Krakow, Poland

Well, I realized this is my only journal of the trip, so if you don't want to hear about outside of school things, stop reading it.

Poland was a fun time, probably two of the best days I've ever had. We got in late thursday night, the train left Prague at 2:00 and got in about 9:30. We walked to our hostel, which was very nice (better than some hotels I've been in), then spent the next few hours looking for a restaurant still open.

Friday we walked around town. Old town here had the largest open square in Europe, excluding the museum thingy in the middle, St. Marys, which is the most decorated church I have ever seen, and a crazy street performer knight, who knighted Peter for his charitable donation. We spent some time at Wawel castle, which is amazing, but unfortunately we got there too late to see the armory and crown jewels. That night, we went to the bar in the basement of our hostel, played some card games, and the nice thign about travelling with 5 girls (maybe the only benefit...) is that the bartender/owner decided we needed lots of free champagne and vodka.

Saturday we went to Auschwitz concentration camp. It was very sad to visit a site of mass murder, but I was overall disappointed at how the place is run. It felt no different to me than visiting holocaust museums in America, which is not too good, because this was at the site. I got a much better visit, in my opinion, by wandering around the empty buildings and sites with a guide book than by looking at the exhibits.

Saturday night was much more fun, we went to this awesome Polish restaurant. People were singing and dancing, there was some guys playing accordian and violin, and cute Polish girls dressed traditionally that I really wanted to bring home as souviners. I tried some blood sausage, which suprisingly isn't too bad. Then my Officer's Platter came, which is a pile of meat. Everythign on that was delicious, except for one thing. It looked like a piece of steak, so I popped it into my mouth, and it turned out to have the most horrible texture ever. Think of the stringyness of meat with the consistancy of cheese. Turns out it was pig's stomach. I'll be sure to never order stomach again. The good point is, no one is ever going to grab a bite of anthing off my plate again :) Oh, I found I like pirogies too, as long as they are meat filled.

Sunday morning was the only downside of the trip. We were headed to the train station at 5:30am, so no one wanted to walk. We took a tram, but couldn't figure out how to buy tickets, so we just got on. Unfortunately, in Krakow, ticket inspectors check tickets at 5:30am, and we all got hit with fines. I'm willing to put that behind me, though, and say Poland is an awesome country that you should visit should you get the chance.

Now, I'm off to plan spring break.