A Gypsy Lesson

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Hiya!
I'm writing this entry from Krakow, an absolutely beautiful city in Poland. We have done so much since my last post, which wasn't too long ago so I'm not sure where to begin. We flew from Amsterdam to Berlin. Berlin was such a cool city. Our first day there we took an all day walking tour which was pretty much a 9 hour history lesson and saw most major sites of the city. Our guide was really great and my brain actually hurt when we were done from taking in so much info. The city is very interesting because it's stilll changing so much. I've never seen so much scaffolding and construction sites anywhere in my life. Seeing the buildings with bullet holes just covering the entire thing, and learning about which buildings were even standing after the war was amazing to learn about. It was also really interesting to see how the city is struggling deciding how and where to mark the different historical sites. Some, such as Checkpoint Charlie, are really touristy, and have been re-created and have officers to take photos with, etc, and others, such as Hitler's Bunker, have nothing to mark the site.
Enough about that. Funny, or not so funny story time. When we got into Berlin, we were really tired from not getting any sleep the night before, and the plane ride, etc. But we decided we better go walk around and check the city out for a while. So we were walking through a little market area, and there was a Gypsy playing this little ball game where he had three boxes and rolled a little ball around, and made bets with the tourists which box the ball was under. Well, we thought it would be easy, and a quick way to make a buck, so we started making bets with this guy. Well, needless to say, we lost some money, then lost even more trying to win back what we had lost. I'm not even going to say how much we lost, but it hurt. But, we did learn a lesson, to not play with the Gypsy's because they're obviously better at their own game. Also-not to make bets when we're tired.
From Berlin we flew to Krakow, where we have been the past three days. Our first day we spent at Auschwitz. Some of the things they had on display were just unbelieveable. They had rooms just packed full of the belongings of those who entered the camp. One room was full of hair brushes, one of suitcases, one of eye glasses, and even one of human hair shaved from their heads. Walking through the rooms they slept, and the gas chambers, and the places they were burned, and hung, and shot was so strange. A very surreal experience. I was very happy to go, but it's not a place I ever wish to return to. Yesterday we just walked around Krakow and took in the sites. Today we went to a salt mine just out of town.
Tomorrow we're off to Prague. So far, I'm loving Eastern Europe so much. It's absolutely gorgeous! And so cheap! If anyone wants postcards, email me your addresses. Talk to you soon!

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