Photographs.

Fountain Hopping

I know that I've been seriously slacking on actually putting important information into my journal entries lately and for that I apologize.
BUT.... I do have an interesting tale to update about.

Last night was the six kids first night in Rome. We stayed in the Hostel Yellow near the train station Termini, and it was super hot when we arrived, so everyone showered and rested for the evening the first couple of hours we were hear. But we definitely were dressed and out the door by nine o'clock, ready to eat some authentic Italian food and barter with the multitudes of street vendors that exist in this amazing city.

Our night ended up better than I could have imagined, though. We ate and we walked around, meeting three girls from Chicago, a guy named Chris from Oklahoma, and two girls from the UK, and saw Kristin buy a glass ring from Murano. We also sampled the local nutella cresent rolls, ate some After Eight ice cream cones that were to die for, and sat on the steps with the local teenagers to just hang out and enjoy the night time air. Random guys in cars called the four of us girls over to their windows, trying to ask where we were from and maybe make friends with an American... to which we all, of course, laughed but strongly declined. And then, sometime around midnight, we got on the tram to go back into town. A tram, I might add, that we had no idea where it ran or what the final destination might be... but we figured that it was headed in the right direction. This was right about the time that Markie tried to baptize Courtney in a drinking fountain. It was all very carefree and fun. But on the tram four older British men asked us where we were from (people always marvel at the southern accent) and told us, jokingly, that we were on the tram to Hell. Which was funny, because soon after, the entire tram shut down in the middle of the street and we had to shuffle off into a random Roman street.

Dave and I have been to Rome before, right around this time last year, and I swear I recognized the spot we were in. There were Roman ruin baths about a level below us on the right, with stray cats milling around everywhere, and a kiosk that looked oddly familiar. We were by the Pantheon... I could smell it in the air!

So I went running off. Michael and David were straining to understand a tiny map of the huge city, and Courtney and I really really wanted to see the monument by night, so we just started running. And we ran until we made it to that Plaza with the fountain that is in Dan Brown's book Angels and Demons. And because we were laughing and carrying on and running around already, and because it was on the list of things that Courtney and I made that we aboslutely, 100%, MUST do in Europe, we climbed over the railing and jumped into the fountain. The freaking famous fountain. And we took pictures and splashed around and Markie even grabbed one of the statue's butts.

AND THEN... soaking wet and still laughing, we climbed out before the police patrol could make their way over, and we went down the alley way to find the Pantheon (since that was our original mission after all).. and we found it! After help from a boy from Nevada and two girls from the UK... and there was another fountain, and these four kids from the states were standing around so of course we introduced ourselves, and then invited them to climb in the second fountain. The one in front of the Pantheon. While there were two cops asleep in a cop car right in front of us. It was all very 'Pink Panther' sleuth oh my goodness we're going to jail if we get caught... but it was two girls, one from Harvard and one from Yale, and two boys from Boston University, who needed to live a little.... and I figured that we could be the ones who helped them on their journey to corruption. And fun.

So second fountain conquered, we headed home... soaking wet but completely satisfied... not ready for the night to end but knowing that tomorrow, inevitably, we'd get into some other kind of amusing adventure that would bring about a whole new set of smiles.

And so we went to bed.

When in Rome... do as the Romans do. It's kind of amazing to have my entire family and three friends here.

And last night we had an amazing dinner and evening in Cinque Terre on the Italian coast. How was I born into such a lucky family?

Can I Steer the Boat?

Oh my goodness... today I jumped out of an airplane.
AND went white water rafting.... with the guide letting me steer the boat.
Plans tonight with these two incredible friends that we met at the train station.

Life is bliss.

A day in the Canyons and staring at Alps

This will be a super short post because I have about three minutes to update.
Our trip, so far, has found Courtney, Michael, David, Markie, my mom, my dad, and I in Amsterdam for two days (with plenty of bike riding included), in Paris, and in Switzerland.
I never get over the beauty of the amazing cities in Europe. Seriously, I have seen the Eiffel Tower about 45 times and, when we went there with arms full of cheap wine and Fanta (thank you Diego for enlightening us on the wonders of Poor Mans Sangria), I could not help but just stare up at the monument - once again in speechless wonder. It was fun to just sit in the grass and talk and take silly pictures. Court and I even wanted a picture of the Eiffel Tower above us, so I set the camera on self timer down on the ground (yikes, no scratches!) and she jumped on my back. It turned out to be a completely cute picture - after three tries - and people thought we were crazy when we started hollering and jumping around and slapping high fives. I think it is a goal of ours to make people stare at us in every country, whether it be because Court is throwing up on the side of the road, our skin is so porcelain white (Cairo?), or because we are jumping around like crazy people.

Anyway, after much train riding we are now snuggly situated in a little city high up in the Swiss Alps called Interlaken and have already managed to jump off an ENORMOUS waterfall (without any injury to Courtney's knee) and sorority squat with a man from New Zealand named Nick. Tomorrow is skydiving at an insane 2350823598 feet above sea level and the entire extended Paulzak traveling company is high with anticipation. Believe me...... there will be some amazing pictures in the near future of this silly "blob."

I never want to move back to America!!

Off to Explore the World!

We'll be gone for a while.... until we meet again!

(stories of Amsterdam, golf carts at Versailles, skydiving in Switzerland, and red wine in Rome to follow)

Giant Bear Hugs and Fond Farewells

I'm sad to have to leave everybody so soon.... it's 4 a.m. on the morning that I leave to meet my family in Amsterdam, and as excited as I am to see them, I still feel sadness at permanently parting with so many incredible people here in Lodz. Thanks for the memories, guys.

That's me in the middle, in white (making a ridiculous face because I wasn't ready yet) and Courtney is in the back on the left. This picture was stolen from Lazar... and it was taken right after the Italy-France futbol match on Tuesday night... which was completely fun.

Deutschland

Courtney and I just finished watching our first official futbol match in Europe... and it was twenty kids all crowded into the dorm hallway, eating sandwiches, drinking Fanta out of coffee mugs, and taunting each other about whose country team was the best. We just sat back and enjoyed the show - not only the soccer, which was fun to watch, but also the friendship between all of the foreign people we've met from the first floor. And of course, we had to cheer for Germany because Til is German and he would have shot us if we'd so much as uttered that Austria was doing good.

I think the best part of the night, though, was when everyone started jumping around and cheering when the Germans finally scored... and Diego went off down the hallway, ripping off his shirt and cheering in excitement. It was entertaining to see everyone so excited about a fuzzy soccer match that was being streamed live from a random website in Chinese.

I wish we had more bonding over such things in America.

Giza

Actually seeing the pyramids was indescribable.

Courtney and I arrived on the Cairo tarmac at 2:10 a.m. on Friday morning after befriending an entire plane full of people from Palestine, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa - we even picked up a surrogate father along the way who gave us a two pound bar of genuine Swiss dark chocolate and a tub of cough drops for Courtney's throat.

Our surrogate Egyptian daddy. He even used Mont Blanc pens like my own father! 

(And we look rough. We'd been traveling for about 10 hours at this point.)

The three stooges - from Saudi Arabian - and some of our friends from the plane.

We actually almost didn't make it onto the plane to Cairo. We had electronic boarding passes, but the blonde lady behind the counter said we didn't have our "tickets"... although I don't know what the difference between a pass and a ticket are... and I went into Gary-Paulzak-mode and yelled at the lady until she saw that I was serious about getting our butts on the plane, and called security to check. She kept just waving us away, like we didn't matter, and it was extremely frustrating because we had about 10 minutes before the plane was going to take off and no matter how many times we said "How do we get a ticket?" she wouldn't answer us. But no fear... my slew of mean words and our determination got us aboard, to the amusement of a bunch of people who saw the entire ordeal take place... and those were the people who laughed and chatted with us on the plane. It was definitely a good opening act.

BUT... we made it to our hostel by 3 a.m. Courtney even had a man with a sign pick us up from the airport - very classy! And the ride through Cairo in the early morning was eye-opening. The city doesn't sleep (and we had no idea that it didn't), but when we exited our car, the street was teeming with people of all ages: street venders, passersby, taxi drivers, little kids running around... we weren't sure if there was a special festival going on or something. We did learn, though, that nobody in the city ever sleeps, and we quickly fell into that same pattern... getting about 5 hours of sleep the entire weekend that we were there. There are simply too many things to do, see, and experiences to be had to waste time on dreamland!

Thus, we fell asleep around 5 a.m. in our comfy hostel double bed, cuddling and exclaiming at our good fortune to find ourselves in the cradle of life, only to wake up a few hours later and depart for the pyramids with our own private driver. We kept staring at the windows the entire time... gasping at our first view of the Nile, staring at the 1940s cars and donkey-drawn watermelon carts, and anxiously awaiting our first glimpse of the pyramids that were imminent on our horizon.

About ten minutes into our car ride of wonder, Courtney just grabbed my knee and pointed. There they were! Seriously, I cannot even describe how amazing it was to see the pyramids in person. I just stared and stared... watching them slowly come closer.... my mind both focusing on the past and the history of how they came to be, and the future of our adventure through the desert to touch the giant monuments. I had to remind myself several times to hold my mouth closed, and our driver was kind enough to stop on the side of the road and let us girls snap away with our cameras.

The first glimpse that made me fall in love with Egypt.

I do have to say, of this entire experience, that I have never met more kind or friendly people in my entire life. Not only the amazing Hostel Brothers, Mohamed and Mustafa, but EVERYONE was kind and patient. They took pleasure in our marveling at their gorgeous city, and seemed to be delighted that we were enjoying ourselves so much. One of the drivers (because we ended up having several), Salem, put on some Arabian music and danced with us in the car - shouting his trademark phrase "Welcome to ALASKA!" (to which we exclaimed that 'Alaska' was quite warmer than we had expected) and driving like a roller coaster down the freeway.

Salem, our fabulous driver.

Our pyramid tour guide indulged our wishes for silly photographs and helped me gallop across the desert on my horse with the stirrups that were too short. At one point he came over and said "Okay girls, quick, climb the pyramid!" And I turned around and knew, surely, that he was kidding. I think I distinctly remember saying "You're just messing with us, right? Climbing the outside of the pyramids is illegal!" And yet there Courtney went, swiftly up the side, and I wasn't about to hang around in the Sahara while she was scaling an ancient wonder of the world.

We were catered to, fused over, and laughed at - flirted with, teased, and called Moza (which means beautiful). People bought us ice cream, sailboat rides down the Nile, Egyptian eye charms to hang as good luck from the bazaar, and Joey even bought a shot glass for Courtney's big sister in our sorority. There wasn't an ounce of hostility to be found, and once people found out that we were Americans, their faces would light up and they were quickly pronounce "I love America!"

"Nah nah nah nahnahnahnahhhh sheets of Egyptian cotton..."

Carla, the camel. I named it Shamoo at first, but after much discussion, we decided that Carla was a better name.

At one point, Mustafa even decided to abandon his job for the day and come hang out with us instead. We met up with some Americans that we met at our IREE conference in Washington D.C., and together the band of us headed for a sailboat on the Nile. Before we got there, though, we climbed a gigantic lion about 8 feet up in the air on the only pedestrian bridge in Cairo (another monument that, I'm sure, was illegal to climb) and got a bird's eye view of the city. I even shouted "GOOD MORNING CAIRO!!" to all of the cars streaming past, flashing a peace sign and laughing at my own silliness.

The Americans in Cairo: Joey, me, Courtney, Dawn, and Daniel.

Kisses on the Nile for my ABS... we love each other very much.

Our boat ride down the Nile was magnificent. (I feel like I'm running out of synonyms for the word incredible while I write this!) We bartered for a faluka, a small sailboat, to journey up and down the Nile for an hour, and then as soon as the ship set sail, we claimed the bow of the vessel and dangled our toes in the water. When our toes got wrinkly, we laid out on the front deck and sunbathed in the Egyptian sun, soaking up the rays and marveling at our luck. I mean, who really gets to hang out in a sailboat on the Nile and sun bathe? And my camera had run out of battery at this point, so I stole Joey's (thank goodness he was good natured about it) and captured our Nile adventure on his camera... and since he hasn't given me the pictures yet, I will have to add those later. The "captain" even let Courtney and I steer the boat for a little while! And after the sun got too hot, "Audrey - God of Shade" was born. I think we amused even ourselves that afternoon... playing a game of how-many-people-can-we-get-to-flash-the-peace-sign-at-us-while-we're-on-this-boat, and laughing at each other about our lack of actual scientific work going on in our respective countries of study.

The Nile by boat at night.

I will write more stories letter.. of our adventures to get silver rings, making our own papyrus, meeting Mohammed Ali, smoking a hookah in the bazaar, and belly dancing on a Nile cruise. I'll even tell the embarrassing story of how I fell off of a stopped horse, but for now, I must get back to work.

Have a wonderful day, Habibi!

Cairo, Al Qahirah

This weekend has been nothing short of incredible. This morning I was in Egypt... I saw the Cairo sun rising as I saw in the airport and now I'm in a train taken from Warsaw Central, squished between three sweet old people who keep jabbering to us despite of our lack of understanding, and one lady praying on the rosary under her breath. I now have five different kinds of money in my wallet - Polish, Egyptian pounds, American, Ukranian, and Euro - and each currency holds its own story. One nice man gave me two Ukranian coins when we ended up in the totally wrong terminal at the airport in Keiv, and Mustafa gave us promised, and somewhat rare, Egyptian coins last night - more as a token to remember him by than the value of the coin itself. We've met more people than I can keep up with - some that I'll miss dearly - and we pulled an all nighter at our hostel yesterday evening, along with the entire Hostel Brothers' staff, because all of us were too sad to actually waste time on sleeping. All of the memories are more incredible in my head than I could ever relate on paper, and it makes me scared to write them down and risk not doing the places, and the people, and the adventures justice, but for the sake of not wanting to forget a single detail: I shall try.

But for now, because it's so late and I haven't slept much in almost three days... I'll leave you with a slide show. I PROMISE I will add a variety of stories and explanations about our trips tomorrow! For now... sweet dreams.

I think we're Egyptian at heart.

Finnish Idol and the Superhero

My neighbor across the hall, Elodie, is leaving Thursday to go back to her native land of France.

Court and I with Elodie.

Last night as Courtney and I were cooking dinner (shrimp scampi and grilled red peppers with loads of garlic and onion, I don't know how we managed that!) she stopped in the doorway and said "American girls! It's my farewell party... you must come down and say hello. And there are Americans outside who want to meet you."

She was attacked with kisses because we'll all miss her so much!

Exciting! So we threw on some clothes (our typical kitchen attire are pajamas and big t-shirts) and headed downstairs to make new friends.
Our night ended up being a ton of fun...! I met a guy named Heikki from Finland who wore a Polish flag around all evening as his cape and claimed he was a super hero. At one point he even tried to convince me that he was a finalist on "Finnish Idol" and we got a digital video of him and a friend singing "Turn Around." It was hilarious.

That's a super hero there on the left. I was doing the Superman pose too, but the people taking the picture cut my arm off. =(

Thus, last night we met someone from Finland, Mexico, Germany, Spain, Scotland, France, Serbia, Columbia, and America. It's amazing the diversity we run into here, and how much everyone gets along. It's kind of disheartening that they all have such a bad view of America, but we are slowly changing that view - one person at a time - with our aggressive friendliness and good wit and charm.

Oh yeah, and I got a pretty cool Spanish flag from a latino boy who put pistaccios on my head and made me take out my hair in the middle of Piotrkowska Street. And at one point someone spilled blood. It was quite the evening.

Boy on the right, Diego, lent me his Spanish flag for the evening. Boy on the left, Kevin, started bleeding in his attempt to get on the night bus. We should have been renamed the Motley Crew.

A real life super hero and finalist on Finnish Idol, Heikki.

Even though Courtney and I had met him thirty minutes earlier, it was Hiekki's last night and he wanted us to sign his Polish flag. Except that everyone kept saying goodbye to him while I was trying to write, and I had to pause because he received six million hugs during my four sentence farewell address.

"Ouch Charlie... that really hurt!!"

A small part of the group we hung out with last night in front of Dorm 9.

And the girl on my right, Esmerelda, was an American! It was very exciting...

In other news, Damian came back from Egypt today! It was exciting to see him walking down the hall, even if he is about seven shades more tan and severely distracted this afternoon. He's the only one around here who actually takes care of us... and it's lovely to have our friend back.

I am starting to miss home, though. I miss my Jozey and my Ashlie... and my Lump. Messaging online and talking occasionally on Skype just isn't cutting it anymore - I need to laugh with my girls and hug my dog to sleep at night! Thank goodness Courtney is here to keep me sane. Yesterday we were both in a sort of depressed mood, so we rallied each other to shower (it was quite the chore) and walked down Piotrkowska until we found a nice little outdoor cafe. We promptly sat down - Court ordered a chocolate milk shake and I ordered cafe au lait - and we people watched and talked about our future careers and dwindling love lives. I think we sat in the Polish afternoon sun until it set... observing people and discovering stuff about ourselves. 

And it's silly how skinny some of the girls are here. 

But I must stop rambling and pack up my stuff. I have clothes to iron and a backpack to set in order for our journey to Warsaw tomorrow morning. 

Until then -

Manufaktura

There is a grand shopping realm in Lodz, Poland called the Manufaktura. The largest textile factory in the city was recently (2 years ago) converted into a giant shopping, eating, hanging out, rock climbing, beach volleyball, summer night concert in the park kind of place that is THE destination a la mode in our dear city. And since my professor left for the Czech Republic about three minutes after I got to work this morning, Courtney and I decided to take a "spa" day and investigate all of the pleasures this little city in itself had to offer. Not only did we shop (I bought a really cute dress, two shirts, and some aviators for our weekend travels), but we also ate Subway (gasp..... their chocolate chip cookies taste EXACTLY the same here Ashlie.... and I bought one to eat, just because I knew it was the right thing to do)... and visited an interactive museum that was SUPPOSED to have the largest soap bubble in the world. In true Polish fashion, the soap bubble was out of commission, as well as about 1/3 of the other exhibits that the tiny museum had to offer, but Court and I still had fun. We drove around remote control tanks that had cameras and firepower attached, watched a robotic dog sit, do pushups, and pee (robotically), and we saw this really amazing hologram that I still am marveling at. I know it's completely nerdy, but the hologram was really a trick of mirrors and light that was based entirely in physics - a physics that I understand because of my schooling - and it was fun to understand the angles and light waves and inversion that went into designing the exhibit. Leave it to us to find school 5000 miles away from the actual institution.

And I cleaned my room this evening! Don't dismiss that.. it's a really big achievement for Miss Audrey Paulzak and I'm glad that I did it. Soon I will be traveling all over Europe so much that I'll be living out of a rucksack, and I need to start being organized and put together (as Ash would say) to mentally prepare myself. Wearing the same four shirts and two bottoms isn't going to be easy, but I'm tough. I can do this!

All jokes aside, I'm excited and ecstatic about our upcoming travels.

Never again will my life compare to this summer.

Alpha Charlie and Charlie Echo

Photographs from our journey.

The PKP train... we were on it for a lovely seven hours with no air conditioning and no entertainment.

Polish countryside. I, sadly, was not quick enough to catch a picture of the cows tied to trees.

Gdansk by twilight.

The Baltic Sea at midnight!! We were totally stoked to be running around in the water - and getting soaking wet.

I do believe we were all crowded in the Sea when we took this picture. No one wanted to leave...

Our ferry boat to Hell, the island.

Paradise? Who knew Poland could be so pretty.

Nothing beats the feeling of warm sand between your toes...

I shall remain a child forever.

Kristin and Courtney...

Ecstasy.

There and Back

My day today was fantastic. There isn't a better word to describe it.

It started off last night, when Courtney and I rallied the girls to go to the Baltic Sea at midnight. We took a guy with us that we met on the couch at the hostel, bought our tickets with directions and help from only two Polish locals (and also learned the word for "sea"), and found ourselves at the pier in Sopot.
I don't know what it is, but during the last hour of the train ride yesterday afternoon, the presence of the ocean was tangible. I've missed it so much, living in Alabama, and my excitement was evident to everyone I was around... and kept growing until last night when I found myself standing in front of the crashing waves of the Baltic. The four girls rolled up our pant legs and pulled up our skirts and ran straight into the Sea. At midnight. And the sand was incredibly soft and the water was warmer than the surrounding air..... and we frollicked.
Just like the children we are.

So today, we woke up late after our adventure, ate some bread and (in Courtney and Kristin's case) pizza for breakfast, and headed out. One of our roommates at the hostel told us about an island in the Baltic named Hel (pronounced "Hell") that was supposed to be awesome, and you have to take a ferry to get there, so we jumped at the chance and bought tickets to go.
I have not had a more relaxing day since I've arrived in Europe. We bought big beach towels at an outdoor market by the sea, staked out a little section of beach to call our own, and laid in the sun all day long. It's incredible, because back home I get overheated and sweaty after thirty minutes, but here the sun is warm and friendly, and doesn't burn even with hours of exposure. We people watched, laughed at kids building joint project sand castles, and soaked up the rays to help our bodies make Vitamin D - the only vitamin we've gotten in abundance since we've been in this malnurished country!
Sundresses and seawater aside, our day ended at a fabulous little cafe that saw four tiny girls eat two ENTIRE loaves of bread with butter, and we filled our water bottles with sand to bring to all of our loved ones back home. Courtney even ate TWO ice cream cones somewhere along the day's journey. AND we took the stereotypical jumping-in-the-air-with-the-sun-at-our-backs picture, which turned out adorable.

The ferry ride home lasted an hour, and saw the four American girls sitting on the deck of a ship called the Opal, watching the sun set over a foreign landscape that somehow endeared itself to us. It was astounded to realize that that same sun was shining a 1 p.m. sun to our parents and friends, and that looking at it was also looking towards the direction of home. It's something the four of us shared... and no one else will ever actually know what it was like or how we felt. It's sad to think that tonight was probably the last night of my life that I will see the sun set over the Baltic Sea.

So now I'm camped in the common room of our hostel... the three other girls and two friends we've made here are debating politics as we pass a giant water bottle and a tub of nutella around. Everyone is in pajamas and we're in for the evening. It's our tribute to the amazing time we had in Gdansk...... I'm sad that we have to leave so soon.