Eatin' GREECEY gyros!!

Are you tired of my corny titles yet? Well, Ill be done with this blog in... 3 days! So we finally made it to our final destination and today I took my LAST final of the semester! Uff ta. Glad thats over! Greece is beautiful! I came in with a bang... and that bang was directed at my suitcase in flight from Rome to Athens. Basically, the people moving my bag decide to take a samari sword to my suitcases handle and completely mutilated it. I was soooo angry when I saw it. Usually I dont get too stressed over stuff like that but I was mad because my suitcase is dang heavy and I really need that handle to work so I can move it! And when I went over to file a complaint to the airlines they basically told me to go away. They said that since it was over weight that I could do nothing about the handle. Which makes no sense because its not like th handle fell off... it was sawed! I drew a picture of it in my journal. Its of a suitcase with a sad face and a samari sword chopping its handle in half.

But anyways, Athens is awesome. I have been eating at least one gyro a day... sometimes more (: They are so goooood! We went up to the Parthenon and Mars Hill yesterday (shout out to Jackie and Lidia- thats the name of their church!)

I am borrowing a friends laptop so I should go now... but I guess this will be my last blog while on my semester abroad! Its been such a great learning experience. Everyone has what we call 'enlargment fatigue'- meaning we have learned so much that we just can't even take it all in. Its been a fun semester and a once in a life time experience. My professors have been so cool and I couldnt image having any other ones but them with us.

One way that you could better help me process everything that has happened this semester is to ask me specific questions about certain locations of subjects I have encountered. The question "how was europe?" is pretty hefty to try to unpack in 2 minutes or less (which is usually the amount of time I imagine people could stand to listen to unless we go out to coffee together!). I have missed everyone at home and at school! I can't wait to see you all! Thanks for reading my blog! Pray for my loooong travels home... we calculated over 24 hours traveling. Eeek. But... I am so excited for the movies on the British Airways flight from London to LA. (: He he.

Thanks! T-minus 2 days and counting!!!!

Firenze!

I am in Florence! Or Firenze as the Italians say. We just got here a few hours ago and it is such a relief to have free internet at the hotel! Although there is a 15 minute limit and I have a line waiting for the comp so I gotta make this quick. I really love Florence already. We are RIGHT by the biggest attraction of the city, the Duomo with the bell tower by Giotto. I got really excited about the bell tower because weve seen pictures of it in our art book. Our hotel is right in the heart of the shopping area and luckily our street is for pedestrians only! (: But I have yet to see the city during the day. I was sad to leave Venice this morning but I enjoyed my time there. I was most excited for that city from the beginning. After seeing it in person I can say it was more beautiful than I imagined it. Although Florence I can see already that it is a more metropolitan area. Venice afterall is a series of islands so everything there was much more expensive since everything has to be exported. BeforVenice we were in Switzerland! It was prettcool,,, literally sinthere was snow! But it kind of reminded me of the mountains in Washington... FYI if anyone wants to come, I really want to go sledding at Mt Rainier when I get back! I think the last blog I wrote was from Paris. Paris was awesome but there is so much to see in that city so I think Ill just have to come back to get the full experience. It didnt help that we had a test and quite a few other projects all due here. ): But Im trying to live everyday to the fullest. Speaking of which I need to go do more preparations for my debate that is coming up on Monday!

So what is everyone doing for Thanksgiving? We decided not to have thanksgiving dinner on Thursday but rather Friday because it worked out for us to rent a kichen for that day. Oh well. We are planning on making our own turkey dinner with all the fixins! Speaking of food... I really miss Mexican food!!! And fresh choloate chip cookies! And pumpkin pie! I could go on and on... in fact I made a long list of food I miss while traveling on the bus today. Maybe Ill share it later... haha.

I like flying buttresses and I cannot lie...

Hello, I am in Paris. I L-O-V-E it here. I just got here last night but it has been sensory overload since Ive been here. But last night on the metro, aka subway train, I made some lists that I will share with you (:

Things I miss:
Pumpkin pie
Mexican food
My laptop

Things I dont miss:
Cell phones
English
Staying in one place

Things I will miss:
Awesome chocolate...right now I am obsessed with Bueno by Kinder... I eat waaay too much of it
Great public transportation... seattles pub transit doesnt even come close
Mango brand clothing stores

Enjoy some more recent photos. They took forever to post but I hope you like them. They go from most recent to least recent... all taken within the last four days... well mostly.



At the Notre Dame cathedral today... listenin to Rick Steves' audio guide to Paris' historical site... many flying buttresses where to be seen here. But sadly no hunch back.

At the Eiffle tower last night.... kind of excited. Can u tell?

This is from when we went to Normandy. This is a memorial site for the soldier who died on D day and also after that. I felt very patriotic there. Its actually American soil given to it by France for the memorial.

Normandy beach

I cant remember the name of this church... ill find out later for u but the inside was the prettiest thing i have ever seen... many flying buttresses on the outside

Bayeux; France ... and you already know there where flying buttresses on this church

This is in Brugge, Belgium, working the sweatpants look

Brugge, on a bike ride

a few pics

ben isnt that big...


Oh Orlando


Dubrovnik, Croatia airport


Chrissie, Yuko, and Me- london


outside les mis in london


no explanation really


in london


yuko met john lithgow! from 3rd rock from the sun... and shrek


Leiden, The Netherlands


OLeiden.... notice the windmill behind me


Our tour guide for Poland, Gabriel! But this photo was actually taken in Berlin, Germany. His last day on the job


One of the professors... Dr Brothers! Hes really fun.


me! in qmsterdqm waiting to get in the anne frank house museum

Never-never land

Yo! I'm in Leiden, Netherlands. Just got here tonight... it was pretty exiting that we got here 3 hours early! So my friend Yuko and I walked around and went to this great pizza place- Donatellos. We shared a pizza but after that I still felt like I just needed... something. So we went looking for coffee. We remembered walking past a place that said "Coffee Shop" so we walked back toward it. When we got in, it was full of young men and was blasting "P.I.M.P." by 50 Cent. So we were kind of like... hmm this is an interesting coffee shop, but whatever. So we got to the counter and looked at the menu... basically we had our choice of various flavors of Hash and Joints. No coffee. FALSE ADVERTISING! So for future reference if you ever find yourself in the Netherlands just know that "Coffee Shop"s here DONT sell coffee. Haha. In case you are wondering, we DID leave right away. Ol Steffers is not that adventurious... or maybe the better word is stupid. Sadly I had to get my hot drink fix at McDonalds. The other shops were closed and it was getting too cold for me to keep going.

Im bummed that this internet cafe wont let me conect my camera because I wanted to post some fun photos! One is of me in front of a Windmill.. taken tonight in Holland. The other was of me with my bike in front of the Reichstad in Berlin- thats the house of parliment for Germany. Yesterday Yuko and I went on the ride of our lives! We went with Fat Tire bike tours around Berlin. It was sooo fun! Would have been perfect if it was 20 degrees warmer... coldest day yet yesterday. But oh well. We went on the English speaking tour and had this awesome guide, an ex-patriot from Australia with the narliest dreads I have ever seen! They were sooo long. Props to Randall (the guide)! Yuko and I were the only Americans on the tour.. except this cool lady whos husband is a professor at Stanford. Everyone esle was from all over... I was excited to see some paisanos from Mexico! Others were from Norway, Netherlands, Peru.... and thats all I can remember. I guess English is one of the most common second languages in Europe so since the tours were only offered in German or English it would make sense there were lots of other Europeans there.

Does anyone else like the song "Apologize" by OneRepublic? I love it! I wish I could get it on my iPod... Ill have to work on that one. Well I better go... need to study for another exam. Plus the door is open in here and my fingers are turning into icicles. Ill try to post some photos soon... and I really mean it this time. I keep saying that but I think I can actually get photos on soon.

Oh, one more thing I thought was funny. I was looking through some random phrases in Dutch and I saw some interesting things. First, to ask someone what their name is you say "Who hate you?"... thats the way it sounds at least. And to ask someone to marry you its "Trauma". Haha. k bye.

Knock knock

Whoäs there?
Brrr
Brrr who?
Berrrrrlin!

I made up that joke last night. Ok heres the run down:
Im in Berlin, Germany- got here on a cramped sleeper train from Warsaw Poland. We said our sad goodbyes to our awesome tour guide. Now im supposed to be studying for a massive exam tomorrow. We are going to a holocaust museum and a jewish history museum at 2pm today so i have a few hours to study as soon as i get off the internet. Im liking Berlin but still need to see more of it . Im really becoming a big fan of museums and >I am stoked to go to the Pergumum museum m tomorrow to see the Ishtar Gate and reconstructed Temple of Zues... in large part because I actually knew what they were before coming here. Im really annoyed with the keyboards here... not only do they not have an at sign on the keyboard in addition to having the z and the y switched... the space bar on this particular keyboard is jammed. haha.

hope all is well! since i dont hear news on life back home when i finally do it always seems so dramatic... and in many cases it is but its even more so to me here since i am so disconnected from life at home.

p.s. i really miss pumpkim pie.

Warsaw

Hello! I am on an energy high right now because this evening was very eventful. And really had nothing to do with the history of Poland or of Warsaw- that was all day earlier. Tonight we went bowling! Yeah, doesn't so great or cultural but it was fun. There were all these Polish young adults there singing Kareoke (sp?). Then some Westmont kids started singing it too, at which point we all stopping bowling and started singing along and dancing... all while other people were probably hating us because they wanted to bowl and were waiting for us to get off the bowling floor. Then we decided it was time to go... but that we had to be at the tram within 4 minutes. But the problem was that it was way the heck down the street so our whole group just RAN through the street to get there. It was so hilarious because we totally took over the bowling alley and then all of the sudden we all just left running. Anyways, we jumped on the tram but then it started leaving without everyone! And out tour guide was running along side until he totally ate it! He fell! I was so worried that he might have gotten hurt. And we couldt get off the tram because it wouldnt stop until the next official stop. Luckily I just saw the other group and they made it back safely on the next tram. And out guide was fine. Poor guy! Oh but he was so funny... he was dancing so hard to Billy Jean. haha. He was having a solo dance that we all just watched. It was funny.

Ok, but on the serious note we did some major historical touring today. I think I mentioned before that Warsaw was 90% demolished by the end of WWII. So we walked aroudn the city and saw the last 10% that was still left over. It was sooooo cold! Warsaw has been the coldest place we have visted so far! Way too cold! But we survived. We also visited the former Jewish ghetto which was super depressing. Warsaw is kind of a depressing place. All the buildings here were built by the Soviets so its all communist style- all are super tall and square and UGLY! But there is some sign of capitalist life here... the massive mall in the middle of town! Its huuuuuge! I actually like it...

Well, thats all for now! Miss you all! Comments are very welcome! Oh, and tomorrow night we will be taking an overnight train to Berlin, Germany so that will be interesting... and I might be updating on Auschwitz later. I have been trying to push back time to reflect on it mostly because its such a heavy topic! But I will be journaling on it tomorrow on the train.