Poland and Paris

Although Poland and Paris were very different trips, I am falling behind and hence things are getting put into one post together!

I went to Krakow, Poland the weekend of April 25 through 27. This was the one place I most wanted to ensure I made it to this semester. I really wanted to tour Auschwitz-Birkenau. And, although my father's family is from Poland, I was the first person to return to Poland in 64 years- since the Holocaust. Michelle, my best friend from high school, met me and 4 other BSM students in Krakow for this trip. Most the BSM students who went decided totally last minute and it ended up being a really random group but it was sooo much fun! We stayed out partying Thursday night getting maybe an hour of sleep before our 6 AM bus ride Friday morning. Some people did not have such a great time on the bus; one person got to know the bus bathroom well! When we got to Krakow, we met up with Michelle and had a great Polish lunch of pirogies. After that we toured the salt mines, which were pretty cool. You can lick the walls and it tastes like salt. There were also all these statues carved out of salt and these beautiful rooms where all the decoration was made out of carved salt- even the chandeliers!

Saturday was Auschwitz-Birkenau day. Seeing Auschwitz was... weird. Anytime I saw train tracks (anywhere in Poland), I immediately associated them with deportations. Myself and the other Jewish girl there were adamantly against the idea of taking the train to Auschwitz (people generally take a bus but you can take a train but that just didn't feel right at all). It is a mostly incomprehensible place to go to, like not a lot can be said about it because it can't really be understood. I thought the tour was well done and it is weird to see that there are just normal restaurants and a town and normal people living right there now (you can see houses from the barracks at Birkenau, but they weren't there before, but could you imagine living in a place where that is your view from your window everyday). Auschwitz looks like a cute little town, like the work camp, it's the weirdest thing. It is really pretty with nice trees and pretty buildings- it's just doesn't seem to make any sense. The only place I felt really uncomfortable actually being was inside of a gas chamber- I had to kinda edge past another guy in my group so I was standing closer to the doorway, it just felt too weird. It is very weird that it is a tourist attraction. It is good that people see what happened and are trying to learn from it, but it is weird to have all these gifts shops (although they are mostly like book stores, so educational). I did see a group of guys probably about my age posing for a very touristy, "cool guy pose" sort of picture under the "work makes you free" sign, which just didn't feel right. It's just a very weird and different thing to see.

Krakow itself was a cute town. Nice and little, completely walkable. There was a pretty river (like all European towns it seems...). We took the bus back Sunday afternoon. The roads of Poland are awful so it was super bumpy and we played spades so I was sitting backwards in my track, practically falling into the aisles half the time. They also showed American Pie on our bus, which was fun! All in all, Poland was one of my favorite, if not my favorite, trips.

But, in exciting news, I brought Michelle back with me! So Michelle was in Budapest with me from Sunday evening til Wednesday evening. I finally made it to the baths but somehow we were inside when they were supposed to be outside- it was basically the most confusing thing I've done in Budapest. They were alright but I'm a pool snob- I would rather have a private hot tub in my backyard. I went to a European flat party; a friend of Michelle's is studying in Budapest so we went to a party of her program and it is mostly European so that was very different for me. I missed my American math majors! We ate gyros for like at least half our meals. A guy in my program made hot wings for people on Tuesday night and those were really good and then we went out for another girl's 21st birthday.

And then, Wednesday, I was off to Paris for my May Day long weekend! My friend Nicky's family was going to be in Paris so they got a hotel room for four of us. This weekend was planned months ago and always felt like an end of the semester thing so it was so weird that it actually came! We got to Paris late Wednesday night after running through Frankfurt to make our connection and were picked up by Nicky's mom in a rented car- how upscale! On Thursday, we wandered Paris and saw Notre Dame, the Seine, the Louvre (but didn't go inside as it was May Day), Moulin Rouge, and Montmarte. Friday, we absolutely killed ourselves with waiting in line for 4 hours to go up the Eiffel Tower, then walking to the Arc de Triomphe then down the Champs Elysee and finally through the Louvre. I have never been so exhausted in my life- standing for 4 hours is ridiculously hard! We never really recovered from Friday forcing the rest of our weekend to be mellower. Saturday, we went to Versailles but the wait to go in the palace was 4 hours and we were not doing that again. We choose to wander the gardens instead, which were really impressive but Scott and I were tired so we ended up mostly sitting on the steps and watching the fountains! Saturday night we played some spades and then it was bedtime. And Sunday we basically just woke up, ate, and flew home. The flight home was really fun- I bought a Cosmo and we read aloud and then Nicky and I planned our weddings! All in all, Paris was fun and relaxing (after Friday). I was impressed with how much of Paris I recognized once I was actually there after having gone to Paris when I was 13. But, I'm kinda over big European cities. Next time I do Europe, I would try to fit in more small, cute towns and scenic places. But, now I also have covered a lot more big European cities so I won't necessarily have to go see them!

Currently, I am suffering from a really silly mistake. As we don't have dryers here, everything line dries so it takes a day or so. Well, I accidentally washed every pair of jeans I own yesterday. So... my choices for what to wear today are wet jeans or shorts... I really will enjoy dryers immensely when I am back home! Less than three weeks- I can't believe how time has flied!

Still Here and Alive

I've realized I've stopped updating but that's mostly because life here is just... life. It is normal for me to live in a country where I don't speak the language, take the bus to school, be surrounded by math majors from all over the US (and my roommate from Canada), all that. Last week it did feel a little weird to be here because it was room draw and registration is this week so I've mentally been at CMC a lot in the last week. Tomorrow is the one month til I go home mark, which feels weird. I'll end up being 3 days short of being out of the US for a full 5 months. Pretty crazy.

But yes, last weekend was one of my most fun weekends in Budapest. I stayed out late every night- pretty out of character for me but fun to do every once in a while. The first night we went to a bar, then a chocolate bar (chocolate fondue and really really rich hot chocolate), and then another bar with dancing. We stayed out dancing and karaoking (is that a word?) until 4 in the morning but it was a great, fun night. Morrison's (the place we went) will now likely become a regular Thursday night thing (staying out all night to catch a 6 AM bus to Poland on Friday morning is the plan for this weekend). And the next morning, someone hosted breakfast meaning excellent french toast and good company!

Friday night we had another girls' party. Girls' party roughly translates into all the girls in my program get together and share all stories of who is dating who, who is hooking up with who, etc as well as some actual deep conversation about being abroad and stuff. It's great fun! Not too much new stuff had happened since the last girls' party in February that everyone didn't already know about it but it was still a great time. The people in my program really are all nice, good people.

Saturday night was another awesome, fun night. Some friends and I have concocted a Siamese Twin party. The premise is everyone gets randomly paired with someone else and they are tied together for the night and then everyone watches hilariousness ensure. Well, unfortunately, the rest of the program was not very excited about this party idea so it basically ended up being those of us who came up with the party theme. However, we stayed strong and tied ourselves to each other (I kid you not). It was good fun. My twin and another set of twins even decided to attempt a limbo contest while tied together (and I am embarrassed to admit we lost to two guys lol). After that, we attempted to go out dancing but not enough people were into the idea so the idea quickly died. But this evening was also followed by french toast!

I was sure by this point in time in the weekend, after three nights in a row of little sleep, that Sunday would be a mellow evening. I was wrong. Another girl in my program and I had decided to make dinner for anyone who was interested and serve Passover food so we could feel like we did something for Passover, even in Budapest. We made charoset, kugel, matzah brittle, matzah pizza, and a lentil salad- all good Jewish food! It was a success- we had like 15 people and the matzah brittle and pizza were especially popular! After that, four of us decided the night was not yet ever and wandered the street of Budapest while drinking some beer and ended the night with finding some gyros

Now I have a normal week, then going to Krakow, Poland to see Auschwitz (and meeting Michelle, my best friend from high school!) then Michelle will come back to Budapest with me for a few days. Then I go to Paris for a long 4 day weekend! After that, we have our last full week of classes and my 21st birthday! Then we have another 4 day weekend (likely with a trip that is not yet booked), then 3 final days of classes, then finals! Crazy how fast time has passed!

Who Knew Hungary was Beautiful?

Finally, springtime has arrived! This weekend, my aunt and grandma are visiting. It has been really nice seeing them. Yesterday, I went on a tour of the Danube River Bend with them. We visited three small towns along the Danube north of Budapest- Szentendre, Esztergom, and Visegrad. The view of the river and the beautiful cute houses along the river was amazing. I really had no idea that parts of Hungary could be so beautiful! These towns were colorful, everything was in bloom, it was amazing! It was really great finally getting out of Budapest and getting to see some other part of Hungary.

It is funny because in my program we all associate Budapest as ugly and grey and cloudy and covered in dog poop. But now, the sun is starting to shine and things are in bloom. I looked out my kitchen window today and realized that the trees at this park across the way are green and beautiful. I totally missed that happening. Literally, everything had no leaves and all of a sudden everything is in full bloom. I mentioned it to my roommate that it seemed like it happened all of a sudden, like overnight. She told me that indeed it had. Last weekend while I was gone, she noticed that on Friday everything was still brown and grey and all of a sudden on Saturday, everything was blooming and green and beautiful. Budapest transformed into springtime with greenery overnight! It is amazing and a wonderful, much needed change.

Wonderful Weekend in Switzerland and the Problems with Cities

This weekend, I went to Geneva to visit Greer. It was such an amazing and needed weekend. I will note, first, thought have flown Air France for the few trips I've flown and I really like them (they are nice, good food) but they are ridiculously inefficient. Like when I landed, we had to wait on the plane for a good long time because the ground crew wasn't there. Um, this same flight itinerary flies everyday... how could the ground crew not be there? And on another flight, our clearance to take off got canceled. What? How does that happen? But anyways, Greer's homestay is on a farm that you have to take 3 trains to get to from Geneva. It is this adorable little town and it is just surrounded by the beauty of Switzerland, and let me say, Switzerland is breathtakingly beautiful. Greer's homestay family was so nice. The food was absolutely amazing- they make everything by scratch and so much of the food was fresh from the farm. I ate fresh eggs that I saw Greer take out from the chickens, jams made from fruits they grew, fresh baked bread, vegetables from the farm, it was amazing! They even made cheese fondue! And served us wine made from their vineyards! Honestly, one of my coolest European experiences this semester. Greer and I walked for hours around the town and the nearby hills and farming fields. After being in a city for so long, I absolutely love getting out of cities and getting some fresh air and some cleanliness and just the slower pace of life that exists out of cities.

Speaking of needing to get out of cities, I returned to Budapest to discover I hate cities. Okay, that's an exaggeration. But, I return to discover that public transportation had a strike planned for the following morning (today, right now). This meant I would have to wake up at 6:45 AM to walk to school (an hour ish walk) to make my class this morning. So I got up but then got a call saying that the strike had been called off so I could take the bus as normal. So I left my apartment at normal time, got to the bus station, saw there was no one there and got another call saying they were wrong, apparently the strike was not off. At this point in time, had we walked, we would have missed at least half of our class. So the plan- go back to sleep. Which sounds great, but this class was a midterm review session. And the class that this midterm in is HARD. I feel so unprepared for this test already, I am so upset that I missed that review session this morning. I will get the notes but it is not the same. So because of stupid things like public transportation and strikes, I am really upset with cities. Life in suburbs with my car is just so nice...

End of Spring Break- Madrid

For the final weekend of spring break, we were in Madrid. Immediately after checking into our hostel, two other guys from our program walk into the hostel to check in! We knew they were in Spain but thought they would be in Barcelona the whole week but gave them information about our hostel just in case so it was pretty exciting that they actually came. We then went to El Tigre, a bar where you get a beer for 1.90 euros and then you get free tapas! It was pretty cool but after one plate of random odds and ends (as Nicky read in the guide book, for tapas they use the whole pig) Nicky and I decided to order a plate of actual regular food and eat that haha. And I just didn't feel up to drinking enough to get a full meal of tapas! After that, we wandered around Madrid for a bit and then ended up going back to the hostel to sleep.

Friday we went into Segovia, a really cute town about an hour out of Madrid. There is a famous aqueduct there built by the Romans. It was amazingly well maintained for something so old! The whole town looked like something out of a Disney movie. This courtyard area looked exactly like the town in Beauty and the Beast! There was also this castle, which was pretty cool (although it seems like there are castles everywhere in Europe). We then went down to this path below the main town and walked around. It was so nice to get out of a busy city and just walk around in nature for a bit. Segovia was one of my favorite sights of spring break. Friday night we then met up with Frash and some of her friends who were also visiting Madrid and went to this bar where you can get a 6 liter bucket of sangria. An Irish guy in our hostel room came with us and bought a bucket and wouldn't accept any money so that was pretty cool! We then tried to find an inexpensive place to go dancing but the first place we went to, we were told dancing wouldn't start for another hour or two. Then we stopped by this club we heard was expensive to see just how expensive it was but they said we would have to go home to change first! At that point we were ready to give up so we returned to the hostel.

Saturday we went and saw the Royal Palace, which was less impressive than the palace we saw in Vienna. We then went over to art museums. I went into the Thyssen-Bornemisza (missing the famous museum, the Prado, because the line was too long), which had a really eclectic collection. It was nice walking around an art museum, it made me think of museums I had visited with my CMC friends so I missed them a lot. After that, it was raining and we were tired so we went to Starbucks to work on math. It turned out to be an amazing plan because we got a ton done! Plus, I thought it was pretty awesome that I was in Madrid with a group of people who wanted nothing more than to go to Starbucks and do some math! We went out to a Spanish restaurant for dinner and then just hung out for a bit then bedtime.

Sunday was a short day. I basically just met up with Frash for lunch then it was time to go to the airport. Now, I had a 1 hr and 5 minute connection in Paris and I was told my flight to Paris was running about 10 to 15 minutes delayed but I should be fine. But then, on the plane, they said our take off had been cancelled and we couldn't take off until 6 PM, 55 minutes behind schedule! So I called the flight attendant over to ask about missing my flight and he said he would keep me updated. We ended up being able to take off earlier then that but got into Paris about 35 minutes delayed. The flight attendant told me it was a very tight connection but I might be able to make it. He gave me all the gate information and kept just telling to walk very quickly. I did just that and of course set off security for the first time in my life (chapstick container with metal in it in my pocket... whoops...). I got to my gate just as boarding started. I get on the plane and they inform us that the tractor is broken so we sit there for about 20 minutes waiting (it took me the whole flight to realize that the tractor was the thing that took the plane away from the gate, I couldn't figure out why the plane had a tractor haha). I finally made it back to Budapest but when I got to the train station discovered that the next train to the station near my apartment wasn't for 45 minutes- I was not waiting by myself at the dark station in the rain so I splurged and got a taxi back to my apartment. And thus ended my spring break. Overall, Spain was pretty cool but it is good to be back into normal life. Next trip- Geneva, Switzerland to see Greer in two weeks!

Spring Break Continued- Tarifa (Spain) to Tangier (Morocco)

Following my amazing weekend in Barcelona with my CMC friends, I met up with my BSM friends in Madrid but only for a few short hours of sleep because we were out of our hostel before 6 AM to catch a flight to Malaga in Southern Spain. Just from the plane landing, I could tell we were in a beautiful, beachy area. We had to get to Tarifa so we ended up taking 3 buses and go to our hostel in Tarifa around 2 PM. Nice, long travel time... Tarifa was a lot like Santa Cruz- a small, cute town. Our hostel was adorable- it was this house convereted into a hostel and there was no regular trash, everything was sorted (and I am assuming recycled). It might be my favorite hostel I´ve stayed in so far. We wanted to the beach, saw where the Mediteranean meets the Atlantic, and then had some dinner. After waking up so early, we all went to sleep early- definitely not the cool kids at that hostel!

The next day, we went to Morocco! We did a 2 day guided excursion. A really nice ferry took us over and the ads all over talk about how the ferry is 35 minutes but the ferry definitely left like 20 minutes late and then we had to wait 15 minutes because another boat was in the spot our ferry was supposed to go in so we made it to Morocco about an hour later than expected. Our tour basically involved walking through Morocco and being hounded by sales people and stopping at a few places where the tour definitely received a commission that they wanted you to shop at. And AJ made the mistake of asking a guy how much something cost. When the guy started at 27 euros, AJ said he wouldn´t pay more than 5 (even though he had no intention to buy at all) and when the guy finally went down to 5 euros and AJ said he didn´t want it, the guy followed us for another 10 minutes calling AJ an ignorant, arrogant American. But we did get some good Moroccan food! In the evening, they just dropped us off at a hotel (we were worried where they were taking us but it ended up being pretty nice and it was right by the beach) and the next day, they informed us, was just a free day. We had all had enough of Morocco and there was no way we wanted to wander on our own so we asked them to put us on an earlier ferry out of Morocco the next day. We had to wait FOREVER to get on the ferry (at least an hour after it was supposed to leave) but we finally made it back to Spain!

Back in Tarifa, it was raining so we spent most of the afternoon and evening playing cards. We met some other people in the hostel but nothing too exciting. We had planned to spend the morning in Tarifa then bus back to the Malaga airport for our flight to Madrid but while getting up in the morning, we learned that it was Holy Thursday meaning buses would not follow the normal schedule so we rushed out of the hostel. It was another long travel day. We left the first hostel at 10:30 AM and after 3 buses, 1 plane, and 2 metro lines, we arrived at our hostel in madrid at 8:30 PM. Next time I plan a spring break trip, I will definitely travel around less and situate myself in one spot for a while! Now, I have the final leg of my spring break trip in Madrid so I will update on that once I am back in Budapest!

Start of Spring Break- Barcelona

After a stressful last week with my first midterm, I was super excited for it to be spring break. I am traveling throughout Spain with Nicky, AJ, and Jacob for most of the week. But the first weekend of spring break was Barcelona with Frash, Greer, and Jessa. Frash and I flew to Barcelona together from Budapest on Friday. Nothing too exciting there although we flew through Paris and I found in my first visit to Western Europe after living in Eastern Europe for over 2 months a lot of differences between Eastern and Western Europe. Western Europe is much more fashion conscious. People dress so differently! It was really fun people watching. I also absolutely love the sound of the French language and was able to understand some French through reading, which is good since I took French for like 6 years! It was a super long travel day- we left my apartment at 9:30 AM and got to our hostel around 9:30 PM. Flights with layovers and taking public transportation to and from airports will do that...

Frash and I were staying in the hostel without Greer and Jessa the first night (they both came in Saturday morning) and I was totally intimidated by the hostel the first night. It was a 20 bed dorm room, much bigger than anything I´ve stayed in before and I had not traveled in a small group and without guys before. We walk into the lobby to check in and it was a smokey, intimidating bar with drunken people yelling "Chug, chug, chug!" My exhausted, hungry self was not pleased at this point in time... We walk into the room and it just felt like everyone was watching us walk in and I mean, it was a room with 20 beds! After some cheap falafel (yes, I found cheap falafel in Spain after being there for only about an hour!), we went back to the hostel bar and ended up meeting some Portuguese guys. We hung out with them that evening and ended up having a great time. Of course, we made friends with the noisiest people in the room. They stayed out later than us on Friday night and woke us up to talk to us when they came in at 4 AM and then this other group of Americans decided to have a shouting conversation at 5 AM so my first night in Barcelona did not involve much sleep...

Greer and Jessa arrived the next morning and it was so great just being us. We walked to the beach and caught up over some tea and coffee in a cafe. Barcelona had all these cute little stands with beautiful jewelry and clothes and other various things all over. There were also all these artistic statues which were really awesome. We went out to dinner in this vegetarian organic restaurant where I had some great paella. The food and ambience there was absolutely awesome. After that, we went back to the hostel bar and hung out just us and with the Portuguese guys again. Another really fun night. My two nights in Barcelona were both super fun and the closest to the stereotypical "spring break" nights I´ve ever had.

Sunday morning we finally went to do some touristy things and saw a church (Segrada Familia or something like that) and this park that is basically this artistic architectural structure (Gaull park I believe). It was really beautiful and impressive. We then had some more falafel and basically just made fun of each other and acted like us for a bit longer. After that Frash and I traveled on to Madrid where I met back up with Jacob, AJ, and Nicky who I am with for the rest of the week.

Well this internet place is closing now so I will post more later... well when more happens as well... Enjoy spring break for everyone else who is on it!