When Australian Aborigine males reach adolescence, they have a rite of passage called "walkabout," during which they leave their homes and journey across the wilderness to forge a deep connection with the Earth. Last week, my roommates and I decided to conduct our own version of "walkabout" by venturing into the unknown lands of Central and Eastern Europe. We haphazardly picked three cities that none of us had ever visited before: Prague, Krakow and Berlin.
Some of our most absurd experiences occurred traveling between cities. The day of our departure, we scrambled through our final exams, jolted back to the dorms and took off for the Geneva airport. Malev Hungarian Airlines offered the cheapest flight to Prague, so we booked it, despite some horror stories about the airlines that we heard from our friends. Two guys in our program flew Malev to Budapest and made an emergency landing in Zurich because a piece of the aircraft randomly fell off mid-flight. We smiled and told ourselves that would never happen twice. Sure enough though, our flight was canceled 10 minutes before boarding because of "technical difficulties." On the bright side, Malev footed the bill for us to spend the night in a five-star Geneva hotel, complete with room service, transportation and comfy bathrobes, proving that every mishap has its benefits. Standing on the balcony of a snazzy Crowne Plaza showed us a whole new side to Geneva that we could have only imagined from our student brothel-turned-dormitory.
The next morning we woke up at the crack of dawn to catch our rescheduled flight to Prague. Upon landing, we downed some espresso and then were set to go. The city was an interesting mixture of fairy tale architecture and a funky post-Soviet vibe, with everything from the gorgeous Prague Castle to the John Lennon Wall and Franz Kafka's house. Prague also has loose peacocks strutting around in many of the public gardens. My roommate and I amused ourselves by taking pictures of ourselves chasing after the peacocks. Later on, we met up with one of my best friends from high school who is studying in Prague for the semester. That night happened to be my 20th birthday, so my friend took us to a Czech nightclub called Lucerna that played 1980s and 1990s music with a giant dance floor, absurd music videos and hundreds of people rocking out to Michael Jackson. Needless to say, it was an unforgettable night.
After three days in Prague, we grabbed a final kielbasa and headed out to catch the night train to Krakow, Poland. This train ride was one of the sketchiest experiences of my life. My friend in Prague set the stage for our imaginations to run wild when she told us that there were bandits on the Eastern European night trains who gas passengers in their sleep and then steal their money and passports. We arrived at the creepy train station late at night, making a scene that could have been straight out of a horror movie. After communicating in broken Czech and English that we were trying to find compartment No. 3, a strange pale man dressed in a conductor uniform appeared out of nowhere and lead us down a dark corridor into our overnight car. He then explained to us that we needed to lock the compartment after he left and showed us how to work the triple bolt lock and chain. After doing this, we turned around and realized we were not alone. There was a third passenger in our train car, a scruffy bearded guy in his mid-20s. Apprehensively, we said "hello," wondering why we didn't listen to my friend and buy gas masks like she suggested.
After sitting down and talking, however, we became great friends with our fellow traveler and realized that he was not at all a creepy bandit, but rather a hilarious Frenchman named Cedric. The three of us chatted for hours about traveling and life experiences. At one point, Cedric attempted to start a "train pub crawl" by going to our neighboring train cars and trying to convince them to socialize with us. It was essentially impossible to sleep in the tiny cramped compartment, so we stayed up for most of the night until the creepy conductor returned and told us that we had arrived.
Krakow also was incredibly fun and interesting. My roommate and I took a five-hour walking tour of the city led by a Polish student named Pyotr, who showed us locations where Schindler's List was filmed and told us the history of the Krakow dragon. My favorite thing about the city was probably the food - you could get giant plates of schnitzel and pierogi or huge soup bowls for about $4. Our hostel was very small, so we became good friends with the other travelers, primarily a group of Australians and a few British students. The Australians were very good-natured and humored us by saying phrases like, "Fish are friends, not food," for our personal enjoyment. We had a few interesting conversations with them about American stereotypes and vice-versa. The last day, we went to the Polish salt mines with a few of our newfound friends and saw the enormous underground salt reserves that have been carved into beautiful rooms and statues.
After 10 days of cavorting about Central/Eastern Europe, we said, "Do widzenia," to our fellow international travelers and opted for a plane instead of a sketchy night train back to Geneva. Seeing Lac L
Read More
Professors who parent: navigating motherhood at the University
By Malaika Rehman | YesterdayThese professors say that University-sponsored resources make it possible for them to flourish in both their academic careers and family lives.
Top 10 things I love — ahem, loathe — about spring
By Sam Saks | 2 days agoFor all of spring’s green-ish flags, look no further than this “love letter” to the season’s downfalls.
