No More Łódź

Dear Nathan,

This morning we checked out of the dorm and took a train to Warsaw. We did not do much sightseeing, however. We visited Warsaw before, a few weeks ago, and we are getting ready to be home (at least I am).

I spent the afternoon wandering the region near the hotel we are staying in. For dinner I got one last shaorma at Sphinx at the mall. You may remember this mall. I mentioned it in my post about Warsaw.



I was alone at dinner, since Philip and I made separate plans. However, it rained downporiously for my entire stay on the top floor of the mall. It was a nice show during dinner.

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Tomorrow around noon we fly out. If you weren't in Budapest for the next four months, I would see you soon.

I can slice a tomato with a fork.

It didn't turn out pretty, but the sandwich needed a tomato and our knives are gone.

Dear Katie,

Right now I am sitting in the room with Philip enjoying a room-temperature slice of pineapple-banana-cinnamon pizza. I just returned from Project Salsa, where I had my last class tonight. This morning Thomas and Nathan checked out and got on a train for Budapest. Last night we returned our borrowed dishes and silverware to Kasia, and as a result ate out instead of having Wine Wednesday. Yesterday morning we had our last meeting with Professor Wilczynski. He gave us some final feedback on our papers. We will work on them with Professor Humke when we return, though we will continue to be in contact with Professor Wilczynski.

Yesterday I also got a haircut in anticipation for the heat that is much more present in Minnesota than it is here.

This morning I packed almost everything up. I have enough clothing to keep me decent for the next several days before we leave, and my laptop is not stashed... but that's about it. I feel like I am about done here. It's exciting because I am ready to go. Our projects are as done as they will become in Poland and I miss a lot of things about home. Most importantly, various people and a strong presence of English literacy.

But I am also a little sad to go. I don't think leaving the math department will be that big of a deal, but I am sad to leave Project Salsa. For the last month I have done something like ten hours a week of salsa dancing. I went out dancing most evenings, as a result of the other guys' hesitance to leave the dorm. I have as a result spent a lot of time befriending the salsa dancing community here, particularly Ania and Gosia, my instructors. I may see people tomorrow night if Mojito has a salsa party, but typically Saturdays are the nights for that. And on Saturday night I will be in Warsaw, sleeping in a hotel in preparation for flying out Sunday morning.

Sunday night (to the extent that the term applies on the day I will gain 7 hours), however, I will hopefully land in time to see Joey's circus show. Shortly afterward I will be back on the cell phone grid for the first time since early June. And in the days and weeks following that I will be excited to see everyone, including you, again. As you have pointed out to me, this has been the longest time we have gone without seeing each other since we met.

Lunchtime!

Dear Dad,

I'm sure you are wondering, with posts only about dinner, what I eat for lunch here.



Of course that doesn't all go on one roll (I use at least two), but that's all that would fit on the plate.

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On Friday Professor Wilczynski took us on an excursion. We went to Łowicz and saw a museum. Then we stopped at a very old building. I'm not sure what to call it... it's not a castle but the word mansion does not do it justice. It is very well preserved and has itself been turned into a museum. We had been planning on going to see the Chopin museum at his birthplace but were prevented from doing so by several factors. The traffic to get there was insurmountable, and we found that they have concerts only on Sundays.

At the first museum, photos were not allowed. They would not have been so interesting anyway, I think; pictures of old stuff are just not as exciting as seeing the old stuff in person. Most impressively, I think, was the weapon room. They had swords about as tall as I am, as well as a cabinet of very old guns (which were so large and decorated I would be surprised if anyone could carry them).

I did take some pictures at the second destination.



The structure from the front. It was so surrounded by trees that it proved impossible to see the whole building from any angle.



Tons and tons of old furniture.



There were several rooms with just one color. This olive green one was less impressive than the red room, which was quite overwhelming.



The main (maybe) staircase had walls covered in these pretty blue on white tiles. Each tile is unique.



In the back yard there were some gardens. They served as a buffer, I guess, between the house and the park that filled the rest of the grounds.



Oh, and did I mention that this place has some canals? You could make some excellent solitons in them.

Just Saw Dark Knight

Or, as it is known here, Mroczny Rycerz.

It was intense. Very good. Holy cow.

Wine Wednesday Numer Osiem

Dear Grandma and Grandpa,

Last night was our eighth Wine Wednesday. We did not have one the first week we were here, which means that there is only one more (nine in ten weeks). I did not post right afterward because I headed off to the Dublin Pub again for salsa dancing. I was struck by irony while there; now that I am 21, and staying in Europe, I go to bars and order apple juice. This may be a special case, I suppose, since I go there to dance with my Project Salsa friends and not to drink.

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For dinner tonight I made something that I had not made before, although it was not really new and exciting. We had spaghetti with chicken. The first change is the chicken, which I had not done with pasta yet. The second change was that we used long noodles. In the past we have used shells, spirals, wiggles, and all sorts of other shapes based on availability.



We had a white Chilean wine. This week we chose the wine based on the bottle that looked good since we had nothing in mind when we went out to get it. The same was true last week, though I hope we come up with something exciting for our last Wine Wednesday next week. The wine was pretty good. It had an interesting taste to it in addition to the sweetness. Since the label said "Sweet Boa," we decided that the taste was probably a result of the wine being made of snakes.

Our frying pan is just about destroyed. It was low quality to begin with, and has seen almost two months of nightly use. It's to the point where I really don't want to use it anymore. Luckily, I only need to make about 4 more dinners in it. Sundays the groceries are closed so we eat out due to not having a fridge. Mondays and Thursdays I have salsa dancing during the dinner hour so the other guys fend for themselves. And next Friday Thomas and Nathan get on a train for Budapest to start their Hungarian language class. Philip and I will be here for another few days, we leave next Sunday, but I don't want to plan on the pan surviving for that long.