What a Ride!

Well, here it is already...19 months and 46 blog posts later, I only have one more week of work left. I have to be honest that before I came here, I had no idea what to expect or what I was getting myself into. I sort of felt like I was stepping off into the abyss for a lot of reasons, but how quickly all of those reservations turned into nonsense. I met some great friends who immediately welcomed me and made the transition unbelievably easy. It's because of them that I know leaving will be much harder than it was coming here.

On the other hand, all of you at home were great at keeping in touch by sending emails or even one-liners on facebook just to say hi, which made being half a world away seem like I was as close as I always was. As hard as it is to leave here, I of course am extremely excited to come HOME and see all of you again. I learned a lot about myself while I was over here and being away made me appreciate things I often took for granted before. It made me appreciate the people in my life more than I ever did and because of that I am looking forward to spending more time with my family and watching my brother's family grow up.

I hope you've enjoyed following along and I just want to say thank you to everyone for keeping in touch while I was over here. I'm not going to mention names, but you know who you are. A huge thank you goes to my family so I am going to call them out. To my parents, you've been nothing but supportive from the time I told you I applied for this position, which has meant a lot to me. And of course, for coming over for 2 great weeks of vacation. Kyle and Brad, thank you guys for the comic relief you provided on the phone and through emails and Kyle for sending so many pictures when I couldn't be there to see the faces full of spaghetti or the dress-up parties.

I know I'm starting to ramble, but I guess to sum it all up, these past 19 months have absolutely flown by so quickly I am sort of in shock it's all over. I've had such a great experience, both personally and professionally, that I have no regrets whatsoever for taking this chance. It was indeed one heck of a ride.


I am going to take one last trip before I come back. I am going to Jordan for about 10 days and then will return to Denver mid-May. I wanted to do something completely different for my last trip and heard a few people talk about Jordan and what a great experience they had, so thought why not. I'm pretty sure it meets all the criteria of some place completely different alright! I'll post a blog about that when I get back.

Here are a few things I'm going to miss and a few things I'm looking forward to:

Going to miss:
1) Biergartens - absolutely no better way to spend a summer day
2) Lederhosen, dirndls and beer festivals
3) Laid-back and carefree lifestyle
4) Sundays - everything is closed here
5) Butterbreze - big pretzels with butter spread in the middle (breakfast)
6) Schweinebraten (pork roast), obatzda (pretzel dip), and definitely Augustiner beer
7) Skiing in the Alps and the apres ski parties - great atmosphere after a day of skiing
8) Not taking my shoes off going through security at the airport
9) Easy last-minute travel by air or train
10) Being around so much history

Can't wait for:
1) Going to college football and baseball games
2) KC BBQ
3) Mexican food (yes, this includes Chipotle)
4) Going to the grocery store and stocking up - no more trips with only 4 tiny bags
5) One-stop shopping and not having to sack my own groceries or bring my own bags
6) Being in a society that knows how to form a line
7) Getting unlimited, free water at restaurants
8) Having a house, a yard, and car again
9) Fishing and spending the summer in the Rockies
10) November elections (bye bye Libs!)

Krakow, Poland

I went to Krakow this past weekend. I booked my trip a few weeks ago, but it turned out to be a little more eventful than originally planned. First, the President of Poland and 95 others died in a plane crash the week before and they decided to hold the funeral and burial in Krakow. Then I had to take a train back to Munich instead of my flight due to the volcano in Iceland. However, it was a good trip and I really enjoyed Krakow.

This is Wawel Castle and was built in the 1300s. 17 former Kings, 2 saints, and now the former President and first lady are buried in the crypts in the church there.

City walls

These are some pictures from around the old city of Krakow.

A new Catholic Church on the outskirts of town.

Old town.

St. Mary's Church. The funeral mass for the President was held here.

I am still laughing at this one...

This is where Pope John Paul lived when he was priest in Krakow.

This is the church in Wadowice, his hometown.

Baptismal font where he was baptized.

Alter dedicated to him in the church.

His apartment growing up.

This was a house alongside the road between Krakow and Wadowice and the tourguide told us that it is painted blue because the daughter in the household is "ready to marry". Hahaha! I'm still not convinced whether this would be an attractant, or more of a "repellant".

I took a tour of Auschwitz (and Birkenau, which is only about 2 miles from there). They did a really good job at the museum and made it very personal and moving. I was amazed at the size of the place too. Dachau in Munich is tiny compared to here.

Gallows where prisoners were hanged in front of the others during roll call.

This is a wall where prisoners were executed.

This is one of the many exhibits. It is an entire room of shoes they confiscated. Of course, this wasn't even close to all of them, but even so, the huge display was really made you think. It was much more moving than if they would have just had one shoe in a display case like you see in most museums.This is an urn full of human ashes from the camp.

Birkenau

Toilets in one of the buildings.

Only the chimneys of most of the buildings remain, but there seemed to be hundreds.

Memorial to the former President in front of St. Mary's Church.

Memorial for the Katyn massacre. The Katyn massacre was where in 1940, the Russians executed about 20,000 Polish citizens. The Polish delegation was going to Katyn (Russia) for the 70th anniversary when their plane crashed near there.

Memorial concert in the Market Square.

Rehearsing removal of the caskets

Funeral procession. They marched from St. Mary's church where the funeral mass was held to Wawel Castle where they were buried.

The man on the far left is the President's twin brother.

President's casket

This is a video of the rehearsal for the removal of the caskets from the hearses.

Istanbul, Turkey

This past weekend I went to Istanbul. It is a really neat city with lots of history and I think clearly rivals New York as a "busy" and crowded city. It was founded in about 700BC and was later known as Constantinople. Now it's one of the world's biggest cities. It also sits on 2 continents - Europe and Asia (split by the Bosphorous Strait that connects the Black Sea to the north with the Marmara Sea to the south). I also learned that it has over 4,000 mosques! And needless to say, arriving midday on a Friday, I heard my share of calls to prayer over the loudspeakers!

The Blue Mosque was built in about 1600.

Outside courtyard of the Blue Mosque.

This is the Hagia Sofia mosque and was built in 530.

Inside the Hagia Sofia.

Inside the Blue Mosque.

This was inside a cistern, which was built in 532 by the Romans to store the city's water. It was also featured in the James Bond movie "From Russia with Love" and Indiana Jones "The Last Crusade".

This is the main train station, which was the last stop of the Orient Express.
Camondo Stairs. I had never heard of these before, but I guess they are famous, so I had to take a picture.

I went to a traditional Turkish show one night that had belly dancers and other performances.

Attack of the pigeons.

Amongst the 4,000 mosques, I finally found a Catholic Church to go to Easter mass at.

Courtyard in front of the church.Easter decorations inside the church.

All throughout the town are outside markets and this stand sold freshly squeezed juices with orange, grapefruit, kiwi, and pomegranate.

One of the countless kebap restaurants.

The most common things for sale in Turkey are rugs and ceramics.

No caption necessary here.
Fresh fish market.

Safer not to ask what this is.

Fresh olives for sale at the spice market. Spices NutsIf you visit Istanbul, I hope you can deal with crowds!

Jellyfish were everywhere in the Bosphorous Strait.

This is a view from Europe across the Bosphorous to Asia.

I took a cruise up the Bosphorous to the edge of the Black Sea. This is a view from the Asian side back toward Istanbul.This is the place we docked and where the picture above was taken from. I hiked up to the ruins of the castle/fortress.

Typical houses seen along the cruise route.

I had great weather the whole time. It was sunny and warm, and there were spring flowers everywhere.

This is a view from a hill on the Asian side to the Marmara Sea just to the south of the city. There were hundreds of boats (mostly oil tankers) anchored here.