Saturday, July 26, 2003

That scene from Crocodile Dundee when he goes out and drinks with the taxi driver, which was last night. The Italian and I went out and he got shit-faced, I taught him that one. He was trying to pick up Polish girls and they were laughing at us. It was good times. And boy is Polish beer strong. Least it seemed to be.

The tour was great. It was just me and the Italian and the tour guide and she knew quite a bit. We saw pretty much all of Krakow in about 3 hours. Not the most beautiful, but the most interesting part was the Jewish quarter. The tour guide said that there were 7000 Jews in 1939 and only 500 after the war. And there are only 100 Jews in all of Krakow. 5 Synagogues and only 2 are used and only 1 by locals. I guess I always thought that Poland was still the home to many Jews, but she acted like that was not true.

The Italian says that they do not have cappuccino here. They make murder of it. The Salt mines were quite fascinating. They had 3 chapels, the third being the biggest, with different carvings in each. The best was a recreation of Leonardo DaVinchi’s Last Supper in 3D. It looked very deep but was only 10 cm in actuality. The elevator was a trip. It was not really enclosed, and had not lights so at certain times it was completely black.

The whole day was quite nice. Spent most of it with Jonathon, the Italian. He bought coffee with a shot a vodka at 1:30 in the afternoon. Met a chap from Dublin and on the tour were 4 people from England. It is starting to dawn on me how much I have actually seen. One of the girls from London was telling me about what a big deal it was going to Edinburough, Scotland. I did not really think that was that far away. And one of the guys from England had never been too Dublin. It seems that when youth get around the age I am, they travel, but to mainland Europe, where, as I am doing this, but I am from the states. I guess I just figured everything was so close that everyone has been everywhere. But I guess that was a stupid assumption seeing as I have not really been anywhere in the states.

I believe I am getting more comfortable with the whole traveling bit. I do not think I was ever too worried, but I seem to know more. Or John just does not know much. There were a lot of times he was clueless and I had to help, which made me pretty happy seeing as it was 3 weeks ago I was clueless when no signs were in English.

One job I would not want is selling train or bus tickets in a European tourist town. Man, what a mad house. Everybody expects everyone that works there to speak their language, especially Americans, but they do not. Although that is frustrating and you know they deal with Americans everyday, you cannot be too hard on them. We would not give them the time of day in the states.

Well, the salt mines were east of Krakow, so that is the farthest away from home I have ever been. The air, they say, is good for you. They have a department for asthma and other things in the bottoms where people stay to recover. Maybe it is all in my head, but I do feel better, not that I felt terrible, but better. And so the journey home begins. To Prague, Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, maybe St. Louis, and then home. Maybe that is why I feel better. I think there will be a smile on my face from here on out. This weekend has gone pretty slow or maybe just seems that way because it was four days long, but I imagine it will start going pretty fast, or I am hoping so. Call Dad, Mom, and Michelle tomorrow when I get back. Till the bus.