So, this is what's been happening....

Well, to start with, we had a national holiday in Slovakia. The Saint's Day of the Virgin Mary of the Seven Sorrows, whi is the Patron Saint of Slovakia. Her Saint's Day is on the 15th of September, and for my school, at least, marks the end of an extremely long weekend. You see, my school saw no point in bringing us to school on Monday, only to set us free again on Tuesday. It worked out well, for Beth and I. For Carlos, well, let's just say he was not so fortunate. He had school on the 14th. Beth and I were a bit smug at the Rotary meeting that night.

At any rate, the long weekend marked:
1. My learning of how to get to Aupark, the really big mall here in Bratislava, by myself. It's a nice thing to be able to get there on my own, so I don't have to rely on Miša to drive me there.

2. We went to Garulata, the ruins of this old Roman fort. It was cool, although it didn't have the same awesomeness as Glanum did, primarily because a heard of reenactors had flocked there for the day. Now, this would only be mildly irksome if they didn't promote ignorance. As these people always do, they insisted on having a table set up to demonstrate how to put on a toga. And they always, always put them on girls. Now, for those who don't know, most girls didn't wear togas in ancient Rome. In fact, most people we consider Romans didn't wear togas. Toga were a sign that a man was a citizen of Rome, a rare honor in the provinces, such as at Garulata. Female citizens, however, did not wear toga. They wore stola, which are quite cool, if I do say so myself. There was, however, one class of women who wore togas: The women of, shall we say, ill repute. So. I once again had to bite my tongue, and avoid pointing out to a nine year old girl who was being wrapped in the 6 meters of cloth in a toga that she was being dressed up as, to be quite frank, a whore. Then Miša asked if I wanted to try it. It was one of those dreadful situations where you could not say what you wanted, and had to do what you really didn't want to do. Thus, I was dressed in a toga. Oh well. At least intelligent girls who wore togas in ancient Rome stood a fairly good chance of being powerful behind the scenes, right?

2. A very lovely trip to Vienna. I went with Petra and her boyfriend to the city on Tuesday. We saw a photography portrait exhibition in one of the museums, which was, ummm... how shall I put this? Very... very cavalier at times. A lot of the photographers, all three of us agreed, had some issues. I think, in the future, I'll stick to landscapes. However, there were several diamonds in the rough of the exhibition, and I'm glad I got to see those. We didn't really stay long in Vienna, just an hour or two, and my camera was running out of batteries. It died while I was there. I did get a few pictures, though!The Parliament Building

A theatre across from City Hall

City Hall of Vienna

So, pretty much, we went, we saw the exhibit, saw the Steppendome, the really famous church in Vienna, then proceded to get some ice cream, and headed home. Kind of pathetic, I know, but I'll be going back more than once over the course of the year. It's only an hour or so away!

And that's about it. School's good; I'm making friends, and my host family is great.

And that's all there is. There isn't anymore.