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

I havent written on here for a while... but a lot has happned!

January 1, 2007 in Barcelona, Spain

I meant to write on this once more before I left China but I slept through my alarm again and didn't wake up with enough time to write on it. But I wanted to talk about my last few days and my finals and what I did. My sociology final went terribly... I might have done really bad on it but I think everyone did so it shouldn't be bad then because if everyone does bad then they will curve it. But the test was imposssssible to do. My chinese final wasnt bad, I think I'll end up with an A or an A- in the class. I packed everything and cut my stuff down to one suitcase and left China early in the morning for Moscow, Russia. I am going to miss China a lot (especially the prices!!) Also even though my roommates got on my nerves at times I'll miss them too. I learned a lot more Chinese than I thought I did though so thats also nice.

I flew to Moscow no problem and got through to my next flight to Madrid which was also no problem except that it was delayed an hour or so. They Russians kinda scared my though, even the stewardesses were mean. But I got to Madrid a bit late and Aliyah and James met me at the airport without Phil becuase he missed his flight haha. We all went to the hostel and had a few days in Madrid to hang out and walk around and we also made Christmas Eve dinner which was also rrealllllllyyy good.

Then we flew to Morocco on Christmas day also with no problems. I LOOOVE Morocco. Since so many europeans go there it has basically been turned into a turist city though so there were high prices and lots of people trying to rip us off. We stayed in a really nice 2 bedroom apt a bit away from the city, but we just hopped on the bus to get into the city. I didn't get to practice Arabic as much as I wanted to though becuase most of them didn't understand me and they all speak French and a little bit of English so I just stuck with the French which kinda made me go crazy after a while because of all the langauges. When I got to Spain it was soooo hard to switch my mind out of Chinese and into Spanish but then once I started getting used to the Spanish I had to switch to French, and then once I started getting used to the French I had to switch back to Spanish haha. We went to the famous square Djemma al-fna in Morocco where they have snake charmers and monkies and clown things and lots and lots of food and teas and juices and nuts and fruits and tradtional moroccon things. We also got to ride camels while we were there which was also one of the main goals of our trip. I tried to write on my blog while I was there but it was blocked or something and I couldn't get to it. It was sad leaving Marrakesh but I know some day I will go back there because there is still so much left to see.

On December 30 we flew to Girona, Spain and then caught a bus to Barcelona and wandered aruond the city until we found our hostel which is on the one of the main streets of Barcelona, so its a really nice location. Barcelona so far is a lot better than Madrid, but they don't speak Spanish much here so sometimes I don't know if I should try and speak Spanish or use English, but a lot of people I have met here so far speak English pretty well.

So tonight is our last night in Barcelona and we are off to Madrid again tomorrow for a few days. Ill try to go ahead and update this sometimes before I head off to France with Phil but if not I'll be sure to do it while I am in France. Also I have not head back from Egypt people so I don't know what is going on with that yet. Leave a comment!!

Trip to Taiwan and Philippines is official!

October 23, 2007
Lisa picked up our passports today with no problem so thats all set. Then I had a nap and made some more bok choy ( its getting better every time!!) and then we discussed our trip. This is now the official trip

November 9 1230 AM Shanghai - Manila (arrive 430 AM :()
November 9 1110 AM Manila - Taipei (Arrive at 110 pm)
November 9 to 16 in Taipei and surrounding areas
November 16 at 155 PM Taipei - Manila (arrive 355pm)
November 16 to 18 in Manila
November 18 8 PM Manila - Shanghai (Arrive after 11pm)

And now that thats all worked out I can start to work more on my European/North Africa plans. After discussing with Phil and Aliyah this seems to be a good plan to start working on:
Phil and I arrive in Madrid on December 22 and most of our friends will be there already.
Then we will stay there and on the 25th or 26th we will take a bus down to the south of Spain and then catch a ferry over to Tangier, Morocco. From there we will either go to Fez, Marrakesh, or Casablanca and spend some time there. Then on the 29th or 30th of December we will head to Barcelona and stay there for 3 or 4 nights. Then we will hop on a bus from Barcelona to Madrid. Then I will leave Madrid on the 4th and fly to Marseilles with Phil and stay with him for a while there. (We are thinking about going to maybe Oslo, Norway, or Stockholm Sweden sometime in the beginning of January... but thats another story) Then sometime towards the 18th or so of January I will fly back to Madrid and stay there for a few nights before heading to Cairo. :o) It is really confusing and it involves lots and lots of planning and I have to hear back from all of my friends if they like this idea or not... but it seems to work out pretty well as of now.
I still haven't heard from Cairo though if I got accepted to not into the program. They told me middle of November though so I am not really worried, I am just getting too antsy haha... Also I have a spoken midterm tomorrow for Chinese and a written one Thursday so I think I need to study now!!!!!
Leave a comment!! I like to see if people are actually reading this or not haha