A year ago: Gaming?

I actually don't know exactly what I did a year ago... It was either last weekend or this weekend that we had a two-day weekend so we stayed back and did homework. Wait-- I think we went to St. Polten and got our Eurrails activated. Yes. That's what we did. However, there's no pictures for that, nor did I write anything, so alas, all I believe I remember from this trip is that it took longer than what we were expecting, so we didn't get as much homework done as we wanted.

However, I will treat you with some random photos!

Let's begin with a nice picture-- this is of Our Lady Rosa Mystica and the Immaculate Heart of Mary behind it.  I would see this every time I walked up the stairs from 1st to 2nd floor. It's really neat since my household is Roses of the Immaculate Heart and our Big Sister household is Rosa Mystica!

This is what our door looked like. Claire's name tag looked empty without having a  felt oval for household, so we made her one for being a groupie. Take note-- she does not endorse this!

Claire collapsing in our room/her suitcase after returning from a long weekend's journey.

Now for a couple really random ones:

Meet Johnny the Printer. He traveled all the way from Southern California to join us on our trip to  Austria. Sadly, he was not able to travel anywhere outside the room, but he guarded our room with great courage so we knew we could leave it safely unattended as we sojourned. Take note of his hands and the love note he is holding. After being squeezed into a suitcase with many souvenirs and clothes, Johnny made it safely back to the United States where he now resides with Clairisita.

Yes. This is random. This is a banana Claire brought back from the Mensa. It has no significance other than its randomness.

A year ago: Poland

Last year, I figured out that I can survive on 4 hours of sleep! But, I'm sure if I tried doing that now, it wouldn't work very well...

Last year, I also did all the write-ups for Poland, so here are the links, and I will post pictures below.

Poland, Day 1: Czestochowa and Auschwitz
Poland, Day 2: Krakow and Divine Mercy
Poland, Day 3: Krakow, Nowa Huta, and Wadowice

Me and Julie in front of the Cathedral in Krakow.

Legend says that these are the bones of the dragon
that used to guard the cathedral.

Matki Bozej Bolsenej (Our Lady of Sorrows) in the
adoration chapel of the Franciscan church in Krakow.

The Mothership which brings Souls to Heaven!
More commonly known as the Shrine of Divine Mercy.

Alexis, Hayley, Mary Kate, Sr. Joan Paule, Claire, Julie, me, Sr. Carrie Ann,
Josh, and Dorothy at Padre's, an Italian and Indian restaurant in Poland.
The food was absolutely delicious!! (see below)

Julie and I split this chicken and pasta dish and... 

...the ice cream covered with chocolate powder. I think it's
because of Clairethat we have these pictures...

This is one of my favorite pictures from Poland. Julie and I are
standing in the field across from our hotel where
Blessed Pope John Paul II met the 3 million people when
he came back to visit his home country as Pope.

In Nowa Huta, we did Praise and Worship at the steel cross
that the steel workers fought to keep standing.

The church in Nowa Huta that was built to
model Noah's ark (three floors).

Blessed Pope John Paul II's report card.

Blessed Pope John Paul II's skis and boat oar.

Blessed Pope John Paul II's vestments from when he was
Pope, Cardinal, Bishop, and parish priest.

Me in front of the parish church in Wadowice where JPII
received his first sacraments and heard the call to the priesthood.

Pope Cake! I'm not sure what it's really called, but when JPII
came back to visit Poland, he said that this was his favorite
kind of cake, so it's called Pope cake now! It is quite delicious,
but I wouldn't have minded splitting it with someone-- it was sweet!

A year ago: Skiing in the Alps and Prague

A year ago, I was caught up on my blogging! On Friday we went skiing in the Austrian Alps, then on Saturday, we did a day trip in Prague. Here are the links for those trips:
Prague, Czech Republic
Austrian Alps Skiing

I really don't know how we did this-- we went skiing and were all sore from that and then hopped on a bus at 5am to go to the Czech Republic! It's pretty insane...

Alas, last time (as my brother pointed out), I did not post any pictures, so therefore I will post pictures on this post.

Me, Markita, and Tim after our adventure of skiing/snowboarding in the Austrian Alps.

You can't see us very well, but this is Claire, Markita, and Julie by the river in Prague, and the little tower on top of the hill is the Fake Eiffel Tower. I never intended to get a picture with it (because it is much better to see the real one...), but I did, so, oh, well!

Markita and me overlooking the city of Prague. Eastern Europe is so beautiful!

Julie and Markita "with" one of the castle guards after the changing of the guard. When Kita stands on the curb, it makes her look taller!

Me and Claire having fun taking pictures by the Vlatava River  in Prague.

It is safe to walk here-- this is what their 'person-crossing-the-street' signs look like. They're pretty cute because the people are wearing traditional garb! [I hope to make a post of all the different ones.]

A year ago: London

 London was our first trip on our own, which meant that it was a complete adventure! I think I covered the main stories in my post last year:
http://outsidethekartause.blogspot.com/2011/02/london.html

No first trip on your own would be complete without missing a bus or two. However, our morning did not begin with us missing the 5:50am bus, but me almost missing the fire alarm! There was an alarm (I thought for someone to wake up) going off at 3:15am and I was praying that someone would turn it off when Julie said to me and Claire, "you guys, I think that's the fire alarm" to which Claire and I groaned and asked, "why are they giving us a drill now?!?!" So we waited outside for 10 minutes during which the fire trucks came. It turns out that some cables were smoking, but it was safe enough that we could go back inside. Thank goodness!

So then we go to bed again, wake up at 5am for the 5:50 am bus which took us to the train station where we picked up our Vorteils cards, ran up to the platform, and missed the train by 10 seconds. And that was just the beginning. We also got on a train late, the wrong one, and had to run to our gate at the airport! Thank goodness we didn't have EU/UK passports, so we had the short lines for passport control!

What a fun time we had! It was great being in an English speaking country (so we could ask for directions-- really helpful when you don't have a city map!), but we found that we missed the Kartause. There's no place like home-away-from-home!

Regina, Julie, me, and Kita checking out the landmark red telephone booth!
I  think this is my favorite picture from the whole trip.

I'm a groundling at the Globe Theatre! Now, where is Shakespeare?

Kita, Claire, and Julie at the Pub in London where we enjoyed Fish 'n' Chips.
That is, after we enjoyed hot chocolate... and ketchup...

Me, Regina, and Julie "feed the birds" on the steps of St. Paul's for tuppence a bag.

A year ago: Salzburg/Munich

A year ago this weekend... we did our first overnight trip when we went to Salzburg and Munich. Now I could check off visiting one country of my ancestry-- Germany! At this point, I was so used to hearing German being spoken that whenever I heard someone speaking it, I thought it was my second language-- French!

When we went to Salzburg, there were many sights that were very familiar to those of us who
have watched The Sound of Music. Regina had fun posing with the famous statues of the
conclusion of Do Re Me as we entered the snowy garden area of Salzburg. We were very
glad to be in Prof. Wolter's tour group because this is where her family is from!

This is a man standing on top of a gold ball in a square
in Salzburg. No, it's not a crazy, adventurous
Franciscan student. It's just a statue!

For dinner, we went to the oldest restaurant (I'm not sure if that is in the world, Europe, or what...) --St. Peter, founded in 803 A.D. There we had weiner schnitzel, potatoes, and Apple Strudel-- yum! And I got to use the minimal amount of German that I knew-- "enschuldigung-- schprechen sie englisch?"

At the Residenz Museum in Munich, Germany. Megan and I had a grand time together-- and it was quite by accident how we ended up exploring the city together! We went to take a bathroom break after our tour with Fr. Brad, but we both got separated from our friends and couldn't get hold of them. So we decided to get some lunch at the open market and look around for them. When we didn't see them, we decided to go on our own and explore the town! We did a holy hour at St. Michael's Church and explored the Residenz Museum where they had lots and lots of relics of Bible-time Saints.

After that we just walked into random stores that looked intriguing, such as a chocolate store and a spice store (which smelled delicious!). When it was almost time to go back, I was looking at the map as I was walking out of a store when I almost ran into this bronze statue in the middle of the road. Then I realized as I passed it (and as Megan reached out her hand to pull me away) that it wasn't a statue... it was a street performer dressed up as a gold statue-- that was a close one!

On the way back, we stopped at a pizzeria, and they spoke to me in German
but to Megan in English! Haha! Must be my German ancestry!

And if you're wondering how I'm remembering all these things, well some I just remember and looking at the pictures, but others, I'm so grateful that I was very disciplined with my journal keeping!

A year ago: Vienna

It has now been one whole year since we began our adventures in Austria. I can't believe that it was that long ago-- we have such wonderful memories of it that it feels as if it was only yesterday!

This weekend a year ago we had just finished our first week in Austria and were getting ready to go to Vienna, or as the locals call it, Wien!

Julie and Claire had a grand time at Melk Monastery. There isn't
really a story for this one... it's just a really cute picture!

As part of our tour of the Kartause, we got to go places we weren't normally allowed.
This place is above the choir loft in the church and above all the beautiful frescoes
of St. Bruno on the ceiling. We are walking on the ceiling! It was very nerve-wracking,
to be walking on the newer, lower ceiling put in place of the original gothic one (which you
see above in the picture) but, oh, what an adventure that was!

Haha! This one. Um, this is Claire-- with a street performer in Vienna. We were walking around Vienna on our own after the tour exploring the city. When we passed by this performer, Claire waved to him. And he reached out to shake her hand to shake his-- which she did, but then became part of his act-- which you see depicted. This was toward the beginning of our adventures-- we had no idea what was going on! It was harmless and she just stood there for a minute as we got this picture and we were then on our way. But, oh! what a story!

I don't know how much I'm going to be able to keep up with this, but I'd like to post a picture with a short story that corresponds to what we did a year ago.

My Favorite Things...

After being back in the US for approximately 3 months, here are my list of "favorite things" from my Austria trip:

Place I would want to live most:
1-Assisi, Italy
2-Poland-- anywhere there!
3-Lourdes, France

Place I would want to go back to:
1- The Vatican
2- France
3- Austria

Favorite country:
1- Vatican City
2- Austria
3- Poland

Favorite city:
1- Salzburg, Austria
2- Assisi, Italy
3- Lourdes, France

Favorite all-around trip:
1-Roma Super Trip (Beatification of Blessed John Paul II)
2-Lourdes Mission Trip
3-London

Neatest place to visit:
1- Medugorje, Bosnia
2- Bratislava, Slovakia
3- Our Lady of Czestochowa Shrine in Poland, followed by Auchwitz and the Divine Mercy Shrine

Favorite church:
1- Westminster Cathedral (London, England)
2- St. Stephen's Cathedral (Vienna, Austria)
3- St. John Lateran (Rome, Italy)

Coolest currency:
1- 20 Czech koruna (as seen below-- especially side 2!)
 
                   Side 1                                        Side 2

Places that I didn't go that I would like to:
1- Ars, France
2- Lisieux, France
3- The Holy Land (I would like to, but this one probably won't happen!)