When possible Rose Bowl glory is waiting at the other end, the answer is an unequivocal 'yes'. Unequivocal, even though getting to California from Oregon in wintertime involves waking up at 4:30 am to make it over the Siskiyous before bad weather strikes. Unequivocal, even though once you pass Redding, the next few hundred miles is straighter than a flatline, boring, and smells like cow dung until the Bakersfield turnoff. Unequivocal, even when you eat too much unlimited pea soup at Andersen's restaurant, and have to drive in a food coma for the next two hours to the hotel. Unequivocal, even when you include L.A. rush hour traffic in your driving plans. And why so unequivocal, dear Puddles? Four words:
I LOVE MY DUCKS
And so does everyone else on the I-5 corridor. You wake up early because you know that, more than a caffeinated beverage, fans in cars souped up with green and gold decadence will inspire you to keep truckin'. How many flags, windsocks, rear-window pom-poms, and painted slogans can one vehicle possibly hold? Never enough. Honk if you love Ducks. And let's all gang up to run over that one Ohio State guy we saw in traffic in Stockton. He even had an Oregon license plate--oh, the shame.
You make it through the 1,000 miles--sometimes tortuous, sometimes seemingly endless in their straightness--with the support of roadside signs, also extolling the virtues and prowess of water fowl with a permanent Disney grin:
I will lend my support to the separation movement of the State of Jefferson in exchange for more Duck fans, as long as they promise not to ever vote for Sarah Palin.
You listen to the Lion King soundtrack as you channel your childhood memories of the last time your drove to the Rose Bowl, 15 years ago. No, we didn't win that time. Yes, this time will be different. Our fan love has only grown. Hakuna Matata. Yes, I still know all the words.
You grin and bear it when your stomach aches at the end of Road Trip Day 1--flapjacks at the Seven Feathers, combined with all-you-can-eat Pea Soup Andersen's was a bit too much. But it was soooo good. And, after all, pea soup is green, and a little extra-superstitious school spirit never hurt. Apply the same logic to the tureen of a margarita you down before the Santa Monica pep rally the next day--green lime and golden tequila mix. Alcohol is also useful in warding off a little of the chill from that liquid sunshine we Oregon fans tend to bring with us. It never rains in Santa Monica.
You already know the trip was worth it when, leaving the Intercontinental, you feel the velvety microfiber under your fingers as you touch your Rose Bowl ticket for the first time, when you see Jeremiah Masoli fistpump to cheering admirers at the Santa Monica Pier, and hear those first sweet strains float above the crowd during a live performance from Supwitchugirl?:
You dance your heart out, bang your noisemakers, blow your commemerative Rose Bowl quacker. That's right--I don't yell "O", I SCREAM! Buckeyes have nothing on Ducks. My bird will roast your chestnut any day, Ohio State.
I'm riding the pep rally high all the way through crosstown traffic and on to Disneyland tomorrow. Donald Duck and I are going to pal around the whole day. Ring in the New Year with a Duck victory, and the 1,000 miles back to Oregon will be unequivocally easy.
Saturday was wonderful--I went into New York and took in a matinee performance of Jude Law as Hamlet on Broadway (excellent, and not just because it was Jude Law). I then made it back to Princeton for an tasty fall dinner with friends (acorn squash!), and got over to my fellow Oregon fan's room at the Old Graduate College to catch the second half and two overtimes of the incredible Duck victory over Arizona. Memo to Arizona fans: don't rush the field before the game actually ends. Civil War, here we come! We celebrated by watching the contraband video "I Love My Ducks" and then I moved down to the D-Bar in the basement to catch the second set of the Turkish rock band from New Brunswick, Istavrit Istanbul. Made me wish I was in the City of Seven Hills right now...
High on Ducks and Turkey, I got home and realized that a different kind of fowl awaited me. This Turkey was the main course for the Woodrow Wilson School Thanksgiving Potluck and I had volunteered to cook it for the next day's festivities. The 21-pounder had been dropped off at my house around noon...completely frozen. Thank you, Butterball. I did not know at the time they have a hotline, but I do know my way around Google pretty well. Search: how to thaw a turkey asap! Naive little me. It takes 5 hours PER POUND to thaw a turkey in the refrigerator, and here I was, a mere 15 hours from serving time with a rock of turkey ice on my hands. Leaving it out on the counter is bad for the quality of the meat, and you cannot just stick the thing in water overnight and go to bed while it warms up. Oh no. You have to CIRCULATE the water EVERY HALF HOUR, gradually warming the temperature to help thawing progress and prevent the growth of bacteria. Joy of joys. The Office and 30 Rock kept me up for one hour, then I started cheating a little. I would nap for 45 minutes, then circulate the water. I eventually pried out the bag of innards, wrenched the frozen neck from the inside of the big cavity, and Hallelujah, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition--by 8 am, the thing was ready to be dressed by a very tired yours truly.
Dump a little celery, carrots, parsley and onion in the cavity, spices and herbs and garlic all over, and put that turkey in the oven. You only need to adjust the temperature and baste every couple hours (and in between bastings, I took a nap--and had a group meeting for a school project). In the end, voila! That bird came out so pretty! I'm sure I have a picture, which I will share eventually. Greeted by cheers in the Robertson basement, the turkey was demolished by several scores of hungry graduate students. Nothing left but bones!
The juices in the pan also made for an excellent gravy and the grease that accidentally spilled in the bottom of the oven made for--a week later--a not-so excellent grease fire. This evening, as one of the roommates was preheating the oven for her dinner, smoke started pouring out of the oven. Flames in the oven pan quickly followed. Whoops. Forgot to run the self-clean feature. Google will tell you that water will NOT help put out a grease fire, and this was useful information. However, the fire could not be contained by the pot lid, which was the other suggestion. 9-1-1 it was, and oh, the turnout was huge. By the time the four police cars (Public Safety, Princeton Police...), two police SUVs, two fire engines, and a facilities van had arrived, the smoke alarm had stopped beeping, and the fire had put itself out. Disaster averted. The cops and firemen were very nice...let's hope they are equally as nice if they get called to quiet us down at my roommate's birthday party this Friday...
After the longest flight of my life, and a debriefing from our professor after an evening arrival at the hotel, exploration of Hanoi had to be postponed until Sunday. Too tired to go out on the town, I reveled in the luxury of the Hotel Moevenpick, which as their tagline suggests is “Passionately Swiss”. While I have never heard those two words together in the same sentence, I now define it as:
1. Having very comfortable pillows and beds, perfect for relaxing on as I finished editing a fellowship essay 2. Having a strangely un-private bathroom: one wall of the rainforest shower is a glass window into the bedroom, and the shades can only be controlled from the outside. Kinda weird. 3. Having delicious room service! First bowl of authentic Vietnamese pho: check! So you understand how good it is, I’ve included a pho-to (haha, get it?)
Getting out of the hotel in the morning was even more exciting than pho...my first time in Asia non-Minor! The first thing you have to adjust to in Vietnam is the extraordinary numbers of motorbikes that weave in and out of Hanoi traffic. The only rule they follow is that they go where they want, and any time you want to cross the street, you just have to take a deep breath and go for it. Sudden movements are a bad idea. As our professor told us from her day of experience: walk with a "measured gait" so they can swerve around you—which they usually do pretty effectively.
These motorbikes carry Vietnamese professionals on their way to work, young couples out for the day, entire families, decorative items, or furniture stacked high on the back…and almost every individual on a bike is (unbelievably) wearing a helmet. I was told the government recently instituted a law requiring helmet use, and once the law went into effect, behavior changed overnight. Credit it to a good public education campaign (the fee is more expensive than buying a helmet!), a government with the authority to make things happen, or the fact that helmets come in so many styles and colors they become a fashion statement of coolness…whatever it was, it worked. The next step would be encouraging people to actually straps on the helmets-—Burberry patterns aren’t magically protective if the helmet flies off your head in an accident.
We managed to safely dodge all the bikes on our walk from the Moevenpick to Hoan Kiem Lake, and took in the peacefulness of the temple on the lake before diving into the bustling streets of the old quarter. Women in the traditional cone hats look like giant scales of justice as they tote their wares on platters hanging from the ends of bamboo poles—you decide if the dragonfruit or the pollution masks look more deserving of your attention and a few thousand dong (it’s the currency…and no, Princeton students aren’t all that mature so yes, we’ve made plenty of jokes about this).
In need of sustenance, I opted for an early lunch—more pho! It’s a chopstick challenge, but it’s worth the effort—and it sounded better than fried roodles:
After lunch, Maura and I took what we thought would be a quick detour into a salon for a bikini wax. Rather than take the standard 20 minutes, we were in there for over an hour and a half, as the ladies waxing were painstakingly thorough—with an emphasis on the pain. Ready for a more enjoyable experience, we meandered over to a market, where we decided the Vietnamese are no longer Communist. Knock-off Converse, North Face, designer jeans, and plenty of non-essential crap were available in abundance. We did find something we wanted at the fabric vendor stalls though, and bought some beautiful patterned silk to take to a dressmaker. But by now, the jet lag was kicking in, and I was in need of a nap. Taxi back to the hotel, and I collapsed on the feather-soft pillows of the Moevenpick and was instantly asleep.
Three hours later, I groggily awoke to realize I needed to get ready for dinner. Our first meeting of the trip was with a WWS alumnus who is now the Clinton Foundation’s country director in Vietnam, working on environmental and waste initiatives. Benny took us to a fantastic Vietnamese restaurant, where we gorged on spring rolls, various meats, leafy veggies, and plenty of rice while swapping stories of the beloved Woo. Benny wanted to take us out, but we begged off until another night—too many meetings tomorrow and way too tired.
The Hong Kong airport smells like Chinese food, but I guess that's to be expected. Out the airport terminal window, layered hills rise like dragons' backs out of the water, shrouded in fog...or smog, I'm not sure which. In the past 24 hours, I've crossed twelve time zones and the international date line (I find this concept a bit mind-boggling...for instance, if you lived on the international date line, would you decide to live in the future or the past?), and slept very little and very sporadically. Miraculously, all ten of us managed to make the 5 am shuttle from Nassau Inn to JFK. I decided not to sleep after returning home from D-Bar after 2 am, and was happy for the decision when several classmates whom I'd also seen at the bar had to be roused from their beds by more responsible classmates. But now, after a 16-hour flight, I am tired. And when I log on to the free wireless, this is what I see on the Yahoo home page:
I feel like I am hallucinating. Happy Halloween. But I need to rally for an evening at the Water Puppet Theater in Hanoi. Asia's calling.
I felt the familiar twinge of cultural readjustment this week. On Wednesday, I went out for my first row since being back in the States. It was a beautiful morning for getting back on the water, but reappearing in the boathouse meant plenty of the standard questions about my summer. It's never easy to sum up all the wonder of a new cultural experience in the 15 seconds people actually pay attention after asking: "Wow, Africa...how was that?" Do you just feed into what they want to hear and answer: "Great...yeah, I saw a lot of animals. The people are really friendly."? Or, do you assume that they only asked you a broad question because they don't know enough details to ask you something more specific? I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, so I would briefly try to describe the HIV education I had been involved in.
But then, after I mentioned Botswana's high HIV rates, someone asked me something along the lines of: "So is there just a complete sense of hopelessness there?"
Hopelessness? I can just see him picturing Africa not as the vibrant mix of culture, music, and languages that it is, but as this desolate wasteland populated by skin-and-bones people crawling with flies--the images you see on the "Save the Children" ads. This may exist in other parts of the continent, but it is not what I saw this summer in Botswana, nor anywhere else in Southern Africa. I'm sure I encountered people with HIV this summer--shook their hands, sat next to them in a taxi van. And what I can say about "hopelessness" is that I didn't see any of it. People are living their lives, and they are friendly and happy (or at least acting like it), even if they have HIV. Granted, Botswana is doing better economically than most places in Africa, and can offer free anti-retroviral drugs for those who need them as a result of its mineral wealth. I'm sure this has had an impact on how optimistic people are about dealing with the epidemic. But even in Mozambique--another place with high HIV rates, and higher poverty levels--HIV is not destroying people's desire to enjoy life. Remember, even when you have HIV, you look perfectly healthy for years before complications of AIDS set in. If you had HIV, would you just want to sit around depressed for ten years because you knew you'd eventually die a pretty miserable death? I hope not. There's no reason people living in a different hemisphere should look at it any differently. So no, in spite of colonization, having imported political-economic structures placed upon them, wars, and the ravages of infectious disease, the people of Africa do not share a collective sense of hopelessness. I would call that resilience.
*****
On a happier note, I will look back on this week as a highlight of my Turkish-speaking career. I spoke with the Turkish Prime Minister--in Turkish! The UN General Assembly was meeting this week in New York, and PM Tayyip Erdogan decided to come down to Princeton afterward to give a speech on Turkey's new foreign relations priorities. I was quite possibly the first person to pick up a ticket to the event when they became available last week, and also managed to swing getting a ticket to the reception following the speech. The speech was fantastic, and I had no idea the Prime Minister had such a sense of humor!
When discussing the importance of not just having international conventions and laws, but putting them into practice (not verbatim, nor translated word-for-word): "In Turkey, we have a saying: You cannot feel the sweet taste of honey in your mouth just by saying the name of honey. You have to eat the honey to taste it!"
When discussing how Turkey understands other countries suffering from terrorism: "Someone who falls off the roof understands another who falls off the roof. Nasreddin Hoca falls off the roof and breaks his leg, and says: 'Do not find a doctor; find someone else who has fallen off a roof!'"
At the reception, I met up with my classmate and friend, Aytug, who is a Turkish government employee, and will return to Ankara when he finishes his masters. He was determined to have me meet the PM, and after we had patiently waited several minutes to have the chance to speak to PM Erdogan, Aytug moved right up to introduce himself, as well as his "American friend who speaks Turkish" (that would be me). Mr. Erdogan shook my hand, and asked me (in Turkish--he doesn't speak English) how long I had stayed in Turkey. My response was just one sentence, and not a topic of any great weight, but it was grammatically correct, and beautifully delivered--I told him I'd studied in Ankara for 8 months in 2004. He smiled, and then he had to leave--Aytug had made his move just in time.
I'm still waiting on more pictures from the photographer, but here's one that made the online article, and the speech itself (with translation) on YouTube:
***** More fall fun: this weekend, I went apple-picking! Lena, Maria Elena, Andrew and I went out to Terhune Orchards and ate apples in many forms: apple cider with our macaroni lunch; apples off the tree as we walked through the orchards; caramel apples after the picking was over. Some fun pics from the day:
It's been a rough week back in Princeton, getting over the jet lag while trying to finish first-day-of-class papers, move in, and meet old friends and new people at pub crawls, bluegrass nights, and service days. After a day of cleaning up a youth center in Philadelphia, I was tired. But, I wanted to go into NYC for the evening to meet up with Peace Corps Morocco friends to celebrate Graham's birthday. So I napped, rallied, and caught the train in to meet Lauren by Penn Station. Finding the bar was a minor challenge, as we didn't know where exactly St. Mark's was (other than knowing it was close to NYU). We got subway directions to the right stop, but when asking at the liquor store where St. Mark's Square was, we were given very confused looks. I guess it's actually St. Mark's PLACE, though why the five men working the liquor store didn't assume this immediately about a place two blocks away, I know not. They eventually pointed us in the right direction, and we enjoyed a fantastic evening at Grassroots Bar.
Then I learned a lesson--don't miss the last train back to New Jersey, unless it's on purpose. Lauren and I got to Penn Station about five minutes too late, and after the 1:41 train, nothing goes to the Jers (except exorbitant taxis) until 5:14. If we had stayed down in the Village, I think we would have had plenty of fun, but now we were in Midtown, and too lazy to go back. And Midtown sucks. When they say the city never sleeps, they don't mean Midtown, though all the lights around Times Square might fool you into thinking otherwise. The few open bars looked sketchy, a few fast food joints stay open until 2 or 3 am (including McDonalds and Starbucks), but only one little pastry shop was open 24 hours. Luckily, Europan has good hot chocolate. By 4 am, we were fading though. An hour sleeping in NJ Transit Waiting area, and another hour on the train wasn't enough either. So I slept until noon, and hence, am still not jet-lag recovered. I guess it's early to bed tonight--need to wake up for a 9 am class tomorrow.
Vienna is the ultimate in classy cities. If you arrive in the Austrian capital for the first time a little clueless, and feel slightly under-dressed when stacked up against men in tuxes and women in ballgowns or the most recent haut couture, the culture and elegance will soon start to rub off on you. You can be eating wiener schnitzel at a local pub or attending the opera--whatever it is, you will become refined beyond belief. Or just plain goofy.
Four days in Vienna was the perfect way to end an unforgettable summer of traveling. Much of this, I attribute to having the most excellent of tour guides. I haven't seen Ozan since I re-visited Ankara early in 2006. In the past almost-two years, he's been working in Vienna, and so he knows his way around the city. He is also one of those fantastic friends that always wants to make sure you are having a good time and are well-fed, and can provide excellent conversation and a sharp sense of humor to go along with any experience. And, of course, he is easily able to satisfy my yen for all things Turkish by supplying or being able to find the food, raki, music, tea and language I crave. In fact, Ozan and I are considering planning to avenge the 1683 Ottoman defeat and reconquer Vienna--as great as this place is, it would be even better under the Turks :)
After arriving at Sudbahnhof and dragging our bags (for the last time!) to Ozan's apartment, he made us feel right at home by fixing up some Turkish coffee and reading our fortunes in the coffee grounds--there is, I do believe the grounds said, more wandering in my future. Ozan thought it was Japan, I argued that it kind of looked like Mozambique. When we finally mustered the effort to get out of the house, we were not disappointed. Dinner was my first taste of authentic Wiener Schnitzel and the best beer I've had on this trip at the Seven Stars Brewery. We then wandered our way around town, stopping by the greenhouse at the Hofburg Palace, which has been converted into a restaurant. There was a private party going on in part of the greenhouse that was an actual ball--people were waltzing in ballgowns and tuxes--who knew that still happened? We tried to take pictures through the windows, but were thwarted by the guard. Consolation: glass of wine at the restaurant.
After a night stroll down the fancy shopping street near St. Stephan's Cathedral, we ended the evening the best way anyone can: ice cream! Tichy is the best Italian-style eis that Vienna has to offer, and it is, quite luckily, right on the way back to Ozan's house, at the Reumannplatz square. One literally was not enough. They had Aschanti (peanut) flavor, which was sooooo good when combined with the hazelnut or chocolate and raspberry. Ozan had two, Jaime and I split our second one. The sad part is, this is not available year-round, so next time I return to Vienna, it better not be winter. Otherwise I will cry at not being able to get this ice cream.
On Friday, Jaime and I were able to sleep in for the first time in awhile. When we finally rolled out of the house at 11:30, we decided that we had enjoyed our culinary excursions so much on this trip, why not continue? We figured out how to get to the center of town by asking directions (we hadn't been paying very close attention the night before), and after only one small subway mishap, we used our handy dandy map to navigate from Karlsplatz to the Naschmarkt. And how was the cuisine? Scrumptious! This is vacation, and Jaime and I are definitely using the money we've saved on lodging to try it all! Pickles from a barrel...then lunch at a little market cafe (scallops and potato pureed with wasabi, mango lassi on the side)...then some falafel and dried fruit samples from some stalls...then a purchase of blackberries to eat with our Turkish dessert...and a pomegranate for later. Maybe I should turn this into a foodie travel blog.
Ozan should have joined us earlier after getting off work, because the shopping street with 70% off sales was too much to resist. For Jaime, who was coming from a small German town with limited shopping, and me, who hadn't seen shopping this easy since New York last spring, we easily succumbed. It was just one sweater though! And fall is coming! We also found a cute outdoor market where we enjoyed some bio (organic) milk that was being handed out for free all weekend to promote living organic. Free milk is a strange thing to be handing out, but for someone coming from Africa, I loved it!
When we met up with Ozan and his friend Cem, we took a quick look inside Stephensdom. The cathedrals all start to look the same, but the unique thing on this one was the statue of a proud Vienna priest standing on a vanquished Ottoman on one outside corner--of course the Turks knew where this was. After re-energizing over Vienna's version of a cappuccino (melange) and apfelstrudel, we did the requisite wander inside the ring road, impressed by the grandeur of all the Hapsburg imperial buildings. Outside the balcony where Hitler gave one of his famous speeches, there was a large farmer's market being set up for the next day. It was strange to think of the historical events that had taken place here and royal grandeur in the midst of eggplants, carrots, and tractors, but did make for some interesting photo opportunities.
After dinner near the Rathaus, it was time for another cultural experience: the opera! I'm not an opera aficionado, but the opera of the evening was "The Magic Flute," and it's hard to pass up the chance to see a Mozart classic in Wolfgang Amadeus' home country, especially when it's only 3 Euros for standing tickets. While the wealthier Viennese like to look nice, they also know the riff-raff and second class citizens also enjoy the fine arts, so the opera has implemented an excellent system for young people like us who want to see the opera, but don't want to pay a lot. We arrived an hour before show time, waited in the standing room line, and secured spots on the balcony for the three hour show. Yes, three hours is a long time to stand, but the intermission does provide a chance to rest your legs, and the opera was so excellent, we didn't really mind. Who knew Mozart had a sense of humor? He was also somewhat racist and sexist (ok, it might have been typical for the time), but all the funny animal costumes and superb arias made up for it. I've decided opera is much better than ballet (you actually understand what's going on), translated subtitles are funny, and fantastical operas are especially fun as they remind you of being a kid again.
Post-opera, we grabbed a couple beers at an Irish-style pub (only mine was made with Oregon hops...yum!), then went back to the apartment for an abridged raki night--when you want to get an early start in the morning, one raki is plenty.
Saturday morning was a slightly overcast, which meant that after an amazing Turkish breakfast of menemen, it was the perfect time to go to a museum! I had to do one in ten days in Europe, and the Albertina was the perfect choice--I love impressionism! The exhibit featured all the usual suspects (Monet, Manet, Cassat, Renoir, Gaugin, etc.), and also really excellent explanations of how the movement originated and progressed, and was made possible by the invention of portable paint tubes that allowed open-air painting. The museum also had an enjoyable modern art collection, palace rooms to explore, and some awesome photography, including a "one-minute sculpture" series of people doing weird things in normal environments. We were so inspired, that while wandering by some giant manicured bushes in the Museum Quartier, we decided to try it ourselves. Then we got silly. Check it out:
Following a mid-day melange and cakes at Aida cafe, we made our way to Bourgestrasse to check out a gallery owned by the son of my friend, Bonnie, who I'd served in Peace Corps with. The Galerie Inoperable had just opened an exhibit on bicycle-inspired art, which consequently re-inspired us to do what we had been planning and trying to do since we arrived in Vienna: rent bikes! But first, in what seemed to be emerging as a pattern, we got distracted by Turkish food. Our justification for stopping by Etap restaurant was that we needed fuel for the bike ride, and we got plenty of it! Mercimek corbasi (lentil soup) probably would have been enough, but when is just mercimek ever enough? We each ordered an entree--I gobbled up the manti (ravioli) drenched in yogurt sauce, and Jaime and Ozan polished off their respective saslik and Adana kebabs. Oh, and we got complementary salad, and couldn't turn down the tea--we needed the digestive aid if we were wanted to be able to pedal at all.
Bike rental in Vienna is not as easy as it should be--to get a city bike, you have to register at the kiosk with a user name and password, swipe your card, enter your address, and promise your firstborn child to City Bike Wien. It took us at least 20 minutes to rent the bikes, but once we had them, we loved them! We rode down to the Hauptallee--a long, tree-lined lane through a park. We were afforded views of the giant ferris wheel in the Prater fair and horse-drawn carriages, rode along a canal, saw people playing softball (in Europe?) and walking or running with their dogs (there is no place like Europe to make you feel like you need a dog to complete your life), and even caught a glimpse of the Danube before riding back into town along the canal. We sat down to have one beer at a funky streetside bar, but good conversation turned it into three or four. We then decided we hadn't had enough Turkish food for the day if we hadn't had dessert. We had to return to Etap! The waiters welcomed us back with a friendly hos geldiniz, and brought us happiness in the form of kazandibi and kunefe. We were completely stuffed, and so decided to forgo the Tichy ice cream until our final night.
The last day of vacation is always bittersweet, but we tried to make the most of it. First stop (after a quick cafe breakfast, of course) was the Schonbrunn Palace, the summer residence of those darn Hapsburgs. The palace used to be outside the city, but after several hundred years has been absorbed into the outskirts. You can wander around the well-manicured gardens for free, all the way up to the Gloriette on the top of the hill overlooking the palace and grounds. We also paid to go into the labyrinth and mazes on one end of the garden, and found these to be far superior to the Hanover maze from a few days earlier. You really could get lost in dead ends, and around certain corners, there were games to play, or water that squirted you as you were crossing little bridges. I felt like I was in Alice and Wonderland. We enjoyed apfel gespritzers on the garden terrace, and chased squirrels back down the hillside past some schon brunn (nice fountains), then we started the trek out to Weingut am Reisenberg, a winery affording panorama views of all of Vienna from its perch on a hillside west of the city. Ozan's girlfriend, Lydia, joined us for several glasses of Riesling and appetizers as we watched the sun sink lower over the skyline. While the ferris wheel, churches and palace are all very nice to look at, the most interesting sight to me was the municipal waste facility that featured a giant tower that was so glittery and colorful, it looked like it belonged in Las Vegas. Is this an incinerator? What is it for? I wish I knew.
We ended our final night in Vienna in a similar fashion as the first night we had arrived. The Seven Stars supplied us with a few pints and some grub before we stopped off at Reumannplatz for more Tichy sublimity. Again, Jaime and I had one and a half--this time we tried the speziale (hazelnut covered ice cream with fruity filling), in addition to our old aschanti standby. Raki provided the perfect end to a perfect summer, as we viewed the pictures from our holiday, reminisced, and shared alternately melancholy and happy stories in true Turkish tradition.
Now it's back to responsibility and (semi-) reality in the Princeton bubble. I'm sure a little culture shock awaits, but hopefully a few adventures as well. I will sporadically continue this blog while in school, and should be traveling to Vietnam at the end of October, so stay tuned for more travel tales.
P.S. Check back after this weekend for updated pictures--and by then, I should have finished typing up my stories from Cape Town and Mozambique from August. Stay happy and travel...J
We knew the lady in Uberlingen was trying to tell us something when she sold us our tickets from Prague to Vienna. It was only on the train that we realized what this was. Number One was that you needed to pay for a reservation. An extra 8 Euros each. Number Two was that the deal she found us only took us as far as Bratislava…we had thought that Bratislava came after Vienna, and we'd just get off the train early. Not the way this train went. "And what about the ticket to Austria?" said the train conductor when the stop for Bratislava passed. "Uh…oh, sorry. We'll pay for it." "That is a good idea. Otherwise, you will be outside the train with your luggage."
Images from the movie "Euro Trip" flashed in my brain. When the recent high school graduates get out of the German truck after hitching a lift and realize they are not in Italy (where they wanted to go), but Bratislava, they see only tall Soviet-era apartment blocks and three-legged dogs. "Where are we?" EASTERN EUROPE! Oh no! We paid the 15 Euro each. No getting thrown out of the train for us.
You can, by the way, get Jaime's take on our adventures as well, by checking out: http://ubergonian.blogspot.com
Don't plan an eight-hour train/bus trip for your birthday when you are carrying 30+ kilos of luggage and expect to have too much fun. I did get birthday hugs and wishes from Jaime and Tim, a birthday phone call from Botswana, lots of emails and facebook messages, and a Magnum ice cream bar before the bus left Nuremburg. And the trip wasn't that bad, just long. The birthday improved markedly when we arrived at our Prague couch surfing destination around 7:45 pm, and Evgeny (from Russia, near the Black Sea) immediately realized we needed dinner, and promised to take us to a salsa dancing club with some of his friends later that evening. Dinner at a nearby restaurant was a miracle dish of kale, bacon, cheese and potato dumplings that tasted much healthier than it probably was. Oh, the caloric joys of being back in Eastern Europe. After dinner, Evgeny took us to the promised salsa club, where I realized I don't really have any idea how to salsa. I felt bad for the toes of the guy who asked me to dance. Luckily, just watching with a Czech beer in hand was perfectly acceptable for the rest of the evening, and eventually the salsa gave way to non-ballroom dancing music I could actually move to.
Since the real birthday was a bit of a bust, Jaime and I decided to just pretend that the next day was the celebration, and live a Bohemian lifestyle to the fullest in Prague. The first requirement for acting Bohemian is to find good food, preferably in a café. We were feeling quite hungry and desperate when we got to the Old Town Square at 10:30, and almost succumbed to the evilness that is tourist-land breakfast fare. Prague has become something of a tourist mecca since the fall of the Berlin Wall, particularly for Americans, and the town square, featuring a unique clock tower, churches, cute architecture, and statues, is the center of tourist activity. While the square is prettier in the summer sunshine, the atmosphere was much more appealing last time I was here in winter, when gluhwein flowed like Niagara Falls from the taps of the temporary holiday village on the square, and the tourist hordes were either smaller, or you were tipsy, so you didn't care. The experience in the restaurant on the square that we almost ate at went something like this:
*Look at the menu at the entrance. Breakfast looks affordable enough, and it is served until 11! *Sit down at an outdoor table. Realize the breakfast menu the waiter gave you (in ten languages) is more expensive than the one you looked at outside. BUT, it says the prices are 50% cheaper if you sit inside. Waiter confirms the prices are cheaper inside, but not a full 50% cheaper. *Move to table inside by the window. *Indoor waiter brings bread and another menu, which doesn't feature breakfast. *You ask for a breakfast menu, and the waiter says that breakfast is only served until 11. But it's not 11 yet, you say. The waiter assures you it is after 11, even though your watch says it is 10:40. *Leave, fed up and still really hungry.
But the food would have sucked, and leaving was certainly kinder on our stomachs. Instead, we found a little juice bar that also served delicious baguette sandwiches. The perfect snack to stave off our hunger for another 20 minutes until we found the café of perfection! If you find yourself in Prague in the future, please find au Gourmand Café (www.augourmand.cz) and prepare to be wowed. I haven't had hot chocolate so thick and rich since my first trip to Spain 12 years ago. I'm not sure which crepe I liked more: the sweetness of the apple with brie and walnuts, or the savory cheese and mushroom. Since we had walked in the rear entrance of the café garden, we didn't see their display cases until we left. We contemplated buying quiches or pastries for later, but decided to get something that traveled better to share--so we settled for the chocolate chip cookies to take back to Evgeny that evening as a thank you for his hospitality. They were so delicious he made sure to get the address for the café so he could go back for more.
Nutritionally satisfied, the Bohemian adventure continued with a stroll across the river, up the hillside, past a giant metronome (we don't know why it's there) and a double bench swing (that didn't actually swing very well), and through the park to Prague Castle. Aaagh, we were back in tourist land. These people are so uncultured! Ok, yes, I know we were also tourists, but I get skittish in the massive hordes of photo-snapping, oblivious, check-something-off-in-your-guidebook people. Nor can I understand the couple we saw in St. Vitus' Cathedral where the man was filming a stained glass window and the woman was reading aloud from her guidebook the description of the Biblical scene depicted. I pity the family and friends that are forced to sit through that film showing.
Eager to escape the tourist lemmings, we opted not to pay to take the unguided castle tour. Instead, we made our way down the hill and toward the Charles Bridge. We stopped at a hair salon where Jaime got a Czech haircut from a lady who didn't speak much English. The blowdryer made her hair a bit poufy, but after a wash that evening, the cut actually turned out quite good-- excellent considering the limited stylist-client communication.
A walk across the Charles Bridge took us back to the old town, where we found a café on a quiet side street and had a fruit salad and mint ice tea. Refreshed and re-Bohemianized, we started to make our way toward the opera house for our final dose of Bohemian culture for the day: the 7 pm ballet performance of Swan Lake. Of course, on the way, we window shopped for clothing, and stopped for more culinary happiness at a quiet restaurant near the museum: I had the zander fish, and Jaime had the schnitzel. And the waiter managed to convince us we wanted dessert. It's my birthday celebration, and the only cure is more sacher torte!
We went to the ballet wanting to feel cultured, but instead left Swan Lake somewhat confused. The dancing and costumes were certainly beautiful, but no program was provided for the show. Unfamiliar with the tale, we struggled to understand just what the storyline was. Why don't you people talk? When you flap your arms, I think I've figured out you're a swan, but I don't understand what your leg-wiggling and all those pirouettes mean! And good god, prince ballerino who looks like Owen Wilson in "Zoolander"…put some pants on! Your tights are too tight! And are you in love with a bird? It's never going to work! Back at Evgeny's we looked up the plot--apparently, the prince is supposed to be choosing a wife, but while hunting, falls for a girl who has been cursed by a sorcerer, and is transformed into a swan by day/girl by night. The prince falls in love with her because he pities her (wow, that's romantic), and wants to profess his love to her (and break the curse). But the prince is tricked by the sorcerer into thinking that another girl is the one he loves (she is transformed to look identical), and he professes his love for her by accident, meaning that the spell can't be broken. There are various endings with varying degrees of sadness, but the ending we saw was actually fairly positive: the prince kills the sorcerer and almost drowns in the river, but doesn't. The girl finds him, permanently turned back into human form: happily ever after, curse is broken, hurrah. All you need is love…even if it's from a bird.
Our cultured day wasn't quite over though. Evgeny had prepared dinner for us, so after watching the end of the World Cup qualifier (Russia beats Wales, 3-1!) we had yet another meal, which was quite tasty (pork and salad). Then, Evgeny told us how he is trying to translate Seinfeld episodes into Russian for broadcast (I think on Youtube). So if you ever see the Russian version of the episode where Jerry freaks out the masseuse, thank Evgeny. And if you understand the lines: Elaine: "It's a slap on the wrist!" Jerry: "Yeah, but I still don't see any dinner invitations forthcoming," in their Russian version, thank us too, for clarifying the English meanings.
Before finally turning in, Evgeny showed us videos of him and his fiancée in ballroom dancing competitions (impressive), and another of him as a 10-year-old in an ice skating competition (even more impressive!). He was one of the champions of his region in Russia when he was skating!
Completely cultured out, we went to bed. Vienna is on the agenda for Thursday, and more artistic endeavors and culinary adventures are sure to come.
Europe on the cheap is not easy. But one way Jaime and I tried to save money was to buy the not-so-direct train tickets to Hanover, featuring two hour-long stops in some random German towns. So the 20 Euros we each would have spent on the faster train we instead spent on:
-1 hour of luggage storage in Ulm. Amazingly, we fit all of our bags into one big locker, so this only cost 4 Euro (2 Euro each!). -Sangria! We wanted to check out the giant cathedral in Ulm, and right next door to the cathedral was a wine festival. The Spanish tent had sangria for 3 Euro a glass, which looked so good, it made us forget that it was only 11 am. Delicious! -Lunch in Augsburg. I'd had doner for lunch two days in a row--this time I mixed it up with a GIGANTIC pide from the food stand run by a man from Malatya. 4 Euro.
So in the end, we saved money. And we found a couchsurfing option last-minute, so we had a free place to stay, right in the center of Hanover. I knew I was still in Africa mode though (and a little tired) when I talked to our future host, Tim from Australia (a chemistry PhD student in Hanover), on the phone. He offered to meet us at the train station, and I felt the need to describe what Jaime and I looked like to facilitate his job of identifying us on the platform. The adjectives I chose were:
1. Tall (most people in Northern Germany are tall) 2. Bonde (Jaime is not blonde) 3. White (this one was unique in Botswana)
Jaime's suggestion, after a quizzical look (since I had just described the average North German): "What about: we have a lot of luggage?"
I guess I'm not used to fitting in when I travel.
For those who don't know couchsurfing, this is a great way to meet locals or people living in an area and have some memorable cross-cultural experiences. The premise is that you can offer up your couch or spare room to travelers (or be willing to meet for coffee), and ask for places to stay in return when you are on the move. And an online reference system significantly reduces your chances of staying with anyone creepy. Tim was a fabulous host, and an excellent cook. After meeting us at the train station to take us to his flat, he made us a delicious pasta dinner, and we enjoyed a good bottle of wine and great conversation while relaxing after a long day of travel.
Hanover is a relatively attractive but completely unpretentious city. While it features a beautiful old town by the river (the part that survived WWII bombing), and the gargantuan Herrenhauser gardens, there are very few tourists. Residents are friendly and welcoming. In short, it would be a lovely place to live for a while, and I might have to do just that. On Monday morning, I visited the offices of EMZ, an organization that advocates for improved immigrant health care services in Germany, and runs several programs promoting health education in immigrant communities across the country and with partners across Europe. I stumbled across EMZ online while researching sponsor options for the German Chancellor Fellowship, and the organization seemed like the perfect combination for my interest and studies in health care and most things Turkish (a vast majority of immigrants in Germany are Turkish). EMZ was incredibly welcoming when I contacted them about sponsorship, and willing to meet with me if I could come through Hanover. After arriving at the office, I spoke with the organization's founder/CEO and a program coordinator for almost two hours about their work and potential for collaboration. I also got the office tour, and an offer to meet some of the organization's employees that evening for drinks. What a great opportunity this would be if it works out! I'm so excited to go and write the application essays!
In the afternoon, Jaime and I walked around old town, enjoyed a sushi lunch (but not the $2 they charged us for water--apparently, you can't get tap water in restaurants in Germany, they'd rather rip you off), and toured the gardens. To get to the larger, fancier gardens, you have to walk down the longest, most symmetrical tree-lined walkway I have ever experienced. You get almost dizzy from the perfect alignment. After what seemed like eons, we reached the Grossgarten entrance, and spent a few hours looking at a grotto, fountains, flowers, secluded tree groves, and a Baroque garden maze. We had hoped the maze would be a little more challenging, but with four paths leading to the center, I don't know if there actually were any dead ends. Jaime, the landscape architect, thinks she could design a better one, and I am certain she could.
After a wonderful evening of drinks, dinner, and a walk by the river with some of the EMZ crowd, Jaime and I were going to head back to Tim's place, but were side-tracked by…wine tasting! Ten Euro for three glasses of wine with some olives and ciabatta on the side sounded like a perfect early birthday celebration. And the outdoor seating was literally on the street…couches and a table in what should be parking spaces couldn't be passed up. Having the flustered waiter an restaurant manager explain the German wines to us in English made it even more worth it.
