Getting into Prague Life

I'm writing this post while consuming a somewhat late breakfast of toast and beet/grapefruit/lime juice that I just made a few minutes ago. Despite the fact that it's almost 9:00 and I'm just now eating breakfast, I've actually been up since a bit after six. Around 7:00 I went for a run in the local park. Can I please be this motivated every day?

I've been pretty busy these last few days. I moved to Prague last Friday. Since then I've been roving around with Jaye, learning how to get around town through the transit system, where to shop for groceries and clothes. On Monday I met one of the families I will be tutoring for and then managed to navigate my way home. Yesterday I went to actually tutor the mother for an hour. By the time I got home it was about noon and so hot that I could hardly stand it. I made some lunch and tried to work up the courage to go back outside. I really can't tolerate heat. I don't like sweating and I prefer weather to be no higher than 75F. It was so hot that I debated with myself for quite awhile on whether or not I wanted to make my planned trip to the mall to buy tanktops to wear in the heat.

Finally I sucked it up and headed to the bus stop. Getting to the mall I went to is pretty easy as it's just one bus. Getting back is a little more tricky, however, because only every other bus actually goes all the way up the hill to where my bus stop is. Sadly, on this particular day, I forgot that. But it was fine. I just had to wait outside for another 10 minutes or so.

I actually had two missions at the mall yesterday. One was to buy tank tops, which I found at H&M on sale for 70C (less than 5USD!!). The other was to get price estimates on roller blades. You see, the park by my house has a really nice paved path for bikes and roller blades. And on the weekend there are so many people out having fun and roller blading that I really wanted to attempt it myself. I'm currently looking for a used pair, but I haven't had any luck and I would like to get a hold of them soon so I have time to put them to good use. I've managed to find a few pairs for about 60-70USD but most of them are more like 100-150USD. I'm not sure how I feel about dropping that much money after just having spent that on a phone....

Before I went on my actual shopping spree, however, I decided I was in dire need of caffeine. There was a Costa Coffee (England's number one coffee chain!) in the mall, so I stopped in there for a bit. I sat at a table and doodled some. It felt so good to just be able to draw without pressure. I didn't feel guilty like I should be doing something else, like studying, but I also didn't feel like I was just forcing myself to draw for the sake of drawing, which is how I've felt for about the past month. So yeah, that was really great! After I'd been sitting for a bit, one of the baristas came around with a tray giving out lemonade samples. It was awesome.

I had such a good time being out yesterday that I'm going to attempt the same this afternoon if the weather holds. Apparently it's supposed to rain a bit today or tomorrow. This is only a concern because the only way to cool down the apartment is to open the windows and pray for a breeze.

Now that I'm a bit more settled, I'm going to attempt to keep this more regularly!

Getting to York and the first two days

It’s been a crazy last two days. Three days? I still get my flying time mixed up. I last left off in JFK, where I was miserable being stuck in the arrivals section of the airport. It really wasn’t as bad as I made it out to be, I just don’t like JFK. Finally the time rolled around and I was able to head back to the baggage drop off. It took forever to make it through that line, and then I had to wait in the painfully long security line. I have never in my life had to wait to long, and I’ve been to a lot of airports. It was so crowded that this TSA woman came over and escorted a handful of us over to first class security so we could speed up getting people through. The first class lounge is sweeeeeet. Perfectly air conditioned, nice chairs, clean….. On the other side of security was an actually decent terminal. Apparently it was new. It was actually pretty nice.

My flight to Iceland, I was both amazing and awkward. Firstly, Iceland air is AMAZING. Best airlines I’ve ever flown. The first class seats were all named after Norse gods and the economy seats taught you Icelandic. You got complementary Icelandic spring water when you boarded, the blankets were actually warm and soft, and the pillows had little lullabys on them in English and Icelandic. This is the English:

Bye bye and hushabye

Can you see the swans fly?

Now half asleep in bed I lie

Awake with half an eye

Heyho and welladay

Over the hills and far away

That’s where the little children stray

To find the lambs at play.

I don’t know, I think it’s cute. I was stuck sitting in the middle seat in a row of three for the fiveish hours of the trip. The boys on either side of me were brothers and kept speaking Icelandic over me. Occasionally the one at the window seat would climb onto the seat and then step over me to go to the bathroom. It was weird. I tried to sleep most of the time.

My layover in Iceland was sadly pretty boring…. There not anything in the area of the airport. Outside is just barren land. . . I had a really good chicken tikka masala sandwich though.

Second flight was in better company. A young mother from Minnesota flying to meet her husband and his family in England. The baby was not just cute but also really well behaved!

After landing in England, it took FOREVER to get through customs. It was even more difficult than trying to get back into the US. After that I went to take the Picadilly Line to Kings Cross. Everything was going great. Then I found out the Picadilly Line was closed halfway through. So a guy came on, ushered us off the train and onto some busses. Then we drove through London. Which was actually pretty cool. Then we had to get back on the trains. By the time I made it to Kings Cross I was stressed and tired. I had planned to get my tickets for the 3:00 train as it was 2:20 and that would give me time to find Platform 9 ¾. However, when I bought my ticket the guy gave me one for the 2:30. At that time I had 5 minutes to run for the train. I had no idea where I was supposed to sit and I couldn’t read my ticket. I asked a woman in a station uniform for help and she was just like “look for an open seat.” Great. So the train was starting to make noise and I was running up and down the platform trying to figure out what to do. Finally she just told me to hurry and get on so I just got in the nearest car. Turns out my suitcase was too big to fit down the aisles so I needed to find a spot in one of the two cars on either side of where I got on. I finally did and sat down. Because of the rush, I hadn’t called Ellen. I used the 15 minutes of free wifi on the train to message her everywhere so I wouldn’t get stranded in York. After awhile, I was finally able to calm down again and enjoy my train ride. Across the aisle from me was a friendly Canadian couple who I talked with some.

I got to York in the end and got to see Ellen. We went back and had cottage pie for dinner. Then she gave me a tour of Heslington, which is the village her University is in.

On Monday we walked into York proper. We walked up and down nearly every street, went into the Minster, went to the train station and the museum, walked back to the city center, then to the supermarket, then home. I feel super fit. We got to see all the interesting places in York. The wall that surrounds the city was originally built by the Romans. The Minster ‘s stained glass is so old that all of it needs to be replaced.

We ate lunch at a local restaurant and got fish and chips. The place was packed with a group of German kids on a fieldtrip.

We did so much walking that both of us were terribly sore. Even today.

Today we went to Ripon, which is the town that the Crawley family of Downton Abbey are always visiting. Modern Ripon is, well, modern. And bigger. We got there pretty early and were freezing. While waiting for the bus to Fountains Abbey, a famous ruin, we looked around town. We got coffee from the nicest barista ever and ended up in the cathedral. Unlike the Minster, this one was actually still in use, though it was also a museum. We donated some pounds and walked around. There were a line of bishop statues or something that were in chronological order. It was interesting to see how their names represented the different groups in the area throughout the years.

After that we went to the Abbey ruins. They were beautiful. At first I thought it was just a tower and some other rooms, just like the Minster and other places we visited. Then we walked down the hill and into the valley, walking around what we could see to discover a vast collection of ruins. The ones we had see from the hill were just the most intact. Behind them were the remnants of what would have fit both of the other Cathedrals we had visited. It was really amazing. After having a picnic in sight of the ruins, we hiked the trails around them. Eventually we ended up at a deer park where we saw lots of awesome deer!!

Hello from JFK (AKA Hell)

Hello and welcome back to the Mina Diaries!

I am finally going on another adventure! And this time, adventure is actually a bit of an understatement. Today I left my house at 6:30AM to catch my first flight (of four today). Right now I am en route to visit a very good friend in York, England. I'll stay there for about 5 days before heading over to Prague, Czech Republic to house sit for another good friend. I'll be there for another 2 1/2 months or so before moving to Osaka Prefecture, Japan until December for a study abroad.

Today is my first day of traveling. It started off with a bang when the security stations at KCI were closed because the fire alarm went off. That was a fun experience. When I finally got on my plane, the captain came on to inform us that one of the air conditioner units on the plane was broken and someone was coming to look. They decided we would just fly without it (since everyone was on the plane already) and just fly lower because the cabin wouldn't be fully pressurized due to the air duct breaking. then there was another wait for a fuel truck to be brought out to insure that there was enough for the extra gas it would take to get to DC. We finally landed....and got to walk on the tarmac to the terminal because apparently there were no gates for us.

We land on time, amazingly, and I join a group of people from the flight running madly to catch our connector to NYC. We landed in terminal A and had to hop a terminal connector to terminal C, running to our gate at the far end of the terminal. On this flight there was a last minute maintenance check that left us all sitting on the tarmac an additional few minutes, making me regret having run all the way from the other side of the airport. Oh yeah, and we weren't at a gate again, so we boarded from the tarmac. I found out during this flight that United Airlines doesn't give free snacks like Southwest or Delta. I never thought I would hate an airline more than Delta, but I think United has claimed that spot. At least Delta has those yummy cookies.

When we landed at Hell JFK, we were escorted onto the tarmac again and into the terminal. Gates? What are those? At this point, I was officially done with my US airlines flights, so I had to go pull my bags out of baggage claim and go recheck them with Iceland Air. This is where things start to go wrong. For some reason, even thought I wrote down my flight time last night, both my mother and I got it in our heads that my flight was at 5:00 something. I tried to recheck my bags, but it turns out that my flight isn't until 8:00 something. This brings us to where I'm at now, sitting in JFK, my least favourite place in the entire world, for 8 hours. I can't even go through the gate to get decent food for another 4 hours or so. I would go out and see New York except I 1) have a ton of baggage, and 2) I hate NYC anyways.

After I finally get going, I'll have one more layover in Reykjavik, Iceland before landing in London, England. Not only will I get to see Heathrow but also King's Cross Station! I am super excited!