Ok, here was my list of things I wanted to do this semester:
# know the city/walk without (looking at) a map check.
# ride the bike path this is the one thing I didn't do?
# read in Spanish check.
# read in English check.
# keep a journal in Spanish check.
# find a summer job almost.
# do research for my thesis check.
# travel around Europe - Paris, Milan, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, and Budapest check.
# travel around Spain - Madrid, Ronda, Matalascanas check.
# learn about Sevilla check.
# enjoy my classes check. mostly.
# read by the river check.
# run outside check.
# find a favorite spot several checks.
# take a flamenco class check.
# get an internship check. sortof.
# meet Spanish students check.
# go out check.
# shop check.
# take pictures check.
# be fluent check. sortof.
# talk to my Senora check.
# do the walking tours in the guidebook check.
# try all types of Spanish food check.
I'd say I was pretty successful overall, which is great. I have such mixed feelings about leaving here. On the one hand, I am so excited to see my family and friends, especially since my whole family is coming to Sharon's graduation, and I can't wait to go back to Brown when it is all pretty for commencement and to move into my house a week later. But on the other hand, this semester has been incredible. I feel like I could make a mile-long list about all the things I will miss about Seville, but here are my favorites:
my house and my Senora
the 15 American students I have spent the last 4 months with
hanging out by the Triana bridge, in our favorite spot, drinking tinto de verano
having time to read
running by the river at sunset
tanning with Hannah on the roof
my Senora's cooking
my walk to school
the Spanish schedule
the fact that it doesn't get dark here until after 10
the Plaza de San Lorenzo and the people watching that we do there
seeing the Torre del Oro at night
the fact that everyone in Seville is always in the streets
Basically, this semester has surpassed all my expectations, and I feel lucky to have had the chance to enjoy living in Spain for this long, to learn as much Spanish as I have, to have made so many good friends, and to have had the opportunity to travel all over Europe at the same time. I don't really have any big plans for the next two days, but I think we are just going to walk around and enjoy the best part of Seville - the atmosphere.
Ok. Time to pack. See you in Providence.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
It's May Already?
I'm not sure how this happened, but it's May 10th, which means I'm leaving in 10 days. While now it feels like a blur, it also seems like I've been here for ages. Although I'm so excited to see my friends and family when I get home, there are definitely things that I can already tell I'm going to miss. But I'll save all that for the actual last post, which will probably come next week at some point. Anyway, the past week went pretty well, mostly just getting back on track and doing a little bit of organizing/studying for the 4 exams I have this Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday. They shouldn't be anything too difficult, especially since all my grades automatically transfer as pass/fail back to Brown. I'm anxious to get them over with because when I do, it will be Thursday and I'll have until the following Wednesday to hang out with my friends and do all the last things I want to do while I'm still in Seville. I guess nothing incredibly exciting has happened in the past week, except another visit to the doctor - apparently I have an ear infection, probably caused by getting water in my ear from the Turkish baths and then flying back here. It is always an experience to go to the Spanish doctor because I never really know all the words and definitely have to improvise a lot. Hannah came with me for moral support and I explained to the doctor what had happened but when I was getting my paperwork filled out, they wrote 'M' for gender. I was a little confused and said something to the woman there, but then quickly remembered that in Spain, 'M' obviously stands for mujer (woman). Right. I'm glad I've been here for 4 months and am still doing things like that. Que gracioso. She gave me some drops and everything is all set, especially because medicine is so incredibly cheap here. I got a lot of ibuprofen for only 2 euros and my ear drops were only 3 euros. Hannah was right to encourage me to go to the doctor here - it can cost a fortune in the US!
Besides all that excitement, I've mostly been just trying to hang out and enjoy myself before all the craziness that happens for the last week here and when I get home and go straight to Providence to meet up with my whole family for Sharon's graduation. I've been training for my sprint triathlon (June 13th) by running 3.5 miles a day, but I can't run until about 8:30 or 9pm because it has been 80-90 degrees here every day. I have a run by the river that I love doing and that never gets boring because of all the people watching I get to do while I run. Hopefully I'll be in reasonably good shape by the time I get home and I'll get to ride my bike and swim intensely for the next couple of weeks to make sure I'm ready. I mostly just want to know that I can do it, and maybe I'll try and do another at the end of the summer and see what kind of times I can get. I've been really enjoying the running, especially because I've been doing it so late at night - basically at sunset. Watching the sunset over the Guadalquivir (the river here) is probably one of my favorite things to do in all of Seville. I'm definitely going to miss that.
That reminds me that when I get home, I'm going to be seriously confused with my schedule. I've gotten so accustomed to the Spanish way of life - I used to think that if I didn't go out before 4pm that there was definitely something wrong with me, whereas now I don't even expect myself to leave here before 4. Running at 9 is something I've never really done on a regular basis, and I eat dinner every night at 10 or so. That is going to be a big adjustment when I get back to the US, but I also think I'm going to try and keep up some parts of the schedule that I have here because I like it so much. I like eating lunch at 3pm and eating dinner later. Maybe it's because I haven't been that busy here, but I feel like I have so much more time in the day, even though the day doesn't start until much later here. I think it probably also has a lot to do with the fact that it stays light here until about 10, so even if I don't do much until 2 or 3 in the afternoon, I still feel like I have the same amount of daylight.
The most exciting thing that has been going on here is that Loly is teaching me how to cook! I have been standing with her in the kitchen when she makes lunch and dinner and watching while she explains to me what she is doing and why. It has been a great experience so far, I have learned a lot of new vocabulary and a lot of her technique. Hannah and I were trying to convince her to publish a book with all her recipes because her food is so delicious, because she knows how to make traditional Spanish food, which generally has a lot of meat, into vegetarian food, and because we haven't seen that many Spanish cook books in the US. We talked to her about it for a while, and she pulls out this awesome printed book that she had put together a while ago for all her friends that has a ton of her recipes! We told her she had already done all the work and that she ought to bring it to a publisher. I told her that I would translate it into English for her and that she should try to sell it - her food is amazing and so healthy. She was like, yeah, I could do that, but most of my recipes are just things I make up in the moment, I don't measure or anything, I just do what is in my head. Pretty impressive, if you ask me.
Nothing else too exciting around here, I'm really glad to just relax for a while before going home. I've been able to sit and read, study a little, work on my Spanish (which has actually gotten really good at this point!) and tan. This week, after exams, I'm going to do a little shopping to get all the things I want before I leave here and then ya esta. I can't believe it's almost time to go home, but I'm also so excited because I have been looking forward to seeing my family so much for Sharon's graduation, and basically everyone is going to be there. I'll also have some friends who are still at school so it will be great to see them for a few days. And then, after a possible week at home, it's time to move into my new apartment in Providence with Rebecca and Rachel! I'm really excited, it's going to be a great summer. But for now, I am going to enjoy every last minute in Seville because I'm going to be home so soon. I can't wait until after exams are over and I just get to be with my friends in this beautiful city for another week.
Besides all that excitement, I've mostly been just trying to hang out and enjoy myself before all the craziness that happens for the last week here and when I get home and go straight to Providence to meet up with my whole family for Sharon's graduation. I've been training for my sprint triathlon (June 13th) by running 3.5 miles a day, but I can't run until about 8:30 or 9pm because it has been 80-90 degrees here every day. I have a run by the river that I love doing and that never gets boring because of all the people watching I get to do while I run. Hopefully I'll be in reasonably good shape by the time I get home and I'll get to ride my bike and swim intensely for the next couple of weeks to make sure I'm ready. I mostly just want to know that I can do it, and maybe I'll try and do another at the end of the summer and see what kind of times I can get. I've been really enjoying the running, especially because I've been doing it so late at night - basically at sunset. Watching the sunset over the Guadalquivir (the river here) is probably one of my favorite things to do in all of Seville. I'm definitely going to miss that.
That reminds me that when I get home, I'm going to be seriously confused with my schedule. I've gotten so accustomed to the Spanish way of life - I used to think that if I didn't go out before 4pm that there was definitely something wrong with me, whereas now I don't even expect myself to leave here before 4. Running at 9 is something I've never really done on a regular basis, and I eat dinner every night at 10 or so. That is going to be a big adjustment when I get back to the US, but I also think I'm going to try and keep up some parts of the schedule that I have here because I like it so much. I like eating lunch at 3pm and eating dinner later. Maybe it's because I haven't been that busy here, but I feel like I have so much more time in the day, even though the day doesn't start until much later here. I think it probably also has a lot to do with the fact that it stays light here until about 10, so even if I don't do much until 2 or 3 in the afternoon, I still feel like I have the same amount of daylight.
The most exciting thing that has been going on here is that Loly is teaching me how to cook! I have been standing with her in the kitchen when she makes lunch and dinner and watching while she explains to me what she is doing and why. It has been a great experience so far, I have learned a lot of new vocabulary and a lot of her technique. Hannah and I were trying to convince her to publish a book with all her recipes because her food is so delicious, because she knows how to make traditional Spanish food, which generally has a lot of meat, into vegetarian food, and because we haven't seen that many Spanish cook books in the US. We talked to her about it for a while, and she pulls out this awesome printed book that she had put together a while ago for all her friends that has a ton of her recipes! We told her she had already done all the work and that she ought to bring it to a publisher. I told her that I would translate it into English for her and that she should try to sell it - her food is amazing and so healthy. She was like, yeah, I could do that, but most of my recipes are just things I make up in the moment, I don't measure or anything, I just do what is in my head. Pretty impressive, if you ask me.
Nothing else too exciting around here, I'm really glad to just relax for a while before going home. I've been able to sit and read, study a little, work on my Spanish (which has actually gotten really good at this point!) and tan. This week, after exams, I'm going to do a little shopping to get all the things I want before I leave here and then ya esta. I can't believe it's almost time to go home, but I'm also so excited because I have been looking forward to seeing my family so much for Sharon's graduation, and basically everyone is going to be there. I'll also have some friends who are still at school so it will be great to see them for a few days. And then, after a possible week at home, it's time to move into my new apartment in Providence with Rebecca and Rachel! I'm really excited, it's going to be a great summer. But for now, I am going to enjoy every last minute in Seville because I'm going to be home so soon. I can't wait until after exams are over and I just get to be with my friends in this beautiful city for another week.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Budapest
We got in to Budapest around 9pm - let off the bus on the curb, next to the metro station... - and somehow found our way to the hostel, which was actually in an apartment building. It turned out to be not only the cheapest (10 euro a night) but also the best hostel we stayed in for the whole trip - free breakfast, free laundry, and really friendly people. We went out to get some dinner and then crashed and slept late, we needed it. When we got up, we had a pretty slow morning, showering, getting our laundry ready, and eating breakfast. Budapest is actually divided into Buda and Pest, so we decided to go to Buda for the day. We took a metro up to the Parliament building, which was absolutely gorgeous, and then a tram down to the Chain Bridge, which is a remake of the first bridge to connect Buda to Pest - the original was destroyed by the Nazis during WWII. We took this little train up the side of Castle Hill all the way up to the castle, and the view as just incredible. I fell in love with the city. We wandered around Castle Hill for a while, looking at Buda Palace, Fisherman's Bastion, and the St. Matthais Church, and decided to eat lunch from a grocery store overlooking the city. It is always an experience going into a grocery store in another country, but it was fun and had a relaxed and beautiful lunch on Fisherman's Bastion. After we were finished, we decided to go to the Buda Labyrinth, which basically runs under the entire Castle Hill. We had fun for a while chasing and scaring each other in the dark and trying to find the legendary wine room. After going through almost twice, we finally stumbled upon it - I smelled it and Kelly saw it - and even though the wine was technically undrinkable, we had some fun hanging out and sitting by it. After we left the labyrinth, we went down Castle Hill and over to Gellert Hill, at the base of which stands the most famous/expensive hotel in the city, which also has the most famous/expensive Turkish Baths. Budapest is famous for its Turkish Baths because hot springs run under the entire city and naturally heat the baths. We climbed up Gellert Hill to the Citadella, a building constructed by the Austrians during the Habsburg period when Austria and Hungary were one country. It was a beautiful walk and a beautiful view, and we even stopped along the way to play on some awesome slides. Then, we found a Church carved into the side of the hill and wandered around it for a few minutes until we realized that mass was about to start. We had decided that we wanted to go on a cruise down the Danube at some point, so we wandered along the shoreline to try and find one. We finally did, and the man who sold us the tickets also helped us find somewhere to eat dinner. Perfect. So we got chicken paprika and onion soup and took a beautiful cruise down the river so we could see the entire city all lit up at night.
The next day, we slept in again and got going later in the morning to see the biggest synagogue in Europe, which was absolutely gorgeous. Then, we saw St. Stephen's Church, the biggest/most important church in Budapest, and got some lunch right next to it so we could look at it the whole time. Then we walked down Andrassy Ut, which is the main street in Pest and also has the House of Terror Museum, which is the former headquarters of both the Nazi and Communist regimes. It was a great museum, although completely in Hungarian. There were information sheets in every room, and of course we all collected all of them. So now I have a book of Hungary's history during WWII. After a short break in the museum's cafe, we walked down the rest of Andrassy Ut to City Park, where we saw the Heroes' Monument and the beautiful buildings that house the art museums. We walked further in to the park to get to the Turkish Baths, where we would be spending the rest of our last night. You can enter into the baths for only about 9 euro, which is incredible considering the baths have 3 huge pools (cold, warm, and hot) as well as a million little pools of different temperatures and various steam rooms/saunas. It was great, and I'm really wondering why we don't have that in the US - oh wait, it's because we don't have natural hot springs. Right. So after that, we walked back to the hostel to call it a night. We had to pack and get ready to go home the next day.
Traveling home was interesting. We got to the airport in about an hour and a half and our flight wasn't posted on the board. We realized that there were 2 terminals, A and B, so we walked over to the other one but it wasn't listed there either. Uh oh. So we went down to the information desk to try and ask, and they told us which line to stand in. After asking a bunch of people in front of us and hearing Spanish in the line, we were finally convinced that we were actually going to Madrid. So we waited in line and realized that it was 12:20, and our flight was supposed to leave at 1:20. Unfortunately, the desk hadn't opened yet...so we weren't sure what to do. Kelly went to pester the woman behind the counter, but she wasn't very helpful, and finally the desk opened for check-in, although they were probably the most incompetent airport workers I'd ever seen. The line wasn't that long and it took so long to check every in to 4 different windows. Also, halfway through the line, our flight finally got posted on the departures board. Pretty ridiculous, especially considering the fact that when we got up to the front of the line the man told us that our reservation had been deleted. We talked our way on, but by that time it was 1:10 and we had to run through security and get our seats on the plane, which ended up leaving a half hour late anyway. Oh budget airlines. So when we landed in Madrid after a slightly rocky flight, it was already almost 5 and we knew we were going to miss the 6pm bus from the center of the city. The next one wasn't leaving til 10ish, so we decided to hang around the airport to wait for the bus to leave from there at 9:30. However, we knew we had arrived in Spain again when we couldn't find the bus and when everyone at the information desk had no idea what was going on. Charlie tried to ask about the bus and the woman looked up the phone number on google for him. So helpful. So we decided to go to the city, but when we tried to buy tickets, all the 10pm buses were sold out since it is Feria in Sevilla, so we had to wait around until 1am. It wasn't actually that bad, though, we just had some extra time to spend together. We knew that everything was going to be ok when we came out of the metro, it had stopped raining, and there was a double rainbow. We got home on Friday morning at 8am and passed out until after 2. I already have some separation anxiety from the people I've spent the past 10 days with.
Budapest Pictures
The next day, we slept in again and got going later in the morning to see the biggest synagogue in Europe, which was absolutely gorgeous. Then, we saw St. Stephen's Church, the biggest/most important church in Budapest, and got some lunch right next to it so we could look at it the whole time. Then we walked down Andrassy Ut, which is the main street in Pest and also has the House of Terror Museum, which is the former headquarters of both the Nazi and Communist regimes. It was a great museum, although completely in Hungarian. There were information sheets in every room, and of course we all collected all of them. So now I have a book of Hungary's history during WWII. After a short break in the museum's cafe, we walked down the rest of Andrassy Ut to City Park, where we saw the Heroes' Monument and the beautiful buildings that house the art museums. We walked further in to the park to get to the Turkish Baths, where we would be spending the rest of our last night. You can enter into the baths for only about 9 euro, which is incredible considering the baths have 3 huge pools (cold, warm, and hot) as well as a million little pools of different temperatures and various steam rooms/saunas. It was great, and I'm really wondering why we don't have that in the US - oh wait, it's because we don't have natural hot springs. Right. So after that, we walked back to the hostel to call it a night. We had to pack and get ready to go home the next day.
Traveling home was interesting. We got to the airport in about an hour and a half and our flight wasn't posted on the board. We realized that there were 2 terminals, A and B, so we walked over to the other one but it wasn't listed there either. Uh oh. So we went down to the information desk to try and ask, and they told us which line to stand in. After asking a bunch of people in front of us and hearing Spanish in the line, we were finally convinced that we were actually going to Madrid. So we waited in line and realized that it was 12:20, and our flight was supposed to leave at 1:20. Unfortunately, the desk hadn't opened yet...so we weren't sure what to do. Kelly went to pester the woman behind the counter, but she wasn't very helpful, and finally the desk opened for check-in, although they were probably the most incompetent airport workers I'd ever seen. The line wasn't that long and it took so long to check every in to 4 different windows. Also, halfway through the line, our flight finally got posted on the departures board. Pretty ridiculous, especially considering the fact that when we got up to the front of the line the man told us that our reservation had been deleted. We talked our way on, but by that time it was 1:10 and we had to run through security and get our seats on the plane, which ended up leaving a half hour late anyway. Oh budget airlines. So when we landed in Madrid after a slightly rocky flight, it was already almost 5 and we knew we were going to miss the 6pm bus from the center of the city. The next one wasn't leaving til 10ish, so we decided to hang around the airport to wait for the bus to leave from there at 9:30. However, we knew we had arrived in Spain again when we couldn't find the bus and when everyone at the information desk had no idea what was going on. Charlie tried to ask about the bus and the woman looked up the phone number on google for him. So helpful. So we decided to go to the city, but when we tried to buy tickets, all the 10pm buses were sold out since it is Feria in Sevilla, so we had to wait around until 1am. It wasn't actually that bad, though, we just had some extra time to spend together. We knew that everything was going to be ok when we came out of the metro, it had stopped raining, and there was a double rainbow. We got home on Friday morning at 8am and passed out until after 2. I already have some separation anxiety from the people I've spent the past 10 days with.
Budapest Pictures
Vienna
We arrived in Vienna at 4:45 in the morning. What can we do at 4:45 in the morning? So we got ourselves to our hostel, which was on the other side of the city, and luckily there was a giant couch there so we slept for a while, some people showered, and we got ready to go into the city and see the famous Vienna Boys' Choir perform in the Hofburg Palace, the winter residence of the Habsburgs in Vienna. We waited in line for a while but we were first, so we got the best (free) standing-room places and although you are only able to see the choir if you have an expensive seat in the balcony, we were able to hear them perfectly and they were awesome. Then, we went to the bathroom, which is conveniently located right next to the balcony from which the Boys' Choir sings! So we were able to peek around and see them for a minute, after getting some dirty looks from a woman standing nearby. After we left, we went to explore the Hofburg palace, which houses one of the best treasuries that I have ever seen - jewelry, swords, clothing, and a unicorn horn! We wandered through the rest of the palace grounds, saw the New Palace, which has never been used, and then walked to the Kaisergruft, where all the Habsburgs are buried - well, almost all of them. It was a maze of rooms arranged in order of year of death, and the most recent person (one of the last Habsburgs) was buried there in 2007. It's hard to believe that things are still done that way, but I guess it does exist. After we left, we walked into the Opera building to see what was there, and then we walked back to the Hofburg palace to find a place to sit and have lunch. We were all pretty tired from traveling overnight, although I had gotten some good sleep on the bus - it was surprisingly comfortable. After lunch, we had to go to the Sacher Hotel to get the most famous dessert of Vienna - the original Sacher Torte, basically a fruity chocolate cake. It was pretty good, but wasn't my favorite, although I feel a little bad saying that. The experience was the most fun part, sitting with my friends in a fancy restaurant eating 5 euro cake and drinking espresso. After that, the girls went to the Belvedere Palace and to the art museum there, which houses 3 of the most famous Gusta Klimt works, including The Kiss, Hannah's personal favorite. It was a beautiful museum, not too big and overwhelming like some of the others had been. It was really one of the only art museums that I went to on this trip, mostly because I had just seen all of the famous art in Paris and Madrid and felt that other things were more important to see in these cities. The Kiss was absolutely incredible, and looked like it was made of gold. I wanted to stare at it all day long. After the Belvedere, we tried to go to the cemetery where Mozart is buried, but we ran out of time because we got a little lost and didn't realize that the cemetery closed at 7pm. So we went to dinner at this ridiculous place called Centimeter, where you can order your food by the centimeter and the menu has a ruler. The waiter spoke to us in German for a while even though we obviously only spoke English, and I ended up ordering schnitzel, which was probably an entire chicken. I felt like I was back in the US - huge plate and way too much food, a stark contrast to Spain where everything is small and you eat tapas for dinner with tiny forks. For the evening, Hannah, Liz, and I went to the Prater, which is the amusement park on the outskirts of the city. It was huge and beautiful, and we went on one of the oldest/biggest ferris wheels in the world. It was 8.50 euros, but I think it was worth it for the view of the city, which was absolutely gorgeous. Each car of the ferris wheel was like a little house, and by the time we got up to the top (200 feet), we were pretty scared. It ended up being really fun, and after we got off the ferris wheel, Hannah and Liz went on this spinny ride that I opted out of. Instead, I took pictures while the ride went way too fast and Jump (For My Love) blasted. Hannah and Liz were the only people on the ride, and the person running it didn't even check to see if they had their seatbelts on. Oh how things differ from the US. The boys and Kelly didn't come with us to the Prater because they had actually gone to Bratislava for the night (the capital city of Slovakia, which is about an hour east of Vienna). I wanted to go with them, but I decided not to because I loved Vienna and wanted to see more there and because I was just too tired to stay up all night.
Day 2 of Vienna, we got up early to get to the Schonbrunn Palace, which is one of the 3 biggest in Europe. It was the summer residence of the Habsburgs, and is probably the most beautiful palace I've ever seen. I mean, Versailles was cool, but this place was just so nicely decorated. Everything matched and every room was more gorgeous than the last. I though Versailles was a little too much, but Schonbrunn was perfect. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but I took a lot of the gardens because after we bought our tickets for the guided tour, we got on a horse and carriage for a 30 minute ride through the park! It was great, and was followed by an awesome guided tour through 40 rooms of the palace. After, we went to get some lunch at a Viennes place - Liz and I split bratwurst and we all tried the clear broth soup with pancakes. Interesting stuff. Then, we went up to the Freud museum, which was probably one of my favorite things we saw, considering I'm a psychology major. The museum was in Freud's old apartment/consulting office, and we entered the museum by ringing the doorbell. Then, we were given black 3-ring binders with information about the museum in them, and instructions for where to go. It was a pretty cool exhibit. After that, we went to see the symbol of Vienna (St. Stephan's cathedral) and to get some ice cream - nutella flavored and delicious. After, I dragged my friends to the Steinway store and got to stare at an entire row of Steinway baby grands as well as sit at the grand piano. Pretty much my dream come true, and made my experience in Vienna complete. We went back to the hostel to gather our things and make our way to the bus station and to the final city, Budapest. We had some trouble finding the bus station, but they we saw the bus pass by us so we decided to just follow it. It stopped a few feet in front of us, just on the side of the road, which I'm guessing was their idea of the bus station. Right...so luckily we found it, we were 6 of the 8 people on the bus, and we were on our way to Budapest.
Vienna Pictures
Day 2 of Vienna, we got up early to get to the Schonbrunn Palace, which is one of the 3 biggest in Europe. It was the summer residence of the Habsburgs, and is probably the most beautiful palace I've ever seen. I mean, Versailles was cool, but this place was just so nicely decorated. Everything matched and every room was more gorgeous than the last. I though Versailles was a little too much, but Schonbrunn was perfect. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but I took a lot of the gardens because after we bought our tickets for the guided tour, we got on a horse and carriage for a 30 minute ride through the park! It was great, and was followed by an awesome guided tour through 40 rooms of the palace. After, we went to get some lunch at a Viennes place - Liz and I split bratwurst and we all tried the clear broth soup with pancakes. Interesting stuff. Then, we went up to the Freud museum, which was probably one of my favorite things we saw, considering I'm a psychology major. The museum was in Freud's old apartment/consulting office, and we entered the museum by ringing the doorbell. Then, we were given black 3-ring binders with information about the museum in them, and instructions for where to go. It was a pretty cool exhibit. After that, we went to see the symbol of Vienna (St. Stephan's cathedral) and to get some ice cream - nutella flavored and delicious. After, I dragged my friends to the Steinway store and got to stare at an entire row of Steinway baby grands as well as sit at the grand piano. Pretty much my dream come true, and made my experience in Vienna complete. We went back to the hostel to gather our things and make our way to the bus station and to the final city, Budapest. We had some trouble finding the bus station, but they we saw the bus pass by us so we decided to just follow it. It stopped a few feet in front of us, just on the side of the road, which I'm guessing was their idea of the bus station. Right...so luckily we found it, we were 6 of the 8 people on the bus, and we were on our way to Budapest.
Vienna Pictures
Prague
So we got up at 4:30 in the morning to catch a train from Berlin to Prague, which was pretty easy to do. Our hostel was close to the train station, so we got there pretty early and then hung out and got some breakfast until our train arrived. We got on the train and got our own little car for the six of us and basically just passed out for a while, we were all exhausted from our intense touring in Berlin. We woke up and hung out for a while until we got there around 11:30, at which point we had to get ourselves to the hostel, but not before exchanging money first. I didn't realize how nice it was to have the euro in most of the countries in Europe - when I went on my first trip to Milan and Paris, I didn't have to exchange any money. It was kindof annoying to have to figure out the exchange rate from euros to crowns in the Czech Republic and Forints in Hungary, especially since I am constantly converting from euros to dollars in the first place. Things got a little confusing, but it was ok. So we got ourselves to the Czech Inn Hostel, and that's where the puns began. We spent the rest of the trip trying to come up with the best puns for all the cities we had been to - things were Budaful, we were Pragueably going to do something, or we didn't want to be Pests but we were Hungary. I'm sure that these puns will continue till the end of the semester between the six of us, haha. So anyway, we got to the hostel, checked in, and found out we had our own room for the six of us which was great! We got ready and went into the city to get some lunch. The first thing that was different about Prague (besides the language and money, of course) was the fact that the metro/tram system in Berlin was super-organized and could get us absolutely anywhere. In Prague, it was fine, but not quite as efficient. Besides that, the metro in Prague was so far underground that we had to take a 3 minute escalator to get there! Kindof scary, when you think about it. So we went in to the city and ate lunch at this place called Country Life where we got as much vegetarian food as we wanted and we paid by weight. After that, we went to the Jewish Museum, which is actually just a collection of 5 or 6 synagogues that survived the Holocaust even though the Jewish community in Prague did not. It was really interesting to see the synagogues again, since I had been to them on my trip to Eastern Europe/Israel when I was 15. I remembered a lot about them, but it was great to see them again, especially since each of them is so distinct. Also, the Jewish cemetery that is in Prague is fascinating because the Jews were not allotted enough space to bury all their loved ones and were forced to bury people on top of one another. The result is a mess of gravestones, but is actually very interesting to look at. After all the touring, we went to a beer garden that overlooks Prague, which is basically just an open space where they sell beer and where you can sit to just hang out and enjoy the view. Charlie met up with a friend from Brown and we all hung out for a while and then went to dinner. After, we were all pretty tired and went back to the hostel to crash.
The next day, we got a huge breakfast at the hostel and then went to the Old Town Square to see the Tyn Church, St. Nicholas' Church, the Astronomical Clock that chimes on the hour, and the old town hall. Prague is just a gorgeous city, and it is really fun to just walk around and enjoy the beautiful architecture. We did a little bit of shopping and then met up with our whole group to take a free walking tour of Prague Castle, which turned out to be really interesting. I had also been there before, but it was great to go back and learn more about what is there. We walked up the 206 steps to the castle and got to enjoy the gorgeous view. After the toru was over, we took a break to get something cold to drink and then walked down the hill again and across the most famous bridge in Prague - the Charles Bridge, which is now just a walking bridge and provides some of the most beautiful view of the city. We went to a restaurant with traditional Czech food, which was great - we all tried the goulash and a couple other things, along with traditional Czech beer, all for a very cheap price. I found that nothing was really that much cheaper in countries without the euro except the food. After our great Czech meal, we went back to the hostel to get our stuff and to get on a 12:15am bus to Vienna!
Prague Pictures
The next day, we got a huge breakfast at the hostel and then went to the Old Town Square to see the Tyn Church, St. Nicholas' Church, the Astronomical Clock that chimes on the hour, and the old town hall. Prague is just a gorgeous city, and it is really fun to just walk around and enjoy the beautiful architecture. We did a little bit of shopping and then met up with our whole group to take a free walking tour of Prague Castle, which turned out to be really interesting. I had also been there before, but it was great to go back and learn more about what is there. We walked up the 206 steps to the castle and got to enjoy the gorgeous view. After the toru was over, we took a break to get something cold to drink and then walked down the hill again and across the most famous bridge in Prague - the Charles Bridge, which is now just a walking bridge and provides some of the most beautiful view of the city. We went to a restaurant with traditional Czech food, which was great - we all tried the goulash and a couple other things, along with traditional Czech beer, all for a very cheap price. I found that nothing was really that much cheaper in countries without the euro except the food. After our great Czech meal, we went back to the hostel to get our stuff and to get on a 12:15am bus to Vienna!
Prague Pictures
Berlin
So I think I'm going to do this in 4 steps - one post for each city - so that it doesn't get too ridiculously long. I guess that means I'll start by saying that 5 friends (Hannah, Kelly, Liz, Jon, and Charlie) and I went on a 10-day trip through Berlin, Prague, Vienna, and Budapest with only what we could carry (no checking bags). We had a flight into Berlin on April 21st, buses and trains between the cities, and a flight back to Madrid on April 30th. It was pretty intense and exhausting, but probably one of the most interesting, fun, and educational trips I have ever been on. So here goes.
We started by taking a train to Malaga, which is about 2 1/2 hours from Seville because it was easier/cheaper to fly from there to Berlin. Hannah and I got to the train station last (about 10 minutes late) and I got a phone call from Charlie saying that everyone was there and they were worried because 'we were the responsible ones.' haha, a good start to an awesome trip. We got to the airport pretty early because the train only left at a certain time, so we hung out for a while and eventually got on the plane to Berlin - a pretty uneventful flight. It took us a while to figure out how to get from the airport to the city, but we finally got to our hostel, went out to get some food, and called it a night. We wanted to get up early the next morning to see the Reichstag and try to avoid the lines.
We woke up around 7, left the hostel around 9, and walked over to the Reichstag (the German Parliament Building). Hannah had been carrying a crutch because she has tendonitis in her feet and when the people who work there saw us, they let us cut the entire line! We saved about an hour of waiting time, which was awesome. So we took the elevator up to the to the glass dome and got to overlook the entire city, which was beautiful. From there, we walked over to the Brandenburg Gate, which is one of the most famous gates that used to be part of the Berlin Wall. Then, we went to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which was this strangely shaped collection of almost square gravestone-looking things that is supposed to have 'no symbolism.' I didn't really like it at first, but after we went to the museum that is under it, I changed my mind. The museum was really cool - it had an entire room with stories of about 15 different families that had been affected by the Holocaust, a room with huge screens on the walls and benches to sit and listen to stories of person after person who had died in the Holocaust, and a room with a really interesting timeline of what happened when Hitler came to http://www.blogger.com/power in Germany. It was especially interesting because there is so little Jewish history in Spain that I haven't really thought about it that much in the past couple of months. So after that, we took a break for breakfast (at Dunkin' Donuts!) and then walked over to the Topography of Terror, which is an outdoor exhibit that displays the history of the Nazi regime and is located on the area of land where the Nazi headquarters used to be. After that, we went to Checkpoint Charlie, which was one of the most famous checkpoints between East and West Berlin, and the museum there, which tells the history of the checkpoint as well as many stories of escape attempts/successes from East Berlin to West Berlin. We were pretty tired after that and went to have some lunch - currywurst, one of Berlin's most famous dishes - and hung out for a while to rest, and then it was on to the Jewish Museum, which ended up being quite the experience - it started out pretty normal, but then we ended up in the children's section and didn't really know it so we were a little confused. After a long day, we met up with a friend of mine from Brown and all went to dinner near our hostel at a Vietnamese place which was delicious. We hung out at our hostel's bar for a little while to catch up on our abroad experiences, and then we went to sleep so we could get up for an early day the next day.
Thursday morning we got up to go to a northern section of the Berlin wall, which is supposed to be one of the more authentic sections. It was really interesting and different from what I expected, which was the brightly colored, painted, Berlin wall that is always seen in pictures. This was 2 cement walls with a space (a no man's land) in between, and we were able to go up to the top of a building to see it from above. Pretty interesting, and like nothing I'd ever seen before. After that, we went over to a beautiful synagogue near our hostel, which is one of the only synagogues in Berlin that survived Kristallnacht. Now, the part that has been restored is a museum. We went to a market for lunch where we got Turkish food (delicious) and Hannah got a banana/nutella crepe that we talked about for the rest of the trip, and then to the Berliner Dom, one of the most beautiful/important churches in the city. Then the girls walked down the Unter den Linden, the biggest street in East Berlin which is full of history. You can see where Einstein went to school and where the Nazis burned thousands of banned books during the time they were in power. After that, we went to the Pergamon museum, which was especially cool because everything was built into the walls of the museum. We got to see the Ishtar gates of Babylong, a temple to Athena, and lots of mosaics. Then we met up with Nick again and went to Alexanderplatz, which is the newish part of East Berlin - meaning everything was built in the last 15 years or so. The TV Tower, built by the Soviets, is there, as is the world clock and lots of shopping. After that, we went down to the East Side Gallery, which is the longest remaining section of the Berlin Wall and is the typical, graffiti-laden, touristy Berlin wall that you would expect. We walked down it for a while and found a restaurant near the end to get some more currywurst. Then, Hannah and I went back to the hostel to get some rest while the others explored this abandoned amusement park that was pretty far away. Tired yet? I was.
Berlin Pictures
We started by taking a train to Malaga, which is about 2 1/2 hours from Seville because it was easier/cheaper to fly from there to Berlin. Hannah and I got to the train station last (about 10 minutes late) and I got a phone call from Charlie saying that everyone was there and they were worried because 'we were the responsible ones.' haha, a good start to an awesome trip. We got to the airport pretty early because the train only left at a certain time, so we hung out for a while and eventually got on the plane to Berlin - a pretty uneventful flight. It took us a while to figure out how to get from the airport to the city, but we finally got to our hostel, went out to get some food, and called it a night. We wanted to get up early the next morning to see the Reichstag and try to avoid the lines.
We woke up around 7, left the hostel around 9, and walked over to the Reichstag (the German Parliament Building). Hannah had been carrying a crutch because she has tendonitis in her feet and when the people who work there saw us, they let us cut the entire line! We saved about an hour of waiting time, which was awesome. So we took the elevator up to the to the glass dome and got to overlook the entire city, which was beautiful. From there, we walked over to the Brandenburg Gate, which is one of the most famous gates that used to be part of the Berlin Wall. Then, we went to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which was this strangely shaped collection of almost square gravestone-looking things that is supposed to have 'no symbolism.' I didn't really like it at first, but after we went to the museum that is under it, I changed my mind. The museum was really cool - it had an entire room with stories of about 15 different families that had been affected by the Holocaust, a room with huge screens on the walls and benches to sit and listen to stories of person after person who had died in the Holocaust, and a room with a really interesting timeline of what happened when Hitler came to http://www.blogger.com/power in Germany. It was especially interesting because there is so little Jewish history in Spain that I haven't really thought about it that much in the past couple of months. So after that, we took a break for breakfast (at Dunkin' Donuts!) and then walked over to the Topography of Terror, which is an outdoor exhibit that displays the history of the Nazi regime and is located on the area of land where the Nazi headquarters used to be. After that, we went to Checkpoint Charlie, which was one of the most famous checkpoints between East and West Berlin, and the museum there, which tells the history of the checkpoint as well as many stories of escape attempts/successes from East Berlin to West Berlin. We were pretty tired after that and went to have some lunch - currywurst, one of Berlin's most famous dishes - and hung out for a while to rest, and then it was on to the Jewish Museum, which ended up being quite the experience - it started out pretty normal, but then we ended up in the children's section and didn't really know it so we were a little confused. After a long day, we met up with a friend of mine from Brown and all went to dinner near our hostel at a Vietnamese place which was delicious. We hung out at our hostel's bar for a little while to catch up on our abroad experiences, and then we went to sleep so we could get up for an early day the next day.
Thursday morning we got up to go to a northern section of the Berlin wall, which is supposed to be one of the more authentic sections. It was really interesting and different from what I expected, which was the brightly colored, painted, Berlin wall that is always seen in pictures. This was 2 cement walls with a space (a no man's land) in between, and we were able to go up to the top of a building to see it from above. Pretty interesting, and like nothing I'd ever seen before. After that, we went over to a beautiful synagogue near our hostel, which is one of the only synagogues in Berlin that survived Kristallnacht. Now, the part that has been restored is a museum. We went to a market for lunch where we got Turkish food (delicious) and Hannah got a banana/nutella crepe that we talked about for the rest of the trip, and then to the Berliner Dom, one of the most beautiful/important churches in the city. Then the girls walked down the Unter den Linden, the biggest street in East Berlin which is full of history. You can see where Einstein went to school and where the Nazis burned thousands of banned books during the time they were in power. After that, we went to the Pergamon museum, which was especially cool because everything was built into the walls of the museum. We got to see the Ishtar gates of Babylong, a temple to Athena, and lots of mosaics. Then we met up with Nick again and went to Alexanderplatz, which is the newish part of East Berlin - meaning everything was built in the last 15 years or so. The TV Tower, built by the Soviets, is there, as is the world clock and lots of shopping. After that, we went down to the East Side Gallery, which is the longest remaining section of the Berlin Wall and is the typical, graffiti-laden, touristy Berlin wall that you would expect. We walked down it for a while and found a restaurant near the end to get some more currywurst. Then, Hannah and I went back to the hostel to get some rest while the others explored this abandoned amusement park that was pretty far away. Tired yet? I was.
Berlin Pictures
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