Sorry!

Hey, sorry I haven't written in forever. My normal life just isn't that interesting.

Home is a Good Place to be

It is so good to be home! I went to church today and saw my friends there. It just feels good to be doing something normal for a change.

Flowers

I just think flowers are fabulous. The colors the smell, there are so many wonderful things about flowers.

I want your opinion on somthing. Do you see a difference in these two pictures (besides the fact that I'm making a funny face in one)? The top one is of me a couple of days ago and the one below is of me a couple of years ago.

Happy ending

Hi everyone! So now I'm home and totaly jet laged. I just want all the people who were following my blog how much fun it was to read your coments and how much I apriciate the contact. I will be continueing to wright on my blog though my life isn't going to be quite as interesting for a while. So anyway Bye!

Art. And my opinion of it.

This is the Piaza of Michelangelo. Michelangelo supposedly was depressed when he was carving it. It was meant for his own tomb and depicts the dead body of Jesus being held by his mother Mary(right) Mary Magdeline(left) and Nicodemus(top). The face of Nicodemus is that of Michelangelo himself. I truly do love this sculpture. I think it portrays true feeling. But the feeling diffires from person to person. It means different things to everyone.

Florence and Me! The dome to my right is the Duomo. The wood carving to the left is the Mary Magdeline by Donatello. There are few pieces of artwork that cause me phisical pain but the Mary Magdeline is one of them. Alot of people have opinions about what this one means but I think Donatello was pretty darn fed up with the humanistic world view that was so popular at that time (humanism is the view that says that man is great enough that he can get along fine without God) . I think the Mary Magdeline was his way of trying desperately to bring people down to earth. To show them repentance and the beauty of it even in its uglyness.

Harmony in the Babtistry

Oops! I forgot to tell you about the babtistry in pisa. Ok the cool thing about the babtistry is that the way it was built an eco will continue for about ten seconds. So if a person was singing in there they could harmonize with themself. The movie below is of someone doing that.

This is the entrance to the Peperdine campus in Florence. My grandparents spent a summer teaching here and wanted to show it to me. I think they're trying to convince me to go to Peperdine and I must admit it's working.
The courtyard from above.
Tis is Alessio he works at the Peperdine house and showed us around.
Well I an kicking myself now for putting off all this homework. I mean I'm in FLORENCE and I have to stay in the hotel room working.

Pisa

Guess where I went today! I don't have that much time to wright. The internet caffe is about to close.

Me on top of the tower.

Florence

Hello from Italy! Gosh I can't belive my trip is more than half over! Italy, even durring the off season, is filled with tourists. Each and every one clamoring to get the "authentic Italian experience". But I'v heard more people speaking English here than Italian! Today we went to see artwork from the medevil and renesance periods. Artwork by Michelangelo, Raffiel, Da Vinci, and Donatello. We saw Michelangelo's David and Prisoners. But unfortunately we weren't allowed to take pictures. This picture is of me (obviously) in front of Ponte Vecchio, translation, Old Bridge. There are a million shops inside and every single one sells gold jewelry.
This is the front of the Duomo. For all of you who don't know the Duomo is a famous cathedral made of solid green and pink marble and is longer than a football field.
The Duomo's dome is a great mystery because no one knows how it was built. The rest of the cathedral was built long before the dome was. It was a real problem until they brought in an architect named Brunelleschi. He got it done but no one today knows how he did it.
Traffic in this city is scary! The sreets are narrow and the busses are huge. There are a million people on bicycles and motercycles. In fact today I saw a guy on a bicycle ride between a bus and a van that were mabey two feet apart. This is a tiny one person car with three wheels.

Train Travel

At 5:30am I got on a train to the capital of Slovenia. Fom there we caught a train to Villach, a city in Austria. Then we took a train to Venice and changed to a train which took us to Florence. We arrived in Florence at 5:30pm. It was a very long day.
We rewarded ourselfs at the end of our travels with Gillato (itallian ice cream)!

This is Biella Kava. Its bacically a Croatian latte. When I order I get bez cafine biella kava or in english a decaf latte. Tomorrow I will get up at 4am and board a train to Florence. Chow!

This is us with our friends Branko and Marica. They live here in Zagreb and we spent the day with them.
This is a huge satelite tower. It broadcasts TV, radio, and everything else.
The woods here are so differednt from home. There is very little brush and most of the trees are deciduous. I finally understand what all those english writers are talking about when they say "he took a walk in the woods" because they were thinking of a wood like this and not the thick forests of the north west.

Today while we were walking in a little village called Samobor we went past a lady pruning the rose bushes outside of a music school. She was going to throw all the roses away so we asked if we could take one. But instead of letting us take one of the old ones she cut a whole bunch of them right off the bush for us. You know I think its not the big monuments or the historic sites that make traveling worth while, its the little excperiences and the unplanned encounters. Things like recieving roses from someone you'v never met are the things that make living worth it.
In European resteraunts no matter what you'er drinking they usualy serve it by giving you a wine glass and the bottle and letting you pour your own.
This is Jagnic Dol (vally of the Lamb in English) it's the village we're staying in.
Today we went to a crystal making factory. Every thing in it glittered. These candle holders are my favorite things I saw in there.

Plitvice

Plitvice is a series of waterfalls and lakes in a staircase system created by natural dams made of calcium.
I took over 150 pictures today. All the waterfalls were spectacular but I found the path we were walking on the most interesting. The way it was designed was so that you felt that you were, instead of itruding, just following a natural winding path that never ended.

I think I like Croatia better than Germany so far. I mean I havent seen very much of either but the people seem to be friendlier and ther's just somthing about it that I like. The hills and vallys around where we are staying are just breathtaking from the swing on top of the hill, and the houses and vinyards beautiful.

Nothing Happened Today

I spent the whole day curled up on my bed with a book. The End.

Zagreb

This is me and my grandparents at my new favorite coffe shop in Europe Kavana Palainovka. It is quiet and delicious. The perfect place to sit and think.

Brail grafittie impressive I think.

There is kind of a corner chappel called the stone gate downtown. It's not pretty but it certainly gives you a scence of the renessance period as it really must have been without all the Hollywood style we are used to.
In Croatia the traditional view on building is, Build until you don't have any money, stop, and when you have money agean pick up where you left off before. The result is alot of houses that you see half done.

This is Zagreb, the city that I'm staying in. At one time it was under comunist rule and it still shows in some places.
These are the Siblies, Tom and Sandra. Tom works at the Bible college in Zagreb and I got to hear him preach today. We are staying with them for our time here.
This picture should be tilted the right way. But if you crane your neck to the side you will see what it is supposed to look like. I t is a monument to Croatians who died sometime I forgot why. And I want no rediculous comments about how I cant fix a picture on my computer. I can I just don't want to. By the way if any of you know how I would apriciate it if you would email me.
Some one (my Mother) has been bugging me to talk about food. So here it is Croatian roast turkey. It was heavenly. Hey I'm sorry that there arent more pictures of me but I'm not very photogenic and I hate the way I look right now. BYe

I love the Alps!
A castle in the Alps. Dont know anything about it.

So yesterday I was on a train through the alps and didn't get a chance to blog sorry. Do you know how ffrusterating it is when you can't speak the language everyone else can?

OK sorry. Today I was way more tiered than yesterday because against good judgement I brought along two new books and probably only got about four hours sleep. OK maby five I just remembered how mad I was when I slept through breakfast. But today I did go to the castle ruin and took pictures so please forgive me. This particular castle was attacked by the French forever ago and instead of trying to blast through the five foot thick walls from the outside the Frenchies simply set fire to the gunpowder that was already in the turret and blew it up from the inside. I was pretty mad though because the people who run the castle wan't let you go hardly anywhere inside it unless you purchace a tour.

Hello again, sorry about not writing yesterday I was way too tiered. Almost everyone in this city has window boxes. They pour from the windows like brilliantly colored waterfalls. The balcony off my bedroom is practically engulfed in sweet smelling flowers. Anyway that was my so-not-impressive little rant about something georgous I saw. This entry ant the two bellow it are about yeasterday.

This is the Moor house (forgive me if I spelled it wrong). When I was six years old my Grandfather and Grandmother were living in this over 100 year old house as teachers and my family visited them for Christmas. I don't remember too much from this visit but I did remember the Moor House.