Wrap-up

I almost didn't write this blog, it's so late now, and I don't have much more to say. I've already talked to most of the people I've wanted to about the trip.

The blog was... mostly a success. It ended up being more limited in scope than I wanted, and I kept getting way behind. I probably shouldn't have been so detailed in my day to day stuff, and talked more about broader things. I learned a lot about blog writing, I think. But it was still good, and I think it will be great to look back on. If anyone has any questions, I get notifications, so I'll still answer them, even after today.

My favorite thing about the trip? Seeing all the architecture, and the age. It really reminds me how young the United States is. My favorite moment was walking across the Charles Bridge at night in Prague, and looking up and seeing these lit-up fairy-tale like castles. It was so unreal. It was amazing.

This isn't the time or the bridge (it is still in Prague), and it doesn't give any idea of the wonder I felt, but you can get an idea of the architecture in the background.

I just loved that.

Worst part was how tired I felt, and by extension how much my knees hurt. There was a *ton* of travel, and while I loved it, it kind of wiped me out. It's been nice not having to travel so much.
Worst moment was waking up in the middle of the night on the Croatia trip, and projectile vomiting, cramping, and having diarrhea. Ugh. I get nauseous just thinking about it. Food poisoning is awful.

I'm already missing the architecture, and I'll probably start missing everything else in the coming months. But man, it's good to be back with friends and family. I never really got close to anyone there. I like my people.

The drinking was frustrating. Hungary has twice the global average for alcohol consumption, so it's their culture, so it's not really a surprise that most of the Calvin students went out drinking so much, but I did feel left out. My decks of cards and board games that I brought never got used. :(

I did have some personal growth. I learned to be much more independent, and I think I'm about ready to go live on my own. That won't happen for a while yet, but at least I'm ready. It gives me a more solid foundation.

On the whole, Hungary was an amazing trip. I want to keep traveling, but if I got to choose, I would choose somewhere in a new part of the world, SE Asia, India, Africa, or South America. Nothing against Hungary, but I want to continue to expand my view of the world.

Isaac gives Calvin's semester abroad program in Hungary two thumbs up!

Events: 12/16-17: Last days in Hungary

Photos
Christmas Gifts

So, for my last day in Hungary, after my Econ exam, I went around the city, ticking off some things I had wanted to do, and buying gifts for people. I made a live blog (that ran a bit into the next day):

12/16/16
1:43pm
Last day in Hungary. Going to be doing some last minute stuff and reminiscing, so I thought I'd liveblog. The city is beautiful. If I go quickly enough, I might get to watch the sunset from Gellert Hill.

1:53pm.
I started on the other side of Gellert bridge, and have now crossed it to the Gellert monument. Time to climb.

1:58pm
It's absolutely frigid up here, 40F, but no wind. I took a bad selfie to show. The climb is warning me up, tho. All steps. Also, I took a selfie. I think I'm gonna do that on future trips, should probably start practicing now.

2:04pm
It's a bit labyrinth like, lots of paths, but I figure as long as I keep going upwards and inwards, I'll make it to the top. Too many trees in the way for city pictures now.

2:13pm
Made it to the top. Sun is blocked by a big building, tho. The downtown side is absolutely gorgeous, tho. It's hard to believe this is the last sunlight I'll see in Hungary for a long time. I'll be in the US tomorrow.

Man, you can see forever from up here.

2:26pm
There's a cool park up here. Trees everywhere, so you can't see much of the rest of the city, but still pretty.

And now I'm crying.

I'm gonna miss Budapest. This semester has been amazing. I'm here too early for the sunset, it's still over an hour away, and I have stuff I need to do. Yet another thing I didn't do perfectly this semester.

2:32pm
I appear to have gotten a little lost. I'm not worried, in this day and age. A bunch of ravens? showed up. I think they're eating nuts. Lots of banging their beaks.

2:40pm
Bunch of crazy dogs running around in the park. I can still hear them. The building on top was a citadel. Maybe I should have explored it. Won't get the opportunity now.

2:46pm Well, now I know where I am, except I think *now* I'm going to cross Gellert bridge. I don't know the name of the other bridge.

To the Christmas market!

3:12pm
Well, I stopped for guyas soup, first. One of my professors recommended it, and I'm not even sure I've had it yet, so I had to get some. I was going to get it after the Christmas market, but I'm hungry (Hungary) now.

3:26pm.
I was going to get some food to walk and eat, but it's too big. I also spent a bit more than I thought, the place was a little swindley, not making clear that the extras they pushed for weren't free.

4:46pm
I walked to the Christmas market, and tried to finish the food (a hotdog type thing), bit couldn't, so threw the rest away. At first, it was a bit daunting, but I'm moving through my list of stuff to get, well. Chess set remains elusive. Running out of time.

5:30pm
Finally got everything. On the tram back to the dorm. Hands are super stiff from being so cold. They were completely numb at one point. Chess board was hardest to find, practically bought the first one I found. I'll take pictures of everything I got, at some point tonight.

5:46pm
Almost back to the dorm. When I get back, it'll be cleaning and working on final papers, so no posts for a while, probably until after midnight.

12/17/16
12:20am
So first paper submitted, the one I was more worried about. Now I need to pack and clean. Just started the process of getting my data turned back on for my phone. Next to clean up, then take pictures of my gifts, then to pack up.

Live blog ended above.
The trip back was fine, although we had to rush a bit in Paris; coming from Hungary, and then leaving the Schengen Area *and* heading to the US, with only an hour and half between flights. Switching flights in Minnesota was much more chill, although still long, due to the 3 hour layover. ~3 hours Budapest to Paris, ~9 hour Paris to Minneapolis, ~1 hour Minneapolis to Grand Rapids. Back in the US.

Events: 12/11-12/15: Last Week

So, the last week. I watched the Lions Sunday night, they beat the Bears. Monday and on was furiously working on grad school applications. It was crazy. I got most of them done on time. I went to Holocaust Literature on Wednesday, which was a mistake. The professor was busy, so we just filled out course evaluations and left. Round-trip, it took me about an hour and a half, to spend fifteen minutes writing an evaluation. I skipped most of the end of Hungary parties and meetings. Thursday I had my econ exam; I think I did well, but even now, in January, I don't have the grade. The class hasn't transferred back to Calvin yet. After the exam, I took a final trip around Budapest, to wrap up some stuff I wanted to do.

Events 12/9-12/11: Trip to Serbia

Photos

This liveblog was a bit shakier, but still good.

Serbia live blog:
12/9/16
8:19 pm:
Whoops, forgot about the blog until now. Bus ride was about 6 hours long, I slept and worked on my final paper during it. Then we went to the hostel, got settled in, then headed to dinner. Dinner was a little ways away, so it took a bit of walking to get there.

Our guide is from Belgrade, so we went to one of her favorite places to eat. It was delicious. A few french fries, and various meats. It was delicious. I couldn't even eat it all. They were playing classic rock the whole time, which was interesting. We're now walking back to the hostel.

12/10/16
~9am We decided to split up [last night], so I went back to the hostel alone, which required some detective work, but I made it back. This morning, we walked to breakfast. It hasn't come yet, and I'm hungry. My phone didn't charge fully during the night; it's at 37% charge now. I hope I can find a place to charge it.

3:25 pm
Breakfast was great. I got French toast. No place to charge. I have a few pictures, but not many. We went in a tour of Belgrade, to a cobblestone street, to a farmer's market, to a Serbian Orthodox Church, to a fortress, with a Roman ruin exhibit. After having trouble figuring out where to go, we found our lunch place. I got some chicken breaded with cornflakes with fries, an oreo shake, some tortillas, and a scoop of ice cream for dessert, it was *amazing*. We're now wrapping up.

4:21 pm:
We got on the bus and are heading to Tito's grave, and then museum. After, we're going to his Orthodox Church. Tito was the big dictator of communist Yugoslavia.

5:40 pm:
Tito's grave was very interesting. There was a museum, and a section just for gifts to him. He is extremely revered, even today.

5:59 pm:
The church is under renovation. It's quite beautiful from the outside. The inside is a bit more sparse. It will be amazing when it is done, tho. The church bells are amazing, too. We're heading back to the hostel now.

12/11/16
9:46am
I napped and rested for the hour break got. Then we went to dinner. It was fine, but I was full going into it, so I didn't eat some of it. The mashed potatoes were delicious. I could barely even eat the dessert. It was milkcake. To me, it tasted like cake soaked in milk, which isn't awful, but I couldn't eat it when already full. Then we went back fit the evening. In the morning, we got up, and went to the same breakfast place as last time. I got scrambled eggs with bacon. It is delicious.

12:37 pm:
We got on the road, I took a two hour nap, and then we stopped at a gas station, where I spent the last of my dinar. Lots of snacks. We'll be stopping in Szeged, Hungary, soon.

The liveblog ended above. We ended up having to wait a very long time to cross back into Hungary; there were some Serbian large vehicles crossing the border in front of us, and I believe all of those are required to get a full search. We waited at least an hour. So we skipped Szeged, and just went straight back to Hungary.

Quick update: Still going to finish

Sorry about not finishing the blog; going to try to resolve this soon, hopefully tonight or tomorrow morning.

Events 11/23-12/9: More Skimming

Wednesday was a weird day. Holocaust Lit was fine. Afterwards, my group met to work on the presentation. We decided to go with a very minimalist powerpoint.

Thursday, I had the presentation. Most groups chose to go with a very detailed powerpoint, which made us feel out of place. Our presentation was also shorter, although I think we were the only group to actually stay in the time limit, if that counts for anything. I think I did my part well. The Lions won their game, another comeback.

The rest of the weekend was relatively uneventful.
On Monday, I finally got into a presentation group for Central European History, and headed to Memento Park, a Communist monument, and the subject of the presentation. It was interesting, seeing both how the communists had been "revered" for years, but also the decay.
Memento Park

My favorite statue. (It's huge, like 30 ft tall)

That evening, our group met to plan, and then gave our presentation. The prompt was complicated and weird, so we mostly winged it. We decided to go first, which was a great decision, because pretty much everything we said was also said by another group, but us going first hid it, as it was all new at that time. But we got a great score on it (later) from the professor, so I guess it went well. It reinforced two things for me: 1. I can give speeches, without fear, and 2. I suck at giving speeches. My part had awkward pauses, stumbling through words, confusion about what I was going to say next, and I don't think many people were impressed. I'm not afraid of it anymore, but public speaking does not come naturally to me.

The rest of the week was a bunch of last classes, other than Late Antiquity. They went smoothly, and I worked for the end of the year, albeit with plenty of procrastination.

Friday, we got a tour of Hungarian Parliament, which was cool. Not many pictures allowed, unfortunately, but it was beautiful, and it was cool learning the history. They were setting up for Christmas, apparently Santa was coming to Parliament in a few days.

Another boring weekend, even the Lions were boring, winning by a decent amount for once. The next week, I had my last service-learning. It was bittersweet. They love me there, and everyone talked about how nice it was to have me (although it was also said to me that if I want to become a teacher, I would need to put in a lot of work!). I also wrote a small paper, and then took the final exam, in Holocaust Literature. I think it went well! My studying paid off.

I had my last Late Antiquity course today, and now it is time for bed, so I can get up and go to Serbia!

Events 11/19-11/23: Germany

Look at all the awesome photos!

So, for this trip, I did something a little different. I blogged while I was on it! I didn't post, wanting to edit it later, which I'm doing now, with notes added using [], as well as pictures. It's a bit inconsistent, but overall, I think it worked well. The next paragraph is all afterwards as well, setting the scene.

I went with my friend Tristan, who I've played board games with many times, with a group of friends from church. He's in the US army now, so I haven't seen him in a while. It was great getting to see him. We both wanted to travel Germany, which is great, since I'm not allowed to travel along, per Calvin rules. Getting my tickets had been a huge pain, with lots of problems, mail-only tickets getting mailed to the US instead of Budapest. It was crazy, but finally, I got it worked out.

7:42 am

Train just left. Wi-Fi doesn't appear to be working, which is annoying. I'd like to let prof Kim know I left and Tristan that I'm on my way. Should've done it before I left. Oh well.

Anyways, thing #1 happened: I got in my seat, and a little later a guy came by claiming it was his seat. We compared tickets, and they were almost identical... except his ticket was for the 21st. Oh no. Poor guy.

The seat beside me was unreserved, so a young Hungarian woman is sitting next to me. (You can get tickets for trains in Europe without buying a seat reservation, which is a little extra)

7:55 am: Figured out the wifi situation. The portal page (the one you get redirected to) was wrong, and I was able to figure out the right one from the last time I was on this company's train. On this trip, the wifi internet (to the outside world) is only once we get into Austria, which will be about half way through the trip. So I'll be able to message prof Kim, although Tristan is likely already on his way to pick me up. Time for a nap. Blast, forgot my travel pillow.

10:19 am:

Took a nap. Am in Austria now. The wifi is being stupid. Can't even get to the portal page anymore, just get "too many redirects". Someone didn't configure it right, I guess.

2:34 pm:

Rest of the train ride was uneventful. I mostly rested, although I only got 20 more minutes of sleep. I've still got a tickle in my throat, and a nasty cough from Poland. I found Tristan pretty quickly, we dropped my stuff off at his car. We wanted to the old town here I'm Salzburg, and got sausage hot dogs for lunch. We then went to the birthplace of Mozart, which is a museum. I'll let you know how it was when I'm done.

3:06 pm:

The museum was great. Was quite detailed about all things Mozart. Lots of things from his life, letters, portraits. Little bit confusing layout, but excellent experience. Only a few places allowed pictures unfortunately.

8:52 pm:

After the museum, we checked out the fortress. 12 euro for the basic entrance, which came with an audio tour, and since we're going to tour two castles tomorrow, we skipped it. As we were walking back to the center of old town (where all the interesting stuff is), we saw a large chess set, probably 1/7 life sized. The game is below:

1.d4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3. g3 Bf5 4. Bh3 Bxh3 5. Nxh3 e6 6. f4 Bb4 7. a3 Bxc3 8. bxc3 Nd7 9. Rb1 Nb6 10. O-O O-O 11. f5 Qd7 12. e4 dxe4 13. Nf4 exf5 14. d5 Rab8 15. Rb4 Nxd5 16. c4 Nxb4 17. Qxd7 Nxd7 18. axb4 Nd5 19. c5 Rbd8 20. Be3 Rd7 21. b5 c6 22. bxc6 bxc6 23. h4 Rfd8 24. Kf2 Rd1 25. Ke2 Rxf1 26. Kxf1 Nf6 27. h5 Rd8+ 28. Ke2 Re8+ 29. Kf2 a5 30. Bd2 Rh1 31. Bc3 Ra2 32. Ne2 a4 33. Nd4 Nxd4 34. Bxd4 Rxc2+ 35. Ke3 a3 36. g4 fxg4 37. Kxe4 g6 38. h7 a2 39. Ke5 Rc1 40. Bb2 a1=Q 41. Bxa1 Rxa1 42. Kd3 Ra6 43. Kc2 g6 44. Kb7 g7 45. resigns

It was a ton of fun. I got some great pictures.

After that we went to the cathedral, which was quite beautiful. We were even able to go to the catacombs, for free, although they weren't very expensive. Finally, we looked around for a good restaurant. It took a while, but we found one. I got a dish with a couple sausages, a pretzel, and mustard. It was delicious. Tristan got a 1/4 duck, some cabbage, and potatoes. I had that in Prague, I think, and it was delicious. We split an apple strudel for dessert. We then headed to the road, and are currently 20 minutes from our Airbnb.

11/20/16

9:48am

Rest of trip back went fine. We got back, figured out our plans for the next day, including that our first castle tour was an hour later than we thought. We relaxed a little and went sleep.

In the morning, we got up, and discovered the place we were planning on going for breakfast, was closed. The owners are on vacation for another month. So we headed to town, picked up our tickets, and headed up to Neuchwanstein Castle (on a bus). Next to the castle appears to be the only place to find breakfast before 11, when our tour is. Right now we're next to the castle. It's gorgeous, and being on the side [of a mountain], there's since great views.

11:42am

The breakfast place was under renovation. I guess we're here in the off season. 95% of the people here are Asian. It's crazy. The tour of Neuchwanstein was relatively short. Tristan says that the previous times he was here, the tour was more informative. I am stopped at the café for a little food (munching on a pretzel) before we head to Hohenschwangau Castle for our other tour at 12:30.

12:19pm

Booked it down from Neuchwanstein and up to Hohenschwangau. The carts going down weren't ready, so we walked, and it's faster to walk up to Hohenschwangau, so we did. I'm quite out of breath right now. (Tour is at 12:30)

2:19pm

Hohenschwangau was a better tour. The tour guide was most more knowledgeable, great tour. After the tour, we checked out the chapel, walked to the nearby lake, and then headed out. We're now on the road, 3 hours from our Airbnb, although we'll probably find food before them.

11/21/16

9:33am

We grabbed some food from pizza king. I got "peperoni" which was pizza with peppers on it. Needless to say, I ate some of Tristan's Hawaiian pizza as well.

We got to our Airbnb around 6, made plans for the next day, and then relaxed. We played a few games of magic the gathering while I watched the Lions. They won in a nailbiter, but a little less than usual. Tristan beat me 3-2 in magic. We got a good night sleep.

In the morning, we ate a combination of some food Tristan brought and some food our first provided, it was okay. We would have gotten food yesterday, but in Germany, all the grocery stores are closed on Sunday. We're on the road, now. 10 minutes from the start of our hike.

11:05am

We started hiking, and then realized, we don't know whether the bus runs. We're still figuring out what to do about that. There's no stop until we reach the end, but it's too far to turn around and walk, probably. Just stopped for a snack, keep our energy up.

11:14am

Side note: It is *ridiculously* beautiful out here.

2:38pm

So, hiking has been interesting.

We saw lots more beautiful stuff. Gorgeous gorges, pretty streams, and fantastic waterfalls. The roaring river has been excellent as well.

We decided to press on, with the idea that the bus will take us close to the car, and we'll hike to it. Unfortunately, we soon ran into a closed part of the trail, and while taking the detour, discovered the detour was quite long, probably too long. It took us near a town, where after some looking around, we discovered we had just missed a bus, and the next one wouldn't go where we needed. So, we decided to hire the roads back, which Google Maps told us will take a little over an hour and a half. So we'll get back to the car around 4. Tristan is being excellent and carrying my backpack for me.

5:48pm

It was a long walk, there were a couple scenic views, but it was mostly boring, and we were tired. We finally made it back, and drove to about three restaurants, which were all closed, before we just went to the first open place we found, Doner Kebap. Tristan got a doner, and I got a salami pizza. Much better than "peperoni". While we were driving around looking for a place to eat, we went to ALDI, and got some breakfast food. Tomorrow morning, we plan to head out around 6am to drive the four and a half hours to Trier. So we'll figure out our plans for tomorrow, and then go to bed quite early. Which won't be hard, considering we're both super tired.

11/22/16

8:25am

We relaxed a bit, went to bed, woke up, ate breakfast, headed out. Everything according to plan. We're now two and a half hours from Trier.

10:41am

So, we were driving, and Tristan realized we were right near the big base next to his base. I needed to use the restroom anyways, so we went there. He was giving me a quick tour, when he got a call, and discovered he needed to go back to his base for something, so that's what we're doing now. His base is only half an hour from the big base, so hopefully this won't throw us off track too much.

11/23/16

6:56am

Whoof, way too long since the last one. So, Tristan ended up being needed back at base, and after I waited for a couple hours, he told me he would need to drive me straight to the train station. After we got there, I waited in McDonald's for a while. There were no power outlets, and the wifi only lasted 3 hours, so I started a search. Eventually, after about an hour and a half of walking and searching, I found a place a mile away from the station. It was relatively expensive, but I still got dinner there, and just chilled for about 5 hours. A large part of that was talking to Jessica, which was cool. I then came back, boarded my train, which is coming into the final station now, so I need to transfer to my last train.

2:30pm

And I'm back. Transfer was easy, I got some water to aid my throat, got some more sleep on the train. I'm still exhausted, nervous about the presentation tomorrow. Got back, an am now on a bus to Holocaust Lit. Thanks for reading!

(Back to now)
So, all in all, a great trip, albeit cut short. I think this way of the blog worked great, and will use it for my last trip of the semester, to Serbia.