Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Auschwitz and Salt Mines

Two days into the trip and I'm already behind on my blogging. Perfect.

I'm staying in a pretty awesome hostel about the size of a traditional flat. The flat itself has teh decor of a Friends set (imagine that purple paint from Rachel and Monica's apartment) but the atmosphere of Cheers (where everybody knows...and uses your name). On the first night, the guy brought me up mulled wine...just because. I think I'm the only person staying tonight, so for like 6 pounds I got an entire hostel to myself.

Krakow is cold, but apparently not really. At this time of year, the temperature is usually -20C, which I guess is roughtly -5F. And around a meter of snow. So I'm thankful that there is no snow and only a bitter 41F.

I'm kind of over Polish food. I had pierogis the first night, which were good, but filling. I brought back half the order and have been trying to do damage on them each night. Only four more left. They eat a lot of meat and potatoes (sounds familiar). Not as bad as Scotland though. They at least have spices.

I went to Auschwitz yesterday which was quite an experience. The original camp was actually pretty cute. I guess I was expecting some big, ugly, fluorescently lit death houses. They had all these exhibits with the items they stole from all those killed. Hair, suitcases, glasses, shoes. Even with all of the massive display cases full of personal belongings, it was still hard for me to imagine what 1.1 million people would look like. And as hard as I tried, I couldn't imagine what the jews, pow, gays, gypsies and other prisoners must have looked like, felt like, smelled like in those camps. I know how disrespectful this probably would be, but I sort of wanted there to be a mini-Auschwitz where people dressed in the clothes and went through daily life in the concentration camp. Kind of like the renaissance fair or something. Just to better envision it. I know...probably disrespectful.

Today I went to the Salt Mines outside of Krakow. You're probably wondering why would I ever want to look at salt. Well, I wondered the same thing. Turns out they are pretty cool. I guess at one point they were trying to promote salt mining, so they opened a museum and had artists carve stuff out of salt. Now they take you through some of the caverns of the mine and show you these statues. It's pretty cool.

Tomorrow, Schindler's Factory and another Castle (yawn). Then, an overnight train to Budapest. This should be interesting.

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