litoměřice!

our trip to litoměřice was arguably the best cerge trip i've taken all semester, for several reasons.

1) it was the warmest - seriously, spring in prague ROCKS. i'll probably reiterate this in every blog post.
2) it was the shortest - we were back in prague by 9pm.
3) it had the fewest people. 

... among many other reasons, as you'll see.

we left school around 10am on friday morning and drove about an hour away from prague to a small town called litoměřice (pronounced something like lit-to-mye-zritz-se). per usual, i remember shockingly little from the tour so almost all of the following information is from wikipedia. litoměřice was established in the 10th century and remained fairly intact throughout history. the symbol of city is a chalice (see photo below) and one of the coolest parts is that a bunch of cellars are connected underground via tunnels, which we got to see firsthand at the restaurant we went to for lunch. 

also, just for pavel: the original town wall was built in the gothic style.

after our tour, we went to go eat lunch and then headed to ploskovice castle, where anna, one of the study abroad directors, LIVED. yes, she lived in a castle (because her mom was one of the caretakers) so she grew up alongside crystal chandeliers and ridiculous ceiling paintings. anna gave us the castle tour and she had her own KEY which was awesome. plus we got to sit on the castle furniture! epic. there was also a cave-esque cellar downstairs that was built to keep people cool during the summers. seriously, great stuff. i also got to see some more peacocks (i think i'm up to peacock sighting #4).

then we went wine tasting at velké zernoseky. yes, we went wine tasting on a school trip = another reason why i love europe. we first got a tour of the wine cellar which was really cool - we saw bottles that were fermenting (or whatever the proper term is) and then sat down to sample seven types of wine (five white wines, two red wines). they didn't really tell us how to properly taste the wine (nothing about whether we should swirl it, whether we should smell it, etc) but that's alright. it was a great time. we made some neat art with toothpicks, ate a lot of bread and cheese, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. once we returned to prague, karin, kyra and i went to get thai food at lemon leaf before calling it a night.

on thursday night, i went to an international club-organized party in mala strana with kyra, jeannie, karin, and pranadhi. we got english flags painted on our faces, went to mcdonald's at 3am, and took some quality pictures. a good night, i'd say.

as the weather gets warmer, i've noticed two things happening:
1) there is an inverse relationship between the temperature and my level of productivity.
i'm not sure how i'm going to manage getting work done in the next three weeks. i have four final papers, and three of them are 10+ pages, which is pretty legit. and requires research. however, i spent sunday "working" outside, going to see the lennon wall, then sitting in the park. uh-oh. i feel sort of torn because on one hand i am not a good student in prague and feel like i should try more.. but on the other hand i KNOW next semester is going to compensate several times over for what i'm not doing this semester (i think rubenstein's three hour class is going to be more work than this entire semester) so i might as well enjoy my semester abroad. i can already tell you the latter is going to win.  

2) there is a direct relationship between the temperature and the number of tourists in prague.
nicki (the program director) told me that during the peak of tourist season, there are so many tourists on charles bridge that you can't even cross it. now that we're reaching may, i can totally believe it. i'm glad i decided to come abroad in the spring to see prague transition from winter to spring, but i'm also glad i won't be here for the height of tourist season. 

speaking of tourists. my mom is coming to prague on wednesday night and we are definitely going to hit all the tourist places. not only am i excited to show my mom around prague, we are going back to cesky krumlov, which is going to be INCREDIBLE :))))))

one last note: why the hell is MGMT playing at yale's spring fling? i can't believe we don't get to reap the benefits of MGMT being wes alums. LAME.

just kidding!

yay spring :)

ok, so it's sunday night and i actually do have to do a little bit of work (tragic) since my mom is coming on wednesday (!!!) and i want to show her around prague and not have to do "homework." but! two quick updates.

1) our cerge trip to litomerice = so. amazing. expect details soon about more peacock sightings and wine tasting.

2) i have a place to live in paris!! well, almost. i just have to figure out a way to pay the deposit. but it's about 10 minutes outside of paris and it's with a french family. YESSSSSSS!

destination: nowhere.

looking for housing in one city is hard, but trying to find a place to live in two different cities/countries/continents when you're already abroad is giving me a headache. mostly because i've been unsuccessful.

sigh. i miss this:

anyhow. fingers crossed that i won't be homeless for three months. and REUNION. THIS. SUMMER. it will be epic.

also, it hasn't quite hit me that i'll be returning to wes as a senior. my friends will be living in woodframes. i'm going to write a thesis. WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN? i can still remember moving into the butts freshman year, going to dinner at 5pm every day at summerfield's, bringing leetly to an a cappella concert in the chapel, taking the zwellmaster's class...  time really flies.

destination: paris!

sacre-coeur!

i can't believe it was two whole weeks ago that i was hanging out in paris... hmm. well this was the last leg of my spring break travels and it was fairly low-key. not even close to being as activity-packed as rome. by this point i was pretty sure i'd be coming back to paris in may so i didn't feel as pressured to do/see everything. on wednesday i walked to notre-dame, sat in the luxembourg gardens, met up with jess for lunch, saw the eiffel tower, went to musee du quai branly, then watched LOST with julie when she got back from class. (side note for lost fans: LOVE. THIS. SEASON.) on thursday, i went shopping (which was GREAT) and then went to sacre-coeur in the afternoon before walking around paris at night with julie. on friday, julie had two friends from spain visit her (steph and lauren) so all of us went to versailles. i left paris on friday night and arrived back in prague late friday night, and proceeded to do nothing for the next two days besides watch copious amounts of project runway. now, pictures!

good news - i have made it through four chapters of "the death of yugoslavia" and will be staying in tonight to finish the last two chapters and do some homework. my european integration class got canceled this morning because my professor is still stuck in the states and can't fly back to prague yet. this weekend, we have a group wine tasting trip to litomerice, and i'm hoping to also go to plzen (where pilsner beers are from) to check out a brewery. 

also, we went to go see "the clash of the titans" in 3D last night. probably one of the worst movies i've ever seen, but it was still a lot of fun :)

destination: bologna!

food. bologna. YUM.

i would say the two pictures above describe my stay in bologna pretty well: delicious :) after three days of nonstop action, i spent two days in bologna with greg living the good life - food, friends, and more food. i also cannot believe that it's been almost two weeks since i was in italy. and i'm still writing about spring break. well i'm going to write about bologna and also do a quick recap of the past few days so that i don't fall too horribly behind.

like i said, we arrived in bologna on sunday night and spent monday hanging out - we toured bologna with julie and maria (one of julie's friends from ND who is studying at university of bologna (unibo for short) for the year) and it was neat - maria knew WAY more about bologna than i do about prague, which is sad considering the fact that i am in a class that talks about prague. most of the stores were closed since it was easter monday, but it was all good - the above pictures are from dinner on monday night - and can i just say that i had the best panini of my life? plus, monday was an important day because i ate gelato twice.

on tuesday, greg and i grabbed breakfast (aka another DELISH experience where i had one of the best cups of coffee known to mankind) then walked to a huge park that had everything from fountains to a GIANT TRAMPOLINE. italians sure know how to live the good life. we ate lunch and then met up with julie and maria at the bus station. julie and i flew ryanair and arrived in paris around 9pm on tuesday night. the last leg of my spring break (destination: paris) is ahead!

now. life in prague!

this weekend was superbly fun, probably one of my favorite weekends to date. we went to the PRAGUE ZOO on friday, which was awesome!!!!! the zoo is apparently one of the best in the world (7th according to forbes) and it is massive. we were there for 3+ hours and probably saw a quarter of it... well i got to see giraffes (which are probably one of my favorite animals now), penguins, lions, monkeys, flamingos, and much much more. 

on saturday, i finally got to go to narodni divadlo (the national theater) and saw a ballet called "la sylphide." it was incredibly beautiful and i loved every minute of it. i loved the costumes and the graceful dancing and the orchestra... a great way to spend an afternoon! i picked up a ton of groceries and made some vegetable korma for dinner after being inspired by karin's cooking way back in february. we went out to sasazu, a dance club, which was lots of fun :) the only down side is that I LOST MY PHONE LAST NIGHT, UGHHHH. i'm mad at myself because it just fell out of my pocket and of course it was impossible to look for it with that many people around. and i don't know if this is a good or bad thing but i also ran out of minutes on my phone so if someone finds it, they won't be able to call someone in my address book or something. oh wells.

today (sunday), i went to a carnival in prague 7 with jeannie and kyra and it was SO MUCH FUN! i think that's the first carnival i've gone to in a long time and it was a lot more elaborate than i thought.. we went on roller coasters and a water ride and the ferris wheel! plus one thing that prague carnivals have that american ones don't is an abundance of booze. we're not just talking beer on tap, but it is quite possible to take shots of vodka and/or rum while you're driving your bumper car. haha.

i actually can't believe i only have one more month in prague. i feel really mixed about this because on one hand, i am excited to live and intern in dc AND have my bffs visit me (and also go back to unlimited texting in the states, haha). i am also really looking forward to senior year, writing a thesis, HR-ing, and spending time with friends that i haven't seen since december. on the other hand, i LOVE prague. sure, there are down sides to being here but being abroad has been such an incredible experience and i know i am going to miss na svihance and taking the metro to mustek and buying groceries at albert's and speaking czech... and so on. i have four weekends left, which are more or less planned:

next weekend: litomerice wine tasting, plzen

last weekend of april: mom visiting

first weekend of may: london

second weekend of may: last weekend in prague / studying for exams / doing everything

well. i am not going to waste any time in the next month, that's for sure. too bad i have a FIVE HOUR DOCUMENTARY i have to watch on yugoslavia.

life update :)

before writing the next two blog entries (destination: bologna and destination: paris.. i know, creative titles) - a quick life update.

1) first, i changed my schedule for the fall from what i originally planned. for anyone who knows me and is remotely aware of my love affair with wesmaps and/or my inability to make decisions.. this comes as no surprise. i'm still taking worling the world and islam and muslim cultures, but i'm taking foreign policy at the movies and russian politics. i'm sure everyone was dying to know what my schedule would be so there it is. 

pro: i only have class on tuesdays, wednesdays, and thursdays.
con: i have three classes on tuesdays and thursdays and my rubenstein class on wednesdays. 
con: i'm going to have so much reading. for the rubenstein class alone it'll probs be 400 pages a week or something equally ridic.
pro and con: i'm going to have to work. really. hard. and be stressed out. but at least i'll enjoy going to class?

well. we'll see how that works out.

2) it looks like i will not be going home this summer. so if you haven't been reading my blog but happen to catch this entry - it's your lucky day because apparently my blog is full of inconsistencies. well. i'm not going back to seoul because.... i got the davenport grant from wesleyan to do research for my thesis in france this summer!!!!!!!!! yes, this means someone is actually giving ME money to do something that i really want to do!!!!! SO. EXCITING. i've moved around a couple dates so it looks like my plans will look something like this:

may 19: leave prague
may 19-june 9: research in france
june 9: fly to dc
june 14-august 13: intern at pfaw
august 15: move back to wes for HR training

so what is my thesis and what kind of research will i be doing? well i will hopefully be writing about all my french adventures in this blog! my thesis is about french representation of religion and religious communities in north africa. i want to study how colonizers are affected and transformed through their interaction with the colonized, and how french representation of north african religions and religious communities changed domestic french policies. that's the gist of it. anyhow i am bummed that i won't be going home but i think this is going to be an incredible experience. now, if only i could find a place to live between may 19 to august 15...

destination: vatican city & florence!

 day two: welcome to vatican city! (st. peter's basilica)

day two in italy was no different from day one - after grabbing a delish breakfast at the nun hostel, i headed off to the vatican museums on my own. sadly, julie couldn't get an online ticket because they were sold out for saturday about two hours after i got mine. i was freaking out a little bit while in line because my ticket reservation was for 9am but even with my e-ticket, i still had to wait in line for a half hour. luckily i made it inside and started exploring - there is SO. MUCH. TO. SEE. it was seriously line a sensory overload. i saw everything from egyptian to etruscan art, to the hall of many many statues to early christian art (read: lots of body parts), and of course the sistine chapel, which was smaller than i expected. it was a wonderful 3+ hours but it was a bit overwhelming. they should not have so much stuff in one place but it was more than worth the 12euro. towards noon, the museum started getting so crowded that it literally took me a half hour to get back out. ridiculous.

the rest of saturday was pretty laid-back. julie and i grabbed lunch with her friends in their apartment (a bunch of them got an apartment for the week), then got gelato and walked around some more. unfortunately, we did not get to watch the final four butler vs. msu game (which feels like a long long time ago) because we were both super-tired (or at least i was). plus we would have to get up even earlier the next day (sunday) for easter mass.

***

day three: easter mass (in the rain) 

well, i guess italy can't be perfect. the weather was beautiful on friday and saturday (i may or may not have gotten a tan) but sunday was cold and quickly became very, very wet. thanks to notre dame, julie and i got tickets for easter mass but after 2+ hours outside (two hours waiting, then a half hour of mass), it started pouring so we bounced. i got to see the pope from afar and got a neato easter booklet so all in all it was fine. plus, this meant that i could take an earlier train to florence to meet up with greg, which is exactly what i did. the rome train station was a major struggle (again). florence wasn't the last stop and for some reason my train number wasn't showing up on the screen... i made it on to the right train with about two minutes to spare. whew.

florence was cool, but i didn't get to see too much. thanks to the rain, we took some pictures in front of the duomo, walked along ponte vecchio, picked up some leather goods (i got a purse and greg got a belt), then ate gelato. we arrived in bologna around 10pm and had a SUPERB easter dinner courtesy of his friends (who all cook). needless to say, it was the best surprise ever. what did we do in bologna? that's coming up next!