took me a little while to find it, even though one of Christina's friends had given me directions the night before. But it was so cool. The view from the top of the Acropolis Hill was amazing, and some weird weather looked like it was moving in really fast and that was awesome to watch from up there. Also, I think there might have been an NBA player there... It was like a 7 foot tall guy who a bunch of Americans kept recognizing and asking for a picture. I don't follow basketball, so I don't know who he was. Was there ever someone named Reg Rexall? I don't know who or what I was hearing people say.


Later, I met some people who were staying at my hostel. We went for a walk around the city. We found Hadrian's Arch, the Temple of Zeus, the old Olympic stadium, a sweet national park, and the Parliament with it's traditional Greek guards out front. It was a really nice day. OH and I can't forget that we got ice cream at this place near the hostel. It was amazing, by far the best ice cream I have had on this entire trip so far. I can't even describe it! Wow.

The Acropolis

lots of Athens

another view

Parthenon

Temple of Zeus

Hadrian's Arch

me at the old Olympic stadium

the guards at Parliament

It turned out to be such a great trip, even if I was apprehensive at first. So many thanks to Christina, her mom, and her friends! 


<3 <3