Best of the Rest Pt.2

Contrary to popular belief, Germans do not go around in those little leather shorts, singing polkas and hanging out at beer halls all day. Well not all Germans, just the ones in Bavaria. I made a stop in Munich, as I wanted to get a feel for the different and very distinct regions of Germany.

It was a good but short stop, though a little strange. The hostel I was staying in had a bar on the first floor, which attracted a lot of people from elsewhere and gave it a completely different feel from a regular youth hostel. Many of the people were middle-aged and trying to chat up young Australian and Asian girls. I did see young people there, but I’m not sure where they were staying, it certainly wasn’t my room. My roommates were in their 30’s and 50’s respectively. Nothing wrong with that of course, but different.

I did meet some young English guys, in for the UEFA cup matches, and some Australian architecture students. The Aussies and I explored the city a bit, catching some dinner at a traditional beer hall. It was a cool eating experience. You sit at long tables with a bunch of people you don’t know and are somewhat forced to make dinner conversation. It’s all light fair of course, and a good opportunity to get to know new people. The only minus was that I had lipstick on my glass from the last person to use it, and it was scented. We also walked through a scene being shot for a movie in one of the city streets around the town hall. I’m not sure what movie it was, but if you catch any Bavarian films anytime soon look for a guy wearing a blue rain jacket and a green plaid scarf. It just might be me.

The day’s activities included a rather sobering trip out to the Dachau concentration camp. It was an appropriately disgusting day with bitter winds and sleet that was blowing sideways, seemingly always into your face. There are still a few buildings left on the sight, like the offices, processing center, Jail and the main gate. There are also replicas of two of the barracks. The main walls are still in tact as are the ovens and there are memorials from different traditions scattered throughout as well.

This was the one stop that just didn’t seem real. At different places, I often try and put myself back into the time of the original occupants and imagine what it might have been like. Despite all the documentaries and photos that I’ve seen over the years, it just didn’t seem possible that such evil could have occurred on that very spot. Yet there it all was. It was not exactly an uplifting time, but all of the effort that has been made towards remembering and preventing similar acts certainly is encouraging.

From Munich, I caught a train down into Italy. Aside from the fact that the heater in our compartment didn’t work and kept making a clicking sound that would make even Job want to rip it out and throw it onto the tracks, it was a pleasant ride. I met a nice older German couple and we talked about various German things for most of the 5 hours.

I then got into Padua and gave my brother a call. He was studying for the semester there, and by the time I came to visit was all fancy and speaking multiple languages and stuff (translating ancient Greek into Italian, I’m not kidding). I got to meet and stay with his host Grandma, or Nonna as he referred to her. She was hilarious and talked to you in Italian constantly, whether you understood it or not. Thankfully with my two years of Italian I could usually get the gist. When she wasn’t talking to you she was showing you pictures or making inappropriate comments about the people on TV.

I did a day trip to Venice. Took some pictures, almost fell in one of the canals, the usual. It was pretty, but perhaps a tad overrated. It was quite dirty, and I can’t imagine the smell from those canals in the summer time. There were lots of good photo ops though, and a pretty cool glass blowing industry.

After Luke got done with his classes, we hopped aboard a plane to Sicily. We have always wanted to go as our Grandma’s (on Mom’s side) roots were there. It was well worth the wait as it had beautiful scenery and weather and has been a lot less spoiled by the tourism industry than a lot of other places in Italy. The people there were some of the friendliest as well, and actually gave us free stuff at the restaurants instead of trying rip us off. People were even encouraging when you made an effort to speak Italian, rather than just rolling their eyes and playing along.

There was a neighborhood that still has some ruins from WWII bombing, including an amazing church: Chiesa di santa Maria dello Spasimo. The roof has never been put back on, and there is now a tree growing up in the sanctuary. There is a whole lot of spiritual metaphor there, but I’ll let you nuance that. There was also an amazing garden up around the outside of church, from where you could look down into a neighborhood and watch the people of Palermo go about their lives. It was a great place to simply explore and soak in. Not to mention the pizza and pasta.

The fourth day we headed about an hour East of Palermo to Cefalu.
A town with an ocean-front view and lots of cool cafes. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to see any of it, as a typhoon rolled in just about right when we got to our guesthouse. I’m sure we would have loved it though.

From Sicily, Luke had to return to the north to get back to classes, and I headed for Roma. I had already been to Roma Christmas break the year before, so it didn’t hold any of the revelatory discoveries of some of the other places, instead it was like getting back in touch with an old friend.

It was the first time I had revisited a place abroad, and since I had absolutely fell in love with Rome the year before, I was really looking forward to it. The American friend I met in Vienna happened to be heading there at the same time to meet his sister, so we met up and I got to act as tour guide for a couple days. The first day, we started up north at the Spanish steps and did a day walk through all of the major highlights such as Trevi fountain, the pantheon, Piazza Navona, Campo di Fiori and Trastevere. It was a strange, but good feeling to reengage so many sights that I had loved so much already. The same wonder and sense of history was still there that I had enjoyed before. It was kind of like having mini flashbacks as I would walk through the different neighborhoods and remember the apertivo I had here, or the gelato from there.

My second full day, and last day before heading back to Sofia, I gathered my friend and his sister and we headed out to the Via Appia Anticha. One of the original Roman roads built many many years ago, yet still in tact and traveled by the people that live on it. Despite the scattered houses and military instillations on it, the Appian way is one of the most peaceful places I know. We spent just about the entire day wandering up and down, examining the various ruins and chatting about places we had been or wanted to go. It was a good way to unwind and collect the thoughts at the end of the trip.

From there I bade western Europe goodbye and headed back to the Slavic regions. It was much of the same as my previous blog postings, grumpy people, cold weather and lots of yogurt. I stayed there through the holidays, getting to meet Raia’s Dad’s side of the family etc.

Most of my time was taken up with my grad school applications. Classes at the Dom have rendered all previous academic acuity I had completely useless, so the process took a lot longer than perhaps it should have. I did get applications for four programs at two Swedish universities completed and am now waiting for their (hopefully positive) reply.
Raia and I did also take a couple of weekend trips, one to the coastal city of Varna and another to Veliko Turnovo in central Bulgaria. Not too much to say about either of the stops ,but they were both pretty and had cool monasteries, ruins and slightly different cultural feels from Sofia. Veliko Turnivo also had an old fortress that provided some great views of the city and university on the opposing hilltop. We also spend an entire evening wandering around a hilltop village trying to find our hostel. The Bulgarian inability to give directions again proved to be our undoing. It wouldn’t have been too bad except that the streets were steep and covered in ice, and the fact that it was in the middle of a snowstorm. At least we found it.

Since then I’ve made stops in Turkey, Greece, Milan, Spain, and am now in Portugal. I will try to get some more updates in before long. Internet has been really difficult to come by though.