This is a picture of Saarinen's Dulles Airport that i took getting here.
Sooo, due to my amazing translating skills, i can read slovak blogspot.com. or, at least make a (kind of) educated guess. So the title of this post is actually "new post"...and was the button i pressed to get here.
So it's 7am. I think to my body, that still means 1 am. stoopid jet lag! Also on the downside, i bought a 200 skk calling card ($8) - and am excited to (as ET would say) phone home. But because of the time difference and how late my friends/family sleep (all of you! you slackers :P ) i have to wait until at least
four o'clock to do so.
So here is part of what i wrote in my journal today:
This morning i woke up to rain, then went back to sleep until about 11am. I headed into Bratislava with some trepidation...fully expecting that it would be a tricky day. I am not so convinced that "everyone knows english." It really only seems that young, educated slovaks do. However, I've found almost all of my italian coming back to me now, as soon as i don't need it AT ALL. I keep being thrown off and forming sentences al'italia. For instance, on the bus back into svaty jur, i was crammed and cramped into a seat, with three drunk slovaks blocking me in. i saw the sign for svaty jur and started to panic that the bus would fly past my stop and i would end up in nitra or modra or POLAND, and as it showed no sign of slowing(and some signs of perhaps running into other cars), i stated to the air,panicky, "how do i get the bus to STOP?" The nice drunk lady next to me enunciated "SVEH-TY JUUUUR?" and i yelled, "si! i mean, yes! Aagh! sorry - Ano!" Luckily for me, the bus did indeed stop and i tumbled out, very thankful, and very loaded down with my three tesco bags.
when i arrived in Bratislava earlier in the day, it was already 1:30. I accidentally got OFF the bus way too early, but i stopped in a travel agency and a nice travel agency boy with a two lazy eyes (where are you looking???) pointed me to the tram (he pronounced it "tramp"), and i made it to the old part of the city. i noticed a tesco...which proved to drive me to my breaking point later in the day.
I registered at the american embassy with little to no trouble, though i did find it peculiar that no one working there was actually american. On the way i ran into a group of americans, and i chatted to them a bit. it's already muy comforting to find english speakers. I feel like a deaf-mute, helen keller-ing my way around. As i left the embassy, i started to look for a place to have lunch. But instead, the skies opened up and STORMED. hard rain and thunder. I sought shelter under an awning made by construction, and a middle aged man from kosice started to talk to me in english, and ended up offering me a piece of licorice gum to enjoy with my cigarette. Not a bad combination, really. kind of like a menthol cigarette. a menthol-LICORICE cigarette. I found a little restaurant and had a pivo and some halusky. Pivo is Beer, and Halusky is the national dish. Halusky is small potato dumplings with sheep's milk cheese and pork cracklings. It was creamy and rich, but the dumplings were a little gummy and not nearly as delicious as gnocchi. I could not eat it all - in fact it made me a little sick after a while. I'm not exactly sure if i am "supposed" to eat everything on my plate here, as in other european countries, so i made a point to tell the waiter that it was "dobry. vel'mi" (good. very)
When i was back on the street, the sun was shining, and i made my way out of the old city into the tesco. according to the sign outside, it was now 16 degrees outside.
Tesco. Damn you, tesco. I "stopped in" because while my boarding house definitely has the essentials, there's also a lot that it lacks. It needs more lights, more closets, and a fricken freezer...but also things such as sheets and paper towels. And juice and booze. Two hours and a hundred dollars (wtf? i thought slovakia was cheaper or something_) later, i left. Almost in tears. i was almost in tears A LOT in tesco. It was super busy, and the merchandise was not really the best stuff, and no one spoke english, nor had any idea, - FOR INSTANCE - where i could find a lightbulb for the lamp i found. the boy i asked looked at the lamp for about five minutes, said some stuff i didn't understand, and handed it back.
I bought some other groceries, such as muesli and tangerines and surprisingly cheap mangos. Keifer is a really big beverage over here, which i remembered when i opened what i assumed was yogurt, and found it to be, um, a liquid.
So it's still an adventure. Today i will unpack (my roomates/comrades/fellow students have yet to arrive) and hang out in svaty jur...take some pictures. It's a darling little town on a slight slope, with a couple of shops and pubs, a restaurant and two internet cafes. More than a few young people. It's very clean. My room is part of a boarding house that was once a monastery. It's not big, but there's enough light hard wood that it kind of reminds me of a sauna, and it overlooks a courtyard.
other notes: i can't find candles to save my life. There is no shower here, only a bath (there is no dana, only zeul...that's for you, la). Slovaks look a lot like americans, thank god. They are not as perfect looking or dressed as italians, and many are tall or not-so-thin. I've got a bit of culture shock...but nothing too bad just yet. I'm excited for compatriots to arrive - friends are good. And most of all, i am really excited about the possibility of traveling. Like a lot. Bratislava is so close to Vienna, Budapest, Prague, Poland. And not so far from Germany or the Ukraine or France or ANYWHERE it seems!
