End of April, Beginning of May

I knew I was not doing a great job updating my blog, but I just realized that I haven't posted in over a month. So...here is a brief recap of the last month:

1. We went to Poland with our program. Excluding the long bus rides there and back, I really liked Krakow. A lot of the people on our program let the poor planning of the bus times get them down, but I really don't see why that should spoil the trip. We got a tour of the city, which was great. I really liked out tour guide and Krakow is a much more beautiful city than I thought it would be. We went to Auschwitz, which I will not describe as I am unable to do the experience justice. I will say, rather, that if you have the opportunity I would recommend going. It is an invaluable experience. We also went to see the salt mines. A lot of our group did not like them...I think they were expecting something cooler...but lets face it...its a salt mine, not a gold mine :) I liked it. There is a beautiful chapel inside with chandeliers made of rock salt (well, everything is made of rock salt, but the chandeliers are beautiful). You can rent the chapel to get married. Destination wedding anyone?? My friend Justin said he would not marry me in the salt mines...sad I know (and no, Mom, this is not someone I would actually marry). I took a pretty cool video in the mines, although most of it had to be on night vision so its a bit funky. The below is a group of us at a restaurant in Poland.


2.) Lauren from Willamette visited with her friend Jessamyn. They are studying in Germany outside of Stuttgart. We had a lot of fun showing them around Prague. The weather was beautiful and we walked in the park as well as showing them the Castle, the Bridge, the Clock, the Squares etc. It was really fun to see someone from WU and her friend was great as well. The below is Kelsey, Lauren, and me.





3.) The people we stayed with in Dublin visited. We had 5 extra people sleeping in our apartment at one point :) We also showed them around, although they were here during the week so we had classes through some of it. I really enjoy having people come stay with us. Its really fun.

4.) I went to Cannes to visit Annie. She is studying in Rennes and was staying with a friend (Maryann) in Cannes who she met at Taize. Maryann is an English teaching assistant in Le Cannet, which is sort of like a suburb of Cannes. She lives with two friend girls who were nice, but not overly friendly. Her housemates brother and his friend were staying there as well (good to know we are not the only people who cram visitors in!). Her brother and his friend are studying to be shepherds, which is pretty cool. Most of Maryann's friends are other English assistants. We met a Canadian guy, a Scottish girl, another American, and another girl who was possibly also Scottish but she did not really talk all that much. The Scottish girl Maria was really nice - and reminded me of someone I might meet at GV - she told the shepherd guy she would try to find him work in Scott land :) Even though he speaks neither English nor Gaelic. The weather in Cannes was beautiful. Luckily I did not get sunburned. We spent a lot of time on the beach and it was very relaxing.

This is our last week of classes, next week is "finals" although I only have papers. The picture below is from our last Prague as a living history class. We hiked up this hill outside of Prague (we took a 1 car train out there...it was quite odd) and it was a really beautiful day.

Pics

There are some very belated Ireland photos on my photo page. They took a really long time to upload...so I'm sorry, but I am gonna take another break before I try to upload any others.

Update

I guess its been awhile since I wrote anything. So here's the update.
Being back in Prague after break was fun. Kelsey and I went out to a true European dinner (got to the restaurant around 7:30, got home around 11:00). We ordered way more than we would usually, but figured since we weren't spending money traveling we could treat ourselves. It was wonderful. Then on Friday we unfortunately had a fire in the courtyard of our building. It was a bit scary, as it was a fairly large fire, but it was confined to the courtard and only burned a the outside walls. Luckily everything was fine. We went to our assistant program director's house to get a little sleep (the fire was a 4:30am) and when we came back everything was back to normal.
Leah came to visit!! It was awesome. We showed her all of the touristy places...and tried to recount what we have learned in our Prague as a Living History Class (I'm afraid we didn't do a very good job). It was very nice to have Kelsey's and my other third. We have missed her - and miss her still :) I was also very excited last weekend that the movie 27 dresses was released in Prague. Corny, I know, but it was really cute. And anything in English (even if it has Czech subtitles) is very relaxing.
My mother will be happy to know that we have found a house to live in next year at school. Kelsey, Leah, Alyssa and myself will be roommates! It looks nice from the pictures, although it has some ugly 1970's wood paneling. A group of senior girls live there right now and are moving out. Its a little bit away from campus, probably about a 15 minute walk (so I might want to get a bike...although I'm dreadful at bike riding).
Tonight Kira, Kelsey, and I are going to see Aida. I think Kira and I are also going to see a chamber music concert on Saturday or Sunday. So this week should be a good cultural week.
We are also going to the town Cesky Krumlov on a class trip tomorrow. I am excited (excpet for the fact that we are meeting in front of school at 7am, which means I have to get up around 6am :( It should be interesting though. I have heard good things about Cesky Krumlov. Also, I think it will be fun to have a class trip...I haven't had one since...8th grade?

Spring Break

Budapest-
Kelsey and I really enjoyed our stay in Budapest. Dylan was very nice to let us stay with him, especially considering his parents were in town. He also had two other extra friends staying...so he is clearly an amazing person. He stayed in his parents hotel room and let us have the room (and his keys...need i say "nice" again?) We got there pretty late, and it took awhile for Dylan to figure out where we were which kind of sucked a little, but Kelsey and I are very positive people so we were not phased by that. The next day we did what we always do in every european city...walk. Unfortunately a lot of stuff was closed because it was Sunday and also the weekend of their independence day (we saw some sort of demonstration and a lot of cops in riot gear on the bus in). We walked all the way up to the Citadel and the hungarian statue of liberty (which is a long way up). The picture is from the St. Gellert Monument on the side of the hill that the Citadel is on.

That night Dylan's friend Mathias took us (and Dylan's other friends Alex and Danny) out to a fusball and billiards place. We played both games rather badly. We saw Dylan for a very short time when he got back from spending the day with his parents.
The next day Kesley and I walked some more, went shopping, and went to the baths. The baths were interesting, not something I would partake in regularly (lots of hairy old men), but interesting nonetheless. That night we went out to a place called Morrison's with Dylan's roommate Ryan (yet another amazing gentleman). We hung out with him, his Turkish girlfriend, their other roommate Andy and some more of Dyland and their friends. It was very fun.
All in all, Budapest was enjoyable. The city is fairly run down and their are homeless people around (something you don't really see in Prague at all - we have beggars, but no one actually visibly sleeping on the street). We did not like the Budapest train station at all. It is extremely confusing and rather unpleasant. We were not at all sure we were on the right train when we left for Bratislava. We met some fun British guys on the train, who also were not sure if they were on the right train (the train said it was going to Prague, so we were hoping it was stopping in Bratislava. The two guys (Jeremy and Nick) were, like most of the people we met, visiting Budapest, Bratislava, and Prague for their vacation.

Bratislava -
Bratislava is a nice town. It is similar in feel to Prague, but much smaller. When we got there we just got some food and then took a nap. When we woke up we met the other people staying in our room (who had also been napping). Four of them were students from Georgetown studying in Madrid, and the other guy was just on vacation traveling around. They were all really nice and we met up with them later that night in what is apparently the former largest beer hall in Europe. It had been recommended to them by someone who had not mentioned that Tuesday was country western night! It was pretty hilarious to see a bunch of Slovaks two-stepping to a live country band that was playing translated country music. Not exactly the first thing you expect to find in Slovakia. After that we wandered around a bit and ended up at a strange little slovakian Karaoke bar. The guys sang some Slovakian music for awhile, it was amazing :) Then we went back and hung out in the basement of our hostel, where we met Paul, a British guy who apparently works outside of Eugene for several months each year, and is a frequent visitor to Salem. He was very drunk and proceeded to call someone in Salem so that he could tell them he met girls from Salem in Bratislava. That was not the only weird connection of the night though. Peter (the blond in the picture) is from Hudson and went to Hawken for Kindergarden. Cavan (with the beard) filmed a movie in southern oregon near where Kelsey lives. Sean (next to Cavan) grew up in Northern California where Kelsey has a lot of family. Jonas (the one in the middle) did not have any interesting connection to our lives, but he is Swedish (though he's lived in the U.S. for abut ten years) and speaks about 5 languages, so he's an interesting person all on his own.

Though we enjoyed our travels Kelsey and I were very glad to come home. We ran into the British guys again on the way home which was fun, and we may see some of the other people we met who are coming to Prague. We had planned to go to Olomouc and try to hike later in the week, but the weather has turned quite cold (it was snowing when we arrived in Prague) and so we have decided to just take some time to enjoy Prague. We figure we can take a few days and spend a bit more than we usually would taking in the city since we are not paying for travel or accommodation.
Thats it for now.

Flowers are not enough

Prague is a beautiful and wonderful place, and an easy place to help you forget other things. A family friend passed away earlier this week and I am torn between the two worlds in which I seem to be living. One holds everything new and shiny and draws my attention like a moth to a flame, and the other is caught in a moment of grief that I share and yet am separated from. I am not accustomed to death. Of the things I have experienced in my short life, it is not one that has come up very often. I find it difficult to fathom that someone I have known all my life, who I have seen almost every holiday that I can remember, whose son I apparently had my first "co-ed" sleep-over with (when we were toddlers), who is one of "the dads" as I have always thought of them, is gone. His family is part of my family. He was dearly loved, and he will be sorely missed.
As I leave for spring break today, I know that all of this will leave my mind. I will remember from time to time, but push it away. I wish I knew a way to hold him in my memory without tears and without such a sense of loss. I wish I could be there with our family of friends, if only for a moment, to truly acknowledge that loss. But I don't know a way to do that, and I can't be there with them, so I will focus on all of the new and shiny things that Europe has to offer me. Kelsey and I leave for Budapest this afternoon, and will meet up with Dylan who we met in Paris and went to Versailles with. After that we plan to go to Bratislava and Vienna. We may also travel around the Czech Republic, either in southern Bohemia or central Moravia.

For Ed:
May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind always be at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
and rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

Class?

There is something about having classes for 3 hours 1 day a week that makes you feel as if you never have class. Yes, it is the same amount of class as if you had it for 1 hour 3 days a week, but it doesn't feel the same. Especially when your classes are clustered on 3 days a week (and one of those days you only have 1 class). Of course, now that we have some reading and homework to do, I feel a bit more like I am going to school. On the other hand, my weekends are longer than my week...

I am enjoying my classes with the exception of my class on cultural perspectives. The professor, who I am sure (based on his name dropping habit) is very well read and has had the benefit of an excellent education, has some very bad habits. One: the name dropping. He cannot go more than 5 seconds without referencing a philosopher he has read, a well known academic he has studied under, or a friend who is "an expert" in some field. It often feels as if he feels the need to list these people because he is afraid that without them we will not trust what he says. Truthfully it just makes him look insecure, especially when he feels the need to use Kant as support for his attendance policy. Two: isn't it? aren't they? He tends to finish any statement with one of those two phrases (again making him seem very insecure). Three: making up words. He ads the endings "-ality" and "-ization" to words that they should not be added to. Correct me if I am wrong, but I do not believe that "disciplinarizations," "fascinatingness," or "valuality" are in fact words. He tends to use words with -ality or -ization endings so much, that even the words that are real start to feel fake because he uses the endings too much. Okay. thats enough venting.

In the interest of not having class, spring break starts this weekend! Kelsey and I are going to Budapest, where we plan to meet up with Dylan who we met in the hostel in Paris. Then we also plan to make out way down to Croatia if possible. I am very excited. I am also really glad that we are not going to countries that use the euro :)

Kelsey's computer is broken so I can't upload pictures to picasa for a little while. Here is a picture of us at St. Patrick's Cathedral. ( Left to Right: Alyssa, Me, Kelsey, Alison, Kate).

Ireland

We came to Ireland on Thursday and it has been wonderful. On the flight to Dublin Kelsey and I met a Canadian guy who is teaching in Prague right now. We were very pleased to make a friend on the plane (I think it makes it feel like you did not waste those two hours of your life). We had a hostel for Thursday, but we did not know where we were staying the rest of the weekend. Luckily we met up with Hannah's friend Kelly and his friends and they have graciously allowed us to stay with them in exchange for buying electricity cards (apparently you have to buy electricity cards if you want to have electricity in your dorm room).
Thursday night we went out to a couple pubs with Kelly and company for Alison's birthday. We had a lot of fun. Yesterday we did the hop on hop off bus tour of Dublin. We saw Dublin Castle, Trinity College, Christchurch, St. Patrick's Cathedral, the Guinness Storehouse and probably some things I don't recall. All the grass is super green, its amazing. Then we went out to Indian food which was really good. After that we went to Kelly's. We hung out with his friends for the evening, it was really nice. His friend Shane was incredibly helpful and sweet. I didn't get to see the girls we stayed with very much, but they are also wonderful.
Today we went on a bus tour of the Irish countryside. We went to Glendalough (I am not sure I spelled that correctly) and Avoca. It was a beautiful day (a bit cold and windy though). Ireland looks exactly how you imagine it, we even saw a rainbow! There were plenty of sheep, and some shaggy ponies, and cows. We did not see any wild goats, but they apparently have those too. Glendalough apparently means glen of two lakes; they are both beautiful. The remains of a 6th century monastery are also located in Glendalough. They look very typical of what you would expect to find in Ireland and are very cool. I took some pictures of Celtic crosses in the graveyard, because I know my mom will like them ;)
We are going out tonight for Kelsey's birthday, which should be great. Unfortunately I am still feeling sick and cannot shake my cough. I know that everyone will tell me to see the doctor and I will soon if it does not get better. I would stay in tonight, but its Kelsey's 21, so I don't think thats really an option. I plan on sleeping late tomorrow though.