Stuff That's Different #4 - Sylwester

In the U.S., "Silvester" is the name of a cat (and a few people).  :)

In Poland, "Sylwester", which is pronounced the same, is the word for New Year's Eve.

So have a Happy Sylwester everyone!  Don't over-indulge.  And be safe.

5 more pictures from Edinburgh (night time)

Since it gets so dark so early in Edinburgh in the winter (just like Poznań) and since I brought my Nikon D300 with me this time, I took a few opportunities to try some night photos from up and down the Royal Mile, which is the street my hotel is on.

I didn't bring a tripod with me, so all the shots were hand-held.  I knew this would result in high failure rate, but I got a few pictures that I think are OK after a bit of tweaking.  At least I have confidence that the lens I took and my camera give the option for some decent night shots if take more time, a tripod, and probably some neutral density and polarizing filters with me.

Anyway, here are the pictures.  Enjoy and feel free to provide comments if you like.  As always, click on the image to see it in the size I uploaded it.  Thanks

This was the most difficult image to take.  The hill and building were lit from below and required very long exposures.

One quick picture from Edinburgh (day time)

Because it was winter in Edinburgh, the sun goes down at about 3:30pm.  And on Saturday it was sprinkling for most of the afternoon, so I only took one picture during the day.  I'll post a few of the pictures I took at night in the next entry.

I was inspired to try this shot because there was a photo on the wall of my hotel room that is similar to this, although much better of course.  :)

I converted this to a Sepia tone because I liked the effect.  Also, the stone of the monument is a brown and sepia color in general, so it picked up the tones very well without washing out as much as it would with a grey-scale conversion.  Unfortunately, the (very) grey sky was overblown as I tried to take several quick shot up into the mist during a minor break in the sprinkles.  Still, out of the three pictures I tried, this one turned out pretty good I think.  Enjoy!

As always, you can click on the images to see them in the full size I upload them in.

My trip to Edinburgh for Christmas

I went to Edinburgh for Christmas this year to visit with my friend Justin Ross and his wife Shannon.  I hadn't seen Justin since he and Shannon moved to Edinburgh from Sacramento over a year ago, so this was a nice chance to catch up and spend the holidays with friends.

I arrived early Friday afternoon and met up with Justin later that day.  Shannon was tied up cooking.  Justin and I grabbed some coffee and chatted for a while, catching up.  Unfortunately for the dinner plans, I was pretty wiped out for some reason (HINT: A bit of foreshadowing here) and ended up skipping dinner to crash early at my hotel.

Saturday, all three of us met up at the German Market.  Besides wandering through the market, we also toured one of the art museum's that the Market is right next to (I think it was the National Gallery), and Justin and Shannon went on some rides.  We all then grabbed some coffee, went to Justin and Shannon's flat to chat for several hours, and then went out for very nice French dinner.  Feeling a bit tired still, we split up after that.  After resting up at my hotel for a bit, I decided that since the sprinkles of rain seemed to have stopped that I would go out and try some night photography.  After a bit of that I went back to the hotel and crashed, looking forward to a nice Christmas day with Justin and Shannon and our planned Thai food for dinner.

Unfortunately, Christmas day did not get off to a good start.  I woke a bit after 6am feeling VERY ill and nauseous.  This continued through the day getting worse and worse.  I cancelled all plans with Justin and Shannon and spent Christmas day holed up in my hotel room with a raging fever, constant severe nausea (that on occasions led to what you expect nausea to lead to), and the sorts of aches and pains you also expect in that type of situation.  It was a thoroughly miserable day in which I hardly ever got out of bed.  I tried to eat some food and quickly realized that was a VERY bad idea.  And I was really worried that I would still be so sick the next day that I would not be able to make my flight back to Poznań.

Luckily, despite a 3am wake-up call from my body that was similar to the 6am call the day before, by around 8am I was up, packed, and feeling like if things went just right, I could make it home.  I lucked out at the Edinburgh airport and was checked in and through security almost directly (honestly, I think it was the fastest time checking in and through security I've ever had).  After a couple hours of waiting I got to boarded onto my flight and took off.  A longer wait through passport control on returning to Poland and eventually I got back to my apartment, rapidly feeling worse.

I managed to eat some semi-solid food (yay yogurt) and keep it down, and promptly crashed for 14 hours of fitful sleep, still with a fever going.  After getting up today and feeling much better, I was shocked to find I had lost 11 pounds in 2 days.  So lots of water and mild food today, and hopefully I'll be better soon.  Now I just hope my New Years turns out much better than my Christmas day went.

Have a wonderful New Year's everyone!

** Check back in a day or so, and I'll start posting some of the pictures from Edinburgh after I have processed them.

Some more pictures from today's snow

Here are some more pictures from today's snow.  I would guess we got about 1.5 to 2 inches of snow over the whole day.  Unfortunately, it won't be sticking around.  It supposed to be cloudy by warmer tomorrow, and then rain for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.  And apparently Edinburgh is supposed to be the same, so I won't escape the rain there.  Anyway, here are some more pictures:

This is the view out my kitchen window just before I headed to work.

This is behind the cathedral that is on my way to work.  Snow still isn't too bad.

View from the 16th floor later in the day.  Snow is starting to get worse.

From the 16th floor at the height of the snow.  Visibility got pretty restricted.

A bit later in the day.  It's starting to get darker and most of the snow has fallen.

First snow

We finally got our first snow here in Poznań that is sticking to the ground.  I saw snow one other time a couple of weeks ago as it went by my desk on the 16th floor, but nothing stuck.  Now I get to see what walking to work and back will be like.  :)

Unfortunately, I don't think it will stay around long as it will supposedly be warming back up a bit tomorrow.

My pants were lying to me

So I encountered a minor conundrum recently as my weight loss since I arrived has forced me to buy some new pants.  When I left the US I was in a hybrid phase where I had lost enough weight that some of my 38" waist pants were becoming nearly too loose, but I could only fit in a few certain pairs of 36" pants.  And since virtually no one makes 37" pants, I didn't have much in between.  So I ended up shipping over a large amount of 36" pants from my slimmer days that I figured I would eventually start fitting into.

But as I lost more weight and even the 36" pants started feeling loose, I decided to go out and buy some new pants for work.  Figuring I would start with 90 cm (the same as 36") and see if how much I have to go down with whatever brand I found (I know there is always some variability) I was shocked to find that the 36" pants I eventually found fit just fine.  And that this was true across all 4 of the brands I tried.  And that even those brands I tried but didn't buy (apparently skinny leg pants aren't just an option here, they are nearly the default, and those aren't comfortable for me) fit around my waist fine.

So out of curiousity I pulled out some of the pants that didn't really fit any more that I had brought over.  This included pants marked as both 38" and 36".  And in general, I found that they were all nearly at an inch bigger around the waistline (measured from where the flap over the zipper would lay to the end, which skipped the part that overlays the zipper area).  Most were actually over an inch bigger, which one pair of supposedly 38" pants actually having a waistline slightly over 40".  And nearly all of my supposedly 36" pants were 37" or bigger, with most being between 37" and 37.5".

So I have to wonder, are your pants lying to you too?  And why is that seemingly every pair of pants I brought from the US was significantly larger than advertised while that doesn't seem to be the case with the European brands I have bought here?  Have American's gotten so fat that our clothes retailers deliberately sell us clothes with incorrect labels in order to make us feel better about ourselves (and buy more of their brand)?

A day (or week) in the new life

I figured I'd give you all an idea of what my new life here in Poland is like so far.  It will probably come across as fairly boring, but that's at least somewhat by design.

Because I still have to work with folks in the US (in addition to here in Europe and in India) my working hours are usually from sometime around Noon to between 7:30 and 9:00pm.  Some days more, some days less.  Now as anyone who knows me well can attest, this is NOT a bad thing.  I'm not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination, so the ability to sleep in every day until around 10am is WONDERFUL.  I think I'm consistently getting more sleep during the week now than I have gotten in at least a decade, if not longer.

When I get off work I may head to the mall across the street if I need anything from the grocery store, or if I feel like I need to walk around for a while, I will head home to drop off my laptop and stuff from work and then head over to one of the malls or somewhere to look around.  Given that it's winter and it gets dark around 3:30pm I'm usually not wandering around outside too much.

After that it's home to make dinner.  I'll usually check Discovery (3 channels in English) or BBC (also 3 channels in English) to see if there is anything on that I want to watch while making and eating dinner.  If not, I'll do some reading (either on my iPad or on the internet).  And depending on how energetic I still feel, I may put some time in with my Rosetta Stone software trying to learn Polish (I seem to retaining more of the words I pick up just wandering around town and seeing on signs, but I am making slow progress).  

Then it's off to bed between Midnight and 2am (usually right around 1am).

Saturday is my "wander around" / errand / shopping day.

Sunday is my laundry / clean the apartment / study Polish day (I try to make sure I do an hour or two every Sunday so that I am making some progress).

So why is it boring by design?  Partly because I wanted to make sure I put regular effort into learning the language.  I figured Winter would be a time when I was not that inclined to wander around outside and explore,  so if I spent it focusing on the language and learning the basics of what I needed to know about life in Poland, then when the Spring and Summer roll around I will hopefully be that much more prepared to get more out of travelling and wandering around town.

I haven't done a ton of socializing yet.  I've gone out to a few meals with co-workers, including earlier this week (thanks to Daria, Kasia, Karolina, Monika, Krzystoff, Waldemar, and Pawel for coming along).  And I know about a "language exchange" meeting that happens everything Thursday.  Unfortunately my schedule and distractions haven't let me make it to that one yet, but it's on the schedule for the new year.

So there it is.  An overview of my boring new life so far.  Hopefully once spring and summer roll around I will have more interesting posts for you all as I hope to a lot more travelling.  I'm off to Edinburgh this Friday for Christmas.  And possibly another trip (somewhere) after that for New Years.  I just saw a reason to try and go to Berlin around the end of January (if I can arrange it) and then it's off to Stockholm, Helsinki, Turku, and elsewhere come the spring.

Have a wonderful day.

A faint hope dashed......

When I left the U.S. to come to Poland I had the faintest of hopes that somehow the pollens, molds, and other things I'm allergic to would be just different enough that they would not trigger my allergies.  It was a faint hope, but alas it has been dashed.

Given that the only places I can remember my allergies not bothering me (in my entire life) have been in the middle of the sea while in the Navy, and in Oman and Dubai (where at the time there was virtually no living plant life to generate pollen and not enough moisture to support mold), I'm not really surprised.

Poznań has had a fair amount of rain this last week.  And one evening (Wednesday or Thursday) we even saw snow falling outside our window on the 16th floor at work.  None of it appeared to reach the ground, but it was the first snow fall anyone had seen.  But when the rain largely stopped yesterday and the sky started clearing, the sun came out, it warmed up a bit, and the mold spores lept into the air with joy so that they could be carried along to my sinuses via the wind.

Oh well, I can still hold out some faint hope for the Spring, can't I??  Have a great day everyone.

Christmas in Scotland

Since I didn't really want to try and go home for Christmas this year (very long flights and EXPENSIVE tickets), I'm heading to Edinburgh to spend it with Justin Ross and his wife Shannon. When they found out I wasn't flying home, they kindly invited me to spend Christmas with them.

I will only be there 3 nights due to the weird Ryannair flight schedule between Poznan and EDI, but maybe when I get back to Poznan I'll look at taking another trip somewhere else for a few days around New Years. 

But I did get a decent deal on the Radisson Blu, so I get to spoil myself for the few days I'm there (hopefully).

A bit of Polish history

I came across this YouTube video and thought it was pretty interesting to see the way the borders of the Polish state have changed from 960 AD to the current day.  From the start of the country, to it's expansion into a great empire, to it's entire disappearance for a while, and finally into it's reappearance.

Ignore the overly-done patriotic sounding music and just watch the map.  It's pretty interesting in my opinion.  And of course, if you get interested in looking into it a bit more, Wikipedia has a pretty good overview of Polish history from the 10,000 foot level.

Stuff That's Different #3 - The Cost of College

College education is free to Polish citizens all the way up through the Masters Degree level.  And the cost of a Ph.D is pretty low as I understand it (comparatively).  And the education seems to be of pretty high quality.  The medical school here in Poznań attracts students from around the world.  I've met students from the U.S., Taiwan, China, and India so far in just the 2 months or so I've been here.  Strangely enough, I seem to meet the majority of them at Subway when I'm getting lunch.  =)

Add in that seemingly most young Poles speak not only Polish, but English as well, and I suspect the US could learn a bit about running a successful education system here.  And those young people I've met who don't speak English often speak some other language (Russian or German mostly).

Stuff That's Different #2 - Pizza

There are some pizza places here in Poznań, but when I'm told by everyone I asked that the best pizza in town is Pizza Hut, it's a bit of a shock.  I'll admit I haven't tried any other places yet, but I've only had pizza once so far.  But coming from California where pizza is practically a religion, having anyone recommend Pizza Hut as the best option is like someone taking the Lords name in vain in front of the Pope.  It's just not something you expect to happen.

A Lesson in Weight Loss

Interesting fact of the day:

My weight in May 2009 = 243 lbs (my all time high as far as I know)


My weight on 14 Sep 2011 = 224 lbs (last full day in the US)

My weight today = 209 lbs

That's nearly as much weight lost in 2.5 months as I had lost in the 2 years prior.

Lesson learned:  If you want to lose weight quickly, sell your car and move to Europe.  =)

But given how little difference losing 15 pounds has made in how I look, I suspect I still probably need to lose about 20 more pounds.  But hey, I have about 21 more months to go.

Have a nice day everyone.

New Food #4 - Chleb

So it's hardly a new food, but bread (aka Chleb) seems to be a MAJOR part of the Polish diet.  It's inexpensive, it's good, and there are all sorts available that you can get, and it's fresh every day.  I find that I'm eating more bread here than I ever really did in the US.

My favorite are the little baguettes (about 6-8 inches long) of garlic bread that you can get.  They slice the baguettes diagonally a bunch of times and into each slice they put some olive oil, butter, and garlic.  If you can time it right and get them while they are hot, they are fantastic!

Another type I've found is called Bartowski or something like that.  That's a picture below.  It's sort of dense, and seems to have a bit of rye in the mix, and it makes really good french toast (although I can't seem to find any vanilla here for some reason).

There are also all sorts of rolls, wheat breads, and other types.  I've only tried about 5 or 6 different breads yet, so I figure I'll have lots of variety to try over the next couple of years.