3 minutes to write this

before the internet thing kicks me off.

we are in belgrade, serbia and we love it. it is full of life and singing people and reasonable fashion. it's a team hamabam (that's me and kristen s.) recommended city.

thanks to matt, parents, and kss for sticking with blague. :)

love you guys!!!!!!!!!!

the balkans rule!

p.s.

i can sort of read cyrillic now. also, does anyone besides my parents still read this blog?

immobile in sofia

when kristen and i were on the train from istanbul to bulgaria, i looked out the window at dawn and saw bulgaria for the first time. what i saw was a vast green field with two bushes. so my first impression of bulgaria was as flat, with two bushes.

when we were in our little abandoned town on the black sea, i asked kristen what words she would use to characterize bulgaria. they were something like empty, depressing, and prom. mine were something like empty, green, and vast.

now we're in sofia, and my impressions still include the color green, but now they also include graffitied swastikas, yellow brick roads, and the gates of hell. sofia is by far my favorite place in bulgaria.

i don't like all the nazi stuff all around, obviously. it is very distressing, in fact. we see swastikas scrawled all over signs and monuments and sidewalks and walls all over this city. and we went to a street with a row of vendors, and one of them was selling a little box with a flattering portrait of hitler on it. kristen bought a picture of a funeral from the vendors. i bought some crazy earrings. but neither of us bought anything from the hitler vendor.

the vendors were right next to a statue park with images of people dragging dead people on their shoulders, or screaming in agony whilst breaking free from some sort of cube-like prison, and, of course, a giant pillar with a swastika spray-painted on it.

the statue park was right next to the alexander nevsky church, which is sofia's main attraction, and, after seeing this church, i can honestly say for the first time that a church deserves to be a city's main attraction. this place was INSANE. it was giant and empty and utterly creepy. there were candle-light chandeliers (now electric candles, but they were once certainly wax), that hardly lit up the immense space. there were small windows surrounding the tall domes, but no light came through them. there was an alter with painted images of saints on the panels, but the saints looked so so sad. they were not dramatically sad, but they were more, like, just subtly and deeply sad looking. they all had mostly neutral expressions on their faces, but i couldn't even look at them. there were also lions with pillars coming out of their backs that also looked very, very sad. sad lions. and there were monks singing. and kristen and i were thinking that we'd entered the gates of hell. this was the most sinister church i have ever seen. when we came out of it, the sky looked like it was about to crush us.

the worst thing about being in bulgaria is the fact that i can't move when and where i want to because i'm on crutches. and unreasonably uncomfortable crutches at that. i'm worried that my immobility is going to dramatically decrease my quality of vacation for the next few weeks. adn i'm worried that there might be something seriously wrong with my ankle that should be attended to before a few weeks from now. but there is no way to know and getting home would be so depressing and also expensive. i want to see some things here before i go back there.

anyways, we're changing our itinerary a little bit. we were going to go to macedonia tomorrow, because the lonely planet description looked really good, but now it looks like we'll be going to belgrade, because it is more central (meaning there are more buses going in and out of it than skopje) and the macedonians we met said that skopje wasn't all that interesting. so we'll go to serbia and then we'll stay there for a night and head on over to sarajevo. then croatia. then italy. then home. oh, the other thing is that if we went to skopje, we'd have to bus through kosovo (and maybe albania), which sketches me out a little bit, although i'm sure it is safe as long as we stay on the bus and etc. it's a non-issue anyway; it's just inconvenient.


some guy told kristen that canadian girls were even more beautiful than polish girls; she was flattered despite the fact that we're not canadian.

bulgaria

so, of course the nicest computers i've been on in europe are in this random town in bulgaria, and i have no time to write. the good news is that i have no time to write beacuse i am going to bulgarian prom with a bulgarian friend of kristen's and also with krsiten. i'm excited. here's the email i wrote to my parents. you know, just for an update.


here i am in stara zagora, bulgaria. we're
staying at yoanna's family's apartment. yoanna is a friend of
kristen's from indian springs (she came the year after i left). she
is super sweet and really awesome and her family is SO nice. her mom
keeps feeding us more food than we could possibly eat, and then
demanding that we eat it. it is all vegetarian too, because yoanna is
vegetarian, so her mom knows how to cook good vegetables. today,
yoanna took us to her family's garden up on this hill by her
apartment. her grandparents stay in the garden all day to look after
the potatoes, strawberries, melons, roses, and especially the cherry
tree (because young hooligans and also birds keep trying to eat the
ripening cherries). none of her family speaks english, although she
speaks it perfectly (she goes to school in california), but they all
love us and demand to socialize with us constantly, which means that
yoanna constantly has to translate. but she doesn't mind. she has a
beautiful personality.

my ankle is still hurt, but it is feeling better every day, although
it looks pretty bad. it is swollen and a little bruised, but i've got
some crutches (that are painful and wooden!!!!!!), and so i'm not
putting much weight on it when i walk around. we are going to stay
here one or two more nights, and then we will go to sozopol, which is
on the black sea coast. it isn't the most direct route to the west,
but we had to come to stara zagora first because yoanna is leaving for
prague (of all places!) in a few days where she will be for the
summer. i'm excited about her going to prague, though, because this
way i can help her find the good vegetarian food.

guest entry from kristen

hey folks. this is what kristen wrote for her own blog, and i thought i'd repost it for you guys so that you can have another perspective.


with love from constantinople
MERHABA!!!! I am in Istanbul, Turkey. got here friday night after a long flight where i made a friend from azerbajan and then there was this loquacious turkish man flailing his hands the whole time and talking about how he was looking for good people because he loves good people and then i took the tram alone and there were only men and i felt weird but then there were women. and then i got to the hostel and i was very tired air france lost my bag it sucked. but then it came later, after nicole got here. no sleep too much turkish beer and somehow i made out with Vili. bad idea he is insane and wants me to move here and live with him sketchy he kept waking me up note to self no hostel employees because now he wont go away because loco loco. then the next day we went to Haga Sofia, the Blue Mosque, the underground cistern, the grand bazaar etc. we made some friends in the mosque i really liked the mosque very peaceful and serene. WE are the only Uruguayoas in Turkey. We met the same pair of kids 3 times but each time they pretended not to know us. new best friends are the best. We went to Taksim square at night and saw this fun turkish pop band with Naco and Becky and Vili and some other kid i dont know from California who says this other girl I know from the US has a crush on him. They sang a song in English about a sexbone. Also Nicole is a superstar. before she got here i met 2 people who knew her from Prague. Crazy. some socialist and another boy with really bad hair. rad, but what is not so rad is that nicole fell in a hole and then me on top and owwwww owwww she hurty hurty in the bed with pillow ice and blankey. Vili was mad and said he was going to break his foot too. too much drama no thanks. and then yesterday we looked for crutches but didnt know how to say it in Turkish and we never found any but I think I found a 12 year old husband for Nicole and we saw the Golden Horn and lots of stuff for sale but everyone kept saying how everything was closed. did not look closed to me. then went to see the whirling dirvishes at the train station it was awesome they whirled and whirled like in a trance and then we went to the TURKISH BATH. It was awesome, everyone wet and naked and then they cleaned us and then washed our hair stroking naked naked lots of naked. then last night we came here and it was fun i was tired had not been able to sleep and then went to bed late again and then today got up and now we are waiting for crutches and Becky. And then tonight we are taking the overnight train to bulgaria. sorry for the stream of consciousness. in a hurry and wanted to update. evil eye evil eye a la TSATF eye but really the Istanbul eye. Can someone please use a high quality printer to give me pictures of saddaam in his underwear hot hot hot turkish bath. Istanbul is so great, east meets west, Europe and Asia. The people are really friendly and open, it reminds me a little of latin america. going to topkapi and asia now. I want more turkish bath. I will write more later. Adios!

istanbul ii

so right now i have some time to write a little blog entry because i'm waiting for the crutches i purchased to arrive at the hotel next door. who knows if crutches are what i'll actually be getting, because everyone has seemed confused that i'd want crutches and not a wheelchair, a cane, a shoulder, or this one guy's son. language barriers. i think that yesterday's quest for crutches almost won me a fourteen year old husband.

anyways, despite my injury (which sucks a whole friggin lot), istanbul is potentially my favorite city i've been to in europe (we still haven't been to the asian side). it feels different from any other city i've been to. the people are really really friendly. lots of times they are just trying to sell you things, but if you refuse to buy their things and drink their tea or just ask them for directions, they're really nice anyway. this one guy walked us a block and a half to help us find a bathroom because the one in his restaurant was out of order, then he just left us. he didn't try to make out with us, get our phone numbers, or sell us anything. he was just nice. we've been having that experience over and over here. also, the guys are really hot. like the goodlooking ones are REALLY goodlooking to me. i like the look. one guy at the hostel fell in love with kristen (i'm with b'ham kristen now, darling is off with her parents in germany).

here is a list of things we've done:
-hung out in hostel (a lot)
-wandered the streets in sultanhamet
-blue mosque
-underground cistern (beautiful!)
-dancing to a turkish band/hanging out with hostel owner and austin-friend becky
-breaking ankle on the street
-aye sofia (used to be a church, then a mosque, now a tourist location)
-seen the dervishes whirl
-been to the turkish bath (also known as a hamam; also known as incredible)


we still need to go to asia, get my crutches, and also go to topkapi palace today (this is a priority). i REALLY want to see topkapi. NOW! but i can't walk.

tonight, we get on a train to stara zagora, bulgaria, where kristen has a friend. then we're going to the black sea coast on bulgaria. hopefully my ankle will hold up.


oh, i just found out that we're probably not going to get to go in to topkapi because we're still waiting for my stupid crutches for mty stupid ankle. i am really sad. it was the number one thing i wanted to ddo.

anyways, i will just have to come back.


okay i still have a little time, so i will elaborate on some of my favorite things that we've done.

turkish bath:
okay, this is where you get naked with a bunch of same-gendered people in a steamy room and lay on a hot rock slab in the middle of it. you lay there confused for a while, looking at all the different women and trying to figure out if you would prefer to be shaped this way or that way, when all of a sudden, five or six large old naked turkish women come in and command you to lay down in front of them. they get this exfoliating glove adn rub it all over the back of your body, then they slap you on the butt and you turn over. then they rub it all over the front of your body. then they pull your arm and you sit up and they rub it all over your arms. then you lay down again and they get this bag with all these soap bubbles in it and squeeze it all over you and clean you and massage you at the same time. then they take you in to this other room where they shampoo your hair and pour little bowls of water all over you. then you lay on the rock slab again for as long as you want. when you get too hot, you can go into the little rooms on the side and pour bowls of water on your head. it feels really nice and also makes you clean and makes you feel like you are on a greek vase or something, being in that room with all those naked ladies and pouring bowl fulls of water over your head and shoulders.

dervishes:
you think it'd be boring to watch people whirl in place for half an hour, but really it isn't at all. you start to notice all this different whirling techniques. like this one guy always put his foot down in exactly the same place, and looked like there was an invisible pole through his left ear, down the center of his body, and out one of his heels into the floor. then this other guy also turned like 200 degrees and so his foot was always coming down a little bit farther ahead of the last time. first, i watched their feet, then i started noticing their heads. they were so still, even though their bodies were moving adn it made their tilted heads look like they were in motion. then i started to notice the fabric of their dress- how it billowed out in this whooping patterns. i got in to sort of a trance watching them. i've never seen people in constant movement appear to also be so still. and i don't know how they didn't fall down with dizziness. no wonder it is a religious experience for them. i bet they feel like they are on drugs when it is over.

okay, i'm gonna stop now because i have to see about going out in this town.

istanbul

hey folks, i'm in istanbul. it rocks here. tonight, an old woman who i had never met before scrubbed me and soaped me up and massaged me in a room with about 20 naked ladies at the hamam. it was awesome.

tomorrow, we leave for bulgaria. so far, though, istanbul is my favorite big city that i've visited since i've been in europe. it's totally unlike any of the other cities. oh, but the only thing is that i'm pretty sure i sprained my ankle last night on the busy party street. there was a pothole. it's already feeling a little better, though, so hopefully i'll be able to walk properly within the next few days. the people are nice here. the architecture is beautiful (mosques!). the food is good (turkish delight!). the hostel is one of the best in the world, probably.

k, i'm tired from having been scrubbed and massaged so thoroughly by the big naked lady.

p.s.

i'm in prague again, by the way. and i'm leaving for istanbul on friday. k.

last night- the story of no sleep

i could write about all the incredible things that happened on our road trip through eastern europe, but instead i want to write about last night.

so i ended up staying at my friend matthew's place. he owns/lives above the bar. he lives in filthiness. this doesn't bother me. he has no shower, hot water, or toilet (there is a toilet in the hall). this is a bit inconvenient.

so anyways, around two, michelle (very nice girl who works at the bar but floats from flat to flat instead of having her own) shows up. i'm really excited because i have insomnia and i want to hang out with her for a while. so we chat for a bit and then she passes out, because she's been drinking. then, i lay down and try to sleep some more. meanwhile, matthew's cat is very persistently sniffing, kneading, and sticking her butt in my face/hair. no sleep. then, at six am (still awake, and with plans to wake up at 8:30 to go to the rental car place and sort out paperwork), noah (the other owner) shows up at the door with katka, who just broke up with her boyfriend (who she lives with), and says, "matthew has graciously offered his bed to katka, who needs a place to sleep." i let her in and show her which piece of foam on the floor is matthew's bed, and which piece is nicole's temp-bed, and which is michelle's temp bed. while i was letting katka in, matthew's cat ran out. so i ran out after it and chased it all around the building at six am. when i get back, katka is already snoring and sleep talking in slovakian. it was pretty adorable, but not sleep conducive for me. about thirty minutes later, i'm still trying (and failing) to sleep, and the cat decides she wants desperately to play. so she jumps from a tall table onto my chest to 'wake me up.' i don't want to give in to her wily ways, so i pretend to stay asleep. so she starts rifling through my stuff and pawing at my legs. i keep ignoring her. so she goes into the kitchen and knocks over a few pots and pans and then comes up and sniffs at my face again. i pretend to still be asleep. finally, she curls up in my lap and falls asleep. i begin to have those still-awake-pre-dream dreams. one specifically where i'm riding on the curling leaves on a giant head of cabbage as if the cabbage were a jungle gym with slides. but then it's time to wake up and go to the car rental place.

the night of no sleep. zero minutes, actually. absolutely no sleep.

matthew never came back to his apartment, so i just left the sleeping ladies there and left the key in the door. and now my stuff is there but i'm locked out. tonight, i am going to sleep at anthony and lindsey's place. they are very sweet people who have offered me my own futon, a toilet, AND a shower.

but it was an interesting night, anyways. not bad, but i'm dizzy-tired now. and now i'll go meet my cousin for dinner. yay!

the end.

nine minutes in vienna

this is how long i have on the internet before it kicks me off.

we're in vienna. we are kristen, amy, and nicole (that's me).

yesterday we were in plitvice, croatia, looking at the garden of eden/the plitvice national park. it was like this- levels of clear, turquoise colored lakes, with little silver fishes hanging out by the surface. a little wooden platform winding between several waterfalls, and around the nearly invisibly clear lakes. bright green foliage hanging from hundreds of trees. and old white-haired people winding around the little wooden platforms. i thought that we had died and gone briefly to a place where all the nice old white-haired people go when they die. then we had to leave. kristen said, "awwww, sucks that we have to leave." i said, "well, you can only stay in a place like this so long when you're not dead yet."

there were also old french dudes who were actually wearing berets. can you believe it?!?

i want to show you pictures, but i have no access to a place to download my pictures right now. hopefully i will soon, though, because my memory card is entirely full. today we look at klimt paintings and then go back to prague for a few days. then i meet the other kristen in istanbul!

IKEA

This is me and Nick on our daytrip to Holland

Gone to Texas

I got back to Richardson yesterday afternoon. After Prague, Berlin, Krackow, and Stockholm (and Brasov and Vienna if I can count places Nicole went while I was in Prague), Richardson seems like a charming, idyllic utopia. Well, not really, but it's got family and Suma Veggie Cafe, so it's not the worst place in the world.

But back to the memories. In 1628 - the year Britain introduced The Petition of Right (An important document setting out the rights and liberties of the subject as opposed to the prerogatives of the crown) - Sweden was at war with Poland. Now that Sweden's worst warmongering is a mild cultural rivalry with Norway, it's hard to imagine them decapitating Poles and ripping out their spinal cords for territory. But aside from blond hair and blue eyes, ancient Swedes had little in common with their modern counterparts who are known for being passive, afraid of uncomfortable situations, and, in general, neither happy nor sad, neither great nor horrible.

1628 was the year Sweden completed The Vasa, a giant warship meant to wipe Poland off the map until the end of time. One version goes like this... The ship was almost completely built when the King of Sweden realized they should double the number of cannons on the ship, just to make sure Poland couldn't possibly think about rebuilding their society out of the rubble. Since The Vasa wasn't designed to hold all those extra cannons, the ship was really unbalanced, and people on deck had to watch where they walked. Fifteen minutes after it set sail, it caught a mild gust of wind, fell over, and sank to the bottom of the sea. Fifty of the maybe 200 soldiers, women, and children drowned. No one was held responsible for the accident. Probably because it was the king's fault.

Then, in 1959, the Vasa was discovered and dredged up. Sweden spent 30 years restoring this shame of their past, and now The Vasa is an artifact in the most popular musuem in Stockholm. I went, and I have proof. This photo. It was dark at the Vasa, and it's kind of hard to see the ship behind me, but trust me, it's there.



Photo credit and Photoshop credit goes to Nick Stevens, the guy I went to Stockholm to see.

Last post from Europe for real... this is Rhys

I guess this is it. Good-bye to Europe forever. From now on, Europe may as well not exist as far as I'm concerned. Well, Nicole is still in Europe, and I don't want her to get sucked into a vacuum of non-existence. Or Nick for that matter. Otherwise, to me, there might as well be nada on the other side of the Pond we call the atlantic. No, no, that's not true. I can't leave the blog like this, so short, so sarcastic, so anti-climactic. Stay tuned for every single Prague and Stockholm incident that I didn't have the net time to write before. Seriously, this isn't another of my empty promises. I can already tell, though, my catch-up entries just won't be the same. I've already noticed my mentality changing. Just look at my recent Jeremy Coon obsession. Not possible in Prague or Stockholm. My head had to be at least halfway in The USA to think like that. Nevertheless, this isn't the end. Perhaps Nicole's tales from Europe will keep me in line. Good luck on your adventures, Nicole! Goooooooooood Luuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!

Last day in Stockholm

Yes, you read that title right. This is my last day in Stockholm, maybe forever. I have had many adventures here - too many to even begin to recount, or even hint at. The best part has been seeing my old friend Nick - one of the few connections to my Dallas, TX past - playing Dungeons & Dragons (my character in Stockholm is a human barbarian named Taschen, a far cry from my old character Basil Spire who was a half-elven half-theif/half mage), reminiscing about our school days and Cafe Brazil nights, and preparing for our high school re-union. In only two years, we will be re-united with all our high school mates, and this has got me thinking of my nemisis again. I have to beat Jeremy Coon.

Jeremy Coon produced Napoleon Dynamite, which, even if it may get a little slow by the end, is a cultural behemouth - a defining film of our generation that will influence art and even society building for at least the next 100 years. Do I have it in me to help create something as worshipped, as quotable, and that inspires as many laughs and smiles as Napoleon Dynamite will do for generations to come? Something more brilliant, yes, of course, there's no question that that's in me, but something as beloved? I'm not so sure.

No matter what, the next two years of my life will, in part, be a ceaseless, undivided effort toward that perhaps impossible goal. And that is just one of the many reasons I must leave Europe (for now?) and return to my real life, the the land where I was born, The United States of America. See you soon, everyone!

slovenia

in slovenia, they like to take random one-syllable english words and turn them in to city names. for instance, we are now staying in a town outside of bled. also outside of bled, there was a town called log.

anyways, if i am even somewhat of a reasonable person, i will not spend more than 5-7 minutes writing this entry. i am in a small town outside of a small town outside of the small slovenian city of bled. we are staying in a gigantic apartment for 13 euros a piece in a valley with some mountains and some lakes and one slovenian receptionist, who is very nice, and his very very nice dog.

it took us about twice as long to get here as it was supposed to, but the upshot is that i can now drive a manual transmission car with confidence.

here are the things i want to tell you about but don't have time because i need to eat, shower, and interact with slovenia at some point:

-floor crashing/apartment hopping with amy in prague (sort of miserable, sort of great)
-specifically, austin's apartment (and floor) and matthew's apartment (showerless)
-puke everywhere (the horrible hostel)
-tesco picnic
-getting lost in klagenfurt (the most beautiful, picturesque, weird little college town i have ever seen)
-the austrian countryside.

i should spend a minute on that anyway. the austrian countryside is easily the most beautiful countryside i've ever seen. the green of the grass is so green that it almost hurts your eyes. right where czech republic and austria meet, there are fields covered with yellow flowers that are so bright that my mind had previously been unable to conceive of such a color. the sky was blue with supermario little white fluffy clouds everywhere. basically. it was nice.

okay i have to go.

things and stuff and

today we watched a spanish movie with czech subtitles in my art and architecture class. our teacher was not the best of teachers. we all speak english and not spanish or czech.

last night i got really really drunk unexpectedly. the thing is, i left my listerine at the dorms and i wanted to kill the germs in my throat somehow, so i drank a sizeable shot of vodka and then forgot about it. then i went to the blind eye to see a concert and had a glass of wine. and it didn't immediately hurt my stomach (like alcohol usually does), so i drank another. and then it was all over for me. but noah printed out my paper for me at the office in the bar, so i didn't have to worry about that this morning. that was very helpful.

now i feel hungover and awful and have a 10 page paper to write by tomorrow morning, not to mention another class tonight. not to mention that this is my last night at kate's and my stuff is still strewn about the city in the most illogical of places. ugh! curse that landlady!

amy is coming to town tomorrow. i am extraordinarily pleased with this new development. YAY!

speaking of new developments, kate has a full length mirror, and it turns out that somewhere along the way (between junior year and today), i have acquired love handles. curse full length mirrors!

this internet session is going to cost me a fortune. curse bohemia bagel!

the stress is slowing paying itself off

my cousin's apartment is beautiful. i have it to myself right now. and she has a computer, so i'm gonna buy some cd's, write my papers at her apartment, and print them elsewhere. it's impossible to get a computer at the study abroad office right now because everyone is writing papers, so this is more help than it sounds. the key board i'm on right now is awfu l adn it adds in random spaces.

okay- to paper wri ting.

this is nicole, stressed out

so i had to leave the apartment today. we sort of had a choice and sort of didn't as far as whether i had to leave. i chose to leave in order to save everyone money, but it really wasn't worth it AT ALL. I AM SO STRESSED OUT!

not only did i waste a whole day and a half cleaning and packing (what i will just have to unpack and send off), but i have two papers to write and a test and also no place to stay tonight. well, i didn't have a place to stay tonight until a few minutes ago, when it turns out (now that all my stuff is at the dorms, where i'm not allowed to stay) that my cousin's friend can let me into her apartment even though my cousin is out of town and has no idea that i'll be staying in her apartment. but the thing is, her apartment is over there, and i (and all my stuff) are over here. i think i'm gonna buy a bunch of boxes and send off everything today so that my stuff will be in transit without me. but that means i can't write the papers or study for my test that i have to do all within like the next two days and all without the use of a computer.


annnnnyways. i'm about to have an awesome vacation, at least. and i'll have a little extra money from being homeless that i can use to, i don't know, eat extra food or something.

alright. off to do things.

This is Rhys, live from Sweden

I'm on welfare now. More soon...