Photo Blog!

Okay, I know I've been back from Munich and Prague for a while, but I JUST realized that I never posted a photo blog for you guys. So, long overdue, here are some of my favorite photos from the trip!

One of the first things we saw when we got to Prague -- I love grafitti! It's so beautiful, especially when it's done artfully. :)

The Dancing Building in Prague -- isn't it beautiful? I wish I could have gotten more shots of it, but I never got the chance.

Again -- grafitti. I love it.

Okay, this time, a picture of me with grafitti.

This and the next picture are from a random open air market we found on the street in Prague. It was super cute. :]

Another picture from the open air market -- their fruit was so fresh.

Doors to a church. :)

One of the very random interesting sculptures we saw in Prague.

This is the entrance to the Charles Bridge (Karluv rnost). It was really cool -- there were sculptures everywhere -- some religious, some not -- that were beautiful, but the way the sun was in the sky prevented me from taking a single good picture of them. :(

This was one of the few good pictures I did get on the Charles Bridge -- the guy was having his pupper "play" along with a record that was playing. It was pretty cute.

Neuschwanstein -- I've covered this one before. :]

These statuettes are of King Ludwig and his fiance that never married before he died.

These were some candles in a Munich church we toured (not St Peter's or St Nepomuk's). I'm not totally sure I was supposed to take pictures, but I'm really glad I did.

I know, I know, again with the graffiti. But I love political graffiti. And this time, in Munich, on the back of St Peter's Church! (Unrelated: Can anyone translate that one for me?)

This is a couple I spotted while on our Hitler and the Third Reich tour. They were cute. :]

This is the building where the Nazis (NASDP) had their first political rally. It is now a bar/tavern/thing in the bottom and a large eating hall of some sort on top.

A shot of one of the tables in the upstairs dining hall-type room where hundreds of people gathered to hear Hitler speak as teh leader of the Nazis for the first time.

This is the Apple Store of Munich, which was built on top of the site of the beer hall where Hitler's failed Beer Hall Putsch happened.

This was at the Hard Rock Cafe in Munich. The guitar is a big deal because it's actually a piece of the Berlin Wall. Legit, huh?

This is a picture of Mahdis and I at the ever-wonderful Hard Rock Cafe that I love so dearly. :]

Uhm, cool grafitti, anyone?

A random cute little fruit stand near the Glockenspiel.

The apricots at the fruit stand. They were apparently (according to my mom) the best apricots ever. She hasn't eaten once since she got back to the US because she thinks they won't be as good. She said the same of the cherries.

I love how bright the colors of those cherries were. It was eye-catching.

Just pay attention to the license plate.

This is near the Beverly Hills of Prague, in the Jewish cultural center. If you look closely, you can see a Star of David on the door.

Actually in the area where the Jews were corralled into pogroms before concentration camps were established and running.

A very beautiful church in Prague. :)

We stumbled across a wedding while in Prague for the second time. I decided not to post pictures of the bride and groom (yes, I have some), but I thought this was really pretty and acceptable to post. :]

These were up in the Astronomical Tower, and I thought they were really cute. :]

Here's a picture of the actual Astronomical Tower. We went up to the top and took pictures, but none were particularly mesmerizing or anything.

I know it's blurry, but this was at the five story club we went to in Prague that was crazy fun. It was a great way to end the vacation. :]

Hope you enjoyed the pictures! Havee any of you taken any cool trips recently?

More Texans, Hitler, And Everything Else

Remember how I was saying I could attract every Texan everywhere we go? I've proven myself right numerous times since then.

On the 24th we spent part of the day walking around and sight-seeing (the Glockenspiel, St Peter's Church, etc) then going on a tour of the parts of Munich that show it's Nazi history. Since they're not exactly proud of Hitler, Munich has naturally allowed some of the buildings to be torn down or fall into disrepair or they just conveniently didn't rebuild them after WWII ended, but some are still around. For instance, the museum the Nazis built to house "German art" is still around, built resembling the neoclassical style but uglier. However the beer hall where Hitler attempted the Beer Hall Putchz (which landed him in jail) is actually now the site of a very nice two-story Apple store. The buildings that are still around are typically used for other things and it's only been very recently that they're admitting to the Nazi history o the building.

That night, we dropped by Hard Rock Cafe - Munich and had some good old burgers and fajitas (ah, Tex-Mex) then went across the street to Hofbräuhaus, which is actually where the first Nazi political rally was held. The place is like a huge typical German hangout -- long wooden benches and tables, pretzels and sausages, free-flowing beer, really loud traditional music, waitresses in slutty milkmaid outifts, the works. That's where we ran into more Texans -- one of the people we talked to had lived in the state for a little while before going to UC San Bernadino, then graduating and moving to Riverside, California. I never caught his name, unfortunately, but we actually ran into him again on the street in Prague twice, which was super bizarre.

The next day, we mostly spent the day shopping near Marienplatz (the square where the Glockenspiel is) at a few big German department stores and some other European stores. We got on a train headed back to Prague around 4:45 and that's where we ran into more Texans. The carriage we got in was actually super crowded but I managed to somehow sit us down right next to three guys that just graduated from Rice University (Houston). We talked through probably a little more than half of the six hour train ride about a little bit of everything -- medical stuff (they're all about to start medical school), Houston versus College Station, Iran, scary stories, the Olympics and China -- one of them actually worked at the Beijing Olympics. How bad ass is that?! We talked a lot about Chinese culture and he (his name was Tommy) actually got me really pumped about studying abroad there in a few years. So that was kind of a Godsend since I'd been starting to doubt myself and freak out about learning such a complicated language and moving across the world. But now I can't wait to go! I know I said I'd love to live in Europe, but China might be quite awesome as well. We're thinking about going to Beijing next year to look around and see the country once before I go live there.

The next morning (the 26th) we woke up and went to see the half of Prague we didn't see the first fay we were there. Our hotel was really close to both what we dubbed "the Beverly Hills of Prague" and the Jewish cultural center. After breakfast, we walked around the Jewish area, taking pictures of synagogues and etc. It was the same area where the Nazis coralled all the Jews into pogroms after Kristallnacht and before the concentration camps were built and there was still a lot of evidence of that history in the area. I didn't actually take many pictures there because I felt kind of weird taking touristy pictures in a place where a lot of people spent their last free weeks of life, but the few I have are on facebook and flickr. It was then, as we were leaving the area that a man stopped me on the street, looked at my maroon 'Howdy, we are the Aggies' shirt and said, "are you from Texas?" I said we were and he immediately exclaimed "I'm actually a horns fan, but it's so nice to see a friendly Texan face!" I laughed and we chatted for a moment before parting ways.

My dad joined us later that day (he hasn't been with us the rest of the trip) and we showed him the Jewish pogrom area, walked through the Beverly Hills shops (Burberry, Dolce & Gabbana, Cartier, Louis Vuitton, etc), then had a really late lunch/really early dinner at 4 pm. After that, we went to a really famous five-floor club in Prague even though it was pouring rain. We had to leave earlier than appreciated because we had to leave for the airport at 5:30 am, but it was fun.

Yesterday, unfortunately was all travel. I woke up at 4:30 am (Prague time-- about 8:30 pm CST) to be downstairs and ready to go by 5:20. We got on a plane to London and chilled there for about six hours. Luckily, there was plenty of free alcohol, good shopping, and (don't act surprised) Aggies to keep us amused. Because, yes, after running into six Texans during our trip, I FINALLY ran into two Aggies. It was pretty awesome. I got home pretty late, thanks to my good friend Kevin who was nice enough to come pick me up from the airport then take me to Sonic for American food. :]

Now, I'm unpacking, writing, probably going to Buon Giornio's and editing pictures for the rest of the night. I'll be attempting to stay awake until at least 9 pm to conquer jetlag. Hopefully going through the close to 700 pictures I took during five days of legit vacation will help in that endeavor. :)

Learned: Rain boots are a must-have

I’m learning a lot on this trip – you know, why it’s called backpacking, that peach schnapps are all right… and now that rain boots are a must-have for a trip to Europe.

This isn’t my first trip to Europe. Or second, or third, or fourth. I’d venture to guess it’s well into the double digits, actually. But, it’s taken me this long to realize that rain boots are a must have when traveling to Europe. Why, you ask? Because it will rain at least once, and it will be miserable.

Oh, and no, your really cute TOMS do not count as appropriate rain shoes.

If you couldn’t guess yet, it rained a lot today. And I was wearing really cute TOMS because we weren’t expecting rain and therefore none of us had rain boots. It wouldn’t have been so bad if we hadn’t decided to go on a (really stinkin’ awesome) tour two hours outside of Munich that required a thirty minute hike. But other than the freezing rain and my TOMS that were once off-white but are now brown, the tour was amazing. (The picture is what they used to look like. Weren't they cute? http://www.tomsshoes.com)

We visited one of King Ludwig II’s (or, in German: König Ludwig) dream castles, Neuschwanstein (again, in German: Schloss Neuschwanstein), which is nestled high in the mountains above a tiny little town. I’d be surprised if you feel like that’s a familiar name, but if you do, it’s because it’s the castle that Disney based the castle in their company logo on, as well as many of the castles in their movies. I won’t give you a full history of König Ludwig’s lifetime and reign, but I’ll cover some basic facts for you: many often say that Ludwig was slightly mentally incompetent/insane. In his childhood, he withdrew from his parents and the proper grooming to become a king of Bavaria, and when he was suddenly shoved into the position prematurely at eighteen, he was entirely unprepared to take control of the kingdom for many reasons. Instead of trying to rise to the occasion, he brought composer/playwright Richard Wagner to Bavaria, gave him a home, and asked him to bring Ludwig’s childhood fantasies to life.

As Wagner brought these fantasies to life, Ludwig ordered the building of three castles to house these fantasies, attempted to get married, lost a war, and began what can only be deemed as a controversial relationship with Wagner. All of this eventually led him to ruin – Bavaria lost it’s military independence to Prussia, he never married his betrothed (that's a picture of statuettes of them to the left) and never fathered an heir, he fell into immense debt (yet was planning a fourth castle when he died), and his courtiers became suspicious of Ludwig and Wagner and demanded that the playwright leave Bavaria or they would. Ludwig was eventually deemed mentally insane due to intense substance abuse (morphine and cocaine at the same time), was asked to abdicate the throne, but was probably assassinated before he was ever able to appear before the parliament and make his case against mental insanity. I say ‘probably’ because the day after he was served the papers declaring his incompetency to rule, he and his psychiatrist were found “drowned” in a lake near Munich, but the autopsy showed no signs of water in their lungs.

Because of his death, Schloss Neuschwanstein was never completed, but from what was completed, his childlike mentality seems clear. Other than his throne room, which is decorated to look like a Byzantine church with lots of vivid colors and scenes depicting the Apostles, every room has a different legend as a theme – his bedroom shows the story of Tristan and Isolde and another passageway was constructed to appear like a cave so he could play out a scene from one of Wagner’s plays. A huge hallway is decorated with stained glass, carvings of mythical creatures (I’m talking unicorns here) and baby animals, and other frolicking things adorn the walls. It’s beautiful, and interesting, and adorable, but it looks like it was decorated to be a play palace for the children of a royal family, not the castle of a grown ruler.

Maybe he wasn’t totally mentally incompetent; maybe he was just “eccentric and gentle” as my sometimes-too-kind-for-her-own-good mother said. Either way, he’s still considered one of the favorite past rulers by people in Germany because his immense building projects boosted the economy not only then but to this day. He seems cool; I would have liked to have met him.

Chicken Fried

“You know I like my chicken fried, cold beer on a Friday night, a pair of jeans that fit just right, and the radio on. Well, I was raised up beneath the shade of a [Texan] pine, and that’s home you know – sweet tea, pecan pie, and homemade wine, where the peaches grow. My house, it’s not much to talk about, but it’s filled with love and grown in Southern ground…”
-Chicken Fried, Zac Brown Band

Truth be told, I’m a Southern girl at heart. I was raised in the South, my kids will come to love the South someday, even if they never live there, and one of these days, I’ll be buried underneath that big open Texas sky.

That being said, I want to live in Europe for a little while. Long enough to really get a grasp on the culture and fit myself into it, to establish lasting friendships so whenever I visit I have a place to stay and friends to catch up with.

I know this is all very random, but I’m thinking about this because, honestly, only I could attract every Texan visiting the same countries as us everywhere we go. Sitting in the hotel lobby last night, trying desperately to get internet so my mom could tell the people she works with that no, she can’t make some meeting because she’s in freaking Germany, and a guy wearing a UT ring sat down next to me and said hi. We struck up a conversation, making jokes about each other’s respective schools and discussing what had brought him to Munich – apparently he just graduated from the UT business school and was celebrating by traveling between Switzerland, Germany, and Italy for a month. Alone. How incredibly bad ass is that?

[I’m sorry, but I have to interrupt my own story here to say that I just told my mom I was hungry and her response was “Here, have this,” and passed me a bottle of vitamins. Cool, thanks.]

Anyways, Dallas' story made me realize that I want to do nothing more than travel around alone at least once. I want to see places and do things on my own time, meet new people and be forced to speak and learn other languages. Maybe after college or during a summer? We’ll see.

Anticipating!

First and foremost, I apologize for taking so long to update!

I leave for Prague in roughly seven hours. After a few days there, I'm taking a train to Munich, which is also going to be awesome. I recently mentioned that my mom is letting me plan the Munich part of our trip, and I've finally made my decisions:

1. St.Nepomuk's (also called Asamkirche) -- a rococo style church. (Pictured.)
2. The New Residenz palace of the Bavarian rulers -- 130 rooms open to the public & the royal jewels on display.
3. Nymphenburg Palace -- the summer residence of the Bavarian rulers.
4. St. Peter's Church -- the oldest church in Munich. It has the best view of the city.
5. Alte Pinakothek -- a museum full of the Old Masters: Rembrandt, Rubens, Raphael, Da Vinci, etc. :]
6. The Glockenspiel -- 32 little mechanical figurines re-enact some of Munich's history.

There are other museums to go to -- The BMW museum, a modern art museum -- and palaces to see, so I'm sure there will be some of that too. What we're doing in Prague is going to be a surprise for me though! I'll try to update throughout the trip -- pictures, posting, etc. Hopefully! I've got to go finish packing though. Have a wonderful week, all of you!