Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 8 - Viennese Sunday

We woke up at 8:30 am and had coffee in our room. We decided to spend our Sunday like Viennese do, in a laid back style. After getting ready, we left our hotel at 11:30 am and headed to a cafe next to the Opera. It's an authentic local cafe and we were the only tourists there. The locals were sipping on their coffee, having pastries and reading newspapers. We shared a latte and had pancakes which were actually like crepes. The quality of lattes in Vienna has been the best on this trip so far.

We resumed our walking tour of the historic city area. For centuries, Vienna was the capital of a vast empire ruled by the Hapsburg family and the empire included Prague, Vienna and Budapest, all cities that are part of our current trip. In 1273, the noble family of Hapsburg claimed Charlemagne's title of Holy Roman Emperor and ruled a vast empire for the next six centuries.

We stopped at the Kaisergruft church where various famous members of the Hapsburg family are buried including Maria Theresa, the beloved ruler who ruled for 40 years, reformed the government, banned torture, funded schools and also found time to mother 16 children which she then married to different royal families in Europe to create and strengthen alliances. Maria Antoinette of "let them eat cake" fame was her youngest child. We spotted a Lebanese restaurant whose chicken schnitzel looked very appetizing so we sat there and tried it along with hummus while listening to the history of Hapsburgs on our Rick Steves audio guide. After that we continued walking on Karntner Strasse, passing the statue of Lady Providence (surrounded by figures symbolizing the rivers that flow into the Danube river) and making our way to the center of the historic city, the Saint Stephen's Cathedral. When Austria was a kingdom ruled by the Hapsburgs, the old city used to be enclosed inside a circular wall with Saint Stephen's Cathedral at its center. The circular wall has now been replaced by a ring road called the Ringstrasse.

Saint Stephen's Cathedral is very impressive with its south tower rising to a height of 450 feet with its colorful roof and its gothic and Romanesque outer facades. It's an imposing structure that has been central to Viennese history. After it was built in 1300, it was much too big for the small town but it's grandeur brought prestige to the town and put it on the map. That convinced the Hapsburgs to move the capital of their empire from Prague to Vienna. Vienna was invaded by Ottoman Turks in 1529 and the crusading invasions continued till 1683 when the Turks were driven away. That ushered in Vienna's rise as a great European city attracting talent from the entire German-speaking world. Composers like Mozart, scientists like Doppler (of Doppler effect fame) and the father of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud were all products of the intellectual culture of Vienna that focuses on living a good life and having stimulating conversations in cafes, even to this day. We went inside the church and appreciated the intricate statues of some 70 saints on gothic columns. There is also a chapel inside where Mozart had his wedding and had two of his children baptized there. We saw a magnificent pulpit, a huge pipe organ, the high altar and the painted altarpiece next to it. Thanks to the Viennese people's proactive measures in preserving the integral elements of this church during the Second World War, the church did not incur too much lasting damage. After visiting the church, we sat in the square next to it, called Stephen Platz and enjoyed ice cream from a nearby shop.

We resumed our walking tour and walked on the Graben, one of the world's first pedestrian-only streets. To this day, it has throngs of people, buildings with impressive architecture, lots of cafes and a lively atmosphere - the quintessential Europe. We detoured to a side street to see some famous local eateries. Both at cafes and restaurants, the regulars usually sit there so often and for so long that they get their telephone calls there too! Back on the Graben, we saw the Plague statue which was built by a king to thank God after Vienna was saved from Bubonic Plague only after 70,000 people had died. Then we continued walking to Kohlmarkt which is a street lined with the most unaffordable high end shopping stores but also includes the best chocolate store in town, the Demel. Their cakes are said to be the best in town and their Sacher Torte cake is supposed to be better than Sacher Cafe's version. We plan to go there tomorrow for breakfast.

We finally arrived at the Hofburg Palace, the winter residence of the Hapsburgs and a complex of several buildings including the famous Spanish Riding School (whose horses perform choreographed dance shows), the Imperial Apartments, the Imperial Treasury and 4 museums collectively called the Museum Quartier. We will come back to the Hofburg Palace tomorrow to go inside some of these buildings after we are done visiting the summer palace Schonbrunn which is outside the city limits.

We then came back to our hotel and took a nap for a couple of hours. After waking up, we got a dinner recommendation from our hotel concierge and set out again for the tram tour of the Ring Strasse. Unfortunately, a couple of stops into the tour, the ring road was cordoned off by the police so we couldn't continued the tram tour. Instead, we decided to walk the next couple of stops to the Danube river where the recommended restaurant was located. The restaurant's location was picture perfect and we got a table right next to the glass wall of the restaurant, overlooking the river and its cruise ships. The food was impeccable. We had beef steaks with mushrooms and a molten lava cake for dessert. I also had their latte which was the best coffee I've had on the entire trip so far. We walked back to our hotel and realized that we've walked more than 100 km in the last 8 days. Time to go to bed now since it's going to be a busy sightseeing day tomorrow, as opposed to the Viennese Sunday we spent today. Till the next update, take care and goodbye!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 7 - Musical Vienna

After sleeping at around 1 am, we woke up at 6 am. We got ready and had breakfast at our hotel and took a cab at 7:50 am from our hotel to the Prague train station. Our train was for 8:42 am but we didn't want to take a chance and reached the station a little early. The train was on time and set off for Vienna at exactly 8:42 am. It was a 4 hour train ride so we caught up on sleep and also listened to Rick Steves' audio guide about Prague to get more background information about all the places that we had seen there in the last 3 days. Prague turned out to be an absolutely amazing city and it will be hard to top that experience. There are still three more cities to go so let's see. We love traveling within Europe by trains. Not only are the trains very comfortable and reliable but they enhance the travel experience and in our view, are a better option than taking flights.

We reached Vienna at 12:55 pm and first withdrew some cash in Euros. During our last trip to Europe, all the countries that we had visited were in the Eurozone so we were only dealing with one currency, the Euro. However, in our current trip, most countries are not in the Eurozone so we have to plan our currency management and remain on top of mental conversions. Poland uses the Polish Zloty and Czech Republic uses the Czech Koruna. Austria is the first country in the current trip that uses the Euro. 

We took a cab to our hotel and checked-in. After freshening up, we booked tickets for a live performance of the Vienna Mozart Orchestra at the famous and historical Vienna State Opera for tonight. Our hotel's location is again excellent, like our hotel in Prague, and we are opposite the Vienna State Opera and within walking distance of almost all tourist attractions that we want to cover in the next few days.

After booking tickets for the orchestra performance, we walked to a mall about a kilometer away since I had to buy headphones. I forgot mine in Calgary and I needed them for the next thing on our list - doing a walking tour of Vienna using Rick Steves' audio guide. On our way to the mall, we stopped to share a quick egg sandwich since we were really hungry. After buying the headphones at a huge electronics store, we walked back and on our way, stopped again to share a chocolate croissant.

Then we started our walking tour in front of the Vienna State Opera. It was built in 1869 in a grand building where classical musicians like Mozart and Beethoven have performed. Vienna is a city famous for music and the Vienna State Opera is very much the center of the city. 

We then walked to the back of the Opera where the famous Sacher hotel and Sacher cafe are located. Franz Sacher created his famous Sacher Torte cake which is essentially two layers of dark chocolate cake with apricot jam between the two layers and topped with whipped cream. Vienna's cafe culture is one of the characteristics of the city and its probably the only city in the world where big coffee chains like Starbucks haven't been able to spread too much since the locals prefer going to their local corner cafes. They say about Vienna that people's living room is in the corner cafe since people love hanging out there and enjoying a good coffee and pastries/cakes to go with it.

Then we saw the Albertina Platz. It's a triangular cobblestone plaza with monuments built as memorial for the almost 70,000 Viennese Jews who died in Nazi concentration camps. The plaza is next to the Albertina Museum which is part of the Hofburg Palace Complex and is a long white neoclassical building which houses art. It's modern entrance is topped by a sleek titanium canopy that resembles a diving board.

We passed by a couple of another famous cafes including the Mozart Cafe and then made our way on the Karntner Strasse which is a pedestrian-only street with shopping stores on both sides, much like the 5th Avenue of New York City. Most shops are now owned by modern brands but one shop has been there since 1823 that has been selling crystal for almost over 190 years now. 

We were running short of time so we decided to pause our walking tour, to be resumed tomorrow. We had a late lunch/early dinner at an Italian restaurant recommended by our hotel concierge. We tried an appetizer platter of seafood which was really good but the main entrees - penne pasta with olive oil and garlic and ravioli with cheese and garlic - were really worth the recommendation. After the meal, we realized we still had about 20 minutes before we needed to get to the Opera so we made a quick stop for dessert at Cafe Sacher. We tried their Sacher Torte cake, of course but also tried a coffee caramel cake. We also shared a latte to keep us awake during the orchestra performance. I'm not a fan of dark chocolate cakes so I liked their coffee caramel cake better. 

Then we crossed the street and made our way inside the Vienna State Opera. The Opera's interior is very grand. The lobby has carpeted stairs and ornate marble walls and high ceilings. The theater itself has five wraparound balconies, gold and red decor, and a bracelet-like chandelier. The show was a sequence of excerpts from famous symphonies of Mozart. Some of them featured just the orchestra, some included a female Opera singer, some included a male Opera singer, some included both and some included a choir of singers dressed in black. The orchestra consisted of primarily violinists but also had trumpeters, flute players and a drummer. The unique thing about the orchestra was that they were all wearing 18th century style wigs to give it a more authentic feel. The orchestra was amazing but the best performances were the ones that also featured the male singer and the choir. The female singer voice was unable to hit the high pitched notes but to be fair to her, female opera singers have a harder role to perform since the male opera singer's voice just needs to be deep and loud but the female singer also needs to create those shrilly high pitched sounds that don't come naturally to humans. Overall, it was an experience of a lifetime to see talented musicians performing the most famous works of a master in the hall where the master had performed himself. The conductor/director engaged the audience towards the end and made them clap according to his instructions. He was surprisingly very successful at that and it was a good demonstration of the skills he possesses. The show ended with an excerpt from Mozart's symphony 40 which I'm sure everyone has heard in their lifetime, even if they don't realize it. After this exhilarating experience, we walked back to our hotel and are going to bed now. Take care and goodbye!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 6 - Jewish Prague and Royal Route

Our last day in Prague was a busy one and started when we woke up at 9 am. After having breakfast at our hotel and getting ready, we set out for a comprehensive tour of the Jewish quarter Josefov which is a 2 minute walk from our hotel.

We bought the Jewish Museum ticket which covered 7 different sites in the Jewish quarter, all within walking distance of each other. The first one was the Maisal Synagogue which has been converted into a museum now. It chronicles the history of Jews in the Bohemia region and the discrimination that they had to face throughout the rule of different regimes for hundreds of years. Christian rulers forbade the Jews from working in any other trade so money lending was left as the only viable option since Christians weren't allowed to do that because of religious reasons. Jews became really good at it after generations in the trade but still had to pay additional and special taxes. However, this systematic discrimination pales in comparison to the extermination philosophy of the Nazi regime during the holocaust. The synagogue exhibits various artifacts as old as 700 years old that were used by the Jews of Prague.

Our next stop was the Pinkas Synagogue. This synagogue now serves as a memorial to the 80,000 Jews of Prague who were murdered by the Nazis during the holocaust. The walls of both floors of the synagogue have the names of all 80,000 of the innocent victims written on them along with the date of birth and date of death. One wall has the names of all the Nazi concentration camps written on it. A soundtrack plays in the background where the singers say the names of the victims. The synagogue tries to humanize the magnitude of this atrocity and gives visitors a true appreciation of the sheer number of people killed. In this context, imagining that over 6 million Jews were murdered during the holocaust is just astounding. The global population of Jews was reduced from 17 million to 11 million in one of the worst crimes in human history. On the first floor of the Pinkas Synagogue is a heart breaking exhibition of drawings made by children who were exterminated at the Terezin concentration camp on the outskirts of Prague. The children were taught how to draw at the camp by one woman and their depictions of the daily life at the camp, transport in and out of the camp, dreams of getting out and visiting Palestine one day, the life before getting to the camp and just drawings of the world around us are a cruel reminder that the Nazis didn't even spare innocent children in their genocide.

The next stop was the Old Jewish Cemetery next to the Pinkas Synagogue. We saw this from the outside during our walking tour a couple of days back but this time we got a chance to walk around the graves. There are about 10 or 11 layers of buried people here with the number of buried closing in on almost a 100,000. Since the Jews of Prague were confined to living in the Josefov quarter for hundreds of years, they didn't have enough space to bury their dead so they buried them on top of each other. The cemetery is yet another evidence of the haunting injustice bore by the Jewish community over the centuries.

The next stop was the Klausen Synagogue. It chronicles Jewish customs and religious rituals including the Jewish calendar, the Saturday Sabbath, the daily prayers and their timings, holidays such as the Yom Kippur, Hanukkah and Passover and religious clothing.

Our next stop was the Ceremonial Hall which chronicles Jewish customs and rituals related to sickness and death. Then we took a break to have lunch at a restaurant that was a few blocks away and had been recommended by our walking tour guide on our first day in Prague. We tried the beef steak in creamy sauce and the chicken steak and both of them were really flavorful. We tried the honey cake for dessert and it turned out to be good too. The restaurant looked like a tavern and is on the old ground floor level before the city was raised so essentially we sat in an establishment with 700 years old floor and walls!

We resumed our tour at the Old-New synagogue. We had seen it as part of our walking tour on the first day too. It's the one whose windows are now at eye level after the city ground level was increased to prevent from flooding. It's the oldest synagogue of Prague out of all the ones that we saw. It's an active synagogue and the Jewish community of Prague still uses it as a center of worship. The synagogue was completed in 1270 and you feel that weight of history when you enter the premises.

Our last stop was the Spanish synagogue which has a monument honoring Franz Kafka outside it. It's quite ironic, given Kafka's disdain for religion for most of his life. The synagogue is extremely ornate and elaborate inside and uses the Moorish style of decoration.

We walked back to our hotel and freshened up. After a little while, we ventured out again and this time we didn't have a touristy checklist to go through but instead wanted to enjoy the medieval romantic atmosphere of this unique city. We had coffee at the cubist cafe in the House of Black Madonna. This house features the cubist architecture style which emphasized symmetry of form using only functional elements. The house is on the Royal Route which was the path taken by Czech monarchs upon coronation. The path starts from the powder gate which was the main gate to the old town, passes through the old town square and a cobblestone street all the way to the river, crosses the Charles Bridge to enter the Lesser Town (Mala Strana) and ends at the Prague Castle. We walked part of the Royal Route from the House of Madonna to the Charles Bridge (where we saw several street musicians performing) and then onwards to Mala Strana and then the Castle Town. We didn't go all the way to the Castle since we had seen it in the previous day's walking tour so we turned back when it started getting too hilly. Charles Bridge is the symbol of Prague and it's not an ordinary bridge. It has 30 statues lining it on both sides and is a stone bridge with cobblestone walking path and is the length of 7 football fields. It's flanked on both ends by medieval gates. For 400 years, this was the only bridge that connected the old town with the new/lesser town and its importance as a cultural and historical icon still remains the same.

By the time we got back to our hotel, our feet were hurting because of all the walking in the past week so we decided to get a massage. We got a one hour Thai couples massage which seemed like it will be effective but we will only know after waking up after a night's sleep. We walked to the Italian restaurant where we had planned to have dinner but their kitchen had closed by the time we reached there a little after 11 pm. There weren't many options for dinner available at that time so we had a very late dinner at KFC and had chicken zinger sandwiches. After coming back to our hotel, we packed our suitcases for checking out next morning to catch our train to Vienna. Till the next update, take care and goodbye!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 5 - Communist Prague and Prague Castle

After sleeping at 3 am last night, we woke up at 9 am and went down for hotel breakfast. We got the same things as the last couple of days - omelette, croissant, cereal and fruits. We came back up to our room, got ready and left around 11:20 am for another day of exploring Prague.

Our first stop of the day was the Museum of Communism. It's a small museum which started by giving a quick introduction to Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin and their socialist philosophies. Lenin's philosophy was a take on Marx with a focus on industrial production. The museum chronicles the story of Czechoslovakia and its communist history. Czechoslovakia was founded in 1918 towards the end of the First World War after the collapse of the Austrian empire ruled by the Hapsburg family. The Czechs and Slovaks were in different stages of economic development and had distinct cultural identities but working together helped them make quicker economic strides so they tried to make the union work. The first republic remained a democracy till 1938 when Hitler's invasion of Czechoslovakia brought to light the differences between the Czech and Slovak people - Slovakia broke away and declared independence whereas the region of what is Czech Republic today was annexed to Germany. The government of Czechoslovakia kept operating in exile and during the Second World War, they asked the Soviet Red Army to help liberate Czechoslovakia from Nazi rule. Czechoslovakia was back on the world map in 1945 but this new political landscape was dominated by socialist parties in the country. In 1948, the communists took over the country under the cover of superficial legality. Thus began the communist era of Czechoslovakia which lasted from 1948 to 1989.

The ideological divide between supporters of democracy and supporters of socialism/communism still exists to this day in the Czech Republic and it was no different back then in Czechoslovakia. The Soviet Union had great influence over Czechoslovakia, so much so that they made super expensive memorials for Stalin and were in effect a satellite state of the Soviet Union. However, by 1960s, Czechoslovakia had completely stagnated economically and there were food shortages in the country. In response, Czechoslovakia started de-Stalinization and started introducing more elements of the free market economy.

When Czechoslovakia seemed closer to democratizing their brand of socialism in the so-called Prague Spring of 1968, the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia fearing that their control would be weakened. A student Jan Palach set himself on fire in the Wenceslas Square in January 1969 to protest the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia which shocked everyone in the world. But it didn't achieve any substantial change. Thus began the era of what was called "Normalization" or in other words, the purging of any reformist elements from the communist government of Czechoslovakia that continued through the 1970s and 1980s and kept the population quiet. Then in 1989, there were several anti-establishment demonstrations starting with the anniversary of Jan Palach's death and each one increased the momentum of change. Finally, Czechoslovakia became free of the communist party's control in November 1989. On January 1, 1993, Czechoslovakia peacefully separated into Czech Republic and Slovakia.

After the Museum of Communism, we walked to the Municipal House building and had lunch there. We had the beef goulash which was great and tiramisu which was okay. It had become quite windy and there was rain in the air so we stopped at our hotel to pick up cardigans and then walked to the meeting point for our walking tour of the Prague Castle and Mala Strana (Lesser Prague).

We started next to a bridge that has the statue of the man who painted the astrological part of the astronomical clock of the old town square. We crossed the bridge to the Mala Strana area and found out that the name comes from the fact that the elevation of the area is lower than the Prague Castle area which is on a hill. Mala Strana has scores of castles that were built by nobility and are now mostly used as embassies and government buildings. We took a tram up the hill and started our tour of the castle. We stopped at a view point that gives a majestic side view of the castle and then went inside the castle complex by crossing the bridge over the moat. The moat used to be a natural river which was then diverted because the lazy kings wanted the moat area to be populated with deer so that they could go hunting there. Then we walked onward to the second courtyard which is now surrounded by the President's office and a famous ballroom that is morbidly expensive to rent but still features for a few seconds in Mission Impossible 4. The second courtyard also has a well of water that had a cage over it to protect it from tampering by enemies. Then we walked to the first courtyard which is smaller and is the place where heads of states are greeted with a guard of honor. Our guide then pointed out different fancy palaces in the castle complex. Since we were on top of a hill, it had a decent view of the skyline of Prague, the city of a thousand spires (and orange rooftops) and it look magical. He also pointed out the replica Eiffel Tower on top of the Petrin hill and the rocket ship like TV tower that was built by the communist regime. It reminded us of Berlin where the only great building built by the communist regime was also a TV tower. The Prague Castle is the most elaborate complex of medieval palaces and buildings in the entire world and its like you're walking in a different era. Walt Disney's inspiration for medieval castles is also Prague.

Even in this impressive Castle town, the most impressive building was yet to come. That's the St Vitus Cathedral. The building is huge with an outer facade that's fitting for the main church of a castle, with gargoyles and statues and a big round window that was built using thousands of glass pieces. We went inside and the church is equally impressive inside, very spacious with ornate stain glass windows. Then we went to the back of the church and that's even more imposing and grand. There is a gold panel, giant murals, an even bigger window and tall spires. The building is primarily Gothic but in a strange quirk, the top part of the building is baroque! That happened after a lightening strike destroyed the top of the church building and they just decided to rebuild it in a different style, for no good reason. The Wenceslas chapel to the side of the St Vitus Cathedral is where the Crown Jewels of Czech Republic are stored. Then we saw the Royal Palace building followed by St George's Cathedral. Then we went to see the Golden Lane that has tiny houses in different colors and were home to the sharp shooters of the castle. Franz Kafka also lived in one of these houses for six months. Our last stop was a toy museum with a nude statue of a boy outside. Our guide parted ways at a great view point of the skyline of Prague. We took a few pictures and walked around and then took the stairs down the hill. Then we walked back to our hotel and freshened up for dinner.

We had dinner at a fancy Thai restaurant. We ordered the wok fried beef, pad Thai noodles and red curry. The food was really good but we must say that the best Thai food we have had so far is in Calgary! After dinner, we did some souvenir shopping and then came back to our hotel and are going to call it a night. Till the next update, ciao!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 4 - Old Town Prague

We had a comfortable train ride while it made its way from Kraków to Prague overnight. We slept at around midnight and woke up at 6 am when the conductor knocked on our cabin door to let us know that we will be reaching Prague in about half an hour. We took a taxi and reached our hotel at around 8:30 am. Check-in wasn't available that early so we stored our suitcases with the concierge desk and had breakfast.

After breakfast, we left for a walking tour of Prague. There are 5 major attractions of Prague: the old town, the Jewish quarter, Wenceslas Square, Prague Castle and lesser Prague (Mala Strana). The first 3 of them are to the East of the Vltava river and they were the focus of this walking tour. The last 2 will be covered in another walking tour tomorrow. 

Our hotel is one street behind the old town square so the location is excellent. The walking tour started at 10 am in the old town square. Our tour guide was a Dutch guy who is a psychologist by profession but is waiting to be certified in Czech language so he has been working as a tour guide for the last 4 years. The most striking features about Prague are its atmosphere and its architecture so to fully experience the city, you need to take it slow and that's what our guide did. In the square, there is an old church by the name of the Church of Our Lady before Tyn which has Gothic architecture. An interesting quirk about the church is that both its towers differ in width which is only noticeable upon close inspection, probably a design mistake which was too late to correct. In the opposite corner of the square is Saint Nicolas' church which is currently under renovation. In the middle of the square is a statue of Jan Hus who was burnt at the stake for questioning the corruption in the Catholic Church. Most buildings of Prague have been well preserved over the centuries which gives it a very medieval feel. Buildings in the square are no different except the old city hall. It was burnt down when Prague's residents were trying to save the city from a Nazi invasion. They eventually reached a truce with the Nazis since the Nazis wanted to leave Prague before the Soviets invaded it. The old city hall was so ugly that they decided not to rebuild if and instead just planted some trees there. Then our guide showed us how to read time on the famous astronomical clock of Prague's main square. The clock not only tells time but also shows additional astronomical information such as the moon's phases. It also show recommended names for each of the 365 days of the year and for a long time, many people followed the recommendations. Our guide gave us a hilarious demo of the hourly clock show which gave us a fair warning that the show would be disappointing.

Then we walked to Powder Tower which is a Gothic gate/tower dating back to the 11th century and separates the old town from the new town. After crossing under the gate, we saw the majestic Municipal House building with an outer facade that has the Art Nouveau architecture style. Then we walked to Wenceslas Square and saw the National Museum building at the end of the square. Then we walked to a cafe where we took a break. Samia and I shared a latte. 

We started walking towards the river but first stopped a few steps from our hotel. That was the house where the famous philosopher Franz Kafka was born. Kafka is an interesting personality and owing to his general outlook towards life and existence, he was disappointed in his writings and never got them published. He put all of them in a box and sent them to a friend asking him to burn them. His friend didn't do that and instead got them published. Otherwise the world would've never known about Kafka. 

Then we walked to the Jewish quarter and saw a couple of synagogues. The interesting thing about one of them is that its windows are now at eye level after the entire city was raised a few feet to safeguard against flooding from the river, causing the synagogue to go a few feet underground. We also saw the cemetery of the Jewish quarter. Since the Jews were forced to live in a small area for almost 600 years, they buried their dead in one cemetery and over time, that resulted in a vertical stacking of gravestones. It served as an inspiration to Berlin's memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe with its varying heights of gravestone columns with some of them tilting to one side.

Then we walked towards the Vltava river and our guide showed us a great spot to see the major attractions on the other side of the river - the Prague Castle, Charles Bridge and a government building where Czech Republic's president resides. Our guide told us a couple of jokes about the presidents of Czech Republic - the last one stole a pen while he was on national television and the current one showed up red-eyed and drunk to a press conference that was also on live national television. He also told us a funny story about a man shooting the president with rubber bullets and not getting arrested but instead giving an interview on TV. In short, it's an interesting political landscape. Another fact, there is still a Communist party that has large mass scale support and received 20% votes in the last election. We ended the tour by finding out about a remnant of communism that we might experience in Prague - poor service at restaurants. Our guide was really good and also gave us tips about the local currency's purchasing power, where to get the best rate when exchanging money and also restaurant recommendations.

We took one of his recommendations for lunch and had the traditional beef goulash which was amazing. It is almost like the Pakistani nihari, minus the strong flavor and aroma. After lunch, we came back to our hotel. We were able to finally check-in and get a room. We took showers and were extremely exhausted after walking over 50 km since the start of the trip and not having slept in a proper bed last night so we took a nap for a couple of hours. At least the weather has been good in Prague so far and hasn't been as hot as it was in Poland where we were finishing 5-6 bottles of water per person per day.

We went for dinner to a restaurant just off the square. It was an Italian place with very authentic thin crust personal size pizzas with fresh ingredients. We got a mushroom pizza and an eggplant pizza and then had tiramisu for dessert. It had gotten chilly so we quickly grabbed our cardigan/hoodie from the hotel and strolled to Charles Bridge. It was very majestic, specially the Prague Castle in the background. We walked over the bridge and on to the other side and walked around a little before heading back to our hotel. I wasn't able to finish yesterday's update so I wrote that and now after finishing this one, we're going to bed now. Till the next update, take care!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 3 - Kraków

Today was our last day in Poland. We woke up at 6:45 pm, got ready and had breakfast at our hotel and then left at 9:15 am for our day of sightseeing Kraków. If the largest city and the current capital of Poland, Warsaw, is the economic hub of country, then Kraków is its cultural and academic hub. Kraków dates back to the 8th century and for most years of its existence, it served as the capital of the region of Poland.

Our first stop of the day was Wawel Royal Castle and Wawel Cathedral, both situated on the Wawel hill, 5 minutes walk from our hotel and situated on the banks of the Vistula river. The castle is a huge medieval complex of buildings with high towers and hugs gardens. We walked through the cathedral which also houses crypts of some kings from Polish history including Kazimierz the great. He was a very forward thinking and progressive King who reformed the criminal and civil law, reformed the Polish army, built many buildings including Wawel Castle, founded the University of Kraków (now known as Jagiellonian University) and also doubled the size of Poland during his reign. Kraków has a district named Kazimierz which eventually became the district where Jews primarily lived. The medieval towers and gardens are impressive but perhaps the most interesting thing about the Wawel Castle is the statue of the dragon that's located at the base of the hill. The legend goes that the Wawel dragon used to live on this hill before the city was founded. The statue not only looks like a black dragon rearing to fly away into the sky but also breathes fire from time to time. Then we walked along the Vistula river to get back to our hotel where we took a quick break to freshen up. Then we got a map and directions to the old town square.

Our walking tour started in front of Saint Mary's Basilica located in the oldest medieval town square of Europe, the Rynek Glowny. The tour was about the Jewish history of Kraków. Our first stop was the Jewish district of Kazimierz which was about a 15 minutes walk from the old town square. It used to be a separate city that neighbored Kraków but later became a district of Kraków as the city expanded. After a fire in the late 15th century burnt down a large part of Kraków, the Jewish inhabitants of Kraków were moved to Kazimierz. The fortress synagogue called Old Synagogue was also built around this time. After a quick stop at the Old Synagogue, we walked a little farther ahead to the New Synagogue (officially the Remuh Synagogue that was built by a banker for his Rabi son). Then we saw a street that features in a scene in the famous Hollywood movie "Schindler's List". We also saw another building and a set of stairs that were also used in the movie. We stopped by another synagogue that was built was someone who allegedly found a treasure hidden under a tree in his backyard after he had a dream about it. To thank God, he built the synagogue. Then we took a quick break at a circular row of stalls that used to be a kosher slaughterhouse but now sells Zapiekanki, a pseudo-pizza or open sandwich on top of a baguette. We regret not having tried it since it looked delicious. 

The Jewish population of Kazimierz at its peak used to be about 68,000. After the holocaust, the population that survived the Second World War was about 18,000 but most of them started emigrating from Kazimierz and now the Jewish population here is less than a thousand. After it started becoming a ghost town, the government started moving ex-convicts to the area so it became a no-go zone because of the high incidence of crime. In the 1980s, students started moving here because of cheap rent which resulted in the gradual revival of the area as a hip and young nightlife district of Kraków.

Then we crossed the bridge over the Vistula river to the area which used to have the Jewish ghetto. This ghetto was the area where the Nazi regime relocated the Jews of Kraków before they were transported to concentration camps. Our guide told us the story of a pharmacist who had a pharmacy in the ghetto and who saved hundreds of Jews by letting them escape the ghetto through a secret exit in his pharmacy. He maintained good working relations with the Nazi party by bribing their officials. Our guide mentioned his story to highlight the point that Oscar Schindler is not the only Polish person who saved Jews during the holocaust but there were others as well. In fact, the government of Israel has recognized about 6400 Polish people for saving lives of Jews during the holocaust. We also saw a memorial park with many empty chairs to signify those who could never come back here. The area has nice buildings now so it's hard to imagine that it ever was a ghetto and the memorial park is the only visual hint. Then we walked to Schindler's factory which was what enabled Oscar Schindler to save the lives of 1098 Jews by putting their names on the so called Schindler's list and giving it to Nazi party officials and telling them that these are all people that he will need to relocate as he is opening a new factory. That way, he saved the lives of those 1098 Jews who would've otherwise perished in Nazi concentration camps. Our guide did tell us about the ways in which the Hollywood movie simplifies the story, the most important of which was the fact that the list was actually compiled by someone else and not by Oscar Schindler. 

After the tour, we took a taxi back to the old town square and had lunch at a traditional Polish cuisine restaurant that had a very nice garden in the back with lots of shade. Having walked in the scorching heat of July for the third straight day, we really appreciated the shade. We tried pierogis (stuffed dumplings) with cabbage and mushrooms and a goat cheese salad. We also had a traditional Polish apple pie. We've had the dumplings in North America (called pirogies there) but the Polish version was way better.

Lunch and a break from the sun had energized us and we were ready for our next walking tour of the old town area. It also started from the same point, in front of Saint Mary's Basilica. Our guide told us that this was the oldest medieval gothic church of Europe that hasn't required reconstruction. The church has two spires, both different in height and appearance. The taller one is for the city's fire department that was used to keep a look out on the city in medieval times to spot fires and the slightly shorter one is for the church bell. In keeping with tradition, to this day, a trumpeter plays his trumpet in the city spire of this church on all 4 sides and you can see him through the windows. We waved at him and he waved back. Then we walked outside the main square area after passing through a perfectly preserved medieval gate tower to the remnants of the fortification system or the Barbican. The Barbican was a building based on a simple concept - a walled structure with misaligned gates so that when the enemy had broken down the outer gate, they needed to change the direction of the battering ram and this gave the defenders the time to shoot them down. Then we saw the museum that houses Leonardo da Vinci's famous painting "Lady with an Ermine" but the museum is closed for renovation. Then we walked back to the old town square. We stopped in front of the old cloth hall building which is a long building with about 70 souvenir stalls inside, essentially a smaller version of the Grand Bazaar of Istanbul. Our guide told us that in medieval times, there used to be many more buildings like this but only the cloth hall survived after all the others were taken down gradually when economic decline hit the rich city of Kraków after the capital was moved to Warsaw and the country went through a series of partitions. Then we walked to another building just outside the old town square, the old building of what used to be called the University of Kraków. We found out that Copernicus was first a student and then a teacher there. We also saw the university clock's hourly show. Then we saw the window of late Pope John Paul the second's old residence that he used to open to address people whenever he came back to Kraków after becoming Pope. It now bears a picture of him smiling down at the city. Then the walking tour was headed to Wawel Castle and Cathedral but since we had already seen it in the morning, we headed back to the old town square. We walked around for a little bit and then had an early dinner before our overnight train. We tried a different variation of the pierogis, this time with a potato filling. We also had eggplant salad and then I had coffee and Samia had mint tea. Then we did some souvenir shopping in the cloth hall and walked back to our hotel. We freshened up, collected our bags and took a taxi to the train station.

Kraków is a hidden gem and has exceeded our expectations. We wished we had more time in the city so that we could have enjoyed some additional experiences from another time, for instance the horse carriage ride across the old town or a cruise on the Vistula river or maybe even a tour of the Royal rooms inside the Wawel castle.

We reached the train station at about 9:15 pm. We had a little difficulty in ensuring that we were at the right platform since it didn't say that anywhere on the ticket or the giant information screens. The overnight train departed on time at 10 pm and after a short but wonderful stay of Poland, we were on our way to our next city, Prague. Till the next update, take care and goodbye!

Eastern Europe Diaries - Day 2 - Auschwitz and Wieliczka

We woke up at 7:15 am and got ready for a day of exploring Auschwitz and the Wieliczka Salt Mines, both of which are outside the city of Kraków. We went down to have the hotel continental breakfast and were done by 9 am. Our driver for today picked us up at 9:15 am sharp, as previously arranged. We drove about 75 minutes to Auschwitz which is about 70 km west of Kraków.

Auschwitz is notorious in history as being the deadliest concentration and extermination camp set up by the German Nazi regime - over 1.1 million people are estimated to have been systematically murdered at this site of which 90% were Jews. Essentially, of the 6 million Jews that were murdered during Holocaust, 1 in 6 was killed at Auschwitz. The original camp Auschwitz-I was set up on the outskirts of Kraków, initially as only a concentration camp where Jews, Soviet prisoners of war, Polish dissidents, gypsies and anyone else not deemed fit to live in the eyes of the Nazi regime were imprisoned and made to work. Then the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration/extermination camp (about 20 times bigger than the original camp) was set up a couple of kilometers away from the original concentration camp. The first part of our tour was a guided tour of the original Auschwitz-I concentration camp spanning almost 2 hours. The second part was a walk through what remains of the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp.

The tour started after we passed through the notorious gates that have the German inscription "Arbeit Macht Frei" on them which means "Work sets (you) free". The lies of the German Nazis started right at the gates. We walked through barracks of prisoners that showcased the atrocious and inhumane living conditions. Real pictures of innocent civilians showing different parts of life at the camp paint a heart wrenching picture of this mass murdering criminal site. Most people who arrived at the concentration camp, mostly Jews, were rounded up from all over Europe and sent to these camps by train. If they arrived to Auschwitz-I, they were "sorted" by a doctor into healthy and fit to work versus weak/sick and unable to work. Most women, children, elderly and disabled people got sorted in the unable to work category. The healthy were given tasks to carry out at the camps whereas the weak/sick were sent to gas chambers. About 75% people got categorized as not fit to work. If they were Jews and arrived at Auschwitz-Berkinau, they weren't even sorted and most of them were sent directly to gas chambers. Getting sorted into the healthy category did not spare you either. These workers died within a few months as well after suffering from exhaustion and starvation.

To make sure that the people about to be murdered did not panic, they were told that they were going for a shower for disinfection and de-lousing before being given accommodations. They left behind their luggage (one suitcase per person with their name and address written on it) that they had brought with them from their home countries. All cherished memories of a life reduced to a suitcase and then taken away. People were asked to take off their clothes outside and go inside for the shower and about 700 people were pushed in one shower. Poisonous gas cans were thrown into these gas chambers from holes in the roof and the innocent people inside died in a few minutes. Despite concrete walls, screams and moans of the victims could be heard outside. After that, sonderkommandos wearing gas masks dragged out the dead bodies and cut off hair, removed artificial limbs, glasses and any dental work where precious metal had been used. The bodies were then burnt in crematorium and the ashes thrown in rivers or used for fertilization. Hearing about the heartless and systematic killing method is overwhelming enough but seeing piles upon piles upon piles of shoes, glasses, women's hair, artificial limbs, hairbrushes and children's clothes can move anyone to tears. These were people who hadn't done anything wrong but had their lives taken away because of the Nazi belief that they were a superior race and should not let the so-called inferior races survive. The Nazis then proceeded to use the women's hair to weave carpets! The holocaust is definitely one of the lowest points in human history and should never be forgotten so that appropriate measures can be taken to ensure that no human regime is capable of repeating such horrors again.

After witnessing the ugly history of holocaust, we drove on to our next stop, the Wieliczka Salt Mines. After having walked in the hot scorching sun, we were exhausted and fell asleep in the air conditioned car. Just before the Salt Mines tour, we stopped to have lunch at a restaurant picked by our tour driver. The restaurant was in a hotel and the entire facility seemed like it was built last week. Everything was brand new and the food was amazing. We ordered a 4-cheese pizza and penne pasta. We got half the pizza packed for dinner and finished off with some delicious tiramisu and latte.

The Wieliczka Salt Mines have been the coolest experience of our trip so far, both literally and figuratively. The tour started after our group descended about 50 flight of stairs (380 steps to be exact) to reach about 135 meters below the ground. That was the first level of the salt mine. We saw a total of three levels, each one beneath the previous one. We followed what is called the tourist route which is a meagre 2 kilometers when compared with the total length of routes in this salt mine - 300 km! At its deepest point, the mine is over 300 meters deep. Everything inside the mine is made of salt and all structures are primarily wooden since wood resists the corrosive effect of salt better than any metal. There are scores of intricate statues, all made from salt. There is a giant statue dedicated to the Polish scientist Copernicus, there are statues commemorating the two brothers who built most of the statues, there is a statue of Pope John Paul the second and then there are 3 surviving chapels! There were a total of 30 chapels but only 3 have been excavated. Then there are statues depicting miners at work - burning methane, working the pulleys to move cylindrical blocks of salt up and down the mine or tending to a horse - there are also statues of dwarfs. Every statue is made of salt. Even all the floors are made of salt. There was also a very majestic looking lake, filled not with water but with a completely saturated salt solution (called brine). One of the chapels is probably the size of a football stadium and we were surprised to find out that it holds active Sunday mass every week and because of its excellent acoustics, it even hosts musical concerts! The air inside the mine is so fresh with just the right amount of humidity that people with respiratory ailments come here to spend time and usually get better very quickly. After this unique experience, thankfully we didn't have to climb back those 60 flights of stairs (we went down another 10 or so during the tour) and instead took an elevator back up to the ground. We exited the mine a few blocks away from the original entry point and walked through the scenic green gardens back to the main building.

Then our tour driver dropped us off in Kraków, at the main post office. We collected our tickets for tomorrow's overnight train from Kraków to Prague and then took a cab back to our hotel. We had ordered these tickets online about a month back but they had to be picked up in person. After reaching our hotel, we relaxed for a bit and planned our day of sightseeing Kraków tomorrow. Then we had the leftover pizza. Samia has already fallen asleep and I'm going to do the same now since we have a very packed day tomorrow! Till the next update, take care and goodbye!