Polska!!!
<-no, Adam, not the Polish girl from high school, the country
POLAND! WOOHOO!
Wow, This weekend was absolutely amazing. Where to begin...
Thursday, after classes, after dinner, around 7:00, we all got on the 4 busses and prepared for a 12 hour pilgrimage to Poland. The bus ride wasn't that bad...I slept a while, we watched a documentary on the Pope, etc. It was fun when we went across the border into Czech Republic and the border guy had to come on and look at all of our passports. At one of our stops ont he way, we were in Czech still, and the currency there is Crown i think, and the exchange rate is something like 1 Euro = 30 Crown, so it was weird. Anyways, crossing into Poland, the border guy took our passports and stamped them which is cool. It's fun to see where the ol' passport will be stamped over the course of the semester. Anyways...
Sometime in the morning we arrived in Krakow, a major city in Poland. Immediately after getting out of the bus was a 2-hour walking tour of Krakow. It is a wonderful place, has an old castle, and an amazing and big town square / center. It's weird, though, being in a country that you know even less of the language. I mean, I learned enough German to kinda get by, but Polish is hard. Anyway, since the exchange rate is 1 Euro = 4 Zloty (polish currency), we all took lots of Zloty out of the ATM and eagerly approached the shopping plaza where vendors sell an array of neat goods. I got a bunch of cool souveneirs for really decent prices. After lunch at a Pizzeria, we left Krakow for Lagiewniki, the place of St. Sister Faustina, a really amazing Polish saint. We saw this really awesome church there and had mass in another. Then we returned to Krakow to our hostel, ate dinner, and were ready to call it a night. A few of us went out to wander the town of Krakow at night though. Me and two guys and 6 girls walked around, towards the big square, and went to this cool dessert place where I got a dessert called a Smurf: it had strawberry and apricot ice cream with pieces of banana, pineapple, and other fruits, along with whipped cream and blue sauce stuff that made it smurf-like. After price conversion, it was only like $1.50. Pretty sweet. So that was a good night.
The next morning we got back on the buses and headed to Wadowice, the birthplace of Karol Wojtiwa, AKA Pope John Paul II. In this nice, quaint little town, we visited the house he grew up in and the Church next to his house. It was neat to see where he grew up and how inspired he must have been by his father and the Church next-door to his house. We stayed there for just over an hour, and then back on the buses we headed to Auschwitz, the Nazi's concentrations camp where I think millions of people were killed. Uneasy feelings entered our bodies as we approached the place. We got a tour of both Auschwitz I and II. Auschwitz II was much much bigger and called Birkonow or something like that, and a lot more of what I imagined it to be. In the first place, we were able to see the cell of St. Maximillian Kolbe, a really awesome saint that died there. It was really just amazing in a horrific sense the places we visited, because just thinking of all the pain and suffering that took place right where I was standing was really tough to bear. It didn't settle well with everyone who visited. Many tears were shed for people we never got a chance to know. Theres really not many words that can be said to explain what the places were like, jsut try to imagine. After the camps, we went to a church not too far from the camps where we celebrated mass, ate dinner, and saw this amazing display of artwoork by a man that survived the camp. The artwork was horrific as well, but amazingly done, and captured so much emotion and pain that must have been inside of the artist. Back on the buses, we headed for our final destination: Czestochowa. We got to the hostel at night and went to sleep, preparing for the next day's activities. Czestochowa is an important place because of the image of Our Lady of Czestochowa, Our Lady Queen of Poland, or whatever she is prefered to be called. Mary, basically. It is a most amazing image of Mary holding her child Jesus. I forget the whole story behind it, but I think it had to do with an appearance that Mary made. I'll have to look into it, but it was amazing. very key to Polish culture. It's really neat seeing countries like Poland and Austria whose cultures and histories are so Catholic and religious. Really awesome. So, after mass in front of the icon, we got on the buses and headed home.
I could have stayed up and watched the superbowl after we got home around midnight, but I was tired, and really dind't care that much. Yay Patriots? whatever. Poland was just amazing though and really made me proud to be a Pole. See ya guys. Later
POLAND! WOOHOO!
Wow, This weekend was absolutely amazing. Where to begin...
Thursday, after classes, after dinner, around 7:00, we all got on the 4 busses and prepared for a 12 hour pilgrimage to Poland. The bus ride wasn't that bad...I slept a while, we watched a documentary on the Pope, etc. It was fun when we went across the border into Czech Republic and the border guy had to come on and look at all of our passports. At one of our stops ont he way, we were in Czech still, and the currency there is Crown i think, and the exchange rate is something like 1 Euro = 30 Crown, so it was weird. Anyways, crossing into Poland, the border guy took our passports and stamped them which is cool. It's fun to see where the ol' passport will be stamped over the course of the semester. Anyways...
Sometime in the morning we arrived in Krakow, a major city in Poland. Immediately after getting out of the bus was a 2-hour walking tour of Krakow. It is a wonderful place, has an old castle, and an amazing and big town square / center. It's weird, though, being in a country that you know even less of the language. I mean, I learned enough German to kinda get by, but Polish is hard. Anyway, since the exchange rate is 1 Euro = 4 Zloty (polish currency), we all took lots of Zloty out of the ATM and eagerly approached the shopping plaza where vendors sell an array of neat goods. I got a bunch of cool souveneirs for really decent prices. After lunch at a Pizzeria, we left Krakow for Lagiewniki, the place of St. Sister Faustina, a really amazing Polish saint. We saw this really awesome church there and had mass in another. Then we returned to Krakow to our hostel, ate dinner, and were ready to call it a night. A few of us went out to wander the town of Krakow at night though. Me and two guys and 6 girls walked around, towards the big square, and went to this cool dessert place where I got a dessert called a Smurf: it had strawberry and apricot ice cream with pieces of banana, pineapple, and other fruits, along with whipped cream and blue sauce stuff that made it smurf-like. After price conversion, it was only like $1.50. Pretty sweet. So that was a good night.
The next morning we got back on the buses and headed to Wadowice, the birthplace of Karol Wojtiwa, AKA Pope John Paul II. In this nice, quaint little town, we visited the house he grew up in and the Church next to his house. It was neat to see where he grew up and how inspired he must have been by his father and the Church next-door to his house. We stayed there for just over an hour, and then back on the buses we headed to Auschwitz, the Nazi's concentrations camp where I think millions of people were killed. Uneasy feelings entered our bodies as we approached the place. We got a tour of both Auschwitz I and II. Auschwitz II was much much bigger and called Birkonow or something like that, and a lot more of what I imagined it to be. In the first place, we were able to see the cell of St. Maximillian Kolbe, a really awesome saint that died there. It was really just amazing in a horrific sense the places we visited, because just thinking of all the pain and suffering that took place right where I was standing was really tough to bear. It didn't settle well with everyone who visited. Many tears were shed for people we never got a chance to know. Theres really not many words that can be said to explain what the places were like, jsut try to imagine. After the camps, we went to a church not too far from the camps where we celebrated mass, ate dinner, and saw this amazing display of artwoork by a man that survived the camp. The artwork was horrific as well, but amazingly done, and captured so much emotion and pain that must have been inside of the artist. Back on the buses, we headed for our final destination: Czestochowa. We got to the hostel at night and went to sleep, preparing for the next day's activities. Czestochowa is an important place because of the image of Our Lady of Czestochowa, Our Lady Queen of Poland, or whatever she is prefered to be called. Mary, basically. It is a most amazing image of Mary holding her child Jesus. I forget the whole story behind it, but I think it had to do with an appearance that Mary made. I'll have to look into it, but it was amazing. very key to Polish culture. It's really neat seeing countries like Poland and Austria whose cultures and histories are so Catholic and religious. Really awesome. So, after mass in front of the icon, we got on the buses and headed home.
I could have stayed up and watched the superbowl after we got home around midnight, but I was tired, and really dind't care that much. Yay Patriots? whatever. Poland was just amazing though and really made me proud to be a Pole. See ya guys. Later