I have probably talked about this before, but it´s becoming an all consuming thought in my life - I have so much to learn! I need to relearn everything I ever learned in pre-university schooling, particularly history. I swear I learned nothing about history in school. And when I did, I learned it in a way that allowed me to forget it easily. It made no impression on me. History is generally taught in such an abstract "on this date so and so did this" blah blah blah that it makes little to no impact on the way people think or understand things. At least for me and many people I have talked to it hasn´t. I think relearning history was one of the main things that changed my course of thinking in college. Had I not learned about this untold history of US involvement in Central America, I might have stuck with psychology...But anyway. I just feel like I should be reading constantly because I don´t know so much. I need to learn about geography and languages and history and the World Wars and international law and domestic law and social change and so many other things. And economics. Bleh. Ugh. Ok, enough of that rambling. I fly out in less than a week. Holy crap!

Another whirlwind couple of days. I went to Den Haag two days ago and then Brussels yesterday. I barely had any time in either city which was a bummer. I tried to go to the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice. I knew that neither of them were in session. Of course they had to take a vacation right when I am coming. I was upset. But I figured that I would at least be able to see the courts themselves and have some context for understanding these bodies. But I wasn't able to see either of them! I was so upset. The International Court of Justice and the Peace Palace that it is housed in (which was donated by Andrew Carnegie strangely enough...need to know more about this...) was only open for tours and the next tour was going to be at three and I had a train to catch, so...Disappointing. And then the ICTY was just totally not open to the public. I guess I should have expected that given the hoops you have to go through to get accreditation at the UN, but I was hoping...So, yeah. I stayed at a very nice and clean hostel, saw some crazy ducks and baby ducks, one of which almost attacked me, and met a cool girl from Canada studying poli sci and interested in much of the same things I am. Oh and got stuck in the rain. The Netherlands. I've really been lucky with the weather so far, though, so I can't complain. Too much, anyway...Brussels: I checked into the hostel, which was a little ghetto, but oh well...Had dinner in the cafe in the hostel, which was not that great, but cheap and convenient. Walked around a bit, but then it looked like it was going to downpore, so I didn't want to get stuck in the rain twice in one day...I went to the botanical gardens and saw a beautiful church at the end of the street where I was staying. Then drank some Belgium beer, sent some emails and went to bed. This morning I thought I would have more time, but I misunderstood where my train to Frankfurt was leaving from. I really wanted to go into the center of Brussels (described by Victor Hugo as the most beautiful square in the world), but I was really nervous about missing my train to Frankfurt. I walked around near the train station though and saw a beautiful building and had SO MANY MEN cat calling me. It was so ridiculous and I really felt like screaming at them. Some of them were quite persistent and I was like, dude I don't speak French and I am so not interested. I was so angsty and pissed by the time I got done that I wanted to scream. Ugh! I mean honestly, do you think I care that you think I'm goodlooking? Keep your damn opinion to yourself! It doesn't make me feel good - it makes me feel like a piece of meat frankly. Ok, enough of that. I'm in Frankfurt now, got here this evening, so I will be checking out more of the city in coming days...It's very tall compared to the other European cities that I have been too. Many glass buildings and whatnot. The business world. It will help prepare me for NYC! Ok, time is running out!

Can we talk about how much I am stressing out about the future? How am I going to support myself? How am I going to find a place to live? How am I going to find a job? How am I going to get into a competetive grad program? AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I went running today, which was successful on my part. I said goodbye to Maia for the next couple weeks. Tomorrow FLOWERS ALL DAY. It's going to be amazing. Tuesday, Den Haag, Wednesday Brussels or Frankfurt...Should be interesting....

I have been going to see Maia play tennis for the last few days. Today, however, she didn't have any games. I tried to convince her to let me break her loose (she was complaining that the program is very strict), but I guess she wanted to hang out with her friends since she won't see them again in the near future, totally understandable. So, today I luxuriated in bed for awhile. Got up for breakfast and a mango smoothy, planned my day, then went back to sleep glamorously. It's very hard to sleep in the hostel because there are 17 other people in my room and people are always going in and out and rustling around and whatnot. So, I was overly tired and needed to catch up. Oh and I love sleeping. There's that as well...When I woke up again I went to the Van Gogh museum, which was cool, then laid in a park nearby and read my book. It's so good. It's called The Place at the End of the World. It's written by a journalist who goes into war zones and reports on the perspectives of the people who have no voice. Very informative, but readable, which is always good with a nonfiction book in my opinion. I often get bogged down and can't finish non-fiction books because they are so informative that I feel like I have to soak up ALL the knowledge contained in the book. Then I get frustrated because I don't progress with the book quickly and then I generally give it up halfway through or something. Ridiculous. I know. I just got through the Anne Frank museum. Oh the Holocaust. They had a cool movie thing at the end where it presented different rights - they were using the example of freedom of the press as an example and asking questions like if someone is promoting Holocaust denial, should that be cracked down upon. Basically it was looking at the balancing of rights. It was basic for me, but I think for other people, probably not. These might not be things that people generally think about. So, I was impressed by that. Tonight the hostel people are having a movie and discussion night - sounds good in theory. I thought it might be a God related movie, but no - they are watching and discussing Batman Returns...So bizarre. Not exactly what I was hoping for. So I am trying to avoid the place until then. But my dinner is there...So tomorrow I might try to go to the Dutch Resistance museum. I went to the war documentation center yesterday before going to Maia's game and they didn't let me in because I wasn't doing research. But I just wanted to look around and find out about their mission statement etc. Mmmmm war documentation. But oh well. So, the resistance museum may be kind of what I am looking for. Then I will head back to the tennis stadium. It's the last or second to last day of playing. Maia leaves the day after tomorrow. I am almost positive that I will be meeting a friend in Frankfurt and I'm not sure what the plan is from there. Things have gotten a bit confusing...We'll see what happens and I will keep everyone updated...since I'm obsessed with the internet at this stage in my life...

I am finding that Amsterdam is very specific. I think I would enjoy it much more if I was with friends, but alone it is kind of weird. It's really quite a party city. There are some very cool little shops, but I haven't gotten a chance to go into them. I have spent the majority of time figuring out the logistics of finding and hooing up with Maia. I got to watch her play tennis today, which was cool, but she was playing against this very annoying girl who threw her off with her strange grunting. Last night Maia said that she is homesick, but not homesick in the traditional sense. She said she misses the familiarity of home and Milford and everything, which is completely understandable. She has made several friends and I think she is having fun. The people who are the "counselors" are cool and it seems like Maia likes them as well. I talked to one of them for a bit today. She is from Holland and she was saying that it has been interesting for her to work with American kids, because she has all these preconceived notions about Americans and they have been disproved mostly. She was also saying that the main thing she notices is that there is a huge difference in kid's senses of responsibility for their actions, which I thought was interesting. I am having trouble balancing going to the tennis area and seeing Amsterdam. Today I slept in a bit and then went to Hillegom to the tennis tournament and the train timing was so long and ridiculous for a town that is very close. Hopefully now that I know the routine, I will be able to cut down on travel time. Then when I got back to Amsterdam, I went grocery shopping for Maia and I, then got lost with a full bladder and bags of groceries, found a bathroom, went back to the hostel, then did laundry and now coordinating with a friend on the interweb. I need to go to the flower market outside of town and see the sights in Amsterdam as well. I have time though...The hostel I am staying at is pretty crazy. The people there are REALLY INTO GOD. I mean I respect religion and everything, but this is intense. I was perusing the bookshelves, all about christianity, novels about christianity, etc. There are quotes from the bible everywhere. There is a book with information about each of the employees and most of them are like "hobbies: god, snowboarding"", etc. very intense. To each his own...

I am in Amsterdam! Glamah! I haven't really looked around that much. I came in last night at 7 and thought there would be no way I would find a hostel, but I found one straight away, which was such good luck. I was on the train yesterday for 12 hours and had to trasfer twice, cause the train was late and it was a pain in the ass. The hostel I stayed at yesterday was absolutely crazy. The reception itself was a bar, and there was a lounging area where people were of course smoking weed and other things and there were lots of pillows. Today, I checked out of that hostel and checked in to my hostel that I will have for the next five nights. I have rejoined the religious community. The nuns would be proud. Hopefully it won't be too intense. It was the cheapest thing available, so...Today I will take the train to the place sports complex where Maia is apparently, but I'm not sure where she is training and whatnot, so I will wander around for awhile. After I eat something. So hungry. This town is disgustingly expensive I must say, which is depressing, especially after Prague, which was so cheap. Oh Prague. How I love thee.

And now I'm in Prague. Yesterday I went to Auschwitz. I took the overnight train from Budapest to Krakow, then transfered trains and went to Oswiecim. I was going to spend a little bit of time in Krakow, because the train was getting in at 6 something and I figured I didn't need all day for Auschwitz, but I got barely any sleep on the train the night before, so I was very tired and didn'tp feel like dealing with all the checking my luggage and figuring stuff out crap in Krakow, so I just got on the train to Oswiecim. And fell asleep. A nice lady woke me up before we got to Oswiecim, though, which was very sweet. I tried to communicate with the people at the train station and it was very difficult and they were extremely rude to me. So, I checked my luggage and then started walking. I figured that there would be signs for Auschwitz everywhere...but there weren't. So I walked and walked and walked. It worked out well, because I ended up seeing the village of Oswiecim itself, which was interesting for several reasons. I was thinking about it on the train and I was thinking, what will the village be like? What will the people be like? Is the site of Auschwitz some kind of profitable tourist industry and how is the town affected by it? Who lives there? Why would you live there? What is the effect of the camp on the town and is it reflected in the daily living styles? What about the collective memory of the town? So, with these things in mind I walked. It is a very green town, set on a river, with several small parks and whatnot. Bike paths. Children playing. Nice gardens. Churches. The only thing in the village that was different was the Jewish cultural center, but that is prevalent in most of the eastern european towns, so if you didn't realize that this was where Auschwitz was, it wouldn't seem out of the ordinary either. There was a town square and some wild dogs running about. And still throughout all of this, there were no signs for the camp. So, I stopped at a bookstore and got a map and it was actually on the other side of the train station from where I had been walking. Then I saw that there was a Auschwitz museum, so I thought I would wander there first and build up to the site itself. I wandered about trying to find it and then went in the wrong entrance. I found an open building and went in and of course I wandered straight into the remains of a crematorium. The thing they save for the end of the tour because it is the most horrific. There was a sign that said, please maintain silence, thousands of people were killed here. Of course, that just started me crying right off the bat. Then, I found the actual entrance to the museum and got a joined and english tour. I guess the rest of the experience and tour and everything can be described as simply unreal. I mean you're standing in this historic place, places actually, and you can mentally know that all these horrific things happened, but to actually realize this is very difficult. It is difficult to conceptualize the sadness and, well, everything that happened there. There were rooms upon rooms of shoes and suitcases and hair. That was one that really got me. They had loads upon loads of hair. Apparently, the Germans used the hair that was shaved off of peoples' bodies to make textiles. So there were just piles of human hair. It was so disturbing. So many thoughts...so much to say. There are people waiting for the internet though and I shouldn't be wasting this beautiful day. But the rest of the non-emotional side of the visit was just pissy. After I left the museum, I got a bite to eat, then played on the internet, then waited for a bus to the station, because my feet were killing me. The bus never came. I walked to the station, asked to buy a ticket to Prague, the lady was really rude with me, then I asked her if she took credit card and she snorted at me. So I walked and got money, then to the grocery store and got provisions for the 6 hour wait I had ahead of me. I wasn't about to go back into the town of Oswiecim, because there is simply nothing there and I knew I could either sit there or at the train station. So...I sat in the train station for 6 hours or so, reading, writing, drinking caffeinated beverages because I had gotten no sleep, sewing, and futzing around in general. Of course, I had to pee at this point. I went to use the (paid) bathroom and it was closed so I asked the cashier lady for the bathroom and she looked at me like I had asked her to give me the moon and said, uh, huhhuh, no. I was so angry I almost pulled the waste basket over in front of her booth and peed in front of her, but I held back. Then I peed in a bush. Then the mosquitos descended. It was just not a fun time in general is my whole point. And then I was in a car with 5 and then 4 other people for the night train, so sleeping was not fun.

I arrived this morning in Prague, checked my stuff, got coffee (3 actually), and found a hostel. They let me shower even though I couldn't check in till 1, which was fantastic. It was truly a beautiful showering experience. The layer of grime is mostly gone now. Mostly. Then I walked to the botanical gardens and took a nap, which was also lovely. I walked to a couple of parks and read and ate some food. I'm still very tired. I really don't feel like doing anything today, but I think I will take the public transportation (which will be a trip, cause I haven't been doing any public transportation, except with Emrah in Vienna, so we'll see what happens. Ok, I really need to end this. Perhaps more later.