Chris: An 8am start again, tempered with the thought of coffee when we get to the school, and the longer coffee break after the first class. First of all we chatted with two kids, very good english from both of them, played the usual game... drawing numbers from the hat of doom. We have a numbers printed out from 1-32 on pieces of folded up paper. Each number then corresponds to a particular question on a sheet. Questions like, describe your best friend, name your favourite 3 things you like about your town, and describe a country you dislike and why [View Full Entry]

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shems: Went to the Erni school at 8am (slightly sore-headed) for a conversation class with four 18 year old girls. We played Linda's conversation games with them and marvelled at the difference in productivity from yesteray. Mid-morning we wandered around the town and went to our now regular cafe stop - it sells fantastic cakes, ice creams and most importantly good coffee. In the afternoon we met a lovely guy, Rafa who was very into Radiohead and wants to travel. After this we met Pioter, a real gentleman who supervising the technical side of Farm Frites, a french fry factory supplying [View Full Entry]

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Shems: For our first day at ERNI (Adam and Kathryn's language school), we went into Calmat, a family run screw, nuts and bolts suppliers. We were there for conversation practise and met some very nice people. It was a beginners class, and hard work for us ad them. However there were and interesting group and one member in particular, Waldek, an ex sailor had a burning urge to communicate whatever it took. We did several more conversation practise classes before heading home for lunch. We had a lovely carrot soup which Adam had made. In the afternoon we had more conversation [View Full Entry]

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Shems: Decision making is becoming a little arbitrary now, with us imposing false and meaningless conditions for taking a particular course of action. For example, this morning we randomly decided that if we were asked to move to yet another room in the hostel we would pack our bags and leave, if not we would stay another night. And so it was we found ourselves hurridly checking out without a plan for what to do next. I did a last-minute email download and found Adam had replied to my message from last night, saying he did not know of anyone else [View Full Entry]

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Chris: A quiet day today. We Wandered about Torun, without any particular plans in mind. Popped into the British School to see if they had any work, but they had not started term time yet - so no luck there. Two potential hosts replied, unfortunately both wanting us in a week's time. We ended up going to a rock/indie bar called The Lizard King to discuss our options over a few beers. We decided to email our preferred hosts, Adam and Kathryn, to ask if they knew anyone else we could work with in the meantime. [View Full Entry]

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Chris: We visited the Copernicus Museum today, as the town makes a big thing about being the home town of Nickolas Copernicus. Being a bit of an astronomy nut I found the museum pretty interesting, although I did feel sorry for Shems! Most of the artifacts they had on display were dusty old books, some in glass cabinets, and also rather randomly lots of cannon balls. Shems tried to force herself round the place, but I think she was hit with the same affliction I get when entering M&S (especially the clothes department). The boredom becomes so intense that you physically [View Full Entry]

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Chris: We heeded the advice of the guy on the front-desk in the hostel and took the train to Turon. We had been told that it would be an interesting and historic place to see (birth place of Nickolas Copernicus - inventor of the solar system), so without much more research we set off to the city. One handy tip we read was to ask someone to write down out the train ticket request so that we could show the ticketing staff in the station. We asked the girl on the hostel reception desk and she helped out, and thank goodness [View Full Entry]

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Chris: Had a bit of a lie in at the Cinnamon Hostel then I went to the Market Square to see the famous (ish) townhall clock strike 12 and the model goats that perform in the old townhall clock tower. It was just about worth the 10 minute walk to see. They basically come out to a fanfare, bow and then jiggle about a bit in mock aggression, butting-heads occaisionally. It reminded me slightly of the fight scenes in Team America, but would have been quite entertaining to your average medieval peasant. Meanwhile Shems had been writing to potential help exchange [View Full Entry]

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Chris: Big move. Got up early and went to Alexander Platz to get a replacement for the late lamented camera that was lost on the first day of the trip. Bought the camera, at a bargain 179 Euros cash. This is because in Germanys, even the largest chains refuse to accept credit cards... bizzare! Imagine turning up to buy an Apple product - with 2 grand cash! So after purchasing the wonder camera we headed back to buy surprisingly inexpensive train tickets to Poznan in Poland. The trip from germany to Poland was interesting. We sat in a 6 seater cabin [View Full Entry]

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Shems: After coffee and cake at a strange bakery in a passage joining two rival supermarkets, we headed into the centre. Travel was frustrating due to S-Bahn still being out of order so everything took an age. We walked around the centre for a bit and had a fast-food risotto. It both amuses and delights me that risotto can be considered a fast-food. Italian cookbooks describe the dish in typically romantic terms - lovingly-made, mama's secret recipe, all that stirring and ladelling of fresh stock. Nonetheless it made delicious and filling fast-food fuelling us to eurolines HQ to ask ab [View Full Entry]

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