Budapest, Venice, Florence

I'm hanging around at my host family's, waiting to leave for the airport to head to Turkey (unfortunately my flight doesn't leave until 1:30 am). More travel break updates:

End of Berlin: The DIS part of the trip ended in Berlin after a visit to a concentration camp, but instead of going back to Denmark, my friend Karen (from the program) and I stayed in Berlin for an extra night. DIS was supposed to drop us off at the train station, but instead dumped us off at an abandoned train station. In the middle of nowhere. I think (hope) that was a mistake. Luckily we found a police officer who spoke English and had her call a cab for us. Oh adventures in public transportation...

I was really happy that we stayed in Berlin an extra night as there was still so much to do and see. (Topography of terror exhibit, National Gallery art museum, etc.)

Budapest, Hungary: Jillian (my friend from NU) is studying math in Budapest for the semester and offered to let Karen and I stay in her lovely apartment. It was great to see Jillian and Budapest was a beautiful city to spend a couple of days in. While Jillian went to her classes during the day, Karen and I explored the city. We climbed St. Peter's Basilica, went to castle hill, visited a museum of medical history, ate honey nut cookies and pastries, and relaxed in thermal baths. I was expecting it to look and feel similarly to Poznan, mostly because of their shared communist history, but was pleasantly surprised that they were very different.

There are about 180 forints in one dollar, meaning that I spent most of my time in Budapest having no idea how much I was spending. If a price was in the thousands, I could come up with a rough estimate, give or take several dollars. We had some really nice dinners out, I ate pumpkin pasta with goat cheese and chicken paprikash.

We went out dancing one night and I was suprised to bump into someone from DIS that I know from one of my classes. The world is small. Also, the guys in the club would sketchily dance by themselves really close to girls, hoping the girls would turn around and start dancing with them.

Venice, Italy: Went here from Budapest with Karen, Jillian, and Jillian's friend Amelia. Lots of canals, very pretty. We walked everywhere and were hopelessly lost, which was the whole point. It also had a lot of tourists, for obvious reasons. We opted out of the $80 an hour Gondola ride, but rode the water bus down the Grand Canal at night to enjoy the light reflecting off the water.

I encountered my first ever "cover charge" that restaurants had added to their menu, just to sit down. For one of our dinners, we tried to not order any drinks and our waitress went "no. that is against the rules. The rules are you must order drinks." This made me miss eating in the US where the waiters are mostly kind, tap water is free, and no one makes you order anything. Luckily my gnocchi al ragu was delicious, so I didn't mind the forced water consumption so much.

Florence, Italy: Amelia, Jillian and I took the train here from Venice. Our hotel was really great, so that was a good surprise. We spent our days wandering the city. We climbed all 438 steps of the Duomo, saw the famous art work at the Uffizi, and ate far too much (or not enough?) gelato. I also had roasted chestnuts for the first time and they were amazing! Our dinners here were also really great. One night I managed to meet up with my friend Katie from DIS, and we all went to a bar with a live cover band. We also experienced the stereotypical Italian men who followed us around wanting to know our names and where we were from.

My second week of travelling was successful. I'm amazed that nothing went wrong. This was my first time making travel plans all on my own and it was a lot of work. We had to book the plane tickets, find the hotels and make reservations, figure out how to get from the airport to the hotels, etc. I used the internet for all my directions and reservations and everything ended up working out.

This week was a good break from the structure of the first travel break. I liked getting to make my own plans and being free to do exactly what I wanted to. However, I am looking forward to being part of a tour group for Turkey again. It is nice to not have to worry about transportation, getting lost, etc.

I also feel lucky that I had such great people to travel with. Karen, Jillian, and Amelia were all really fun be with and I think everyone got along well.

on to Turkey (Istanbul, Izmir, Bodrum)...