Krakow - Day 3

Sher:

Yeah I know... our titles of entries are really boring... but can't be helped. grinZ brain cells are meant for greater things than conjuring amusing titles. Besides... I'm not being cryptic for once... (yeah... friends you know what I'm talking about...) so appreciate that.

Underpass @ Krakow Główny - entire stretches of book-stalls, punctuated by pushcarts of - plain bread twisted into a ring with sesame seeds on it. It tastes quite normal.. but believe me, we saw so many people holding it... It must be a staple here or something...

I'm supposed to be covering the Jewish trail actually... but I decided to finish what I didn't finish for the Auschwitz-day entry; the happier stuffs =)

In Poland, you absolutely have to eat Lody (Ice Cream) cuz... it's much much cheaper! Flavour variety is almost like that of Gelato or Venetia's in Singapore... but while you pay almost $3 for a one-scoop ice cream, you pay just 1.4 - 2zl here! Then you get flavours like Whisky Cream (Twin tried that @ Stare Miasto in Warsaw), Pistachio, Praline, Orzech, Caramel, etc etc... There's even this blue one called Smerfy - yeps.. the shade of blue comparable to the blue skin of Smurf's! =) 2 happy girls with ice-creams. Calories? What's that? =P

Oh yeah... please do not disturb twin when the last wk of our adventure in Poland commences... cuz twin fully intends to lounge at home with big big tubs of cheaper but equally sinfully sedap ice-cream. =P

"Yum! Okie.. get that camera away!!! I am trying to enjoy my ice here!"

This is the fountain piece that I liked pretty much at the basement of the mall.

Found out that there's a Salsa Workshop going on at U Louisa at 9pm on the 2nd night. Decided to go check things out! Oh man... those girls are really hot.. and they can really work their bodies. Impressed... Salsa in Poland leans towards Cuban style as well... Body waves are like second nature to the Polish people... The confidence they ooze just cannot be missed.

Now for a little of our hostel... double bunk beds =) We're both taking lower bunks cuz nobody else is using the room just yet... 8-bunk room & 1st night? We had 3 of us girls. 2nd night, there was just me & twin in the big room with 8 beds... We were perfectly happy with how things were - and were prepared to praise the hostel to the skies cuz of its generous breakfast supplies, nice sheets/etc, good facilities, free internet etc... until the 3rd night happened...

The view from the top bunk. =) So on the 3rd / last night in Krakow... I happily climbed up to the top bunk... There're supposed to be new room mates.. but we're both hoping that those are party animals and will stay out till we're asleep. All I can say is... peace is never long-lasting... We were soon facing 3 very friendly people who wanted very much for us to join their drinking session... to which we politely declined... Sigh... I shall summarize the story into the following:

1. Being the centre of someone else's phone conversation w/o knowing what is exchanged

2. Building false security within a makeshift fortress and wishing there's a huge, wide and deep moat outside the fortress

3. Smiling and reducing speech

4. Photos and being squashed

5. 3 Men strutting around in underwear in a room with closed door

The view that greets me in my bed in the hostel every morning for 3 mornings. =) Yeps... we survived the night - quite uneventfully.

With that, I resume the entry I'm supposed to be doing...

Statue of Maria =) It's prob the wrong focus.. but I do very much like the halo of stars and the flowers that's part of the sculpture..

Kazimierz District - home to the Jews of sorts. This is where the trail begins. This part of Krakow felt quite different from the Rynek/Florianska/Tomaska area where our hostel was.

Tempel Synagoga. One of the 2 Synagogues in Krakow that's still being used for worship. THe others have by and large been transformed into museums housing Jewish history/ customs etc by now. I guess the Jewish population is greatly diminished... and there's a need for awareness for this rather prosecuted minority group.

It's a pity we didn't get to go in to take a look. I did very much want to.. but the place was locked up. Tourists like us lingered around with a touch of longing. Couldn't do very much about things.. so we moved on.

One of the Synagogues that's been transformed into a museum. I think this is the Izaaka Synagogue. I might sound rather unaffected... but I guess I'm really just coping with the fact that there were 3.3 million Jews in Poland before and over 3 million were killed in the Holocaust during WWII.

Btw, this museum's closed to the public on Saturday and Jewish holidays... it's be good to take note.

2 Jewish posters around. Both seem to suggest liberty to me.. In truth, though, I have no idea what they are about. =P

Pl. Bawoł. The thing about synagogues, is that they aren't very showy. Mostly, you can just walk past them without even realizing you're going past a synagogue... cept for little hints like in the iron grilles above. The star of David.

We did go into this synagogue which is also a museum for Jewish customs and holidays. I refrain from commenting on religion cuz it's really subjective. But, I'd just say that twin likes the Jewish holidays a lot cuz there's just so many... and some involves abstinence from work - like Sabbath. hehs and of cuz she especially likes those involving preparing and eating food. =P

There was a room dedicated to the Jews who had special accomplishments in their lifetimes... be it in teaching, medicine, arts, or religion. Then you stop to wonder... what were the Nazis thinking when they felt that Jews were inferior as a race and have to be exterminated to make way for their Aryan race...

Jewish Memorial outside Pl. Bawoł.

A flea market of sorts. The stalls are being set up as we walked around... It was on Sunday (next day) when we returned to it, that we saw the market in full glory. Heh pity we were too busy being enchanted by kids' clothing to take photos. =P

Which reminds me... there's a eating place here.. and the food did look quite good. Unfortunately, we weren't hungry at all... so we had to give it a miss. Next time maybe? hehs

Spring is coming!!!

Sign of the Warsaw Rising (Aug 1944) - PW. As usual, I leave all things abstract open to your imagination.

Sights in Rynek Główny - town square.

Top Left: Bazylika Trójcy Swietej
Top Right: Twin beaming after chasing after balloons for kids =P

Bottom Left: Bazylika Mariacka
Bottom Right: Cloth Hall or Sukiennice (elaborated in another entry)

Bazylika Mariacka had a sign at the entrance that said "For prayers only" - so no pictures of the interior... but it was quite an experience... The interior of the church was a vision of splendor; Jesus on the cross against a blue painted sky of stars, biblical portraits, carvings, dim lights exemplifying the gold paint works, colorful stained glass panes...

Head of a fallen warrior - he's blindfolded. You'd wonder if there's significance to that... or is it simply part of the ritual with being killed at war. Today, amused teenagers scamper in and out of the hollow head to pose for photos.

I might get a little depressed if I were him.

Walls run all round Old town - the area around Rynek Główny. This little town is actually fortified - as you can see... The wall circling the town is supposed to be punctuated with 47 towers.

Today, I don't know how many are left... but this is the St Florian's Gate... with 2 towers at the sides. The eastern tower belonged to the haberdashers, whilst the western one was manned by the carpenters. I don't think anyone really mans the place now... but the legacy remains...

Food will most certainly not be left out of the entry that closes the Krakow chapter for 2 of us.

Dinner was the above! Yep we challenged the ultimate creamy cake. Surprise surprise! The cream actually tastes like strawberry ice-cream that is not cold. All the same, I'm glad we shared this slice... it's a little too sweet to be consumed whole. Then again, most creamy cakes in Poland are rather sweet...

Grin I know... this picture is totally irrelevant. I just wanted to highlight that they actually have LAKSA in Poland. Er... I havent tried it.. but neither of us felt quite compelled to give it a chance, given the disappointment that would set in if it's not quite the same...

Heh Another non-sequitor kind of picture... I just thought the cow reminded me of a certain card... haha jas, do you think it's the same cow? =P

Street performance @ the St Florian's Gate.

And then, I was just snapping pictures like nobody's business - of places we didn't visit. =P

Top Left: The Tourist Information Booth - I think we grew tired of these booths... got our maps from the hostel =)

Top Right: The memorial + maze that I didn't take a closer look of.

Bottom Left: Unknown and Uncharted Territory

Bottom Right: The train station. This we did visit - for peron/platform information etc etc... =)

The final picture in the entry shall be about Regrets.

STEVE REICH AND PHILIP GLASS IN CONCERT!!! Sobs.. it's on the 27th... when we have left. It's just not meant to be...

Krakow - Wawel Castle

HL:

After the depressing trip to Auschwitz, and a good night's rest, we decided to visit Wawel Castle - well after all, it is one of the few recommended sights in Krakow. We had already seen it on the first day when we went in search of our concert tickets...but did not manage to go up cos it was too late already.

So the day started with a pleasant surprise - a lot of food for breakfast bright early in the morning. =) Even though the amount seems insufficient, it actually is cos few people are staying in this hostel (it is still undegoing renovations and this is not the peak travel season as well). So we happily helped ourselves to it before stepping out to Wawel.


After a short walk (the location of our hostel is really prime man), we reached Wawel (in the background). It was a bright and sunny day! Its quite good cos just yesterday when we were at Auschwitz, gosh you should see the rain!

Another picture of the Wawel Castle, cos the previous picture could not display the top of the castle. Assure you the weather was good despite the threatening grey clouds in the sky. =)

Unlike monuments and sights in Hungary, its neighbour, this castle is definitely older than 100 years! Despite the wars, this castle managed to survive. Were it in Warsaw, perhaps now it may still be undergoing massive reconstruction efforts! Cos unlike Krakow, Warsaw was flattened by the Nazis during the 2nd world war to quell the uprising efforts of the Poles.


The way up the hill. Twin is happy because of the good weather =) You prob cannot see but it is a longer way up than the picture suggests! By the way, can you see the signs of spring on the trees already? The weather is no longer as cold and leaves are already starting to sprout on the trees! Pretty! (Maybe this is another reason why twin is so happy - no need to wear thermals liao hahah)


Outside the gate onroute to the castle. =) Seriously, I think that we are the only Asians around. Somehow.


Well. the first corner that greeted us was the ticket office =) We wanted to go for a guided tour ard the castle, after all this is the most visited place in Krakow!, so we went to buy tickets. Sadly, the tickets for the state rooms and the garden grounds were not available. Think they closed the state rooms for cleaning and the gardens probably for pruning?

When we first walked into the castle, the first sight that greeted us was the cathedral and its museum, as well as the royal tombs. =) I think that the cathedral needs tickets to go into haha, and we wonder if they cost money...Anyway, we just went into the cathedral (no one checked for tickets!) without any tickets and looked around for a short while without taking photos. All the time, I was just telling twin that all the tombs are royal tombs. Haha! Actually, I think she took me with a pinch of salt...


Aren't the grounds pretty? All the white patches you see on the ground are actually flowers in bloom! =)



WOnders if twin was bored already. Anyway. upon turning left before the pretty flowers, we reached the armory place. It also has an admission ticket but this time, we did not sneak in =) Anyway. we were here mainly to find the royal apartments which we would be visiting before it was time so that we dun get lost and reach late. Its just up ahead from this point by the way. =) But can see from the pillar that Wawel castle is not the kind of castle that is lavishly and very expensively decorated...it seems more of a functional castle.


At the same place.. the courtyard. The pipes above on the roofs are shaped like dragons =) Can you see? The four sides of the roof are surrounded by these pipes, its really quite cool =)


See the openness of this courtyard! Haha, twin was just saying that no one could have a rendezvous in this place man. The whole palace could just look down and stare at the couple haha! Guess the gardens are a better place? Anyway, the courtyard is big enough to be a town square...like the old town square back in Old town in Warsaw.


Twin likes this clock =) Oh when we went for the royal apartments tour, we found out that the Poles like French clocks! Most of their clocks came from there! Wonder if this came from France too...But ya, its pretty isn't it? It looks like Christmas to me! Anyway this clock is from the cathedral!

We couldn't take picture during the tour therefore I guess the tour will be in words and no pictures. Basically both twin and I felt that the tour was a little brief. THe lady guide was basically telling us information on the art pieces of the rooms like who painted this and where he was from, rather than the people and their history...like who stayed in this room, what was he in the history of Poland or something. However, because of this, we learnt that most art pieces and deco came from other nations like Italy and France (esp the clocks...there was even a shiny golden one!). But they do use local products like Polish marble =)


After the tour, at my insistance? We went to look at the Vistula river. And this is the big bend, I think the biggest bend of the river in Krakow. BY the way, this river runs along Warsaw too! Separates our home and school haha! So we get to cross it everytime we want to go to school.


I wonder why but I always think that this kind of trees are pretty.


Twin is sleepy le I tell you =) Anyway, the wind was really really strong!


Another nice nice shot of the river =)


Ok this is seriously cool! You saw the river? They were all taken at the Dragon's Den which leads down to this dragon you see in this photo. SO this dragon is actually facing the river. And every 5 mins or so, the dragon will spew flames in the direction of the river. But the cool part about this whole thing is that the dragon actually spews fire. And we didn't think much of it, until we finished the scenery photos and were preparing to leave when from the corner of her eye, twin caught the ends of the flame. Thats when we starting camping there to wait for the dragon to spew fire. What a big sacrifice...standing still among the blasts of cold wind...


The signs that spring is coming. You see beautiful flowers blooming =)


This is a music records shop in the castle selling even old records! Those big big LDs! Hehes but mostly on the classical side...


You know the walk walk see see and must sit down eat something? =) We had a big breakfast so we weren't hungry, but we were still tempted by the idea of eating something nice in a warm place =) The lady at the counter was very nice. =)


And this is the cake with apple =) It looks like apple pie and tastes like apple pie =)


And this is the soup with meatballs. Seriously not what we expected. We were thinking of some thick soup with humongous meatballs. But this is good too, cos it tastes like Chinese cooking hehehes!


So with that, we ended our tour of the Castle. =) Will come back again for the state rooms =) I want to see!



Ending off with the last things we saw upon leaving the castle....The afternoon was spent on a Jewish walking trail..shall leave twin to cover it =)