Krakow and Auschwitz

My school has this thing called the Buddy System which offers various planned activities (that are even somewhat subsidized by the school). These activities are everything from trips to Dresden or Krakow, to Boat Cruises, to Skydiving. The one that I knew I must do was the trip to Krakow, Poland, which is a party city about 9 hours away from Praha, and is only 1 hour away from Auschwitz, the place where millions upon millions of people were slaughtered during WWII.

This trip was an awesome trip cause it helped me bond further with many of my classmates as there was 30 of us from VSE that went to Krakow. This trip would also be good because I would get to do alot of things that I would have been too cheap to do when traveling alone.

On the Friday the 9^th we departed just after midnight, I knew this ride would be dreadful and thus I HAD to do what I could so that I would fall asleep quickly so me and Ruann had a couple drinks before we got on for the 9 hour bus ride (so we would pass out quickly.) Once we arrived everyone was super tired, but the buddy system had a whole day of planned activities so we dropped off our stuff and went on a tour for 6 or 7 hours from our personal tour guide. The city was cool, but alot similar to the rest of Europe I had seen already though I did enjoy that the city center was entirely enclosed by walls (or atleast it used to be), the dragon spouts that you can take showers from, and the huge dragon that you used to be able to text (now it just happens every couple of minutes) and it would breath fire hahaha (and alot of fire at that!). That night we enjoyed a Mountaineering 3 course meal which was pretty tasty, this was one of the two 3 course dinner + Entertainment meals that I would have been too cheap to pay for if traveling alone. That night the gang headed to an Irish Bar (which by the way are identical in every city I have been to including Ireland.) the bar was cool I watched some rugby and then I enjoyed some karaoke with the other exchange students.

our Mountaineering freinds

The next day was a very sad day in Polish History on this 70^th anniversary of Katyn a plane carrying many of Poland’s leaders went down, just to show how crazy this was, these are some of the people that went down in the crash.

* Lech Kaczyński, President of Poland
* Maria Kaczyńska, First Lady of Poland
* Krystyna Bochenek, Deputy Speaker of the Senat
* Archbishop Miron Chodakowski, Orthodox Ordinary of the Polish Army
* Leszek Deptuła, member of the Sejm
* Grzegorz Dolniak, member of the Sejm
* Janina Fetlińska, member of the Senat
* General Franciszek Gągor, Chief of the Polish Army General Staff
* Grażyna Gęsicka, member of the Sejm
* Przemysław Gosiewski, member of the Sejm
* Mariusz Handzlik, Undersecretary of State in the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
* Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, member of the Sejm
* Ryszard Kaczorowski, the last President of the Polish government-in-exile
* Sebastian Karpiniuk, member of the Sejm
* Vice Admiral Andrzej Karweta, Commander-in-chief of the Polish Navy
* Janusz Kochanowski, Polish Ombudsman
* Andrzej Kremer, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs
* Janusz Kurtyka, Historian and president of the Institute of National Remembrance
* Tomasz Merta, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage
* Aleksandra Natalli-Świat, member of the Sejm
* Piotr Nurowski, President of the Polish Olympic Committee
* Maciej Płażyński, President of the Polish Community Association
* Tadeusz Płoski, bishop of the Military Ordinariate of the Polish Army
* Krzysztof Putra, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm
* Andrzej Przewoźnik, Secretary-General of the Council for the Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom Sites
* Ryszard Rumianek, Rector of the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University
* Arkadiusz Rybicki, member of the Sejm
* Sławomir Skrzypek, President of the National Bank of Poland
* Władysław Stasiak, Chief of the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
* Aleksander Szczygło, head of the National Security Bureau
* Jerzy Szmajdziński, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm
* Jolanta Szymanek-Deresz, member of the Sejm
* Anna Walentynowicz, free trade union activist, member of Solidarity
* Zbigniew Wassermann, member of the Sejm
* Wiesław Woda, member of the Sejm
* Edward Wojtas, member of the Sejm
* Paweł Wypych, Secretary of State in the Office of the President of the Republic of Poland
* Stanisław Zając, member of the Senate

When we were told about this in the morning in the Jewish district everyone was shocked beyond belief, how could so many important people be on one plane, where should Poland go from here? That afternoon we had a tour of Auschwitz 1 and 2, from a tour guide that had been doing this tour for 10+ years. IT was one of my most Shocking and horrific experiences thus far, and I thought of the world in a totally different way after this tour. Just the stories are horrific. 12 people sharing a single bed, with the sheet moving on top of them cause there are so many rats, and some people would die in the middle of the night and you would wake up with someone beside you eaten by the rats, they would have no nose, no chins, just terrible, if you go to Europe you should differently hit up a concentration camp it will definitely make you think of the world we live in differently.

the entrance to the concentration camp, the sign reads work brings freedom... work did not bring freedom

the bunkbeds, a thousand people would live in this building alone

Day 2's fancy dinner, me, Chris, Hanna and the dutch crew finished our whole bowl of tomato soup (4 bowls each!)

The final day we went on a Communism tour. Where we got to look at Fidel Castro’s ideal city, shoot some vodka to make communism problems go away, eat communism perogies, eat communism pickles, and drive in a plastic communism car. This was cool but I still think Jarov dorms beat all in their amazing communism feel. As we were leaving you could tell the city was in mourning, Krakow had closed all entertainment (movies, clubs etc) for a whole week, and even the grocery stores were closed on that Sunday.

the plastic car, it bends when you step on the plastic roof

All and all I strongly, strongly recommend all of you to try and go to Krakow so you can go to Auschwitz it is definitely something all of us Canadians or Americans should know more about, so the horrors of WWII never happen again.

Berlin Son!

Easter is a massive tourist fest in Prague, and because of this and the long weekend (5 days for me) many of my classmates were going away on the weekend. Me and Chris decided we needed to go away as well so we went to the computer lab after class Tuesday and booked our bus which left at 730am on Thursday (5 hour bus ride). Planning out my travels until I go back after classes I realized i might not have the chance to go to Berlin and Vienna, so we decided to hit up Berlin.

My roommate told me Berlin was expensive as he went for 4 days I believe and spent something like 600 euros! I went there for 4 full days (1230pm Thursday to 6pm Sunday) and somehow only spent around 250 Euros. For this included

- Return Bus Ride

- Hostel for 3 Night

- Kebab Action X 6

- Pizza Hut Action X 3 (so so so so good)

- Curry Wurst

- Brotwurst X 2

- BBQ Bacon Burger Meal at some delicious Diner

- Alternative Pub Crawl which included entrance at 3 bars 2 bars / clubs and one final club, 4 free shots, and all for 10 euros

- Pub Crawl which had the same amount of bars and clubs but this time every time you bought a drink (beer, wine, vodka shot, anything!) you got a free shot of jager.... also the first 45 mins at the first bar there was unlimited beer.

- 2 Guided 4 hour tours

- 4 day Bus pass

The first day me Chris and Cindy arrived. We took transit to the Hostel and unpacked our stuff. The hostel was very nice, though there wasn’t to much social action going on while we were there. After we dropped off our stuff we walked around the zoo, and then saw some of the major attractions, the gate, the wall, and Checkpoint Charlie, and this brutal 10k walk (thanks alot CINDY!) we bought a 72 hour transit pass) and transited back to the dorms. That night we had a chill night and just hit up an Irish bar and walked around downtown for a bit.

The next day we meet up with Jay and company and hit up an Alternative Walking Tour. Some cool things we did on this tour, saw some of the best street art in the world (saw a apartment building in east Berlin which each balcony was decorated differently my favourite was the one with Zoidberg from Futurama, It was also cool that some guy came out wearing a backlova acting like a monkey for 10 seconds then saying “fuck off tourists!”.

Other cool things we saw in Berlin were alot of squatting locations (especially in the old bombed out central train station. If you don’t know what squatting is, is it is a program that Berlin has where anyone could take one of these old abondaned destroyed building and could have it is they made use of it positively for society. Ie:

- Do your art in this building and let people look at it

- Transform it into a bar and serve people alcohol here.

Bombed train station transformed from nothing to something (ex of squatting)

Other cool things we saw here included Yaam a beach in the middle of Berlin which use to be a Concentration camp i believe. The Turks people living in old tanks left behind by the Soviets after the Berlin wall came down, and the huge Tree house in the middle of central Berlin which is randomly protected by the Church.

-Tree house in the middle of the city (in the middle of a road)

That night we decided to continue all Alternativeness and hit up an Alternative Pub Crawl. This Pub crawl was awesome we went to bars like an Upside down bar, a Ping Pong Bar, and the Club in the old bombed out train building (also in this area there is 3 or 4 bars, a couple restaurants, a rock climbing wall, and the largest indoor skate park in Europe.) What was also cool with this pub crawl is the tour guide would tell us when to stop for road beer and such, overall it was a great night.

The Next day we went the largest zoo in Europe. This zoo is really cool as it is literally in the CENTRE of Berlin a city of 4 million people. Also what i liked about this zoo was that they had no gates, and instead they had ditches (so the animals couldn’t come over) Thus you could see the animals really close. That night we decided we must eat the world famous Mustahas Kebab before we headed to the next pub Crawl. Though when we went there we were greeted by a 1 hour line at this little kebab stand in the middle of the street, after waited 45 minutes we had to abandon our Mustahas Kebab hope for the evening as we had to make the next pub Crawl. We started the Pub crawl at Zampatas which is a super cool squatting area. After the pub crawl ended we tried to try our luck again at Mustahas but when we got there at 3am it had just closed.

(Zampatas)

We started our final day by headed to Mustafas bright and early. We had our first Kebab and it was soo delicious that me and Chris got another one for the road. (The secret for these Kebabs is they put roasted vegetables, Peppers, and potatoes in the Kebabs we got) That day we did another walking tour, the tour guide was really good and we got a real feeling of how life has been over Berlins history.

My favourite parts of this tour, were feeling the actual bullet holes from WWII in one of the last remaining buildings from WWII in Berlin. I also liked hearing the stories oh what people did to travel from east to west Berlin, for instance two guys dressed up as a cow and crossed from east to west with a farmers cows who he was selling to West Berlin. We decided to end the tour early so we could see the East Side Gallary. The East Side Galary is a section of the Berlin wall (1/2 remaining sections) Here there is a 1.4 km strip of murals from 120 artists from over 20 countries. Here are some of my favourite pieces.

All and all Berlin was an amazing city and i cant believe i might of almost missed the city this time in Europe.

Some thing to know about Berlin

1) The transit system in incredible, there is 6 – 8 metro and skytrain lines and it goes all night

2) Eat the fast food, it is good, it is quality, and it is 50% the price

3) The City is Flat, so I would definitely recommend renting bikes to see the city (10 euros for half a day)

4) Stay in East Berlin if possible all the important places are located in east Berlin

5) Stay ATLEAST 4 full days, its a big city with alot of history. Here you should hit the Zoo, get Bikes for a day and explore, Go to the alternative walking tour, go on the regular walking tour.

Ireland for Paddy's Day!

So while in Budapest my friend Oystein said to me that he was going to Ireland for St Paddys day and it would be an epic trip, so I decided i must come. Immediately that night I decided to look at flights, luckily i didn’t buy a flight because the next week i found my flight for around 90 Canadian dollars (deffinetely a steal considering my friend Vanessa paid $600 Canadian to Fly for Paddys day for 1 night (20 hours) from France!

Here was the basis of Mike and Kerrys trip plan (which they had been planning since they came here in September) Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday in Dublin, Thursday Travel to Cork till Saturday, and come home Saturday to see the big 6 Nations Rugby Match between Ireland and Scotland.

So because Mike and Kerry missed there flight (cause the gate closed early), All of us besides Oystein were on the same flight there. The flight lefts at 11:20 or something like that and got in at 1pm, so we had the whole first day to explore. The First day we were just in a surreal atmosphere, so many tourists dressed in big hats, and lots of green (i think 750,000 went to Ireland for paddys day), and people spoke English! After we dropped off our bags we headed to the temple bar to enjoyed some good old bar food.

We saw this sign here, which i thought my Irish friends would enjoy

At the bar i had fish and chips, something me and Kerry had been talking about the whole morning, and although my meal Fish and Chips 10 Euros, Mushy Peas 2 Euros, and Guinness 3 Euros (half the price of miller by the way) was probably triple the price i would pay in Czech Republic i enjoyed in thoroughly, especially the free water, and free ketchup and malt vinegar yum!

After fish and chips we walked around a little bit, seeing both Trinty College (the oldest and most famous college in Ireland), and we had a couple drinks in the smallest bar in the world and then went to Jasmine and Mikes hostel. Here we played drinking games with some people staying at the hostel and then headed home to take a couple shots of beckerovka (czech medicine) before going to sleep.

The Next day i got to sleep in a bit which was enjoyable as i only had a few hours sleep in the previous couple of days. After we woke up we headed for some traditional Irish Breakfast (which was super cheap too!) for 5 euros i got toast, tea, hashbrowns, sausage, bacon, and eggs. (thought i should of got some beans too!) After we ate that we jumped on a hop on hop off bus tour. The tour was awesome cause the 3 guides we had were hilarious “Skinny people die too”, “If you come at the right time you can get a perfect shot of Madame president’s legs” “Watch out for the girls walking up the stairs they be whisked up!” Along the tour we stopped at the famous Guisness Brewery this was super cool. Not only was it the tallest building in Dublin (guess you can figure out what the Irish like), but it was well designed and included many free samples. The coolest thing to me about the Guisness Brewery was the fact that the Brewery was purchased for 100 pounds and was leased for 9000 years for 45 pounds a year, and not only that Arthur Guisness also negotiated free mountain water for the use of the lease (quite a good deal when you use 3 million litres of water every day hahaha. Also Arthur Guisness had 25 children hahaha. After the Brewery we got off at the Whiskey distillery (which was booked for the rest of the day which sucked :( ) and we say the national museum.

(The Bartenders were very talented)

That night was Irish people Paddys day, so we headed back to our 4 star hotel, which rate was 300 + Euros a night be we somehow got it for 80 Euros, split up between all of us it worked out to 12.50 euros a night, definitely a bargain! That night Oystein met up with us and we met up with Arrtu and his friends and we drank in true irish fashion) Also we went to Eddie Rockets (a 50’s diner chain all over Ireland) i Recommend the Sliders and Cheesy fries!

So as we went to bed around 5am the night before walking up for the Paddys day parade was definitely a chore. But we knew Paddy’s day only happens once, so we dragged out ass out of bed and started doing shots! (well i didn’t but Kerry, Jasmine, Oystein and such did, true warriors!) The paddys day parade was one of the most random parades i have ever seen. But instead of describing it to you i will show you in pictures (P.S i guess the egg came before the chicken)

After the Parade we headed on our Pub Crawl. The first pub we headed to was so birazze, it was like something like the foggy dew (half bar half dance floor) and it was packed with drunk people and it was noon hahahaha! After that we headed to another 5 bars, all had great music, great people, and were overall great atmosphere. At 6 we decided to go to gourmet burger (amazing handmade burgers soooo good, and shotgunned some beers) Also i found the Ireland Jersey i wanted around this time! After that we partyed a numerous bars till only about 1 or 130 am (as we were practically drinking since 7pm the night before) headed home and collapsed. Though before we collapsed we got a nice warning for being loud when the hotel manager walked in on 10 people in 3 beds, in a hotel room for 3 adults. He was deffinetely shocked.

Ultimately, St Patricks day in Ireland was definitely an an amazing experience and I was so glad I went.

The next day we headed to Cork at 2pm. Cork was an awesome city, people were friendly the town was on the Atlantic ocean, and people sang there words, thus far in my travels Cork has been my favourite city. We arrived in Cork having no idea where our hostel was so we asked a bus driver where the street was, he answered giving us very good directions, and he even followed up asking us where exactly we were headed to and gave us even better directions (The people of Ireland are sooo friendly) After checking into the Hostel we played some pool and watched some rugby at the bar in the hostel. Following this we went to a close by restaurant where I got some delicious Sheppard’s pie (soooo good). After the restaurant we headed to go to the bar. We ended up at a bar on a student night it was a blast especially cause we were singing Seven Nation Army at the top of our lung, and that we found some interesting characters that were lots of fun hahaha.

After the bar closed at 2am (way to early) we headed home singing Country Roads by John Denver, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oN86d0CdgHQ Great end to the day.

The next day we headed to kiss the Blarney Stone, it was a cool castle, and I loved the moat, here is a picture of me kissing the Blarney stone. As we were leaving the stone it started to rain so after we got home we just watched a couple (probably more like 6) episodes of a show that apparently my sister and lyss both introduced me to, but i forgot, and when Kerry introduced it to me i was instantly hooked! Later that day me Kerry and Oystein headed to buy ingredients for Kerry famous spaghetti that he was made for all of us (and a couple of delicious beers, rum and whisky) The predrink before the club was lots of fun and so we headed to the bar about 5 minutes away and we were greeted by Irelands very own Boone County, the old people of Ireland drink just as hard as young people, it looked like some of them ever did a predrink! After that bar we went to the bar we went to the night before and it was good times once again, though it does suck going back to the North American way where the bars close around 2 – 3 am. (Below is me kissing the Blarney Stone)

Our final day in Ireland we woke up at 930am to catch the 10am bus. We figured it was a 10am bus on a Saturday so there would be no line, but there was. This was actually pretty frustrating since we hustled so hard to the bus stop, packed in 10 mins and then pretty much ran to the bus getting there at 959am.

Because of this we had to take the bus at noon which we thought would of gotten us to the match at 30 mins before or so. We ended up catching a Dublin Direct bus which worked out amazingly. We got to the city just about an hour before the match, which gave us enough time to find a hostel and walk to the stadium for the 6 nation Rugby Match between Ireland and Scotland. There was 5 of us walking there, we had 0 tickets and the face value was 75 Euros for the CHEAPEST ticket. About 3 blocks before the stadium we got offered tickets for $50 euros, for a SOLD OUT game. I personally was soo pumped we found tickets at all especially for that cheap (i was willing to spend a whopping 200 euros to watch this match) and we snatched up those tickets in less than a minute. We arrived at the stadium 5 mins or so before the 5pm start time, the atmosphere was crazy it was in Crooke Park a rugby stadium that seats 85,000 people. The rugby game was absolutely incredible, screaming CRUSH HIM, 85,000 green flags (everyone gets one under there seat) when Tommy Bowe scored an epic try, and the roar of rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr when a scrum formed. Though it would of been much better if Ireland would of won the game earning them the triple crown, this Rugby game was one of my best experiences thus far in Europe and probably my best experience in Ireland.

John Beattie's Try

Overall Ireland was an amazing Country, and Cork is my favourite city thus far in Europe. Definitely if I earn my CA designation I would very much consider getting transferred to Ireland to work for a year there.