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Who wants a blog post?!

Well I got time to kill on my train to Vienna so I figured I’d jot some things down.

I think I left off with Copenhagen, to make things brief, the trip was amazing, especially cruising bikes to the beach with Jerome then going to the hippy district and playing some backgammon over 8 dollar beers. Later that same day we went to an awesome club and danced the night away. The train ride home, 13 hours, wasn’t too bad.

Shit got all sorts of crazy when I got home since my friend in Paris had bailed saying he was too busy with school to let me crash at his place for a night en route to Cannes so after trying to contact everyone I knew with French connections I managed to piece back together some sort of mutant version of the trip that I had been planning for a month. Discouraged, tired, and depressed I just decided to surrender and forgo going to the French Riviera and Paris until a later date if ever this trip.

So now because of one little change of plans, losing somewhere to stay in Paris my schedule is FUBAR. I’m basically just doing whatever sounds good now, trying to throw together some trips to see other friends I’ve made here in their home countries. So far I’ve gathered one trip to my absolutely lovely German friend’s small town kind of near Hannover. I’ve been welcomed to Jerome’s in Arnhem so long as he doesn’t have work, I could roll to Flanders in Belgium, Bratislava, 3 different cities in Poland, Budapest, and possibly Paris and Berlin assuming people keep their word.

However, Little did I know while in Denmark that I had a paper due the day of my return to Prague. I had been operating under the assumption that it was due before the examination term ended in September. So after frantically trying to figure out when the paper was due I bit the bullet and spent several nights locked in the study rooms at my dorm working on one of the worst papers I have ever written.

The rest of the week was spent enjoying the sunshine in Prague because the weeks prior had been rainy and cold. The best thing about nice weather in Prague is you don’t need to think about finding somewhere cool or hip to hangout at because you can just hang outside and I think the general consensus is that drinking, reading, laying, sitting, standing outside is always better than inside.

During this span of outside hanging I met some very nice Swiss guys, a nationality I had yet to come across in Prague. I was also privileged enough to spend some time with a very nice, cute, sweet, German girl and all I can say is that you never realize how beautiful Prague is at night until you have someone to share it with. Not that Mark is insufficient, Mark it’s not that I don’t like you, but I mean come on, you’re a dude. You get what I’m saying right? Right.

So lets now fast forward a few days.

I am currently on the train home from Vienna. Michael and I decided to take a trip there to stay with Branden Gebka. Branden did a really great job showing us around and taking us to cool places but in the end it got the best of Michael and I so after only 2 nights we were ready to go back to Prague. Being a tourist and a college student simultaneously is fucking hard.

Vienna though was amazing. Never in my life have I ever seen a city so grand, so regal. The main area is just palace after church after government building all built hundreds of years ago but so majestic and overwhelming you couldn’t even really believe what you were looking at. Michael and I took a day trip Friday morning to the summer palace/gardens and it was just unbelievable that something like that exists. I kept asking, “why does this place exist?”

I’ve come to learn that words can’t really describe the things I see in Europe. Or maybe my vocabulary just sucks. It’s not about what the buildings look like, or what the gardens look like, it’s about how you feel when you see them. There’s just this feeling of insignificance that comes over you. It was like when I stood at the base of the alps, gazing upwards, realizing that I am a mere ant to these mountains and it’s the same when comparing America with Europe. America is a meager 300 or so years old while Europe is over 1,000 years old. But I mean America still fucking rules and we don’t need palaces or gardens or old churches to make our cities seem superior, we got fucking sky scrapers n’shit and to me, that’s what a city really is, tall ass buildings made out of iron and steel.

However, Vienna was still amazing, but as I sit here on the ride back to Prague, I couldn’t be happier. Prague is the best, nowhere I have been can top the feeling you get walking around Old Town or Malastrana at night arm in arm with someone or drunk with your friends feeling like in that instant you own those narrow cobblestone streets.

Now I go home, recouperate, finish another paper, and finalize my travel plans for July. To quote Jack, “and we’ll say ‘now the end is near’”.

Greg's first adventure in back packing part 1

It is with a heavy heart that I am leaving Copenhagen right now. I’ve visited other cities in Europe so far but none can compare to my time in Copenhagen, which did not consist of much. My friend from high school housed me, despite the fact we may have only hung out once or twice outside of school or football. His apartment, shared with 7 other people is located minutes from the city center and ocean. His 7 other flatmates are wonderful people from France, Spain, Poland, Holland, and the states. Everyone was so hospitable and welcoming I couldn’t have asked for a nicer group of people to hang with for 4 days. I felt at home on his floor, and after the first day, in his neighborhood. If the weather had been nicer I don’t think I would have left CPH but with rain forecasted for the next few days I figured I should get back to Prague and get things figured out for France. With most of that said, here’s what happened.

Hamburg: a let down. Save for some awesome shops and nice parks Hamburg wasn’t anything to write home about, so don’t expect any postcards. The people were nice and it’s always fun trying out my German but I got lost so much and was so hungry most of the time I just wound up disgruntled and disheartened. I’m sure the city would have been fun if I had some friends with me but I didn’t so I was left to my own devices.

I left for Copenhagen Thursday afternoon with no idea of what to expect. I had no impressions of the city, no idea what it looked like, only that it was expensive and that the women should be beautiful.

The train ride was pretty chill. I knew we had to cross one massive body of water so I was stoked to cross some gnarly bridge defying architectural standards but much to my pleasure the train wound up on a boat and me on top of the boat, and the sea before my eyes. What better way to get up and stretch your legs than on a boat? There was this rad Palestinian dude on the train so me and him chatted it up while sailing away. It’s always great meeting middle eastern people who are just so stoked on life and really want there to be peace. We didn’t delve into the whole Israeli conflict because I could tell it would get pretty intense if we did, so we kept it light and enjoyed the ride.

An hour or so later we were in CPH and I was on my own. Pat said he couldn’t grab me at the train station but gave me metro directions to his place. I decided to forgo the public transportation and hoof it, no map, no money, no idea. I felt comfortable enough in the city that I walked up to the first guy I saw and asked him for directions. He spoke perfect English and was one of the most ruggedly handsome men I’ve seen in my whole life. He was stoked that I wanted to walk and he even referred to it as a “pleasant stroll”. Well 45 minutes and one pleasant stroll later I was where I needed to be. Pat rolled up on his bike soon after and we headed to his place.

Word on the street for the night was poker then some big party so I set in for the long haul. Headed to the market and grabbed some 2 dollar New Castle tall boys and chips and after a short meal of watermelon and chicken sandwiches poker started.

I hadn’t played poker since Fawell’s basement circa 2004 but I knew I still had skillz. The game was fun and friendly with lots of joking around and big betting. I eventually lost but it was fun regardless. The sun had finally set around 1030 so everyone got dressed up and we went to this party. Pretty fun time and just so many beautiful women I was fine people watching with some dancing intermixed. When I finally hit the dance floor to cut some rug this short girl came running over to me pulling on my tie and blazer yelling “you’re so tall! You’re sooo tall! Why are you sooo tall?!” I mean I know I’m tall but it was Scandinavia, the land of Vikings. However, I was the tallest person there. She seemed nice but very drunk so to Pat’s chagrin I just left it and got another beer. The party finally ended around 3 and everyone was quickly ushered outside. Outside I made friends with a Danish guy who was more than happy to talk about Danish culture and Danish people, I don’t remember much of what we talked about, but he was a super nice dude. After hanging out side for 45 min we took the Metro home, made some food, watched the sun rise (4:00am) and hit the hay.

The next morning, pretty hungover, I killed time waiting for Pat to wake up by talking to his lovely French flat mates who were busy cooking and cleaning. I’ll make it short. Big dinner planned that night, everyone contribute, so I went to the bakery got a nice loaf of bred and some danishes hoping they’d wake Pat up, they did and he showed me around the city. The city center was very humble and relaxed, nothing like Prague where it’s super busy with tons of tourists and people peddling things. We came back home, Pat worked out, I went and read in the park and then everyone started cooking. The French girls had desert, me and pat made chicken pesto pasta, Enrique and Elliot made crazy Spanish dumplings and Slawek and Jerome made awesome cabbage wrapped sausage things.

The dinner was lovely and chill, everyone stoked on the food and atmosphere. Everyone’s contributions were amazing, especially E&E’s dumplings and the French desert. Once dinner was over it was party time.

A huge party was planned in the apartment with over 70 people to attend. We had returned all the bottles/cans from the last party they had and were able to get two more 30 beer crates. The party was a blast with tons of dancing and chilling but I was incapable of getting past buzzed because of all the food in my belly. I called it quits and walked out to the pier to watch the sunrise, came home and went to bed.