Happy Birthday Tanya!!!

Today I give you pictures....it's just a few but one is especially for my bff Tanya because today is her birthday!!!

Photo 1: A photo (taken by me!) of the Pest side from Castle Hill (on the Buda side!). I told you it had good views!!! The building you can see sticking up is the Basilica.

Photo 2: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TANYA! I got you some lilies because they are your favorite! I took this picture at a flower stand in Vienna just for you!

Photo 3: A front view of the Basilica of St. Stephen where we went yesterday...big huh!?

That's all the photos for now, I will work on posting some that actually have me in them so you can all see that I am alive and well! We leave on a train tomorrow morning at 6am (!!!!!!!) to go down to Croatia so depending on how crazy today gets I may not be able to post until we get to Croatia and I can find internet! Love and miss you all and everyone tell Tanya happy birthday! <3 A

Busy in Budapest!!!!!

Hello everyone!

I feel like I haven't blogged in forever but I have been running around this city like crazy! Sooooo....ok, let's go back and talk about yesterday...

So because yesterday was everyone's first full day in Budapest, we decided to make it a group outing day and stay together as we learned the city a bit. Our first stop was at the House of Terror, a museum about the atrocities which occured in Hungary as a result of Russian invasion and communism. The experience was very somber but extremely important in understanding the people here and their history. We split up to go to lunch and then met back to walk across the bridge to the Buda side where Castle Hill is. It is literally up on top of a huge hill and we climbed steps to get to the top to see the old palace. The best part about castle hill was that it provided great great views of the city because we were so high up! We then walked as a group to a bath!

We definitely managed to find the 'local spot'...everyone looked at us like we were crazy and the language barrier was a bit of a struggle, but we eventually all found the various pools and hot pools and saunas...what started out as a somewhat intimidating situation turned out to be a very nice and relaxing experience. We are lucky enough to have some very good chefs with us in the group, so they cooked dinner for everyone back here at the hostel and we all ate a homemade sausage and vegetable pasta and enjoyed each others great company family style! It was a great end to a long day!

Now to today...Wednesday! Everyone was feeling pretty exhausted and worn out from lots of travel and lots of walking and lugging around packs and suitcases so everyone took the day kind of slow. People got up whenever they felt like (I slept until 10 and read in bed until 11!) Then we kind of went out and wandered around town before we had to be back for the ballet this evening!!! I went to St. Stephen's Bascilica which was really really pretty! I have to say, the weather here has been really nice and sunny but HOT! And we are walking a lot so we are always hot :) So rather than walking more we sat on some benches behind the Parliament building and people watched before heading back to the hostel to get ready to go to the Ballet!

So as you know, we wanted to go to the opera but there's not one playing right now so we went to the Ballet instead. I have never been to a ballet before so it was definitely a new experience for me, but we all got dressed up and went to the Hungarian National Opera where we watched "Zorba". It was really good and it was interesting to be there watching it with a Hungarian crowd!!! We got out of the opera about 9ish and hadn't really eaten dinner yet so we headed back to the area where St. Stephen's Bascilica was and found an amazing cafe and gelatto place sitting right beside the bascilica at night! We had so much fun sitting as a group and chatting and listening to the bells toll!

It's been a great couple of days in Budapest and tomorrow is our last day here before heading down to Croatia on Friday!

That's all for now, love from Budapest! A

Budapesht!

Yes, I did spell it wrong, but that's how you say it! Did you know that Buda and Pesht used to be two different cities and then they built a bridge across the Danube and joined the two cities!? Cool huh? We all made it here safely last night. The train ride was nice and relaxing, only about three hours long and coming to a brand new city was a little bit of a challenge. We are all working to adjust and learn a completely different city from the one we were just in, and the language here is very very different so we've kinda lost hope for being able to understand it. I don't have much time to write today, but we are getting ready to leave for a group outing to the Museum of Terror (highly recommended...I'll let you know!), then we will head over to Castle Hill where there are a lot of huge old castles (and it's a World Heritage Sight), then we will go to a traditional bath....a huge space with lots of pools of different temperatures and you rotate through them all...it's supposed to be very refreshing! Then we are *hoping* to go to the Opera!!!!! We thing 'Carmen' is playing! Now we are off! I hope everyone had a good Memorial Day weekend! Love you all! A

Day 1.5 in Vienna!

Now that it's the end of my first full day in Vienna I am discovering that only one full day is not nearly enough to see all this city has to offer!  It is HUGE (again, I don't know what I expected it to be!) and we just can't seem to get to it all!  Today the group planned to rent bikes and ride them around the city but it was raining this morning so we all kind of split and went our different ways.  Brian and I headed out to Shronbruen (sp!?), which is one of the palaces of the Hapsburg family who ruled Austria forever.  It was very similar to Versailles in France or the Piti Palace in Florence, except not as good because it wasn't the original furniture or walls or paintings (the Piti Palace in Florence is essentially untouched from the time of the de Medicis, so I'm a little biased and judge everything against that!).  The Palace did have A-Mazing gardens...I took lots of pictures of them to show my roomates so they know what kind of landscaping I want for my future house!!!!  <3>

Halo from Vienna!

Yaaaaaaay we made it safe and sound to Vienna but the keyboards are slightlz different so forgive any typos! Brian and I were both up by 4:30 am and caught a train at 5:21.....we had no trouble making our connections on the train, but upon arriving at the airport we quickly learned that the one hour we had allowed was not enough to get through the Stanstead airport and get our flight! Luckily, thez called for anyone on our flight and took us to the front of the line at the last minute, where we found that a ´´W. Clark´´ had accidentally been checked in as Brian so all of this persons bags were going to Vienna.....anyway, they got that worked out, we RAN through the airport and onto our plane and made it. Upon landing for our lazover in Muenster we realized we had forgotten to allow for the one hour time change so we onlz had 15 minutes to make our connection....we had to go through customs, exit the airport, and go all the way back through security....but no worries, we ran and made that one too!

We finallz arrived in Vienna around 12 and caught a bus to the general area of our hostel and ran into our first Caldwell on the walk to the hostel....that was a happy sight! We were all exhasted because all 3 of us had been travling all morning so we checked into the hostel and thez took naps while I read. The rest of our group slowly trickled in and eventuallz we were all here! We took the subwaz down to the museum corridor and all went our seperate wazs for dinner and now we are all trickling back in here to the hostel. Tomorrow will be our first real day of sightseeing in Vienna! yay! Ok, until tomorrow.......Auf Wiedersehen! A

Cheers!

We are winding down from day number 2 (our last day) in Cambridge! It's currently 6pm local time and I think Brian and I are both looking forward to another early night to bed :) We are leaving this internet cafe and are headed to the train station to buy our tickets for tomorrow - it's looking like we'll have to leave between 4am-5am to catch the train to the Stanstead Airport and fly over to meet the group in Vienna. That's sooooo early! It sounds like both Brian and I had fairly acceptable nights at our hostel. I only had 3 other girls in my room - I didn't really get to talk to any of them because I was in bed by 7 :) Brian was in a room with 3 guys - he said one guy wheezed until Brian thought the guy was about to die, and another snored louder than Brian has ever heard....you know it must have been bad if they managed to wake Brian up and keep him awake when he hadn't slept in 2 days!!! Anyway, the hostel had a good breakfast, we got ready and headed out for the day!

We spent most of the morning and early afternoon in West Cambridge checking out Brian's college (where he will live next year) and his building where all of his classes will be. After being around buildings that were 600 and 400 years old, it was a major change to see a 'new' building....Churchill College, Brian's College, was completed in the late 60's....and it looks like it hasn't been touched since then :) Brian was a little disappointed, but we had seen pictures of the...dated...college :) Hopefully I can upload some pictures later! Then we headed across the street to the buildings where Brian will have class...they are really nice and pretty! He was even able to talk to two American's who are currently finishing up the Part III (the program Brian will be in next year).

We then headed back to the city center where we went to the original site of the Cavendish Laboratories, where JJ Thompson first discovered the electron way back in the day :) I took pictures of the plaque :) Finally, around 2:45pm we ate lunch at The Eagle Pub, the pub where Watson and Crick ate lunch every day and where they first announced that they had discovered the double helix and had unlocked the secrets of genetics....there was a plaque there too :) Brian had fish and chips and I ate chicken curry (and we both got Strongbow of course!) It started raining while we were eating lunch, don't worry mom, I had my umbrella with me!), so what do you do in a foreign country when it starts raining??? You go sit at Starbucks! hehe. We used the rest of one of my Starbucks gift cards to sit there and read and watch people walk by at the market. We finally left Starbucks, walked back towards the hostel a different way so we could see more of the city and now we're here at the internet!

So, early morning tomorrow...we're supposed to land in Vienna around lunch time and we'll navigate our way to the hostel where we will meet the rest of the group and officially begin the EEST! I'm not sure what the internet will be like for the rest of the trip, but I will definitely update as much as I can! If you have any questions, post a comment and let me know and I'll do my best to answer it! Until next time...cheers! A

We're Here!

We made it across the pond! Brian and I had no trouble flying over - all of our flights were on time and they didn't lose our luggage! After over 12 hours of traveling we finally made it up to Cambridge. We landed in London at 8am London Time, then caught the train to Victoria Station then took the tube to the Kings Cross Station (where we ran right past Platform 9 3/4!!!) then caught the train up to Cambridge. We got here around 12:30pm and walked straight to the hostel which wasn't too far from the train station. We were both exhausted but knew we needed to stay awake so we immediately went back out for some lunch. When traveling abroad, where else is there to go for lunch than a Pizza Hut Lunch Buffet!? lol. We ate our fill and then started walking around the city. In my mind I had decided that Cambridge was small and old and there were no cars and cobble stone streets...wrong! It is very busy but very beautiful. We were able to sneak onto the grounds of some of the Colleges and watch people punting down the River Cam. Tomorrow we hope to punt also, and make the forever long trek out to Churchill College, the college where Brian will be spending the next two years! I'll let you know how all of that goes as soon as I can! Anyway, we're here safe and sound! Cheers! A

It's Today, It's Today!

Here it is...the day we leave! I'm still not finished packing, but I'm pretty close to being done :) I'm having a hard time packing light, but I keep reminding myself that I will be carrying everything on my back in a pack, so I will be very grateful if I can spare a few pounds here and there! I spent the day running last minute errands and printing and confirming itineraries....it was a bit stressful but I'm also really excited! Brian and I will be flying out of Greensboro, so we will leave Concord around 2 and Dad will drive us up to the airport! We will fly overnight to London (and will hopefully get to watch some good movies!) and then we'll land in London at 9am on Thursday. From there we'll hop right on the train and go to Cambridge! I'll post as often as I can and will try to keep you updated on the goings on of all of us in Eastern Europe! <3 byeeeeeee

Welcome!

Welcome to the ALG on the EEST Blog! For those of you who don't know, EEST stands for Eastern European Service Trip and ALG is me! We're down to t minus three days before I leave so I'm making shopping lists and to do lists and doing laundry like crazy! This trip was the idea of a group of Caldwell Fellows, and as with all things Caldwell, it grew into a group trip! We will travel through Austria, Croatia, Bosnia and Turkey from May 21-June 30. Brian and I will actually begin in Cambridge, where Brian will be spending the next two years, so that we (I!) can get a feel for the area before Brian leaves in September. We will be in Cambridge May 22 & 23 before meeting the group in Vienna on the 24th. So, welcome to the blog! I will write later about the purpose of our trip and what we hope to accomplish....until then....byeeeeeeeeeeeeee!