Slovakia: Have a Drink With Us

In eastern Slovakia we were hosted by a young man who had just moved back home from college.  He was living with his mother and father outside the tiny town of Bardejov.  When we first met up with him, he took us on a tour of the little wooden churches near the town.  These were the few churches we were able to enter. 

In the evening we were treated to a wonderful meal by the man's mother.  Afterward we retired to the living room to talk.  The man's parents did not speak a word of English, but they were very interested in learning about our lives.  The father was especially talkative, and kept his son busy translating for us.

After talking for a while in the living room, the father invited us out to the bar down the road.  We bundled up in our winter clothes and walked out into the snow.  At the bar the father ordered plum brandy: slivovitz.  When I told him I liked it, he was overjoyed.  He kept ordering more.  It was a point of pride for him.  Eventually we had to leave his father at the bar, so we could go back to the house to sleep.  The walk back was warm and toasty from the alcohol.

The next morning we were greeted with another wonderful meal from the man's mother.  We had to leave shortly after breakfast, but she made sure to supply us with food for the day.  She sent us off with sandwiches and a huge jar of homemade pickles. 

There really is nothing that compares with the hospitality we experienced in eastern Europe.

Little Wooden Churches

In southern Poland and eastern Slovakia are beautiful and intricate wooden churches.  They were built between the 1500's and the 1700's and have beautifully painted interior walls.  All of the churches we visited were Orthodox, but there are also Catholic and Protestant churches in the area as well.

Poland: A Smorgasbord of Couch Hosts!

We did not want for couch hosts in Poland.  We had hosts practically fighting over us.  For basically every town we requested a place to stay, we received at least two positive responses. 

Even when we let one host down, because we had already accepted the request of another, they would insist we come and see them.  How could we decline such eager hospitality?

Every person we stayed with, had lunch with, or took a tour with was ecstatic to have our company.  The grandfathers would bring out their special liquors and insist we have seconds; we were treated to delicious home-cooked meals; and given intimate introductions to the places we visited.

I always suggest Poland to people who are planning on visiting Europe.  The cities, food, and history are marvelous, but the people are even better.

Warsaw

Warsaw is a nice city, though I don't have too much to say about it specifically.  A pretty typical European city; it was almost completely destroyed by the Nazis at the end of the Second World War.  We stayed with a wonderful man who fed us amazing food every day, and refused to let me do the dishes.  He even gave me his Rubik's cube when he saw me solve it.

Apart from walking and exploring the city, we also visited the Warsaw Uprising Museum.  This museum delves into the uprising of the Polish resistance in Warsaw against the Nazis, and subsequent demolition of the city by the Nazis.  It was very interactive and we had a great time; I highly suggest this museum.

Oswiecim - Auschwitz

It was just after New Years that we took the drive west of Krakow to visit the Auschwitz concentration camp.  From the moment you arrive the experience is sobering.  I think for many it may seem odd that we actually spent two separate days at Auschwitz I and Birkenau.  It was important for us to learn as much as we could while we were there.

Auschwitz I is not very large.  This was the original camp, and it did not hold as many people as the later camps.  A few places in this camp are very heartbreaking and difficult to see.

The first place that was very disturbing for me, was an exhibit which included the clothing, shoes, and hair of many prisoners.  There were even artificial limbs in the exhibit.

The next area was also upsetting: the rooms where they first tested their methods of gassing prisoners.

Probably the worst area for me was the series of rooms in Block 11 where prisoners would be tortured or left to die in different ways.  The standing cells were particularly distressing.

A sickening feeling rises up from deep in your chest when visiting these places.  A silence comes over everyone.  There really is no joy in a place like this.  We spent the whole first day visiting Auschwitz I, and by the time we had finished seeing the rooms we needed a break from the sadness that had overcome us.

The second day we went to Birkenau.  Birkenau was built later to accommodate the increase in prisoners being brought to the camp.  The train tracks were built right into the compound; bringing many to their final living quarters.

Birkenau is very different from Auschwitz I: it is much larger and there are very few remaining buildings.  Much of the camp lived in canvas tents and wooden barracks, the only remains of which are the brick chimneys.  At the back end of the very large camp, are enormous piles of concrete and stone.  These are what is left of the gas chambers.  The Nazis tried their best to destroy any evidence of these at the end of the war.

This site evoked a very different feeling than Auschwitz I.  Despite the fact that the vast majority of deaths in this concentration camp occurred in Birkenau, the wide open landscape and lack of remaining buildings makes the experience less solemn.  There is much less evidence of the terrible acts that occurred there. 

Krakow

Krakow is a charming city located in south-eastern Poland.  We spent a week in Krakow around New Years.  We stayed with two different hosts.  The first were a charming couple who lived in some communist era apartment buildings away from the center.  We stayed with them twice - before and after New Years.  They had a grumpy rabbit they were watching, who Javier and I often think about.

During New Years we had to leave the couple's house, because they were going away to visit family.  For New Years we spent the night with a young man who was having a big party at his small apartment.  We rang in the New Year with these young people who proceeded to open sparkling wine and spray it all over the place.  It was a long sleepless night of fun and conversation.

On a hill overlooking the center is a small citadel.

The central plaza of the city is broad and impressive.

Bunking with Communists

North of Prague near the border with Poland we stayed with a young woman and her mother.  This was (as far as we know) the first time we stayed with a staunchly pro-Soviet family.  I am actually quite obsessed with Soviet times; I really love Eastern Europe and enjoy learning about life in the bloc states.  It was really wonderful to hear a new side to the story.  As westerners (especially Americans) we are inundated with anti-communist propaganda for most of our lives.  It is good to hear the other side.

What was most interesting about this family is that the mother knew very well that her experience during communist times was not normal.  Her father had diplomatic status when she was a child, so she received special privileges most people did not.  For example, in former communist states there is a fixation with jeans.  Jeans were a hot item to have, but not easy to get.  If you could get some, they were most likely not the fancy western brand that everyone worshiped.  Because of her father's special status, this woman was able to get the fanciest jeans.  Her privilege got her jeans, but also the envy of every other girl at school.  She was apparently not well liked.

You could say that her pro-Soviet stance was because of the entitlement she enjoyed, but we have met many other people who do not look back on those times with negativity.  In western countries you rarely hear neutral or positive stories of communist times, because the people who have those opinions never left.  We only hear stories from the people who immigrated.

Prague at Christmas: We got robbed!

Our time in Prague was very memorable, but for all the wrong reasons.  It was just two days before Christmas when we arrived.  Although we had sent dozens of couch requests hoping for someone to take pity on us during the holidays, nobody was able to host us.  We arrived in Prague in the evening, and we decided to go to a local Couchsurfing meeting at a pub.

Hoping to find someone who might take us in, we spent the whole night making acquaintances.  Unfortunately nobody offered to help us out, even though we made it clear we had nowhere to stay.  When we were leaving - already rather depressed - we found our car had been broken into and much of our stuff had been stolen.

The people we had spoken with during the meeting were helpful, but not very supportive or sympathetic.  Although they helped us call the police, they felt no shame in standing there discussing how we had done everything wrong and how it was our fault we were robbed.

Despite these people I don't consider this a bad Couchsurfing experience, because we weren't surfing with them.

We spent a couple hours with the police filling out paperwork.  We were fortunate that nothing of serious value was stolen, but it did cause some serious issues for us.  All of Javier's eye medication was stolen, as well as his clothes.  They took both of our backpacks, and in a sad display of desperation took what they thought was a briefcase.  I'm sure they thought it was something important, but it was just a camping stove.

I was nervous about what we would do with the car for the night.  The thieves had drilled into the driver's side keyhole, so anybody could open the locked car with a screwdriver.   We eventually went to find a hostel.  It was very late, and the hostel we went to would not have normally been our first choice.  We were so tired it just didn't matter.

The next day we began the process of getting the lock on the car fixed.  We had no interest in exploring the town until we could leave the car with more confidence.  At the Volkswagen dealer it took only a couple hours for them to replace the lock.

By the time we were done, we decided to find a new hostel.  This second hostel was okay, but the next day we changed to a third.  The third would turn out to be one of the greatest hostels I have ever had the pleasure of staying in.  After two anxious days we were greeted on Christmas eve by a delicious free feast and beer in the basement of the beautiful hostel.  It was a comfort for us.

Now that we had fixed the car lock and were a little more at ease (we really would never be at ease with the car again) we could finally explore the city.  Prague is very beautiful.  It is truly a grand city.  If not for the bad circumstances of our arrival it would probably be one of my favorite European cities. 

Western Czech Republic: Carlsbad, Ceske Budejovice, and Cesky Krumlov

The western and south western part of the Czech Republic has some simple but very charming little towns.  We toured through Karlovy Vary, Pilsen, Ceske Budejovice, and Ceske Krumlov. 

Karlovy Vary is a famous spa town known for its hot springs.  The town is situated along a the banks of the Tepla river.  With its colorful facades and quiet promenades, the city definitely feels fit for the many famous names that have gone there over the centuries. 

Cesky Krumlov is a UNESCO town located on a tight curve of the Vltava River.  It is really a very cute town, though it is quite small.   It is very well known for its castle.

Dresden

Dresden is a beautiful city, but at the same time is strange to visit.  It seems to be an old city, but the reality is that it isn't.  The whole city was leveled by the British and American Air Forces during the Second World War.  The bombing of the city is well known, because although the city was a center for communications and manufacturing, the level of destruction was excessive.

If you look online for photos of the city after the bombing, you will see that the entire old city center was flattened.  There was no differentiation between military and civilian zones.  Nothing was left untouched.

Today you go to the city and it is hard to tell that everything was reconstructed less than 100 years ago.  Many of the buildings have been rebuilt as they were before, and the center of the city has the feel of an old city.

You can see here on the Frauenkirche which parts of it are from the original church.  Any dark colored blocks were salvaged from the rubble when the city was flattened by the British and American forces.