30m and Counting

Well, as promised, here is the last of my little fit of entries. I am writing you from Frankfurt airport, where I am waiting for Allison, who will be here visiting and staying for this upcoming week. I only have 30 free minutes on the airport's wifi, so procrastination is now not an option. "21m 13s" and counting. Allison's flight is supposed to arrive at 22:00, I hope there are no complications. Speaking of complications, I got on the wrong train attempting to get here. Not a huge problem, it wasn't like I got on the wrong train at the beginning of the trip and ended up in München or something, I made it to Frankfurt before getting lost. I arrived in Hanau from Würzburg. Ok, off to a good start. I arrived in Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof Süd from Hanau. Awesome, almost there! I arrived at Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof instead of Frankfurt Flughafen (Airport). Fail. Now, it is important to notice that I did NOT somehow go from Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof (Train Station) to Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof, it wasn't THAT bad...one was Süd (south) and one was wrong.

"14m 08s". Anyway, I am here early and waiting. So I have plenty of time to think of the classes that I started this past week. I only started 3 of the 8, the language courses don't start until this coming week. This past week I had a class that is in English about German National Historic Sites, I think it will be easy but also interesting. There are also some cool extra stuff that go along with it. Like wine tasting, tour of the Würzburg Residenz, and an informative session about beer culture at the Würzburg Hofbräu brewery. I had a German-English translation class. That is going to be immensely difficult, considering that it is geared towards Germans that are fluent in their mother language and basically fluent in English. However, it was extremely interesting and I look forward to the rest of the sessions. I also had a second class in English about German Scientists and Inventors, again it will be easy.

You might be thinking "Wow, he seems to have a lot of easy classes." Not quite. I am also taking a Spanish class, French class, German class, German hearing comprehension class, and German reading comprehension class. I will make sure to give you the update on those, as well as Allison's visit next weekend!

It's kinda crazy because I'm so used to posting pictures now that this post looks like it's missing something! It's good to practice my English though :) I have noticed myself sounding a little less intelligent when speaking in English at times. My grammar sometimes is a little backwards, and depending on what I am trying to say I might come up with very interesting syntax. Syntax, solid word, I guess I haven't lost it all yet.

I have been watching a lot about the candidates to prepare for the upcoming election, which I can proudly say I will be voting in! It'll be my first. I received my absentee ballot just yesterday, printed it out, and will fill it out and send it in sometime this coming week. By fax, you're right, it wouldn't make it in time by mail. "3 min 09 sec" Well, I better go for the sake of being able to send this! Just on a quick political/comedic note, it can be easy to get sucked into rivalries during election times. Check out this video. It is very entertaining and definitely refreshing! Both candidates speak also in it:

http://www.c-span.org/Campaign2012/Events/67th-Annual-Alfred-E-Smith-Memorial-Foundation-Dinner/10737435020-2/

Until next time! You're all in my thoughts and prayers!

Pavlik...Back to the Source

For those of you who do not know, my ancestors on my father's side came from present day Czech Republic. So you can imagine that one of the destinations on my "To Travel To" list was Prague, or Praha in Czech (simply Prag in German). Robert's son David has also never been to Prague, and so when Robert told me of an idea that he had to visit it 'on our way' back to Würzburg so that we could both experience it, I readily accepted!

It was about a five hour drive from Stuttgart to Prague, somewhat shorter with the help of the autobahn, which doesn't have a speed limit. As we approached the capital, we could smell it before seeing it. As Robert informed me, being that Czech Republic is still a relatively young country attempting to recuperate after a long and hard communist occupation, it is still quite poor in many parts. As a result, new forms of energy production are still young (we did see a few solar farms) and coal is still the primary fuel burned for warmth. The smell was definitely intensely noticeable, however I didn't find it unpleasant. We checked into our hotel around 21:00 (yes, I have been converted to a military time supporter now due to it's lack of potential confusion) and then had a quick dinner up at the second level of the hotel. The hotel was two buildings. The first had 8 levels, this was the one we stayed in. The second had I think some of the extravagant suites, as well as the restaurant, and was accessible from the first building by way of a tram. We asked our waitress how to say "thank you" in Czech, a potentially helpful phrase, and the answer is "děkuji". Yes, it looks intimidating, but phonetically is not pronounced "dah quee" ...or at least fairly close to that, she understood well when I repeated it that way. I must say, my heart beat with a couple proud pounds as the words of the 'Pavlik' language came out of my mouth.

We would only have around 6 hours in Prague the next day before we would have to race back to Würzburg to drop me off and then Robert and David would return to Stuttgart so we turned in for the night and in order to prepare for an intensely packed following day.

We woke up the next day and partook in a truly amazing breakfast offered by the hotel. After this we packed up our things, drove into Prague, exchanged a little money, and began the tour of the city...

Adam and Eve Church...Adam is the slightly larger one on the right.

Tower modeled after one in Venice. The good king captured the clock maker  who created the one in Venice in order that he could make one equally as beautiful there....and then after completion gauged his eyes so he couldn't make any more.

Why use a file for your feet when you have 32 degree Celsius water with hungry fish in it? 

National Museum

St. Charles Bridge

Statue on St. Charles Bridge

View of the city from Pražský hrad (Prague Castle)

Entrance way to the fortress and cathedral

St. Vitus Cathedral

It had the most gorgeous stained glass I have ever seen

Into the dungeon 

Hmmm....doesn't look like the most enjoyable toilet 

Just enough room for a criminal to fit into

There was also a small street fest going on in the more downtown part of the city. We scouted the booths, filled with tantalizingly delicious smelling foods of many sorts, and were able to somehow make a choice as to which we wanted for lunch. We then made our way back to the car and returned westward, back towards Deutschland, work for Robert, school for David, and the first of classes for me. Many thanks to them for hosting me for an amazingly fun week and a couple priceless excursions!

 I can say that Prague was easily one of my favorite places out of all those that I have visited. I am not sure exactly what it was about it, but I felt completely at home there and loved the architecture, history, and culture of the capitol. An extremely interesting and beautiful city which I definitely hope to return to at some point in my lifetime!

Just Rome-ing Around

Ok, well I suppose I need to begin this post with an apology: I'm sorry. I have been ludicrously busy traveling recently, thanks to Robert Humphreys, a family friend who taught with my parents when they taught for the Department of Defense Schools (DODS). Not only have I been traveling, but I have been attempting to cement my spots in various classes for this coming semestre, as well as organize a visit from my girlfriend, Allison, who will be arriving in Frankfurt on the 21st. So, I will give you a quick overview of how I am going to go about attempting to cover everything that has been going on:
     a) this current entry will be about my trip to Rome, Italy
     b) I will create a second entry (within the next couple days) about my trip to Prague, Czech Republic
     c) by Sunday the 21st I will post a very short piece about the general events going on as the semestre starts up here
     d) then we will be back on track and I will fall back to the weekly updates

So the plan was to take the train down to Stuttgart on the Friday the 5th, in order to arrive at Rebert's house that evening. However, there ended up being an accident with one of the trains near Karlstadt and so all of the following trains were delayed. As I was not yet packed (imagine that, a college student procrastinating) I decided that it would be more prudent to wait and leave the morning of the 6th and arrive around 11:00 a.m., because I didn't want to be navigating new areas during the evening/night. All went well this time and I rolled into Stuttgart at about 11:15 a.m. Robert was kind enough to pick me up from the Hauptbahnhof (main train station) and we went back to the house. David, his son, was participating in a soccer camp, so I had the afternoon to relax and unpack. With regards to lunch, Robert asked if I would like a burger...the heavens opened and God proved to me his existence. It was the most amazing burger I have ever eaten. After being deprived of American food for so long the burger was my Mana and Robert my Moses.

That evening we went to the Cannstatter Volksfest, the second biggest fest in Germany (behind Oktoberfest). Robert and I happily ate our way through the fest as David and his friend rode some of the rides. On Sunday while David was participating in his last day of camp Robert took me to mass on the base and then afterwards to the store on base. It was amazing, I was able to stock up on American food staples as well as grab a couple gifts to cook up for the host family. Such a brownies, cornbread, Oreos, Reese's, and a couple jars of salsa. Fun little side note: While shopping for a salsa there I saw a brand which hailed from New Mexico, Albuquerque nonetheless! Pride for my state was boundless.

Fish frying

Crêpes...yes, we donated to the cause

My plane for Rome departed the Stuttgart airport on Monday afternoon and my return flight was on Friday afternoon. This gave me 3 solid days in the Eternal City, as well as a couple half days. I am going to stick with the format that I have been using to document trips, mostly pictures with a few stories or commentary here and there. However, if you have any questions or comments about anything, or just want to go a little deeper with the details of something, feel free to shoot me an email, or if you have Facebook obviously I am there too! Here we go!

DAY 1: Monday, October 8th

My plane touched down in Rome at about 6:00 p.m. local time. I tracked down my baggage, navigated the airport, and slowly sniffed out the airport train station, where I rode the Leonardo Da Vinci Express into the heart of Rome...Termini Station. Termini Station is basically the train station, as well as where all of the metro lines begin and/or pass through. I was aware of pickpockets, however I had no trouble with anything the entire trip through. Upon checking in to the American Palace Hotel EUR, I dropped my stuff off at the room and then decided that I had just enough time to explore the immediate area of the hotel. It was very interesting and I ended up finding a market to buy a bottle of water. I also stumbled upon a shop where I ordered a calazone for dinner. It was different than the American one though...it had almost a sweet bread and was mostly bread with a little bit of filling. 

DAY 2: Tuesday, October 9th

This day was huge. I spent 11 hours hitting some of the biggest names in Rome as well as just walking around and exploring the city a bit. Also, I want to warn you that you are about to see an army of pictures of the Colosseum...I'm sorry about that. It makes for quite the photo subject though and it seemed like every time I saw it the lighting or angle was different and inviting.

The first site to greet me after ascending the stairs to the city from the metro station.  You cannot see it in this picture (there is a better one later) but this is Circo Massimo...the site of all of the ancient races and such

Ruins on the Palatine. These next few pictures were taken on the Palatine Hill, the location of the houses of all of the great nobles that lived in the city

The Colosseum from the Palatine 

Another picture from the Palatine...my favorite picture of the Colosseum actually, maybe the tree does it for me.

The city of Rome

The gardens of the Palatine

From the Palatine: If you strain your eyes and look into the distance...

...you can see the big boy himself. Hello St. Peter's!

Palatine stadium

The Colosseum from the temples by the Foro Romano 

The Foro Romano (Roman Forum)

Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II (National Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II)

I finally actually made my way to the Colosseum for a tour

The innards of the Colosseum. It actually legitimately had lifts which were used to raise animals or props up onto the competing surface of the arena

The colosseum from the inside. It had something like 80 entrances/exits, held around 60,000 spectators, and could be completely emptied in 15 minutes.

Arch of Constantine 

Fontana Trevi

The Spanish Steps

"Holy Moses! There's a baby in the river!"

Rome had some of the most beautiful bridges

A statue on one of the bridges

Even though I told myself I was saving the Vatican for Wednesday the Catholic inside of me could not hold back....I just wanted to make sure it was still there after having seeing it on the Palatine Hill

Circo Massimo

Old aqueduct, if I'm not mistaken, on my way back to the metro

DAY 3: Wednesday, October 10th

Just to give you an idea of what separates Vatican City from Rome

Inside St. Peter's Square

Chairs are all set out and people begin to fill in for the papal audience, of which I was lucky enough to be a part of, thanks to a free ticket from Robert via the USO

Papa! 

Benedict XVI throwing a quick blessing down

Now within the Vatican Museum

Just a normal Vatican ceiling

Herakles

Supposedly the sarcophagus of St. Helen

I think this picture shows the difference between Vatican City and Rome well. The street to the left of the wall is Rome. 

The famous Map Room of the Vatican

The ceiling

The entire wall was covered in these paintings of maps. One of the former popes had every region of Italy documented on these walls.

St. Peter's from one of the museum windows. I unfortunately never made it into St. Peter's Basilica. However, I made it everywhere else and I think I made it to potentially a better place...I will show you later.

Holiness is always on sale near Vatican City

The Pantheon 

These pictures cannot even begin to describe how huge this building is. This is the most expansive dome I have ever seen

DAY 4: Thursday, October 11th

Thursday I was quite tired of all of the people, lines, and hecticness of the main Roman haunts so I decided to have a more relaxed day. I slept in a bit, then leisurely explored a different area of the city, specifically on a quest to find the Basilica of St. Paul. St. Paul, as some of you may know, holds a very special place in my heart as he is my patron saint.

In my search I ran into this Basilica of Sts. Peter and Paul. This stood out in a huge way because, as you can see, there is a lot of open space here...something that you almost never find in other parts of Rome, or at least the heart of the old part of the city

My boy St. Paul with his Sword of the Spirit

St. Peter...see the keys there?

How my buddy St. Paul left this world.

Things didn't work out quite that well for St. Peter either.

Here it is. The site I had been searching for. The site that I would be prepared to argue is more worth a visit than the St. Peter's Basilica. This is the Basilica of St. Paul.

Here is one of the ceilings, who knows how high up there

One of the nice small side passages

The famous painting of the conversion of St. Paul

If you can see all of the small gold circles on the wall just over 1/2 of the way to the ceiling, those are all popes. The basilica had a profile of every single pope since St. Peter on the wall.

Peter snuck into the Basilica also...but I guess he does have the keys 

"Lord, where else would we go?"
"You will go on the wall of St. Paul's Basilica, Peter, that is where you will go."

There's Benedict, he made the cut for the wall too

Courtyard of the Basilica

This is supposedly the tomb of St. Paul...back in that hollowed out area there

By the way, St. Peter's is still on my list of places to get to, don't think I am not interested. However, if you don't feel like battling a crowd and if you want to be in a place of worship that actually feels like a place of worship and not simply a tourist destination...St. Paul's is not a bad second. It is also the second largest basilica in the world, second to St. Peter's of course.

DAY 5: Friday, October 12th

Friday my plane left at around 4:00 p.m. Checkout was at 12:00 so I lugged my baggage to St. Paul's for one last rosary and prayer session before the commute back to Termini and then to the airport. I landed in Stuttgart around 5:30 p.m. and was welcomed by Robert. We then drove home to rest until the next afternoon, when we would continue on to the next destination in the queue...Prague.