Thailand and Egypt and Midterms

April 12, 2008

I seem to not remember to write on this very often in Taiwan... But a lot has happened in the month since my birthday. Up until March 28, there wasn't anything out of the ordinary that happened, just normal going to class and tutoring English on Fridays at the high school. However on March 28 I went on my trip to Thailand. I had to do a lot of stuff for my classes in advance the week before I left so it was kinda stressful but one I was in the air to Thailand it all melted away. I arrived to Bangkok at about 1030 at night and my friend picked me up at the airport. After that we went out and had dinner and he introduced me to all his Thailand friends and we all went out. Then next day all of us took a 3 hour drive to the south of Thailand and then hopped on a speedboat to an island where we stayed in a bungalow for about 6 days. Most of the time there we just hung out on the beach and drank from coconuts and had massages, and then at night we would eat dinner on the beach next to the water. It was really nice but there were a lot of European tourists there. After we were done at the beach we headed back to Bangkok where we spent the rest of the time around town. I came back to Taiwan on April 7 at night and had to go to class the next day. The next day I felt kinda sick in class and it got pretty bad by the time night came around so I thought it might be malaria or something so I planned on missing more class the next day, even though I had a midterm the day after, to go to the doctor. I felt better in the morning when I got up to go to the doctor but I went anyways just in case. He asked my symptoms and I told him and then he gave me 4 different types of pills haha. I heard they like to over prescribe pills here... So then the next day I took my midterm and I don't think I did very well because I didn't get to study much because I missed class and was sick. At least the grades don't transfer back to IU haha. And the next day they didn't have class to go on a field trip somewhere but I couldn't go because I had to go teach English.

Also the day I got back from Thailand I got an e-mail from Egypt saying that I got on the waiting list again and I was really upset about it and sent a lot of e-mails and had my dad call too because I couldn't call from here. I was also spending a lot of time trying to find something to do with my time over the summer because they wait so long to let us know if we are in the program or not in Egypt but then they sent me an e-mail that said I was moved from the waiting list and I am now accepted. So it is official now that I am going to be in Cairo, Egypt to study Arabic at the Arabic Language Institute at the American University of Cairo from June 7 until July 27. And then after that who knows what? Just as long as I'm back at school in time to start class in September. I am getting really excited to start again at IU, I just picked out my classes last week but I am still a little iffy on some of them because I don't know if some classes will transfer and what classes I will test into when I get back, but we will just have to see.

Also I am starting a private tutoring job once a week at a Taiwanese family's home which should be fun. And I may start a thesis correcting/editing job for all the Taiwanese students here that have to write a thesis in English because most of them cant write it very well and they need a lot of correcting. So we will see how that works out.

Monaco, Oslo, and Auschwitz

from top to bottom

random contemporary art in Oslo
street shot of Oslo
shot of Oslo from a hill
Auschwitz gas chamber
Auschwitz entrance gate that says "work makes you free"
sign in Aix-en-provence commemorating the Americans liberating the city in WWII


Sunday January 13, 2008 from Krakow, Poland


So I'm in POLAND right now but I'll get to that in a minute. Me and Phil ended up going to Monaco for a day trip for fun which was country 11 for me over-all and number 7 on this trip. We took the bus to Nice which was kinda too expensive and then we hopped on a bus for Monaco. We got there and walked around for a while but it was really quiet and all that there was were a lot of really nice, expensive cars and buildings and rich people and a lot of really expensive shops. So me and Phil decided to go back to France and spend some time in Nice because its more interesting and cheaper (but still expensive). BUT we couldn't figure out how the buses worked to get back so we ended up finding a train to Nice for 3.4 euros so we just took that and as soon as we bought the ticket we found our bus hahaha. But the train didn't leave for a while so by the time we got back to Nice we had to basically just hop back on our bus to Aix. Overall my stay in France was nice, I had a nice relaxing time before my next big leg of traveling started.

On Thursday me and Phil packed up and headed on the bus to Marseilles to catch our realllly cheap flight to Oslo, Norway. We got to the airport in Oslo and the bought really expensive tickets to get to the city because the airport is actually much father away, like 120 km. Once we finally got to the city it was about 10 pm and really cold and rainy and wet. So me and Phil had to walk around for a long time and look for our hostel and then we finally found it without taking a really expensive taxi. We got there just in time because they close the front desk at 1130 and checked in and headed up to our rooms. To our surprise there was someone yelling in the room so I knocked and opened the door and there was just a some girl in there alone and she seemed really surprised that we were there so she went down to the desk to complain because she thought only girls would be in that room. (i guess she is an actress and she was practicing her lines by yelling them haha)But she ended up being wrong and came back and was just really jerky for the time we were there. Me and Phil on the first day went to the museum for the Norwegian Resistance during WWII and some art museums. I got to see a version of "Scream" which I happen to like a lot and a lot of other paintings and some crazy things at the contemporary art museum. We had lunch at burger king to save some money cuz I thought it would be cheap, but no... it was about 20 dollars. Norway is expensive! Don't go unless you really want to or have to! A bottle of coke cost over 4 dollars, a bottle of water is about 4 dollars. It costs over 4 dollars per ride on the metro or the bus, a super cheap meal if you can find one starts at maybe 16 to 20 dollars and go much much higher. So we basically didn't do anything Friday night because it would cost so much to go out, so we watched some movies on my computer. On Saturday we got up and went to the national museum and saw another version of Scream and a lot of other paintings and then we headed to the bus station to catch the bus to the airport so I could go to Poland and Phil could get back to France.

I left Phil at the airport and went through passport control and got a stamp for leaving Norway yay and then went and got on my Wizzair flight to Katowice airport. The flight got in a bit early and I found my shuttle bus to Krakow and we left about 45 minutes later and got to Krakow at about 945 at night. I knew where I was on the map and I knew where I was going and everything... but I still just couldn't seem to find my way to the hostel, I walked around for a while but I finally gave up and took a taxi (9 zloty or about $3.50) to the street it is on, which was really close. I got to my hostel then and checked in and everything and I really like it. They have a few big rooms, maybe 6 or something I don't even know, and then 4 bathrooms with showers, a kitchen, a common room and free wifi and its open 24 hours which is also a plus. So far everyone here is really nice but not to talkative with me. Most of the people here are Australians and maybe a couple of Americans. I just took a shower and stayed in last night because I was exhausted from traveling and I had to get up early to go visit Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps.

I got up early and had free breakfast then headed to the tourbus on the hour bus ride to the camps. We had an English speaking tourguide and the whole thing took about 4 hours. It was realllly depressing, kinda like I felt after I visited Hiroshima in Japan. They showed HUGE rooms full of things like glasses and brushes adn clothes they just took from the Jews before they killed them. They also showed things like hair they shaved off of women to make socks and the gas and torture chambers and everything. I took a lot of pictures but not of any of the stuff in the buildings because they didn't allow it. We also went to Birkenau which was Auschwitz II where they murdered most of the people, but it was mostly destroyed from the war whereas Auschwitz was kept up. We were kinda rushed through by the tour guide lady, I would have like to mull around a lot longer and just look at everything, maybe sometime in the future I can come back and visit it again.

Also... luckily while I was in the midst of writing this I got an e-mail from my Taiwan program CIEE saying that IU selected me for $1000 dollar scholarship and sent it off to CIEE. This is really surprising because I have no clue what it is from or what it is for, but it will sure help out A LOT with all the random expenses, especially the airfare. So thanks to whoever gave me or helped me get this scholarship!! I really appreciate it! Tomorrow I am getting up a bit early to head out and visit all the places I have in my book and then I'll be back to write about them tomorrow maybe and hopefully add some pictures :o)

drew

Frace, Final Trip Plans, and PICTURES from Taiwan to Morocco finally

January 8, 2008, Aix-en-provence, France

So I have been in France now for a few days with Phil. It's just a tiny little city in the south of France with small winding stone streets and little shops with all the apartments on the above the shops. Phil's apt is like this, its kinda small but its got a lot of character I guess haha. It has 2 bedrooms and a bathroom and a kitchen/living room and there are 3 people living here. Its really nice here but its already more expensive than Madrid I'm noticing and from what I hear you get really sick of it being so small after a while. Also, tomorrow we MAY try and do a spontaneous trip to Monaco which would also be fun, and then we leave Thursday evening for Oslo, Norway :o) And after that I'm off on my own for a week and a half.

Me and Aliyah also finally finalized our trip plans for the last leg of my trip, here they are;

January 31 fly from Madrid to Berlin and stay in Berlin for 2 nights
January 2 fly from Berlin to Athens and stay in Athens for 3 nights
January 4 or 5 HOPEFULLY have no problems getting a train to Istanbul and stay there for a few nights
January 8 fly to London and stay in London for 2 nights
January 10 fly to Madrid
January 11 fly home to Chicago via Dublin

also I finally got my pictures all uploaded, just click on the link to go to them

Taiwan 1
Taiwan 2
Taiwan 3
Manila 1
Manila 2
Thanksgiving Chinese Style
Shanghai, China
Post China/European Adventures 1 (Russia?, Madrid, Barcelona, Marrakesh)


I'll have a chance to post all my France, Poland, Czech Republic, and Dublin pictures after January 23 when I go back to Madrid for a week to get my Taiwan VISA... hopefully no problems there...
leave a comment!!!

drew