3 August 2008

There are 50 churches in Krakow. I think we have seen MOST OF THEM now! Fascinating history in each one, and beautiful ornamental touches and stained glass windows and ...crypts...graves...church stuff, you know. I am eating an awful lot. Today i ate uszki, bigos, pierogi, barszcz and drank some more Polish beer. I have tried beer with raspberry juice, quite refreshing in this heat actually. I am starting a beer glass collection (don't ask!) and this is going to be difficult since my suitcase will weigh too much for the plane!

My brother Chris is annoying as all hell, but our antics are amusing the rest of the family, so I'm glad we can offer some comic relief to the church visiting...

We are discovering all kinds of things about Krakow, like the service industry. They are not very friendly. Sometimes downright SURLY....now that we have worked out the 'money tray' issue we are getting along just fine. What is the money tray, you ask? In grocery stores, the cashier does not want to touch your hand when taking your money, so this involves placing your money on a small tray...and then the cashier places your change on said tray. No hand touching allowed. Now that this issue has been resolved we feel confident in buying things such as bottled water, yummy chocolate, and strange forms of snack food/chips (ketchup flavour??). Also, unfortunately, some Euros have fallen into my wallet and it's hard to tell the difference between Euros and Zloty (Polish currency) - we are calling them Zs. I get nasty looks when trying to pay with Euros...they don't like those here.

Although i have been doing a bit of running, I'm not game to be skipping outside....yet... Early in the morning is apparently late night for some, (wow, was I really like that in my younger years?)....so i get a lot of strange looks from the wasted Irish and British buck's party groups stumbling around the cobblestone streets at 5.30am. There seems to be a lot of those.

I am practicing my Polish again..not with a lot of success...but at least i am saying Please and Thank You and Good Morning happily...when i get blank looks i realise i'm speaking Spanish and not Polish!

I am one step closer to uploading some pics on here. The hotel internet computer is 1) a Linux operating system and 2) ALL IN POLISH!!! so i have no idea what the commands are, or how to implement anything. Luckily Karon (sis-in-law) brought her laptop so if we can get some wireless action, i can do my pics tomorrow.

Tomorrow: the Salt Mines and a little bit of shopping. I bought myself a new pair of Docs (sandals) but i am going to spend some more money...after all, what are holidays for?