August 30, 2001

Back in front of this screen, in our block apartment. It feels good to be in a familiar place after traveling through much of Central Europe and staying in lots of not-so-familiar-places. It was a fantastic trip and we incredibly spoiled to have the means to do such a thing. We started in Budapest – actually we started in Bucharest after my parents said goodbye to us after a week’s visit with us. After not seeing my parents for over a year it was quite a treat to spend a week with them, not to mention the great hotel that we all stayed in, in Bucharest. After Budapest, we headed to Vienna, then Prague, Krakow and Berlin.

In our first stop, Budapest, we saw a lot of remnants of communism still leftover, but in a beautiful city. Old Russian cars, East German Trabants still were on the streets, but fewer than we see in Sofia or other parts of Bulgaria. It was also exciting to be in the city that staged the first public protest against communism, in 1956. It was a haven for backpackers because of the cheaper prices and all the funky things that are available during the day and at night. We really enjoyed the Buda side of Budapest, with its castle and much greener and calmer streets than the Pest side. We headed onto Vienna and were blown away by the quality of everything. The city center was immaculate and everything was nearly perfect. While we were there, we were looking for some cheap entertainment and we found a great outdoor “concert” that was actually a video of an opera. It was projected on a huge screen in front of the city hall. Lots of locals were there and mainly for the great food that was being served up in the international booths. One night we had great Japanese food, the other night we had Cuban food. Yes, we went all the way to Vienna to have Cuban food. It was nice to be out at night with the crowd that was there – very relaxed atmosphere and beautiful surroundings. We headed on to Prague and we were immediately overwhelmed by the amount of tourists there. It seemed that every other person around us was videotaping or snapping a picture at any given moment. The city center was beautiful, but it has turned into a means to earn the tourist’s money, so the function of the surroundings seems to have been lost to the moneymaking possibilities. Nevertheless, it was a gorgeous city to wander around in and learn a lot of the history. The first night there, we ended up staying at a hostel that boasted it had the lowest price in the lowest price category in Prague (I swear I didn’t know this when I made the reservation!), and after we took a shower in the co-ed bathroom, we decided that night we were definitely out of there the following morning. We found an incredible pension on the outskirts of town that treated us really well. It was nearly heaven. We headed on to Krakow and wound up there on a Sunday morning after taking the night train. Went to mass at the Dominican church. The town square was very peaceful at 9am on Sunday morning and we thought that might have escaped the tourists for one town. However, after going to church and then stopping at a café, we were again in the presence of tons of tourists. The town was much more manageable than the previous three capitals that we had visited. Probably the most memorable and moving thing that we experienced in our entire trip was to visit the concentration camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau, west of Krakow. There’s not much to say about a place that was built for the swiftest and most efficient way of murdering of people. It’s an awful, but necessary place for visitors. One day was enough for both of us. Even being there and seeing the mounds of hair that had been shaved from victims to make cloth, the mounds of shoes and suitcases with names, and other personal items of the victims, I don’t think we came close to the horror that place held for its prisoners. We walked the path that thousands of people walked after being let off the train in Birkenau, directly to the gas chambers. I still don’t understand how a regime can hope to do such a thing to people and ultimately succeed. After Krakow, we headed on to Berlin where we found a city under construction. Everywhere you looked, there was a construction crane, a detour, or a jackhammer ringing in your ears. The city, when finally completed, will probably be the first city that will truly be a 21^st century city. We soon found out that the city comes to life at night and enjoyed a funk band one night and hanging out at Potsdammer Platz, near the Sony Center, another night. Even Brandenburg Gate was under construction. We did get to tour around the dome of the Reichstag, which is a cool place. Our trip back, which wasn’t exactly what we had in mind, was enough of an adventure in itself. We hoped to take two trains back from Berlin to Bucharest, stopping in Prague for a few minutes to catch our next train. Didn’t happen that way. As it seemed we were going to pull into Prague on time to catch our train, we sat outside of Prague as we saw the time for our connecting train come and go. The only option we had at that point (it was1am) was to take the next train to Budapest and figure it out from there. Ended up piling into a compartment for ten hours with four other guys and dozed in and out for the whole night. You’d be amazed at what parts of your body can fall asleep in some positions . . . We ended up taking another night train from Budapest to Bucharest (we had a sleeper this time) and eventually made it back to Silistra. The amazing thing is that most of this really didn’t surprise us, it mainly made us more tired.

After seeing former communist cities and non-communist cities (West Berlin and Vienna), we saw how much communism left its ugly fingerprint wherever it was. Block apartments and hulking, useless factories. It was a relief to be in Vienna, where communism never had much of an impact. There was an abundance of signs of imagination in its architecture and the seemingly countless museums with endless pieces of art. The history of music-making of the country is enough to fill a hundred masters’ theses. There was still a great divide between East and West Berlin. Thank God for artists, poets, musicians, and imaginators. Too bad communism didn’t feel much of a need for them. Coming from Bulgaria, Vienna was the most impressive city that we visited and I may not have been so deeply impressed with it if I had come directly from the States for a week’s visit.

So we’re back in Silistra and we’re happy to be in place where people know us and where we know them. School starts soon for both of us and I am looking forward to teaching again. Last year I think I learned how to teach here and maybe this year I’ll be able to do some teaching too. We have less than a year left in Bulgaria – the next group of volunteers was just sworn in today. I guess we’re the wise and experienced ones here now. We’ll see if that’s true or not.

Peace out –

Josh