DUBROVNIK, CROATIA. This week of sun and total relaxation was just what I needed.  so nice.  some quick highlights:

• spending days doing absolutly nothing on the beach
• going swimming in the adriatic sea even though it was freeezzzzing
• exploring the island of lokrum where we found a small lake to swim in between a few cliffs and then climbing to the fortress on top to have a view of the beautiful sea and beautiful old town
• our hostel which was run by a family.  The “dad” picked us up from the airport, and the “mom” made breakfast for us every morning (delicious french toast with honey) and told me to wear a coat. One night, I told the “mom” that my friend and I wanted to make dinner and asked her what would be a Croatian thing to make.  She said “you get fish at store - three fish there.  one by river, two by sea, get round one by sea, not thin one, you bring here and we cook.”  She ended up cooking the fish for us.  It was simply brilliant.
• waking up early to walk along the old city walls by myself and take some pictures of the streets tourist/cruise free
• talking and spending nights out with backpackers from our hostel

I’m home in Prague after a week away in sunny Dubrovnik, Croatia.  I was loving the total relaxation and good weather of Croatia, but I’m happy to be back.  The trip home was a bit long (and a bit stressful since I was traveling home by myself, unsure of where the bus stop at Frankfurt was, and didn’t know that my bus was going to be 38 minutes late) but its awesome to be back in Prague for a few days before school starts back up again.

So here I am enjoying laziness of Prague in my room with my new tan and new Dubrovnik mug :)

Did I mention that I have a sofa chair in my room?  I decided that I needed a more intense chair for my desk so I moved two boys moved one from the common room upstairs to my room.  It makes sitting and drinking coffee much more enjoyable.

I’m setting this entry to be posted on Friday at 12:10 because that’s when my flight should we arriving in Croatia!!

so so so excited. I’m spending my fall break in Dubrovnik, Croatia with my friend Wil.  It’s going to be warm.  and awesome.  and THE BEST.

BERLIN. too cool.  If I ever wanted to leave New York permanently, I would probably come here.  Cute cafes, nice people, good art, interesting history, and there were so many people my age around - something that I’m not finding in Prague.

After taking out night train Wednesday night/Thursday morning, we got to our chill hostel The Odyssey in a very rainy Berlin.  We did what anyone else would with such a day in a such a city and spent some the morning in a cafe.  Amanda and I spent a good amount of time in cafes over the weekend.  The rain stopped so we strolled along cute streets and stumbled upon some of the sights we wanted to see like the missing house and the cemetary along Grosse Hamburger Strasse, the New Synagog (who’s story is really fasinating), and ”Museum Island.”  Then we (obviously) went to another cafe, took a nap, and had an awesome awesome fondue dinner.

wait sorry… i have to run out the door now and can’t finish this now, but I’ll update and talk more about Berlin when I get back! Promise!

Last week Amanda spent the week with me in Prague; it was really nice showing someone around.  It reminded me how beautiful this city is - especially the blue skies and picturesque clouds which I really believe only exist here - and how lucky I am to be here experiencing everything.

I didn’t realize how busy my week was until Amanda came here!  Although I had classes and rehearsals and practicing to do, I still managed to show her a good time in Prague.

After my Monday classes and lunch at Bohemia Bagel (a comfy Americanized restaurant/cafe), Amanda and I headed near Charles Bridge to experience the Lennon wall.

This wall has been constantly graffitied by young people with messages about peace and freedom since Lennon’s death.  Pretty cool when you think about what this must have been like when Prague was under communist rule.  Apparently the police painted over the wall a few times, but it would shortly be recovered with Lennon inspired graffiti.  “The Lennon Wall represented not only a memorial to John Lennon and his ideas for peace, but also a monument to free speech and the non-violent rebellion of Czech youth against the regime. It was a small war of Czech people against the communist police who cleaned the wall.” We, like most people who visit the wall, made a contribution.

When we got there Amanda told me it  wasn’t quite what she expected.  She thought I was calling it the Lenin Wall.

That was the only sightseeing we did in Prague.  Amanda’s been here before, so I didn’t feel too guilty about it.  The two of us spent most of our time just hanging out.  We stopped in a Turkish tea house for an hour or so, and another day we made it to the Letna Beer Garden.  This beer garden is relativly close to my apartment and is in a beautiful park on top of the hill in Holesovice.  Its an easy climb to the top, and the view is stunning.  Up there we looked through some books I got at my school library about Berlin and began to plan our trip.  (I’ll try to write about berlin soon!)

Its snowing in Prague!

Two weekends ago, a few of my friends and I made our way to Munich to attend the legendary Oktoberfest!  Well, I totally raised the bar on the epic-ness of this beer festival by meeting my sister Amanda there!  Best weekend ever.

Oktoberfest was crazy crazy fun, smiling at every moment.  Munich knows how to throw a good party; thus I can’t recall every individual awesome thing that happened, but here are some highlights:

• Getting to the tents for the first time and being so overwhelmed and excited
• Walking around in the tent with a friend and making lots of new ones at every table we passed/”prost!”ed
• Hearing ”Seven Nation Army” one too many times
• Going on the swings over Munich
• “The Hill”
• Seeing my sister!
• Coming back to the camp site (yes, I slept in a tent for a few days) to find a full out dance party and open bar (i.e. free cheap beer)
• Deciding to wait around for breakfast with another friend and making it into the tents before the friends that went breakfast-less
• Wishing I had a durndle
• Running into a few people from Cincinnati
• Being caught stealing beer steins and watching the security guard dance around with them
• Loosing and then meeting back up with the friends I came with
• Dancing
• Wishing I had a durndle
• Playing the “Prost!” game
• The Italians - especially the short one - near the band who appreciated my thick faux Italian accent
• Drinking with the crazy Brazilians at 10 am
• Sitting for a few hours with our German friends studying in Munich who are true “wankstas”
• Finding random NYU people
• “what happened to your arm?” “oh that’s ketchup”
• finding mustard all over my black jacket (and not being able to get it out a week later)
• Wishing I had a durndle
• Finding the same late night party at the camp site
• Being amazed that someone could ever (and would want to) chug a liter of beer
• Being amazed that someone could ever (and would want to) chug beer out of their shoe
• Wishing I had a durndle
• Having awesome sister time
• The ridiculous South Africans who unknowingly gave me their hat
• Eating the best food ever (sorry mom!)
• Watching Amanda and her new dance partner
• Long haired Italians and even more ridiculous ones

Ahh - there are way too many things to mention so I’ll just end it here :)

I only brought my camera on the last day I was there, but I still got some good pictures - flickr.

(Sorry I’m a bit behind!  Amanda was distracting me in Munich, Prague, and Berlin!!)

ah budapest.  how’d you get to be so awesome?!

If I go into too much detail this is going to be a novel.  I’ll just start of by saying that I went with three of my friends, and we were all really up for anything and positive about the trip which I think made a big difference.  Six of our friends booked their stuff a little later than we did, so they stayed in another hostel.  The four of us from my hostel would spend the days together and then all or 2 of us would meet up with the other crew at night.

FRIDAY: easy 7 hour bus ride, awesome hostel with everything we’d need and the nicest people working there, long lunch/dinner outside which left us perfectly content, constant photo ops while walking across the bridge and beside the river, meeting up with more nyu friends for a beer or two along the river, stumbling upon a park filled with young people laying in the grass and hanging out on a friday night, finding an awesome awesome club underneath the park - Gödör Klub, hearing/experiencing the coolest band Dreadzone at the club, taking the long trek home not being scared to be walking alone at night with only another girl

SATURDAY: waking up to breakfast and Steve at my hostel saying “morning Lisa! Do you want me to make you coffee?  latte?” running to get to our bike tour on time and then finding out that it was just the 4 of us on the tour, a ridiculously beautiful day which was experienced on a bike, seeing all the touristy sights and the backstreets of Buda and Pest with our personal tour guide Andrea (really I can’t stress how amazing this 3 hour part was), cheering for the long and random skateboard parade, getting a great lunch and coffee (and surprise! with ice cream in it) outside on a street filled with little restaurants, getting a blanket during lunch, climbing on Hero’s square, exploring city park and finding a beer garden with a live 1950s band, laughing at the hilariously awesome lead singer and wishing I could dance as well to the music like the people next to me who were 40 years older, hanging out for a few minutes at California Coffee shop and seeing starbucks art, meeting friends at their hostel, exploring my favorite bar in the whole entire world - Morrison’s (pub/beer garden, pool hall, club, karaoke bar in one), meeting a bunch of people from all over the place, karaoking ”papa don’t preach” and making new friends through it, getting lost and amazingly being able to find the other hostel and then being able to find the bar again, my friend and I deciding at 4.30 am that we should get back to our hostel, having the person that helped us find the tram come back to us after a few minutes to tell us which way to turn when we get off of the tram -seriously? so freaking nice, running into hilarious Italians - including the beautiful Caesar - on the street and having the most ridiculous conversation for over a half an hour

SUNDAY: waking up feeling surprisingly way too hung over and then realize that I’m just sick like fever sore throat sick (no good but i don’t let it ruin my day!!), visiting the beautiful St. Stephen Basilica during mass as the light was shining through the windows quite majestically, strolling through the streets of the city that the four of us had grown to really love, being confused why nothing cheap is open for lunch on Sunday near our hostel, having sandwiches and coffee at an “american style” coffee shop, coming home to the hostel and really feel like you were coming home, napping, going to the Széchenyi Baths at night and swimming while the sun went down, being directed to really yummy cheap hungarian food in some hole in the wall restaurant, having a chill night at the equally chill bar Szimpla, wishing i had my camera (even though i don’t really want to carry it around and be “that girl” taking pictures of the bar), getting cookies and watching Eternal Sunshine with the girls back at the hostel

MONDAY: waking up from a 2 hour nap at 5.30 to pack my stuff up, trying to not make any noise to wake everyone up, making a lot of noise by accident, figuring out the subway by myself and getting to the bus on time, saying goodbye for now to Budapest!

More photos on flickr!