Sweet Road: Going out-kind of, The Central Cemetery, Allison goes back home, the end of midterms, Krakow and Auschwitz.

Montag 25 Oktober: So today I had a midterm and a lesson, so unfortunately Allison was on her own. I think the midterm went well, it was in Art and Architecture. Then I had a very good lesson. While I did all of that Allison went to Museums Quartier and hit up a few museums. I was sad I couldn't hang out with her today, but I'm glad I have a friend that's independent and able to do stuff on her own. What a guy! At night we decided to try to go out. We went to Loco, which is a bar that has 50 cent drinks (no relation to the rapper), but they were checking id's and not everyone had their id. We decided to default and go to Chelsea. It was totally poppin. There was a band playing, but you had to pay 5 euro to see them, so we just hung out in the part the band wasn't in. Then we got a kebap at the best kebap stand and headed in early.

Dienstag 26 Oktober: This morning Allison and I decided to go to the Central Cemetery of Vienna. It is where Beethoven and anyone famous who died in Vienna is buried. It took forever to get there a. because it was at the very end of one of the lines on the Ubahn, b. because it was a long long walk from the Ubahn and c. because we walked the wrong direction for a good 15 minutes. Once we got there, we realized that there weren't any cemetery maps there, so we just wandered around and looked at graves. It was still really interesting, but next time I go, I'm going to find a map before hand. For lunch we had to get some Wienerschnitzel. You can't leave Wien without eating some schnitzel first! So no one really told us, but today was an Austrian holiday. Austrian independence day. And therefore, nothing was open. No stores at all. Nothing. It was worst than on Sundays. And of course Allison and I planned on doing some shopping today and for her to get some last minute gifts and of course, everything was closed... Turkish market to the rescue! Thankfully the Turkish Markt up the street was open, so Allison could at least get some candy for people. At night we had tickets to the Vienna Phil! They were standing room and they only cost 2 Euro!!! They played a Brahms, then a Trombone Concerto and then they played Dvorak's New World Symphony!!!!!!!! It was so amazing and so beautiful, I got teary eyed in the first movement. It was just great! After that Ben made us dinner and then we went to Chicken Dinner, so I could show Allison and so she could get one last radler before leaving! Then it was time for her to go, so I walked her to the Ubahn and said goodbye. It was so nice to have someone visit!

The Central Cemetery... Map not included.

There were a lot of people walking and driving around while we were there.

There were so many graves.

Mittwoch 27 Oktober: This morning I got up so early to study for my Nations and Religions midterm. I think it went alright, but this whole midterm business has just been so stressful not knowing what to expect! After my test I came home and cleaned and slept and packed for Krakow and studied for my last midterm that's tomorrow. I found a yarn store on Mariahilf so I got some yarn to knit on the train tomorrow.

Donnerstag 28 Oktober: I took my backpack to my midterm with me and left for the trainstation straight from my test. On my way out I picked up some mail and I got a birthday package from my viola students at home Toran and Lexa! It was so cute and I loved it so much! The train ride from Vienna to Krakow was 7 and a half hours long. We had to transfer once in Katowice. It was so funny because we saw all these IES kids that were on our same train and we ended up being in the same compartment as some of them. It was so weird. When we got to Katowice our train was late, so we were worried we missed the connection. We don't speak Polish (obviously) and it was so confusing trying to figure out what platform we were supposed to be on and if the train was gone. (Basically if I were by myself I would have been crying.) But then we saw the most ghetto old school sign that said that the train to Krakow was delayed and we found the right platform. (sigh of relief) We finally made it to Krakow and now it was time for us to find our hostels. Jennie was staying at the Flamingo hostel, which was easy to find because it had a ton of flashing lights coming from it... (Little known fact, Krakow is totally poppin at night. There are a ton of people out and about and even the mall is open until 11 at night, very different from Vienna, the city that goes to sleep at 10) Once Jennie was all settled Emily and I found our hostel, which was The Dizzy Daisy. It did not have flashing lights. It was down a very very dark street, but once we were inside, it was super nice! (Strangely there were a ton of Spanish tourists in Krakow, the first two nights, all of our roommates were Spanish except for two or three people). After we were all settled we went to find somewhere to eat so we went to a 24 hour Perogie place. We each got a traditional combination perogie plate. It cost the equivalent of about three US dollars! Polish money is called Zloty. Here are our perogies:

Areal view of the dumplings. Mmmm!

The one on the far left is some sort of potato, cream cheese mix. The middle one was my favorite, cabbage and mushroom and the one on the far right was some sort of meat. So yummy!!!

After eating dinner we went to a bar. I was pretty wiped so I didn't get anything, but we decided that this bar should be called "Fish Dinner, the Chicken Dinner of Krakow" here's why:

There were pictures of fish everywhere...

They also had a projector showing weird movies.

Freitag 29 Oktober: Today we visited Auschwitz. This was just the most real and the most surreal day of my life. I don't even know how to describe the experience. We took a two hour bus ride from Krakow to the camp. Every visitor has to go in a tour, so we went on an English tour in a big group. Our tour guide was great. He was very thoughtful, passionate and informative. We started at Aushwitz I. The most emotional parts for me were when he talked about the orchestra that would play as people went to work and came back and how many people would come back dead. I don't even know how I could possibly play music in conditions like that. There were several parts of the camp, different buildings, where I would just feel like I couldn't even breathe. Like something was compressing my chest and my heart was racing and eventually I just started leaking. It was unlike any crying I've done before. It wasn't crying, tears were just uncontrollably leaking out of me. I don't even really know how to write about it all, just because it was so intense and I don't know how to make the experience come across through a blog post. The whole time it was really difficult for me to take pictures. I could only take pictures outside and even through the four hours or so that we spent there, I only took about ten photos. There were some people that were just going crazy taking pictures, and posing in front of things and having their picture taken, it was just so weird. I guess it's strange how different people deal and treat these sort of things. After Auschwitz I we went to Auschwitz II, Birkenau. That was just surreal too. We went into one of the barracks and imagining all the people that were forced to live there and seeing how many barracks in the camp there were. It was just like, even though I was there I couldn't grasp the magnitude of how big the camp was, or how many people were contained there and definitely not how many people died there. I'm so glad that I had the opportunity to visit Auschwitz and see it for myself. It was just so intense.

The entrance to Auschwitz I.

The train tracks that lead to Birkenau.

Each of these chimneys was were a barrack was. There were so many of them.

After we got back to Krakow we went to the mall. The mall in Krakow is huge and as I said before it's open until 11 at night. This was the biggest confusion to by brain ever. Going from this intense day where I felt like I was on another planet, where something like this was possible to going to a super familiar, most American feeling place since I've been to Europe-this huge mall. It was just a huge mind f*#% if you know what I mean. It was just draining and all I wanted to do was sit and think or sleep or I don't even know. So basically we turned in pretty early and just went back to our hostels and slept.

Samstag 30 Oktober: So we slept in today, which was just great. Then we just walked around and did some shopping, I got some pretty cool slippers and a scarf. We went to the Jewish Quarter of town and we had the most amazing bagel I've ever had in my life! We basically just walked around a lot today. It was really nice and I was still thinking a lot of yesterday, so it was nice not to do a lot.

St. Mary's Basilica in the main market square. After the bell tolls on the hour, a trumpeter plays taps!

There was a strange group of people all dressed up.

A cute little brass quartet. The tuba player never changed at the right time, it was so funny!

And a puppetier with a bunch of marionettes.

My yummy homemade bagel with lox!

At night we went to an ice cream place and then we went to a jazz bar, where we made friends with some people from Krakow. Thank God too, because one of them told me that the time change was tonight! We didn't even know. It's fun to make friends with people from all over. It's also fun to speak with people who English isn't their first language. It's like talking to a kid with adult ideas or something. I like it. The guy that was playing at the bar looked just like Bill Murray and we discovered a new drink. It was something like beer and raspberry juice. The radler of Poland I guess!

Yep, that's ice cream!

Prost! (I don't know what cheers is in Polish)

Watching Bill Murray on the screen from the other room.

Kind of like Bill Murray? Huh?

Sontag 31 Oktober: Can you believe it's Halloween? So weird. Anyway, today we leave Krakow and go home to Vienna. I must say I am quite homesick for Vienna! (For the states too, but what's new) In the morning we got some snacks for the road, then went back to our favorite perogie place for an early lunch. This time I got broccoli. It was so delicious!!! After that we headed to the train station and went to the mall to spend our last few zloty. We made it to the train with time to spare and we got these kind of bagel-pretzel things that they sell everywhere. They're very good and ours tasted kind of like an everything bagel and they cost the equivalent of about 30 US cents. So cheap. Coming home we had some pretty old trains. Very eastern Europe. We made it home without any hitches and it is good to be home in Vienna!!! Now I think it's time to watch a scary movie to celebrate Hallowien! (haha)