About 15 minutes before arriving in Prague, we stopped at a traditional Czech food restaurant. I got potatoes, a dish that tasted like vegetables and meet soaked then cooked in oil, delicious mushroom soup, and raspberry trifle. I really liked everything I got, but it was definitely too much food! Soon after lunch we reached Prague; it was very cold and windy during our guided tour. We walked around the grounds of the Prague Palace, crossed a Bridge over the river, an then continued to the main square.
On Tuesday we woke up at 5:50, were down in the lobby at 6:30 for breakfast, and left around 7:00. On the way we stopped at a gas station to exchange money. It was interesting because it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere, but there was a miniature theme park, a store that looked like a castle with a giant dragon and wizard on top, a restaurant inside of an airplane, and a big world. The theme park seemed pretty vacant and the gate was open so we explored a little bit. Apparently you can buy your own tokens, insert them into the ride, and operate the ride by yourself. After we began driving again, Olya asked who wanted to go on the boat ride. We had the option to ride a boat in either Budapest or Prague but I hadn't planned on going on any boat rides because of the extra cost. However, the more I got thinking about it, the more I thought about how much I would like to experience a dinner boat ride down the river in Prague. So both Kristina and I decided to go. About 15 minutes before arriving in Prague, we stopped at a traditional Czech food restaurant. I got potatoes, a dish that tasted like vegetables and meet soaked then cooked in oil, delicious mushroom soup, and raspberry trifle. I really liked everything I got, but it was definitely too much food! Soon after lunch we reached Prague; it was very cold and windy during our guided tour. We walked around the grounds of the Prague Palace, crossed a Bridge over the river, an then continued to the main square. After the tour, we had about an hour before our boat ride so we explored the main square a little bit, went inside a church, and made our way to dock 6. The main layer of our boat was indoor with tables, a buffet bar, a bathroom, and a small staircase that led to the top deck. There was lot of traditional Czech food at the buffet. I had potatoes, ham, cheese, salad, bread dumplings, fried cauliflower, lots of French fries, chocolate covered cookies with some type of cream, and chocolate covered cookies with mouse on top. I really like all of the food! The river was gorgeous with the building lights reflecting into the still water. After we ate, we went onto the top dock. It was very chilly, but such a pretty view; i'm really glad we chose to do the boat ride. Eastern Europe is so beautiful!
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After a great day in Budapest, we woke up the next morning at 6:00 a.m., loaded our stuff on the bus by 6:45, at breakfast at 7:00, and were pulling out by 7:45. It was about a 3 hour drive to Vienna and we arrived at around noon. While we waited for our tour guide, many people from our group went to find the bathroom in the metro, Kristina and I needed to find an ATM to pull out Euros so we tagged along. Luckily there was one and I couldn't believe how clean and beautiful the metro was. Vienna is very wealthy and keeps their city extremely neat, clean, and orderly; it’s so much different than Kiev! Our tour guide was an older man with wild white hair. He showed us main points around Vienna like the Hofburg Palace, then afterward many of the people in our group went to eat dinner. The restaurant we ate at served the same classic Viennese food to everyone. First we were given bread with a soup (I am used to water with a little oil and cooked vegetable soup, so this soup was extremely flavorful and absolutely amazing). Next was the main dish, schnitzel, potatoes, and cabbage. I've never had schnitzel before, but I really liked it. Apparently ours were veal, but they kind of tasted like giant chicken nuggets. Everything was SO yummy! Finally we were given something similar to apple pie for dessert. After dinner Kristina, Alysha, and I wanted to go to St. Stephen's Cathedral and look inside. On our way I saw a little shop that sold macarons. They had all different colors and looked so delicious so we went inside and bought a small pack of them to share. I chose salted caramel and hazel nut. We decided to save them until later, because we were all so full. The Cathedral was very beautiful and peaceful inside. St. Stephen's was completed in 1160! It amazes me that something so large could have been constructed at such an early date. I love visited different churches. They are all so different and beautiful. Kristina has been to Vienna before, and wanted to try to find a street market she really liked. We found a place to look at the directions then searched on the map for the specific streets. We were trying to find the metro and asked a random man on the streets. Kristina tried talking to him, but because he had head phones in just starred at her. He finally started talking to us, and the first thing he asked was if we were from Afghanistan. We laughed and said no, from America, and Alysha said Canada. We showed him the map and told him where we wanted to go. He said that it was close enough to walk rather than ride the metro, and explained that there were a lot of “terroristy” things to see over there. We corrected him by saying “touristy” but he laughed and said, “If you’re from Afghanistan you should know all about “terroristy”. We laughed then started walking to find the market. We finally made it there. Kristina was so happy to be back to a place she was at only a couple years ago. Apparently there were a lot of Turkish immigrants that came to Austria, so most of the stands were Turkish foods. The air was filled with a mixture of spices, and all kinds of food. Each vendor we passed tried to get us to sample and buy their food. One man wanted us to catch the sample in our mouths so both Kristina and I caught one. When it was Alysha's turn, he walked over to her and daintily place it in her mouth; it was the strangest thing. Kristina has been going on about how I need to try baklava, a layered pastry with honey inside, falafel, squished beans that are deep fried, and a duna which I tired in Germany because I was way too full! I really enjoyed both the baklava and falafel. Because we were tired of people asking us to eat their food, we deiced we would say something random that sounded like a completely different language, so they would stop talking to us. The next time someone asked us to try their sample Alysha turned and said something random and so did I. The vendor looked so confused and Kristina and Alysha couldn't stop laughing, i wish we would have gotten it on video. After the market, we saw the top of St. Charles Borromeo Church and decided to try and make our way there. This was probably one of my most favorite places. We didn't go inside because there was a fee, but the outside was absolutely gorgeous! We had a lot of fun posing in front of this church. After having so much fun at St. Charles Borromeo Church we began making our way back to the group meeting place so we could see all of the buildings lit up. There was one church we could see in the distance that I would have liked to see up close, but unfortunately we didn't have enough time to walk over there. Because we had a long way to get to Prague, we didn't sleep in Vienna we drove back to a small Hungarian city. By the time we got there, all I wanted to do was sleep. It is very tiring walking around so much. This week has been amazing! I have never traveled in a bus for so long, or seen so many places in such a short amount of time. It was definitely a new experience for me to travel this way, and I loved every second. Because there are so many pictures to show and stories to tell, I am creating a separate post for each city. Forgive me for not having them all posted at once; I promise I am working on them and will get them up soon. Enjoy! Saturday morning Kristina and I loaded up our bags, met the rest of our group, exchanged some money, and found our way to the blue, double-decker bus; this was our home for the next 8 days. Both of our seats were located on the bottom level. After all the passengers had boarded, our bus pulled out of the station and we were off! What do you do for nearly 24 hours on a bus? I talked to Kristina and other girls on the bus, listened to music, practiced Spanish, slept, read scriptures, sat, tried to sleep more, and ate. The bus would stop about every few hours for bathroom breaks and food stops. At about 8:00 p.m. we stopped at a place to eat dinner. We were told it was only about 15 minutes to the border. There was going to be a gas station where we could exchange money, then soon after that we would need to get our passports out. Because I thought it was so close, I left my boots on. After about an hour of waiting and not getting to the border I gave up and took of my shoes, got out my blanket, and went to sleep. The bus driver turned on the lights when it was time to get out our passports. A Ukrainian lady entered our bus took all of our passports, they checked the luggage, stamped our passports, gave them back to us, then let us go through. After making it past the Ukrainian border, we had to go through the Hungarian security. We were told to get off the bus and line up outside. There was a long line of people from our bus waiting to get their passports stamped. I was so tired and cold; it seemed like we were standing out there for so long! When I finally got to the front of the line, the man took my passport and tried scanning it. The light kept turning red instead of green. He tried several times then finally sent me to the man at the other window. I was beginning to get nervous but luckily he finally stamped it and let me through. We sat on the bus for a long time after that while they checked several bags of luggage. It took about 2-3 hours total to get through both border patrols. I woke up around 8:30 a.m. and we were finally almost to Budapest! That was the longest time I have ever consecutively ridden in a vehicle (nearly 24 hours)! Budapest is one hour behind Kiev so we gained an extra hour. The first place we went was the Szechenyu Spa (the biggest spa in Budapest) I think there were about 28 different pools. Olya, the foreign coordinator that came with us, gave us all bracelets that we scanned to let us into the spa. There three big pools outside and a lot of saunas, smaller pools, and steam rooms inside. The first sauna we went into was so extremely hot! We sat down and quickly jumped up because it was burning so badly! Outside was a small but deep pool of cold water, you are apparently supposed to go back and forth for the cool pool to the hot sauna. My favorite sauna was one that was filled with a pine scent. I wanted to stay in there for a lot longer than we did, but it was a very popular room and we figured we should leave so others could sit down. When we entered one steam room we couldn't see anything. After sitting down, we realized that we were in a room with a bunch of old men. Due to the fact that I couldn't breathe and that I didn't exactly feel very comfortable in there, we left pretty quickly. Once we went back outside, the sun was shining. The rest of the time we relaxed in the pools outside and took pictures. I was so grateful we did the spa first; it was a perfect way to recover from a very long bus ride. After the spa, it was time for our guided tour. Budapest is spilt into two different parts Buda and Pest. Pest is the more modern half and is where we began. An English guide showed us around the center of Pest. In Hero’s Square there were large wooden block letters that spelled out Budapset. Apparently they are only staying for about 12 days, so it's cool that we got to see them. Our guide also took us to Vaidahunyad Vaiz Castle where we took a lot of pictures and looked around; it was so beautiful! After about an hour we met back at the bus and drove to Buda. I was trying so hard to stay awake, but kept falling asleep; I was so exhausted and it was only our first day. We were dropped off near a large church, the Parliament Building (where the President used to live), and close to the chain bridge. After a short walking tour we were free to explore; the view was gorgeous! The whole day the weather had been really warm, but during our free time it began to get really windy and by the time we got back on the bus was lightly raining. The bus took us then took us to our hotel where we unloaded our bags and were let free to do whatever we wanted. Kristina and I were assigned to share room. It was the cutest little hotel room and was actually really nice and modern looking. I felt disgusting and quickly hopped into the shower while Kristina figured out how to get to St. Stephen’s Basilica. Once I was out of the shower we got ready and on our way out two other girls from our group wanted to join us. We found our way to the metro and eventually to the Basilica. I can’t describe how large it was! We wanted to go inside and it happened to be during their mass. I've noticed that there are usually candles lit in the Cathedrals which gives them the same smell. It was interesting to watch the priests and congregation. The architecture was unbelievable! Once we left the church, it was lightly raining outside. We walked around for a few minutes trying to find a place to eat. We decided to eat at a place called Jack Burgers. A cheeseburger and French fries sounded so delicious! After ordering, there were only two open seats, but they were at the same table as another group of people. Kristina and I sat there, but it was really awkward. The whole time we dreaded biting into the burger that was bigger than our mouths in front of all the people at our table. Once I did though I couldn’t believe how tasty it was! After eating we made our way to the chain bridge. On the way we passed through city streets. It was like a dream come true walking on small lit up European streets, enclosed by tall skinny buildings full of shops and restaurants. The view from the bridge was gorgeous! There are about eight bridges that cross the river and we could see three of them from where we were. The two girls we were with wanted to walk around for about another two hours and because our feet hurt and we were tired, Kristina and I decided to leave them and head back. We got to the metro just fine, but it was then that we realized that we didn't remember where we started. We spent nearly 3 hours getting on and off wondering where to go. We didn't have the address to our hotel, my phone was dead, we were exhausted, and had no idea what to do. I have never felt so lost, scared, and helpless. We asked a woman to help us and her son let us borrow his iPhone to message Alysha and Solana on Facebook. Unfortunately neither of the answered. The lady mostly spoke Hungarian, but eventually found someone who spoke English on the phone. We finally decided to ride to the second to last stop the other direction to see if that was right. When we exited the metro it did not look familiar, so we went to the other side and saw the bus stop we had started at! I have never felt so much relief! You'd think after getting lost so many times in Kiev we wouldn't trust ourselves to find the way back on our own. I don't think either of us will ever go anywhere without being more prepared though. After a long day it felt amazing to lay down in my cozy little bed and fall asleep. Budapest is gorgeous! I loved the feel of the streets, architecture, and overall beauty. I definitely want to come back here someday. So many things have been happening! Monday the 10th was one of our days off, so we decided to take a day trip around Kiev. We visited St. Michael's Monastery, and St. Sofia's Cathedral; they were both beautiful! The Sunday before that one of our host family's friends gave us his really nice camera to use for awhile so we brought it along with us on our little adventure and had a lot of fun taking photos! Sunday we visited babushka's house. She has a massively large cat that we loved playing with. This week I witnessed one of the most life-changing experiences. Thursday afternoon our foreign coordinators and head teacher took our group to Maidan to see downtown Kiev. I have explained in previous posts that the political unrest and protesting reached it's peak about two weeks ago. The president of Ukraine has stepped down, the protesting in Kiev has now stopped, and they are planning on have re-elections in May. It was unbelievable walking around the main square and seeing where all of the violence took place. Surrounding buildings were destroyed, the streets were ripped up, the air smelt like camp-fire, and barricades blocked off the streets. People had placed flowers, candles, flags, pictures, and memorials to pay respect and show remembrance to those who were killed; there were thousands of flowers everywhere! It was a solemn and humbling day. The sights I saw helped me to take a step back and remember a broader view on things. When you see the results of such a tragedy, the problems you experience in your personal life suddenly don't seem so large. As I was leaving the place where most of the people were killed, I saw two young girls standing over a picture of a man that had been surrounded by flowers. They held each other and just sobbed, I couldn't help but get a little emotional; it was heartbreaking. I was immediately reminded that when you feel life is too difficult and nothing seems to be going the way you had hoped, there is always someone who has it worse than you. We can all find simple beauties to be thankful for each day of our lives. Big and small blessings come to us always, we just need to take the time to notice them and be grateful. It's interesting to think that had I not been in Ukraine at this time, all of this wouldn't have seemed like such a big deal to me. I'm sure I would have felt bad, but then soon forgotten and gone on with my daily life. Being here while all of this is going on, seeing the way these people have been truly affected has changed my perspective forever. I will never again take for granted the freedoms and safety I have always be given. God bless Ukraine. Here is a short clip I took we while were at the center. It's weird to think that another week of teaching has gone by. This week we switched rooms again and I started teaching drama and arts and crafts. Like I've said before, it's nice to have a variety of subjects to teach and to move around. I'm loving my kids more each day and love seeing the improvement in their English. I have enjoyed the time I have had so far with them and also getting to know the other great teachers I work with. On Friday Kristina was teaching Pre-k, and was trying to get the kids to say Hakuna Matata. I couldn't help but catch it on video; they are just too cute! Kristina has been getting hiccups a lot lately, and it makes me laugh every time! She just happened to get them during class today and little Alyssa thought it was the funniest thing. Her little giggle gets louder after each hiccup. Saturday was International Women's Day. Apparently our host family only eats "sweets" all day long! I have never felt so sick... too much chocolate is not good for you! As most of you already know, this week was very special for me. I had been expecting my call to arrive at some point, but it was difficult not knowing when it would be here. My guess was it would come either Wednesday or Thursday which meant I wouldn't realistically be able to open in until Thursday or Friday my time. After teaching on Wednesday, I figured the mail arrives around 10 a.m., but that my mom would be working until 12:00, so I wouldn't know if it was here until 9:00 p.m.. I waited in anticipation and was only about an hour away of hearing from my mom when the power went out. The internet connection was cut off leaving my hanging the whole night. I set an alarm at 2:00 a.m. to check my phone, and when I did saw there was a messages saying it hadn't come. The next day was the same thing; I waited to hear from my mom. Around 9:00 I received a text saying, "Kate, this is Chris. Guess what I have?" I turned to Kristina and started screaming! It was such a strange feeling knowing my call was finally here. I told my family that I wanted to open it once my dad was home from work and to plan on 5:30 p.m. At 2:00 in the morning my alarm went off and I quickly got things ready to skype. I may have mentioned this in a previous post, but our bathroom gets better internet connection than our room and is kind of like our place to go if we want to be alone, so that is where I had planned to open my call. Once I was ready to skype, I woke Kristina up. It turns out that my dad wasn't home from work yet, so I brought our pillows and blankets into the bathroom and we sprawled out on the floor while I talked with Alyssa. My dad and I had a whole plan schemed out, so once he got home from work, he opened my call (without looking), scanned it, and emailed the file to me. He then placed my call back in the envelope and when I was ready I logged onto my email and read my call to everyone. Right before I began reading I started shaking and became really nervous. For a moment I just wanted someone else to read it to me, but I finally pulled up the file and before I could even finish reading the first sentence, my eyes were drawn straight to the words, "You are assigned to labor in the Chile, Concepcion Mission." The next thing I looked at was the day I would be leaving, "You should report to the Mexico Missionary Training Center July 16, 2014. You will prepare to preach the gospel in the Spanish language." I'm not sure how to explain the way I was feeling at this moment. I was no longer shaking and immediately knew that Chile is where I need to go. There was no disappointment, no fear, and no anxiety. Peaceful is perhaps the best way to describe my feelings at that time. It may have been strange that I was unable to hold the envelope with my call inside, and rip it open myself. It was definitely a unique experience compared to what one usually imagines for opening their mission call and I would have loved my family to have been right by me to share such a special moment, but I wouldn't change the way things happened. It is interesting to consider the way different experiences can alter the way you perceive things. Because I wasn't physically with my family, I felt their support even more and have realized how fortunate I am to have been blessed into such a wonderful family. I realized how grateful I am for technology and the way my dad was able to scan and send me my call clear across the world by the simple click of a button. I can log onto a computer or my phone and talk with my entire family. I am constantly being blessed and being here has helped me to realize that. I apologize for not having a lot of pictures from this week, but on Saturday our host family took us to Pyrohiv Park to celebrate Maslenitsa. Pyrohiv Park is a village from early settlers of Kiev. We were able to go inside old houses, an old church, and walk around the village. Throughout this week they eat a lot of pancakes (crepes), so we packed a lunch of chocolate crepes, cream cheese, jam, and tea. There were a lot of food stands and people to celebrate. Sunday was amazing as always; fast Sunday has a special spirit. Our small branch has mostly couple missionaries, and a few families from the Embassy, and they all have such strong testimonies. I have learned so much from each one of them just in the short time I have been here. After sacrament meeting, the Mission President asked if I'd meet with him in his office for a few minutes. He congratulated me on my call and offered some advice that could help in preparation for my mission. I was so grateful that he was willing to share his wisdom with me; everything he had to say touched and inspired me to put forth every effort I can in preparing so that I may be the most effective missionary once I'm in the field. I know that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the true church upon this Earth and I will proudly stand as a witness and testify of Jesus Christ.
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Author“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” Archives
December 2015
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