back from krakow

well.. it's just one thing after another for me and my computer. I got my computer back - which was exciting -but- like 2 or 3 weeks ago we went and paid for our internet for the semester and when we went we had to write down a number we had picked when we first connected to the internet. Since I didn't have my computer I couldn't look up the number to check for sure, but I thought I knew. Well, it turns out I was wrong. I had it half right - but left off 3 of the numbers - I sometimes use the shorter verson and sometimes the longer version. So I got it wrong and now the internet is telling me i haven't paid. There are some directions it takes me to which explain what to do in case what i did happens.. so HOPEFULLY I will be fully connected sometime soon. I would just like to blame kstate for this incident because they're always making me change my password which leaves me with too many passwords for my little mind to remember. :)

Anyways.. on to more exciting things. We just got back from Krakow at about 7 this morning. We took the train over night. We did this on the way to Krakow too - this is miserable. There may be better trains than we had, but our train contained some of the most uncomfortable seats I have ever sat on in my life. The train rides didn't provide much sleep.

We got to Krakow and walked a little ways in the wet, cold weather to our hostel - The Stranger Hostel. We all found beds and crashed for a couple hours. It was my first hostel, but I thought it seemed pretty nice.. it was clean and roomy. we were all split up into 4 rooms of beds. There were 20 students from our university and we joined some foreign students from the university of economics. This is another university in Prague and we often can go on trips or join each others activities.
Most of the day Friday we went on a walking tour around krakow. Our meals were also provided from the initial fee we paid when we signed up, so it was kind of nice not having to worry about paying for meals with a huge group. Friday was also St. Patrick's day so we went to a club in Krakow and I was surprised that they were serving green beer - I guess I wasn't expecting them to really get into St. Patrick's day there. So that was my first green beer ever.
The city was really cool at night - there were so many people out and walking around the city. It really surprised me. I was also really impressed with their English - I don't think we ran into anyone who didn't speak any English and they understood us really well.

On Saturday we went to Auschwitz concentration camp. It was quite an experience being there and it was hard to believe where I was. It was a pretty intense day, but we were really glad we got to go - I never imagined myself visiting Auschwitz. I bought a couple books written by survivors that I'm looking forward to reading. Our tour guide was really good - we heard so many stories that were so incomprehensible.

Sunday we went to these Salt Mines right outside of Krakow. We got a tour of these humongous "caves" made of salt. It was pretty amazing. There were chapels and statues carved out of the salt. They reach a depth of 327 meters - which is about 1,070 feet!! We walked down all the stairs at the beginning, but got an elevator to the top at the end of the tour. The temperature down there is constantly 59 degrees.. so that was so nice compared to the cold weather we've been having.

After seeing the salt mines we were walking back to the bus along the street when a car drove by and completely splashed water on me! This has never happened to me. One other girl may have gotten it too, but she definitely braced for it with her coat. So I got a little wet. It wasn't too bad and thank goodness it wasn't muddy water.. but everyone had a good laugh at me.

Well, I gotta go! We're going to meet up with our professor that is visiting from Italy.
Later!