This has been quite a week! Last weekend, I went to the Tatra mountains with some friends for a relaxing mini-vacation. M & took the night train to Zakopane- it's surreal to be in the train station at 1am and sleeping all night the way there! Pretty good rest, though- very relaxing and rhythmic. Though, we almost missed the train- when we arrived, a sign on the departures thing said it was delayed 20 minutes, so we waited in the waiting area. Around 1, we heard something about a train and Zakopane, so we decided to go check it out... and got on the train about 2 minutes before it left! Apparently the train got on schedule sometime along the way and we didn't know that they'd taken off the "delay" notice.

A group of us shared a nice apartment in the heart of town for the weekend. Zakopane is a fun resort town in the mountains, pretty crowded year-round. In the spring and summer, people come to go hiking; in the winter, they ski and snowboard. I chose not to go on an epic hike up to the top of the mountain and instead, spent a very nice day wandering around the town, enjoying the people-watching, ice cream, good local cuisine and beautiful architecture. In preparation for heavy snows, all the buildings have high, peaked roofs, like chalets. Many have gorgeous designs carved into the wood. It's a very beautiful and restful area, and the hills and mountains are so green and pretty!

I left on Saturday afternoon, took an express train back to Warsaw. Got a good night's rest, then left for Vienna Sunday afternoon. I was going there for a business meeting for three days. We accomplished a lot, I think. It was nice to have more time in Vienna, though, especially in better weather. I mainly wandered around a lot, just exploring and admiring the buildings. On Monday, I went to a lovely concert of Mozart's music at the Staatsoper. Gorgeous opera house, nice acoustics. The musicians all wore kind of fun period costumes, adding a unique element to it. Afterward, I went to the Anna Sacher cafe in the hotel Sacher and ate a piece of the world-famous Sacher-Torte, a legendary dessert that's 175 years old. Everyone told me it was so sweet it'd make your teeth hurt, and they were a bit right- there is definitely a tangy sweetness to it. Though, I can't quite put my finger on what it is... a mystery!

On Tuesday night, I found an English cinema and watched Harry Potter 6. I did this because I really want to see it on the big screen and it's only dubbed over here, with no subtitles. So I counted that as a worthwhile thing to do. Had a *very* yummy steak dinner and salad afterward.

On Wednesday, I almost missed my flight back! I somehow mis-read the departure time on the itinerary as 17:45 instead of 17:25. Looking back, I think I had first seen the 16:45 boarding time and mixed that up in my brain. Needless to say, I somehow raced off of the CAT train, ran up the stairs, checked myself and my luggage in, made it through security and onto the bus that goes to the airplane in under 15 minutes. The luck of the Tiger must have been with me then!

Had a pretty uneventful flight back, caught a taxi home, dropped off my bags, then caught a bus out to the Old Town for a good-bye dinner with some friends. It was M's last night in Poland, and A is leaving at the end of the weekend. So we all ate tons of delicious Indian food and chatted. One of the girls had bought a bottle of wonderful raspberry liqueur made by monks, so we enjoyed that after dinner, then headed next door for a couple more drinks. More good conversation, plus a lot of Doors on the stereo- good times. It was a wonderful night, and I'll miss them, but I also wish them a good future as they head off to new endeavors.

On Thursday night, I joined a couple of friends at Ujazdowskie Castle for a really rad concert by a Polish singer named Katarzyna Nosowska. When we arrived, there was a huge crowd and we were told that tickets were all sold out. So we went to the nice restaurant behind the castle and chatted over some beer instead. The music was still going when we finished beer, so we asked if we could just hear the last couple of songs. We had a welcome surprise, though- the lady said the concert was only about 20 min. into the set and that we could get in for half price! So we ended up seeing most of it.

VERY cool music- reminded me of Dead Can Dance, punk, blues, country, hard rock, a lot of things all mixed together. The band was really great, and she has a strong but ethereal voice. And it was awesome to see this out in the open-air courtyard of a castle under a dark blue sky dotted with stars. Had a fabulous night and made a nifty musical discovery!

I guess that's about all for now. Hope everyone's having a good weekend!