Central Europalooza, Part I

First, THANK YOU all for your emails. I’ve received a ton lately, and I can’t tell you enough how much they mean to me. I plan to reply to them all, but I figured to be fair I’d do the blog thing first.

I’m back in Prague and confused about where the last week went. You probably are more clueless than I, so I’ll tell you what I know. I think I will do it backwards, however, because that makes the most sense to me right now.

After a 5-hour train ride, I got into back Prague at 10pm last (Sunday) night. As the train pulled in, characteristically 10 minutes late, I frantically begged one of my companions to stop laughing at my height and help me get my bag down from the overhead racks while simultaneously Elena called me to find out where I was and I realized that I had told her the wrong train station (When you see Hl, do you think Holosovice or Hlavni Nadrazi? That’s what I thought) and she said, “Jesus, Claire. We will have to meet you at the bus stop” and in my frantic state I left my scarf on the blazing hot train (this is the second scarf I’ve lost in a week) and thought that Prague has a terrific sense of humor. When I got in the car, Jan, Elena, and Simon were all there, and I apologized profusely before realizing that I was only a minor annoyance that night, not the biggest problem. Apparently Simon has been skipping school and forging his parents’ signatures on excuse notes and according to Elena is “trying to get kicked out of school because he is lazy.” So they discussed that in Czech and I tried desperately to not fall asleep in the backseat. Then bed, and today back to school, and here I am.

It’s a small miracle that I stayed awake for so long, because despite a well-deserved 13 hours of sleep on Saturday night, Sunday tuckered me out with its persistant goal of reminding me of the trials and triumphs of travelling. My three companions and I woke to see the sun rising over the mountains to peek into our little room in an isolated Slovak chalet. We rolled out of bed, packed up our bags, and decided to go on one last hike. We were rewarded for this effort when we found a hidden chapel built into a rock on the side of the mountain and a path that didn’t get our shoes muddy. We then dutifully reported to the bus stop, very concious that our very expensive train tickets necessitated getting back to Zilina by 4pm. When the bus was officially twenty minutes late, we started getting suspicious. Sure enough, the bus times are different on Sunday, and the next one wasn’t coming for us for three hours (reported the receptionist who did a terrible job of hiding her amusement). There followed 30 seconds of silence, until one of us suggested walking, and the rest, elated by the excessive hours of sleep the night before and woozy from lack of food (we were boycotting the chalet restaurant because we spent way too much money there the day before), agreed enthusiastically. Armed with Snickers bars from the vending machine, we strapped on our overloaded backpacks and set out on our 6km trek. Actually, it was extremely pleasant; the scenery was beautiful, it only took a little over an hour, and most cars gave us ample room as they swerved by us.

When we got to the main town, Terchova, we beelined to a grocery store just in time to see them lock the doors (they closed at 12; it was 12:05) and ignore our knocks. All of the restaurants were closed, so we trudged to the bus stop and looked hopefully at the bus schedule, which we could not interpret for anything. We asked several people near us, but either our Czech was bad or their understanding of the public transportation was worse, because nobody seemed to know. We only had to wait 40 minutes, though, and then we had a pleasant hour-long ride back to Zilina. When we got there, we practically ran the half mile to Tesco, where we ignored every rule about not shopping when hungry and the looks we got from skinny Slovaks and stocked up on food for pretty much the whole week. Between us there were; two full loaves of bread, nine rolls, two packages of sandwich meat, three separate types of cheese, two containers of yogurt, one container of cottage cheese, almonds, soy nuts, coconut shavings, three bars of chocolate, one package of bad cookies, one package of crackers, one big bag of bacon-flavored chips, five dobre ranos (more on these in a later entry), two peppers, seven apples, six bananas, three oranges, a grapefruit, a bag of green beans, a bag of pumpkin seeds, and I’m probably forgetting a lot. I only listed this because consuming all of this was our sole occupation for about four of the five hours on the train. People kept watching in awe as we pulled more and more food out of our bags.

The day before began with a bus ride in the opposite direction from Zilina to Vratna, but that ride was much more remarkable because it included our view of the first snow of the year! In Zilina it was snowing lightly but not sticking, but as we got further into the mountains (the Mala Fatras- they are small, but gorgeous) it snowed harder and stayed around, until we arrived in Vratna and there was about two inches of snow covering all of the trees and the ground on the mountains (I am not lying, it was so so gorgeous and as soon as I find my camera cord there will be pictures to prove it). Luckily, the air felt snow-warm (if you know what I mean), so we weren’t too cold as we set off for our first hike. We went for about two hours, with a pause to build some small snowmen and a creepy encounter with some other hikers who warned us about bears, then went back to the hotel for lunch. After lunch we went out again for the rest of the day, and after finding the muddiest/snowiest path, made it pretty deep into the mountainy woods, and pretty high up some mountains, as well. It was a perfect day, and it ended with a huge dinner at the same restaurant. We were all exhausted by this time, so we all did some homework/postcard writing and we were ready for bed by 8. This quiet was briefly interrupted by someone in an abominable snowman mascot suit knocking on our door (apparently it was a hotel employee—they were bored and the boss was gone?), which provided some good laughs, and then we slept.

It’s not just the hiking that tired us out; we all only got about 3 hours of sleep the night before. That’s because in Zilina there are some very very strange hotels. First, you should know that Zilina is a small city in Slovakia with not very much going for it. It was pretty much destroyed over the course of communism, etc, and has never recovered. It’s by far the least touristy place we’ve been, and was overall, ugly. We went there for two reasons. The first was to see the reality of some non-tourist towns in Central Europe, the second to visit yet another “alternative art space”- one of Sarah’s (my director’s) favorite attractions (to be fair, they fit in well with the theme of our program, but they’re not really my thing). This one was actually pretty neat. It’s called Stanice (meaning “station”), and it still functions as a main train station. However, they’ve also made it over into a coffeeshop, art gallery, garden, park, theater, and community center. They hold many classes there, particularily for children to do art, and almost every night they have some kind of performance. Many people in the community helped to make it over, and people visit from all over to offer their help. We actually spent the afternoon working in the garden raking leaves, mulching, and planting, which might sound arduous but was much-needed work for us, and it was a pleasant time and a gorgeous afternoon. It was nice to feel useful for a change. We saw a dance performance that night which was pretty extraordinary, even by my skeptical standards.

But the hotels were another story. The first night we stayed in the place Sarah usually has her students stay, but they had recently started renting out the second floor and it currently housed the strangest heat massage/dance therapy sessions I’ve ever seen. Anytime anyone from our group walked past and spied in we heard another strange detail. It might have been a cult. Because of this and the fact that they randomly cancelled our reservation for the second night, we moved to one of the only other hotels in Zilina, which was paired with a casino and had pictures that looked very much like porn on the walls. It was decent until girls in prom dresses showed up and started going into the large “ballroom”, where they were apparently entertained by a DJ until 3am, and I’m not joking. Therefore, we were also entertained by the same DJ, only we were in our rooms. Now it’s hilarious, because they played an eclectic mix of everything from Akon to the entire Grease medley, some in Czech and some in English.

***Interlude: It’s Monday night as I’m writing this. On my way home from school today I started feeling queasy, and since I’ve gotten to the house I have thrown up. A lot. I know that’s a gross thing to know about me, but this is ridiculous. I can’t figure out why Prague and my body don’t get along better.****

In Zilina I also had a particularily frustrating restaurant experience. We would tell the waitress what we wanted, and she would repeat back something different:

Claire: Prosim, dam si maly sopsky salat.
Waitress: Velky vegetarian pizza?
Claire: No, maly sopsky salat. (pointing at menu)
Waitress: Ehh....velky gretzky salat?
Claire: No...a small sopsky salad, please.
Waitress: Pizza?
Claire: Ne. Maly sopsky salat, prosim.
Waitress: Velke gretzky salat.
Claire: Sure.

The best experience was when my friend had a similar conversation with the same waitress trying to say that she wanted her water non-carbonated. We said this several different ways in Czech, pointed to the menu, and tried in English. It ended with the waitress saying, “You want bubbles?” My friend saying, “Yes, whatever” and in the end the waitress brought water without bubbles. It was so funny. Also, after we got our food we didn’t have any silverware, so we asked the waitress for some. There were four of us there, and she brought us two forks and two knives.

This was a trend in Slovakia. I’ll get to the full Bratislava story in a bit, but the waitresses there were absolutely RUDE. At one point I got something that was nothing like what I ordered. When she brought it I said, “Umm...this isn’t what I ordered. I said I wanted a chocolate milkshake.” The waitress told me I was lying, then shrugged and walked away. It’s funny now, but it was pretty annoying at the time. I think it’s a combination of them not having as many tourists (and thus not having the patience for us) with just a general lower expectation for service like that. It’s such a change from the US, and I’m surprised how startling it is for me.

But between Zilina and Bratislava there was KRAKOW. Let me first say that I never thought I would go to Poland in my life. I imagined it grey and dirty and foggy, full of poor people who were always crying. Well, not only did I go to Poland but I LOVED it and I realized that those thoughts were very, very wrong. On the van ride (the very long van ride) to Poland, I felt more and more excited and happy as I watched the hills get bigger as the sun set over Slovakia. We spotted several old, crumbling castles randomly nestled into the sides of hills. The second we crossed the Polish border, however, there were no more castles, and though it was dark, I felt right at home. All I could see were random houses or bars by the side of the road with Christmas lights on them. It was darling. On our ride out of Poland, it was light, and I realized that I had missed even better sights; cows by the side of the road, smoke coming out of every chimney, beautiful hilly farmland. It was all very picturesque, but none of it prepared me for KRAKOW.

Now, Prague and I have had a tumultuous relationship. We like each other for the most part, but Prague has made it very clear that I am on its turf, and I have to constantly be looking for small ways to get closer to it and earn its affection. Krakow is different. The moment I arrived, it told a joke, I laughed, and we were fast friends. Within the hour, we were holding hands, sharing secrets, and we were even comfortable being quiet together. Krakow just embraced me, and I loved it right back. I can’t quite put my finger on why- it was just in the whole atmosphere of the place. Anyway, I’ll tell you what I did there.

Perhaps I set Krakow up for success when I woke up early to go for a sunrise run the first morning there. I set out from the hotel on a park path, and I didn’t know it then, but as I stayed in that block-wide park I ran around the whole main quarters of the city. So, on my way, I saw about half of Krakow’s most beautiful sights, including several magnificent churches, the gigantic castle, and some gorgeous old museums, all in their best morning light. It was a perfect fall morning with frosty air and leaves of every color and sun sun sun, and the park was ideal; wide cobblestone pathways, many benches, even more trees, pretzel vendors, pigeons, and people on their way to work. These people were one of the first signals that Krakow would be different. They actually made eye contact with me, and a few even smiled. I had no idea how much I was missing that in Prague, and it made me downright jolly.

Hmm..I’m feeling like some sleep might do me good, and I want to do Krakow/Bratislava justice, so I’ll end for today, but I’ll post this so you know I’m back. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll finish the story of my trip, because I still have so many other things to write about! Take care, and again thanks for the emails.