We're not keeping up on this blog thing very well!

Wow it's been a whirlwind here! We've mostly been exploring the fun of Poland!

Krakow has the largest Market Square of all of Europe. We've spent most of our free time at or around Market Square. You can eat, shop, hang out, people watch, see clowns, people dressed as statues, or about anything there!

There is an area in the center of Market Square where people sell goods that they have made or 'procured'. It's called the Cloth Hall or Sukiennice I can't pronounce it :) Some of the things you can find in there are carved wood pieces (like chess sets, wind chimes, and boxes), wooden toys, handmade jewelry, and tourist tshirts. Below is a picture of the cloth hall from the inside and out. The building is quite ornate. I'm hoping that on date night tomorrow David and I will have time to get some good pictures of the details.

From Krakow, Poland

When David was in Krakow in February, he brought home a chess set for Brennan. Since then Jackson has taken an active interest in Chess. We promised he could buy one while we were here. We made that purchase on Saturday:

From Krakow, Poland

Jackson is playing chess (and other games using the chess set) daily since then. Best $8 spent so far!

Under the market square is a museum where archaeologist have excavated to learn more about the people, culture, architecture in previous generations. The museum was amazing. It was interactive. There were glass floors so you could see where they had dug. They had rebuilt the buildings that crafts people had worked in such as blacksmiths and tanner. They also demonstrated how they could move large amounts of goods using a two wheeled wagon. There was a 3d depiction of the city as it was then. There was a touch screen of skull as it had changed over the years. There was also a hallway you could walk down to see a building wall that had been excavated:

From Krakow, Poland

I think that what we like most about Market Square is that it is great for hanging out! There are a ton of great restaurants, and they have fun people to entertain! There are people that dress up like a dragon - which is the symbol for Krakow based on an old legend. They also have clowns on stilts and street dancers.

From Krakow, Poland

Jackson also fell in love with this street performer below. He was a statue - standing perfectly still. David and I asked Jackson if he was a statue or a man. Jackson walked up to the man and spoke to the man. Jackson came back to us and said he wasn't talking! I wanted to get a picture of him speaking to the statue so I asked him to go back and try again! So he did, and he dropped a coin in the man's bucket. The man suddenly came to life and started juggling. He put on a great show - dropping his pins and asking Jackson for help picking them up again - interactive and fun.

From Krakow, Poland

Next up? I'll tell you about our visit to the museum at the salt mines - it was amazing!

We've arrived in Poland!

Warning: I usually like my blog entries to be accompanied by a photo, but we've been remiss in taking shots of our tired, worn out, night of the living dead look in our 18 hour journey to get to our apartment in Poland.

For those of you just joining, we are spending a month in Poland. A lot of people ask, Why? It definitely was not on my top 10 list of places to visit in Europe! David's work has an office here. He wanted to do some work there and I can work from here. We thought it would be a great opportunity for Brennan to see for himself how another country operates day to day - so here we are!

If you followed our trip to Australia, you may remember when Jackson tried to skip the immigration line and just run right through. We were fortunate that nothing exciting like that happened this time. We did have quite a journey here!

Our journey consisted of 3 plane rides, about 7 hours of airport 'waiting' and 15 hours 'in the air'. Despite the crabbing we did from time to time, I'm proud of the way that we handled it. It's not easy being so close together, with no sleep, for that long.

An odd thing did happen while we were in Charlotte. While we were in line waiting to get a boarding pass David, Brennan and I were talking. Jackson was standing nearby and some guy reached out and started rubbing his hair. It's so bizzare. is that normal, and I missed the memo? You may recall when we were in NZ some woman wanted to take photographs with Jackson.

A couple remarks about service while we're here. TSA at the Dallas airport - I was stricken by how friendly they were. One of them high fived Jackson. Another pulled his backpack with his stuffed dog hanging out and was like 'wonder whose backpack this is'. One made a joke about David's shirt... They were all real nice. I can imagine how difficult there job is - being the bad guy all day, enforcing rules that people WANT to break. It was a great start to our journey.

(well the woman at the US Airways desk wasn't a great start but she wasn't miserable enough for me to give you all the details)

I also HAVE to tell you about Lufthansa airlines. It's interesting - the night before we left, I saw something on TV that said people would rather deal with the IRS than an airline. Brennan asked if that were true of David and I - I told him my opinion was that flying was a means to an end. Then I flew Lufthansa. Every person I interacted with was SUPER nice. It seemed like their personal mission was to make sure you were enjoying your flight. I was on the floor searching for crayons Jackson dropped, and someone came to ask if I wanted them to do it. REALLY? No, I'm already down here. But thanks! It is the first time I've every had good airplane food. And they served "lunch" on our 75 minute flight from Munich to Krakow. After dinner, they stopped to offer an after dinner drink. Their planes are more comfortable than any United Stated (AA, US-Airlines, Continental, etc) flight I've been on. More legroom, great entertainment in the seat back, good access to the bathrooms. Overall great flights. Oh and in the waiting areas at the terminals for their flights - they have free coffee. How much less cranky would YOU be when your plane was delayed if you had a cafe latte in hand? I'm just sayin...

As far as first impressions... the buildings here have quite a bit of character. We had a gorgeous dinner last night on the cheap. There is a lot of green - green grass green trees, etc. I look forward to being able to explore!

Now we all suffer from jetlag, stiffness, and trying to pull it all together. Tomorrow we have an appointment with Jackson's Nanny in the city square - I'm sure I'll get some pictures then!

Our First Day in Sydney Part 2

Darling Harbour was real close to our hotel. If you've ever taken a short walk with a 2 year old, you know it isn't so short. On the way to the harbour, we stopped at Tumbalong Park where Jackson and Johanna played. They seemed to have a lovely time. We coaxed Jackson off the playground by reminding him there was water to be seen!

The truth of the matter was that Mommy wanted a Starbucks. The flat whites weren't doing it for her :) Jackson TOOK OFF running. Fortunately Aaron, Ricky, and Johanna had more sleep than us, and they were able to keep up. All of us sat on the harbour and enjoyed a Starbucks - including Jackson with a chocolate milk. As we sat there watching the boats come in and out of the harbour, Ricky mentioned that it might be fun to take a tour of the harbour, and off we went!

All of us went on a Water Taxi ride. The driver took us past many areas of Sydney that I'm not equipped to tell you about: The Rocks, The Sydney Harbor Bridge (a beautiful site), the Sydney Opera House, and Luna Park (which has a really freaky looking face as an entrance).

After the taxi ride, we continued our walk around Darling Harbour which included a fountain - in a non-traditional sense. Jackson, David, and Aaron made their way down to the center of this sea shell type fountain where Jackson really enjoyed playing in the water.

After we were finished exploring Darling Harbour, we went all went out to a Spanish restaurant for tapas, paella, and sangria.  It was a lovely way to end our first day in Sydney. At least one of us was pretty wiped out...

Our First Day in Sydney

After the incident with Jackson running through Customs, we were ready to get out of there! We still had to pick up our baggage and make it through customs again - for the baggage check. David and Jackson wandered around while I watched for our baggage to come out on the belt. They had a 'quarantine dog' that walked around smelling your bags checking for drugs, food, and other items that aren't welcome into the country.

Once we finally made it out of there, Ricky, Johanna, and Aaron were waiting for us. They had brought along a stuffed koala bear and balloon for Jackson. It was pretty exciting to see some familiar faces finally. And then they broke the news! They had secured a child seat, and we weren't going to have to take the train to our hotel! It was as if the heavens had opened up and a choir had begun singing! I was OVER public transport.

Now they gave us choices - go out for a nice breakfast at "Max's" or go to our hotel. My mind did some quick math where Hotel=Nap. Breakfast it is! Max had this terrific dish - ricotta pancakes with bananas and honeycomb butter. At first glimpse, honeycomb butter may sound odd, but it is butter with little dots of honey in it. So tasty. I didn't use any of the syrup on the table. The pancakes were so thick - it was so nice! Jackson had a 'fruit bowl'. I thought of my friend Valerie when they brought it out. There wasn't a lot of melon in the bowl. There was passion fruit, mango, lychees and a side of yogurt with honey. It really was lovely. David had [boring] bacon and eggs. I will say that the bacon looked real nice because it wasn't as fatty as you find it in the States.

After that we went to our hotel near Darling Harbour. We stayed at the Radisson, which was very nice with a kitchenette and a separate living area. After quick showers it was time to hit the town again - Off to Darling Harbour!

cont...

Things that are... interesting... about Australia

While we're 'Down Under', David will be writing most of the posts about what we do. I'll be writing posts about the things that are "different". I'm sure this will be the first of many posts...

1. Coffee - First you should know, you can't get cream here. Every time I ask for it the clerk looks at me as if I've got an eye in the middle of my forehead. Second, they have special 'coffee lingo'. You can order a flat white or a short black - I don't know what any of this means. I want a cup of coffee with cream and Splenda.

2. Iced Tea - It's summer here. It's HOT. They can make you all the hot tea you want, if you want iced tea - you'll have to settle for the bottled stuff. Go Figure.

3. Hotel Room Lights - This was particularly odd. In order to use the electricity in your room you have to leave the key card in this slot by the door. Now you may remember that it is HOT - the AC also does not work without this key, so it's 95 degrees (or whatever in celcius (whole other topic)), I can't get iced tea, and when I get back to my hotel room it's freaking hot. Great.

4. Hamburgers - When you order your hamburger you should be aware that it may come with a pickled beet on it. Some restaurants even charge extra for it. I'm thinking about polling people on the monorail to find out if people would really pay extra for it. You may note that you can't pick off a pickled beet, it leaves beet juice everywhere. Another thing about the burger which I found nice was that they don't put pickles on it, they use cucumbers.

5. "Fillet" - We went to a German restaurant the other night. I ordered Fillet. It wasn't 5 or 6 inches in diameter and 1.5 inches thick. I'm not sure what cut of meat it was. It may have been the flank of Kangaroo.

6. Taxes & Tip - This is actually real nice. It's included. If you see something is $15 - It's $15. You don't have to pay any more!

7. 10% surcharge - Today at a restaurant they had a note on their menu that they charge 10% more on Sundays and National holidays. I don't know if this is normal or not - but an interesting concept. I'm going to charge extra for my services on Fridays. If you'd like to utilize my services on Fridays, you'll have to pay me 10% more.

I'm quite sure there is more to come, because I think that I've forgotten some of the things that I've found to be weird. And I think that I could write an entire post on the fact that while we speak the same 'language' it sure can be difficult to communicate sometimes... just ask me what a pram or capsicum is...

Until next time,
Lisa Down Under

Jackson's Escape Into Australia

We touched down in Sydney on Monday morning after a fourteen hour flight from San Francisco. The flight went well. Jackson slept almost the entire way, and was adequately entertained by movies on our iPod Touch the remainder of the time. Lisa and I were not able to sleep quite so much, and so once we arrived in Sydney, we had a very excited child who was ready to run all over the airport. We made our way to the Australian immigration area. Fortunately, with me traveling on an Australian passport we were able to wait in the fast queue. Well, faster queue. It wasn't exactly fast. Jackson didn't think it was fast. After Jackson made it clear he wasn't going to stand still in this long line while the immigration officials processed everyone ahead of us, I decided it would be best to pick him up and hold him. He didn't like being picked up and held after sitting in a cramped space for 14 hours. I explained I could put him down if he would stay still. I put him down. He stayed still. For a little while. Then Jackson suddenly took off, as fast as his little legs could carry him. I had a big heavy bag on my back. By the time I realized I was going to have to get him, he had already ran to the front of the line. He kept on going, right over the red line that marks the end of immigration, past all the immigration counters, out to where all the security guards were, and he kept on running, out toward the customs area! I had to chase him! So, I ran right past the immigration officials too. It'd have probably been pretty funny if I had yelled out "I have nothing to declare!" as I did, but at this stage I was just hoping my son and I weren't going to get arrested. I did manage to scoop Jackson up, and smiling, apologized to the immigration officials as I walked back to my place in line. I think everyone there thought it was rather amusing. None of them pulled out any guns or handcuffs. I was happy about that. One of them came over and asked us if we'd like to just go straight to the front of the line, though we declined and just explained we'd hold Jackson carefully. I think that we will hold onto Jackson more carefully when we return to the United States. Bush will still be president at that time, and I don't want to find out what the PATRIOT Act allows immigration to do to two year olds who try to burst through airport security.

The Museums

We visited several museums over the next two days. First, a museum of musical instruments. They had an innovative setup where one wears wireless headphones, and walks around. When one approaches an instrument, the sound the instrument makes plays in the headphones.

Neither Lisa nor I know much about music, but it was interesting nonetheless. The varied and often bizarre selection of instruments was rather entertaining.

[Lisa Editorial] One of my favorite parts of the museum was on the bottom floor. When you first went in you thought it was the more modern items like amplifiers and then you saw player pianos, but when you went to the back, you found that they also had an area where you could learn how instruments made music. There was a place where you could find out how the length and thickness of the string would affect the pitch of a guitar string. Then they had a piano that had a clear case so that you when you pressed a key, you could see how it mechanically worked. It was absolutely fascinating. Below is a picture that shows another neat 'toy'.

We also visited an art museum. There were displays of both modern and ancient art. The artistic beauty and value of most ancient pieces and some modern pieces was notable, though some of the modern art seemed rather random and bizarre to us.

We visited a chocolate museum as well. Belgium is, of course, famous for making high quality chocolate, and they had various displays of different devices that have been used throughout history to make chocolate.

[Another Lisa Editorial] The chocolate museum was fun. I actually think the smell was the best part - probably even better than the small tastings we had. They had some interesting things that were 'made' of chocolate. They had a dress that had been made of chocolate and several displays that were out to dispel the common concerns people had about chocolate being bad for you. For instance, chocolate isn't bad for your teeth as long as you brush them frequently :) Attached is a solid chocolate statue. They also had some chocolate busts! I find busts a tad creepy anyway - busts of chocolate - eww!

Lastly, at the bottom of the blog you'll see a picture of the Godiva we found in the center of town. I found it interesting because there are so many wonderful chocolate shops - and Godiva is wonderful too - but uhh the other ones were more wonderful :)

We had seen a comic museum, so we decided to visit that as well. It was somewhat interesting, though seemed to be about a specific artist named Jacques Martin, rather than being a general comic museum. Apparently Martin was an associate of Herge, the author of Tintin. Herge actually published a magazine, called Tintin, which featured various comic strips, including Martin's. Martin wrote several comic strips which had never been translated to English and so we had never heard of them before.

We did purchase Asterix in Belgium. I had read this before, but after visiting Belgium understood much more of the subtle humor. The competitiveness of French-speaking Belgians to Frenchmen. The Mannekin Pis, the kind of food they eat (I found it especially amusing that they serve a huge feast and call it a 'snack', which is just like what is really done in Belgium!)

This rounded out the "fun" part of our trip. Next would be the conference.