Amsterdam => pseudo-Thanksgiving

So in case you haven't noticed by now, posts are slowing up. It's not so much that less is happening (although life in general has seemed to slow down some), but more so that I am getting bored constantly typing on this site and would rather (when on my computer) spend time watching TV, reading, chatting, and reading the news. Also, things such as 'crack addicts' and 'funny looking dogs' and 'strange czech ways' are no longer as interesting to be mentioned. So since the posts are slowing down, let's go back in time to try to catch up.
Last Thursday was a fun night of drinking with an early wake up, although not nearly as early as I had expected; I thus had a little bit of rushing to do when I got up. Once I settled down however, most of Friday was spent relaxing. I landed in Amsterdam, found Joey's friends, and walked around the city Friday night. It turns out that many coffee shops require official ID (to prove that you're 18), and since 2 of us didn't have passports or driver's licenses, we had to curtail our night. We waited a while at the train station since trains only come once an hour and we were staying at the airport Crowne Plaza (about a 30 minute ride from the central station). Saturday morning we woke up and walked around for a while. I believe that we walked through the Liedseplein and possibly over to the Rembrantsplein. We also took a tram by the flower market, which I would presume was pretty dead because of the freezing temperature and grueling wind. Or maybe it was the snow in addition to that- I'm not really sure. We also went to the Van Gogh museum which was really neat and had lots of pretty pictures. I wish I could give a better description but I've never been good at understanding art, and my decent writing and poor vocabulary has decreased to poor writing and crap vocabulary.
My favorite part of Amsterdam was probably the food. Amsterdam was designed to have multiple coffee shops on each street, and between them are a galore of bakeries, fast food restaurants, and more. I still didn't get to try the two famous foods in Amsterdam: Rijsttafel and French fries with mayo. Nonetheless, I had more than my fair share of delicious food at all hours of the day. I guess it's a reason to go back to Amsterdam. And because I want to check out some crazy nightclubs and more cool historic areas that I didn't get to see. I think it would be a fair statement to say that I experienced and saw everything while seeing and experiencing nothing there.
Joey and Jon arrived Saturday night and we hung out all night and then all day Sunday. It was fun; lots of fun. But still, I had to leave Sunday night for my 9pm flight. It was quite hard to make it to the airport, although I did, even though I made it there a little too early (about an hour too much time there). I got home at midnight and skipped Czech class the following morning at 830. I turned in my Czech final excursion presentation that Tuesday (it was due last Thursday, but my teacher [who I will add told me it was fine] said I had to redue it for Monday because it wasn't good enough), which was a high quality pseudo-interview with my yoga instructor. Yesterday I went shopping for Thanksgiving-esque products such as a frozen turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce (ocean spray baby, unfortunately already made), sweet potatoes, regular potatoes, string beans, and fruit. YuM. They unfortunately do not sell any form of pumpkin pie mix in this country. Once I leave class in 15 minutes I will be going home to cook our pseudo-Thanksgiving meal for tonight.
[We decided to move up Thanksgiving tonight because 1 person will be out of the country tomorrow and 2 will be going to dinner with family members/friends' families. Thus tonight should be the 3 CIEE flats in our apartment, and I think we will have about 8 people enjoying our feast. I'm still not sure what I will be doing tomorrow. I was invited to join a few people at eating out (expats style), but at the same time I don't think Robert will be able to eat a non-hotdog/french fries or non-quesadilla meal if I don't assist. I have also been informed that a ton of people plan on ditching school for Thanksgiving in a show of patriotism, and I'm pretty sure that I'll be joining (although my absences are increasing), so I might spend tomorrow cooking a duck!]

Sweden deux

I flew back on ryan air which is the cheapest airlines in Europe... they actually have some free tickets with just tax. I landed, got dinner (finally cheap food), and went back late. Today I have done nothing worth mentioning. So, I am back, settled in, have done laundry, have a new coat scarf and gloves, and actually did some work. Below are a few of the pictures from Sweden before my camera died... enjoy!the boat hostel

the super popular puffy coatchanging of the guards... the bandthe symbolic horse of Stockholmthe Washington monument?EURASMUS guyslike are you serious? a Rosie's sign in our bar...my actual new coat

Feels like Heaven! (aka Sweden)

Well, more like Sweden, but I think it may be as close to heaven as possible on Earth. And I'm not just referring to its geographic location being quite far north; everyone is stylish, super attractive, and super friendly. Oh, and they have no poor people, slums, or ugly people (at least in Stockholm). Just 'people' (upper class people pay such high taxes they are practically as wealthy as the middle class), tons of shopping, and good taste. This will be quite a long post because I have a lot to say about Sweden and haven't posted since last Thursday, and have nothing else to do for my entire hour and a half psych class.
Down sides of Sweden (since every place has them): super high prices, strange and strict alcohol laws and age restrictions. It was quite hard for me to switch from paying under a euro for a beer in Prague to going to a restaurant in Stockholm and paying 5 euros for the same quantity (of shittier beer). And it's even more expensive at bars and clubs.
Fashion: all are extremely stylish and all wear gloves and scarves. Super big, puffy, expedition-style jackets (many with fur) have become quite trendy, even in blue. The rest of coats are black or charcoal or MAYBE grey. Women wear ankle shin or knee high boots with tights. Men have sweaters too and just stylish bottoms of some sort.
Food: hamburgers and kebabs are quite popular, as are brats and french hot dogs (a hot dog stuffed into a french baguette instead of in a bun) as street food. Salmon in cream sauces, pickled herring - especially fried yet served cold, sushi, and chokoladballs (served in cafes, a ball of a fudge/flourless chocolate cake mix with sprinkles on top that is unfathomable). MEATBALLS are extremely rare and not popular.
Anyways I found possibly the most amazing bar in the world. 1 that advertises over 400 types of single malt whisky. 1 that advertises over 100 types of beer. 1 that DOESN'T advertise an age restriction of 23. I went in to get lunch there one day but it was too expensive, so I figured I'd come back that evening, until the bouncer told me you have to be 23. They want to maintain a certain 'class' in their bar, and the leather interior and homely cigar bar feeling require 'mature' people not drunk tourists. It was fine since there was a cool and quite similar bar next door. This was Saturday night, and later in the evening (which I will further discuss) I tried getting into clubs, only be told at the first one "you're not 27" and the next "you're not 25."
So I think my last post was from the Copenhagen airport which had atrocious internet and one of the nicest malls I've been in. I got into Stockholm and immediately realized I should have done SOME prep before going, which I plan on doing for the rest of my travels. Why did I feel stupid for doing nothing? I had no knowledge of their currency's value. I had no idea where in relation to Stockholm I was. I had no idea how to get to Stockholm. I had no idea what to do in Stockholm. Anyways I found the high speed train which took me at 200kph for 20 minutes to get to Stockholm (and that's the close airport). I got in, found my hostel - which I will add was a boat - and unpacked and got a beer. The rest of my 'dorm' came in later and we hung out. In addition to the strange Canadian couple (or brother/sister), there was a French girl from Switzerland and 5 EURASMUS students. EURASMUS is the standardized study abroad for European university students. I hung out with these 5 guys all night and then all day Friday. Brief summaries:
Dominic- Swiss-german, 26 years old, stereotypical of my view of Switzerland. Quite mature despite vomitting on his walk home the following morning from a Finish girl's place. Had an awesome scarf that inspired me to buy a similar style one (I was planning on getting some scarf).
Stephan- Serbian born but French and currently living in Amsterdam. Gave me an awesome list of things to do and places to go next weekend while I'm there. 20 years old, and thinks the French are the best. Can you guess his beliefs about Israel and the US? Duh... totally stereotypical. We had some good conversations about politics while strolling through the streets drunkenly.
Anders- 22 year old Dane, very clean cut and again stereotypical of my belief of Denmark. Very clean cut appearance, in charge of organizing his friends and getting them throughout the city.
David- 22 year old Spaniard, quite Euro looking (just like the rest) and not as good of English, although he seemed as if he was learning a lot of it quite quickly. Very nice and stylish, a short guy who looked nasty at soccer and loved to bounce to the techno beat.
Richard- 24 year old Dutchman, nicknamed "Akon" by his friends simply because he was the only black man among them. Kept claiming he was on his second drink, although he definitely confused 'second drink' with 'second second drink,' second, second second drink' and so on. Later pulled the same miscommunication with 'third' and 'fourth' drinks. Decided not to come to the club with us, and puked in a bag and in the Swiss girl's shoes. Awesome guy who convinced me of the need for gloves.

We went to a great club and I only wish I could have spent more time with them, as well as more time with EURASMUS students in general. We stayed at the club until about 530 Friday morning, and left when most people did. Upon waking up, I ate breakfast, stole them some deli meat and cheese, then packed. I was quite surprised about the amount of time they spent preparing to depart. They make sure everything looks proper when they leave, including using a lint roller on their coats, making sure their scarfs were on properly, and having their hair exactly as desired. Quite fashionable.
We found a place that offered a great lunch special of all you could eat salad and then a massive plate of salmon and potatoes in a sauce plus a coke for 8 euros. The amount of butter, mayo, and hollandaise in the sauce however was too much for me and plagued me all weekend (I actually just wanted to know how lucky Ari and Sam were to try escholar). Since it was raining hard and quite foggy all day, it wasn't really worth walking around, so we hung out in the restaurant just talking for a few hours after that. I went with them to the central terminal, said good bye, then checked into my new hostel. The new hostel had free internet as well, super comfy beds (much nicer than the bed in my flat), super clean floors, cool people, ergonomic shower heads, and a real nice kitchen with free coffee, tea, pasta, and whatever food other people did not finish (somewhat of a 'leave your leftovers for the next guests' thing).
Friday night I met up with the American girls from my Prague program, but called it an early night just after midnight... at the time it seemed like a great idea because I had gone to bed at 6,2, and 4 am's respectively the 3 previous nights.
Saturday morning I went out to the Old Town and walked around in the lovely cloudy weather. At noon I headed over to the Royal Palace to watch the changing of the guard (it's technically a changing of the sentry because they haven't needed official guards since the 1960s). After a fantastic performance (highlights include the rap dance-move 'brush the dirt off your shoulder' which they founded over 300 years ago and 1 drummer dropping a drumstick accidentally). I'll post pictures from this on a follow up post because I haven't transferred them to my computer and because this is a long post.
The American girls met me after the changing of the guard, and we walked to the city hall and then the central terminal. Stockholm's central station is directly in its downtown district and surrounded by society. The buses, trains, and metros all run through it, and there are many restaurants, cafes, and bars in it too. Above ground, there are department stores (Aholem's City and H&M of course), and tons of nice restaurants, cafes, shops, and people walking around.
I forgot to mention that Thursday night I had to check 3 coats because I've been wearing 2 sweatshirts and my rainjacket/skijacket mix. Not only is this annoying, but it is surprisingly not warm, or at least in Sweden. While walking around I found a store that had men's coats for 50%, so upon looking and trying them on, with the girls' advice, I picked out a nice winter coat for 65 usd. Not too bad, and since mom's been bugging me for 4 months now to get one, I thought no time like the present.
We also went to H&M where I got a super warm big scarf that can wrap around you like a mummy, or just keep your neck awesome. In clubs here, people - including Dominic - keep their scarves on despite no jacket and even sometimes just wearing it with a T-shirt. Quite European. There are TONS of H&Ms in Stockholm by the way... I found 3 within 100 meters, and over 20 in total. They are fairly cheap by US standards, especially department stores, with nice shirts for under 35 usd. Aholem's City is the nicer Swedish department store, and more in line with Macy's in regards to price and style. I also went to a store on Saturday called "Stylish Mann" or "dress mann" or "something mann" where i bought a pair of nice gloves. I wish I had gone to Aholem's City first because they did have nicer gloves for practically the same price, even though I really like the ones I got.
Saturday night consisted of being turned down at many bars and clubs, but we did get into 1 that was quite fun. I met a Swedish guy named Steward, although that's not how you spell his name. 3 things that display how awesome he was- he was always dancing and upbeat and partying, no matter what was on or who he was near, and somehow either knew or met every girl in site. He also asked why a drink wasn't in my hand, then poured half his beer down my throat (and a 1/4 of that 1/2 down my shirt), then felt bad about spilling on me and thus bought me another beer. He also told me he was only staying out until 3 because he had work AT 7am.
Anyways that bar/club was a lot of fun and we made the mistake of not listening to him and going to one of his suggestions earlier in the night, because by the time I tried getting into clubs, 1 girl was too tired and the other needed to walk her home (bitches), leaving me alone and not able to get into a club. Even with them we would have had to wait over 30 minutes. It was only 2 am, and some clubs close at 3, others at 5. I ended up walking back to the metro, meeting a Swedish girl (she was actually a brunette, but brunette swedes are not that rare but have a mysterious attraction to them) and having a nice 30 or so minute chat with her.
I actually met those girls at a bar, and brought 5 Americans studying in Western Europe with me. For most of the evening the girls were being quite no-fun, so I ended up spending more time with these other Americans. The following morning, the guy sleeping below me, Tony from Texas, told me he was going on a boat tour of the Archipelagos for twenty euros (that's a lot of T's). I decided to join him, and even though we were meeting 2 of his friends at the port, it is massive and 3 blocks from the central terminal. Unfortunately the terminal is massive and at 1150 we were 9 blocks from the port. The cab driver offered us a deal of 15 euros to get there, despite telling us it would only take 8 by the meter. "Business" he called it. We sprinted around the port for a while and finally found his friend waiting with us at the entrance to the boat, which took off 30 seconds after we got on. With no good seats left, we moved a table in front of a walkway (half blocking the walkway and half blocking the bathrooms) for a better view, and after an hour of this traffic jam, the boatsmen requested we move into the restaurant, an area we had been told we weren't allowed in. It was quite a nice upgrade.
This boat trip might have made my vacation by the way, and not just because I had a nice new coat. IT SNOWED! The gorgeous snow as we were boating around some of the 24000 islands was truly great, especially since we could go outside or in if we liked. Tony spent much of the 3 hours outside (he was wearing 3 shirts, 2 sweatshirts, and a snowboarding parka), while the 2 girls spent much of the time indoors (peacoats are nice but get wet quick). I alternated, and wished the whole time I had a camera which I accidentally left on all night. After our return, Karen and Brooke went to meet up with an old au'pere, while Tony and I met other Barca kids at the iceskating rink. Despite not having gone in almost 10 years and never having been good and having skates a size small, I was decent - in part because I stayed in control and didn't let myself fall. After enjoying this rink, I think they may make a movie one day about Swedish rival Asian ice skating gangs that have half dance off - half speed skate races with tackling. They were great skaters and scared the shit out of me. We later took a random bus from a random stop to a random stop, got off, and walked around until we found a restaurant. Since everyone speaks Swedish and English, many of the menus actually offer both, but we wandered onto a very small, very homely place with a menu of 3 appetizers, 6 main courses, and 2 desserts that had no English. It was delicious, and again, I love Swedish salmon.
I went to bed early so that I could wake up early and get in a full day before my flight home. I went to the Vasa museum for an hour and a half on Monday which was amazing. The Vasa was a ship that sunk in 1628, but because of the less salient salty water in the Stockholm port, the wood didn't decay, and in 1961, they pulled up the ship. 95% of the ship in the museum is original, and they have exhibits to show other stuff about life back then which was awesome. I even learned that in the 1600s, Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus wanted to display the awesomeness of the Swedes and how they would WIN IN STYLE by the intricacies of the boat and the extravagancies of the colors and the elaborateness of the statues (they have maintained this 'in style' idea... even some Parisians I met thought the Swedes to be stylish). After not being able to take pictures of this great ship (update: I just learned minutes ago upon going through my bag that I actually brought my charger with me and forgot I did this, thus not charging my camera despite being able to), I headed off to the indoor market. I was told by Americans that after searching for hours for meatballs, this was the only place they could find that had them. I walked in, and saw 3-4 very nice cafes, 2-3 very nice restaurants, and like 15-20 very nice vendors. The delis, fish stands, vegetable huts, and etc. seemed to all be fresher and nicer than most places in the states and reminded me of the upscale grocery stores (1 in NY and 1 in Chicago) that my mom took me to. Anyways none of the restaurants had meatballs, so I went to the deli, asked for their meatball lunch - which was a few massive scoops of mashed potatoes with like 10 meatballs that were smothered in some clamber sauce (might have just been clam or some Swedish word I didn't know) then heated up for me - and enjoyed my delicious and filling yet surprisingly cheap lunch outside in the square. I then wanted to by a terrorist scarf (the square ones with like a checkered pattern in different colors) from a street vendor for cheap, but realized I only had enough money to try a chokoladball so I got one and left for the airport (I arrived with 1 swedish krown left... pretty good).
My next post will be a few sentences about since returning to Prague and then a few photos for all of your viewing experience.

I've been messing around the last few days, doing little, thinking much. Not even much reading, but some pretty dank cooking including curry veggie couscous and chicken with potatoes and veggies. Done a fair share of walking and went to yoga Monday, although not going tonight because it's Dillon's birthday and not only am I joining him for dinner, but we've got to clean [just food off the floor] before people come over. Can't really think of anything that's actually happened, other than receiving sick grades and going to the zoo on Sunday. Took about 75 pictures there because there are tons of crazy animals; Forbes ranked Prague's zoo as higher than the San Diego (7th v 9th in the world). So check some goofy animals:









Im currently in the Danish airport which is unbelievably nice, and has a massive mall in with stores such as bvlgari, porsche design, hugo boss, etc. It's an absolutely gorgeous mall and airport, and I hope Sweden is as nice as I expect Copenhagen to be. Last night was Dillon's birthday so we had a few people over to party, and what was supposed to be a pregame became a party with us never leaving. Anyways I haven't used a dial up connection in forever, and by that I mean years definitely, and I think it's really weird such a nice airport has such shitty internet. It hsa taken me 15 of my 30 minutes just to load the 3 sites I tried accessing... this, facebook, and gmail. So on that note, I leave you hopefully enjoying my goofy animals in addition to the very many pictures on Flickr should you choose to go over there too.

pre-Transmission

Wednesday was quite refreshing... there truly is nothing like amazing weather to vacation you from horrific temperatures. As previously stated, it's not the rain that's real annoying, nor is it the temperature; it's the lack of sun. We go days on end without sunlight, living in a grey environment similar to 1950s television. On Wednesday, it was 65 degrees without a cloud in the sky. It was beautiful, and I had two outclasses to get to enjoy it outside. It was so tempting to not go to my econ class, and so boringly awful to go. When I walked into class, it was absolutely beautiful, and when I exited, the sun had set. Talk about a waste of wonder, a poor choice of class time sure screwed us all over. I went to yoga and then went out to 2 girls' birthday parties. It was fun, and when we decided to leave, half of us got stuck in the elevator. As I raced down the stairs and knocked on the elevator door, I probably should have realized that the 3 knock backs in the same spot meant they had stopped moving. After ten minutes of waiting, I decided it was worth trying to open the door, which got the Czech kids pretty pissed and could have gotten us in a lot of trouble. I at least thought it was a better idea than trying to jump down a floor, which everyone inside the elevator was attempting (they were 3/4 of the way between the 3 and 4 floors). When they finally got out, we shared a laugh as they shared some swear words, and everyone headed in different directions. Instead of getting to walk home with the girl in my building, we took care of her friend, which eventually led to me actually carrying her over my shoulder to get her home. It happens to the best of us, and they luckily are enjoying Amsterdam as I type instead of this horrific grey.
Thursday was back to the usual crud weather, and upon waking up from my post-Czech class nap, I felt fantastic. Czech was awful, and holding my hovering head just inches above the desktop made my situation apparent to not just myself. That day was pretty slow too, but at least ended in humor. We ended up going to club Radost, a few blocks from our apartment, after enjoying the Woodstock environment of my new favorite bar. With $1.10 beers, $1.40 becherovka shots, $1.75 shots of everything else, and $2.20 shots of absynthe or any whiskey, the Woodstock bar across the street is now for me what Chucky Cheese is to Michael Jackson. One side note about Woodstock is that it is quite different from most Czech bars in a form of its pricing. In the CR, if you want a rum and coke, you pay 50 crowns for the rum (or whatever it costs) and then 75 krowns for the coke (again event specific). A gin and tonic, for example, may often be 35 krowns for the shot of gin, and then whatever the tonic costs on top of that. At Woodstock, the 35 krown gin gets translated into a 39 krown gin and tonic drink. Weird, but still in pattern with other drinks. The whiskey coke, however, defies traditional economics. For 45 krowns, they will serve you a shot of any whiskey they have. For 39 krown, however, they will make you the whiskey coke drink. If you figure out the economics of this, please explain it to me, and it can't just be because there is that much greater demand for the shot.
I ran into a yoga friend at Radost while Dillon ran into what may have been Russian mafia guys who wanted to kill him. I can't confirm the first part because they were punks, but their friend that I ended up speaking to definitely did not seem to be the same Rhode Island guido-esque persona. I came home and went to my room to see where Dillon was (we both close the door before either of us go to sleep, and our door was open), and did not find him in bed. I then went to brush my teeth and heard snoring in the shower. Probably beats my sleeping on the trams I venture. I also woke up the following morning with a box of raspberries nearby, uneaten yet open with juice dripped on my nightstand. My keys were still in the door, and we shared a lot of laughs Friday morning. Friday afternoon consisted of me wanting to fly a kite, but shitty weather kept me inside. We then went to see the new Bond movie which opened early here (not as early as London) because it was filmed nearby, and I was slightly disappointed yet still enjoyed it enough to think the experience worthwhile. In Czech theatres you have assigned seating by the way, even if it's not enforced or upheld. They are very nice theatres, and the mall we walked through was really cool. It was nice going to a mall on a Friday afternoon/evening to see the crowd that was going there, and it was really bumping. I even saw a bookstore that had a small english section! I had unfortunately read all of the books that I wanted, most of them in the past 6 months, and right before leaving unhappy I moved a book on the bottom shelf and saw a Penguin classic hidden behind. I picked up Khalid Gibran's The Prophet and took it home with me. Amazon's comments and reviews make it seem like I made a wise choice. I stayed in last night to prepare for tonight, which pictures and Dillon's descriptions predict to be epic.
Today I had wanted to go to the zoo, but more rain sort of made that hope disappear. Well, it's more of being postponed because I still hope to go there, a magical place whose descriptions have consisted of nothing short of awesome. Having stayed in all day, I think it's sort of necessary to get out, which is perfect because tonight is Transmission 2008, a massive techno party. Before I give what I'm told it will be, I should mention my experimental lunch that I just finished. I had purchased canned herring to see what Czech people eat. It came in a paprika/oil dressing, almost like a light barbeque sauce of pepper. I added it to some Czech fake-Ramen, and 'endulged' in an interesting delicatessen that may need a more accurate description. Anyways, the entire O2 arena, the size of the United Center, is turned into a massive stage, and from 9pm until 7am, the whole stadium screams as the CR hosts Central Europe's largest techno party and hottest DJs. I will bring a camera (which is allowed in concerts here even though it's not permitted in castles) and make sure not to lose it, also hopefully taking pictures of the grandiosity of this event: it's going to be a thunderdome

Overall updates

This will be quick, but I figured I should give a small update since Saturday. Saturday night I debated going out, and went to 2 bars within 200 meters with Dillon; we lightly drank and by the second place decided neither of us wanted to go out. I think a small factor was that Mortal Kombat, the horrific classic from the mid-to-late nineties was on, and because we were pretty tired from Thursday and Friday. I stayed in and read, watched TV, and discussed utter randomness with Dillon which was pretty fun.
I think I forgot to mention in my last post that our roommate Robert came out with us Thursday. Robert is from Cornell and takes between 5 and 7 classes a semester, which shocks me because at Emory you need special permission from the Dean to even be allowed to take 5 real classes. Anyways he told us that he drank once at a frat party freshman year but didn't really even get buzzed, so this was pretty monumental when he was drinking with us Thursday. It was even more awesome when he told us he wanted to go out with us on Friday. Granted he didn't go in on the 6 liters for 10usd and didn't get nearly as drunk, but we were proud. Saturday he even wanted to go out again, and although we were up when he came back, he was still the party animal of the weekend. Last night he went out [I think just to see a movie] but didn't get back until I was almost a sleep. I think we created a monster.
Having not done anything on Saturday, I decided to at least leave the apartment on Sunday. Dillon, an avid rock climber back at school, has been going about once a week or so to climb, and I had asked if he would show me how this weekend. It was really difficult, and although I wasn't the absolute worst climber at this gym-bar, I was towards the bottom. And by gym-bar, I mean this place is a bar which turned its basement into a bouldering room. And by I mean towards the bottom, I mean other than the 5 and 7 year old girls whose dad was pushing them on the rope, and the 8 year old boy who was running around as his dad climbed, I was the next worst. Pretty embarassing but I didn't really care; it wasn't as embarassing as Haloween and was a ton of fun. It's really hard by the way, and I have far from an ideal climbers body. Although I have worked on forearm strength by doing pullups off of a 4 x 8 slab of wood, I still don't have nearly the amount of ridiculous finger strength as these guys who are absolutely nuts.
As far as my midterms went, I got an A on my historical development of architecture BS writeup, an A- on my psych test/paper which is pass/fail, and a 93 on my econ exam. I unfortunately don't know if this is out of 100 or 120 points, and since I've only heard of one person getting above a 100 (even though there were 120 possible points), I sure hope he makes it out of 100. My last midterm I find out tomorrow.
Sunday night I bought tickets to Stockholm for our 'long' weekend in 2 weeks. I leave Thursday morning and come back Monday evening which will be awesome and I'm only missing 1 class to do so which is fine, especially since I haven't missed any real classes for this class. Another awesome factor is when I get back that Monday night, I have 3 days of classes before jetting off to Amsterdam with Joey and his friends and Jon who is coming to Europe soon. I also signed up for CIEE's trip to Berlin in December which should be real awesome. I have also decided that I finally need to buy an Ipod and steal people's music, even though Dillon showed me this great streaming site called last.fm. Try it it's awesome. So I've been researching which one I want, going to yoga, and reading more which has been nice.
I guess the final part of what's happened since my last post has been the official temporary culmination of my studies at Emory. I faxed in a temporary leave of absence form and got back a response today, meaning that next semester I will not be an enrolled student. Instead, I plan on meeting up with Ari when he and Sam come to Europe. As of now, we plan on splitting the 6 weeks that we have here between Spain and Morocco, and hopefully catching the FC Barcelona home game on January 4th. I don't really know how this will affect my attire for Allison's Bat-Mitzvah because I don't have any formal clothes and won't be coming back to the states until February 10th, but I'm sure we'll figure that out. Once back in Chicago, I am going to be working for Ari's ex-boss, our current neighbor, and my favorite right wing pastor, Chicago's self-proclaimed and crowned king of surplus, Dave Auerbach. Hopefully on weekends I'll get to visit a few friends at big10s too. Anyways, as of now, in early April I plan on heading off to Israel and staying there for the summer. I am ooking into internships and will soon be looking at jobs too while there, and then I'll be home for a little before back to Emory. This actually doesn't mess up my schedule and helps it out, so long as I still finish in 3 academic semesters. Oh yea, and I still will get into the Econ Honors Program if I respond to their email next semester. So, I'm excited to try a new type of foreign living, different from what is now, and what will be with Ari, and what may be sometime after that.

PS: it's scary how little time I have left this semester, and I haven't even learned Czech yet!

Doing Nothing to Prepare for or Celebrate Midterms

It's been a pretty slow last couple of days. I was very busy preparing for midterms, and by preparing I mean not doing much. It really wasn't my fault that I didn't study; I blame Noah for sending me a 200 level online riddle. Despite procrastinating so much, I was quite efficient in my studying. I planned it out so that the 45 minutes before my first midterm I would study for that test; after I finished, I'd have just over an hour to study for my next test, and having finished that test quickly, I studied for my final exam in class. It was the perfect study plan, and allowed me to bust my brain on a riddle while watching TV too. My Art and Architecture test was slightly tricky, but it's still architecture so it really wasn't that bad, and my interior design architecture exam was literally one picture. It was actually pretty sweet; identify whichever piece of furniture was in my photo, and BS about it for as long as you want. I had a very gorgeous Renaissance commode, and all I had to do was write whatever I want - including the word 'perhaps' in many situations helped too. My economics exam was fine, neither good nor bad, and I had prepared just enough to have learned a pretty basic history of the EU. The one problem with the Europeans and their damn governments is they all decide to call everything by the same names. Examples include the Council of Europe, the European Council (EC), the European Committee (EC), the European Comission (EC), the European Economic Community (EEC). They always have to brag about their Europeanness, and love the letter 'C' for some stupid reason. At least you can't go wrong by guessing EC for any answer.
I guess the real exciting news of the week has been the unbelievable weather. There hasn't been a cloud in the sky and I've been wearing shorts everyday without a jacket since Monday. It's truly been amazing... in my apartment. Outside, it's been a little different. From Monday evening until Thursday morning, it did not stop raining. It did often only drizzle, which was a nice relief from the often downpour, but it sucked the whole time. The only thing that made the rain worse was the 15 knot winds that carried the water drops. Actually, the other thing that was pretty miserable was the 35 degree weather which paired with the gruesome winds. They were pretty brutal and prevented pretty much anything from happening. Especially since it now gets dark at 4:30... that also puts a damper on any motivational drive. So basically it's been a slow week because the weather sucks.
On the contrary, there have been some fun moments. For example, when I was walking to class on Thursday, I got to see real live crackhead gypsies again! Yea the most I've ever seen congregating has been like 3, but on Thursday, I got to see 6 of them shooting up together. It was pretty sweet... and by sweet I mean I felt real awkward and tried walking quicker by them. MVP of the shoot-up sesh goes to the homeless guy who was passed out on the bench, and needed his heroine so badly that he had a friend inject him while he just laid there. He seemed pretty warm and friendly, just like the rest of them. The only thought that passed through my head at the time, other than 'get the hell out of here quickly,' was 'please don't take your needle and stab me with it and give me the HIV.' I should have realized the economic infeasability of that, because without enough money to buy lots of needles (and thus sharing them) they would never waste their precious life medicine.
We decided to go shopping yesterday for Halloween outfits, that was fun. Right next to the main train station there is a second hand clothing store that I guess is really popular with the Czech people because it is massive. It reminded me of the Japanese in Hawaii at an Armani Exchange sale, or a bunch of pidgeons plucking at a fountain. Unlike Americans, the Czechs choose not to organize their stuff. This means the only separation was 'kids clothes' and 'grown ups clothes.' Everything is either thrown in a pile, or hanging from a rack, and its not separated by color, size, gender, or even price (even though they claim it is). You can buy leather coats for 90 krown, and fur ones for 120 (approximately 20 krown to the dollar right now) which is pretty nice, and you can find some great Cosby sweaters. My 3 ideas, with help from Dillon, were Bill Cosby, Russian, or nuts. Dillon and another guy advised against dressing as a Russian for political reasons, so I think I may do that sometime in the future. I got bored looking at 1970s Soviet styled sweaters, so I decided to go with being absolutely ridiculous. We found what had to have been a women's small tank top that said 'everybody need somebody,' and what better way to start off looking totally ridiculous than with something like that. Although I was scared I would rip it when I got it on, it was surprisingly more comfortable than the previous, similar styled top. This one was more stretchy since it was all cotton, and didn't even cut off feeling to my arms, a definite plus. It was a little awkward after trying it on when a woman walked up to me and asked where she knew me from, only to realize that she is one of the yoga instructors at my studio here. Oh well, at least she thought it was downright hilarious, and I think she was also laughing at Dillon who was rolling on the floor dying after she asked me that question.
Having trouble finding any acceptable bottoms, someone grabbed me a pair of jorts which were, especially upon confirmation with some girls, definitely made for women. Women's jorts are even less comfortable than mens, and are fit differently so that they are quite painful. After a little bit of stretching them out, I finally got into them when we got home. Robert was appalled at our costumes: me in the most ridiculous outfit ever, and Dillon wearing super short neopreme briefs and tassles around his arms and legs only (he was a wrestler). When we walked into the restaurant in our building for drinks, every single person in the place stopped talking, looked at us, and starting laughing hysterically... and they couldn't even see my shirt at first. At the next bar, we only got the silence, until some random Czech guy jumped up and started screaming about how he loves Haloween and we are the only ones who celebrate it well. I ended up waiting outside of club and looking to my left last night, and realized "your an American, and not on my program, but are from Emory!" It was actually a guy that I was real good friends with freshman year, and I had no idea he was studying in Vienna. I joined his friends and went into a hotel, down a few flights of stairs, and walked into a massive underground club/bar. Again I go into a random building and find a huge underground complex: it's like this city has a whole city underneath it.
Today has been the most productive day possibly since I got here: I watched South Park, the Office, and typed this. Dillon claims this happened to him last year after Haloween too, and after reflection, I think I was the same way. The grocery a block away is waay too far from our couches, so we have both sat watching TV, slightly hungry, for the past few hours, too lazy to do anything. Everyone has those days.

PS: It's now 6pm and has been dark for almost 2 hours. Without a clock or watch, you might think it was 10pm outside.

PPS: I'm real glad there are no pictures from last night to post, although I'm sort of pissed that a girl did snap a picture of us.