So many monkeys, so little time...

Costa Rica 2010 - Pura Vida

2010-07-01T16:27:00.000-07:00

July 1st, 2010

COSTA RICA – PURA VIDA

Going into the year, I didn’t really have any solid vacation plans. As I looked into options, it seemed as though for the first time ever, I was going to have make a solo trip. As such, the possibilities were somewhat endless and I had my targets set on going to Peru to see Machu Picchu but it was going to be an expensive trip and finding a time to go that was convenient was becoming a bit a of challenge. For as dull and boring as my winter was, the past few months have brought a non-stop schedule (which is both a good thing and a bad thing).

As I was trying to nail down some targets, I received a call from Christopher Fitch Anderson inquiring if I would have an interest in perhaps joining he and Sam Modico on a vacation to Costa Rica. Amazingly, a lot of things came together in a relatively short notice including finding an available time slot that worked for everyone (a miracle in itself given everyone’s constraints, including my own), airfare, hotel, etc. Over the course of the few weeks leading up to the trip, details fell into place in short order and we were off to the land that most Americans know from the Jurassic Park films. I think for many Americans (and this was proven on the trip), Costa Rica is the right mix if ecological wonders and a safe but international destination which makes it a fairly popular tourist spot. It has always been on my list of places to visit (but to fair, that list is fairly long and comprehensive). Regardless, I jumped at the chance to go and I’m glad that I did; they do, after all, have monkeys.

Day 1 – Arrival in Alajuela – 6/24/10

While waiting in the airport, I sat in on a horribly boring 1.5 hour conference call that ended up giving me a whole lot more work when I returned. Ce la vie. In the midst of the call though, I nearly got ran over by a golf cart carrying Regis Philbin and his wife to a gate that was departing for Las Vegas.

Chris was flying from Phoenix and Sam was flying from Baltimore both connecting on the same flight through Miami whereas I was flying direct from Newark. My plane, in typical Newark fashion, sat on the tarmac for a good hour before taking off because all flights out of Newark were grounded due to “weather”. In all of my time flying (and it’s been significant), I’ve come to learn that weather is blamed for everything. As we sat on the tarmac, this realization became engrained into my head as I watched the sun streaming through my window with no bad weather in sight (which remained the case after we took off and through most of the flight). What did help ease the annoyance was that I was upgraded to first class which is always a nice benefit; one that makes it worth it to ensure that you get enough miles to maintain status on Continental Airlines. What was even nicer was that this First Class cabin was one of the best – it had chairs that reclined fully and footrests that came up. Luxury….sort of. For me, I still think the best part of First Class is the hot towel service that comes around after take off. Of course, the free booze, chicken/steak/shrimp dinner (yes, all three in one meal) and the actual silverware are nice as well.

After an uneventful flight (once we took off that is), I arrived in San Jose about hour later than expected. Our plane was greeted by lightning off in the distance. We deplaned onto the tarmac and rode a bus into the terminal. As I entered baggage claim, I discovered that Chris’ and Sam’s plane was also delayed such that we arrived pretty much at the same time. We exchanged some money that we hoped would last us for a week, got our bags, and made our way to the rental car counter where we boarded a shuttle that took us to the actual rental car place just under a mile from the airport. The airport, along with our rental car place and first place of lodging isn’t actually in San Jose but is instead in Alajuela which is a city about 20 mins. west of San Jose. After some searching, we used Economy Rental Car which Chris had used prior and found to be the cheapest. We got the required insurance and a GPS along with the keys to our Hyundai Elantra. Chris had booked us a room at a Bed and Breakfast called Vista Linda Montana. Of course, that hotel wasn’t in the GPS and in Costa Rica, I quickly learned, there are no addresses, just road names and distances as to how far a place may (or may not for that matter) be on said road. The gentlemen at the counter was kind enough to draw us a map that would get us to our B and B and gave us a stern warning not to go past Vista Linda because it leads to a very bad and dangerous neighborhood called Little Hell. How quaint.

So, we loaded our luggage, off we went, and subsequently got lost because we missed one of the turns. I somehow ended up being the driver for the week since the rental car was in my name so it was twice the adventure for me (but at least I can add another country I drove in to the list making the total 6; Canada, USA, Mexico, England, Australia, and now Costa Rica).

Back to getting lost – we essentially missed a turn off but we eventually got ourselves back on the right track and found the road that led to Vista Linda. At first, it looked sketchy in that it was a small road with few street lights and was lined with security gates in front of all the houses. Over time though, I learned that most streets in Costa Rica are like that so you get used to it pretty quickly (plus, I’ve been in places that are far less inviting). The big lighted sign in front of the place was a huge help and we pulled in front of the gate. Chris got out and after some searching found the buzzer to let our hosts know we arrived. It was close to midnight so I felt a bit bad but they knew we were coming in late. As the gate opened and we entered, Ronnie and Yvette were standing there waiting to welcome us. Ronnie and Yvette, I quickly learned, are not Costa Rican (or Ticas as Costa Ricans are known), they aren’t even American. They are German, naturally, and to boot, they are Germans that don’t really speak a lot of English. Chris, in addition to being fairly fluent in Spanish, also knows a lot of German so he served as translator for the trip. After meeting our hosts (and they are very nice people), I really wonder what their story is – why a couple from Germany would move to Costa Rica (in the middle of a non-touristy town mind you) with their young children, without a clear grasp of the language, and start a bed and breakfast. It really surprised me but I’m sure they are doing what they love in a place they enjoy which beats most people.

Ronnie and Yvette live in a house next to the structure that has the rooms people stay in. We were on the top floor of a building that had three beds. Sadly, there was no air conditioner so the ceiling fan did little to keep us cool that night. The beds weren’t that comfortable for me which meant a lot of restlessness but all in all, it was a decent place (and for $75 a night, I couldn’t complain; besides, I’m still young(ish)).

Day 2 – Alejuela to Quepos – 6/25/10

We woke up the next morning for breakfast which was very German. It consisted of meat and cheese along with a bowl of cut up fruit. I should take a sidebar here and say the fruit in Costa Rica is amazing and thus, the juices made out of fruit are also amazing. We joked a bit about the breakfast and kidded Sam about eating something that looked like cat food. The view from the Vista Linda was actually pretty decent as you looked out of their back yard to some mountains behind the property.

We loaded ourselves into the rental car and began the four hour driving trek to Quepos and Manuel Antonio, our destination for the rest of the trip. As we were leaving, Yvette looked at our car with concern and wanted to know where we were going because many of the roads in Costa Rica are poor (if they exist at all). Apparently the roads to Quepos are pretty good so any concern was alleviated. The GPS took us to a highway that looked really nice but for some unknown reason, it was closed so we had to backtrack and rely on Chris’ memory to get us moving to a good alternate route. Chris was the only one who had been to Costa Rica before and his last trip was to the same area that we were going to; in addition, Chris is pretty good with directions and languages so we were in good hands, kind of like AllState but better.

The alternate route was an interesting one because it winded (and I mean winded) through a mountain pass. The nice part was that you get to see the mountain and the forests surrounding it, the bad news was that you couldn’t go faster than 40 kph. The twisting and turning didn’t sit overly well with Chris and Sam but we made it through.

Along the way we stopped for lunch at a roadside restaurant called Restaurante la Carreterra. The place was mostly empty when we arrived but a few people wandered in to catch the World Cup game going on at the time. Most of the food in Costa Rica is of the rice and bean variety combined with chicken, pork, fish, etc. Overall, a decent meal. Right around the restaurant, the raod was flanked by a massive palm tree farm which meant a few miles of massive palm trees lining the road on both sides which added a nice ambience. The rest of the drive down was pretty uneventful and we eventually arrived in Quepos.

The town of Quepos is not very impressive; in fact, it’s a pretty standard Costa Rican town which is what you would expect of a third world country. Bordering Quepos is Manuel Antonio, named after the National Park that is in the immediate area. Manuel Antonio essentially consists of a long road that snakes through a mountain flanked by rainforest on both sides. Hotels line the road and as you go over the mountain and come back down, you end up in a little town with the main beach and the road terminates at the entrance to the National Park.

The “hotel” we stayed at was called Mimos and is run by Giancarlo and his (much younger and I daresay attractive) wife Rebecca. Giancarlo is an interesting guy. Part Venezuelan, part Italian, lived in America, he looks like an older surfer guy that you would see in Southern California. Overall, a pretty nice guy. We found this hotel after some searching on TripAdvisor and it got mostly good reviews. After some e-mailing back and forth, I was able to get us an apartment in the “luxury” building for $100 a night which after the seeing the place, I thought was a great deal. Mimos has a main hotel and behind it, Giancarlo essentially built a large house that can be rented in its entirety or by floor (it has three). We got the ground floor which consisted of a huge living room with a dining table, benches, three sofas, TV, etc., a bedroom with a king size bed, a kitchen, and a bathroom. In addition, we had what essentially became our own private pool, separate from the main pool at the hotel; a nice touch.

After got settled, we decided to go fro a drive and check out the town of Manuel Antonio along the beach. We parked along the side of the road and walked along the length of the beach. The beach gets fairly crowded (and by fairly, I mean not really that crowded) by the town area but as you walk north, it gets more and more secluded until you get to a point where you almost have the beach by yourselves. What makes the area neat is that it’s not your usual beach of sand and water in all directions. Manuel Antonio is somewhat of a lagoon in that the national park flanks one side of the beach and there is a large hill (rainforest) that juts out and there are rocky cliffs (cliffs may be a bit of an overstatement) to the north. In front of you are some rock islands off in the distance. When you combine all that together, you get a pretty unique experience which makes you appreciate the inherent beauty of the area because it was pretty unique.

Because we were worried about leaving our car unattended by the side of the road (we parked in a questionable area), we didn’t spend much time up on the northern part of the beach. We returned to our car (which was in the condition we left it) and headed back up to our hotel. It began to rain so we decided to eat at the restaurant in the hotel, Mamma Mia’s; an Italian joint under separate management from the hotel. In general, the cost of food surprised me. I expected everything to be dirt cheap but it really wasn’t. Prior to dinner, we stopped at the grocery store, Super Joseth, to pick up a few items and they too were expensive (~$5 for a bag of chips!). Restaurants were no exception either. Most meals were ~$7 - $15 (and more). Still not terrible but I expected pretty low prices; I guess that’s what tourism will do for you. We ended up ordering pizzas which were just ok.

A word about the weather. This time of year is the wet season, or as Costa Rica euphemizes it, the “Green” Season. This means that room rates are typically a little cheaper because well, it rains a lot more (because hey, you are in a rainforest). We were fairly lucky with the weather in general. It was dry during most of the day and then would rain pretty hard at night. Manuel Antonio is not really a night town so it suited the weather patterns. We didn’t see a whole lot of sun during the day until the end of the trip but all in all, our fears of being rained out did not come to fruition for which we were grateful.

The first night, like every night after, was early to bed because we got up early. Usually, that’s a disaster for me given I’m not a stellar morning person but it suited the tone of the trip. We got more time in the daylight and slept fairly well without a whole lot of distractions of other things that we could have been doing.

Day 3 – Manuel Antonio

The next day started early with an included breakfast. I must say the breakfast was a pleasant surprise given the fact that it was free. You essentially had five choices: pancakes, typico (eggs, rice and beans), Americano (eggs and sausage), continental (toast) or a fruit dish. In addition, you got coffee or tea and an amazing fruit juice concoction. After breakfast, we headed down to the beach and we took the car because parking the day prior was pretty easy. We spent the morning just hanging out (which was how we spent most of our days come to think of it) and swimming in the ocean. The water was unbelievable warm, like a bathtub so swimming was a nice break from the humidity of the day.

We didn’t plan on staying at the beach too long because the USA was playing Ghana in the World Cup. As we headed back to our car, a man in an orange vest approached us and spoke to Chris. Apparently, we had to pay to park where we did (which was essentially the curb just outside the main part of the town. Initially, we were skeptical but in the end, the badge the man wore convinced Chris to pay him 2,000 colones. In the end, he turned out to be legit (and quite a nice guy) and we were able to come and go as we please and have parking privileges the entire day.

We went back to our apartment and watched the US put up a valiant effort against Ghana but to no avail as they lost in overtime. Overall though, it was a fun afternoon. Being in a Spanish speaking country for the World Cup I think added a little to the ambiance. If nothing else, I always enjoy how the Spanish announcer always accentuated the rolls in his r’s and I thought it was priceless how he said goal. Whenever someone scored, it took about 3 minutes for him to get out goal and he always emphasized the end – sadly I can’t reproduce it in type because it just won’t have the same effect.

After the game was done and lunch was had, we headed back down to the beach for some more swimming. We ended up meeting a nice couple from the States, one of which went to Penn State for his doctorate. Overall, I have to say I was really amazed at how many Americans there were there. They were clearly the vast majority. But what surprised me the most was the amount of families and high school students there. While Costa Rica is beautiful and mostly friendly, I wouldn’t pick it as a place to send or take my young children. The lack of infrastructure, amenities, and language would make it a difficult sell and while most people seemed friendly, you know there are people out there who would easily take advantage.

The currents in the ocean throughout the week got a bit dicey at times. We saw someone have to get saved by the lifeguard and she wouldn’t be the first person that needed saving throughout the week. In fact, Sam and I both got caught in a current and quickly found ourselves unable to stand. After some battling, we were able to make it in but it certainly caused us some concern and made us cognizant throughout the rest of the trip.

That evening, we went to La Cantina for dinner which was a large canopied platform on the side of the road. The food (I had a pineapple chicken dish) was quite good. After that, we headed back to the hotel and made it an early night.

Day 4 – Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio

On Sunday, we decided to get an early start and spend most of the day in Manuel Antonio National Park which sits at the end of the road by the beach. As we were sitting down and finishing our breakfast, a group of girls wanders in and sits down to begin theirs. As they place their orders, a guide comes in to pick them up for an excursion they had apparently booked. We were amazed at the ignorance of the group sitting down and ordering a breakfast at 7:08am when their guide was supposed to pick them up at 7:10am. Ironically, we saw them later in the day at the park on a guided tour which they really could have taken at any time.

There is a bus that costs 240 colones per ride and basically makes a loop between Manuel Antonio and Quepos so we decided it would be cheaper for us to take the bus. On the bus, we met Jennifer (or rather, Chris met Jennifer). She is a really nice local girl who works in a bracelet “factory” and sells the bracelets at the park’s entrance. After bidding her farewell, we enter the park, pay our ~$10 entrance fee, and make our way down the path. We pass a lot of guides pointing out various animals along the main path through the park. It was a nice deal because we got to look at what they were pointing out without paying for the actual tour (and most of the guides, to their credit, were pretty cool at letting us piggyback on their efforts and even invited us over). We saw our first (of what would become many) large lizards that were about 2 or 3 feet long. They just kind of hang out on the trees and rocks and are quite impressive. We also saw some colorful land crabs, a sloth moving ridiculously slowly along a tree, and various other sundry animals. We still had yet to see a monkey up close which was discouraging but that would all change.

The main path leads to the main beach, Playa Manuel Antonio. There were a lot of tourists hanging out at this beach (and by tourists, I mean Americans) which was somewhat discouraging because we were somewhat hoping that the beaches in this park would be isolated. We explored a little bit and found another large lizard hanging out in the crevice of a rock. We went further down the path and ended up at Playa Espadilla Sur. This was the beach we were looking for. There were only a couple of people hanging out but for the most part, it was empty. We put our stuff down and went swimming for a bit. The ocean here was much calmer which made for a really enjoyable experience.

After our swimming break, we went for a hike along the large peninsula that extends from the park. At the peak is Punta Catedral (Cathedral Point). There was no question that we were in the rainforest as we made the hike as sweat poured down our faces. We eventually completed the loop stopping at a couple of the vistas and ended up back at Playa Manuel Antonio. Along the way, we saw some howler monkeys jumping through the trees but we weren’t able to get any decent pictures. As we arrived on the beach, we decided to rest there for a bit and go swimming. While Sam was getting ready to join Chris in the water, I noticed a whitefaced capuchin monkey come to the tree line that borders the beach. Our chance had finally arrived and Sam and I were both able to get some great shots. The moneys (two of them) hung out for quite a bit and were pretty comfortable around all of the people standing there taking their pics.

After getting the shots we were hoping for, we returned to the beach and went for a swim. Afterwards, we decided it was time for lunch so we headed back into town. There is an alternate exit to the park that we decided to take. It required some wading through water which wouldn’t have been a problem until we saw that signs telling us that the water was contaminated with fecal matter. That would explain why there were some locals there offering to take people across to the main beach in little boats (for a price I’m sure).

We walked through town looking for a good place to eat and someone handed us a flier that pointed us in the direction we wanted to go – a place close by with cheap food. We climbed the stairs to the restaurant and it was pretty full of boisterous locals routing (strongly) for Argentina in their World Cup match against Mexico. Their cheers kind of added to the ambience of the whole affair. After we enjoyed our casado, Chris decided to hang out at the town beach while Sam and I decided to go back to the park. As we walked the path back to the entrance, another capuchin monkey jumped out of the tree and started rummaging around some trash near a garbage can. First, he found a pillow and deciding he couldn’t eat that, he found a bag of chips. He ripped open the bag but discovered that was empty and thus jumped up on the garbage can and rummaged a coconut out of there. Finding success, he put it in his mouth and scurried off but not before we got some more pics.

As we returned to the park, Sam and I wanted to take a long hike to a remote point in the park. We found the path to Playa Escondido. After taking a sidepath to some other beaches, we decided to make a push to the lookout point at the end of the trail. We finally made it after sweating about twice our body weight and the view was worth it. We saw the cove as well as the beach on the other side of the peninsula and some large mountains in the background with clouds hanging over them. Feeling satisfied, we made our way back to Playa Espadilla Sur for some last minute swimming (which was needed and well worth it).

Sam and I hopped on a bus back to the hotel and Chris soon joined us from his afternoon on the town beach. That evening, the rain started to pour so we went to dinner across the street to El Mono Azul (The Blue Monkey). It’s a hotel that caters to families and gives a portion of proceeds back to environment conservation. We had a decent little meal (with a good dessert) and returned home for another early night.

Day 5 – Manuel Antonio

The next day started as usual with breakfast. We had nothing in particular on the agenda that day other than going to the beach. Chris had suggested that we check out a pretty secluded beach that he discovered on his last trip there called Playa Bensatz. We walked a pretty good distance along a rocky road that descended down onto the beach. While the beach was small and secluded, the sand in the water was essentially a huge bed of rocks which made swimming less than enticing. We only spent a little time there before heading back to the main beach in town.

Once there, we had an uneventful lunch at a beachside restaurant that consisted of a hut and concrete chairs and tables. Afterwards, more swimming. That night, it rained (again) pretty hard. We sat in the dark for some time as the power went out but enjoyed watching the storm pass through. After it calmed down a bit, we walked down the street to a restaurant called Pizza de Marco. A recurring theme with all of our dinners for the most part was the most of the restaurants were either totally empty or at least fairly empty. I know it was the down season but I’m not sure how they all managed to stay in business. Pizza de Marco was actually a pretty good restaurant and the pizza was quite cheesy.

Day 6 – Quepos and Manuel Antonio

Sam and I got an early start and were picked up at our hotel for a zip line canopy tour of the rainforest. The van took us through Quepos and up into the hills. The place was actually quite nice and the guides were really professional. There were a total of 13 different zip lines with the longest being 450 meters (~1500 ft). Overall, it was a pretty cool experience but you were usually going to fast to take in the scenery around you. Regardless, it was worth the money and I’m glad I did it. We saw a poison dart frog along the way as well as a banana spider. At the end of the course, we had the option of repelling down to a platform which took us back to the main entrance. We had some juice and fruit waiting for us after we washed all o the mud off our shoes.

We ended up back at our hotel and made our way down to the beach to meet Chris. We found him sitting with a guy named Manuel who was conversing with Chris in Spanish. Manuel was a Mormon who had been excommunicated because he liked sleeping with women. He also smoked pot. But he seemed like a really nice guy and spent most of the day with us. He told us about his 2 year mission trip to Bolivia and how we one day thought he would go back to the Mormon Church.

That day, we also met Jose the Empanada guy. We saw Jose the past few days walking the beach trying to sell his homemade empanadas but he always came at the wrong time. Today, we decided to wait him out and just as we were about to give up hope, he came walking down the beach. The empanadas were great; so good in fact, I ran down the beach to buy another round from him. He was down talking to the lifeguard and through my Spanish, I was able to surmise that the lifeguard was his brother and that Jose himself was a lifeguard as well. Although, he seemed to be more of just the lookout and whistleblower because he couldn’t be taken away from selling his empanadas. We started to joke around a little bit and as he told me he was the lookout, I told him in Spanish that he was probably looking at the ladies. He laughed, pulled a set of binoculars out of his fanny pack, and winked at me.

Today was the first day where the sun really came out so all in all, it was probably one of the best days we had just sitting on the beach and relaxing. That evening, we returned to Pizza de Marco having had a good experience the night before and made some good conversation with the waiter. Instead of pizzas this time, we went with pasta and had an enjoyable meal. We also conversed with a couple on their honeymoon from Key West, FL who were also dining at the restaurant. I’m not sure why you would need to go to a place like Costa Rica if you live in Key West but to each their own.

Day 7 – Manuel Antonio to Alajuela

The time had finally arrived to return north to the San Jose area so we could fly out the next day. Both Sam and Chris had started to get into the mode of going home but I just finding my groove with Costa Rica. All good trips however, must come to an end. The nice part of the day was that we didn’t have to rush since we had a lot of time to return north due to the fact that we weren’t flying out until the next day.

In the morning, Sam and I took the opportunity to head down to the beach one last time to get some pictures. The sun was out and the beach was fairly deserted so it was a pretty good morning. While taking pictures of something, some guy came up to us and asked us what we were taking pictures of. While I thought it was a weird question, I explained a little bit of what we were trying to do. He responded with “well, I don’t want you taking pictures of my kids”. I asked him where his kids were and he pointed to the specs in the ocean which was a good distance away. At first, I was incredulous but I soon tempered that with a realization that he was just trying to protect his family which I couldn’t fault him for. But as I thought more about it, I got irritated. First, if you are that concerned about your children being photographed, don’t take them to a very public beach. By going there, there are inherent risks that you take, however remote they may be; you can’t expect to protect your children from everything all the time but I guess it’s within his rights to try. What bothered me more was that he made an assumption that I posed a risk. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that I don’t look like a pedophile (and neither does Sam), especially garbed out in our American clothes and nice cameras. Oh well, thankfully, my filter was working and I moved on.

After finishing our photos on the beach and packing up the apartment, we loaded back into the Hyundai for the trek north. On our agenda was a stop in Jaco as well as a stop at the crocodile bridge. We were warned not to really stop in Jaco because it’s apparently pretty common to get your tires slashed or your car broken into. So we decided that instead of stopping, we would drive through and see if there was anything worth stopping for. There wasn’t. Essentially, Jaco is a bit more touristy of a town with a big surfing crowd. As such, it’s like a larger version of Quepos (and they have a Subway).

After passing through, we arrive at the crocodile bridge. This is a large bridge that spans the Rio Tarcoles on Rt. 34. It’s notorious as a spot where large Costa Rican crocs hang out and we were not disappointed. ON the lef side of the bridge, there were three crocs (two on land, one of which was quite large, and one in the water) and on the other side, there were at least four hanging along the bank. After spending some time getting pictures we headed back to the car and continued north looking for a place to eat lunch. Chris had wanted to stop at what is called a Soda which is essentially a roadside stand with a couple tables and makeshift kitchen. We passed the touristy sodas just past the croc bridge and ended up finding a great little spot that probably gave us the best meal we had had all week (a casado for ~$4 which made it one of the cheapest as well).

As we began to finish our lunch, the heavens opened and rain began to pour (and I mean pour). The rain subsided for a brief period but began again in earnest while we were driving along a windy mountain path which made for a few white knuckles. When it rains in Costa Rica, it rains a lot, comes down straight because there isn’t a lot of wind, and waterfalls of mud come out of the rainforest from either side of the road.

After a lengthy drive, we had some time to kill so we decided to take a driving tour of San Jose, the capital city which I think is, it’s fair to say, a dump. We started out by driving into the main park in the city which is home to the (very under construction) national stadium. After throwing a Frisbee around and reading a bit, we drove down the main street in the city to get a flavor of what living in San Jose is like (not very appealing). Due to the poverty and general sketchiness of the neighborhoods, we didn’t feel very safe leaving our car and eating in the city so we decided to head back towards Alajuela and find something to eat (after battling rush hour traffic). We ended up eating a chain restaurant called RostiPollo near our rental car place before heading back to Vista Linda for our final night.

Day 8 – Departure

Chris had an early morning flight and thus left around 5am. Thankfully, Ronnie and Yvette took Chris to the airport so we didn’t have to rise earlier than needed. After another German breakfast (sans cat food this time), we packed up and headed to the airport ourselves. After arguing with the rental car place that our GPS was useless and we thus shouldn’t be charged for it (whether that was successful or not remains to be seen), we spent some time shopping and eating (both overpriced) at the airport before taking off and returning to the land without humidity. Thankfully, I was upgraded to First Class again which made the trip pretty nice although there was this annoying dance troupe of girls that was giving the flight crew a hard time.

Overall, it was a great trip: good friends, relaxing, and fun. It took a few days for Costa Rica to grow on me but when it did, I really enjoyed it. I would definitely go back but I’d like to explore more of what the country has to offer, especially up in the northern parts. So perhaps, one day…..

Europe 2009 - Eastern Roads. Yah, ish Good!!

2009-10-19T17:00:00.000-07:00

SEPTEMBER 30TH, 2009
EASTERN ROADS – YAH, ISH GOOD!

Ahhhh Europe - Land of ice-free beverages, sub-par hotel rooms, pay-restrooms, and “Erotic Libraries”. What it lacks for in creature comforts, it certainly makes up for in history, culture, and all around good times. I had been thinking about a tour of Eastern Europe for quite some time and it was certainly a good time but it was also packed with a lot of culture and history and I walked away with a real sense of how the last 60+ years have really had an impact on that region (and not in a very good way) in the midst of getting a glimpse of a region that has a wealth of potential as it find its identity and forges ahead.

DAY 1: DEPART FOR BERLIN

This has been such a heavy travel year with my work assignment in California to the point where I haven’t really been “home” for an extended period of time since 2008. Since my full-time assignment ended, I have been splitting my time between Pennsylvania and California and I didn’t have a full week back home before I left for this trip. That chaos prevented me from really preparing for this trip as I probably should have. This was going to be my fourth time in Europe and considering this was a guided tour, I really just focused on making sure I had my wallet, passport, and camera (with the appropriate accessories). That would only haunt me in minor ways later but in the end, it all worked out well.

My flight departed from Newark Friday evening and I was flying to Berlin via Zurich. I was able to see Joe at the airport for a few minutes before boarding. Overall, it was a smooth flight to Zurich and I had a two seat row to myself which was nice. One would think that would have enabled to me to sleep properly (as all flights to Europe are overnight) but no – it was insanely uncomfortable (which was accentuated by the guy in front of me who somehow managed to read the newspaper with his light on for the ENTIRE flight, and every time he raised the paper to turn the page, his light reflected directly into my face). Luckily, I had a four hour layover in Zurich which enabled me to nap a bit and at least some rest. I woke up just in time to catch my Air Berlin flight to Berlin.

DAY 2: ARRIVAL IN BERLIN
Upon arrival, I was dismayed to discover that my Blackberry was not set up to work internationally and thus I was going to be truly on vacation for at least most of the trip. I arrived at Tegel Airport, got my bags, and had decided to take public transit to get to my hotel. I’m usually fine with public transit so long as it is a subway system. Buses usually give me pause because they are somewhat subjective with routes they take and what stops they make. Regardless, I had some time so I figured I would a little adventurous. I managed to successfully take the bus to a subway (“U-Bahn” or “U” station). After I got off the bus, I had a hard time finding the U station and walked around a bit with my luggage trying to find the underground entrance. I managed to find it and get to my stop. After walking in the completely wrong direction for a few minutes, I was able to find my place of residence for the next two nights, the Hotel Belmondo. Overall, it was a standard European hotel but what was cool about it was the doors to the hotel rooms were actually two sets of double doors which I thought was kind of cool.

I had a couple of hours until Joe arrived and we all met together as a tour group so I decided to meander about. I walked around the corner and discovered the remnants of a bombed out church (The Church of Kaiser Wilhem). It was bombed out during WWII and left as a monument and historical museum. It would be my first exposure (of many) to the effects of WWII on this entire region. I continued to walk through the streets and found some random sites but nothing too noteworthy. Upon my return, Joe had arrived and was checking in just in time for our first group gathering.

After the standard orientation, we all met together to head out for our first group dinner at a restaurant a few blocks away. The walk was an amusing one because our restaurant was right across the street from an “Erotic Museum”. You keep it classy Berlin. The meal was a decent one - we had the standard German schnitzel which was decent. The after-dinner plan was to visit the Reichstag at night which would require taking the subway. We were told that the subway trip to the Reichstag would be fairly straightforward but once we got to the U station, we realized it wasn’t as simple as we thought and had to actually change from the U-Bahn to the S-Bahn (don’t ask me what the difference is but they aren’t directly connected – you actually had to leave the U station, go outside, cross the street, and go into the S station).

We arrived at our destination and emerged to see the Brandenburg Gate at the end of Unter den Linden, the main street that follows the heart of Berlin. Just pas the gate and to the right sat the Reichstag, the home of Germany’s Parliament and the famed site that was burned by Hitler during his rise to power. It was recently renovated to celebrate the re-unification of Germany after the fall of Communism to include a huge glass dome. People can climb the dome via a spiral walkway. In the center of the dome is a conical structure of mirrors that at the right angle, allow you to see directly down to the desk of the members of Parliament. The symbolism is strong here and you immediately realize the complex history of Germany and how profoundly it has impacted this country, even today. Essentially, the mirrors serve as a symbolic reminder to Germany’s government that the people will keep a watchful eye over all that they do in order to keep everything in check and prevent radical people from ever seizing power again.

When we arrived, the building was all lit up and was quite impressive. There was a line of people trying to get in and as we stood at the end, one of the doormen came out and said they would stop admitting people at 10pm and it was highly unlikely that we were going to get in. Joe and I decided to go and take some night shots. As we were doing so, a bunch of other tour people arrived and suddenly the line to get in was moving really fast. As we ran to get in line again, we made it in just in time. As you enter the building you are herded into a class case where both doors close (apparently for security purposes).
You take an elevator up the roof level where you are able to climb to the top of the dome as well as walk around the roof of the building which offers views of the Berlin skyline. As I surveyed the landscape, I was expecting to see a vast dichotomy between East Berlin and West Berlin in that I was thinking I would see a slew of skyscrapers and development on the capitalist West side and nothing on the formerly-Communist East side. While I would see differences during the following day, they were nowhere near as pronounced as I had expected.

We took the S-Bahn and U-Bahn back to the hotel to get some rest for a packed day of touring Berlin.

DAY 3: BERLIN

Berlin, in general is a fascinating city because, among other reasons, of its history. First, Berlin was the place of Adolf Hitler’s rise to power and the heart of the Third Reich. As a result, the city was pretty much destroyed by Russian and Allied Forces towards the close of the war. While that alone would make the city interesting enough, what followed WWII made the city even more complicated. As a result of the Allied victory, it was decided that both Germany and Berlin individually would be split into four areas controlled by the United States, England, France, and Russia respectively. Since Russia was Communist, the areas it controlled were vastly different from those controlled by the capitalist countries. What made Berlin especially interesting is that it was a divided city in the heart of Soviet-controlled East Germany. What most people know of Berlin today is associated with the Berlin Wall and the fairly-recent fall of that wall as a symbol of the end of Communism and the Cold War.

After WWII, people were allowed to freely move between East and West Berlin. The Soviets soon began to realize that people were leaving East Berlin (and subsequently East Germany because once you were in West Berlin, you could easily board a flight to West Germany and ultimately, freedom from Communism). Literally overnight, Communist guards strung a barbed wire border and you were no longer freely allowed to cross from East to West Berlin and doing so would result in you being shot. In a few days, a formal wall was constructed and everyone in East Berlin was essentially a prisoner. The wall was actually two layers deep with a “death strip” in between. The Death Strip was a few rows of barbed wire that was lit by flood lights and patrolled by guards every six minutes. Anyone in the death strip would immediately be shot. There are countless stories of people trying to escape, some successful but most not.

As the foundation of Communism was beginning to shatter, a high ranking Communist official in East Berlin had indicated that people would soon be allowed to travel between East and West Berlin again. When pressed for an answer by a reporter as to when, the official was caught off guard and suggested that it would be immediate (which was most likely a mistake on his part). Hearing that, people swarmed to the wall and in a spontaneous event, the wall came down, Communism fell, and Germany was on its way to being reunited.

Off course this little summary doesn’t do the history justice but it does provide a very brief backdrop as to the complex history (and division) that has helped shape this city and made it a very interesting place.

Our day began with a guided tour. We emerged from the U Bahn to see a gigantic structure that was the East Berlin TV tower. It’s essentially a huge spike with a silver ball near the top. It was built by the Communists to show everyone in West Berlin how “advanced” East Berlin was and today, it has become the defining structure in the Berlin skyline. There is a funny story about the tower – the Communists were notoriously secular and had nothing to do with religion. They had contract with a Swedish firm to build the structure and it was designed such that when the sun shone on the silver sphere, it reflected in the shape of a cross. While the Communists thought they were building a structure to show East Berlin’s might, they instead got a holy monument that became known in West Berlin as “The Pope’s Revenge”.

We met our tour guide Fabian in a courtyard where we began to learn about some of the dynamics of Berlin - most of the historical heart of Berlin was in the former East Berlin. We made our way past some statues of Karl Marx and another Communist (one things Communists did right was grow beards – they were definitely solid) and ended up in front of the Berlin Cathedral. Berlin had always been the seat of power in Prussia and Germany and this was one of the few remaining structures from the original royal dynasty (and by royal, I mean a few Dukes who made themselves royalty). For quote a long time, Germany was made up of a bunch of individual states. In order to unify them under one country, one of the “kings” knew that he needed a threat that would require these individual states to depend on his army for protection. He in turn sent a note to France that he knew would provoke war and it did. The Franco Prussian war ensued and Germany emerged as a unified nation.

As the bells of the Cathedral kept ringing and ringing and ringing, we had to move further away to hear Fabian’s history lesson (which was quite good). We moved down Unter den Linden and saw The National War Memorial which has become a building dedicated to the memory of those that were lost in all Wars. As we moved on, we had to side track a little bit because the Belin Marathon was in full swing during the day which added a festive air to the city. We made our way to Bebel-Platz which is the site of the Berlin Public Library. This was also the site of the famed Nazi book burnings. Today, there is a memorial to the event in the plaza that consists of a window in the ground that allows you to look down to a chamber that contains empty book shelves that represent the 20,000 books that were burned at the time. During the event, the Nazi’s burned any books it thought to be in conflict of the ideals of National Socialism which were mainly any books that had to do with arts, religion, and especially, anything even tangentially related to Judaism. Perhaps the most disturbing part of the memorial is a plaque that had the words of poet Heinrich Heine on it from 1820: “Where books are burned, in the end, people will burn”. The foreshadowing was frightening and just added to the air of sadness as you thought about what happened here and how that eventually played itself out in one of the most horrific events of our time.

We then made our way past some large buildings to where Hitler’s Chancellory once stood. The building had been completely destroyed by the Russians after they seized Berlin but you got a sense of just how massive the structure was as it took up a whole city block. Today, it has been replaced with apartment complexes. The Communists were great at taking symbols of Nazi power and turning them into bastions “for the people”. For as good as Communists were at growing beards, they were terrible architects. They were so bad in fact that Communist architecture was given its own name: Brutalism. Essentially, think of a box with windows made out of gray concrete and you have it.

We made our way into a garden to a sewer grate. Our tour guide stopped and pointed to a pile of dog poo and told us that below that spot was where Hitler’s bunker resided (kind of ironic). In actuality, Hitler’s bunker was a massive structure consisting of two major areas. As the Russians were closing in on Berlin, Hitler and his closest associates had admitted defeat. Hoping to avoid Mussolini’s fate of being drug throught the streets of Italy, Hitler had committed suicide along with his newly minted wife by not only shooting himself but by biting down on a cyanide pill at the same time. He gave his guards instructions that he was to be burned as soon as he was dead and the guards did just that. The Russians didn’t know whether the pile of ashes was actually Hitler when they arrived but they were able to later confirm it by looking at dental records (apparently, Hitler had quite the sweet tooth).

Not wanting Hitler’s bunker to become a place where former Nazi’s would come back to honor their fallen leader, the blew up the bunker. What they didn’t realize was that there was a whole second area that they didn’t discover until they went to build the apartment complexes that stand there today. After using a lot of dynamite, the total structure finally imploded on itself and today is a garden and parking lot.

About a block away from the Führerbunker is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. It consists of numerous gray block that arranged in rows. As the ground level decreases, the blocks become taller so as you walk through, the city around you essentially disappears. After a short break, we walked past the former Nazi Air Force Ministry. It seems that this was the one building that Allied Forces were unable to hit in their bombing raids despite numerous attempts; the massive size of this building, coupled with the fact that the one thing Germany was specifically exlucded from having after WWI was an Air Force, made that fact pretty ironic. After the Nazi defeat, it became head to the Communist Party and was the site of a famous uprising in the 1950’s. A few workers were unhappy with their lot in life and took a huge risk by protesting outside the HQ. They protested and surprisingly, nothing happened. The leadership at the time decided the best course of action was to “ignore” the demonstration and in a week or so, quietly arrest the protestors at their homes. This strategy backfired because once everyone got wind that the protestors went unpunished, massive protests broke out since there was no fear of repercussions. Of course, there were repercussions and the protests were quelled with a massive show of force.

Outside the Air Force Ministry was a banner that was supposed to depict Communist Life which of course painted everyone being happy and parading around; an ironic site given the remnants of the Berlin Wall stood only a few yards away. The building was the closest point to the Berlin Wall and was quite high and was thus the source of a famous escape story. An elevator repairman once smuggled his family into the building and hid them until night fall. He had some contacts show up at the wall on the West Berlin side and getting his family out onto the roof, threw a rope to the other side. The building was high enough that you could have an angular trajectory over the death strip to the top of the far wall. His wife went and was supposed to be followed by his son who, at the moment of departure, got cold feet, began to cry, and demanded an explanation of why he was supposed to do this. This came of course at the most inopportune time because the guards were patrolling the death strip every six minutes and time was of the essence. The father eventually convinced his child and everyone escaped to safety. Thereafter, guards patrolling the death strip were required to check above them with flashlights for people attempting to escape.

We finished our walking tour at the former site of Checkpoint Charlie. Aside from the touristy mockup of the border shack, there is little there to denote the importance this area once had. All that officially remains is a large sign that has two pictures of soldiers from both East and West Berlin on either side. What I didn’t realize was that the Cold War nearly came to a head at Checkpoint Charlie in the 1970’s. Apparently, someone had the job every day of passing through the border to ensure that the East Germans would allow it. One day, he was stopped and asked for a passport so it could be stamped. The diplomat refused because doing so would have legitimized an East German State. Tensions grew and before you knew it, Russian tanks and US tanks sat facing each other at Checkpoint Charlie. The situation was defused when Russian tanks withdrew around the block but left their engines revving so their presence could still be known. The Americans, seeing the tanks withdraw claimed victory and backed down as well and thus, WWIII was averted.

After the tour, we had free time to explore the city. We started off by having lunch at a little stand outside the museum district. I had some variety of meat that ended in –wurst smothered with ketchup and mustard on a mismatched bun (apparently, when they ask you if you want ketchup, that means both ketchup and mustard).

We made our way to the Pergamon Museum which housed some of Berlin’s antiquities (some recently returned from Russia). Of particular note in that museum was the Gates of Babylon which was quite impressive. It consisted of blue tiles with pictures of lions and other wild life scattered throughout the massive structure. Having some more time to kill, a few of us decided to go check out the German History Museum which was quite comprehensive. We focused our time in the Nazi section which, to the German’s credit, was not glossed over. You got a small sense of the conditions in Post-WWI Germany that led to Hitler’s rise, one of which was the amazing hyper-inflation that plagued the country. They couldn’t print money fast enough to keep up with rising prices which had a huge impact on the country. It contained various elements of propaganda, Hitler Youth Posters, uniforms, etc. It also had Hitler’s desk from the Chancellory which was quite massive (Hitler liked his offices and buildings to be larger than life to make people feel smaller). What struck in particular was a Nazi knife from JA Henckels. I have a set of Henckels knives in my kitchen today and they are one of the largest knife manufacturers in the world I believe. It was strange for me to see a company who supported the Nazi regime in any way still be in business (at least under the same name) but when you stop and think about it, most companies were involved in at least some way. Following the Nazi section of the museum was the Communist section of the museum and you quickly get the sense that while better than the Nazi’s, the Communists weren’t much better.

After the museum, I decided to take a long walk down Unter den Linden to see the Reichstag during the day. It was a beautiful building slightly reminiscent of the Acropolis but was sadly trashed due to the marathon that day. Regardless, it was a beautiful day weather wise and I was able to get some good pictures.

I took the S Bahn and U Bahn back to the hotel and we had a local dinner at a Pizza restaurant. After a short break, we got back on the bus for an optional excursion that walked through East Berlin and talked about the Stasi (East German secret police), the Wall, and Communist Times. The tour included two stops at bars with included drinks. To get to the second bar, we had to race against another team following letter drops and other clues that was meant to be in the same spirit as those former East Berliners that were trying to secretly communicate with friends in West Berlin. Of course, the atmosphere was a little falsified because you had groups of 30 young people running around loudly – we probably would have gotten caught by the Stasi.

Our tour began with a part of the wall and death strip that was being restored to its original state including the Death Strip. You couldn’t really see much because the restoration was still in process and the inner wall blocks most of your visibility. Surrounding the area, you see comics that have a dark humor about them describing little stories about what it was like to be around when the wall was in full effect. We heard stories about how when the barbed wire first went up overnight, there were some apartment complexes right on the line and people starting jumping out windows before the government boarded them all up. Eventually, people would have to start
Finding more effective ways to escape and one of those ways was digging tunnels. The Germans would catch on to that and eventually use sonar to detect tunnels under construction and would also train their dogs to send vibrations under the ground. One tunnel of particular fame was Tunnel 57, named after the 57 people who escaped through it to West Berlin. The guards caught on and shut it down quickly, arresting some West Berliners who were unfortunate enough to be caught on the East Berlin side. We ended up at a former Communist bar to enjoy a few drinks and German soft pretzels. Our tour guide claimed that the other group won the contest by completing the challenge in a shorter amount of time but I don’t think that was accurate at all. Regardless, we all got to share in the prize of chocolate covered marshmallows.

After the bar, a few of us went to a club to hang out before calling it a night. If case you are wondering what’s hot on the German night club scene at the moment, all I can tell you was that Sex Bomb was being played which was stunningly humorous.

DAY 4: BERLIN TO DRESDEN TO PRAGUE

We got on the road early in the morning and made our way to Dresden en route to Prague. Dresden is a bout a two - three hour drive from Berlin and it a pretty cool city. It was almost completely (85%) destroyed during WWII and the interesting part is that no one knows why. It was to be subjected to four major bombing raids but only three made it through (the fourth “accidentally” hit Prague). No one has claimed responsibility for the bombings from the Allied perspective as to why they actually occurred (or at least offered a definitive explanation). What makes Dresden special though is how it responded to those bombings. It spent the post war years meticulously reconstructing the city to its original glory based on drawings and prints of pre-WWII buildings.

After a brief tour, we were off to get some lunch. Being tired of meats ending in –wurst, I broke down and got a quick meal at McDonald’s and spent the rest of the next hour or so exploring the city.

We were back on the bus and heading towards Prague. Prague is a beautiful city and I would imagine that 5-10 years ago, it would have been the perfect place to visit. Unfortunately, all of the tourists have discovered this town and brought with them the gypsies and chatchky vendors that prey on visitors. The abundance of people crowding the town definitely detract from the overall grandeur of the city. Of course, I’m highly aware of the irony that I write that as a tourist myself. However, I think there is a difference between the way I travel and the busloads of older people (no offense to older people) who walk around wearing name tags of their tour company and wander around in droves hesitant to experience any culture on their own. Perhaps I’m being pretentious but so be it.

Prague is perhaps the only major European city that went unscathed during WWII and that fact alone contributes to the uniqueness and beauty of the city which holds the largest example of Gothic architecture in all of Europe (and I would imagine the world). There are two parts of town separated by the Vtlava River. On one side is the old Castle and Cathedral in the Hradčany section of town. We arrived on one of the three main bridges that span the Vtlava just in time to see the sunset behind the Cathedral which was a nice touch. We them made our way into the main part of Prague.

Across the river is three main areas (among others) that make up the heart of Prague: Josefov which is the old Jewish Quarter, Staré Město which is the Old Town, and Nové Město, which is the “new” town.

The Jewish Quarter is the best-preserved in all of Europe. When Hitler visited Prague, he liked it so much, especially the Jewish Quarter that he decided that it would be preserved as a museum to an extinct species (he was a lovely man). As such, it wasn’t touched and stands today (despite the lack of a significant Jewish population there). The Old Town is centered around the Staroměstké Náměsti which is the Old Town Square. In the Old Town Square, you have a few things of note. First is the Spanish Cathedral which is the token church on the square. To the left of that is a statue of Czech hero Jan Hus who was a Catholic priest that burned at the stake by the Catholic Church for his reformist, Protestant views. Also on the square is the astrological clock which is both a normal clock as well as an astrological one (brilliant, I know). Every hour, it puts on a glockenspiel-esque show that countless people line up to see and are subsequently disappointed in. Of course, the fact that it is older than anything we have in the United States makes it somewhat appealing. It essentially has two windows that open and have revolving statues circle though. The side of the clock is flanked by four statues, two of which represent mortal sins, vanity and greed; an “infidel Turk wearing a Turban”; and skeleton that rings a bell representing death calling everyone home at the end to account for their sins.

After mulling around in the Old Town, we looped up to New Town (passing the Sex Toy Museum along the way) which was where most of the shopping and other sundry shops are before looping back into Old Town for dinner. Todd, the tour guide, knew of a great rooftop restaurant that a few of us ate at that gave us a stunning view of the Old Town Square as well as the Cathedral across the river, all of which were lit up at night – really cool.

After a great dinner, we called it a night.

DAY 5: PRAGUE

We began our full day in Prague with a walking tour of the Hradčany area consisting mainly of the Cathedral and the Castle. Today, it is the seat of government for the Czech Republic. Most impressive was the St. Vitus’ Cathedral which is entirely contained in the castle complex. Built in 1344 but not completed until the 1920’s (talk about a project that wasn’t finished on time), it is an amazing example of Gothic architecture from the Gargoyles on the roof to the entire façade. Sadly, we just missed the Pope’s visit as he was scheduled to arrive the following week. We walked through the Castle complex (and there isn’t really a “Castle” that you would normally picture but it was a sprawling complex with the Cathedral as the centerpiece) before exited into town. At the top of a fill, you could see all of Prague laid out before you and there was a lingering fog that really added a neat effect; Prague is know for its steeples and there are more than 500 that permeate the skyline today. Before crossing the Charles Bridge, we took a detour to see a special statue of two men peeing in a pool beneath their feet. The waists of the two men move side to side and their unmentionables move up and down. You can apparently text message a certain number and the statues will then write your message in the pool below with their “pee”. Sadly, my cell phone didn’t work internationally, otherwise, it could have been a costly day ☺.

We made our way to the Charles Bridge which the most famous of the three bridges that span the Vltava River into the Old Town. It is the only Pedestrian bridge and is lined with numerous statues and it dumps you out into Staré Město. Before you cross the bridge, you come across a street that is really a canal and the Czech’s call it their little slice of Venice. One of the interesting things about Prague is that they work hard to compare themselves to some of the other popular cities in Europe, namely Venice and Paris. In fact, they build a replica of the Eiffel Tower (well, actually, just the top of it) on a mountain and claim that it’s “higher” than the actual Eiffel Tower. It’s sad in a way because Prague is a pretty unique city and they don’t really have a need to compare themselves to any other but alas, they do, and it’s cheesy.

We made our way into the Old Town where our tour ended. Joe and I made our way into New Town (via an unexpected route) and headed up a long road called Václavské Náměstí towards the National Museum in order to have lunch at a place called The Beer Factory. The Beer Factory has large tables with four beer taps in the center of each table. They charge you by volume so you can drink as much or as little as you want without waiting for anyone – pretty cool. After a pretty traditional Czech meal (not really) of Spaghetti and Meatballs, the plan was to head down to the Jewish Quarter. I decided to take the subway one stop just to say that I’ve been on it. We emerged near the Quarter and made our way to the ticket booth. For a flat fee, you can visit the cemetery and a few of the synagogues. Like most of Europe, there aren’t really any Jewish people (at least in significant numbers) still residing there so it has become a museum of sorts. Jews had been persecuted in Europe long before Hitler arrived (although not to the same extent) and this area was walled in as a result of that persecution. Because they were walled in, they had limited space to do things like bury their dead. As such, they had to manage to bury 100,000 people (although only 12,000 tombstones are visible) in an incredible tiny area. The cemetery sits at a higher elevation than the rest of the Quarter because it holds so many people.

We saw about six synagogues in all but they were turned into museums so I didn’t really get a good sense for what a functioning synagogue is like but you could tell they were pretty plain. That is of course, except the Spanish Synagogue which was fairly ornate with gold trim everywhere. The first synagogue we went to was fairly powerful; it was empty but on every wall was the name of a Czech Jew who was murdered by the Nazi’s – really sad.

We ended up back at the Old Town Square and walked through the Spanish Cathedral which was stunning before deciding to wander the streets and alleys of Prague to just “get lost”. We did just that and ended up coming out by the river and walking along the Vltava in view of the Cathedral on the hill. We met up with the group for dinner at a restaurant called the Michal. The food was decent but the sell on this place was that they had authentic Czech music and dancing. The restaurant itself was really small and divided into three rooms. The musicians and the dancers switch between the two outer rooms and those of us sitting in the middle room got the shaft. After booing the band and dancers every time they passed us by, they finally stopped, played, and danced for us (for which we cheered).

Prague overall really is a beautiful city. As I said, it isn’t the unspoiled cheap cultural destination it was probably 5 years ago but it still has a lot of charm and I’m really glad it was preserved and lived throughout the chaos of WWII.

DAY 6: PRAGUE TO VIENNA

After a fairly relaxing time in Prague, we were off again towards Vienna. Before we crossed into Austria, we stopped at what was referred to as “no man’s land”. Prior to the fall of the Soviet Empire, the Czech Republic was Communist and thus crossing the border between Austria and Czech was like trying to cross from East Berlin to West Berlin after the wall went up. Border crossings could take huge amounts of time (6 hours +) so over the course of time, this complex was constructed that had a castle and other really cheesy things consisting of restaurants and shops and play areas for kids – it’s kind of like a weird version of Disneyland gone wrong. What’s funny about it though is that it’s this huge area in the middle of nowhere. Since the Czech Republic joined the EU, there is no border crossing station so this complex just sits there for the amusement of people like me. We ate lunch in the Castle-themed section where a wench served me some pork and rice before ridding ourselves of some Czech Crowns before we made our way to Vienna.

We arrived in Vienna and we certainly did not have enough time there. We had part of the evening and then a few hours the next morning to see the city. Whereas Prague had this Gothic medieval vibe, Vienna was definitely a city built by the arts. By walking through the streets, you could almost hear classical music playing everywhere (even though it wasn’t). Vienna is famous for many things but most of all, it’s famous for being the home of Mozart. We arrived and immediately had a walking tour of the city. The bus dropped us off at Maria-Theresien Platz which is flanked by two identical buildings that serve as museums today. We cross the Burgring (part of the large ring road that surrounds the old city) and entered into the Helden Platz which is right outside the Hofburg Palace which was the main residence of the Hapsburg family.

The Hapsburg Dynasty was powerful in Europe and affected many countries. It can be traced back as early as the 1100’s and the bloodline is still present today (although they don’t rule anymore – since 1918). Unlike most rulers in Europe, the Hapsburg’s did not interest themselves with conquest and instead focused on the arts and protecting their cities. In order to stave off invasion, they married parts of the family off to other ruling families throughout Europe. One of the unfortunate habits of the family though was that they mostly kept it within the family and inbreeding was quite rampant. It is believed that the portraits we see today were slightly altered to hide the affects of inbreeding but one key factor all Hapsburg’s had was a protruding chin.

One of the notable members of the family was Elisabeth or “Sisi” as she is belovedly referred to in Vienna. She was Queen during the late 1800’s and was known for her ridiculously small waste (20 inches). She was stabbed but because her corset was so tight, she was unaware of the severity of the wound until it was far too late.

Sidebar: History of the Austrian Flag
The Austrian Flag consists of three horizontal bars: red, white and red. It is rumored that in the early 1200’s, Duke Friedrich II (the last of the Babenberg Dynasty) like war and to fight people. He cam back from a battle one day and began undressing. His shirt was covered in blood except for the spot where his belt was. He always wore his belt tight as such, the blood was prevented from soaking through. When he removed the belt, he saw the blood stains above and below the white stripe where his belt was. He liked it so much, that became the flag.

Our tour continued to JosefPlatz which is where the world famous Spanish Lippanzier Stallions are housed. They are the famous white horses that prance and dance and are the last truly pure bred horses in the world. They were actually in their stables that day so we saw them (but they weren’t performing). We eventually made our way through the streets of Vienna to St. Stephen’s Cathedral and then looped back up through the town to head to our hotel. Our hotel in Vienna was quite nice (one of the nicer on the trip). After we had some time to get ready, we met back at the bus for an optional excursion.

We made our way to the Schonbrunn Palace which was the Hapsburg’s summer estate. It’s a massive complex that sits a good distance outside the old city walls. We had dinner at a restaurant inside the palace. It was a decent meal consisting of soup and chicken. The real treat was the Apple Strudel for desert. The Austrians definitely love their coffee and their sweets and I would learn more about that tomorrow.

After dinner, we made our way to a wing of the palace that contained the Orangerie which is apparently a room where they used to keep Orange Trees. It is also a room that Mozart was known to pay in during his time. We were treated to a classical concert that played both Mozart and Strauss’ pieces and it was really cool. Of particular note during the concert was the lady in front us who defied the rules and took pictures during the show. She probably took about 50 pictures, none of which turned out. Every single picture resulted in a black screen because there wasn’t enough light. That didn’t stop her from trying to get that picture….repeatedly; logic be damned.

It was a fairly late show so we headed back to the hotel to get a good night’s rest.

DAY 7: VIENNA TO BUDAPEST

We only had a couple of hours in Vienna to explore which certainly did do the city justice. Joe and I mapped out our general route ahead of time so we could maximize the experience. We headed straight down to Stephansplatz for the Stephansdom, or St. Stephen’s Cathedral. It was a pretty standard cathedral (for European standards) but we were able to climb (and by climb I mean take the elevator) to one of the towers to get a good look at the city. Vienna doesn’t really have a definitive skyline and unfortunately, most of the “interesting” parts of the city were on the other side of the church and thus blocked from view by the roof of the cathedral. The roof itself however was pretty cool because it was made of different color shingles and on one side, the shingles were arranged to form the logo of an eagle.

After escaping the tower before the large bell in it rang, we bid adieu to one the happiest and cheeriest elevator operators I’ve met in a long time and ventured across the square to the Manner store. Manner is a sugar wafer with chocolate in between and also happens to be the favorite snack of Arnold Schwarzenegger. He loves it so much that he used it in on of the Terminator movies. He was exiting a store he just destroyed, and threw some candy on the checkout counter and that candy was Manner. Overall, it was pretty decent.

We made our way back to the main part of the Old Town towards the Hotel Sacher. This Hotel is famous for creating the Sacher Torte which is a sweet chocolate cake. It was invented in 1832 by Franz Sacher and is probably Vienna’s most famous dessert. It is only made in Vienna and Salzburg and shipped all over the world. (Of course, I’m sure there are imposters). The cake consists of two layers of dense, not overly sweet chocolate cake with a thin layer of apricot jam in the middle and dark chocolate icing on the top and sides. It is traditionally served with whipped cream without any sugar in it, as most Viennese consider the Sacher Torte too "dry" to be eaten on its own.

We made out way and looped around the Opera House which unfortunately we couldn’t go into because the tours were later in the day when we had to be on the road. We ended up at a restaurant called Rosenberger’s. It was actually a good restaurant that served good a la carte. You paid not by weight but by plate size so I thus attempted to stack as much salad as possible on the smallest possible plate. The cashier gave me a look that said “really?” but thankfully, she didn’t speak English to convey in words just how ridiculous she thought I was with my tower of salad.

With time running short, we decided to walk through the Burggarten which borders the backside of the Hofburg Palace. At the entrance of the Burggarten off the Burgring is a statue that honors Mozart. After a short time of taking pictures, we headed back to the bus and were on our way to Budapest.

After about a three hour bus ride, we arrived in Budapest and quickly jumped into a very quick bus tour of the city. When you arrive, there isn’t really anything that would stand out to you about the city but once night falls, it’s an absolutely amazing city and it would become my favorite stop of the trip. Hungary is a huge part of my blood line, especially on my dad’s side of the family and that really added to the intrigue of the whole city. Budapest is a city of more than 1.7 Million people and is comprised of three smaller “sub-cities”: Buda, Pest (pronounced “pesht”), and Óbuda which stands for Old Buda. The three were united around 1873 to form the Budapest that we know today.

Perhaps what makes Budapest so appealing is that it is similar to what Prague was 5-10 years ago in that it hasn’t really been discovered by the mass of tourists yet and as such, the city hasn’t learned how to exploit them which really helps add to its charm. On top of that, the history, the food, the heritage, and the presence of an underground network of hot and mineral springs makes it a fascinating city.

Our bus tour began at Hősöktere which stands for Hero’s Square which sits at the entrance of the city park called Városliget. It commemorates some of the Magyars that fought during the early years of the Hungarian Empire. From there, we drove down Andrássy Út which is the main street that runs through Pest (one of the sub-cities that comprise the overall city which I’ll talk about below). This street houses a wide variety of buildings from numerous embassies to museums, to Opera Houses, etc. We made our way through the streets of Pest and crossed the Duna (Danube) River into Buda. Buda is where the wealthy resident live in addition to the Buda Castle, Citadel, and other historic structures. We went to the top of the mountain and took a quick photo break which offered a good panoramic view of Budapest just as the sun had set. We drove over into the heart of the castle complex and headed over to the Fishermen’s Bastion. Built in the early 1900’s the Bastion is a castle-like structure with seven towers that represent the seven Magyar tribes that joined to form Hungary. The view from the top of the hill is quite good, especially at night as the city is all it up.

We ended our somewhat rushed and brief tour at a boat dock on the Danube where our dinner cruise commenced. We had an amazing spread of Hungarian dishes consisting of goulash and of course, Chicken Paprikash. People were astonished as they watch me ate and swore I had been starved for the last few weeks given the number of times I went up for more. I have essentially grown up on this stuff so I was very excited to get the original. The main difference between the Hungarian version and mom’s version is that instead of rice, there are dumplings and the sour cream isn’t mixed in with the broth, it’s held separate and you mix it in yourself while you are eating.

The cruise was probably one of the highlights of the trip for me. The food was great but the view was even better – especially of the city at night, it really is amazing. Most people got hammered off the free wine so everyone was on the top deck socializing and enjoying the view not paying a single ounce of attention to the tour guide below narrating. Great times indeed. After the cruise ended, we all went on the bus and most of us ended up being dropped off at a great bar in Pest on a side street off of Andrássy Út near the Opera House called Morrison’s Pub. The bar was underground and consisted of the main bar, an area for Karaoke, a room with a few foosball tables, and night club/dancing area. The place redefined the concept of a fire hazard but I think that just added for the fun. Almost immediately, this place became a hit because beers were only 100 forints which, at 250 forints = 1 euro, they were less than 50 cents and a lot cheaper than water.

The evening started off with a bunch of us singing karaoke which was hysterical because the Hungarians would eventually come up and try to sing an American song or a Hungarian song. We would try to sing along to the Hungarian songs but that was really a lost cause. Equally as amusing was listening to the Hungarians sing American songs (although their English was light years ahead of our Hungarian). We eventually moved to the dancing room and had a blast. One person in particular, Jim Huang, decided to party a little too hard during the dinner cruise and was so drunk at the club, he passed out at a table. As soon as the group discovered this, they decided to stack things on his head (which was down on the table) which eventually included a few beer cups and a sign. The random Hungarians sitting next to him at the table were highly amused.

After a good couple hours, a few of us decided to call it a night and we took a cab back to the hotel.

DAY 8: BUDAPEST

We were thankfully able to spend an entire day in Budapest which was time well spent (and in fact, I could have used another day). I decided to follow our tour guide Todd around for the day as he generously offered to take us through the main sights of Pest. We took the subway down to the Parliament building. As we walked around it, we found ourselves on the bank of the Danube where a touching memorial was built to honor the thousands of people the Nazi’s shot, killed, and threw into the river. The memorial consisted of old shoes (metal) that were simply staggered along the banks of the river.

After some reflection, we moved on to St. Stephen’s church (which still houses St. Stephen’s actual hand). The church was beautiful (which is true of all European churches) but what stood out to me in this particular church were three things. First, we were there in the early afternoon and the sunlight was streaming through the windows directly onto a marble wall with a candelabra on it. Second, the organist started playing the massive pipe organ that was present and third, a choir of people from Norway was traveling through the Church and broke into an impromptu hymn. All of that combined to make it a very worthwhile visit.

Next we headed down Váci U which is a shopping corridor leading to the main market, the Vásarcsarnok. It’s essentially a huge building with two floors filled with food and crafts. One thing was quickly apparent when you walked through the market – the Hungarians like their meat. The food was amazing and I even found some kiffels. I have to say though, they were nowhere near as good as Grammy’s or Mom’s. Instead of having a light and fluffy or sugary dough, they had a heavier dough and while good, it still didn’t compare. I ended up picking up a few souveniers for myself – a hand stitched throw for my kitchen table from a nice lady who was about to leave on vacation and one of those wooden dolls that stack within themselves (hopefully that makes sense because if not, it sounds really weird).

We made our way back to the appointed meeting place for food – Fâtal Restaurant. Our tour guide, Todd, had warned us that the portions were large but his warning underestimated the actual size they were. There were so big that they warranted everyone taking pictures of it. First, there was a the schnitzel that was larger than someone’s head. The salad’s were heaped ridiculously high, one table ordered a tower of fish that could have fed half the city and my chicken paprikash was massive (but delicious). It took us a good while to digest the monstrosities we were just served before we were back on the tour, this time stopping briefly to see the Central Synagogue. Behind the building is a sculpture that’s a silver tree with hundreds if not thousands of branches with a little leaf at the end of each. On each leaf is a name of a Hungarian person who was murdered by the Nazi’s during holocaust.

After that stop, we made our way back up Andrássy Út towards the House of Terror. The building, when you approach it is very identifiable because it has a black extension coming out of the roof with the word TERROR inscribed in it. The building itself was first home to the Hungarian Nazi Party. When WWII ended, the Communist secret police moved in and used it as their headquarters so it was a symbol of fear for most Hungarians for quite some time. Today, it is a museum that portrays its history. Perhaps the most prevalent part of the museum is the basement which was an actual Communist prison, complete with gallows – pretty interesting. One of the more fascinating facts I learned in the museum was that the Secret Police were headed by a man named Gabor Peter who was the most feared man in Hungary. Over time however, he fell victim to Stalin’s anti-Semitism and was murdered. After years of faithful service to the Soviets, the turn around and kill him without a thought because of his religion. You get a sense here (and it was prevalent throughout the trip) that while the Nazi’s were horrible, the Communists really weren’t any better and the entire region was under this harsh rule for nearly 50 years.

After House of Terror, we made our way up to the park area to Széchenyi Gyógyfürdo which is an bath house built by the Roman’s on top of Hungary’s natural hot and mineral springs. Most bath houses in the world frown upon clothing but thankfully, Hungary requires that you wear something (which translates into Speedo’s for most people). I was really excited for this because it was a pretty unique experience. After haggling over some locker space, we were all changed and ready to go. The complex consists of a lot of pools both indoor and out. The indoor pools are mostly cooler and fed by the mineral springs. The outdoor pools (which took us forever to find) were built on the hot springs. We loafed around there (along with most of the group) for a few hours and it really was a neat thing (we don’t really have public bath houses like that in the USA). In the basement, they had sauna’s which were pretty hot. Outside, they had cold pools to jump in which really couldn’t have been healthy considering you were just sitting in a majorly hot room. One sauna was so hot, they had shaved ice that you could take in their with you to keep you cool.

Closing time at the bath’s rapidly approached and we all headed back to the hotel for dinner and decided to have an easy night of relaxing. In the lobby of the hotel, there was a little bar area with a flat screen TV on the wall. When we had checked in the day prior, the Penn State vs. Temple game from last Saturday was actually showing on EuroSport!! Very weird.

DAY 9: BUDAPEST TO SLOVAKIA TO KRAKOW

We got an early start for a day of driving up through Hungary, Slovakia, and into Poland. We stopped at a quiet town called Banská Bystrica for lunch. After driving through the countryside, it seems liked this town was in the middle of nowhere and it was a great little stop. In the 1990’s, Slovakia split from the Czech Republic in what was called “The Velvet Divorce”. After the split, Czech got most of the industry and Slovakia was left with a mostly agrarian economy. Both are part of the EU but Slovakia has a much smaller (and manageable) economy and as such, was able to move to the Euro whereas The Czech Republic still has a way to go.

Banská Bystrica is a quiet town that has a traditional European town square with a few churches and other sundry buildings. In the middle of the square sits a black obelisk that is a monument to the Soviet Union / Communism. We had about two hours to enjoy some lunch and just take in the town which was a nice change of pace. As we walked through the square, we found a good pizza place off a side street that gave you a whole pizza (decent size) for only Є3 and found an ice cream place that gave you three scoops for less than Є1. At the end of the street was a billboard advertising Disney’s Up! but it had the Czech word for up which was Hore which we found kind of amusing.

On the way back to the bus, we stopped at the grounds of a museum. Outside, they had a variety of Soviet Area weapons, tanks, and even a plane. After getting some amusing pictures (riding the guns and tanks), we made our way to a little park and watch some of the people throw around the “futie” (Australian football) before making our way back to the bus.

After a few hours, we arrived at the Polish border which would be the last border crossing we came across on the trip. The border had a restaurant and two areas with a currency exchange. Poland is one of the few countries that has its own currency but really doesn’t accept Euro’s at all (whereas most countries that have their own currency in most cases will accept the Euro). Ironically, the two currency exchange rate places had different rates and of course, I chose the worse one (and they wouldn’t match the place on the other side of the rest stop). While we were there, a wedding pulled up and had a reception at the restaurant located at the border crossing which I found kind of amusing. Perhaps it was a great restaurant but it just seemed odd to have a wedding at a border crossing. It was still a neat thing to see though with everyone dressed up and a little band playing. After exchanging some currency, we got back on the bus and were heading towards Krakow.

On the bud, I started to get a sore throat and that would begin a few days of feeling under the weather. While it never became a really horrible disease, it definitely stayed with me for a few weeks as I still have a lingering cough now. Joe also got sick in a similar way and it spread throughout most of the group towards the end of the trip. I think I caught something at the Hungarian bath house in Budapest.

We arrived in Krakow later in the evening. After dinner at the hotel, a few of us took cabs to the downtown area to get some night shots and see what was going on. The old town of Krakow is pretty nice and is based around a large town square with, shockingly, a church. There were an abundance of outdoor café’s surrounding the square and it was packed with people. Krakow is dominated by college students since one of the oldest universities in Europe is housed there. We made our way around the square and walked down Grodzka St. towards the castle area. Our walking tour was brief and since we were either tired or under the weather, we caught a taxi back to the hotel to get some rest before a full day of touring.

DAY 10: KRAKOW

Poland, despite the many jokes made at its expense, is a fascinating country from a historical perspective. Krakow was the capital until 1596 when a Swedish King Zygmunt III (pronounced Sigismund) decided to move the capital up to Warsaw. It may strike you as odd that I said Swedish because the Swedes never “conquered” Poland (although they apparently tried). Poland’s royal dynasty dates back to the early 9th Century. One of the more famous Kings was Kazimierz III (pronounced Casimir) who is the only King in Polish history to be referred to as “the Great”. He was known to be a very tolerant person and invited all people from Europe to come and reside in Poland, including persecuted races such as the Jews. Because of this, Poland today is still a melting pot of different cultures. After the line of Kings dided out, Poland was one of the first countries in the world to actually elect their kings which is how the Swedish King came to be (although he was more interested in regaining the throne in Sweden than in ruling Poland). It was this King who moved the capital north to Warswaw and people in Krakow today are still bitter about it.

Overall though, Poland has had a rocky history. Sadly, from 1795 – 1918, Poland never actually existed. Instead, it was divided up between Russia, Prussia (Germany), and Austria. The Polish people would come to resent this (for obvious reasons) and tried to rebel unsuccessfully a few times. It wasn’t until 1918, after WWI would Poland be allowed to function as a state. During the time Poland didn’t exist, the leadership of the various areas would try to impose their culture on the various areas they controlled and as such, made celebrating or practicing any part of Polish culture openly illegal. Thankfully, the Poles continued their traditions in secret so we did lose any of it today.

To start off the day, we met our tour guide Eva at the hotel and we started our tour of the city. We started off in the Jewish Quarter. At the time of the Nazi occupation, there were initially around 70,000 Jews living in Krakow. The Jewish Quarter was located in an area called Kazimierz (named after the King). During the reign of Kazimierz the Great, the Jews lived in peace alongside Christians. However, with subsequent rulers, those relationships deteriorated and after Jews were once again discriminated against, they were forced to moved to what was then an island on the other side of the Vistula River. The area would be called Kazimierz after the King and they would reside peacefully there for many years.

The old Jewish area is home to a couple synagogues and various other buildings. In the main courtyard, there is a small monument to the Jews that were murdered by the Nazi’s. There is also a very old building that has not been renovated that was once the home of Helena Rubenstein who apparently built a cosmetics empire (the girls knew the name, the guys did not). While we were in the courtyard listening to the tour guide, her cell phone rang and she told us it was her father calling to make sure she got up for work that day because it was a Sunday and they knew she was out late with her friends the night before; amusing.

From there, we drove past the Krakow Ghetto. For the most part, the ghetto does not resemble what it was during the Nazi occupation but the main square is still there. The ghetto was formed on March 3rd, 1944 and was one of five ghettos set up by the Nazi’s. Many of the Jews were sent to neighboring villages and towns but nearly 20,000 remained and were forced to move from Kazimierz to the ghetto; an area that was previously inhabited by 3,00 people. There were two major deportations from the ghetto, one in 1942 and the other in March of 1943 the latter of which culminated in the liquidation of the ghetto. Today, the square of the ghetto remains and in it, sculptures of chairs that are meant to have people sit in to ponder what had happened there.

There are two people who have emerged as heroes from this area with respect to the Nazi’s crimes. The first is the better known Oskar Schindler, a German industrialist who helped save over a thousand lives and is the subject of the well-known Steven Spielberg movie, Schindler’s List.

The other person who is well known today in Poland is Tadeusz Pankiewicz, the non-Jewish owner of The Eagle Pharmacy. Pankiewicz got special dispensation from the Nazi’s to maintain his pharmacy in the ghetto and served as a support mechanism for the Jews living there. He would hide Jews, provide them medicine, and smuggle goods in and out of the ghetto.

A few blocks away from the ghetto was Schindler’s factory which is exactly how they portray it in the movie. You can’t go in it today but they are in the process of turning it into a museum.

After our tour of the Jewish sections of Krakow, we made our way up Wawel (pronounced Vavel) Castle which was the the historic seat of power in Krakow. The area consists of a few buildings including a Church and an Italian Courtyard. In front of the castle area sits the statue of a dragon which is tied to a legend in Warsaw. It seemed that the Polish didn’t really know the true stories to a lot of things but certainly had a lot of legends to explain their history. Here is the legend of the dragon:

Long ago in Poland’s early history, On the River Vistula, there was a small settlement of wooden huts inhabited by peaceful people who farmed the land and plied their trades. Near this village was Wawel Hill. In the side of Wawel Hill was a deep cave. The entrance was overgrown with tall, grass, bushes, and weeds. No man had ever ventured inside that cave, and some said that a fearsome dragon lived within it. The young people of the village didn’t believe in the dragon. The old people of the village said that they had heard their fathers tell of a dragon who slept in the cave, and no man must dare waken it, or there would be dire consequences for them all. Some of the youths decided to explore the cave and put an end to such foolish talk. They thought that they knew better and dragons were just old stories from the past. A group of these young people took some torches and went to the cave. They slowly entered the cave until they came to a dark mass of scales blocking their way and the sound of heavy breathing. The boys ran as the dragon awakened and roared. Fire came from it’s mouth warming the boys heels and backs. When they were far enough away, they looked back and saw the dragon at the entrance of the cave, very angry being awakened from it’s sleep. From that day on, the people knew no peace. Every day the dragon appeared and carried off a sheep or preferably young virgins. The populace made many attempts to kill the dragon but nothing succeeded and many of those that attempted were killed. The hero in this part of the story differs. In the village lived a wise man, or a shoemaker or a shoe makers apprentice named Krakus or Krac. He got some sheep and mixed a thick, yellow paste from sulfur. Krakus smeared it all over the animals. Then led them to a place where the dragon would see them. The dragon came out as expected, saw the sheep, roared, rushed down the hill and devoured the sheep. The dragon had a terrible fire within him, and a terrible thirst. It rushed to the River Vistula and started drinking. It drank and drank and could not stop. The dragon began to swell, but still it drank more and more. It went on drinking till suddenly there was a great explosion, and the dragon burst. There was great rejoicing by the people. Krakus, was made ruler of the village, and they built a stronghold on Wawel Hill. The country prospered under the rule of Krakus and a city grew up around the hill which was called Krakow, in honour of Krakus. When Krakus died, the people gave him a magnificent burial, and erected a mound over his tomb which can be seen to this day. The people brought earth with their own hands to the mound, and it has endured through all the centuries as a memorial to the person that killed the dragon of Krakow.

And today, they have a statue of a dragon that spits fire every half hour or so.

After our tour of the castle area, we made our way back up to Old Town Square (which really is the highlight of the city). Eva was stalling for time because at noon (just like every hour on the hour, 24 hours per day), a lone trumpeter plays a song from the top of one of St. Mary’s Church’s towers. Today, the trumpeter is someone from the Fire Department but is meant to symbolize a trumpeter who was on watch in the early 1200’s. He sounded the trumpet when he saw the Tartan Army preparing to invade Krakow. His signal helped the Polish army mobilize and prevented them from being ambushed. The legend (sic) is that the trumpeter was shot in the throat by a Tartan arrow and thus, his warning call was cut short. Today, the trumpet that plays ends abruptly in mid note to commemorate this. The trumpet, as stated, is played every hour on the hour in each of four directions from the Church Tower.

After our tour ended, we had some free time and since we were all starving, we were on the hunt for lunch and since we were in Poland, we had to have pierogies. Eva the Tour Guide directed us to head down Florianska Street to a restaurant called Alter Ego. About half the group wandered down that way and we ended up sitting in the patio outside the restaurant. I should stop here to mention that throughout most of the trip, we had amazing weather. There wasn’t a cloud in site until the last day and it was perhaps the best week Eastern Europe had seen throughout the summer. Most tables on the patio were covered by tents and we soon found out why after we sat down. The trees that provided shade were chestnut trees and the nuts were mature at this point of the year and thus dropped from the tree. Perhaps this is in bad taste but you got a sense for what the bombing raids during WWII were like. CHESTNUTS EVERYWHERE, falling left and right. At times, it seemed like they were coordinated to fall as soon as people stepped out from under the cover of the canopies. And when they fell, they fell hard making extremely loud noises when they hit the wooden deck. It made you wonder how many chestnut related injuries or even fatalities occur in a given year in Poland. It could be high enough to warrant a charity: for only 5 cents a day, you can help prevent chestnut related deaths. Perhaps not.

The lunch was awesome, as was expected. You realize just how crappy the store bought pierogies are here in PA. Everywhere we went, we found that there were three main types of pierogies which the popular being pierogies ruske which consist of mashed potatoes and cottage (not cheddar!) cheese. Other varieties include meat-filled, spinach, and one with cabbage and mushrooms. Perhaps the best pierogi is the dessert pierogi. At Alter Ego, it was pierogies filled with strawberries covered in sweet cream. I’m still drooling over them.

After lunch we had some time to walk around and we headed to the end of Florianska Street to see the Florian Gate. During medieval times, there was a huge wall surrounding Krakow which help prevent invasions. Today, the wall has been replaced with a garden-type area that encircles the Old City. The Florian Gate was one of the few entrance points and marked the entrance to the Royal Way which was the path that dignitaries walked to get from the entrance of the city to the Wawel Castle.

From there we went back to St. Mary’s which was perhaps the most memorable church that we saw on the trip, at least for me. The irony in that is that the exterior of the church is very plain, almost Presbyterian but as soon as you walk in, it’s truly amazing. Unfortunately, there was a mass going on so we weren’t allowed to take pictures. You are supposed to be able to climb the tower of the church but we had an excursion to get to so we weren’t able to climb to the top for a bird’s eye view of the Old Town Square.

We met up with most of the group for an excursion a salt mine. This salt mine is quite famous and is listed as a UNESCO site. One of the oldest salt mines in the world is in the town of Wieliczka and had been producing table salt from its foundation in the 13th Century all the way up until 1996 when the finally hit the water table and had exhausted most of the salt reserves. The mine itself is over 300 km (186 miles!) long and the 2 hours tourist route covers less than 1% of the mine (which is truly amazing after taking the tour). What makes this mine a little more special than most others is that the miners who have worked there throughout the years both spent a lot of time down there and were fairly creative. As such, they began to create sculptures in the salt formations. Inside the mine, you can see lots of gnomes, trolls, statues of people, busts of kings, and a variety of other things sculpted out of the sand. The centerpiece of the whole thing though is a full cathedral that was carved in the mountain. It had an altar, chandeliers made from salt, and recreations of famous sculptures like The Last Supper. It’s a monstrous cavern and it actually a fully functioning church that has a service every weekend (and I believe it’s the lowest church on the planet).

There is also a salt sculpture of Pope John II. The Polish people love them their famous people. At the top of the list is Pope John Paul II who the Polish know as Pope Jana Pavla II. They have his picture and name plastered everywhere. The other person they are in love with is Chopin but we will get to that when we arrive in Warsaw. I would imagine they would also have talked a lot about Roman Polanksi, the famous director, but he was just arrested that week in Switzerland on charges from over 30 years ago so there wouldn’t be much to brag about.

At the end of the salt mine tour, they had of course, a bar and the tour guide Todd treated me to a shot of some of the worst vodka in the world. It was so bad that I had to return Todd’s generosity by buying he and I ice cream bars to chase it.

The rest of the evening was free time so Joe and I decided to relax a little bit and find a restaurant on the square to jus simply relax. European service, in general, is nowhere near the level it is in the States and the upside of that is that you don’t have people rushing you out so they can seat someone else. We had great seats in the Old Town Square and enjoyed watching people, horses, and even wandering musicians pass by. After that, we called it a night and headed back to the hotel to get some rest for the next day.

DAY 11: KRAKOW TO AUSCHWITZ TO CZESTOCHOWA TO WARSAW

We had another early start for what we all knew was going to be the most emotional day of the tour and the reason that most of us were there: Auschwitz. Auschwitz had been on my mind for a few days prior. I was exposed to the Nazi’s throughout the tour on various levels and I knew that this was going to be the culmination. The odd part is that I was fearful that I wouldn’t be emotionally touched by visiting Auschwitz and that fear turned into a little bit anxiety. In all, I just wasn’t sure what to expect (which was true of most of the trip which made it that much better).

Auschwitz consisted of three camps. Auschwitz I was the initial camp that initially started off as a work camp. It grew to become a death camp because Dr. Mendel, the famed Nazi scientist who conducted cruel and inhumane experiments on Jews did all his research here and perfected (if you can call it that) the mass extermination of people using Zyklon Gas. Mendel was known as the “Angel of Death” and performed unimaginable experiments. He tried to inject people with things to get their eye color to change and had a horrible fascination with twins.

Auschwitz I was very well preserved and has been converted into a powerful museum. Auschwitz II which is also known as Auschwitz-Birkenau is a monster camp that was built for a single purpose – killing people and I’ll talk more about that in a second. Auschwitz III was more of a labor camp and consisted of a factory which is still in operation today. We didn’t visit Auschwitz III – Monowitz but I was stunned to learn that the industrial factory is still in operation today.

When you enter Auschwitz I, you enter through the Museum visitor center where you get a headset to listen to the tour guide as you go throughout the museum. I wonder what it must be like to be a tour guide there – perhaps the most depressing job in the world. As you exit the entrance, you are immediately struck by the two rows of barbed wire and the guard shacks. On the main path into the camp, you see a guard tower and the traditional “Arbeit Mach Frei” (“Work shall set you free”) sign that spans the main road. As you pass under it, you hit the main road which runs perpendicular. This road is flanked by identical brick buildings that served as housing for all of the prisoners. When you are in the middle of the camp, as sick as this sounds, it doesn’t look that bad. The buildings look nice and there are trees lining the road – it’s almost like a small military base. When you enter the buildings though, the idea of beauty quickly leaves you. The barracks have each been converted to hold various pictures and remnants form the camp. Building or “Block” Number 5 houses the Material Proof of Crimes which consists of massive amounts of shoes, luggage (still with people’s names), items people brought to the camp not knowing what truly awaited them, and worst of all, hair, lots of hair that has since lost its color with the passage of time.

The living quarters have been preserved in one of the buildings and shows stacks of wooden bunks or floors simply covered in hay. The bathrooms were small and prisoners were only allowed to use them for extremely short periods during a day (short as in barely even able to go to the bathroom).

At the end of the street is the block that housed the prisons. There were prison cells that were isolation cells, darkness cells, and other inhumane areas. Outside of the block was a courtyard where shooting executions were held. There was a wall in front of the back brick wall where people were shot. The windows surrounding the courtyard were covered with wooden slats so the people living there couldn’t see what was going on.

After walking down the main road, you pass the gallows where many prisoners were hung and you ultimately come to the crematorium. As we entered, we came into this dark, large room. At that point, the tour guide simply said “and this is the room where you would be gassed” and it hits you. You look up and see two vents where the gas would come in. Aside from the entrance, there is one door on the side of the room and this is where 2 furnaces sat. As you look at them, it’s nearly impossible to comprehend what happened here and why. You almost have to block everything out because the true realization of what it would have been like is entirely too painful to even begin to comprehend yet alone fully understand. Further baffling was the fact that this crematorium was “small” compared to the others at Birkenau. It was really meant to perfect Mendel’s experiments on mass extermination.

After you (solemnly) exit the crematorium, you walk along the perimeter of the camp towards the exit. We all got on the bus and headed to Auschwitz II Birkenau. This is the camp that most people picture when they think of Auschwitz with the train tracks that arrive at a large building with a single tower. When the Germans deserted Birkenau, they destroyed as much as they could have to hide what went on there so most things were either left as they were discovered or reconstructed to give people a sense for what things looked like.

Birkenau, compared to Auschwitz I, is massive and there is no mistaking what the camp was built for. For as far as the eye can see in both directions, you can see the brick chimney stacks which is all that remains of most of the “living” quarters that once stood there. Railroad tracks bisect the camp with living quarters on either side. At the rear of the camp on either side of the tracks are two of the main crematoriums which were imploded and remain in that state today.

We stopped at one of the reconstructed barns which had bunks to show what it was like during operation. The shed next to it had the bathrooms which consisted of a large concrete tank with a circular holes on the top that ran the length of the wooden shack (and wooden shack is the best way to describe the structures).

As we walked down the main path along the railroad tracks (flanked by guard towers and lots of once-electrified barbed wire), we walked past the sorting area where people were sent to either work or die and arrived at the remains of the crematorium. As you walk around them, you are cognizant of what went on there and that you are most likely walking on the ashes of the people who were murdered there and dumped.

The crematoriums were mostly underground and had a staircase where people were led into the main chamber. As soon as you were in here, you were dead and there was no hope for you. The first chamber required you to disrobe. To prevent panic, you were told that you were going to shower and the Nazi’s had screwed fake shower heads onto the ceilings of the next chamber where you were pushed into. Instead of getting a shower of water, they were gassed when the doors were closed and sealed. It took about 20-30 minutes for the gas to fully kill everyone. After that, the doors were opened and people were put into the furnaces and cremated. Horrible.

At the rear of the camp is a monument commemorating those that lost their life at the camp. Every country who had someone that lost their life there had a plaque in their own language commemorating those lost.

As we walked back towards the exit, I was struck by the people who were walking around there. First, there were children running around and laughing, ignorant to the solemnity of the place and what actually went on there. It was an example of the power of innocence and gave you pause. The other thing I noticed was the amount of Germans walking around. It was so strange for me to see that, similar to how it was weird for me to see Japanese at Pearl Harbor. Every German school student is required to visit a concentration camp as part of the curriculum and I say kudos to the Germans for not trying to push their history under the carpet. Yet, I can imagine what it’s like to look at a place like Auschwitz as a German. While the people today aren’t directly responsible, it has to impact them. Of course you realize that nearly every nation in the world has some sort of atrocity that weighs on their conscience over the course of history but I wondered, how much time has to pass to really separate yourself from that, especially when it comes to national identity?

We ended our tour and got back on the bus but I noticed just before departing that there were little wildflowers sprouting around the camp and their contrast against the barbed wire that hovered above them seemed ironic.

What followed Auschwitz was a very long bus trip to Warsaw by way of Częstochowa. Częstochowa is a city that is home of the monastery of Jasna Góra in which the Black Madonna resides. This monastery and the Black Madonna is by far the most popular tourist destination in Polish for both visitors and Poles alike (more than even Auschwitz). The Black Madonna is rumored to be painted by St. Luke himself on a cypress table top that once belonged to Mary, Joseph, and Jesus. It is rumored to be part of dowry in a marriage between royal families from Constantinople (where it resided for many years) and Kiev. The painting is accredited to saving the monastery of Jasna Góra during a 17th Century raid by the Swedes. This “protection” led the King of Poland to crown the Black Madonna as Queen and Protector of Poland. The painting is also credited with saving its church from a fire but not before having turned black from the flames. It is called the Black Madonna because Mary’s face is pure black.

There are two prominent scratches on the painting said to be made by an invader in the 1400’s. He struck the painting twice and before he could do so a third time, he dropped to the ground in agony and died. They tried to repair the scratched but were unable to do so as they kept re-appearing.

The Black Madonna is also known to heal people. When you enter the Monastery, the walls are flanked by crutches of people who claimed to be healed by her power. We arrived very late at the monastery because all of Poland is under construction and we sat in traffic for far longer than intended. We had at least ½ hour there though and a mass was going on. After a few us wrestled with whether or not we should take pictures during the service, we all decided to do so in the midst of those worshiping (and I guess we all cashed in our Catholic chips on that one).

After that, we were on our way for another few hours until we arrived late in Warsaw. Our hotel in Warsaw was the nicest of all the hotels by far and comparable to a US hotel. We had dinner (which was decent) and I was up in the room after 9pm. Literally two minutes after I entered the room, my phone rang and it was a friend from high school, Mike Dietrich, who was waiting for me down in the lobby. I had known Mike was living in Warsaw and hadn’t really talked much to him since high school other than the occasional Facebook dialogue. With my Blackberry not working well throughout the week, we made intermittent contact and his timing at the hotel was impeccable. Despite being under the weather, I went down and we went to an Irish Pub in some office building in the heart of town to enjoy a few Guinness’s and catch up. It always amazes me the impact Facebook has on today’s society and it was cool that I was able to catch up with someone that I otherwise would never known lived there or even thought of.

DAY 12: WARSAW

The next day was spent touring around Warsaw. Warsaw is much bigger (and urban) than Krakow as it has been the capital for quite some time. It was almost completely destroyed during WWII and had been rebuilt in its original image since. The centerpiece of the city, much to the chagrin of the locals, is the Palace of Culture and Science. It is an imposing structure built in the Soviet style as a “gift” from Stalin to the people of Poland. It is the tallest structure in the city and still represents in some people’s minds the Soviet rule of the people of Poland (not a popular subject). Plus, a lot of people think it’s ugly. Because it symbolizes Warsaw, they can’t really tear it down so instead, they are building skyscrapers surrounding the building to somewhat hide it.

Our tour began at Lazienki Park. At the entrance to the park sits a statue of Marszałek Jozef Pełsudski who is one of the more famous people in Poland (the tour guide referred to him as one of the famous “mustaches”). He has been credited with Poland regaining its status as a country after WWI. In the middle of the park is a reflection pond surrounding a statue of Fryderyk Chopin. The tour guide would always say that Chopin was Polish Polish Polish; three times so everyone would remember that fact (as I said, they love their famous people). Chopin was born in Poland and eventually moved to France where he died of tuberculosis. While his body resides in France, his heart actually resides in a church in Warsaw.

The bus ride from the park to the Old Town followed the old Royal Way which was a nice street, lined with historical buildings that have since become embassies for various countries. Along the route is a statue of Charles de Gaulle who is pointing in the direction of his favorite donut shop and an artificial palm tree which is only meant to serve as a conversation piece apparently. We were dropped off in the Old Town known as Stare Miasto. As I mentioned, it was completely destroyed during WWII and has been rebuilt since and looking at it today, you wouldn’t really know it was all built in the 1950’s. It’s a typical European town with two large squares. The first is a semi-square with side streets that lead to the main square (Rynek Stare Miasto) where our tour ended. We had some free time so we first headed back to a Pierogi shop where we feasted on more pierogies than our stomachs could handle (the apple cinnamon dessert pierogies put us over the top but they were worth it). To aid in the digestion, we walked a bit and went down Nowomiejska Street passing through the old wall that used to fortify the city and ending up at Marie Curie’s house (she was also born in Poland). We turn left and followed Długa St. and ended up at the Supreme Court building (which is actually pretty cool – green and gray with lots of modern pillars). In front of the supreme court is a massive sculpture that depicts the Warsaw Uprising of 1944. As WWII came to a close, the Polish Army tried to liberate Warsaw from it’s German captors before the Soviets “liberated” it. They felt that if they could defeat the Germans and drive them away before the Soviets entered the city, they could claim sovereignty. What ensued was a massive uprising that killed 16,000 Polish soldiers and around 200,000 civilians were murdered by the German soldiers. The Polish Army failed and the Germans in retaliation leveled about 35% of the city, block by block. To make matters worse, the Soviet Army was stationed outside the city and could have helped but decided to wait for most likely two reasons. The Poles could risk their lives to fight the Germans and in turn, Soviet lives could have been saved and second, with Polish losses, no one would stop the Soviet occupation that was to come.

We made our way back to the entrance of the Old Town and climbed up to the top of a tower that looked over the first square to get some good pictures. After descending, we walked a bit more before ending up at a coffee shop waiting for the bus.

We headed off to an excursion back into Lazienki Park but this time to “palace” (which was really more of a nice mansion) where the Polish Royalty used to reside. Inside waited Iwona Klimaszewska who was to perform a private piano recital for us of Chopin’s work. She was amazing and didn’t use any sheet music. She was a teacher at the State Academy of Music in Warsaw and has traveled the world playing Chopin’s music. It was quite delightful (the best way to describe it) and we even had a little intermission complete with Champaign.

After the recital, rain had started to fall (the only day we had to deal with it) and we headed back to the hotel to get ready for our last dinner together as a group. We went to a restaurant in Old Town called BrowArmia which was a microbrewery. Dinner was quite good and we all hung around socializing and taking far too many pictures, most of which Joe and I (ok, mostly I) tried to ruin by jumping into the background.

From there, most of us went out to a local bar called Paparazzi. My friend Mike had warned me that it was a bit pretentious and he was certainly right. We were definitely underdressed for the evening but had fun nonetheless. After a few drinks, most of us headed home to the hotel to pack up everything for the flight home the next day.

DAY 13: WARSAW

Our last morning was very low key. Most of the people had left on the bus in the morning to head back to Berlin leaving only those of us who were flying out of Warsaw. We shared a cab to the airport with Emma and Brandon and made it there early enough such that the ticket counter wasn’t even open yet. Because we were flying British Airways to Heathrow and then Continental from Heathrow to Newark, we weren’t able to get our tickets for the London flight which was worrisome because I was fearful that I was going to get a middle seat which for an 8 hour flight is not a pleasant experience. Our lunch on the flight from Warsaw to London was terrible – a sandwich with some sort of cheese on it and plastic tube (not kidding) of milk.

We arrived at Heathrow in Terminal 5 and had to go to Terminal 4 which you would think would have been an easy walk. No, it was a 20 minute bus ride – the airport is crazy (and this wasn’t the first time I’ve flown through there so you’d think that I wouldn’t have been surprised by that). It’s definitely on par with Schipol in terms of size and craziness. We got the transfer desk and lo and behold, I had a middle seat while Joe mockingly showed me his window seat. I asked the lady to see if I could get a window or an aisle seat and she quickly told the flight was oversold and there was nothing she could do. We got to our gate and I found a very helpful gentlemen who was able to prove that the prior woman lied to me and he was able to get me a window seat. After a quick lunch of a chicken Caesar salad which cost about $20 when you did the conversion, we were on our way. The flight was actually pretty smooth. I watched Ray (which was good) and Terminator Salvation (which was terrible) and we had arrived in Newark early. That’s right folks, early and Newark in the same sentence. My dad was waiting for us and thus ended a fantastic vacation (one that has taken me a few weeks to get over – and quite frankly, I’m still not over it).

I took nearly 3,000 pictures on this trip and learned more than I could ever have hoped to. I also made some great new friends (as evidenced by the 30+ Facebook e-mails a day I get from discussions surrounding pictures).

CURRENCY

I remember when I was little and my dad traveled to Europe, he would bring me home Francs, Kroner, Deutschmarks, and other varieties of currency. With the establishment of the EU, those currencies wouldn’t exist by the time I was able to travel abroad and I thankfully had to deal only with the Euro. This trip changed that. With the fall of Communism, Eastern Europe is still a developing area and as such, their economies don’t allow them to use the Euro quite yet.

While Germany, Austria, and Slovakia were all on the Euro, the others were not. In the Czech Republic, Crowns were the currency and the exchange rate was around €1 to 25 Kč (Czech Koruna or Crowns). The constant currency exchange made it a bit difficult because you only wanted to take out exactly what you needed. Getting the currency was easy but exchanging it back was difficult because nobody wanted it. Nearly all the currencies we used were dying (and fared poorly against the USD and the Euro) as they were going to be obsolete in the next five years most likely.

In Hungary, they had the Forints and the exchange rate there was a ridiculous €1 to Ft 250! That made math extremely difficult because you not only had to convert that to Euro’s but you then had to convert if to USD to understand the full impact. On our first day in Budapest, I went to an ATM to take out what would equate to about $40 USD because that went a pretty long way in Hungary. Because I was tired and on vacation, I was unable to do math. I knew that 250 * 40 = Ft 10,000. For some unknown reason, I then multiplied that by 4 thinking that only got me ~ $10 USD. The ATM gave an option for Ft 50,000 so I hit that. As soon as the money came out, I realized my mistake and was walking around with about €200 worth of Hungarian Forints, a mostly useless currency. What made it worse is that the ATM gave me Ft 10,000 bills so while it was cool to walk around with Ft 10,000 bills, I felt really dumb. Luckily, I was able to exchange currency with other people in my tour group and was able to get rid of nearly all of my Forints so it worked out really really well (thankfully).

In Poland, the currency is the Złoty and the going exchange rate was about Zł 4 to €1. Surprisingly, Poland was the cheapest country that we visited.

HISTORY

I think that over all else, this trip was about history and I didn’t quite expect that. When you realize just how much had gone on in the region of the world since the 1930’s (and even before that), it really is amazing; you had the Nazi’s and then the Communists, both of which had a profound impact on the region (to this day).

In high school, you always spend a lot of time learning about WWII and in an effort to get there you gloss over WWI. WWI however represents the culmination of a lot of tensions that were built up since Napoleon’s time and even before. After Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna met to essentially divide up Europe and set up years of tensions that would eventually culminate in The Great War. In particular, there were growing tensions between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the neighboring Serbia which had been increasing in size. At the time, the German Emperor had told Franz Josef, the head of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that should he decide to go to war, Germany would back them. In the background nearly every country in Europe had formed some sort of alliance backing other countries (which was the key to understanding why the war broke out in the first place).

The Austrians were given a reason to go to war when Archduke Franz Ferdinand (a fairly unpopular guy) was assassinated by a radical Serbian group known as The Black Hand. Their intent had always been to murder him and after three failed attempts, one of the members happen to be sitting outside when his car came driving down the street (which apparently was an odd route for him to take). Coincidentally, this particular member of the Black Hand capitalized on his luck and murdered Ferdinand who happen to be the only heir to the Austrian throne. Austria sent Serbia its list of demands lest it declare way and surprisingly, Serbia conceded all but a few minor details. The details were enough to declare war.

So…..

Austria declared war on Serbia.
Germany was allied with Austria so it was now at war.
Serbia was allied with Russia so it was now at war.

Germany then invaded Belgium enroute to France to take back a territory it lost at the Congress of Vienna. This then pulled England into the War.

This drew all of the British Empire into the War.

The Germans then sunk a US ship so they were brought into the war. And the complexities continued.

The War was only supposed to last a short time and was viewed by many as a necessity to enable everyone to sit down and redraw the European map. The War instead lasted many years and ended up with the fall of once-great empires as well as decisions that would eventually lead to WWII.

One of the main decisions was the one to make Germany pay for reparations as a result of WWI. This bankrupted the country (after a few other additional demands were made) and left people in poverty. Hyperinflation ensued and money couldn’t be printed fast enough to keep up with rising prices. The currency was essentially worthless and left the German people in despair. Adolf Hitler capitalized on that despair in his book Mein Kampf and eventually used this issue to bring National Socialism to the forefront and take over in Germany.

Hitler used his gifts for persuasion and propaganda to entice the German public. He made promises to restore Germany to greatness by promising stability in people’s lives. While winning over the public, he hired criminals to carry out strategic assassinations and deeds that would allow him to claim total control over the Third Reich.

Of course, this is a watered down history (and perhaps not entirely accurate, but close enough) but you can at least see the complexity of it and how it had a dramatic impact on the region. After WWII, Russia was able to gain control over most of the region which kept the area in a general depression for many years. Only now is the region coming into its own and it has a fairly bright future.

Through all of this though, it makes you really grateful that your ancestors left and moved to America when they did. Otherwise, I could have spent my childhood years as a Communist – and that’s just weird to think about.

LANGUAGE
Here are some of the new words I learned on the trip:

German:

Hello – Guten Tag
Goodbye – Auf Wiedesein
Thank You - Danke
How are you - Vie Gayts
Entrance - Eingang
Exit - Ausgang

Czech:

Hello - Ahoj (Ahoy!)
Good day - Dobry den (Dobree-den)
Thank You - Dekuji (De-koo-jee)

Hungarian:

Hello - Szia (See-ya)
…and that’s about it….

Polish:

Hello - dzień dobry! (Gin-Dobray)
Thank You - dziękuję (Gin-Coo-Yay)

FINAL THOUGHTS

Overall this was a fantastic trip. I went in with little expectations (and preparation) and I think that helped me relax and enjoy it more than I would have otherwise. Part of the uniqueness of the area is it’s history and you really get a sense for the struggle the region had for so many years. At the same time, that is bolstered by the bright future that awaits it. While some of the culture that you see today will go by the wayside, the area will continue to be unique for many years to come and that’s pretty exciting.

Couple that with some of the great people I met on the trip, it was definitely one of the better ones – and I will look back fondly on it for some time to come. As with any trip, I’m able to have a much better perspective on life I’m afforded here in America and the privileges that come with it, past, present, and future. But I also walk away with a better understanding of the perspectives someone from another part of the world might have and that really is priceless.

The Hearst Castle

2009-06-29T21:55:00.000-07:00

When I came to California and started to put together my list of sites to see, one of the possibilities that people kept mentioning to me was The Hearst Castle. Located in a desolate little village about half-way between Los Angeles and San Francisco, it was quite a hike and required an overnight stay but was well worth the trip.

I knew I wanted to go so it was a matter finding a time and that opportunity presented itself last week. I had to spend a few days in Chicago and initially thought that my flight was returning on a Friday. I could then get an early start and head north on the 4-5 hour drive. It turned out however, that my flight was returning late Thursday night which meant that I could have gone to work on Friday. In the end, since no one really expected me here at the plant, I only came in for a few hours to have a conference call and headed out around noon.

The drive up north was really one of the highlights of the trip for me. Once you get North of Los Angeles, the scenery and terrain becomes very different from that of Southern California. Instead of large sandy beaches and concrete jungles, you have lakes, cliffs, vineyards, and rolling hills. It reminded me of a cross between Tuscany and the hills of northern England. Since only a hotel room awaited me, I was in no rush and decided to stop a little bit on the way up. First stop was at Pismo beach which is really a vehicular recreation area. Essentially, people can take their cars right on the beach and camp. Just south is a sand dune preserve. Unfortunately, it was too far south to walk to and from what I understand a bit dangerous because there are Hummers and Dune buggy’s flying all over the place.

After a brief stop in Pismo, I went up to San Luis Obispo which is the home CalPoly University. It is definitely a college town with your typical downtown of shops and a few restaurants. I ended up eating at a decent BBQ place and taking a brief drive through the campus before heading north up to San Simeon.

San Simeon is a small village that was really established to help support the construction of The Hearst Castle. Nearly all of the land surrounding the estate is still owned by the Hearst Corporation. The Hearst Corporation is still a large force in the publishing industry and publishes magazines such as Redbook and Good Housekeeping among other well-known names. Among those interests is the Hearst Ranch which is utilizes the massive expanse of land surrounding the estate.

W.R. Hearst’s father became one of California’s wealthiest men when he discovered silver in San Simeon hills. He used that wealth to buy a significant amount of land surrounding San Simeon. William would come to fall in love with this land as he began to build his own fortune in Newspapers. During his youth, his mother took him on a trip throughout Europe and this would also have an impact on him. His immense wealth and both his experiences in Europe and his love for San Simeon would eventually lead to the construction of what would become one the most elaborate architectural and artistic projects in the country.

The Hearst Castle would never be a “completed” work as Hearst like to change his mind often. Significant progress started during the 1920’s with the majority of the estate as it sits today being completed in the 1940’s. The cost would be $6 million is construction and $3 million for all of the art. Hearst commissioned a female architect, Julia Morgan, to take on the project in her “spare time”. She would invest a good portion of her time, especially on weekends, to work hand in hand with Hearst to create this elaborate estate. Morgan was famous in her own right getting a degree in Civil Engineering and being the first woman to gain a certificate in Architecture from a famous Parisian school. Morgan was not only the architect but she was also the landscape architect and the interior decorator. It is also known as La Cuentra Encantada (the Enchanted Hill) or as Hearst referred to it, “the ranch”.

In the mid 1950’s Hearst’s estate donated the castle and property (but not the surrounding land) to the State of California which made it into the state’s most successful State Park. People aren’t allowed to roam the estate freely but instead must be accompanied by a guided a tour at all times. As such, they created a Visitor’s Center at the base of the hills where the property is located. You have to take a 5 mile bus ride through the rolling hills to get to the isolated estate – a ride that is really amazing.

I started my day fairly early on the first tour. Essentially, instead of having one comprehensive tour, they break it out into four separate tours (each of which you have to ride the bus back to the Visitor’s Center for). Tour #1 is essentially the introductory tour. Because I started early and the “June Gloom” that plagues California was in full swing, the hillside was covered in fog. While it added a neat effect, it was terrible for pictures. The property essentially consists of about 5 different houses – most of them being guest houses, a recreation area (consisting of tennis courts and a pool), and Casa Grande, the main house. All tours start at the Neptune Pool (which is the well-known outdoor pool) and end at the Roman pool (which is the indoor pool). Tour #1 took you through one of the guest houses and hit some of the major aspects of Casa Grande. Heart wanted to ensure that his construction had the most up to date amenities and technology so not only did everyone have their own bathroom but most bathrooms had showers, not bathtubs (which was a novelty during that time).

Casa Grande is a massive building that was built to mimic a church Hearst saw in Spain. The main entryway led into a huge Assembly Hall where Hearst’s guests would gather before dinner. For me, it was reminiscent of a great hall you would expect to see in Camelot or one of the castles of medieval England. Nearly all of the interior of the castle was decorated to reflect medieval European flair from the paintings to the tapestries, to the woodwork, to the most amazing ceilings I’ve ever seen in a residence. Part of the wall of the assembly area was a doorway that led into the dining room which consisted of a table longer than any I’ve seen. Hearst’s parties were apparently legendary and he hosted a great many people (especially Hollywood-types) at his estate. Surrounding the dining area were flags that represented the different districts of Sienna, Italy.

The dining hall led to a “breakfast room” which was a “small” sitting area that got its name from he window that faced east to watch the sunrise. Nearly all of the views from any window include rolling hillsides. The breakfast room led to the Pool room with two pool tables and mill fleur which was a tapestry that translated to “a million flowers”. These tapestries were owned by only the wealthiest people during medieval times. The Pool room then led into Heart’s movie theatre. It was nearly a full size theatre (at least full size for the 1930’s and 40’s). Heart had married and woman named Millicent and then separated from his wife (very taboo in the day) to spend time with his Hollywood girlfriend, Marion Davies. Hearst owned a movie production studio that would produce all of Davies’ films and he would make his guests watch movies his studio produced when they came to visit.

The Roman pool, the ending point for each tour was pretty neat. It was a heated pool (which was impressive for the 1930’s). For all of its splendor, it was rarely used. Most of Hearst’s guests chose the outdoor Neptune pool. Additionally, most people in the 1930’s didn’t know how to swim so they just hung around poolside. Hearst was known to frequent “local” department stores and buy out their entire swimsuit section for his guests.

After the ride back to the Visitor’s Center, I took in the Hearst Castle movie which was shown in a surprisingly large theatre. It was your standard state park documentary with cheesy actors and a feaux-dramatic story intertwined with historical facts. Overall, not terrible. The funny thing is that they sold the movie on DVD for $30 (that’s $1 per minute) in case you wanted to take it home. After watching the movie, they handed out coupons for 50% off the DVD. Really? What’s the point? Nearly everyone watches the movie that goes there so why not just sell it for the original price? Are people really ignorant enough to think they are getting a “great” deal that will cause them to actually buy the DVD? < /end soapbox>.

I headed back up the mountain for tour 2 which took you through another guest house and back into the main house to see Hearst’s bedroom (which was surprisingly small) and his study. We also saw the massive kitchen which as pretty cool. Hearst never viewed his estate as a hotel and as such, there was no room service. If you wanted something, you had to go to the kitchen to get it. During this tour, there was a couple who brought their two little children on the tour. Now, I don’t have anything against kids. But – you are going to a house filled with priceless heirlooms. There are no ropes separating you from said heirlooms. You are also supposed to stay on a small, special carpeted path because the rugs are older than your great-grandfather. This is not a good recipe for kids, especially kids with ignorant parents. Thankfully, nothing was broken nor were any beds jumped on but lots of things were touched that weren’t supposed to be. After the second tour, the fog began to burn off a little bit and you had better views of the surrounding countryside. We headed back down to the Visitor’s center for an overpriced lunch.

Tour #3 was amusing for me. We got on the bus and as we started the tour, the tour guide (same as Tour #1) looked around and asked, “Does anyone besides this gentleman here speak English?”. One person (out of 20+) raised their hand. Everyone else spoke Chinese only. Essentially, I got a personalized tour which was pretty neat. Of course, the tour was continually interrupted by the tour guide telling the people that they had to stay on the carpet and not touch anything. These people were worst than the children from the previous tour, much to the tour guide’s frustration (and my amusement). Tour #3 essentially focused on all of the bedrooms of the main house which were pretty amazing, especially the rooms in the bell towers.

After a long day of touring, I headed back down to the Visitor’s center to take my leave of Hearst’s Estate. Before driving back to Irvine, I decided to take a quick detour north to see the Elephant seals. About 4 miles North of San Simeon, there is a small beach that is home to quite a few elephant seals. The seals were in their molting stage which meant that they were lazy and looked like they had leprosy. Overall, it was a neat stop, especially as I got to see some seals yell at each other and posture as they tried to find the most comfortable position to loaf and do nothing.

I ended up passing through LA just after sunset and since I had my tripod in my trunk, I stopped at the Griffith Observatory to see the LA skyline at night and ended up getting some awesome night shots in the process.

Jimmy Buffet

2009-05-21T19:57:00.000-07:00

I’ve always wanted to go see a Jimmy Buffet concert but every time I tried to get tickets, the Parrotheads would have always beaten me to them. I finally had my opportunity when I came to California as I happened to check when the show was going to be the day tickets went on sale. Because of his huge following, JB is able to get a hefty price for his tickets so I ended up paying close to $100 for a back row seat. I could have paid less for a lawn seat but I didn’t know the arena well enough and after the fact, the lawn area looked to be so packed that I wouldn’t have been able to move.

It was on a Thursday before Memorial Day so I would have imagined that most people were starting their weekend early. I think what makes Jimmy Buffet so popular is the whole experience of the concert more than the music itself. I arrived as early as I could have (after work) and had about an hour or so to walk around the parking lot. Some people went all out and had full blown tiki bars set up and had been partying for quite some time. What was funniest to me is that you would expect all of the drunken debauchery to be a result of young people. To be honest though, I was probably one of the youngest people there and demographic was much older. It was a cross between a civilized Penn State tailgate from the age perspective and a frat party from the atmosphere perspective. Well, I guess that would be true if Penn State were located on a beach somewhere but we all know that isn’t the case.

People were in full Parrothead regalia including fat old men with coconut bras and grass skirts, hats decorated with Junior Mints, cars with shark fins, and parrots perched on shoulders. I even saw someone driving around a motorized cooler and there were more shot-ski’s than I can count. All in all, a fun atmosphere.

The venue for the concert was the Verizon Amphitheatre which is an outdoor concert area essentially carved into the side of a rolling hill. As I mentioned, I had seats in the very back row which was right in front of a major walkway. In general, it was a terrible location. The stage was far enough away that Jimmy and the Coral Reefers looked like white blurs but more importantly, all the drunk idiots would walk behind me and get in fights only to then get tackled to the ground by security and kicked out. The novelty of this wore off after the first two and then it just became distracting.

Directly in front me sat the world’s tallest man. He was a clear foot and a half taller than me which says a lot. While he blocked my vertical view, I was able to crane my neck around him to see the stage. That was of course until two rows in front of me sat the widest man in the world thus blocking the remainder of my view.

While the pre-concert atmosphere was exciting, I was surprised at the level of enthusiasm during the concert - overall, it was fairly low key. It could have been because my seats were so far back, the fact that Jimmy opened with quite a few songs that most people never heard of, or it could have been the alcohol tiring people out. But what most surprised me about this was that Jimmy himself didn’t seem to be overly energetic which made it hard to really get into it. Don’t get me wrong, it was still fun, but just not quite what I expected from the hype. I was finally able to see some of the faces with the names that I’ve heard on Jimmy’s live CD’s before. Mr. Utley was playing the keyboards and Mac Macannaly (sp?) looks exactly like George Lucas (quite freaky) but he gets bonus points for keeping the 70’s style alive and still managing to be cool.

The pinnacle of the evening for me came from two drunk girls (always a source of entertainment). As I mentioned, I was in the last row and behind me was one of those token beverage and food carts you see at fairs or other public events. There was about a 1.5 foot gap between the back of my seat and this cart and a girl, along with her friend, somehow managed to sneak into the small space between my seat and the cart. I tried to ignore it until I heard a loud thud and felt warm liquid pouring down my side. I turned around to see Girl #1 had somehow managed to fall down between the seats and the cart and Girl #2 in shock, decided an appropriate reaction would be to pour her beer on me to reflect her surprise.

Girl #2 apologized profusely until I accepted her apology. Girl #1 however, was stuck. A guy sitting next to me and I tried to help her up but she was having none of it, shouting “My boobs are stuck, OH MY GOD!”. I looked at her and replied, “Sorry ma’am, there is nothing I can do to help you with that”. Not amused, she told us just to pull her up hard. We did, and she became free.

She was so grateful for my help that she decided to sit next to me. I was thrilled. She turned to me and said, in her drunken stupor, and the following conversation ensued:

Girl: “You know, I just don’t think my right boob can get any bigger.”
Me: “How does your left boob feel about that?”
Girl: “No Seriously, THANK YOU SO MUCH for helping me”
Me: “Not a probl…..”

Girl proceeds to kiss me on the cheek to show her adulation. No, scratch that, she decides to MAKE OUT with my cheek, tongue and all. It was awkward.

Girl: “I love Jimmy Buffet. I really love him. Him, Trace Adkins, and Tom Petty”
Me: “Well, it’s good you know what musicians you like the most”
Girl: “Who are your favorites?”
Me: “Oh, I like a lot. I like Jimmy Buffet of course. I also like Billy Joel I guess”
Girl: “YOU MUST BE A JEW.”
Me: “I’m not sure how I should respond to that. No, I’m not Jewish, not that there is anything wrong with that.”

Girl: “I’m sorry, I’m a horrible person”
Me: “No, you are just Anti-Semitic”

After this little exchange of dialogue, her friend decides it’s time to go and they leave. For this I am grateful.

The rest of the night was uneventful. My fins went to the left and the right and all was well with the world. As I left, I pondered how great it must be to actually be Jimmy Buffet. He’s not an overly talented singer from a technical standpoint but he has managed to build an empire of music, successful restaurant chains, successful alcohol brands (both liquor and beer), has written two best selling novels, and gets to tour the country ever year and see his adoring fans (and I do mean adoring). He’s spent most of his adult years living near a beach in places like Key West. It must be a hard life for him.

Billy Joel and Elton John

2009-04-05T20:28:00.001-07:00

I have always considered myself a fortunate person but never really a “lucky” person. By fortunate, I mean that with a little hard work, the big things in life have worked out for me; getting through a challenging undergraduate program successfully, getting decent jobs, having a great house and nice car, etc. But when it comes to situational luck – hitting the jackpot, winning contests, getting picked for things, etc. – things usually don’t turn out that well for me. I’m told that’s because my last name is Repnyek and I’m sure that one of my ancestors did something that doomed the lineage but you never know.

That all changed for at least one night. Right after I moved to California for my temporary work assignment, I discovered that Billy Joel and Elton John were once again on tour and would be coming to the Honda Center in Anaheim in a few months for two shows. I was able to get a cheap ticket in the last row of the top section. Since I didn’t know anyone, I went by myself figuring it would be a fun evening to just hang out en enjoy some good music.

The night of the concert rolls around and I end up going to the arena earlier to get some dinner before the show starts. As I arrive, I’m abhorred to find that I have to pay $20 for parking (cash only) but suck it up. After I get frisked on my way into the arena, I find an overpriced pizza and park myself on top of a garbage can and chow down when these two guys approach me. I was wearing my New Zealand All Blacks golf shirt and the the conversation that ensued went as follows:

Them: “Are you from New Zealand?”
Me: I held up my finger to tell them "Wait while I finished chewing"
Them: “Sorry. We waited until your mouth was full before we came up to you.”
Me: “No problem. No, I’m not from new Zealand.”
Them: “Oh. Well, are you a Billy Joel and Elton John fan?”
Me: “Yeah” (Thinking, well, I am at their concert)
Them: “Who do you like better?”
Me: “Well, I’ve always been a Billy fan but Elton John has really grown on me over the past few years.”
Them: “Well, I work for Elton John. So you like Elton John right?”
Me: “Yes”
Them: “See, that was easy. Where are your seats at?”
Me: “Last row, top section. Can’t get any further.”
Them: (Pulling a stack of tickets from their back pocket) “Well, how would you like to sit in the front row?”
Me: “Uhhhh…SURE”

They hand me a ticket for the front row….I could…not…believe…it. It was one of those moments where you just have pinch yourself because you can’t believe it. I immediately try to call everyone I know while I wander around aimlessly waiting for the show to start. I finally head to my seat which sure enough is in the front row right in front of Elton. It was amazing. There were a few other people who had the same thing happen to them. It would seem that if they don’t sell out the $2k + tickets for that area, they have to fill the space so they just upgrade people.
The only bad part of the whole evening was that as I was walking out of my apartment, I figured I didn’t need to bring my camera because my seats were so far away. I was kicking myself hard that I made that decision! Thankfully, I had a business card on me and gave it to the guy sitting next to me and he as kind enough to send me a couple of pictures that he took.

To make the night even better, I had noticed a couple of empty seats near me. As the lights went down for the concert to begin, I saw two shadows sneak in a sit down. Those shadows would turn out to be John Stamos and Kevin Spacey! They were so close…and I was definitely star struck. Later, when Billy Joel came on, I made my way to the front of the stage and was right in front of him. He sang Allentown, I went nuts, and segued into We Didn’t Start the Fire. As I was singing along, I noticed Kevin Spacey had made his way next to me and was singing along with me.

The whole experience was surreal and it was an adrenaline rush the entire night. It took me a whole day to recover from the experience. I’m fearful that my life has now peaked and I will never be able to enjoy a concert ever again because it will pale in comparison ☺ .

The Ethos of Orange County

2008-09-27T16:38:00.001-07:00

I have two weeks down in the OC and I must say it’s been a bit of a surreal experience. The amount of wealth surrounding you in unlike anything I’ve seen. Couple that with the lifestyle that accompanies year-round perfect weather and easy access to nice beaches, this place is unlike any other I’ve been to.

It’s strange to be here in a way because I, like many other people in the country, have grown up watching shows like 90210, The OC, Laguna Beach, etc. It’s easy to watch something on TV that represents a far off place because it becomes fictionalized. However, when you are actually in the place that serves as the foundation for those shows and lifestyles they represent, you begin to take on another perspective. Suddenly, those large houses and unimaginable wealth become real and when they are real, they are in a far off way, attainable. Suddenly, the life that you lead and the things you have worked for seem inconsequential compared to the things that the other people have in this area.

But amidst the beautiful weather, beautiful people, and beautiful cars, it’s not a bad place. It’s easy to forget about the rest of the world while you are out here. The weather is constantly nice and with most of pop culture news happening an hour away and the majority of the population being three hours ahead of you, it’s easy to not feel concerned about what’s going on elsewhere.

Of course, the weather and proximity to numerous nice beaches comes with a high price tag; if you wanted to move out here from East coast, you would never be able to afford a house. If you can live with that, then it may be a good place for you (especially with winter approaching in the East). In addition to price tag comes the traffic. It seems everyone wants to live here and driving on any freeway in the LA area redefines the term “time commitment”.

My first night here I found myself in Newport Beach at a huge outdoor shopping called Fashion Island. It’s essentially a huge outdoor shopping center. A short way down the road is Corona Del Mar which is a small beach on a harbor. What struck me was the amount of people on the beach at dusk as the sun was setting. They were huddled around stone pits with fires burning in them cooking out and simply enjoying each other’s company. It was so awesome to see a city condone the responsible use of fire on the beach. As I walked around, I offered to take a group picture for a bunch of students from UC Irvine. They subsequently, and kindly, asked me to join them. After hitting a volleyball around and partaking in some s’mores, I called it a night.

The next evening, I checked out a little place called Balboa Island which is just off Newport Beach. The Island is quaint and small and almost reminds you of a small New England town, except that it’s in California the small houses on the island cost a few million. After dinner at a local Italian joint called Amelia’s, I drove up to the Balboa Peninsula which is the “beach” part of Newport Beach. There are two clusters of parking and downtown-type areas with main access to the beach and a pier at each. After parking, I went for a walk along the beach at night. The weather here is usually overcast in the morning and cool, clearing by early afternoon approaching sunny in the low to mid 80s’ with no humidity by day and becoming cool at night. In other words, amazing; and it also makes for excellent beach walking weather. The beaches here are wide and you don’t see the huge, often-times hideous hotels that mar the beaches in New Jersey. For that matter, you also don’t see the syringes, sewerage lines, and other things that you may find whilst strolling the Jersey shore. Another difference is that the beaches are used year-round because winter doesn’t really exist here. At night, the beaches aren’t very crowded so you can walk in peace which is nice. You occasionally run across the [very] young couple making out on the lifeguard stand but that’s about it. Newport has two fishing piers that flank the peninsula and they are a little over a mile apart. The piers themselves have a little restaurant or diner at the end are used predominantly for fishing. The demographic you see there, at least at night, is starkly different from the demographic that lives in the houses along the beach.

After a nice walk, I returned to my car in the parking lot to find a couple making out next to the car parked in front of me. It was fairly late for a weeknight, 10pm, but there were still a few cars in the lot. As I walked closer, I noticed them making some odd movements and when I reached my car, I noticed a little more than making-out going on. Now, I’m not the type of person to judge someone for utilizing the outdoors for sexual escapades but when you do it in the middle of a very public parking lot, with people around, you’re just asking for it. As I approached the car to open it, I would have thought they would have stopped what they were doing or tried to hide it a little better, but alas, no. So, as I turned my car on, I also turned my headlights on and “accidentally” turned my high beams on (which they were pretty much directly in front of). Now, I didn’t do this is a voyeuristic way, it was more of a means to let them know that I people don’t really need to see what they were doing and if they realized that people were around watching them, they would stop and move to more private quarters (like say, inside the car). But no, they didn’t even flinch so I exited as quickly as possible.

The next day at work, I struck up a conversation with Leo Malamud. Leo was an interesting character because he was your typical SoCal surfer guy. Every morning he wakes up to hit the waves, is a surf advocate (as evidenced by him driving to San Diego to protest at a hearing where they were debating building a toll road that would interfere with a surf spot he used to use in his younger days), is an avid skateboarder, and like to strategize about how he can get into the Hollywood clubs with little or no cover charge. Essentially, he has lived a life that is pretty much as opposite as you can get to mine and I was really struck by that. These people have never grown up watching leaves change, or even seeing snow fall. They can be outdoors most of the year and enjoy sun at the beach while they are at it. Of all the people I met that week though, Leo was the most outgoing and friendly, in a Californian sort of way. I say that because the breed in California is definitely different from the East Coast. I don’t think it would be fair to say that people in California are fake or shallow because that would probably be unjustly harsh. They are all nice, just not very outgoing or welcoming. Ultimately, I don’t think I could see myself finding any deep friendships with people out there because they don’t seem to be wired that way.

As I mentioned, Leo and I struck up conversation at work that day and he made mention that he was going to try to go to a club that night by the airport and that if I were interested, I could join him. Initially, my reaction was no but after a pause, I realized that if I were ever to really get a sense for the social life out here, I need to be flexible and give things a chance so I told him it was a possibility and as I left that day, it was. My mission for the evening was to find a restaurant called the Bluefish Grille. It’s a chain out in that area and apparently has some good seafood. I couldn’t find the original one that a co-worker told me about so I let my GPS guide me to one up in Santa Ana. In true base-model-GPS fashion, that location didn’t exist or has since closed causing me to make numerous circles around a parking lot (which looked shady considering I was driving an old Grand Prix with peeling paint weaving through Maybachs, Rolls Royces, and other high-end models).

Through some handy GPS/Blackberry combination, I was able to find the original location suggested which is next to a military base of sorts and was part of this huge outdoor complex. Eating dinner alone is always an awkward event, especially if you aren’t sitting at a bar. The waiters or waitresses either a) look at you with pity or b) look at you with skepticism wondering what horrible disease or social disorder you may have because you are all by your lonesome. To abate some of this, I took in my Fodor’s Los Angeles book to begin planning out my weekend.

Before the weekend arrived however, I would have to deal with Friday. That evening, I decided that I would head down to Laguna Beach, of MTV fame. I have to admit, it was weird for me being a closet MTV junkie just to be there. Laguna, like some other towns in SoCal, has a strange obsession with parking meters. Let me take an aside here and rant about parking meters. Honestly. How inefficient can we be? Who carries nickels, quarters, and dimes on them anymore? I’m lucky if I carry paper money instead of a check card – it’s ridiculous. It’s not that I mind paying to park, it’s just that I never have any stupid change to put into the stupid meter. On top of that, in some areas, you get 15 minutes for 1 quarter. What is that? I’ve got to carry around 8 quarters if I want to eat and more if I want to go for a walk on the beach afterwards…

Ok, I’m calm. Laguna was certainly not what I expected. In fact, I thought it was pretty touristy which was surprising given my view of the town through the MTV lens. The beach was not overly exciting either because it was at the bottom of a little Cliffside. The sand was hard and eroding. It had a slight hint of a New Jersey beach town (but nothing close to being that bad). That night, as the sun was very quickly setting, there were about three different couples who were on the beach for wedding pictures right after they got married. They were of course very young, very attractive, and I’m assuming very rich. I eventually found a little open air Irish pub with a woeful beer selection but good burgers. After dinner, I left Laguna unimpressed and headed up to Huntington Beach (a.k.a. Surf City, USA) to get a flavor of that town. Huntington was awesome. The beach runs the length of the city and most of it is a state park. The upside is that it isn’t lined with houses or hotels; the downside is that you have to pay $10 for parking or *gasp* use the parking meters. By this point, it was 10pm and I assumed that the parking meters were only into effect until the normal hour of 6pm. Nay. Midnight. What?! Grrrrrr. I said screw it; there were more parking meters in Huntington than there are people in Wyoming – my odds were looking good. I got out for a stroll and was amazed. Huntington took the fire on the beach concept to a whole new level with fire pits lined in two rows the entire length of the beach. Making it better was the fact that every high school kid in SoCal seemed to have migrated there that night and was having a little gathering. In the midst of the mass socialization, a group of people were playing some sort of game that seemed to be a cross between tag and football with lightsabers dug into the sand as endzone markers and teams delineated by glow necklaces.

After my short walk, I headed back to the car (with no parking ticket….woot!) and went back to the hotel to get rest for my whirlwind tour the next day. However, that wouldn’t happen until I had a minor run-in with the California police. I made a slight mistake and was on an exit I shouldn’t have been which in California can take you places like Mexico, or worse, New Jersey. So I cut across the four lane exit to get back on the highway. I was totally clear except for the cop car that saw me do that. I tried to pull over on the exit ramp but was told not to do so. The problem was that the exit ramp was like three miles long – now I know how OJ Simpson felt (but I didn’t actually murder anybody). I eventually found a place to pull over and the cop, who had the emotional intelligence of a rock, saw that the Pennsylvania driver with a company car would have been a paperwork nightmare and decided to let me off with a warning.

I woke up fairly early to a huge commotion in the hotel lobby and perhaps the best breakfast spread I think I’ve ever seen. It was move-in day at UC Irvine so the masses bought out the hotel it seemed. With a full stomach, I hopped in the car and headed north on the 405. Now let me take another aside and say that what the GPS lacked in knowledge of local restaurants that were actually still open, it more than made up for it with successful navigation throughout the day allowing me to do things I never would have been able to do otherwise.

My plan was to head up the 405 into LA and take the Sunset Blvd. Exit. Sunset essentially runs along the northern tier of LA taking you through Hollywood. The first stop was UCLA which was massive! Tall buildings everywhere! I was going to park and peruse but I couldn’t find a good spot to do so and have to live with the driving tour. A little further down the road was Beverly Hills. Boy, I thought Newport Beach was rich – yikes! Beverly Hills, in my humble, poor, opinion puts Nepwort to shame. The houses in Beverly Hills were huge and, pleasantly, each unique in their own way. The streets were lined with these amazing trees that had multiple trunks, smooth bark, and a perfect leaf canopy adding to the ambiance. I finally found Rodeo Drive and, ironically, did not have to pay for parking at a meter. Walking down the street, I was met by stores whose names I could not pronounce and felt like I wasn’t allowed to walk in. It was the first time ever I saw a DeBeers diamond store. DeBeers is the only true monopoly left in the world and they own all the diamond mines. Essentially, they mine them and sell them to other outlets (jewelers, etc.) I have never heard or seen of an actual storefront of the company. The shopping part of Rodeo was surprisingly small but muy rico; the bouncers at the door probably make more money than I do.

After a short jaunt up and back, I was back on Sunset heading east until I hit Hollywood Blvd. I parked and went for a walk along the Walk of Fame. I almost immediately came upon Grauman’s Chinese Theatre which was a) crowded and b) awesome. Sid Grauman was a showman, not an actual actor; he supported Hollywood stars, built theatres, and put on shows. In front of Grauman’s are the famous hand and foot prints (which put the walk of fame to shame). The footprints (or in some cases, face prints, dreadlock prints, robot feet, or horseshoes) are only allowed to be done by movie stars (the Walk of Fame is movie, TV, and radio) and they are selected on a very strict basis. Everyone who has ever left their mark still has it there today. Thus, there were many tiles from the 20’s and 30’s. It would have been great to have one of my grandparents there to see it and tell me stories about who those people were. Every year, there is a committee that decides who will get to honor of leaving their mark and once they fill up all the space, they will stop having the ceremony. The range of celebrities who have left their mark are quite vast; Shirley Temple, Frank Sinatra, Tom Cruise, the cast of Star Trek, Harry Potter, Ocean’s 11, Star Wars, and the latest, Michael Caine (for his role in Batman: The Dark Knight).

I was contemplating going on the tour of Movie Star’s homes but I for the price, I didn’t feel it was worth it. Instead, I took a tour of the inside of the Chinese Theatre which was ok. I was disappointed initially because the actual theatre part had a movie showing at the time (you can still see new movies there for $12 on the widest movie screen in the country). The good news though was that they allowed us to come back after the movie was over and see the inside of the theatre which worked out better because I was the only one who came back and got to hang out inside the theatre all by myself. Attached to Grauman’s Chinese is the Kodak Theatre and, of course, a shopping mall, which was sadly closed for a “private event”. Who rents out the Kodak Theatre for a private event?? It turned out to be Disney.

Following the Walk of Fame, I got to see Chuck Norris’ and David Hasselhoff’s star, the Capital Records building, and some other sundry shops including a great mask shop. But it was time to move on to see the most quintessential Hollywood icon – the sign! I failed to remember that the sign and most of the residents of Hollywood are actually in Hollywoodland. Thanks to my trusty GPS and guidebook, I headed up far into the Hollywood hills through the most amazingly snakelike and skinny roads to a high spot that gave me a great view of the sign. Mulholland Drive which actually goes up to the sign has been closed for quite some time so my spot was the best I was going to get. I headed down to try and see the Hollwood Bowl outdoor concert area but got there too late because they were setting up for that night’s concert.

My plan that night was to go see the Dodger’s game but had a few hours to kill so I headed to pay tribute to Bug’s Bunny and visited the LaBrea tarpits. Shockingly, the tar pits were free and more shockingly, they are right in the heart of LA. I expected them to be out in the desert a little more but nope, right smack in the middle of skyscrapers. More interestingly is that they are on the ground of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art complex which is huge. Now, I’m not a civil engineer or architect but I had to ask myself: “Why, on God’s green earth, would one think it’s a good idea ot build a five massive building complex on the same grounds as prehistoric tar pits that are still bubbling up out of the ground?” I mean, how is that structurally safe? Maybe that’s why I’m an ex-engineer.

After the lackluster tarpits, I still had time to kill so I headed down to Santa Monica, the famous beach with the famous pier. Prepared this time, I dumped all the quarters I had into the parking meter and went for a walk. The pier, in my opinion, was lame. Although come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pier I’ve been impressed with. They had a very basic amusement park on it with a lot of fishing space and pedestrian traffic. The beach itself was crawling with people of interesting varieties with various gymnastic apparati. Before heading to the game, I wanted to try and check out muscle beach and impress the people with my stunning lack of physique. Sadly, the parking meters got the better of me and I had to suffice with a drive through and saw no muscle heads.

It’s good things worked out the way they did though because I got to sit in the famed LA gridlock traffic on my way to Dodger Stadium. Earlier the day before, I had tried to call Ticketmaster to get some cheap-seat tickets and *shockingly* they were sold out!! I figured I would take my chances with the scalpers. I arrived at the stadium about 30 minutes before the first pitch (thrown by Arsenio Hall – whom I don’t recall having a star on the Walk of Fame, huh). I paid $15 for parking (cash only!!) which was more than parking costs at Disneyland, go figure. The stadium was built on a hillside and has different levels of entry with many, many stairs in between. As I ascended and descended levels, I found one scalper who wanted to sell me a $9 ticket for $45. I laughed at him and moved on and found this exceptionally shady gentleman who sold me a $9 ticket for $20 which was palatable. You would swear he was selling me drugs based on his demeanor and cold sweat that he seemed to be breaking out in. As he went on his panicky way, I looked at the crumpled ticket and realized there was a good possibility that the ticket was a fake. Crossing my fingers entering the stadium, I found out not only was it a valid ticket, but I had good seats in the top section behind home plate. There were two girls sitting behind me who were certifiably crazy but we got along swimmingly and had a good time. They played the Giants and eventually won after some ugly early innings. The team turned 50 (at least had been in LA for 50 years) this year and was still playing in their original stadium which was very retro and ultimately grew on me. The game crept on at a painful pace and I had to leave before it ended because I had a big day the next day…

I arose early and headed north into Santa Ana towards Anaheim where on a piece of land that used to be an orange grove sits the Happiest Place on Earth, at least the West Coast version: Disneyland! I felt that if I were in the area, Disneyland was one place I had to visit out of principal. As I drove, I had mixed feelings about spending one of my rare free days at Disneyland. Not only was I by myself, but I was 28. My first foray to Disneyworld was when I was 9 and I remember it truly being the most magical place I’ve ever been to. When I returned in High School with Young Life (multiple times), I remember being shocked at how small the park was and how well, lackluster it appeared the second time around. I had trouble reconciling how the same place could look so different in a matter of 6 years but different it was. That time however, I was there with no parental supervision with a group of friends and was thus able to have a great time. This time however, as I said, I was a) 28 b) alone and c) heading to the smaller, older Disneyland instead of the massive four-park Disneyworld complex.

As I arrived, you have to drive forever to get to the most massive parking garage I’ve ever seen and take the tram to the central area. Once there, you can go into Downtown Disney, California Adventure (Disney’s new park), or Disneyland. I decided to start with California Adventure and arrived before the bulk of the park was opened. Looming in the distance was the Tower of Terror, the same ride that resides in MGM studios. I waited behind the barrier and the bellhops from the Hotel met the people and escorted them to the ride at the beginning of the day. As impressive as the size of the ride was the detail they paid to the décor in the lobby. If I had to say one thing that Disney does amazingly well, it would be their attention to detail throughout their parks – the lines, the gardens, the shops, everything. I was on the first car of the day and the ride there was either different from the one at MGM, or my memory made me think it was shorter and less, well, adventurous than the original.

After that, I went to Paradise Pier where the rollercoaster was and I have to say, while it was simple in design, it was a lot of fun. I was able to get into the front seat which is always a bonus. The park had designed separate lines for single riders which would help me at various points throughout the day. However, if you choose that path, you can’t dictate which seat you were going to get. I tried to get on a Toy Story ride that was apparently pretty popular. The line was the longest I had seen at both parks the entire day and was probably over an hour long. I contemplated waiting and then looked at the demographic and realized that the screaming 3 years olds in line dictated what type of ride it could be and figured it wouldn’t have been as excited as it needed to be to wait that long.

There wasn’t too much to California Adventure and overall, while it was a “nice” park, I wasn’t overly impressed. One ride to note was this iMax-type ride that lifts you up in front of a huge screen and flies you over California’s National Parks which was pretty cool. You twist and turn and when you fly over pine forests, they spray pine scent into the air and orange scent when you fly over the orange groves.

After walking through the park, I headed to the main attraction Disneyland and from that moment, I slowly became a little kid again. Walking down Main Street, I stopped in and watched a mini-documentary on the history of Disneyland which I found to be both informative and entertaining. It was in what was once, I think, the Hall of Presidents. They also had scale models of what the park looked like today and when it opened. They also had Walt’s original sketches which were pretty neat. I was the only one who seemed to find their way into that theatre which is unfortunate because there was a lot of Disney history in there.

As I walked down Main Street, I ran into my first surprise of the day – the castle. I knew they had a castle and that it was different from the one in Disneyworld. What I didn’t know was how SMALL it was. Seriously. It’s small. But it’s still neat. I ate lunch at a place with a view of the castle and The Matterhorn and I have to tell you, nothing beats handing over your corporate card at a place like Disneyland for ridiculously overpriced food.

I made my way into Tomorrowland and went on the MGM-cloned Star Wars simulator and Space Mountain. Space Mountain never gets old – I’m a huge fan of roller coasters in general, but more so of roller coasters in the dark. I once again made my way to the front seat and sat next to an older gentlemen and it’s safe to say that we were both giddy. I asked him if he was here alone and he said no, he is here with the wife and kids who are too scared to go on the ride so he rides it three times, in the front seat, and gives them the rest of the day to do as they please and he willingly follows. My hero. (Well, not really).

I ventured into the House of Tomorrow which I had assumed was the original House of Tomorrow and I was looking for some high cheese factor for amusement. Sadly, they updated the house and it’s actually a very modern version of the house of tomorrow filled with Microsoft and HP stuff. It was pretty neat and I must say, a fairly realistic version of what tomorrow’s house could look like (if you were a millionaire).

Right outside, I ran into the Jedi Training Academy which was one of the highlights for me. They called up about thirty little kids, gave them lightsabers (sidebar, boo on Microsoft for not having lightsabers in their spell checker) and cloaks. This cool Jedi guy (he did flips) trained them and in walked Darth Vader and Darth Maul and all the kids get their chance to fight them. Priceless. Surprisingly, none of the kids were scared and I have to admit, Darth Maul was very in character and I think scared some of the adults.

The rest of the park was a lot of fun. Fantasyland, Adventureland, New Orleans all had their own charm. It’s a Small World was closed which I had mixed feelings about and the biggest disappointment was that the Haunted Mansion was closed because they were decorating for Halloween. Pirates of the Carribean was fun and they even updated it to include a robot of Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow. What’s cool about that ride is that you start off by floating through a Louisiana jungle and pass by an “outdoor” restaurant lit by lantern. I went over to Pirate Island which is essentially a huge fort for kids to run around on which made me wish I was about 20 years younger but I made do.

I made my way over the teacups and felt odd sitting in a teacup all by myself but I can tell you that mine spun the fastest!! I then went over to Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride which I had heard of so decided to give it a shot with the other 5 year olds and it was there that I ran into my first major irony of Disneyland. It’s a simple ride that takes you through painted cartoon-like landscapes of London. At the end, you run into a train and see painted explosions and apparently you die. Now, you are in the Happiest Place on Earth and a) you die but what’s worse, b) YOU GO TO HELL! They have demons and other things. Unbelievable.

I headed over to Adventureland to go on the Indiana Jones ride which was closed because something terrible happened I’m sure and they told me to check back in a few hours. So on I went and ended up in the Enchanted Tiki Room. Now, I’ve always been a huge fan of the Tiki Room song since I’ve been little and was disappointed that Disneyworld didn’t have a Tiki Room. So I sat through the show and sang along as loud as I could with everyone else.

Dinnertime was fast approaching and I decided to head out of the park into Downtown Disney where I came upon the second happiest place on earth: the most awesome Lego Store I’ve ever been to and let me tell you, it was money! I decided then that if I’m ever a millionaire, I would buy a mansion and have a at least a room or two dedicated to Lego’s. This store had everything, this massive Death Star playset (for $400!), and even kitchen utensils (ice cube trays, salt pepper shakers, and yes, a jello mold!). If I had an extra suitcase with me, it would have been dangerous.

I eventually got out unscathed and found a House of Blues for some dinner. After some voodoo shrimp and a burger, I made my way back towards the park and walked through this MASSIVE store that seemed to have every Disney product on the market which was awesome. I made my way back to park and got on the Indiana Jones ride which was ok. I hung around that night for the fireworks which were pretty cool. They were set to all the old Disney songs that we know the words to and other rides in the park. I was able to sneak out early and beat the traffic.

Monday, I was exhausted so I took a quick jaunt to the UC Irvine campus, was thoroughly unimpressed, found a brewpub, watched the Phillies game, and retired back to the hotel and watched some TV. The next day, our Corporate Controller flew in and we went to dinner. He was feeling under the weather but we ventured out to this place where he kind of knew where it was but didn’t remember the name. We drive in that general direction, gave up, and headed towards Joe’s Crab Shack in Newport only to find out that the restaurant he was thinking of was right next store. We were both excited to try their specialty, Opakapaka which is my favorite fish. He had tried to get that last time while there with my boss but they were out. Of course, they were out this time too. We substituted with the sea bass which was still good and realized very quickly, that this was a restaurant where the Orange County wives hung out. We tried to play the popular game “Wife or Mistress” but quickly concluded that all the cougars there were wives because their husbands weren’t there (most likely, they were home with their mistresses).

The week started to wind down for me on Wednesday so I decided to head out to Huntington Beach again and explore the town a little more. I went to a highly recommended restaurant right at the end of the pier. As I sat there by my lonesome with my beeper waiting for a table, in walks a supplier of mine from the East Coast and they happened to be talking about me as they walked through the door. After we both talked about how shocked we were to see one another, they invited me to their corporate dinner with all of their specialized sales team. So I got a free meal (or I should say my company got a free meal). The steak was fantastic and the wine was flowing. After the dinner festivities, I decided to go for an extended walk on the beach. As I started my walk, I noticed that the beach closes at 10pm. How do you close a beach? Simply stunning – isn’t that public property? It was very New Jersey-esque of them.

As I was walking back towards my starting point, I heard a screech, thump, and crash. About 100 yards in front of me, this guy drove over a curb, through three thick wooden posts, over a path, and through a concrete dividing wall and onto the beach. It was a brand new Infiniti G35 completely destroyed and the driver looked slightly hoodlum-ish and young. As I walked by, the cops came and I overheard him telling them that he “was going 10mph and skid out on some sand”. Riiiiiight, because I know if I were going 10 mph, I would have blown through that concrete wall too……

Thankfully, that was the peak of my excitement for the rest of the week. The next day was taken up with a large team meeting that concluded with dinner at a mediocre Spanish Tapas restaurant. Then, early the next morning it was back “home”.

Career Opportunities in SoCal

2008-09-10T16:37:00.000-07:00

It’s amazing how change can just creep up on you. Sometimes, you can sense it coming but other times you have no fair warning. I always like to think that I handle change well but as history has shown, I have a hard time with it. Typically, the major changes in my life have come as a result of my career; the move out of engineering to purchasing, the shuffling og commodities (packaging → plastics → electronics → whatever it is I do now); the move to B. Braun, etc. Another “opportunity” for change was presented to me unexpectedly this past Tuesday morning when my boss called me into his office.

One of the major projects my company makes and sells is the IV bag that you normally see in a hospital. The current product is called Excel and is terribly unprofitable to the point that we lose money on every bag sold. Te reason we still sell them is that we use it as a loss leader to get other business. Enter the $300 million+ Exceed project. It’s a huge investment by the company to redesign the bag to make it better and at a lower cost. The future success of the company essentially rides in part on this project. It’s scope is so large that the COO is personally overseeing and focusing on it. Essentially, they want someone from a strategic purchasing group to focus on all of the procurement activities for the project and the person suggested ended up being me. On one front, I was flattered that would ask me after I’ve been with the company for only 5 months bu on the other hand, it’s daunting because it was proposed that I would move out to our plant in Irvine, CA (the heart of the OC) for a period of a year perhaps more.

Initially, I was taken aback but as I thought more about it, it relly is an incredible opportunity. Irvine is in the heart of Orange County bordered on the north by LA and San Diego is 1.5 hours south. Disneyland, Universal, Legoland, Six Flags, the beach, the mountains, etc. are all a stone’s throw away; my boss describes it as the country’s playground. Perhaps the best part is the SoCal weather and that I would be able to be out there during the bleakest months of the Northeast winter. The downside is that my life would be disrupted for up to a year and that I would leave family and friends here. That downside however is mitigated because I would be able to keep my life (house, etc.) here in Bethlehem with the ability to travel back every so often to keep things in order while enjoying relatively expense free living in one of the most expensive parts of the country. The irony of the situation the weekend prior to the news, I was contemplating how lonely this upcoming winter is going to be and how much of a struggle for me it was going to be.

In the end, I would be foolish not to take it and exploring a new part of the country for a year (and an exciting part of the country at that). It’s a fantastic career move for me as it gives me direct exposure to the COO and makes me very well-rounded when it comes to our products and operations. It also shows that I’m willing to sacrifice for the company.

The details of the arrangement have yet to be worked out and of course are ever changing. Currently, I’m slated to split my time between here and there until the end of the year and then most likely move out for a period of 6-8 months. The timeframe is sketchy at best and it seems I have some vague input as to when I could move back based on workload.

So let the adventure begin!

Flügtag and Cupcakes

2008-09-09T19:49:00.000-07:00

SEPTEMBER 9TH, 2008
Flügtag and Cupcakes

It’s hard to think that almost a year has gone by without me taking any major trips or vacation. It’s even harder to come to grips with the fact that I won’t be traveling to any place exotic this year, the first time that has happened in four years. But, with the job transition and the purchase of a new car, it was time to lay low for a bit. The bad part is that I’m left with a few weeks of vacation that I need to somehow use up.

I returned once again to one of my favorite cities in the country: Chicago. Note: Chicago in the Spring, Summer, or Fall. What I love about Chicago is that there are so many different areas and neighborhoods that have their own style and make you forget that you are in a major city. Every time I go, I get to explore something new and that’s pretty cool. The purpose of this visit (besides seeing my good friends Doug and Debbie who happen to live downtown north of the Loop), was to fulfill a yearning I’ve had for the past few years: to see a Red Bull Flügtag. Flügtag is German for “flying day” and the event, free to the public, consists of ridiculous people pushing ridiculous man-made flying machines off a ridiculously high platform. The tradition started in Europe in 1991 and comes to about three cities in America every year. Each “flying machine” must be completely man-powered (so no motors, catapults, etc.) and contestants are judged on three criteria: 1) distance, 2) creativitiy, and 3) showmanship. Essentially, people strive for points in the last two categories and most build machines that plummet to their doom without any real hope of flying. This leads to a most amusing experience for all who gather to partake. As I was watching, I realized that if aliens were ever watching out planet to judge the intellectual capacity of our species, perhaps today was not the best day to do so – it was that good.

Last time Flügtag came to Chicago, 70,000 people came to watch so Doug and I went down the day before to scope out the best place to sit. Information about the event was sparse but we knew that the gates wouldn’t open until about 11am. We arrived around 9:30 and was able to find a good spot along a wall on the lake that gave us a clear line of sight but put us some distance away. Knowing we could do better, I snuck around and was able to somehow get inside the gated area and get *amazing* seats. Doug was able to sneak in and we spread our blankets. The weather, hot at first, cooled down as the clouds began to roll in and it was a great day for Flügtag-ing.

Before the festivities started, you were able to walk through the area where people had setup their machines and could interact with them. Because performance and showmanship were being judged, the people were dressed in themed costumes and tried to get your attention to vote for them. Overall, there were 29 machines that would try for glory (most of them failing miserably to the crowd’s delight).

Among my favorites:

• The Flying Ditkas. Their flying machine was a simple hang glider contraption but they all dressed up like Ditka and didn’t crack a smile all day. The tail of their plane was a large picture of Ditka’s head.

• The Nintendudes. They recreated the original Duck Hunt from NES and their flying machine was a duck. Someone dressed up as the gun, the dog that catches the ducks, and the ducks themselves.

• Go Shuck Yourself. Basically, it was a big corn on the cob.

• Cactus Smurfs. Papa Smurf was large and energetic as their Smurf House Flying Machine fell straight off the platform.

Whether it was a flying monkey or a flying mustache (and yes, they had both), Flügtag did not disappoint and next time it’s in town, I’m entering. The showmanship, performances, ridiculousness, mayhem, and destruction all worked so well together to make it an awesome experience. (The awesome seats didn’t hurt either).

The one lowlight of the day was this guy who obnoxiously decided to walk through our blanket, nudge me out of the way, and sit right in front of me (which is bad considering I was in the front row). After trying to make small talk with me (that didn’t go well for him), he brought some old guy up and wedged him in right in front of me as well. Irate, I called the police over who did nothing. Additionally, behind us, this angry woman nudged her mom and little daughter down and almost got into a fist fight with the lady behind us. I was amazed at how rude some people can be. The level of disrespect someone must have to think they can show up right before an event starts and move in on people who have been sitting there for over two hours to save space astounds me. But alas, it all worked out in the end. My friend Emily who lives in DeKalb came out to enjoy the festivities and it was glorious! Next time, the plan is enjoy Flügtag from the platform whilst in our costumes!

The day after, Doug, Debbie, and their friend Michelle, decided to take me on a biking cupcake tour of Chicago. It was a great way to see the city and taste some of the finer (and not-so-fine) sweets the city has to offer. We ended up stopping at eight places, splitting a cupcake at each place and ranked each place on a comprehensive scoring matrix. In the end, it was way too many stops and we were feeling it by the end. In the future, we would limit it to four with a real meal in between. But we fought through the nausea and sugar rushes and had a great day overall. It was a clever way to get out and see more of the city and experience something you normally wouldn’t. We rated each place along four dimensions: Cake, Frosting, Overall Presentation, and Value. Most of the cupcakes were around the $2.00 range but there were a few that ventured close to $4. In the end, our last stop, Molly’s Cupcakes, was the clear and unanimous winner.

Catholicism and Buddhism

2008-07-13T16:28:00.000-07:00

Today was quite a day. This morning was the last service at St. Joseph’s (the family church) before its doors were closed. News of the closure had been around for quite a while so everyone knew it was coming but that didn’t change the atmosphere. I decided to go along with mom and dad to support Grammy, a woman who has been around almost as long as the church building itself. That church is steeped in family history. My great grandfather, Frank Piff, was one of the two founding members who financially supported the Church, and petitioned the diocese to have a church built to serve the ethnic Slovenians (known as the Windish people) living in South Bethlehem. The church, started in 1913 and completed in 1917 lasted over 90 years before the Allentown Diocese decided it, along with dozens of other churches, would be closed and consolidated. Much of my family was baptized there: grandmother, both grandfathers, mom, aunt, cousins, brother, and me; my cousin was married there; great uncles and aunts were buried there; the list goes on. Many other families have the same connection to St. Joe’s.

Emotions ran high as the service went on. People who have spent most if not all of their lives going to that church cried as their home was being closed. It wasn’t so much the building for some as it was the memories and friends they have made. The sadness turned to anger as people filed out and many, surprisingly, were talking about abandoning the Catholic Church and turning to a Protestant denomination. They felt abandoned by the faith they have devoted their lives to. It was a sad affair as they lowered the candle from the ceiling and extinguished the flame. For dramatic effect, they turned the lights off as the priest left and we all gathered outside as they locked the doors amongst tears. It was sad affair indeed (even the priest got choked up).

It seems ironic that one of the wealthiest religious denominations in the world would be closing churches. It was indicative of the problems that seem to plague the Roman Catholic Church in America. A shortage of priests and a declining attendance are signs that the Church is faltering here and little if nothing seems to be done to correct the situation. A denomination that was once the most powerful in the country if not the world, seems to be losing its luster and the faithful that remain are victimized by having their houses of worship taken from them.

After we all got through the service, my thoughts and attention turned to the afternoon’s activity and what could be called a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I was fortunate to get a couple of tickets to see His Holiness (H.H.) the 14th Dalai Lama give a public lecture on generating a good heart. I didn’t really know what to expect going into it and I must say, it was an interesting experience. I knew a little about Buddhism but not enough to speak intelligently about it. The Dalai Lama is world-famous and almost everyone in the world knows of his existence and about his basic struggle about the freeing of Tibet. What surprised me about his visit was the amount of protesters who were outside protesting the Dalai Lama. Who protests the Dalai Lama? He is all about peaceful negotiations, winner of the Nobel Piece Prize, leader of a persecuted people… Apparently, he outlawed the worship of a certain deity which some Buddhists are very happy about because they worship Dorje Shugden. I’m sure there are two sides to this whole issue and I’m not going to pretend to claim to know who is right…but protesting the Dalai Lama?!

Anyway, as the Lama himself came out onstage, he struggled to walk but had a large and gracious smile on his face. He began to speak (with his translator by his side) after some formal welcomes and speeches by academic types (in their graduation robes). I was expecting a solemn speech from a quiet and reserved old man but instead got a speech that was broken at times but ultimately, very witty. His sense of humor surprised and I would have to say was my biggest takeaway from the talk. It was refreshing to see this man, a religious world leader, known by so many, considered to be extremely wise, to crack jokes. It showed that no matter how important or wise you are, it’s important to keep things in perspective and be able to take a light-hearted approach to things.

His general message (from what I was able to piece together through broken phrases and heavily accented English) was that the key to generating a good heart was through compassion. By having compassion, you can learn to treat your enemy’s like brothers and sisters and that is the gateway to love. It was a good message overall and he really preached (can Buddhists preach?) a balanced approach to life and harmony (religious and otherwise) which I think is a good thing no matter who you are.

One of the more surprising things he said was that there are some things in life you cannot control and you need to accept that. Because he is Buddhist, he can blame karma, for Christians, you can just blame God. That generated a lot of laughs and perhaps he meant it as a joke but I was surprised by the apathy that statement pointed towards, especially coming from a man who leads his people in exile and struggles for freedom, something he will not achieve in his lifetime. But if you look at this statement in that context, accepting that there are things you cannot change doesn’t necessarily mean you give up on your mission, you just take a more balanced approach and don’t let your expectations consume you.

Overall, it was neat just to see the Dalai Lama as few people (at least in this country) have the opportunity.

Unofficial Reunion

2008-06-29T18:20:00.001-07:00

When I stop and think about high school seems like such a long time ago. I remember a few years ago feeling old when I looked at current high school students and realized how young they were. Recently, I’ve realized the same thing about college students but that is neither here nor there. About a month or so ago, I reconnected with some old friends from high school (actually, middle school: Christine Ma and Matt Williams) and we realized that ten years ago this month, we graduated high school. We knew that we wouldn’t have an official reunion because our class president was MIA. So, offhandedly, we mused about having an unofficial 10-year reunion. While I didn’t think it would happen, the wheels were set in motion by Christine stalking people’s e-mail addresses off of Facebook and sending out an eVite. The list was limited to about 20 people or so based on what we found, the fact that we wanted to invite people we actually talked to in High School, and my house had limits on how many people could fit into it.

There was quite a list of people that were invited (and I must say, it’s impressive how we were able to find contact information for most of these people, many of which we haven’t spoken to in ten years; without the advent of social networking websites, this would never have been possible). As we discussed the invite list, I found myself having trouble recollecting some people and worse, not remembering one person outright (a sign of age). In all, we had about 9 people show up (all of whom I remembered well) and it was actually a great time. Moreover, it was a eclectic group of people consisting of friends from middle school, high school, and even a revered, retired faculty member. All in all, everyone was doing well for themselves. We had a public school teacher (Matt Williams), a former Philadelphia Inquirer journalist in the midst of a job transition (Christine Ma), a surgeon (Arju Ali), a theatre sound engineer (Andi Sotzing), a pastor (Dave Matchette), a celebrity Philadelphia meteorologist (Erica Grow), a entrepreneur who is managing a carwash that was recently purchased by his family (Mike “Schneids” Schneider), a procurement commodity manager (me), and a retired English teacher turned community activist (Mr. Roger Hudak). It was a great bunch and we were able to reminisce, converse, and laugh for about 8 hours. There were a few others that I would have loved to see but it was a great group.

As I’ve thought about my educational experience, it was a good one overall. I really had a great time in both high school and middle school (which I have found is a rare thing). I’ve met so many great people and great educators who have impacted my life; many of which I will never see again. It seems like such a long time ago I was so afraid to enter the public school system in six grade; fretting over whether or not I would be able to get my locker open or whether I would find my next class. It’s amazing how you get older, all of those experiences that took seven years to build lump together as you get older.

In the ten year span since high school, we’ve all gone separate ways and established our own identities outside of the high school realm. What struck me were the diverse career paths that were in the room. More importantly, when I asked everyone whether or not they could ever imagined in high school they would be doing what they are today, no one could have predicted it which was ironic. I’m constantly amazed at how life never really goes as you predict and all of us were proof of that.

Chi-town

2008-03-24T19:45:00.000-07:00

MARCH 23RD, 2008
CHICAGO

To celebrate my two days of unemployment, I decided to return to one of my favorite cities – Chi-town. It was a good opportunity to make up for a missed New Year’s Eve visit and see both Doug and Debbie as well as get the chance to see Jon and Emily.

Trips to Chicago are usually surrounded by adventure and good times and this time proved to be no different beginning with the drive to airport. I decided to fly Southwest into Midway because it was cost effective and less prone to delays. As I got started early Thursday morning, I was running a little late because I had to get gas, hit the ATM, and get stuck behind one of the slowest drivers in the world on a single back-ish road to the Turnpike. As I hit the highway, I became a little concerned that I may not make it to the airport in time as I was already feeling rushed.

I get to the airport in the knick of time just to find out that *surprise* the Economy lot is full. I start to become a little more worried as I make a mad dash (cutting off cars left and right) as I get back on 95 to head to some offsite parking. I make it there, park, and hop on the mini-bus that will take me to the terminal, just to wait while the overly optimistic driver goes to newly arriving cars and sluggishly helps them with their bags.

We get moving eventually and I get dropped off at the Southwest terminal. I rush into the gate to find that my particular flight leaves out of Terminal D and not the main Southwest Terminal which is E. Because Philadelphia is such a spectacular airport, you can’t get from Terminal E to D once you pass through security and there is a maze of hallways in between that one has to navigate. I get to look important by running into people to find that the security line for Terminal D is about 4 x’s as long as the one in E which excites me. I get to the screeners and should have ample time to make the flight. However, in my haste this morning, I forgot to remove my toiletries and place them in a 1 quart see through bag. The wonderfully cheery TSA reps pulled my luggage, slapped on the latex gloves and started to go through everything. The guy said “I’m going to ask that you don’t speak to me while I go through your bags.” No problem except that the same guy proceeds to ask me questions while he is rifling through my things. Do I answer? Or do I follow his earlier advise? You just can’t win with these people. After carefully examining each item in front of everyone and actually holding up the line, he decides to put some items back in my bag while others he has to throw away.

Now let me take a step back. I admit that I didn’t follow the rules. However, the guy went through and examined them by hand. Why, oh why would he have to throw them out? Because they weren’t in a clear plastic bag?? I know that Ziplock bags are rates to withstand an explosion equivalent to a quarter stick of dynamite but come one – what is so important about those little bags? Is he punishing me because I didn’t follow the rules? If so, I’m not in kindergarten anymore…

I loathe the TSA. I should qualify – I loathe the TSA at the Philadelphia airport.

Anyway, Southwest in the meantime has decided to implement a thoroughly confusing boarding procedure which I decided to bypass and go right onto the plane. The flight went really smooth from there which gave me a chance to de-stress a bit.

I arrive in Chi-town, take the Orange Line to some random station and meet Doug who was my chauffeur. Doug has decided that he doesn’t like engineering anymore so he has taken the bold step of going back to school to get a masters in Apple Maggot Flies. Well, I don’t really know what his degree is in other than it has to do with plants, and one of the flash cards he was studying had Apple Maggot Flies written on it. He had his final exam at Northwestern that afternoon so I took the opportunity to head up there and see the campus. I must say, while nice, I was not impressed. I was expecting this big, antique campus and it failed to deliver. They had a few old buildings but they were a bit boxy. At least I saw it and got some good pictures. It was the first time I got to take the camera out and really exercise it.

That night we headed to a restaurant called Uncommon Grounds (which is not to be confused with a great coffee shop in Burlington, VT by the same name).

The next day, Chicago celebrated the first day of Spring by dumping about 8 inches of snow on us. Whenever I go to Chicago, it seems to bring out the worst of its weather for me and that’s exciting. Last time, it was negative 300 degrees and this time, it snows…a lot…the first day of Spring. But we were not deterred. Doug and I went to a Conservatory (the plant kind, not the music kind) and it was actually pretty cool. A lot of the flowers were in bloom and it was in this massive greenhouse. Afterwards, we stopped for some tea and hung out of bit before dinner.

Jon and Emily were planning on making the long trek from DeKalb to enjoy dinner with us but were sadly deterred by the ice and snow. Safety first people! So, Doug, Debbie and I decided to take the reservations anyway and headed to Greek-town to a restaurant called Costas. It was a pretty good place that set cheese on fire…OOPA! I got this sampler which was really good but made my stomach feel a bit unsettled for the rest of the night. While we missed Jon and Em, good times were had.

At the restaurant, this couple came in and was about to sit next to a family with kids. They asked to be re-seated – apparently kids are contagious. This couple reminded me of the Julia-Louise Dreyfuss couple from Christmas Vacation. And they were equally as annoying; ironically, more annoying than the table with kids. The woman decided to talk on her cell phone the whole night and share with the restaurant how they just got back from Fort Lauderdale and will be going back soon, how they will meet people in Vegas, and most notably, she began every conversation with “Hiiiiiii, it’s John and Kimmers!!!!!”. Subesquently, Doug and Debbie became Douggers and Debbers for the rest of the weekend and probably for a good while.

We concluded the evening with and old skool game of Wizard (a specialized card game similar to standard card game Oh Hell! If you even know what that is). I almost won but Doug took me at the very end.

The next day, Douggers and Debbers were supposed to play Ultimate Frisbee and since I had not the desire to play in the snow or the freezing cold, I had planned to spend the day in the Loop (Downtown Chicago). At the last minute, their game was cancelled and they joined me. We had read in the paper that Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 was National Pillow Fighting Day and there was supposed to be a pillow fight downtown by the art museum.

I should take a step back and let you know that any adventure I planned with these guys usually ends up in disappointment. This was a prime candidate to continue that tradition so we decided to start our day there. On the train ride down, we saw a few people with pillows and we started to get pretty excited.

The event was based along the concept of a “flash mob”. It started as a social experiment by a guy and is meant to have something happen “randomly”. More information is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_mob

Anyway, a group of people gathered at the corner of Millenium Park and at the “leader’s” whistle, they ran down to the art museum screaming a pillow fight ensued. There were about 40-50 people and it was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. The security people at the art museum had no idea what was going on and these people were going at it. One guy had a fro wig and his pillowcase had “Momma said knock you out” silkscreened on it. Priceless.

After laughing hysterically and taking waaaay too many pictures, we headed up to Millenium Park, played around on some of the sculptures ultimately making our way up to what is my absolute favorite sculpture….ever – the Silver Bean. For those who haven’t seen it, it is a huge bean that is made of mirrorlike metal. It reflects the entire skyline and is simply awesome. My only problem with it is that it’s a bean and therefore belongs in Boston but I can get over that seeing as I am in Chicago more than I am in Boston (odd, isn’t it?).

We walked the Maginificent Mile making our way to the John Hancock building and in turn up to it’s observation deck. We got a great view of the skyline on a beautiful day. On our way back home, we went to a restaurant called Chicago and Pizza Oven Grinders. Douggers had been raving about this for the past couple visits and we decided to give it a chance despite the fear of a 2 hour+ wait. The restaurant is certainly unique in both it’s menu as well as it’s host. You see, you don’t give your name, you just give the guy the number in your party. He remembers your face and finds you when your table is ready. Douggers said it isn’t foolproof but it worked that night and I must I was impressed. Debbers had imvested a significant amount of thought into how to get seated the quickest. We learned that the host remembers girls more than guys and that face time in important.

The menu is also unique. They don’t sell normal pizza like you would think of it. They sell oven grinders which is basically pizza made in a soufflé dish with a special meat sauce and the crust on top. It comes out looking like a mushroom with the crust on top and the waiter basically flips it and scoops the pizza out of the dish. Good eats.

We finished the evening with a fire, some Smores, and our traditional game of Scrabble. The next morning, we had breakfast at m. Henrys which is a GREAT little breakfast place in their part of town. We headed to the airport for a smooth flight home where I got ready for my first day on the new job.

Oh, and that offisite parking place….$15.98 per day! That’s compared to the $9 in Economy. Oooooooooo, I was pissed.

New job

2008-03-06T16:08:00.001-08:00

Yesterday, I gave my two weeks notice and it was an intimidating prospect. It’s so strange for me to think that I’m ending my tenure at a place which has had such a profound impact on my life over the past few years. I’ve learned a lot while at Lutron; what to do and what not to do. I’ve worked with people I respect and people I don’t. It’s hard not to struggle with the fact that all of my efforts over the past 5 ½ years are for naught.

In two weeks, I leave Lutron for a better opportunity at B. Braun medical. It seems like a great company that is progressive and growing. I'm going to be a Corporate Commodity Manager which is apparently a big deal there. My commute is shorter and it's definitely a good step up.

But first thing is first. Along with my resignation comes the fleeting sense and awareness that I could be making a mistake; the I shouldn’t have made the choice I did and kept with what was safe and comfortable. I know that I could survive at my current place of employment and be secure for quite some time. Coupled with that would be a large amount of frustration and a career that won't get me where I need to be professionally.

In the end, I know deep down that I’m making the right decision. This move will help build a solid foundation to advance my career to senior management level someday and that’s exciting. I won’t be perfect and there are some ways in which I will fall short of their expectations but that’s okay. But, it's better in pretty much all regards - money, advancement opportunities, culture, and the fact that I have a biiiiig office (with multiple windows). However, my friend Jeff was quick to point out that while my office may have more windows than his, I don't have a closet. I told him that a Senior Vice President (his title) deserves a closet and I don't...yet. That seemed to pacify him.

But before I can get truly excited about this move, I have to deal the reality of my resignation. I have to handle it in a professional manner but I need to be truthful in my reasons for leaving. There are certainly things about Lutron that I will miss; some of the relationships that I’ve been able to build there have been fantastic and I hope to stay in touch with some people. In addition though, I hope to meet a new cast of characters as I move on.

After I resigned, I have to say, it's been awesome. Word has started to leak out and the reaction I get from everyone has been awesome. Some people are jealous, some are sad to see me go, but overall, everyone believes I'm making the right decision that helps tremendously. It's also funny to see some people live vicariously through me, ask me for contact info and tell me to "keep my eyes open" for any opportunities that might be of service to them.

So here goes nothing... These are exciting times indeed.

DVD's

2007-12-27T13:04:00.000-08:00

Over the past few years, I've picked up the bad habit of collecting DVD's. This is mainly due to Best Buy's $10 DVD sales that are meant to get people in the store to buy things that they actually make a profit on.

This Christmas, my list consisted mainly of DVD's and as I began to organize the collection and unwrap them, I became consumed with anger as I usually do whilst trying to open the cases. My question is a simple one: why, oh why, do they need to make DVD's so hard to open? The answer you would probably get from the evil DVD conglomerate is that they are trying to prevent people from stealing DVD's from the stores; if people can open the case, they can find the magical sensor bar that sets the alarms off and discard it onto the floor (or more strategically, put it in someone else's bag or pocket).

So they need theft prevention, I get that. I would go so far to say that the shrink wrap they cover it in should be enough. I've never seen a Best Buy store that isn't crawling with employees or at least full of people meandering about. Doesn't one think that trying to get shrink wrap (the crinkly kind that not only makes noise when you look at it but also has a propensity to stick [via static] to parts of one's body they didn't even know they had) would be kind of obvious? Wouldn't they get caught?

But no, the evil conglomerate goes further and puts this clear label placed with Gorilla Glue over the top that is nearly impossible to remove without damaging the plastic case. Worst yet, some conglomerates are more evil than others and put similar labels on the side AND the bottom. If you are lucky enough to get them off, then they attack you by wrapping themselves around your fingers, on your jeans, and across your rear end. Perhaps someone would think it amusing to walk around with a "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" label across your butt (and no, I don't have that movie) but not I.

This is further proof that the world is against me... Or just telling me that I should stop spending so much money on DVD's...

The Kiddie Table

2007-11-23T19:39:00.000-08:00

The kiddie table has long been a refuge at holiday gatherings but this year, there was an egregious violation. To be fair, in order for a violation to occur, there has to be a clear set of rules. After a quick search, I came up empty handed, so I submit to the world a framework that can be built upon as necessary.

Rule 1: Actual kids get the first dibs at the table. If they choose to forfit their positions, the next-youngest person has a right to the table.

Rule 2: The youngest person at the table has the right to be designated "Table Overlord" and thus has the authority to say who can and cannot sit at the table. (Note: This right does not exempt this person from possible repricussions based on decisions made).

Rule 3: If you are over 50 years old, you are banished from the kiddie table. Chances are, if you are that old, the people at the kid's table will be making fun of you. If you are present, this becomes impossible and greatly detracts from the enjoyment of the holiday.

Rule 4: If you are crazy, you are also banished from the kid's table UNLESS you are "funny crazy" which is to be solely determined by rightful occupants. Crazy people include but are not limited to:

a) People who own more than 2 cats
b) People who do not leave their town of residence at least once a month
c) Women who send letters to priests with little heart stickers on them
d) People who think that the actual kid's at the table are their own children when in fact, they are not

The rules are simple. Sadly, rules 3 and 4 were broken this year detracting from the usual pleasure I get from poking fun at relatives who deserve it. Instead, I enjoyed my Turkey in silence - at least it was good Turkey.

High School Rivalries...

2007-11-03T19:51:00.000-07:00

Today, I was on my way to grocery store and while driving by my old high school, I noticed that the nice, big, expensive message board was covered, wrapped to be more precise, in thick, clear plastic. This could mean only one thing - this was the week of the Liberty/Freedom footbal game.

For those of you who aren't locals, Liberty was the name of my high school and Freedom was the "other" high school across town. Every year, the teams would meet in one of the biggest games of the year. It wasn't big in the sense that Freedom was a difficult opponent but more that they were our number one rival. [Note: It's always a good policy to have a rival that is never as good as you and that you always beat].

The best part of the rivalry was the week leading up to the big game - aka Spirit Week. Every day, there was some event meant to boost school spirit and decorations all over the place. What made Spirit Week special was the war that students waged on the other school. It got so bad that they had to stop having the football game on a Friday night and had to move it to Saturday afternoons.

Back in the day, we used to cause all sorts of havoc. Freedom students once let chickens loose in our band room. Liberty students, in what was not our proudest moment, poured red and blue (our school colors) Kool-Aid into their pool not realizing that the filters would mix them together and turn the pool purple. In addition to the good-natured fun, things turned dirty and people would vandalize the other school's property.

But of all the hype, there were three stories that I will remember fondly; two of which happened during my tenure and the third happening the year after I graduated.

1) Freedom's homeroom was held in the gym every morning. My friend Lisa and a crew of band members (with her dad's help I believe), managed to put a tape recording of Liberty's fight song and some speakers into a clarinet case which in turn was soldered shut. They then snuck into Freedom's homeroom and strategically placed said cases into a pile of other cases Freedom's band members had placed against a wall. As homeroom began, the fight song began to play over and over again and no one could find the source. Eventually, they located the cases but couldn't get them opened. It turned into a large scale effort with people throwing the cases at the wall to get them to stop.

2) The night before the game was typically the time that Freedom made their move on our high school. We had received intelligence that they were planning a hit on our band room late at night. At the time, I was in charge of all the lighting and sound in our auditorium (it's not as nerdy as it sounds, I swear) so I have access to a few spotlights. The entrance to our bandroom was in a square parking lot with only one entrance. We had positioned about three spotlights in various elevated areas and had about 50 people hidden in various spots in the area ready with water balloons and other weapons. We were about to give up at about 1am when a car came around the corner of the building with no headlights running on silent. When the car stopped, the invaders got out....SHUNK....SHUNK.....SHUNK... three spotlights on them and the attack began. The poor guys didn't stand a chance but it was war. We won that battle in a big way.

3) Our rival is a fortress-like citadel with a mushroom like shape. Across the roof along a flat part of a wall is "FREEDOM HIGH SCHOOL" in nice letters that spans the entire complex. Some people got the brilliant idea to make two banners, sneak up to the roof, and throw the banner over the wall so it read "Liberty HIGH SCHOOL Forever!". When the student arrived the next morning, they were all shocked to see it. The principal at the time got the great idea to have a little pep rally at the end of the day and have a ceremony to cut down the banners. The perpetrators heard of this and decided that they would join the pep rally pretending to be Freedom students. As they cut the banners down, they went up, grabbed them before they hit the ground and started running (rolling the large banners as they went). They were in turn chased by essentially the entire school. They made it back to a waiting car and sped off without harm. To add insult to injury, we hung the banners on our side of the bleachers the night of the game.

Rivalries are great and I was fortunate to have a good cross town high school rival...

Greece and Turkey....Please!

2007-10-09T21:50:00.000-07:00

After and exhausting week and long plane ride, I have returned from a 10 day excursion through the islands of Greece and Turkey. After visiting Rome and Egypt, I wanted to finish out the ancient empires and visit some of the sites in Athens and experience the part of Europe (and Asia Minor) that many people who backpack through Europe don't normally experience.

MY TRAVEL PARTNER:

My travel partner this time was Joe Grzywacz (don't bother trying to pronounce the last name linguists are still arguing over it). Most of my friends don't really know Joe because I met him some time ago while interning at IBM in Burlington, Vermont. Joe went to the University of Illinois and got his degree (bachelors and masters) in Computer Engineering. For a time, Joe was a professional intern hopping about the country and working for the likes of IBM and Intel before settling down in Silicon Valley working for nVidia. I threw the idea of going on a vacation to Joe and he had indicated that he would be interested in going to see the Greek Islands. Since that was my number one choice anyway, very little convincing needed to be done on either side.

Joe proved to be a good travel partner and his eccentricities only added to the trip (which will be explained later).

THE TOUR GROUP:

I once again used Contiki which specializes in 18-35 year olds. I think it's the only tour group in the world that focuses on that age group and it's been a pretty successful business model for them. Our tour leader was Jess Glennon from Australia. She had been away from home doing tours for the past three years and in Athens for just over a year. This was her second to last tour before quitting and returning home to pursue a masters degree in tour management or something like that. I have to admit that I had a little bit of a crush on Jess. She was cute and very laid back. The Australian accent sealed the deal for me because we know I'm a sucker. But nothing came of that.

The group itself numbered about 30 and it was a wide mix of people from America, Canadia, Brazil, Bolivia, Mexico, New Zealand, and of course, Australia. There were two groups of Canadians, one being a couple (the wife being a travel agent). The other group of Canadians were four friends (two married couples) who were pharmacists, had a love for backgammon, and were aboot as Canadian as you get, eh? There were a few Americans representing from the West Coast – Jason, a social worker from Seattle, Melissa from San Jose who was bore a striking resemblance to Amy Poehler. She was traveling with her friend Ellanora from Seattle who was an assistant manager at Starbucks and liked to dance. Then came Cory and Dave from Oregon who worked at Intel. Cory seemed like he was from a different planet but was actually from Kansas. He was very eccentric and lived by his maps and guidebook and was thus dubbed "Lonely Planet" by the rest of the group. We also had Frank who was a recent Ole Miss grad from Nashville. Mike and Susan were a bit older (37 and 31 respectively), insurance adjusters from St. Louis, and made for very good company. Rounding out the American contingent was Supriya, an unemployed lawyer from San Francisco. She quit a high powered law firm and then decided to travel for a while before figuring out what she wants to do next.

Contributing to the international flair of the group was Kristen and Dorothy (?) from Australia who happen to be our neighbors. Alex was another Aussie which we'll discuss a little later. Rounding out the Aussie/New Zealand contingent were four girls, two of which we never really saw or talked to much throughout the week. The other two however proved to be constant source of amusement. They were on their way to London to work as bartenders (naturally) for two years. Alanna (technically from New Zealand) was the most amusing of the bunch as she enjoyed being drunk almost every night. There was Marcel from Brazil and Eduardo from Bolivia who failed to get a multi-entry visa and was thus delayed and had to join the tour group later on in the week. There were three girls from Mexico who were very independent and seemed to have an amazing grasp on the skill of talking. Throughout the whole week, they would be constantly talking about something, first in English then in Spanish. They would provide amusement at various points with their cackle.

As I stated before, the group was a good one. We had the right mix of people we got along with, were apathetic to, could make fun of, and were amused by.

THE SHIP:

The night prior to disembarking on our high seas adventure, Jess informed us that we were pretty lucky because we would be cruising on the Cristal. Despite being named for a very expensive champagne, it was also the best and newest ship in the fleet of three that was owned by Louis Cruise Lines so that was a reassuring thought. We would later learn that the Cristal replaced a ship that sank about two years ago (no one died but there was a Contiki group on it) because the captain apparently had a little too much ouzo and hit a reef…oops.

The ship was technically a "destination ship" which meant that it wasn't a normal cruise ship with all the amenities that one would expect; it's sole purpose was to get passengers from point a to point b. That being the case, the ship was pretty decent. It consisted of 9 decks, a couple of restaurants, a pool lounge/bar, sun deck, and the Starz Disco Lounge which would become nightly hotspot for our crew.

This was my first cruise and I must say that it was an experience. I'm a big fan of boats, I've always loved them and always will. I was curious to see how being on a big boat would fit into that and I've got mixed reviews. The ship is so large that you can easily forget that you are on a boat (if you ignore the subtle-most-of-the-time rocking and listing. We chose to take an inside cabin because it was cheaper and I typically don't have an issue with sea-sickness (note I said typically). Well, we quickly learned that having an inside cabin has two significant downfalls – 1) they are smaller. Our room had to be 6 feet by 15 feet and that included two beds, a dresser, a desk, two closets, and a bathroom with a toilet and shower. Luckily the room was only really needed for changing, sleeping, and showering otherwise I would have gone nuts. Showering in a confined space was interesting because you didn't want water to go and when you gently brushed the shower curtain (which was the only thing separating you from the rest of the bathroom), it took that as an invitation to envelope you and stick to you like a spider web which was very exciting, clean, and comfortable…

The most striking part about the cruise for me was the demographic of the clientele. As soon as I got on the boat, I ask to ask the porter to ensure I was in fact on a boat and not an AARP convention. Our group brought the average age on the boat down by about 30 years. Now, don't get me wrong, I typically don't mind old people – it's just that they have a very different approach to life then people in my age group. I also fully admit that I will be the same way when I hit their age; it's just that I'm thankful I have a long way to go before I get there and I plan to cherish every moment. They get excited about dressing up for fancy dinners on the boat with their sequin gowns and suits, are wide awake at 7am for excursions, and go to bed after the early sitting at dinner. Conversely, no one in our group brought any real nice clothes, slept through most of the excursions, and stayed up until 2-3 in the morning. What cracked me up (or annoyed me depending on the day) was the way they went about the whole cruise experience. These people lived for the excursions and talked about them with a lot of vigor and excitement. They were also very pushy. On more than one occasion, a few of them thought it was appropriate to cut in line at the buffet. My friends in turn politely informed them that there was no need to rush – since the food was included in the tour, there was no Senior Citizen discount that would expire after a certain time.

One group in particular stuck out seeing as they thought it would be in fashion to wear their oversized name badges on their lanyards the whole week, everywhere they went. It was almost as if they got a sense of security from wearing those badges. It made a statement along the lines of "I feel so safe now because if I wander off and get lost, people will know what to do with me and what tour group to send me to". Now personally, I would not choose to wear such a thing on the streets of Instanbul while walking between the mosques. I would much rather prefer to walk around with a T-Shirt that had a big target on it for the pick-pockets and jihad-ists.

If it weren't for the Contiki group, Joe and I would have gone nuts and threw some people overboard. I do need to note that I met some fun old people on the trip from Scotland, Georgia, Florida, and Canadia. However, they were offset by the French Canadians so we'll call it a wash. There was also one crazy person but we shall discuss him in more detail later.

The bottom line is that I'm not cut out for cruises unless I know there will be a contingent of people who are younger than 40 years old. Perhaps it was the type of cruise I was on or the part of the world I was traveling in but I certainly need to do research on any cruise before I sign up for it.

DAY 1: DEPART FOR GREECE

The days leading up to the big trip were very stressful between work and classes. So much so that I was actually not really excited about the trip. I know it sounds ridiculous and I came to my sense later in the week. Hanging out with Aussies really helps you put your life back into perspective and gets you back on the "work to live" philosophy and I really needed that.

Joe's flight was supposed to come into Philadelphia at 11pm but got delayed in Minneapolis and didn't end up landing until after midnight which was exciting. After picking him up, we stopped for some genuine Philly Cheese Steaks at Pat's.

Our Continental flight departed from Newark at 5pm the following day and it was a direct overnight flight to Athens. The flight over was actually pretty smooth for me. Joe had a hard time sleeping but I was able to handle it pretty well with essentially no jet lag.

DAY 2: ARRIVAL IN ATHENS

We arrived in Athens a little past 10 in the morning. As we flew in, I was surprised to see how arid the landscape was in Greece. I was expecting lush, green, landscapes but it was not to be so. What surprised me further later was the fact that certain islands in Greece are extremely abundant in agriculture (fruits, etc.) so the landscape is fairly deceiving.

After we landed, we headed for the train lines and took the Blue Line into Syntagma Square which is a major station in downtown Athens. After the 30 minute train ride, we stepped out into the square and our adventure began. First, we had to resist the temptation of the McDonald's that stood before us in order to seek out our hotel. The Hermes Hotel is situation on 10 Apollonos Street about three blocks from Syntagma. We found is with relative ease and checked in. The Hermes was Joe's first introduction to the concept of the European Hotel. A five star hotel for them (for the most part) is equivalent to the accommodations you would get at an EconoLodge in the United States. The first challenge was getting our luggage up to our room on the fourth floor. This proved to be more difficult than one would think. Perhaps the only thing more unique than European hotel rooms are elevators that take you to said rooms. The elevator was actually a door that we mistook for a closet. We hit the button and say their waiting for a good five minutes. It was then we noticed the Greek lady behind the reception desk staring at us awkwardly. After another minute, a kind gentleman came up to us and told us that we actually had to open the door to the elevator. This was a novel concept to us considering we were waiting for the doors to slide open automatically. Once we deciphered that puzzle, Joe and I decided that we would try and fit ourselves into the 3ft x 3ft elevator (no exaggeration). This also proved to be very difficult. But lo and behold, victory was ours and we arrived at our hotel room only to find our next challenge: how to turn the lights and air conditioning on. It took us about another five minutes to figure out you had to place the room key into a slot by the door to turn everything on. Once you did, the room lit up like magic. Once you removed it, everything turned off. Brilliant.

After getting settled, it was time for me to tackle the bathroom. I'm just going to come out and say it – European bathrooms and I don't get along. It all started in Rome with a bad experience with a bidet that I don't care to recount and has been fairly bad since – be it finding light switches, hot water, or figuring out how to flush the toilet. My bathroom experiences in Greece weren't actually that bad with the following two exceptions. First, there was not shower curtain in our hotel room, just a piece of glass that came out about a quarter of the length of the tub. There was a drain on the main bathroom floor that was supposed to handle the water that splashed everywhere. That, in combination with the hand held showerhead made for a unique experience. The second interesting fact about bathrooms in Greece is that you aren't allowed to flush toilet paper. The sewer system there is so ancient that it can't handle the strain apparently. I had heard rumors of this prior to my arrival but it's not a very great thing to deal with. As an alternative to flushing, every bathroom has a little garbage can next the toilet that you are supposed to use. Great.

After a brief shower and a nap, I would resist the temptation of McDonald's no more. It's not because I'm a McDonald's-a-holic or that I'm an annoying American. It's just that it was close, convenient, and I've eaten at one in nearly every country I've been to if not all. After lunch, Joe and I decided to explore Athens a little bit.

Our first stop was across Syntagma Square to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier which is right in front of Greece's Parliament building. In front of the tomb area is large section of pavement that the pigeons seemed to have conquered and use for the base of operations throughout the city. They flocked around in a circle on the ground and people could walk into their circle, stick out their arms, and the pigeons would fly on them and perch on their shoulders and arms. I initially thought that this would be a neat picture to get but then I realized that it would entail me having pigeons actually on me so I thought better of it. After I got over my fascination with the pigeon flocking, I turned my attention to the tomb.

Two soldiers dressed in traditional garb consisting of Shriners-type hats with long tassels, a beige uniform with a skirt, wool stockings that look like long underwear, and clogs with little pom-poms guard Greece's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I think that the uniform was one of the reasons that Greece was occupied since ancient times until fairly recently. We happened to arrive just in time for their changing of the guard (which was very interesting). It involvied some ritualistic walking that seemed fit for Monty Python's Ministry of Silly Walks. While it wasn't anything close to the pomp and circumstance involving the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, it was a nice and unexpected thing to watch. After the guard had changed, everyone took their turn getting pictures with the soldiers who weren't allowed to move. Surprisingly, they let you get right up close and stand next to them.

After watching that, Joe and I decided to go for a walk through the National Gardens adjacent to the Parliament building. It really amounted to a bunch of crisscrossing paths and trees. At the end, we came to a large building with pillars called the Zappion. This serves as a general art and exhibition center. It was empty when we went to take a look but it had some decent architecture with a round open air forum and two levels supported by pillars. The Gardens let out to a street adjacent to the Temple of the Olympian Zeus. Since you had to pay to get in, Joe and I decided we would wait to explore this until our return to Athens later in the week. From the gate, the Temple didn't really look all that impressive as it was simply about six columns standing. In it's day, I'm sure it was magnificent but as with most of the ruins in Greece they were sparse. Most of that was either due to a) the British, b) the Turks, or c) earthquakes.

From the Temple of Zeus, you can easily see the Acropolis which is a pretty neat site from a distance. There is a large rock that protrudes from the ground in the middle of downtown Athens on top of which, the Ancient Greeks built a stone wall and foundation (a big wall) to support the Parthenon and other structures that reside on top of it. We decided that we would head down and take a walk around the Acropolis to get ourselves acclimated. Along the way is a large path with a good number of people walking. Behind us was this woman who was in her late 50's/60's. All of a sudden, you hear a loud bark and you see this woman get very startled as a wild dog comes trotting toward her while barking. I should take a quick aside here and mention that Athens, as well as all of Greece and Turkey have a very high number of wild and stray dogs. They are simply part of the city and lounge anywhere and everywhere. They are harmless as long as you leave them alone and don't pet them. Anyhoo, this lady becomes startled and clutches her purse very close to her chest and picks up her purse. They way she clutch the purse indicated that she seemed to be fearful that the dog was not interested in her (and she would have been a decent meal) but only in stealing her purse. As she stepped off to the side, the dog trotted past her barking, setting his eyes on a much better target, a horse drawing a carriage. He began to run over to it but the man driving the coach was ready. He took out his little whip he uses on the horse and whacked the dog a few times to get away. Now, this wasn't a very strong whip so the dog was excited about this and began to play with the whip like it was a toy. Eventually, the horse and dog combo got out of our sights.

We made our way up and around the Acropolis and began to feel the heat of the day upon us. Athens in general is hot. For some reason, it felt like it was 10 degrees hotter around that area. We climbed up the side and found a rock that overlooks all of Athens. Because it's such a large city, it's hard to see all of Athens at once but the view was impressive, smog and all.

After a pit stop, Joe and I headed back to the hotel for a nap before meeting with the rest of our tour group. While resting we decided to watch International CNN only to find out that the dollar hit a new low against the Euro which was thoroughly exciting for us because our trip had just become a lot more expensive. But we were on vacation so it didn't matter. After our siesta, we met up with the Jess and the gang around 7pm to get some orientation.

After the meet and greet, a few of us went on a little excursion to have an authentic Greek meal at a Taverna in the Plaka area. The Plaka area is the oldest part of Athens that surrounds the Acropolis. It consists of very narrow streets that only motorcycles would be brave to enough to try and lots of shops, tourist and otherwise. It's actually pretty neat walking around the area at night as it hustles and bustles. We sat down at the restaurant in a narrow side room. For 33 Euro, each table got a course sampling and a bottle of wine (the white was better than the red). The meal, as with all Greek meals it seems consisted of a) Greek Salad which is a misnomer because their isn't really any salad in it – just tomatoes, cucumbers, and olives, b) fried Zucchini, c) Beans, and d) the main course of chicken or pork on a stick. Halfway through the meal, these Greek dancers came in and did a little show which was nice. What made the night fun though was that the restaurant was full of Australians who were clapping along and having a great time.

After a nice dinner (and if I'm being honest, the experience was better than the food which is not to say the food was bad), we walked back towards the hotel and most of us carried on to local bar/nightclub called Lavabora that Jess knew about. We arrived around 10pm and the place was absolutely empty. The setting was actually pretty cool – an open area mainly with a large bar and a DJ on the second floor. We all have a beer and a shot of Metaxa which is a Greek brandy. After about a half an hour, young Greeks began to pour in and fill the place up making it quite a lively spot. Greeks (and Europeans in general) don't really start their night until 10pm – midnight. What was funny about the scene was the most of the people in the club looked like they were 18. After some drinking and dancing, we decided to make our way back to the hotel for a good rest seeing as we didn't have to get up until a bit later the next day.

DAY 3: DEPARTURE

After an easy morning (and a terrible breakfast), the crew met to head down to the port of Piraeus where we would meet our boat, the M/V Cristal. After a short bus ride to the port, our appreciation for not having to drive anywhere in Athens grew exponentially. We all got corralled into the passport inspection area and all of us passed through without problems except Eduardo from Bolivia. He apparently needed a multi-entry visa for Greece and did not have one. Sadly, he would have to stay behind and meet us later in the week at one of our stops.

Joe and I boarded and headed to our closet…err…room and off-loaded our stuff. We found out that drinks were not included in our trip so we had to choose between paying per drink or getting an all-inclusive drink pass for 18 euros a day. I was on the fence with this because I didn't really think I could hit that target and break even. However, they had an annoying rule that stated if someone in a cabin gets the all-inclusive, everyone in the cabin had to. Now Joe was all excited about injecting himself with as much alcohol as possible. So, being the good friend I am, I gave in and got it. In the end, I think I came fairly close to breaking even whereas Joe's consumption caused the cruise line to file for bankruptcy.

The first day/night on the boat was free as we set sail for Istanbul. All of use went to work on hitting our 18 euro per day target with no food until dinner at 9pm which perhaps wasn't the wisest of decisions. Also that night, we hit a major storm on the Aegean Sea which led to really rocky seas (the staff rated it an 8 out of 10 with 10 being the absolute worst). The combination of the above two did not sit well with Marc. I tried to give dinner a try but didn't even get past the soup before I had to visit the bathroom. It was so bad that half of our group didn't even make dinner and the reception desk was giving out free Dramamine. After getting my complimentary pill, I retired early and was gently rocked to sleep.

DAY 4: ARRIVAL IN ISTANBUL

Early in the morning, we were awoken by our multilingual cruise director. A few times a day, we would hear a pleasant charm (not as pleasant early in the morning) and she would begin everything with "Ladies and Gentlemen, a very good morning to you…". She would go through her announcement and when she finished, she did it again in Spanish and then in French without missing a beat. While this wasn't bad the first time, it was particularly early. As the week went on, her announcements began to last five minutes and then had to be multiplied by 3 as she did it in each language. Regardless, this morning she was informing us that we were entering the Dardanelles and were about to pass a few monuments commemorating the efforts of Australian/New Zealand soldiers and Turkish soldiers in WWI. I decided to roll out of bed and head up to the deck to take a couple pictures of the fairly plain stone monuments. Unimpressed, I went back to bed to be awoken once again by the cruise director announcing that we were passing a mountain or something that seemed insignificant at the time. It was Joe's turn to get up to see if it was anything significant and it wasn't.

Later in the day, I was sitting on the deck with Frank and an older Australian woman came up to us and started talking to us about the monuments we saw in the morning and explained their significance (and I'm glad she did). The monuments were meant to commemorate the landing of Australian and New Zealand troops (ANZAC – Australia and New Zealand Armed Corps.) WWI was the first time that these countries sent troops into war under their own flag and it was a very big deal to them. It turned out that they had landed at the wrong beach and were totally massacred (after taking quite a few Turks with them). The countries were heartbroken and honored their men as heroes. More importantly, it signified their independence to the world and was the basis for the ANZAC holiday that they celebrate today.

We passed the rest of the day by just relaxing, hanging out, and drinking. I eventually got involved in teaching some of the foreigners Rummy. The time passed fairly quickly as we began to approach Istanbul. I headed up to the top deck to watch our approach. As we approached, the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia dominated the background as you cruise past them on your way to the port.

Unfortunately, the weather was poor since we set sail and the forecast for our time in Istanbul didn't look great but all turned out fairly well. Around 5pm, we began to approach the city. If you are going to go to Istanbul, arriving by boat is the way to go. The city is impressive in its scale as it hugs the coastline for miles and miles as you approach the city center. Istanbul is unique in that it is the only city to span two continents. On the left as you approach the city is the European side and the commercial center of the city. Across a bridge is the Asian side of the city where most of the residential area is.

We pulled into port and it was time for our first excursion – a night out in Istanbul. One of the biggest disappointments of the trip was the fact that we were going to spend most of the day Sunday touring Istanbul. While this doesn't sound terrible, it means that the Grand Bazaar was going to be closed. Since we pulled into port on Saturday, they were going to try and bus us out to the Grand Bazaar that evening for a little experience. However, because the sea was so choppy the night before that our arrival was delayed. Since we didn't pull into port until 6:00, it would have been impossible to get to the Grand Bazaar before it closed at 7. Instead, we were taken to the smaller and closer Spice Market.

When we arrived, there was a large tent set up next to the market with a long line a people in front of it. It turned out that we were there in the middle of Ramadan. Since Turkey is 99% Muslim, it's a pretty big deal. The downside is that people can't eat between sunrise and sunset but the upside is that the party starts after sunset. There are huts and stands everywhere that feed people. The tent in front of us was to feed the poor people as there is a heavy focus on helping poor people. During Ramadan, there are lights strung between the minarets of the Mosques that give messages such as the one in our general area: "Yoksulu Gözet" which is Turkish for "Help the poor".

Moving past that, we entered the Spice Market which is in the shape of a "T". It's a pretty standard market with people trying to get you into their shops and make a deal. The unique thing about the Spice Market is that is focuses on spices and very fresh spices. Everywhere you turn, we see vibrant colors that represent all sorts of spices that were brought in that day with Turkish Delights in the backdrop. While the Turkish Viagra was tempting, we tried to push through and see as much of the market as we could given our limited time. We (Joe, Alex, and I) eventually came to this one shop and started talking to this one guy. It turned out his name was "Dennis" (not a very Turkish name but oh well) and he had a stud in his ear that said "Fuck Off" on it (he was a very customer service oriented person). After small talk and the "where are you from" exchange, I eventually asked him how business was going and he said it was terrible. He told us that it would be better if he had a girl to stand out in front to attract customers. I immediately volunteered Alex and a look of terror appeared on her face. Dennis was excited about this prospect and offered to have her move in with him and his family and promised to take care of her. We finished our conversation and walked away before Alex had a massive heart attack.

We came to another guy on the way out who was selling Turkish Tea and Turkish delights. He comes up to me and starts putting this stuff in my arms, telling me how much I like them and what a good deal they were for the price he was asking. I start laughing and begin to try and sell them to the next person that walked by for the same price. He laughs and takes them back from me.

We exited the Spice Market just as they were calling prayer out over the city which is always exciting for me to experience. We headed back on the bus so we could go back to the boat to begin our next excursion that evening.

There were a handful of us and we shared a bus with some of the older passengers who were immediately annoyed with us. The tour guide who went with us was actually pretty cool. He, along with many others in Turkey (and Egypt for that matter), used the word "please" a lot. In fact, he interjected at least once in every sentence. For example: "Please, if you will please notice the soccer stadium to your left please. It is home to Besiktas please; a very popular team here in Istanbul please." We immediately hooked onto that and from this point forward, we would all use the work please as many times as possible please. He also extended the "s" at the end of his words which became important when he used the word "drinks". It sounded something like "drinksssssssssssss" which we also repeatedly echoed throughout the trip much to the disappointment of the old people. We got so rowdy on the bus ride that one gentlemen bellowed: "No drinkssssss for anyone under 50." We consequently booed him loudly.

We finally arrived at our destination, Kervansaray, the "Turkish restaurant and night club". If it wanted to be more accurate it should have read "Turkish Tourist Trap" or even T3 for short. We arrive and cram in like cattle and the show begins. I will say that one of the highlights of the night was the belly dancing. Unlike what I saw in Egypt, these were real belly dancers with many, errr, talents. The best was Asena who is purportedly the most famous belly dance in all of Turkey (a fact that was confirmed by our tour guide). When asked what I liked the most, I easily answered Asena. The girls poked fun at the fact that the guys liked her because of her "talents" but Joe wisely quipped that we like her because she had a lot of charisma. We thus nicknamed Asena "Charisma" and referred to her as such for the remainder of the evening.

Between the belly dancers, they had some people come out and do some traditional dancing from various parts of Turkey. Most of them were actually kind of lame but there was one group that was actually pretty good – these three guys that jumped, kicked, and spun a lot. Now, I'm sure that I'm not doing the history and tradition that went into that dance any justice by describing it simply as jumping, spinning, and kicking, but it gets the point across. At the end of the show (after the belly dancer with the finger cymbals) a guy came out and was a typical lounge singer which cemented the notion of tourist trap in my mind. This guys' act was to sing a song in the languages of all of the people present. For the Americans, he sang "This Land is Your Land" and as is typical with Americans, no one knew the words other than the singer. He then went over to the French Canadians and asked "What country are you from?" to which they replied "Quebec". Now, I may be wrong here but last time I checked, Quebec had not won their civil war and were still part of Canada. He in turn sang Freres Jaques. He also sang songs, for people from Mexico, New Zealand (in Ma'ori), South Africa (Zulu), Korean, Romania, and Brazil (Portuguese). While it was impressive that he knew songs in those languages, it was still a bit campy but the old people ate it up and loved it.

On the way back, we were a little rowdy. Spurred on by the wait staff's amazing ability to use the word please, we kicked our mockery into overdrive. It got so bad that this cranky lady piped up and sarcastically asked "so who's winning the 'please' competition?" We said that we didn't know but we were glad that she joined in…

After we arrived back at the port, I had planned to go find Jess and some other tour mates at a sheesha (spelling?) bar somewhere near the port. Everyone copped out "to go to bed" except Alex who joined me on my excursion. We had some rough directions and headed off into the bustling town (the level of bustling surprised us because it was midnight). In retrospect, it probably wasn't wise to head out into this ridiculously large city so late at night without a larger group but hey, I like to live dangerously. The directions turned out to be a little spottier than usual and we were quickly unsure of our destination. We ended up walking entirely too far and ended up at a bridge that we knew was too far away. On the way back, we walked by the waterfront where countless people were fishing…in the dark…at midnight. We eventually found the row of sheesha bars and they were jammed with people. We couldn't find our crew so we decided to just walk through. Sheesha bars intrigue me – perhaps it's the exotic nature of it or the fact that it's so unique to that area of the world. These places are typically wide areas with pillows on the floor where people just hang out and smoke. It's not like smoking cigarettes and the tobacco doesn't have the normal chemicals that most tobacco does. The funny thing about this place was that there were about seven or eight bars connected to one another so it was just a long area of people smoking and playing backgammon – a lot of backgammon. It's VERY popular in Turkey.

We finally arrived back at the ship (safe and alive) to find that our tour mates did not actually go to bed but got some drinks and headed up to the disco lounge. We hung out for a bit and then went to bed in preparation for our big tour of Istanbul the next day.

DAY 5: ISTANBUL

After a late night, we were all fairly groggy the next morning. The good news was that almost everyone in our group went on the excursion so we had a bus to ourselves. The bad news was that our tour guide was absolutely terrible. We started our day by driving over the bridge to the Asian side of the city which is mostly residential. The cost of living in the city is apparently outrageously high. A house that would sell for $250,000 here in Pennsylvania would sell easily for $4 million USD in Istanbul! The trip to the Asian side was fairly uneventful other than we could say that we were on two continents in one day while staying in one city (which is exciting in its own right). From there, we went to the Blue Mosque which was built to compete with the Hagia Sophia (a very old church that sits next to it). It has six minarets which is fairly rare in Mosques. The story goes that the Sultan wanted a structure built that would dwarf the Hagia Sophia and one of the ways he wanted to do this was to make minarets out of gold. The architect knew that this was not possible from a structural standpoint. The architect also knew that if he told the Sultan it couldn't be done, he would lose his head (talk about a lose-lose situation). However, the architect was clever in that he built six minarets. His saving grace was that the word for "six" and the word for "gold" are extremely similar in that one letter is different. When the Sultan came to inspect his new Mosque, he was furious to see six minarets. The architect explained that he was told and understood six which was not his fault. He went on to explain that gold wasn't possible and the Sultan agreed that his decision was the correct one.

As you approach the Blue Mosque, there were rows of little huts that are put up just for Ramadan. Apparently, the area turns into a carnival-like atmosphere with food and games. At the entrance to the courtyard are two obelisks that were taken from Egypt (obviously).

It has been my experience that Mosques are more interesting on the outside than on the inside whereas Churches are at times the opposite (not the take away from Church exteriors and Mosque interiors). The Blue Mosque is still in use today so we had to take our shoes off and show the proper respect as their were people praying inside. The Blue Mosque gets its name from the millions of little blue tiles that make up mosaic-like decorations inside. Other than that, it was fairly standard inside: plush carpet, wide open, and a wall that faces Mecca. The women are not allowed to pray or worship near the men so as not to be a distraction. Instead, they must stay in a quarantined area in the back or on the second floor balconies.

After exiting the Blue Mosque, you get a good view of the Hagia Sophia which we wouldn't get to see until a bit later. Instead, we were carted off to another tourist trap – a Turkish Rug maker. It is obvious that these excursions are designed for older people because they have money to spend and people are willing to take it from them. We all go into this store and up to the top floor into a large room. We are served some Turkish Tea while the sales guy explains how Turkish Rugs are made and how to tell if they are genuine. The rugs he shows us are outrageously priced but not worse than what you would pay in the United States for one. At one point he showed us a $25,000 rug that was quite elaborate. I've always failed to see the attraction to Turkish rugs but I tried not to spill my tea on them nonetheless.

After the demonstration, we had a ridiculous amount of free time to do nothing. I ventured out and ended up at the Grand Bazaar which was closed because it was Sunday. There were a few shops open so I meandered about. We all got back on the bus and headed back towards the Blue Mosque to the Hagia Sophia (in Greek, it stands for "Holy Wisdom"). The Hagia Sophia was a church built in the 400's so it's a built old. Given that fact and it's massive size, it was quite impressive. After the fall of the Byzantine empire, a sultan turned it into a Mosque and built four minarets around it. Today, however, it has been converted into a museum for everyone to enjoy.

As you walk into the Sophia, you are greeted by massive doors and a sign that tells in Byzatine times, only emperors were allowed to pass through them. The interior is quite impressive. Adding to its intrigue is the Islamic decoration in a church architecture. The coming together of these two very different religions makes a pretty cool experience.

After the Sophia, we went back to the boat for lunch before leaving once again, this time for Topkapi Palace – the residence of the Sultans. The word palace I think is a bit of a misnomer because it isn't what you would expect. Nonetheless, it's unique and expansive. It is dominated by four courtyards and surrounded by numerous buildings that house the armory, the treasury, the library, the portrait gallery, the harem, the receiving room, the circumcision room; the list goes on and on.

As we walked through, the unthinkable happened and it deserves a side note here: my camera died. After 16 countries, 40 states, and 5500 pictures, it decided to have a multiple coronary. The shudder would constantly convulse until I took the batteries out. While it would let me get a couple more pictures off later in the week, it was pretty much a goner. I can't fault it – it's been good to me and provided me a lot of memories but it would have been great if it would have waited a few more days. Thankfully, Joe had a little digital camera he let me borrow for the rest of the week and he had his $5,000 of camera equipment on him.

Back to the story - I went down to the treasury first and there were some impressive things in there. Namely, they had an 86 carrot diamond that was known as the Spooner's Diamond. Apparently, someone foud this diamond unfinished in the trash. Not knowing what it was, he sold it to the local spooner (now there's a profession!) for three spoons. The Spooner in turn sold it to someone who recognized its value who in turn gave/sold it to the Sultan. The Sultan named it the Spooner's Diamond in honor of the guy that bought it for three spoons (and most likely never really profited from it as he should have). They also had the skull and arm of John the Baptist (encrusted in jewels). The thing about the Sultan and his people were that they really liked jewels and they really liked to encrust things in jewels. After the treasury, I went over to the portrait gallery where they had paintings of all of the Sultans from the early 1200's. The interesting thing was that with the exception of hair and beard style, all of the Sultans looked exactly the same; it was quite odd. A funny story about the Sultans – they had a lot of wives/harems/whatever-you-want-to-call-them. Well, it was commonly understood that the eldest son from any of the women would become the Sultan upon their father's death. Further, once that occurred, it was accepted practice for that son to then kill all of his siblings so they couldn't make a move for the throne. This led to a lot of jockeying by the woman so that their child would be eldest. For this to happen, there were a lot of arranged murders on the eldest sons. Eventually, one of the Sultans would be humane and abolish that practice but for a while, they took sibling rivalry to a whole new level.

After the portrait gallery, it was off the armory which was pretty cool. These people really new how to make weapons that would effectively beat their enemies to smithereens. Sharp objects, blunt objects, it didn't matter – they knew how to kill people. They were actually early adopters of firearms as well with really, really oversized rifles.

I was finished with Topkapi and decided to go mourn the loss of my camera in peace and wait for the tour group. While I was walking a little girl decided to go up and pet one of the cute wild doggies. This was not wise. The dog went nuts and lunged at her causing her to retreat screaming. The dog ran off when a vendor threw a water bottle at him as the girl cried learning a valuable lesson – leave the wild dogs alone.

Our day in Istanbul was complete and we were back on the ship heading to our next destination. That evening, the whole group hit up the Starz Disco Lounge and we had a blast dancing the night away with Mosques in the background as we cruised away. At one point in the night, this older woman from Georgia came onto the dance floor and tapped me on the shoulder. She kindly asked me if I would show her how to dance. After showing her a few of my patented moves and having a blast, we got to talking. It turns out that her daughter-in-law works for Lehigh University. It was crazy to me that while in Turkey, halfway across the world, I met someone who knew someone so close to home. The rest of the night was a blast with everyone having a great time.

DAY 6: MYKONOS

The next day, we arrived at Mykonos – the European vacation spot. As it happens, it is also the gay European hotspot. About 1.2 million people pass through Mykonos in tourist season and that's a tremendous amount of people considering it's a pretty small island. Mykonos is part of the Cyclades which is a chain of islands in Greece. All of the islands in this chain have a similar architectural style in that all buildings (as required by law) need to be whitewashed with blue domes. It was neat to see everything be so consistent. A few people were bold and painted the accent color on their homes something other than blue but they apparently pay fines every year. While there aren't many stray dogs on Mykonos, there are a lot cats which are revered by the residents and are protected by law. One of the immediate observations anyone can make about Mykonos is that it's windy. And not just windy, it's really windy. So much so that it's one of the premiere wind surfing spots in all of Europe.

We spent a bit of time walking through the winding, narrow streets looking at a few shops which was pretty neat. The streets themselves are about 3-4 wide and are shared by people, motorcycles, and the occasional brave car. I had my Penn State shirt on that day and this random woman came up to me all excited and told me that she graduated from there. It really is a small world.

As we walked towards the town we began to see the gay influence on the island – I've never seen so many rainbows before and the Ramrod Club had an ominous presence in the town square. As we walked on, we rain into a very, very large pelican relaxing on the beach. We learned that this was Petros, the island mascot. In fact, there are four Petros' and they are trying to breed them to create the next generation (unsuccessfully – the running joke on the island is that all four are gay). The birds are very tame and let people pet them and the residents love them.

Everywhere you go in Mykonos (and on most of the islands), you find a lot of Churches. It turns out there is this convenient Greek law that decrees you don't have to pay taxes if you have a church on your property. Naturally, everyone builds churches that aren't ever used. There is one very famous church in the Greek Orthodox religion that is in Mykonos – the church of Panagia (Virgin Mary) Parapotiani. Again, it isn't actually ever used which doesn't make sense to me but it's there and it's famous. As you walk past the church, you pass "Little Venice" which is a cluster of buildings that have balconies that hang over the waterfront. Beyond that are Mykonos' famous windmills.

While most of the old folks spent the day walking through the small town, our group took a bus up to Paradise Beach on the other side of the mountain. Mykonos has a lot of beaches but two of them are fairly well known – Super Paradise Beach (the nude gay beach) and Paradise Beach (the normal and sometimes nude beach), Paradise Beach is pretty famous so we went for a relaxing day on the beach. The bus ride was interesting in that the driver looked like a crazy guy with buggy eyes, a cracked-tooth smile, and shaggy gray hair who greeted everyone with "Hella Hella Hella" which is the Greek word for hello. While waiting in line for the bus, we met a girl from New Jersey (like the French, you just can't escape them). She thought it was the coolest thing in the world that she had an Atlantic City Beach Patrol hat on and thought it necessary to try and make people guess what ACBP stood for. When no one knew (imagine that), they were unimpressed and stared blankly at her when she told them. Being from New Jersey, she couldn't comprehend that people could care less but I found the whole thing amusing if not slightly sad.

Anyway, we arrive at Paradise Beach and park ourselves in front of the Tropicana Bar. The beach has umbrellas and beach chairs which can be rented for a mere four euros (3 extra for an umbrella). We decided to go to the Tropicana and have a Gyro. After enjoying our meal, we were informed that there was going to be a party at 5pm at the bar which we obliged. I went for a walk and ran into the Mexican girls in our tour group. While on a rock chatting, we observed, much to our dismay, an overweight old man (mid-late 60's) got out of the water, very naked. While this could have been bad enough, he proceeded to go over to a rock face protruding out of the beach to do some exercises. After some vertical push-ups and leg stretches, we got thoroughly disgusted enough to move on.

I headed back down the beach to where the rest of the crew was and decided to go for a swim. The water a little cold at first but you got used to it really quickly. After the swim, 5 o'clock was upon us and it was time for the dance party to get started. Initially, I sat with a couple of folks and watched. Then came the so-called elephant man – a local celebrity of sorts who comes every day and dances for a bit. Let me set the stage for you – picture a leathery, tan man in his 80's with what looks like a toupee; he is wearing nothing more than a worn out old G-String that barely covers his hoo-ha. He gets up on a table and starts to dance (old age limits his movements somewhat). If a girl goes up and dances with him, they will get a free shot from the bar. The beach was a little sparse because it was off season but there was one volunteer – an African American woman from Philadelphia. Watching the elephant man was like watching a train wreck – it was terrible but you just had to watch.

We decided to get up and dance for a bit and were pleasantly surprised to find that the bar gave out free shots to people who were dancing every five minutes or so. After we tired ourselves out we sat down again and some folks ordered a drink called "The Devil's Tongue" which was a combination of various types of high-proof alcohol. I had a sip and it was STRONG! Needless to say, a few of our group got pretty lit up as we were heading out. We went to wait for the bus and our crazy bus driver returned to take us back to town. The bus itself was packed with people as we zipped through narrow windy roads. I felt like all we needed on the bus was a couple of caged chickens and the craziness of the ride would have been complete.

We ended up back in town and were greeted by yet stronger winds. Since we were cold and tired, we decided to head back to the bus that would take us to the boat a little early. After a quick shower, we were relaxing on the pool deck chatting with the waiters as we listened to our friends' names being paged repeatedly. Apparently, they had too good of a time at Paradise Beach and were late getting back to the boat. It was a pretty close call actually as they started to page Jess to call reception. Thankfully, everyone got on at the last minute (if not, it would have been an expensive helicopter ride to the next island). One of the New Zealand girls, drunk, was recounting her adventures trying to get back to the boat. As she was describing how she flagged down a random bus for help, she animatedly threw arms in the air. Just as she did that, the boat turned; it wasn't just a normal turn, it was one of those turns where something is really wrong – the ship groaned, the plates fell off the tables and shattered, and this girl flew back in her chair, her drink glass shattered on the floor, and she slid a good couple of feet before hitting her head on some tables. She stood up and continued her story, most likely too drunk to realize what happened to her.

The rest of the night was spent, of course, at the Starz Disco Lounge. This would prove to be a poor decision because we stayed up until 2/3am and had to be up for a 7am excursion the following morning. Thus would be the schedule for the rest of the week.

DAY 6: PATMOS, KU--ADSI, AND EPHESUS

After a late night of dancing, most of us were up really early to hike with Jess up to St. John's monastery in Patmos. Patmos used to be an open-air prison and John (as well as Paul, I believe) were exiled there when they were arrested for preaching in Ephesus. When John was exiled there, it was purported that he wrote the book of Revelation in a cave on the hillside. We all began our 45 minute climb up to the top of the island where a monastery built in John's honor stood like a fortress. We made it up the top where a little village surrounded the building. The monastery itself was fairly plain because well, it was a monastery. There was one room though that was filled with ornate metal work and various pictures of saints in the true Greek Orthodox style.

I wanted to see the cave where John supposedly wrote Revelation so I left the monastery a bit early. I of course got lost on the path back down because we took a shortcut on the way up. When I stumbled upon the shortcut on the way down, I realized I had gone too far and turned around to see the building surrounding the cave a good way back up the mountain. Disgruntled, I turned around and finally made it to the cave. You descend down a couple flights of stairs before you come to the entrance of the cave. Once inside there are some paintings and ornate objects (candle holders, etc.) decorating the place. On the ground is a half sphere dug out of the rock face where John laid his head to rest and a little hole that was supposedly used as a hand grip. The legend goes that John was blind at the time he wrote Revelation.

While exiting the cave, I met a few other folks from the tour and we walked back down the mountain together and got back on the ship. We were off to our second stop in Turkey: Ku--adasi
(pronounced koosh-a-da-see) and Ephesus. As you pulled into Port, Ku--adasi looks like a fairly standard town. We learned that it is full of vacation homes for the Brits and Irish and that would be evident as we walked through the Bazaar later on. We boarded a bus to head straight to Ephesus and along the way we passed Adaland which the tour guide (Ahmed) told us was the largest water park in Europe. This was interesting considering this part of Turkey was classified as Asia. He also called the water slides "sliders".

We arrived at the top of Ephesus and learned some interesting facts about it. The ancient city of Ephesus was once the largest city in that part of Asia with a population of 25,000 people. The city sloped down a mountain side and ended at the waterfront where ships would sail in. This was an interesting fact to note because we had spent at least 30 minutes driving over land to get here. Over time, silt deposits and receding waters would leave the base of the city dry. In fact, that would be one of the contributing causes of Ephesus' ultimate demise along with earthquakes and the rise of Istanbul.

The top of the city was meant for aristocrats and politicians and commoners weren't allowed to go up to that part of the city. There were two pillars that stood as gates to the upper part that had Hercules carved on them meant to serve as a warning for people to not cross them. As you descended into the city, you learned how advanced these people were. Most of the homes had central heating and air conditioning (obviously not the kind we have today but ancient equivalents). You also had a complex sewer system with complex clay pipes that you can still see today. The toilets were essentially benches with holes in them. Along where your feet were was a trench that water ran through that people of the time would scoop up with their hand and use to clean themselves after they did their duty.

As you walked down the path, you came across the most significant portion of Ephesus, the front of the library. It is a two tiered structure that has Roman Architecture written all over it – arches, marble, and columns. It was quite impressive given its age. It was located close to the Roman bathhouse which was essentially a brothel at the time. We were told that they had found secret passages running from the library to the bathhouse. Apparently, men would tell their wives that they "had to go the library" but they clearly had other plans.

As you move past the library, you come across the open-air theatre which was really impressive. The rule of the time was that theatres had to seat 1/10 of the total population of the city which meant that this theatre sat 2,500 people so you can imagine it was quite large. What was great about it was that they still hold concerts in there today (I'd love to see that!)

As we headed towards the exit, there would bathrooms that are often referred to as Wash Closets or W.C.'s. This one cost €0.50 which wasn't out of the ordinary. What was funny about it was that there was a large sign that had a picture of a little boy sitting on the potty with words circling him that said "Only 0.50 is enough to experience the magic atmosphere".

As you exit the city, you come out into a market where people are immediately trying to get you into their shop. There were two people who stood out to me. The first was a guy who had a huge sign in front of his shop that said "Genuine Fake Watches". He walked around shouting "Genuine fake watches here! Come! Please come see my rubbish!". The other guy didn't have a shop but was walking around carrying boxes of Turkish Delights. We were waiting by the bus and he comes up to us in a bellowing voice and says "Turkish Delight! Turkish Delight here! I am Turkish Delight, who wants me?"

On the way back to Ku--adasi, we were told that we were going to stop by a leather store and see a fashion show. Immediately we were skeptical but we had little choice in the matter. Turkey is famous for their leather goods and exports them all over the world. We arrive at this store and get corralled into a room with a runway. The nice part about these tourist traps is that they give you tea so I'm usually tolerant. I was expecting a really cheesy fashion show but I must say, it was quite professional with some very attractive models. They even had the professional model walk down with the pivots and everything. We all started to laugh when they started to play "Smack That" by Akon because that happened to be our theme song of the week at the Starz Disco Lounge.

After the show, we were funneled into the leather store and offered "good price" on everything. I actually came close to buying a jacket but realized I didn't have to spend $250 on a jacket in Turkey. A few of our other tour mates weren't able to resists as effectively and one girl ended up buying two jackets.

We headed back into town with some free time to walk around the Ku--adasi Bazaar. Joe and I ended up getting separated so I had some time to myself to explore. In the markets, the Turks employed a new trick that I didn't see in Egypt which was a bit clever. They would come out of their shop and go to shake your hand. When you reciprocated, they wouldn't let go and would in fact pull you into their shop without letting go. I feel victim to this but it was ok because I wanted to buy a T-Shirt. He had the one I wanted and tried to sell it to me for €15. After much haggling and to the disappointment of the clerk, I ended up buying it for €5 (you have to love those end-of-season sales). When I got pulled into the shop, Joe kept walking despite the guy sitting outside trying to get his attention "Hey! Hey you! Hey, Texas!" When traveling abroad and American, you must be comfortable with the fact that you are either from New York City or Texas – Joe got Texas because he is tall I guess.

I ended up walking through most of the Bazaar a couple of times and ran into one guy and we started talking. I asked how business was and he said not terrible. He also said he was getting ready to close shop for the season and go back home to his family. I was surprised by this because I had assumed that he had lived in Ku--adasi. Instead, his family lived in Serbia and he comes here in the tourist season to make money and goes home in the winter. My shock was visible to him and he said "You must be from America. Let me tell you something, Please, be glad that you are from America. It is a good place and you have many opportunity there – don't ever take it for granted." I took that to heart because I do apparently take it for granted.

I walked a bit more and ran into another guy who tried to get me to buy a T-Shirt. I told him I already had one. His interest peaked and he asked which one. I showed him and he said I could buy another one and he would give me a good deal. I told him that I'm a hard bargainer and he asked how much I paid for the one I had. I told him €5. He smiled, patted me on the back, and said "Have a nice day". When exiting Ku--adasi to head back to the ship, they make you walk through this labyrinth of upscale stores which would normally be fine except that it really is a labyrinth and most people got lost wandering around.

Back on the ship, it was time for dinner. Joe was feeling a bit punchy that evening and decided he would make his mark. For the evening, his attire consisted of a sport coat, dress pants, shoes, socks, and tie – no shirt. He even went so far to shave off the little chest hair-fuzz he had. Initially, you couldn't tell he wasn't wearing a shirt but if you took an extra second to look at him, you would know. My bet was that he was going to get asked to leave the dining room but once the wait staff realized but to my surprise, they didn't really seem to mind and the headwaiter thought it was amusing. Half-way through dinner, we convinced Joe to take off his jacket so all that remained was the tie. We arranged to have a friend steal the jacket and take it out of the dining room forcing Joe to walk out in all of his shirtless glory. Most of the people in the dining room seemed to be amused by our youthful antics with exception of this table of women. Upon seeing Joe, they put their hands over their mouth with what was perhaps the best look of disgust on their face that I had ever seen. Joe of course smiled and waved hello to them as we all laughed.

It should be noted that there was a person of interest on the boat that caught our interest. He was a bald, tan man in his mid to late 50's. He was from some other country based on the fact that he didn't speak English and wore capri's. What was unique about this particular gentleman was that he founda T-Shirt that he liked in the Ku--adasi market that consisted of a Starbucks logo that had "F$%! Off" written on it where Starbucks should have been. Now, don't get me wrong, I would expect and perhaps even be mildly amused by a disgruntled 16 year-old wearing a shirt like that but not a guy in his mid-50's. What made it even more incredible was that he wore it two nights in a row to dinner. Joe, also amused by this gentleman's seeming lack of social awareness, seized the opportunity to go up this person while shirtless to tell him that he liked his shirt. When we went up the guy and said "nice shirt", some other guy behind him told Joe "Yeah, you too".

The rest of the night, once again, was spent at the Starz Disco.

DAY 7: RODOS, NOT RHODES

After a late night at the Starz, we were all very tired and grumpy as we got up at the butt-crack of dawn for an excursion on the island of Rodos which is commonly and incorrectly referred to as Rhodes. Our tour guide had this funny yet peculiar habit where he ended every sentence with an up-tone like he was asking it as a question. We slept through most of his lecture on the way to Lindos. Upon arrival, we walked down the hill to the pleasant little town of Lindos which was pretty typical of Greek Island towns. We then climbed up through the town to the Acropolis of Lindos that sits on top of the city.

The Acropolis, like most Greek Ruins were sparse and you have to use your imagination but it was a nice setting overlooking the sea. Along the base of the mountain/cliff/what-have-you was a circular lagoon with a small entrance. In ancient times, it was said that ships fleeing the Romans could duck into this lagoon and escape capture. After spending some time at the Acropolis in the intense heat, we descended through the town and headed back to the bus.

On the way back to the main town, we stopped at another tourist trap – a ceramic place. One quick note about the tourist traps – they at least were representative of the skills that the locals on the island were known for. Rodos was apparently known for good ceramics so we went to a studio where this guy made a vase out of a lump of clay and it was fairly impressive. After he finished it, we got a lecture on the properties of the pottery and a demonstration on how strong they are (by rubbing a quarter on them repeatedly and banging it on a table). Then we were graciously allowed in the store to peruse the goods.

Having no interest and starting to feel sick, I waited outside inhaling the exhaust from the bus until we were on our way back to the main town. As we drove, I could feel my head getting more stuffy which was not a good sign, especially combined with the sore throat I now had.

The main town of Rodos (the "Old Town") was fairly interesting. It had a definite medieval flair to it from when it was occupied by the Venetians and was slightly reminiscent of Sienna, Italy. The Old Town has a wall built around it and for the most part, cars are not allowed to drive through unless they reside within its confines. The centerpiece of the town is a castle that upon initial glance, one would assume was very old. In actuality, an explosion set by invaders destroyed the original castle. When Greece fell to fascist Italy, they thought it would be nice to build a nice home and tribute to their fearless if not stumpy leader Mussolini. Thus, the castle that sits on the island today is a product of WWII Italian architects and has little to do with the original that sat there.

After a walk-through of the Old Town, we headed back to the boat for lunch. Most of the tour folks took a 20 minute walk to a beach to relax but I went to bed to try to sleep off the head cold that was coming on something fierce.

The rest of the day was actually pretty relaxing. After my [fairly long] nap, I just hung out with a few people until dinner and then, of course, the Starz Disco Lounge complete with a limbo competition that I did not win.

DAY 8: CRETE AND SANTORINI

Once again, we stayed up too late the night before and had a difficult time getting up for our early morning excursion to Crete. This time, we were off the Palace of Knossos. It wasn't really so much a palace as a large area with short stone walls that were less than a glimpse of it's former glory. It is widely believe that the Minoans (named after their King, Minos – pronounced mee-nose) were the first civilization to inhabit Europe. They had strong relationships with the Egyptians and engaged in a lot of trade. Their sport was interesting – men would run up to bulls, grab their horns, and flip over them. Certainly nothing that I would partake in but hey, to each his own – what else are you going to occupy your time with when you are the first civilization on a continent?

No one is sure exactly how the palace looked but the conceptual renderings show a massive palace with multiple stories that covers a whole lot of ground. Most of what exists today has been rebuilt based on architectural evidence. The palace (and the civilization that lived in it) were mostly destroyed by earthquakes with the final blow coming in 1700 BC when Santorini blew up (more on that in a bit). The Minoans spread out into Asia Minor and are believed to have become the Philistines.

The Minoans and the Palace of Knossos was made famous by the legend of the minotaur and his labyrinth. Today, no evidence has been found of such labyrinth. It is believed that the massive size and complexity of the palace along with their fascination with bulls led to the legend. The reason the bull was so prominent was because of the legend of the King. He wanted a bull to sacrifice so he asked Poseidon to send him one to sacrifice. Poseidon cooperated and sent him a beautiful white bull. Minos adored the bull and did not sacrifice it sacrificing instead on of his bulls. This naturally pissed Poseidon off so he made Minos' wife fall in love with the white bull. One thing led to another, a couple of drinks were thrown in the mix, and Minos' wife was pregnant with the bull's baby, aka, the Minotaur. Minos was pissed so he banished the Minotaur to the labyrinth and that was that.

After the Palace, we were dropped off in Heraklion , the largest and capital city of Crete. There really isn't anything special about Heraklion other than it's reminiscent of Athens. It isn't a city necessarily designed for tourists but people who live there. As we walked through the city, Joe and Alex failed to pay attention to any of the directions given by the tour guide including important items like meeting time and place. This was generally the theme of the week so they resorted to following me around and started to call me dad, complete with pouting.

We headed back on the boat and we could catch a view of the main mountain on Crete where Zeus is purported to be buried. What is neat about the mountain is that the top of it has the profile of a man's face – pretty freaky. What is also freak is having your main, number one god die and be buried on a mountain – where does a civilization go from there?

We were off to the highly anticipated island of Santorini and I was excited. I had heard good things and they were pretty true. Santorini is the southern-most island in the Cyclades. It used to be nice and round until 1700 BC (give or take 50 years) when the volcano in the middle of it blew up…big time. The center of the island sunk into the sea leaving a moon-like crescent. This whole event is believed to be the basis for the Lost City of Atlantis.

Because the middle of the island sunk, what remains is Cliffside. There are two main villages on Santorini: Thira (called Fira on maps for some unknown reason) and Oia. When you arrive at Santorini, you have to take a tender boat from your cruise ship to the island. From there, we boarded a bus that drove us up the cliff side toward the point of the island and the little village of Oia. Oia had to be on of my favorite places in Greece. It has a similar architectural style to Myknonos with the whitewashed buildings and blue domed roofs except the village creeps down the cliff. You can hike out to the end of the village to the point of the island and see the whole village spread out before you over the cliff side. The streets (or walkways) are crammed with local artisans who make a decent living selling their craft to tourists passing through. Santorini is also known for having one of the top sunsets in the world and you get a prime spot from Oia while sitting on a little cliff side café.

But sunsets were not to be had while we were in Oia because we had to go to Thiral, the "main city". It was similar to Oia but less beautiful and more functional. It had a Greek Orthodox church and a Catholic chapel and a lot of stores. The sun began to set and I got a good glimpse and it sunk behind a little mountainous island and it was awesome. As the sun was sinking, I realized it was time to get back to the ship and I had two options before me. I could not be adventurous and take the cable car down the cliff after waiting in line or I could be adventurous and ride a donkey down the winding, 600+ step path to the sea and the old port. I of course chose the donkeys and it was awesome.

You have to walk down this street to get to where the "donkey station" is. The word station is a misnomer because it's a path with three dirty, old, loud Greek men causing chaos lined with hundreds of donkeys. The grab me by the arm and tell me to start walking. I eventually find a train of donkeys with some of my other tour mates on them and we head down the feces-ridden path. There were three things that made this experience great: 1) there were people trying to walk up and down the feces-ridden path that were getting plowed over by the donkeys, 2) I was on a donkey, and 3) the three Mexican girls were behind me screaming in Spanish which cracked me up – one even kept saying "andalay!, andalay!"

After we reached the bottom, we were waiting for the tinder boat and I bought myself a picture print poster of Oia. We headed back towards the boat and when we arrived, I went up to the sun deck to look over the island. It was an awesome sight, twilight with the lights of two villages dotting the skyline as a big moon rose over the top of the cliffs.

Sadly, the boat pulled away and the bulk of our journey was complete but not before one more fun filled night. A bulk of us were looking forward to a talent competition that the boat was sponsoring for one main reason George McCann from Georgia, USA. We had met George on a few occasions earlier in the week. He is a large, stocky man with a gut that probably puts him on the obese side. He tucks is shirt in fully to his pants (no blousing) and belts his trousers as far up his gut as possible. He also has a growth on his face that is apparently skin cancer. George is one of those social people who probably shouldn't be. When he talks to you, he is nice as pie but he is the type of person that you could see going psycho in the right environment. George was courageous enough to come up to Joe and myself and strike up a conversation. Now, that's not a bad thing but I thought it took some courage to come up to a group of young people and interject yourself into their conversation. He decided to tell us three jokes that were so bad, I will not do the injustice of repeating them here. We politely laughed and he kept talking despite promising multiple times throughout the conversation that he would move on because he is overstepping his bounds. We finally escaped and the next night he came up to our table again, repeated the same jokes, did a very bad JFK impersonation that sounded like Barbara Walters, and told us how great water was. He came up AGAIN another night to Joe, Mike, Susan, and myself. Joe immediately turned away and I spilled tea on myself and I just HAD to go clean it up. Anyway, this trend continued throughout the week and he eventually informed us that he was signing himself up for the talent show and we just had to go watch him crash and burn…

So the night of the talent show arrives and he had a four-part act. Apparently, he did the routine for the cruise director and she told him it was too long and he should cut it down…Incredulous, he re-did the act and made her time him. So he started off by greeting people in different languages as follows (as he had been practicing loudly throughout the week): "Madams y Monsieurs, Daman….Daman…und…Daman und Herren, Señoras y Señor-ees". He refused to use a microphone after that, prompting shouts from the old people in the back who couldn't hear (I politely informed them that this was probably better for their general health). He went on to tell the jokes and no one laughed. He followed that with a broken and terrible JFK impersonation (something along the lines of "Our childwen are our fwuture") prompting silence. But it was the last thing that made me fall off my chair laughing – he led the audience in a song. He started by looking for a pen for a minute or two so he could conduct the orchestra. He informed us that there would be audience participation and split us in half. Our half of the audience was supposed to sing "u-u-jah" when he pointed to us. The other half of the audience was supposed to sing "halle-halle-halle". Immediately, we all looked at each other and realized that he was going to have everyone sing a church song…on a boat full of secular and apathetic international people…near the Middle East. What made it even better is that he confused the sides and wanted our side to sing "halle-halle-halle". It was a disaster, but a very, very amusing disaster.

I should also note that I was supposed to take part in the talent show. Joe, Frank, Marcel and I were supposed to dance to "Hot Stuff". No one was really feeling it so we backed out at the last minute. I had everyone convinced that Jess was really pissed at us for backing out because "she had to go and arrange for all this stuff" and made everyone feel really guilty. It was kind of funny…but you had to be there.

To finish out the evening after dinner, we had a farewell evening of dance at, of course, the Starz Disco Lounge only tonight, we were going in style, WITH TOGAS. Of course, I show up way before anyone else in my toga and the few old people that were there were staring at me. This cool guy from Canada came up to me and said "You know son, there's a big difference between going to a toga party and walking around in a towel". I agreed and my other tour mates came to the rescue and we had a blast. To make the evening even better, Joe decided to get generous and bought a bottle of Dom Perignon. We had a little toast on the sun deck with Mike, Susan, Alex, Jess, Suprya, Joe, and myself. It was a fitting end to a fun week…please.

DAY 9: BACK TO ATHENS

Another early morning came and we had to disembark from the ship. After some luggage issues, we were dropped off back in Syntagma Square. Joe and I decided not to get the guided tour of Athens and do it on our own which was a good decision.

After dropping our luggage at the hotel we stayed at, we headed off for the Acropolis hoping to avoid the intense heat and the intense crowds; we were successful at neither. The crowds were immense as was the scaffolding. To be honest, the Acropolis was not very impressive (mainly because I've been to Egypt). Most of it was dismantled, stolen, or covered in scaffolding (until 2020). It was hot and crowded so we didn't spend too much time there. Now don't get me wrong, it's still impressive to imagine what life was like back then when the Acropolis was in full use. It was surrounded by two theatres, one of which is still used today which is cool. After exiting, we hiked up a mountain and say Socrate's prison carved in some rocks. I never knew he was arrested but apparently he was. We climbed to the top of the hill and got a really good view of the whole Acroplis, unobstructed. The only problem was the haze; the heat was so intense that you could see an obvious cloud over the rock. But the view was still a good one.

On the way out, we ran into Alex who was supposed to be on the guided tour of Athens but she forgot her ticket on the bus with her wallet. The bus had left and the tour group went in without her which was a bummer.

But we had to move on so we headed down to the Temple of the Olympian Zeus as the Acropolis ticket gets you access to all the historic attractions. We had seen it earlier in the week and it was a bit more impressive up close if not sparse. You really have to wonder how they managed to build this huge pillars with such primitive equipment. After that, we went back to the hotel where Joe took a nap because he was wiped out. I didn't want to waste my time in Athens so I went out to explore. I headed towards the Agora and got some lunch at a café. It's always weird eating in Europe because they have weird customs. For example, their service is terrible, you have to order a drink besides "tap water" which you don't get ice in, and they charge you for everything (like bread and ketchup – or tomato sauce).

After a €20 lunch of surprise chicken and rice, I headed into the Agora and walked around a bit. Again, it was mostly rubble that made no sense but there was one temple that was very intact and pretty cool. After my self guided walking tour, I headed back towards the hotel and ran into Candi and Martin (the travel agent from Canada) and we made plans to meet up for dinner with folks who were still in town. After writing some postcards out, I went back to wake up Joe and we met everyone at the Hermes Hotel for dinner. Dave and Cory were still in town and Cory almost had a breakdown about the place we chose for dinner. It was recommended by Jason and in the Plaka area so we knew it was close. Cory insisted that we should take a cab and was freaking out because he couldn't find it on his map (trying to find which way south was). Everyone stopped paying attention to him until he announced he and Dave were going to get a "head start" because they had to get back to their hotel tonight which was on the opposite side of town. Cory, in his infinite wisdom, chose a hotel completely out of the way because his tour book stated that it's near the modeling section of town and models frequent there…brilliant Cory.

Anyway, we find the restaurant, Shola Rhio, with ease. They have a cool special that when you bring four people or more, you can choose from 10 dishes for the table to share. We had at least 7 so we got a wide selection including Greek Salad, meatballs, beans, seaweed [terrible], peppers, sardine-like fish [not brave enough to try], pork, various sauces, ouzo, wine, and dessert. As we were finishing, Dave and Cory came from the upstairs having finished their meal. We were all a bit flabbergasted that they didn't save us seats but we got over it pretty quickly.

Joe and I finished the night saying goodbye and going for a stroll through the Plaka. It was a fitting end to a good trip. Before we went to bed, we realized it would be a good idea to check into our flights online. We tried to find an internet café with no luck. We literally walked half-way across Athens asking as many people as we could find until we finally found one. While it was a nice café, we were dismayed that we couldn't check in online for our flights. Angered, we began the long trek back to our hotel (after midnight) and told them we needed a wake-up call at 4:50am.

DAY 10: HOME

We awoke early and walked the two blocks to the train station at Syntagma Square only to find the trains running but the entry gates closed. This did not bode well with our strategy to get the 5:30am train and get there in time to check-in. After some brilliant thinking, I took the elevator down bypassing the gate. After 40 minutes, we arrived at the airport and waited in line to check in.

The flight back was uneventful as I slept most of the first leg. We had a layover in the Amsterdam airport which has to be the biggest (and nicest) airport I've seen. It literally took us a ½ hour to walk from Terminal C to Terminal G. I'm sad we didn't have more time there because there was a lot to explore. But given the time of the walk, and the interrogation we had to go through at the gate because we were "going to America", we had little free time. We also had to re-stock on candy since Joe left our original stash on the plane from Athens.

We arrived in Newark to nice weather and my dad who graciously drove us home.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Overall, it was a great trip because of the combination of culture and people I met. It certainly wasn't Egypt and I need to come to the reality that not much will ever be. Once I got over that, I was able to keep things in perspective and have a really good time. The culture of the Greek islands was unique and I'm glad I was able to experience and Turkey is a country that I would like to explore a little more (partially because it seems so exotic and unique). I was a bit skeptical of the trip half way through but looking back on it, I realize how much fun I really had. For me, the value of vacations doesn't really lie in the time away but moreso in the anticipation leading up to it and more importantly, looking back on it and the experiences I've had.

I realized that I take my country and the opportunities it presents for granted and that I often lose my perspective on what is important in life. Traveling helps me realize how small the world is but also how inconsequential the things are that I worry about and give authority in my life sometimes.

The Rodentia War continues...

2007-10-08T22:30:00.000-07:00

It seems as though the squirrels have been honoring our treaty and sticking to their tree. However, a new threat has arisen...

I stopped at home for lunch today with a co-worker and went to throw something into the recycling bin on my front porch when I noticed a creature staring up at me... I jumped back a bit freaked out. Upon closer examination, it turned out to be a disgruntled possum (perhaps an adolescent) angry that I had disturbed its slumber.

We decided to eat inside instead of on the porch for fear it would leap out and attach itself to one of our necks a la the Killer Rabbit from Monty Python.

When we came back outside (cautiously) and examined the bin, I noticed that there was not one possum, but two. One was sleeping inside my Progresso Soup can (after eating the paper wrapper off of it) and the other inside the Slurpee Cup.

I cautiously moved the bin to the back alley so they could be on the way.

I'm man enough to admit that I'm concerned about the next wildlife enemy that will choose to battle with me...

R.I.P

2007-10-07T22:23:00.000-07:00

I will be posting the ridiculously long vacation summary for those of you with too much free time by the end of the week.

In the meantime, it is my sad, sad duty to announce the death of my camera. It has served me through 40 states, 16 countries and over 5,500 pictures. It has certainly pulled its weight but died at the most in-opportune of times.

She met her demise in Istanbul which was a fitting end.

The time has now come to research replacements and I'm going to make the leap to digital...

PSU Football

2007-09-09T23:22:00.000-07:00

This weekend, I decided to go up to Penn State at the coaxing of a friend to take part in the revelry and tradition that is Nittany Lion Football. It was the first time I went up without a ticket to the game and I wasn't quite sure what to expect.

The day was hot and little humid but manageable. This game (vs. Notre Dame) had a lot of hype built around it due to last years loss and the history between the two teams and the fans. It stood to be a defining game that would help set the tone for the rest of the season for the Nittany Lions and everyone was out in full style. Tailgaters were everyone in their normal style with large RV's and tour buses, satellite televisions, even live bands to celebrate. As you walk through the tailgate, you can't help but feel as though you are a part of something bigger than yourself, part of a proud tradition. I hope that one day, I can build experiences with my own family like the ones I've been a part of for the last 9 years.

Because of the hype, tickets were going for a premium. My neighbor sold his pair for $2300! My hopes of getting a scalped ticket were fairly low because of all the excitement. In fact, as we walked throughout the town, even the scalpers were having a hard time getting tickets, yet alone selling them. Those that were lucky enough to get tickets were selling them for $275 - $300 which was out of my price range.

About an hour before kick-off, I was about to lose hope when a gentlemen in front of me was on his cell phone and I heard him say "Oh, they aren't coming? I'll tell him just to get rid of them then." I politely nosed my way in and asked if he was selling any tickets. He said yes but was selling them for $200 a piece. I told him all I could give was $100 a piece and he replied that there was still some time. As they walked away, he stopped, turned around, and asked if we were actually going to go to the game or scalp them. We told him that we were going to go to the game and he relented and sold them to us for our price. It was great to see someone sacrifice a little so some fans could see the game.

In we went and wow – 110,000+ all dressed in white (except the Notre Dame fans). It was the first ever full white-out at the stadium and it was awesome. The noise level and excitement was second only to the Nebraska game 4 years ago (which I was also privileged enough to attend). The fans did their part to help lead Penn State to an important victory over the Irish and I was blessed to be one of them. The excitement was just so intense when a good play was made – that is what Penn State football is about. Not a player, not even a team, but a tradition.

As a sidebar, here are some the things I've noticed that have changed in the last five years at a PSU football game:

1) Tailgating has become much more commercialized. There were a bunch of marketing buses from companies like Lowe's and Geico that weren't necessary. Hopefully that trend won't continue to grow.

2) The fan base is becoming more organized with whiteouts. What started with a student section idea has now spread to encompass the whole stadium which was awesome.

3) When I was there, the "S" Zone was an area in the Freshman section to be avoided at all costs. They gave you these ridiculous things to wear (not T-Shirts - just a mesh covering) and policed you going in and out. Now it has turned into a thing of pride and moved to the Senior Section. They get proper T-Shirts which is pretty cool.

4) They have stopped throwing things after touchdowns. It took me a while to get over the habit of turning around and ducking for cover every time we score... Instead, they raise people up and throw them into the air for each point we have. A much better alternative then coming home with Nacho Cheese all over your back.

5) The Alma Mater. Today's students are more refined and actually sing the words with pride instead of the repeating chorus of "We don't know the god damned words" over and over again.

6) No more Bobby Jo (Solomon) - the Blue Sapphire. She was a legend, both for her on field skills and her off-field partying. After what must have been 7 years, she finally graduated leaving a gaping hole in the Penn Sate tradition. However, it has been filled with another Jo - Pamela Jo Maierhofer. I think it's a rule that all Blue Sapphire's (Head Majorette) have to have Jo in their middle name. I never thought I would see someone who could ever compare to Bobby Jo but I must say, Pamela Jo was certainly up there. She twirled not one, not two, but three batons while they were on fire. Bobby Joe never did three on fire....

7) No more token flag boy. The flag people (aka color guard - not the military one) in every band has always been the brunt of jokes. Just when we thought the well was dry, Flag Boy joined the group when we were undergrads. Sadly, there is no more token flag boy - it's back to the status-quo all-girl flag twirlers.

8) The Dance Team. When we were undergrads, all the Dance Team EVER did was kick lines. It was one of the most predicable things on the planet that when the Dance Team came out, they would be in a kick line within 1 minute of their routine. Not so anymore, they have expanded their horizons and there was NO KICKLINE. I was floored...

Fight on State!

2007-09-09T23:21:00.000-07:00

Every time I return to my alma mater, I'm struck but how blessed I was to be a part of the Penn State tradition.

The word tradition has a very broad sense and this is true when I think about my time and my experiences as an undergraduate. The Penn State Experience, to me, is more than just a degree or an educational endeavor. As I was driving the familiar route along 322 towards Happy Valley, I was really struck by the impact that the experience had on me and my life. For me, the Penn State Experience is a culmination of the campus, the relationships I've developed as a result of my time there, the town of State College, the football games, the list is endless. It truly is a special place and without it being a part of my life, I certainly wouldn't be the same.

I'm amazed at the amount of emotion that place still stirs up within me when I return, even 5 years later. As I walked down College Avenue, I was greeted by some old, great friends that I randomly ran into. While walking into the stadium, I saw another guy that look familiar to me. He recognized me as well although we couldn't figure out how we knew each other but we exchanged greetings regardless. In addition to old friends, I randomly ran into new ones as well, people I work with – it was crazy. People were a big part of my Penn State experience. Even though I don't keep in touch with many of them, they will always be a part of my life and they will always have my utmost respect for being the amazing people that they are.

It's funny because when I look back on college, I fail to remember the difficult times and the struggles – only the good things. That's how you know it was a good experience. College, for me, wasn't about gaining technical knowledge or even a piece of paper that tells me I'm smart. It was about building relationships and even more importantly, discovering myself.

Penn State is a huge part of me and always will be. Not because I have a degree there, or I have a lion sticker on my car; no, it's because it was a place that gave me the freedom to be me and to lay the groundwork for who I am to become. It gave me memories and experiences that will last a lifetime and I can look back on with fondness and good emotions.

I know Penn State will be there for many years to come and many more people will be part of the great tradition. I'm excited to have the privilege to continue that tradition. Fight on State!

B.B. King

2007-08-06T23:20:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, my parents and I went to see B.B. King with Al Green. I have to say that B.B. King is just amazing. At 81 years old, he is still sharp and no less talented than he was at the height of his career. He is just raw talent and it shows not only in his music but in his storytelling.

This is probably the second time I've walked away from a performance in awe of the talent before me. The first time was at Preservation Hall in New Orleans. It just amazes me and I'm privileged to be able to have a life where I can experience things like that and recognize the value in them.

Musikfest

2007-08-06T23:00:00.000-07:00

Every year, over a million people mob downtown Bethlehem for Musikfest, the self-proclaimed largest musical festival in the world. Having been alive (and mostly present) since its inception, I've been able to see how its changed over the years. Some things have remained the same, many of them have gotten worse which has ultimately detracted from the great festival it once was.

Things that have stayed the same:

1) The mob of youth that poses on Main Street. It's funny walking through the masses of teenagers thinking that was once me. I really hope I didn't look like a poser as much as those kids do. On second thought, I was way too much of a nerd to ever be considered a poser. About the only change here (besides me getting older and more removed from that crowd) is that the goth kids have moved their base of operation from next to the hotel across the street to the church steps.

2) The EPAT. What is the EPAT you ask? Why, it's the one and only Eastern Pennsylvania Alert Team. Since the beginning of time, these people have sat in chairs with walkie talkies. Occasionally, they will escort a car through the throngs of people. They have manned their posts diligently and steadfastly over the past two decades. What make the EPAT interesting is that they look like a REALLY inbred family. While it's mean to say that (I do apologize), it's just been really funny to watch them year after year, sitting, with walkie talkies, in their EPAT hats. It's one of those things that you take for granted in passing but when you stop and think about it, the festival just wouldn't be the same without them.

3) The crazy dancing guy. Every year, there is this 80-some year old dude who shows up in white shorts, a purple shirt, and a sequin-ish belt and dances the polka day and night, by himself. He's sort of a personal hero. Anyone who has that much energy at his age and is that brave deserves to be SOMEONE's hero so I will adopt him. I actually talked to him and he was really cool, partially because he was wasted. I have yet to see him this year but whether he is there or not, he will live on in he memories of countless onlookers.

4) The Bethlehem Dairy Store. All of the Bethlehem-ites know and love this ice cream store. It's an institution for us ice cream aficionados. I, like many before and after me, got so much free ice cream from there in high school when all my friends worked there. It's Belgian Waffles may cost 800,000 tickets but it's worth it. If for nothing else, it's still one of the few local establishments that hasn't boycotted the greedy, evil dictatorship that oversees the festival.

5) Running into family members randomly. It's always comforting to know that on any given day, I can go into the polka tent and find my grandmother in the same general section. In addition, I will find my eccentric uncle walking around with his girlfriend day and night (I think he has actually volunteered not just every year, but every day the festival has been going on).

6) Runa Pacha. While this group only surfaced about five years ago, they deserve a shout-out because they diligently play every day, ALL day with very few breaks. No matter what time you are walking down Main Street, they are there, ready to enchant you with their pan flute music. I want to say they are Native Americans but they could be Mexicans.

7) The list of Musikfest staples would not be complete without the Bell Guy! Every year, a guy dresses in black robes and brings his portable carillion . You can ask my friend Lynne about the Bell Guy - I think her husband has a man-crush on him...

But among the things that have remained the same and helped to define the festival, there are things that have changed since it began that have led most locals to despise the festival.

1) It used to be a true free music festival where EVERYTHING was free, even the headliner acts. A few years ago, they moved those concerts to a strip of land along the mosquito infested river (brilliant) and make you pay even to sit on the ground waaaaaaaayyyyyyy in the back. Their excuse was to get better acts. Sadly, they still bring Meatloaf back - please tell me how this constitutes "better"?

2) The lack of local establishments. When the festival began, it was built around local restaurants. They have all since boycotted because of the greed of the organization that runs the festival. In their wake, all of the standard carnival-fare type establishments have taken over. While it's essential to have at least some of the carney folk, they should be limited. A lot of the quality food has gone away to be replaced with the likes of deep fried oreos and this year, the deep fried peanut butter and jelly sandwich. (OK...the deep fried oreos can stay....)

3) Along with the boycott of local establishments has been the influx of commercialized traveling displays. Trucks of Advil, Geico, Toyota, and Shell have rolled in to cater to people who seem like they have never seen or heard of these products before. If you want to bring them in, that's fine, but take a lesson from Vermont and carve a nice little spot out of the way and place them there. If people are really curious to know that this "Advil" thing is, they can walk out of their way to find out. The reason I pick on Advil is because of the sheer ridiculousness of their display. They set up this little ball toss. When you hit the target, these really loud sirens go off. I'm not sure if it's to excite people, grab passerby's attention, or give everyone around a headache so they take the free samples. I had to laugh at the Advil people who were working because they really have to have a massive headache listening to that.

The next big trip

2007-07-31T22:11:00.000-07:00

So I had some free time tonight and decided to peruse some old photos of my various journeys. It amazes me how fortunate I've been to be able to travel. As I was looking through my pictures of last year's trip to Egypt, it strikes me how truly amazing it was. Traveling really changes you in some cool ways. For me, its been subtle and developed over time and I'm still trying to put to words how it's affected me. Overall, I would have to say that I don't see myself as being so big anymore and I mean that in a good way. It's good to put your life in perspective and I think that as Americans, it's so easy for us to get caught up in our comfort and routine lives that we lose sight of the rest of the world that goes on outside of our borders. Traveling has helped me keep my attitudes in perspective and realize that there is more out there and the world doesn't revolve around.

Despite some of the amazing places I've been, there are countless others that require my presence and seeing as I haven't been on an airplane in over a month or had a serious international visit in a year, it was time to plan my next trip.

So.....in September.....I head to Greece and Turkey. Basically it's an island hopping cruise that spends some time in Athens, Instanbul, and all of the standard Greek Islands that people normally visit. By going in later September, I'm hoping to avoid the August vacation exodus that Europeans seem to love so much.

I'll be going with a friend I interned with at IBM so many years ago so it should be a good time. He will be bringing his digital camera that is worth more than his life and me being the old man, I'll be bringing the trusty old film camera so we have both ends of the spectrum covered.

It should be a good time all around assuming I don't end up in a Turkish prison (which when you think about it, it's me, so it could happen).

Harry Potter

2007-07-18T23:13:00.000-07:00

I'm all geeked out this week in eager anticipation for the 7th Harry Potter book. Amazon sent me the nice little "if you pay extra, we'll make sure you get it on Saturday" e-mail so I upgraded the shipping (I'm a sucker for marketing).

What's great about the whole thing is that I was hanging out on the neighbor's porch and a few of the regulars were there and we got into a huge discussion on it. It amazes me the far reach this book has on people and my block is a small microcosm of it. From the 10 year kid to the 40-something year old college professor - there is equal excitement.

Also interesting is that this book has such a polar influence on people. For some, it gets them back into reading and it throws them into a huge fantasy world through the paradigm of fantastic storytelling. For others, it's hype that they hope will end with this final book and they can't understand why people get excited about a children's book. Still for others, it represents Satan's work on earth and should be banned and burned a la 1940 Germany.

For me, it's exciting. But what's more exciting is engaging with others from all sorts of demographics on it. The author, the history profressor, the head of a psychology deparment at a college, the co-worker, etc. In addition, the books have grown up with its characters tackling more and more adult themes like defying authority, death, love, etc.

Speculation is rampant and the pre-sales of this book have already outpaced some movie sales figures. Today, there were a whole bunch of spoiler websites that were posting their theories and claiming to have actual copies, etc. I'm amazed quite frankly how they keep everything under wraps with today's technology. There was a recent article in time talking about the security surrounding the printing and all they have to go through. Essentially, there are only four people who have read it so far: the author, the head publisher, the Potter-ologist (checks for continuity between the books), and the illustrator.

Two basic predictions from me:

1) Snape is good. In my opinion (humble as it may be), he has to be good. My thought is that he made the unbreakable vow with Narcissa because he had no other choice - if he didn't, it would cause suspicion amongst other Death Eaters and ultimately, Voldemort. He explained the situation to Dumbledore who knew that the only way out was to have Snape kill him. There have been a few references that Dumbledore has made stating that Voldemeort doesn't understand death and has implied that there is still some power that he may be able to yield. More importantly though, if Snape is bad, his character loses a lot of depth - it's the simple solution which I can't believe that the author would take after masterfully weaving a complicated character. As stated in an article I read, the fact that we are now in the 7th book and we are still debating if Snape is good or evil and more importantly, that he COULD go either way, is a testament to the author's storytelling ability.

2) Harry lives. We know the Voldemort dies because let's face it - how can the series have a complete and clean end if he survives? The prophecy states that "either must die at the hands of the other for neither can live while the other survives". This implies that one lives and the other dies (although it doesn't rule out a double homicide).

Poison Ivy - It's valled poison for a reason folks

2007-06-26T22:50:00.000-07:00

So someone has wished wrath and plague upon me and it has come in the form of Poison Ivy. I have no idea how I got it but boy did I get it. I was overly active one day and sweated causing it go everywhere....and I mean everywhere. Over the course of the past week, I watched it creep ever closer to my eye. It covered my whole body (with the exception of my feet). It's a terrible pestilence...

The best part is it spread across the left side of my face making it look like I had Ebola or the Bubonic plague. People look at me like I have leprosy. It's good on one note because people I don't want to talk to me leave me alone. The downside? Last week was my 5 year anniversary at work and my company has a propaganda session they call Service Awards to recognize my "service". Well, me and my poison got to sit at the same, intimate table as the President and COO of my organization. Fantastic.

The Squirrel Brothel

2007-06-20T22:32:00.000-07:00

The Squirrels have found two new activities as of late: killing and mating.

Yesterday, I fired up the old grill and got a waft of death. Upon searching around the yard, I found a dead baby rabbit. There are only two things that could have done such a thing (besides my friend Doug who has a large distaste for rabbits - but he has moved to Chicago so we will count him innocent). The first is a cat. There is one neighborhood cat that stays indoors most of the time and has not been known to attack other neighborhood wildlife.

After looking around the yard, I noticed on the very top of the tree in my yard, staring at me as I examined the dead rabbit, was a squirrel. I could see the guilt on his little face... The rabbit itself didn't really concern me - of more importance was the fact that the squirrels had now infiltrated my tiny backyard. That means I have to protect two entrances to my home from the unwanted rodentia.

I was perfectly ok with living with the growing presence of the squirrels. That was until this morning. Allow me to set a little bit of the scene. One of my nemesii in this world is a large vine that grows up the front of my house and along the side of the porch. I hesitate to use the word vine because it is technically classified as a weed. However, it blooms nice little flowers once a year for about a week (which was supposed to happen within the next two weeks here).

The vine grows at an extraordinary rate - so much that it requires more attention than a newborn (to my friends with children - relax, I'm exagerrating). Well, I go out the door this morning for work and I notice that half of the vine is stripped bare - to the bark. I initially thought it was due to the storm we had last night. I was wrong...

When I came home this afternoon, I realized it wasn't the storm, it was the squirrels. The y had decided to make a nest in my vine by stripping all of the leaves from the other half. I arrived home to find six, yes SIX, squirrels sitting on the ledge of my porch and on top of a brick pillar supporting the roof. They were none too pleased with my arrival and started to scurry about to ward me off. Eventually, I emerged victorious and chased them off. Whenever I open my door, I'm waiting for one of them to get spooked and run into my house.

I've also got to be ready for an attack. My neighbor, amused at the situation, told with utmost seriousness how his girlfriend got bitten by a squirrel that jumped off a branch onto her.

The squirrels seem to have taken a break from fighting each other to make some love - unfortunately, they are turning my porch into a brothel.

The Squirrel Rumble

2007-05-21T17:42:00.000-07:00

The squirrels on my street have been at war since I've moved in. As far as I can tell, there are two factions, each has control over one side of the street. Most of the times, they respect each other's turf and stick to their sides but occasionally, a rogue member will venture to the enemies side leading to a rumble of sorts. The fights usually stay pretty clean and are amusing to watch.

Yesterday, I was sitting on the porch when the battle escalated to new heights. One of gang members ventured to the opposite side of the street and made a move on of the other gang's strongholds. The normal chase ensued throughout the tree and then things turned ugly. After jumping a few branches, the invading member missed a jump and fell from about 50 feet, hitting my neighbors car, flipping off the roof and hitting the street.

The squirrel stood up on the street and remained still for a few minutes. His fellow gang members hurried to the edge of their branches to see what was going on, wanting to help, but not willing to risk a full-scale rumble. The rival members crept to the edge of their branches to see the aftermath. It was an eery moment...

Touring the Southwest

2007-04-10T17:43:00.001-07:00

After spending three weeks in the office, I decided that it was once again time for a business trip – this time, a tour of the Southwest United States that would take me from Houston all the way over to Phoenix. I was excited about this trip because it would help me tie up some loose ends for work stuff (related to sourcing suppliers for our Mexico facility) but also (and arguably of more value) was the opportunity to catch up with some long lost friends.

My flight left out of Philadelphia on Thursday, March 29th and amazingly, the flight was on time and everything went smooth which I think is a first for the Philadelphia airport. I arrived in Houston in the early afternoon and tried out my new status as an Avis preferred customer. This system is pretty neat because it lets you go right to your rental car, keys waiting in the door, without waiting in the horrendous lines that seem to linger around the car rental desk whenever I need to rent. Because this was my first time using this program, I had to go to a special desk and check-in defeating the purpose of the program altogether but I'm told that I won't have to do that anymore.

I walked up to the parking space that I believed was mine to the ever-glorious Chevy Malibu but was dismayed to see that there were no keys in the door. My fleeting moment of frustration was replaced by an immense amount of hope when I realized that I had the wrong parking spot. You see, I'm doomed to always getting the crappiest of the American cars whenever I have to rent to the point where I resign myself to failure. But not today – no – today victory is mine because my car was actually parked in the spot next to the Malibu. The bad car gods were thwarted as I peeled out of the Avis parking lot in my Ford Mustang. What made it even better was that I had the car for the entire weekend.

As I drive down the freeway towards Houston, I rolled the windows down to fully relish the fact that I was driving a Mustang on a warm day in the state of Texas. I quickly reversed that decision when I realized that I was in Houston, the land of Humidity and Pollution. My overall thought on Houston – one of the worst cities I've been to in the United States; and this is coming from someone who lives 15 miles from the New Jersey border. At the risk of offending someone, it may not be the worst, but it's certainly a contender. No one can really ever say they've driven through Houston for two main reasons: 1) People in Houston can't drive – they're terrible (granted, not as bad as Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, or Italians). My friend stated that there are two speeds in Houston, 80mph and 20mph and the speed doesn't necessarily dictate the lane of travel. 2) The word driving implies going faster than the speed in which you can walk from one point to another. The traffic in Houston imposes an unofficial speed limit of 10 mph no matter what time of day.

I really don't know where all the people come from, where they are going, or why they are even living in that city but to each his own. This has not been my first trip to Texas so the whole Texas mentality was no longer a shock to me. However, there were some other subtleties that I picked up in addition to being exposed to hardcore Texas outside of [Weird] Austin. The main thing that interested me was the existence of "frontage roads". They seem very popular all over Texas. Frontage roads are those that run parallel (read: along the side of) major interstates; they are one way and you have to do a u-turn to go the other direction. While this isn't an amazing discovery by any means, it was an annoying one because the frontage roads go on forever and ever and it gets confusing when you are trying to navigate on and off of exits to the interstate. That, combined with the amazing amount of construction and the traffic made driving in and around Houston less than desirable. One of the more repulsive parts about Houston (and I guess Texas) is this restaurant chain called Luby's. Yes, Luby's. Why, on God's green earth would you name a restaurant Luby's?? Why not just call it The K-Y Kafeteria or some other ridiculous name. Luby's….unreal.

All that being said, I finally made it to my hotel and checked in a bit early before heading across the street for my token Chicken Caesar Wrap at a Red Robin's across the street. After partaking, I stopped at the Ikea that happened to be on the way back to the hotel to see if the Swedes have had any major new discoveries in the field of compact furniture (sadly, they did not). The rest of the afternoon was spent working on one of the massively major papers I have due in the next couple of weeks for my classes.

All that led up to dinner with my friend Paul, the Rocket Scientist. If I'm being honest, he isn't a rocket scientist but he does work at NASA which makes him pretty close (at least closer than I). We met up with some of his friends from his Church that evening for dinner (after catching up over some beers) at some seafood restaurant whose name escapes me at the moment.

After dinner, the crew went and shot some pool which was fun. Paul and I were cleaning up which made him confident in challenging the girls to a final fight to the death. The cleaning up continued until we had one ball left to sink before the 8 ball. The balls were semi-close to one another but the 8 ball was totally avoidable causing me to joke with Paul about making sure he doesn't touch that infamous black ball. Needless to say, against all odds and even some laws of physics, Paul sunk the 8 ball causing us to lose. The girls wouldn't allow us to take a mulligan and relished in their unearned victory. The positive aspect of the story is that I got to leave probably never to see these people again but more importantly, Paul will get to hear about it for some time.

The next day, I went to visit a potential supplier for thermoforming in Houston. After being led astray by MapQuest, I found my destination and met with the VP of Sales. Walking into his office was like going into Cabela's with all of the taxidermy. The guy was actually pretty cool and laid back and talked a lot about [shocker] hunting. The whole facility was somewhat amusing because it reminded me of Texas. There were red tape marks on the floor at various intervals which naturally represented the distances for archery which is set up after the work day ends. In their spare time, the tooling guys work on a 1950's Jeep which will be used for [shocker] hunting when it's complete. All in all, it was a good visit (and a good lunch that followed).

After working, I met up with Paul again and it was off to Austin to spend the weekend with my friends Dan Line and Dave "Sunshine" Hall (my Egypt traveling partner). The weekend was a blast and Austin once again grew on me as a place I could really see myself living. Upon arrival, we went to dinner followed by seeing the movie "300" which was fairly interesting. Their casting for the Spartan men seemed to typify the ideal man – strong, brave, virtuous, etc. I think they made every man in the audience re-examine their own manhood and I often found myself at various points throughout the movie making mental comparisons to how I fell short of the definition of manhood that these Spartans portrayed. In the end, I was just really bummed that I turned down the role of a Spartan soldier – my agent needs to hold me more accountable. The night was capped off with some beer and cigars by the pool and all was well with the world.

The next day was an adventure outside of Austin into the heart of Texas to a place called Enchanted Rock. This is a Texas state park that consists of three very large builder formations that stick very high out of the ground. As we pulled into the park, we noticed that there was an entrance fee of $6 per person, that's right kids – per person, not the more familiar per car – which led to mild outrage. An idea was quickly hatched to hide one of us in the trunk of the car while we waited in line at the entrance. Wasting little time, Dave threw down the back seats and climbed through an very small opening before completely retreating into the trunk. Soon to follow (unbeknownst to Dave) was a plan to get him caught by the park ranger. We pulled up to the window and the guard told us it would be $18 because there were three of us in the car. Dan, being the honest person that he is, gave the guard $24 and whispered to him:

Guard: No, it's only $18, not $24.

Dan: Pssst….Come here

Guard: What's the matter?

Dan: [In a low voice] Well, we have our friend in the trunk and it would be really funny if he got caught sneaking in.

Guard: Ok…Sir, I got a report that you were hiding someone in your trunk.

Dan: No sir, that's not true.

Guard: I'm going to have to ask you to open your trunk son.

Dan: That's not necessary.

Guard: [Banging on the trunk] I think it is.

Dan proceeds to open the trunk and Dave pops out, to the intense amusement of the people in the car behind us. We had Dave believing that he was actually caught for most of the day.

The day was spent exploring, slipping on wet rocks, climbing, sweating, stopping, climbing, etc. All in all, a very good time. The landscape of Austin is really cool – rolling hills covered in green and cactus. The view from the top of the boulders is pretty cool. After a long day of hiking, we headed back towards Austin and Dan wanted to stop at a really good BBQ place (shocker) called Coopers. We diverted to a gas station where the attendant told Dan to go to another BBQ place down the road instead because it was cheaper and better. In the end, it was cheaper but that's about it.

That evening, we watched the Wedding Crashers (a standard part of the Austin agenda) with some Toasted Head wine and Ice Cream (<-- This was very manly, I assure you). Before we went to bed, we had a conversation with Dave who was wrestling with the possibility of re-dating an old girlfriend which lasted until about 2 in the morning. He was excited about this considering he had a 6:30am flight to San Francisco. Needless to say, he missed that flight by waking up as the plane was taking off.

The following morning was spent at Church with the standard follow-up lunch at Rudy's. Rudy's is one of the quintessential Austin experiences for me because it just screams Texas. Rudy's is a chain of barbeque restaurants slash gas station (a natural combination). You order your food and the give it to you in a plastic crate. The throw a piece of wax paper in there, throw some meat on top of it, and voila, you have lunch. After proceeding to the BBQ sauce pump, you chow down at one of the wooden benches and tables.

After lunch, Paul and I headed back to Houston where, after dinner at the Galleria Mall, I returned the Mustang (sigh) at the airport. However, that was not before gassing up the car and having a scary toothless man drive his car up to my pump and asked me to spare a gallon or two of gas. This was the first time that anyone had begged for gas at a gas station. I declined his request and he proceeded to yell and curse at me but all I could notice was his lack of teeth. He drove off and I proceeded to the airport. My flight went fairly smoothly with the exception of seeing a middle-aged woman wearing an over-sized sweatshirt with black spandex shorts, and brown penny loafers. Faux-paux on so many fronts. I'm sad I didn't get a picture of her but then again, maybe not…it was just that disturbing. Perhaps the funniest part about it is that she was not only on my flight, but she was in first class sitting next to her husband with the toupee.

I arrived in El Paso for the second leg of my journey which is different from Houston. The climate out here is very dry and the Mexican influence is much more significant which is mainly due to the 2 million+ people that live in Ciudad Juarez across the border. I got to my hotel around midnight and was pleasantly surprised by the 42 in flat screen hanging on the wall of my room. Sadly, all primetime programming is on at like 6pm here so I missed it but all was well.

Monday morning, I awoke and looked at my hotel window which has a nice view of Juarez. If anyone has been to El Paso or Juarez, they would know that "nice" and "view" are two words that don't mix when it comes to the growing Mexican city. From my window, I saw an immense brown cloud of pollution hovering over the city. It was so bad that I could barely see the large mountain in Juarez. That alone made me excited to spend a day visiting suppliers Juarez. After meeting up with Carlos, our purchasing rep from Chihuahua, our first stop was a warehouse in Juarez that an El Paso supplier utilizes for distribution and logistics throughout Mexico. We followed that with a visit to a thermoformer. The thermoformer was actually decent and I was fairly impressed with their quality control procedures, especially for a Mexican supplier.

After lunching at an Applebee's in Juarez (the one time I've been thankful to see an American Chain restaurant), we finished our day in Mexico by visiting a small label manufacturer who decided it would be good to show me one thousand forms that comprised their quality program individually in broken English. That was exciting. After waiting an hour at the border crossing, we arrived back on home soil in El Paso.

The evening was spent with a sales rep for a corrugated company we are utilizing for Mexico. I wasn't sure what to expect because in conversations with this person, I have learned that she's a talker. When we arrived at the restaurant, she showed up and looked nothing like I expected her to. Picture Florence Henderson (Mrs. Brady) crossed with June Cleaver and Princess Diana. Then, add a ridiculously loud blouse/shirt that screams tacky Southwest and you have her. Overall, dinner was good though and the conversation was decent.

The following morning, I once again admired (not really) the brown pollution cloud hovering over Juarez and was thankful I didn't have to go back into Mexico. We spent the morning at our customs broker reviewing their online data system and making some suggestions for improvement. After that, Carlos and I stopped by a metal stamper he had been working with. The sales guy was a bit weird (and I think a bit full of himself) but it was good to see how metal is stamped and made (notice I said good and not exciting). Before getting lunch, we met with the Houston thermoformer at his El Paso warehouse.

After lunch, we met up with a supplier I work with back east and toured their El Paso warehouse and distribution facility. Carlos left to go back to Chihuahua which left me and my suppliers to head to dinner at a Mexican restaurant that had some amazing margaritas. The large size was literally as big as my head.

The following morning, the supplier from back east and I got a ridiculously early start and drove to Tucson. The reason we left so early was because we learned that the plant we were visiting in Tucson is right down the street from the Pima Air Museum and the AMARC plane boneyard. After a 4.5 hour ride, we arrived at the airfield which was actually a pretty cool experience. Imagine a huge desert field with over 4700 planes parked in neat rows that are either utilized for spare parts or in stasis until the government needs to recall them. It's quite a cool site.

After taking a detour, we toured yet another supplier in Tucson before I headed up to Phoenix in all of its 100 degree glory.

Phoenix is hot, but it wasn't all that bad considering it was snowing back home. I met up with a sales contact from back east and we went to the Arizona Kitchen for dinner with the local plant manager. It was a small restaurant and a bit swanky if not overpriced. The corn chowder was worth noting. Also worth noting was the $350 bill which for three people and the amount of food we ate was a bit shocking but hey, it wasn't my expense account (thankfully).

The following morning was spent at the facility and we wrapped up with a Mexican lunch. The sales guy and I had some free time in the afternoon so we took a drive to Carefree, AZ and eventually to Lake Bartlett. I must say, this was a pleasant surprise – the road to the lake winded through desert mountains with more cacti than I can even fathom. It was a pretty cool landscape and it helped me definitely get a feeling for Arizona and the desert climate (minus the freakishly overcast sky).

That night, I stayed at a hotel called the Clarendon which was really awesome – I recommend it if you are staying in Phoenix. It was an old crack house that was bought an renovated in a very contemporary and funky style. I met up with a college friend, Matt Clower and went to a restaurant called FEZ with Matt's friend and another college friend, Rachel Kraines. Overall, it was a good night catching up with some long lost friends.

Friday was the most exciting part of the trip and the one that I was looking forward to the most: my first trip to the Grand Canyon. I had high expectations which tends to get me in trouble from time to time. I must say though, that the Canyon not only met my expectations, it blew them out of the water. It was on par with the Pyramids as one of the most amazing things I've ever seen and probably will ever see. The Canyon is one of those things that can inspire you to greatness by just looking at it. Upon first sight, you can't help but pause. You can only try to comprehend the vastness of it all because it goes on forever… It truly was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen and highly recommend it.

Based on the wisdom of Frommer's, I entered the park from the East via 89N to 64. This was a great move because it dumps you on the far end of the park near the Desert View WatchTower. You then take a road into the center of the park to Grand Canyon Village. The Village is where most of the people stay and commune. Basically, it's the touristy part with more people than I cared to deal with. Hermit Road extends from the Village and covers the other half of the Canyon. The nice part about this road is that no vehicles are allowed except the occasional tour bus and the tram shuttle that runs the whole length. The road itself is just over 7 miles and there is a hiking trail that runs along the rim of the Canyon. My plan was to hike out to Hermit's Rest, the end point, and then take the shuttle back to the Village. The plan was great in theory but difficult in practice. The views from the trail were stunning but the hike lasted a lot longer than planned (about 4 hours). I was so exhausted by the end of it that I bought myself a congratulatory Klondike Bar. Perhaps the most frustrating part was seeing all of the people who took the tram to the end. I loathed them in my head because they took the cheap way out but I helped my anger subside by convincing myself their trip was far less rewarding than mine.

That evening, I returned to Flagstaff and checked into my five star room at the EconoLodge before eating dinner at the Beaver St. Brewing Company. Flagstaff is a pretty interesting town. It's small but Historical Route 66 is the main street which is cool. Flagstaff wasn't a town that really excited me overall but it was a nice place to stop and visit.

The real treat came the following day when I headed down to Sedona which is by far one of the most beautiful cities in the country, I'm convinced (and I've seen a few). I've added it to the places in the country I wouldn't mind living (in addition to Colorado Springs and Austin). The road from Flagstaff to Sedona runs through the Coconino National Forest which is amazing – huge red rock mountains and canyons covered in pine trees. There were places to camp and park along the way but you had to pay to gain entrance (the only annoying park about Sedona). Upon arriving in Sedona, I noticed that they've done a good job adapting the architecture in a way that suits the town; in other words, you don't have a gaudy red McDonald's sitting in the middle of the street in a typical strip mall.

Sedona is a relatively small city surrounded by huge mountains and is really just beautiful. My first stop was Airport Mesa which is a pull-off on the way to the Sedona Airport. This pull-off has a few trail heads that lead out to these rocks that give you an unobstructed view of the city and is really amazing. While hiking out to the overlook (hiking is an overstatement), I met George, who was a religious pilgrim with a huge gray beard, but also a super-nice guy. I asked him where he was from and he said Heaven. The conversation was fairly brief but I learned, among other things, the history of digital cameras.

After having a quick bite to eat, I headed down a road that led to the Chapel of the Rock which was really amazing. This was a Chapel built into the rock face of the mountain and is triangular in shape. It's really a cool feat of architecture and apparently pretty well known. As I walked through the Chapel, I headed outside to see these Asians dressed in some meditation garb doing these strange poses and getting pictures with the mountain in the background. I kind of laughed to myself and went about my business taking pictures. I alter saw them again, but this time the guy had a sword in his hand with a bright color scarf hanging off the handle doing strange poses which really made me laugh. Apparently I wasn't the only one laughing as the security guard came running up the ramp to yell at the guy. Who would have thought that doing strange poses with a sword in your hand wouldn't have been acceptable at a sacred holy site?

From there, I went to find Schembly Hill Road which is an unpaved road that leads to these pretty impressive lookouts high over the city. Frommers warned that the road was meant for SUV's and Jeeps so I stopped at a tourist information place and the lady behind the desk asked if I had a rental car. I said yes and she laughed saying that I was good to go. I headed up this road and it was really sketchy with rocks and ruts everywhere. I was one of the only cars on it and people laughed at me as I drove by. Occasionally I would see another Malibu or Taurus driving the opposite direction and we would laugh as we passed asking if they were rental cars.

I eventually made it to the top (it took me about an hour to go 5 miles) and had some breathtaking views. I'm going to add this to the list of places I would propose (but maybe I'm getting too far ahead of myself). The only drawback was that the sun was close its peak to the view was a bit hazy, but the point got across.

It was another slow-moving six miles to go down the other side of the mountain which ironically led to an on-ramp to I-17. There it was down to Phoenix where I headed to Rachel's house for dinner before taking the red-eye home.

All in all, a great trip but tiring. It was nice because I was able to take a mini-vacation for relatively low cost. I'm glad to get home though because I've got to work on these papers I have due in a couple of weeks.

Pigeons

2007-03-16T21:21:00.000-07:00

The weather has a bit of the crazies and has gone from 70 degrees to 10 inches of snow in a matter of days. The "wintry mix" started early this morning and started to make the roads disastrous fairly quickly. This led my boss to schedule a meeting with the team from 2-4:30 to review various issues and most likely to keep us at work.

I made it home and actually shoveled my sidewalk (much to my neighbors surprise). To celebrate my accomplishment, I made some tea. My guest bedroom was feeling neglected so I went up and looked out over my backyard as I sipped my dairretic and noticed an intereting site: about 10 pigeons perched on a cable connected to my neighbor's house. Normally, this wouldn't be anything to think twice about but it was pelting ice with some heavily duty winds. Yet, there they sat, perched in unison and adjusting their tails to keep their balance seemingly ignoring the ridiculous weather.

Now, I've never been a fan of pigeons. To put it mildly, I think they are filthy street rats that just get in your way. If you've ever walked down a street in NYC, you know what I'm talking about. They just walk around jabbing their necks forward in ingorance as they walk and peck at anything that looks disgusting. They are lazy creatures that don't fly unless it's absolutely necessary. I mean, you would literally have to pick one up and throw it off a bridge for it to actually fly. I once saw a person kick one and even then, nothing. It rolled a few times, looked a the guy and continued pecking at the ground.

But apparently, some people value these things. In Middle Eastern countries, they are a delicacy (they were actually on menus in Egypt) and in San Juan, they have a little square with hundreds of them. People visit this square and feed them. As thanks, pigeons flock there by the hundreds and crap all over the ground and make the entire block radius smell with foul odors.

Back to the here and now though, the pigeons are sitting on this wire and I realized how incompetent these things really are. They are sitting on this wire, getting pelted by a lot of ice at high winds and they don't feel like making the effort to look for a place that has some shelter. Despite my distaste for these creatures, they could have easily flown (heaven forbid) to my covered back porched and rode out the storm there and I would have only charged them a nominal fee. They could have even WALKED 30 feet further and had a plethora of cards to hide underneath.

Maybe I'm overcomplicating things. PERHAPS, these animals are impervious to ice and other elements. I don't know. I just thought it was ridiculous that they would sit there and take it. And yes, I've spent way too much time thinking about pigeons... I need another cup of tea.

VEGA$ Baby!

2007-03-10T23:42:00.000-08:00

Throughout all of my world travels, there have been two cities that have really struck me as being "alive" in the sense that there is always something going on, always some place to be. One of those cities was London; with a thriving theatre district in the west end, pubs everywhere, and a local population that is always on the move throughout its streets, London struck me as a vibrant city.

The other city is Las Vegas. This is my second trip to Sin City so most of the awe that is Las Vegas has somewhat worn off and I'm able to take the city in through more experienced eyes. As we flew in, you really get a sense for how special Las Vegas is. This tourist Mecca that processes billions of dollars every week is in the middle of nowhere. Yet, this desert town could arguably be considered the cross-roads of the United States because you will meet more people from very different parts of the country in this sprawling town.

So far, I've seen Fat Elvis singing, a guy who looked like James Taylor but wearing pink sunglasses, and some nice Mexican ladies who were trying to hand out cards for strippers or hookers or strippers who are turned on by hookers. If you've been to Vegas, you've seen them standing on the streets as dusk begins to approach. They are all Hispanic (I daresay Mexican) and obviously illegal workers who wear bright fluorescent shirts and can't speak English. But these are highly skilled workers because they have this amazing ability to get your attention by flicking the cards with their forefingers to make an amazing snapping sound. I've tried to duplicate their efforts but to no avail and I'm convinced it's a black magic that they are given when they sign their souls over to the stripper-hooker-card pimps that employ them. But you have to admire them, they go out as a family unit and work together: father, son, and yes, mom and daughter. While it's touching to see them working together, its sad to see what they have to do to get paid, especially the woman. If I were interested in the services they were selling, having a card with a picture of a mostly naked woman on it handed to me by a toothless Mexican grandmother would most likely take away all the appeal. However, if I were desperate enough to actually utilize their employer's services, I most likely wouldn't be worried about the method the information is delivered by.

But putting Misty Mounds and Candi Liscious and the other ladies of the night aside, Vegas is actually a fairly complex city that offers much more than sex and debauchery. This is perhaps the best place in the world to people watch and there are a ridiculous amount of people here, including a ridiculously fat Elvis who will sing for free for you in Bill's lounge at the formerly named Barbary Coast casino. People watching has always been a hobby for me and while I've learned a lot from it, it gets me into trouble sometimes. I suffer from what I call the "Grass is Greener Complex". I have this nasty habit of looking at most people and thinking their life is perfect and then get upset that I don't enjoy that same privilege of a perfect life. Now Vegas has both sides of the spectrum. There are a plethora of people out here that make me feel like my life is normal and in some select cases, that I'm the most with-it, successful, and attractive person alive. I'm glad that God has placed some of those people in the world because they help me keep sane and somewhat grounded. It's the other people that I have a challenge with. Everywhere you go in Vegas, there is a cadre of young, attractive people that exude the fact that they know what is going on, they know where to be and what to do and that their life is perfect because they are in what is arguably to most people the most exciting place on earth. The difficulty is that no matter where you go in Vegas, those people exist which leads to this overarching suspicion that you will never be able to do all of the cool, fun, and "right" things which in turn makes you begin to think that you aren't making the most of your experience in this city of experiences.

Vegas in general has this huge stigma attached to it because of its reputation and you feel somewhat pressured (even if it's indirectly) to have this amazing, crazy time while you are here. You want to take advantage of every opportunity to do great things and have a great time, but there are so many opportunities that your head just might explode if you try to do them all (that, and you'll never sleep and die from a crack overdose after snorting some lines with the hooker-stripper that you called on the card given to you by the nice Mexican lady – not that I know anything about any of that because, you all know me, I don't).

But such is life. You have to constantly remind yourself that no one's life is perfect, especially out here. Vegas offers you an opportunity to get away from your life but that also has some consequences and adds to the mystique of this desert town. There is a lot of truth to the statement of "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas". It is so weird for me to realize that this place makes it so easy to throw off any and all inhibitions. You can really get away with anything that you want with very little consequences and there aren't many places in the world that allow you to do that except maybe college. People come here looking for a good time and are usually willing to take more risks to accomplish their goal. The fact that its "Las Vegas" makes a lot of people have an open mind (and not necessarily in the good sense). It's such a strange environment that is most certainly not grounded in reality. Yet, you find that it's a measure of character, a test of who you really are. You can throw off your inhibitions and get away with it, only you will know (or in the extreme case, some girl and an illegitimate child perhaps). But you have a choice, you always have a choice. Most times, you have a network of peers and family to support and hold you accountable for the things that you do in addition to your personal convictions. Once that network disappears, you are left with your personal conviction to bear the full brunt of the temptations of the world. It's strange being in that environment and then returning back to the "normal" world.

So that's my deep thought from Vegas. It really is a great town – you should never get bored. It's been a great trip, relaxing and what not. My company put me up at Bally's because it was the cheapest room in town. Upon check-in, I would learn that I would be staying in a suite, Room 576A. The A excited me because you knew the room had to be special. The A somehow translated into a room with a living room, wet bar, and conference room table in addition to the normal amenities. While this would be cool under normal circumstances (and it was cool), I quickly realized that it is very difficult to fully utilize and appreciate these features when you are traveling on business and have a room all to yourself.

Vegas is certainly different when you are traveling on business. The town itself is not very conducive to be being productive because of the many attractions and distractions. But all worked out well. One of the things that amazes me about Vegas (I know, there are many things) is the amount of high-priced restaurants. You can tell that it is a town that revolves around business expense accounts because normal people could never sustain paying the exorbitant amounts. I had a $65 steak and that was one of the cheaper items on the menu. Sadly, the $65 steak wasn't as good as the $42 steak I had the night before – go figure. Needless to say, it was a week of good eating (I won't need a filet again). We were able to enjoy the fruits of such fine restaurants as Emeril's Delmonico, Strip Steak, Joe's Stonecrabs, and Margaritaville. It's hard to come back home to my microwave pizzas and other frozen sundries but all is well.

In addition to the food, there were two other memorable items from the trip. The first was Cirque Du Soleil's Love (by the Beatles). It was my first Cirque show and it was quite an experience. It was hard to adjust to at first because there was so much going on but it really was amazing. The theatre itself was a technical marvel with all of the robotics… But anything involving the Beatles is sure to be a winner and Love certainly was.

The second memorable event was my first successful foray with gambling (note: first successful foray, not the first foray). If there was one thing Grammy taught me (and she taught me many), it was that Wheel of Fortune slot machines are always good ones to pick and when you play them, make sure you always play three credits in case you get to spin. Well, I listened to her sage advise and was able to turn $20 into $100. I cashed out without thinking too hard about it and quickly realized how hard it is to stop while you are ahead but stop I did. I would like to say that I did the best out of the three of us but my associate Scott was able to get $150 off of the penny slots from a $3 investment…I was a bit jealous.

I'm not sure when I'll return to Vegas but I'm looking forward to it. It's a town that can be easily rediscovered with each new trip and based on the amount of construction there (the largest project in the world – a subcity next to the Belagio – is going on right now as just a small example of this dynamic town), it's safe to bet that there will be many new (and old) things to enjoy in the desert town in the middle of nowhere.

Chicago

2007-02-04T23:15:00.000-08:00

I returned from Chicago today just in time for the Superbowl. It was a great weekend worthy of note. I had to go out for work on THursday and Friday and utilized the free plane ticket to visit some great friends who just moved from Bethlehem out there.

On Friday night, I went to a dueling piano bar called Sluggers next to Wrigley Field. It was the first time I've actually been to such an establishment and I must say, I'm a fan. I think every city (especially mine) should have one. Sadly, they did not play my friends request for "Pour Some Sugar on Me" by Def Leppard which was forgivable. What was not forgivable however was that someone paid the piano players to sing the Michigan fight song over and over again. This pissed off the Ohio State alumni who in turn the piano player to play the Ohio fight song. A bidding war ensued and the songs were played over and over again. I was tempted to pay the piano player to stop playing them both but a) I'm cheap...errrr...frugal and b) I don't think there were any other Penn Staters to support me and I was grossly outnumbered.

Chicago redefined the world cold. I think my tears actually froze to my face, I kid you not. While the cold (I'm talking like -20 degrees) really sucked, it was neat to be in the city Superbowl weekend. They really get into it - skyscrapers had their window lights on at night to have various sayings like Bear Down, Go Bears, XLI, etc. Signs were everywhere and citizens were donning Bears garb. The two lions in front of the Art Musem has custom made Bears helmets and the Natural History Museum's dinosaur statue had a huge Erlacher (spelling?) jersey.

The Science Museum had a Body World exhbit which won accolades for its breakthrough representation of anatomy. They use this technique called plastination to preserve human muscle and organs and display them in various poses. It was amazing to see how complicated our bodies are. They had these bodies (that were actually real bodies preserved by this technique) in a soccer pose, skiing, doing yoga, and playing baseball. It was really amazing... As a sidenote, they had normal lungs next to set of smoker's lungs. If you smoke, you need to stop...seriously.

The highlight of the trip was seeing The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. It's a hysterical show. What made it a lot of fun was that I got chosen along with three others to go on stage and be in the show and take part in the spelling bee. It was fun being on stage with all the actors and actresses. It was cool having the guy next to me belting out songs in full voice. I realized as I sat on stage that I wouldn't be a great actor. The primary reason for this is that I was constantly in fear that my fly was down. I couldn't look without being obvious and felt so paranoid. It was ridiculous.

They had witty introductions for everyone. One guy's name was Mr. Margolese and his introduction was "Mr. Margolese is what you think of when you think 'White Guy' and Mr. Margolese's sweater is ribbed for her pleasure". Mr. Margolese's first word was jihad. They used it in a sentence "Quick Jimmy! Duck behind that western wall, I think I see a jihad coming".

There was an Indian girl who got the word cow. She asked for the definition and the guy said "It's a cow!". Used in a sentence "Please spell cow".

My first introduction was "Mr. Repnyek gets his haircuts from his younger sister". The ironic part is that my dad cuts my hair and I told him to cut my bangs really short right before I left. My first word was "Mexican" which I was able to spell correctly (thankfully). We had to aske for the definition of the word and to have it used in a sentence. The definition given was "Mexican: Term used by Americans to refer to people who come from Mexico, Puerto Rico, South America, or any other Latin Country". The sentence was "Jane's eyes were opened one day while on Michigan Avenue she noticed all the Mexicans walking around".

The second time up, I was introduced as "Mr. Repnyek has recently found fame by winning the Peyton Manning look-alike contest at his elementary school". This drew boos from the obviously pro-Bears crowd on the eve of the SuperBowl. The second word was kinnikinnick (which is actually a word). It has something to do with Indian tobacco or something. I obviously got it wrong (but I was actually pretty close) so i was out. One of the characters is a comfort counselor who is a big black dude on parole. He comes up and gives you a hug and a juicebox.

Overall, it was a blast. I had a good time and it was really neat being on stage. The whole weekend was a lot of fun and I emerged unexpectedly as a Putnam County Spelling Bee Finalist.

A parting fact: Did you know that the Putnam County Elementary School Pirahna's have been the Jai Alai Champions for over 8 years running?

Puerto Rico - Land of speed bumps, potholes, and tolls

2007-01-14T22:45:00.000-08:00

I've returned from my second adventure in Puerto Rico and all in all it was a good time. After having been exposed to the island, I've been able to make some observations about Puerto Rico

Driving: I think Puerto Ricans are some of the worst drivers in the world. I can't really imagine what their driver's manual consists of if one even exists at all. If I'd guess, it would say something like this:

"The lane in which you are traveling shall not be dictated by speed of travel nor by the fact that you are passing another driver. Lane of travel shall be dictated solely by the number of potholes in the other lane.

"Speed of travel shall in no way be affected by lane position. It is perfectly acceptable to drive any speed desired at any given position on the road. For example, you should not be concerned that you are driving at 33 mph on an expressway in the left hand lane."

"At all times during and after dusk, all police-related vehicles shall drive with their lights flashing. This is to serve two purposes: 1) To confuse non-natives into thinking that they are being pulled over and 2) To make it easy for all drivers to locate parked police vehicles trying to pull over said drivers*."

"At no time shall blinkers be used."

"Puerto Rico shall place toll booths approximately every two miles on highways."

* Editors note: One would think that having police parked with lights flashing would make it so easy for drivers to locate that they would adjust their driving so as to not get pulled over. This is clearly not the case.

Puerto Rico must have recently discovered speed bumps and thought that they were the greatest technical innovation EVER. Thinking this, they decided to place an obscene amount of speed bumps all over the island, every two feet.

Throughout the week, I got a lot of experience driving around the island and became like a local. My friend Issac said to me: "Damn, you drive just like a Puerto Rican." My response: "Sí soy un Puertorriqueño."

Mexico - Worst trip EVER!

2006-12-09T13:52:00.000-08:00

Mexico - worst trip EVER
Category: Travel and Places

So, Mexico. I was a bit concerned about all of the normal "Mexico Stuff" (i.e. Montezuma's revenge) but there no need for concern there. No, instead it was the unexpected stuff that made this quite possibly the worst trip ever... A brief timeline of events:

Saturday:

- I start coming down with the symptoms of a cold.

Sunday:

- My driver picks me up at 2:45 AM to catch my flight. He yells at me because he tried calling me yesterday and my phone line was always busy. He must have used the number in the phone book (who still uses phone books?) which is my internet line.

- The cold symptoms become worst and are joined by swollen glands and other symptoms of the flu.

- I end up shivering through two flights until I arrive in Chihuahua to find two things:

1) It's COLD there. Like high of 40 degrees if the sun isn't out. What type of
weather did Marc pack for? 70 degrees. But what I packed didn't matter
because:

2) THEY LOST MY LUGGAGE which contained all clothes AND MY MEDICINES!

- I go to the hotel and check in early and suffer in my bed for the next 13 hours.

Monday:

- My luggage is delivered at 1AM.

- My throat starts hurting like crazy and I have the full force of the flu.

- In Mexico, you are required by law to have a nurse/doctor on-duty in the plant so I go talk to her.

- She recoils with horror as she looks at my throat and proceeds to tell me (in Spanish) that I have strep throat.

- She walks over to a cabinet and hands me a box of medicine that's of course in Spanish. I assume it's Pennicillin but who knows. What's great about Mexico is that people can just give out medicine, they don't need prescriptions or pharmacies.

- I go visit a supplier. At this point in the day, I've lost all control of my body temperature and decide to start shivering uncontrollably. As we go through their plant, they keep staring at me. My Mexican counterpart, Reynaldo, offers to take me to the hospital for the first time. I decline and everyone noticable begins to keep their distance from me.

- My nose has become dry so with every attempt to clear mucus, my nose starts to bleed.

Tuesday:

- I finally unpack my suitcase and realize that my digital camera has been stolen out of it some point before I received it on Sunday. I'm not happy about this.

- See another supplier.

- Drive up to El Paso TX. I successfully used up a whole role of toilet paper as tissues in this 3.5 hour drive. The Mexican border guard searched our car and looked at me in disbelief at all of the used tissues.

- I once again lose control of my body temperature and start sweating profusely for about ten minutes and then start to shiver uncontrollably again. Reynaldo offers for the second time to take me to hospital (sicne we are approaching the U.S.). I decline again.

Wednesday:

- Start to get a little better but only a little.

- Reynaldo rear ends the sales guy we are following while going up an on-ramp. Everyone was ok except the sales' guy bumper.

Thursday:

- Got a little better.

- Had great dinner and tequila. Lost track of time and went back to the hotel at 1am. I had to pack and wait for my ride to pick me up at 4am.

- The ride to the airport was funny. I was still sick and tired. The guy looked exactly like Pedro from Napolean Dynamite. His car was a pimped out Suzuki/Smart Car type contraption with tinted windows and Neon lights and only a front seat that was usable. All the way to the airport, we listened to Mexican polka Music - that was great. Pedro didn't speak English but didn't really seem to get that I didn't speak fluent Spanish. He did attempt to use his hands when he spoke but that didn't help. I usually just nodded and said "si". I realized that was probably a bad thing and started to become concerned with direction we headed. Lo and behold, we go the airport - 45 minutes before the ticket counter opened.

So, dinner and tequila was awesome. Everything else, not so much. I'm not looking forward to writing this trip report up because I really didn't get a lot accomplished.

Ah Mexico - it really is a ghetto. They wear cowboy hats with really pointy boots. They still think Mustaches are in style. But they are actually really nice people.

Viva Mexico!

2006-11-27T16:07:00.000-08:00

So Sunday I leave for Mexico for the next week. My flight leaves at 5:40 am from Philly. That's right kids - when your boss takes his time approving trips, flights get booked and you are stuck flying out of the world's WORST airport (and I've been in my fair share) at 5:40 frickin' am on a Sunday morning.

The upside is that I arrive in Chihuahua at 10 in the morning, a good 4 hours before I can check into my hotel room. I'm excited to see Mexico. I hear that Chihuahua isn't really a touristy town which is good. I've got a few more days of being ingorant and hoping to see a town full of annoying, ugly, little dogs who lead me to various Taco Bells. Do the dogs have any tie to the town? We shall find out - perhaps a Chihuahua Dog Museum - that would be awesome because I could get ALL my Chrismas shopping done...

Part of my visit has me driving up to the somewhat dangerous (or so I'm told) border town of Juarez before we pass in to El Paso, TX for a day. I'm excited to see the reaction on my Mexican counterpart when I tell him that we have to drive a half hour out of our way just ot drive to the New Mexico border and cross into the state so I can say I've been there and up the state count to 39 (plus D.C. and Puerto Rico)! We shall see how he reacts to my freakishness...

The big reason I'm excited about going to Mexico is that I haven't been there before. THat brings the country up to 15 (plus Puerto Rico - how are you supposed to count that??)