Swimming fun!

Mom and I went exploring today to find the swimming pool.  We took a bus right outside our apartment and 7 stops later we were there.  We couldn't quite figure which door to go in (it was a large building), but we followed our noses and found the pool (Mom says "plywalnia"). You can learn  A LOT from watching other people...
People were checking their coats, so we did that.  Then they took off their shoes and put on flip flops and stood in line to pay.  Since we didn't have flip flops, we just took off our shoes.  We got to the ticket stand and they lady gave us wrist bands, but didn't make us pay.  We watched the people in front of us and saw them touch the bands to the entrance turnstill.  We did the same thing.  There were lockers in the dressing room, but we couldn't figure out how to use them.  A lady showed us.  Pick an empty one and use your electronic wrist band to open it, then lock it - cool!  We saw the sign below as we entered, but didn't think much about it.

Tak = yes, nie = no.  Mom laughed and said that men had to wear speedo suits.  We showered before going in like everyone else, but before we could get to the pool, another swimmer stopped us and gestured to our heads.  We had to have swim caps!  Mom went back out to a little shop we saw at the entrance and bought us both caps.  Mine is a beautiful pink!

We finally got to go in.  It was so much fun!  They had a fountain, a bubbly pool (not hot), a swirly pool (like a lazy river but smaller), two hot tubs, and a long water slide.

 

I'm not old enough to sit in the hot tub at the YMCA at home, but there was no age limit at the pool.  We swam for about 2 hours and finally left because Mom wanted to get home before it got dark.  We changed back into our clothes, gave our wrist bands back to the lady at the desk and went to put our shoes back on.  The lady called something to Mom.  Suddenly Mom realized what she was saying - we needed to PAY, not just turn in the wrist bands.  Mom had to dig out every coin in her purse to cover the cost after buying the swim caps.  You have to pay by the hour - that's why we didn't pay when we went in.  Its a good thing we didn't stay any longer! -Delaney

Reflections

The buses here are a combination of new and modern (bendable and non-bendable per Delaney) and old Soviet era diesel or electric (old, utilitarian, functional, and manual transmissions - makes me think of Ralph Cramden). I like very much the idea of "if it works, keep it".
Adam and I ventured back to the E. LeClerc for some more supplies. For a 2L bottle of Mountain Dew, Adam was willing to carry back on the bus two 6L bottles of water. We are drinking only bottled water as the water here has heavy metals in it. O.K. for a short while, long term not so good. We ran out this morning and I used tap water in my coffee, the taste was poor.
Carolyn and Delaney went to the local swimming pool to scout it out for tomorrow's possible outing with Julia, our landlord's daughter. Expect another post on that. -David

Bus passes

Carolyn and I obtained our bus passes today. 340 PLN each (about $120 u.s.) for a 150 day pass. If you buy a ticket for one way each time you ride, you pay 2.40 PLN. The kids will get passes once they are issued student i.d.'s. Once again I thank God for Carolyn's language gifts, they made the process much easier.

On another note, I was reading a post about Bob Gannon, a private pilot who has flown around the world two times. His statement on traveling says it all:

“If you truly want to see the world, then get over your ideas and prejudices and be happy with the process,”.

-David

Bus map hero

David is my bus hero!  Today we took a different route to the kids school that was much easier and quicker thanks to David's curiosity about the bus routes.  After our 25 min, 13 stop, trip to the kids school yesterday, he got to wondering if there was a faster way.  Today we took a different bus that did not require crossing a busy street to the stop, only took 10 mins, and 7 stops!  I think I won't have any problem letting Adam and Delaney travel this route on their own from time to time. -Carolyn

Kids school

Visited the kids' school today and met Delaney's and Adam's teachers.  Both were very nice and spoke English well.  Delaney is in a primary classroom with 16 other children.  School from 9 - 2:00 with 3 afternoons of extracuricular activities included in the school fee.  She picked swimming, dance, and art.  Here is a picture of her with her teacher (Pani Dorota - Ms. Dorothy)

 
Adam's schedule is crazy - no such thing as a block schedule.  Every single day is different, with varying total hours for each course.  Math is 6 hours a week, Spanish is 2 hours a week, Biology is 3 hours a week.  On several days he has free hours where his Polish peers will be taking a course in Polish.  Four of his classes are private tutors.  He's scheduled for 2 hours of Polish tutoring, but has requested several more hours if possible. He also has some elective choices at the end of the day.  They apparently do much of their  PE at a large athletic center downtown at the end of the day. -Carolyn

Beautiful snow

If its going to be cold, there has to be snow to go with it (in my opinion!) Maybe we'll get enough to try out our new sled soon! - Carolyn

My great helper

There appears to be little systematic snow removal from city sidewalks, but generous sprinkles of sand are applied.  This leaves all of our boot very messy when we come home, so we've instituted taking shoes off at the door.  In order to keep our hard wood floors clean, we bought a swifter mop yesterday.  Delaney was eager to use it and helped mop the upstairs last night. (The owners had the floor waxed before our arrival.  It looks beautiful, but all of us have slipped down several times.  We'll be glad when its a little less slippery.)  

Long awaited - apartment photos

We are all extremely happy with our accommodations!  We live on the top level of the apartment complex (4th floor-no elevators).  Our landlord lives two floors below us.  The first picture on the left is our front entry way (the apt is two stories, the main entrance in on the top level.  There is a "back door" on the lower level).  To the right is the living/dining room.  The large window faces south and lets in a lot of light during the day.  It overlooks a main street, but is not noisy at all.  There is a small balcony just off the living room on the left side (not visible).  The second door you see on the right from the front entry is the kitchen.  

 The kitchen is pictured below on the left.  Note the remarkably large refrigerator!  The stove is gas with 3 of 4 burners that work, and 2 of 4 grill tops that hold pots (makes for interesting usage).  It has a dishwasher, but since we only have 6 sets of dishes and have to wash after each meal, we're just doing them by hand.  Plenty of cabinet space. The master bed room (below on the right) and bath are to the left of the front entry.

There is a large tub and a shower (no enclosure).  You have to be a bit careful when showering, but the gigantic tub is wonderful!  The stairs lead down from the front entry way to the lower level and the kids rooms.

On the left is Delaney's room.  Plenty of drawer space to store the treasures that she is always collecting.  On the right is Adam's burrow (and yes, he is burrowed under the covers).

 

The kids have a bathroom with a second shower on the lower level.  There is also a washing machine, and remarkably - a dryer!  We put in our first load today.  We obviously need some further instruction because we ended up dumping water all over the floor when we opened the washer.  I expect we'll probably air dry many of our clothes since the dryers are not very efficient.

I'll take some pictures from the windows in the morning so you can see what kind of view we have. -Carolyn

My shopping hero

We came back home with the kids after our first bus journey, then David ventured out in another direction to the Tesco (another food supermarket) with a list of food items.  We are slowly stocking the kitchen, although with having to carry it all by hand on a bus, we are augmenting our supplies slowly.  David combed every aisle of the store multiple times attempting to read and decipher pictures on packages of food items that look very different from what we are used to.  At one point he called me and spelled out words on different spice packages;  I typed them into Google translate and we got what we needed!  (Pictures of different spices with green leaves weren't very helpful - although the onion was identifiable).  The odd thing is, all the spices come in little paper packages like taco seasoning, not in separate shaker bottles.  I'm sure a store sells spice containers to transfer the opened packages into, but we haven't found them yet. -Carolyn

Day 5

Its so hard to believe we been here just 5 days!  We continue to make adjustments to our new conditions and get comfortable with our surroundings.  We set out on the bus today as a family (Carolyn got tickets for everyone from an automatic machine).  We all visited the local mall that I saw with my host yesterday, and had lunch there (pizza - tasted good).  Then we journeyed on to the kids school (just to locate it, we have an appointment to enroll tomorrow), and went to the Real store where we got a few more household necessities.  By the end of the trip, Delaney was developing a blister with her snow boots, so it was good we were headed back.  Delaney is missing home the most at this point and had a bit of a melt down this evening.  I'll be glad when she starts her classes and makes some friends at school.  Its hard to give her the attention she craves and get a household established too. -Carolyn

Shopping around Lublin.

It was a a busy and productive day in Lublin.  David and I started the morning with an extended visit to our local grocery store to investigate all the unfamiliar items on the shelves.  Our final assessment - we won't be eating well if these are our only options, but enough variety to get us along in a pinch (ie the next few days as we get bus passes and find out where the supermarkets are located).

After lunch I was picked up and taken to the University to be introduced to the Int'l Relations faculty.  As they continued their meeting, I stepped out to walk the streets around the University.  I found an automatic bus ticket dispenser (1 ride and 24 hr tickets only, no long term tickets); I spoke with a bus employee who gave me the address where I needed to go to get long term passes (to be a destination in the near future); and I found the equivalent of a Walgreen's for some needed toiletries.

After the meeting, the department head took me to a store called "Real" (German-based) that is a bit like Walmart with some notable exceptions.  The shopping carts require a 2 zloty coin deposit in the handle in order to disconnect them from a chain of baskets. (When the basket is locked into the chain again, the coin is returned).  Inside the store I found the kitchen aisle and started putting pots into the basket, but an employee took them out again, explaining something to my host.  She proceeded to weigh them on  a scale and put a price sticker on them.  We repeated this for my skillet, my plates, my glasses, my pairing knives and...well, you get the picture.  Very odd indeed.  We proceeded to another aisle and I added cooking spoons and tupperware to my basket without the need to weigh them.  As I checked out, there was another discussion with the cashier.  My host explained that she could charge my credit card in zloty or euros, which did I want?  Since our bank charges the same fee for int'l transactions, I figured it didn't matter...I was just surprised euros were a choice since Poland is not in the Euro Zone yet.

Our final stop was the Galleria Mall and an excellent delicatessan called Alma.  My host just wanted me to see one more shopping option for the future.  We stopped at a Czecolada (sweet shop) and my host bought some Polish chocolates for Adam and Delaney and we headed back to the apartment. With some cooking utensils on hand, dinner was better than last night!  -Carolyn

Art

Q: Do you know what all of these pieces of art have in common?

A:  They decorate the walls of our apartment!  Can you say "eclectic"?!

Dinner in our own place

The kids and I went over to the local grocery store to pick up some food for dinner and breakfast.  We settled on spaghetti, sauce, bread and butter for dinner, with cereal and yougert for breakfast. (Note: avoid taking two kids to a very small store at 5:00 in the evening when all the locals come by).  We realized after filling our basket with milk, eggs, OJ, etc that we didn't bring our backpacks with us.  Fortunately we managed to communicate that we needed to purchase some durable grocery bags and came home with our food.

What we discovered when we got back to the apartment was that we had only one small pot in the entire kitchen.  We heated the sauce, then poured it in a bowl.  Then cooked half the pasta and served Delaney and Adam, cooked the other half and David and I ate.  Unfortunately we had no salt in the apartment and the pasta tasted pretty terrible.  Bread was fine, and the cake from Marek was delicious! Hopefully we'll do  a little better tomorrow after we get to the supermarket and purchase some kitchen goods! -Carolyn

Arrival in Lublin

Thankfully we were greeted on the platform by our real estate agent and the head of my department (Prof. Marek Pietras).  Our baggage and family fit in their two cars and we arrived at our apartment in short order.  We were surprised to be greeted by the family that owned the apartment (mom, dad and daughter - Julia age 7). They live in the apartment below and rent out the one we will be in.   We sat briefly and talked with Marek translating.  The father spoke rough but understandable English and started showing David the new TV system and other things about the apartment.  Marek offered to show me around Lublin briefly.  We walked around the block and identified several local grocery markets.  He took me by a local bakery and bought our family 3 small cakes as a welcome gift (yum!).  Then we drove over to the kids school, past the local equivalent of Walmart (Real), and to the University.  He showed me the department building and a classroom (well equipped), then we walked through the Old Town where he basically indicated that every restaurant is very good.  He shared a lot of the local history with me as we passed various historic points.  The independent Polish govn't that was formed in 1918 first met in Lublin in the largest classroom that the department uses.  We picked up a map and then he brought me back to the apartment (where David was STILL getting the full tour!) -Carolyn

Delaney's first train ride

I took my first train ride today.  It was awesome!  Mom and I rode with a mom and two girls (9 and 12).  They shared their gummy bears and I shared my chocolate.  They rode all the way with us to Lublin.  We had 8 seats in our compartment.  We could close the door and the curtains if we wanted, but it was hot so we kept them open.  I stood in the passageway and walked up and down and took some pictures.  I also used the bathroom - it was a hole in the floor of the train - eww! - Delaney

Carolyn: We managed to get on the right train although I was worried about it.  The Warszawa Centralna train station is the most unusual one I've ever been in.  There is no central waiting area with a large status board of the incoming and outgoing trains.  There are only 4 platforms with 8 tracks and about 100 some newstand-type stores in long confusing corridors.   I gave our ticket to the ticket agent and asked her which track our train was on, she said platform 1.  We waited until 1 minute before the train was scheduled to arrive and it finally popped up on the local track sign.  We confirmed with a conductor and hopped on board.  By some miracle my humongous suitcase fit in the overhead bin.  I don't ever want to travel with a bag this big again (dragging it up to the 4th floor of our apartment was an even bigger pain!)

The ride was uneventful with just 4 stops between Warsaw and Lublin.  Snowy countryside was quite pretty (below).  The Lublin train station is recently restored and much more attractive than the Warsaw station.

David here:  Now that Adam has raved about the electronics in the apartment (Chad, I kept thinking of you as our landlord went over all the goodies) I will start from this morning.  We got a quick cab ride to Warszawa Centralna (Warsaw Central Train Station) in plenty of time to scout out the proper tracks.  The trains only stop for about 10 minutes max so you better not miss it.  We didn't.  Delaney and Carolyn shared a compartment with a mother and her two daughters, Adam and I shared one with a very nicely dressed gentleman, and then the next stop we added three very nice people, a man and two women (think grandfather and two grandmothers).  We all rode together for the 2 hours that it took to get to Lublin (only 160 kilometers).  The countryside was snowy farmland with interspersed small villages.  I can only imagine how beautiful it will be in the summer.

We were met in the apartment by our landlord Adam, his wife and his 7 year old daughter Julia.  Adam is the landlord every travel should have.  The apartment was clean and ready for our arrival.  Sheets on the beds, towels in the bathrooms and a brand new flat screen with built in blueray dvd, all connected to a satellite dish with a couple hundred channels, including many English channels.  Internet included along with a wireless router.  Since our landlord lives right below us, he can pick up the signal from the router, so he is only charging us 1/2 the internet price.  The apartment has many nice architectural and decorative touches.  It looks to be a very nice, comfortable home away from home.

awesome apartment

hey this is adam! and the apartment we are staying in is amazing! i cant put it into words but i love it. blu ray tv, wireless internet, my own awesome room, and lotsa other stuff! thats about it.

Awesome Science Museum!

We spent the day at the Centrum Nauki Koperniki (Copernicus Science Center) in Warsaw.  It just opened in 2010 and is TOTALLY AWESOME!  It must have hundreds (no exaggeration) of hands on science exhibits for every type of science - light, music, motion, astronomy, life science, photography, etc.  Here are some photos of Delaney totally enjoying herself...

creating a "bubble window"

Giant gerbil wheel

Quidditch anyone?  use the air cannon to get the ball through the hoop

 

David and I couldn't decide what our favorite exhibit was.  I particularly liked the "Quidditch hoops" and the ball that you floated with the air cannon.  The water exhibit was fun too with locks and boats and water wheels.  My favorite though was this exhibit where the computer displayed a distance/time graph and you had to try to follow it.  There was a carpet with distances marked out, and a laser tracker that could tell how far away you were.  You would get a countdown, then have to move slowly (or quickly) closer (or farther) trying to duplicate the existing graph line.

The down side of the day was the 2 hour wait in line (1 1/2 of which was outside in the cold).  This was unexpected, but worth it at the end of the day.  A reminder to always have boots, gloves and hats with you even when you are taking a taxi 'door to door'.  -Carolyn

Delaney's passport

I got the first stamp in my passport!  It was in the Stockholm airport (Arlanda).

Luggage Fairy visits

Delaney's lost luggage has arrived - Barbies are out and at play as I type.  -Carolyn

Dinner

We had a wonderful dinner at the Adler, a Bavarian style restaurant recommended by our "Polish" travel guide Dr. Gartland. I (David) had white sausages in a lemon broth and a 1/2 liter of Paulaner Dunkel.

Carolyn had pierogi filled with cottage cheese and potato...

Adam had a filet of sole.

Delaney had schnitzel chicken - it was so delicious it was gone before I got a picture!

The dinner was a nice end to what started out as a frustrating day - lack of sleep and fighting with new cell service. On that topic, we purchased pre-paid sim cards for Play (the network) and I installed them on our phones. After some debugging, I managed to get Adam's and mine working. Adam, the lucky devil, somehow managed to get internet loaded on his phone. Carolyn's cheapo $20 phone did not work. Fortunately I brought along one of our old phones and got it to work later that night. The cheapo phone will no longer work even on the AT&T network - it is permanently locked out of everything.
After dinner we retired for the night and we all got a good long nights sleep. Today we are heading out for the Copernicus Science Museum. -David

The jet lag experience

Our whole family was up in the middle of the night last night as we wrestled with jet lag and fatigue.  We all crashed about 6:30 pm last night.  I then woke up at 8:00 pm, 9:00, and 10:00, going to sleep again pretty quickly.  When I woke at 2:00 am I wasn't ready to be up, but knew I couldn't fall asleep. I quietly got up and started typing a few thoughts on my computer.  Delaney rolled over and asked brightly "Is it morning?"  We  turned on the light and read books for a while, then I laid back down and she put on her headphones and listened to storybooks until she was able to fall asleep again (4:00 am).  We both slept til about 8:00 am and felt much more rested when we got up.  The shower had full water pressure and plenty of hot water (A+! for Etap Hotel).  Breakfast offered a variety of options including 4 different breads, ham, turkey, several cheeses, jam, nutella, corn flakes, granola, yougert, fruit cocktail, apple and orange juice.  We enjoyed the day at the Arkadia Mall (see Delaney's reflections) and headed back to the hotel at dark (4:30 pm).  Not sure how we'll spend the day tomorrow...but the Copernicus Science Museum is in the running.  -Carolyn

Delaney's update

We had breakfast at the hotel and it tasted really weird, except the yougert which was good.  My luggage didn’t come last night so I had to wear the same clothes again!  We decided to go to the store to find some extra clothes.  We decided to take a taxi instead of a “bendable bus” [the city buses are double long with an extension in the middle]. Our whole family spent the day at the Arkadia Mall – the largest in central Europe!  

Dad took forever getting our cell phones to work while Adam, Mom and I went into a huge grocery store to look around.   I had a cheeseburger at McDonald’s, but we had to scrape off the toppings because Mom couldn’t figure out how to ask for a plain cheeseburger.  French fries are called “frytki”.  We went to the movies after lunch and watched Megamochny (Megamind).  We were told it was in English with Polish subtitles, but it was just in Polish!  You might think that you can’t enjoy a movie if you don’t understand what is being said, but we did.  It made me laugh.  We also bought me another book to read because I read all the books we brought on the plane. -Delaney

 

Internet connectivity - stay tuned

As we set out, we don't know what to expect in terms of connectivity for the next week or so.  We'll be in a hotel in Warsaw for several days, then headed to our apartment in Lublin where we will need to get phone/internet service.  I'm sure there are wifi spots around, but won't know until we get on the ground.  We'll add more posts as soon as we are able to...so stay tuned!     -Carolyn

Safe and tired in Warsaw

We've made it to our hotel in Warsaw with only one lost suitcase (Delaney's).  The airline said it would likely come in on the next plane from Stockholm and they would deliver it to the hotel.  We found a minivan cab that could hold all four of us plus our luggage so that was a good thing.  The hotel is clean and relatively roomy (by European standards).   Free wifi in the hotel lobby is how we are able to communicate today.  -Carolyn

The Long flight

Thoughts from our long plane ride (Chicago > Stockholm):

It was my favorite plane ride ever.  I got to watch the take off from a camera in the cockpit.  I also watched a movie on my own screen.  I had a hard time getting comfortable to go to sleep even though I could spread out across two seats. – Delaney

Departure from Chicago @ 4:25 pm.   Dinner @ 6:00 pm.  Attempt to get Delaney settled after finishing her dinner and movie @ 7:00 pm.   Attempt to get some sleep myself with continued restless tossing and turning, asking of questions and random babble from Delaney 7:00-10:00 pm.  Breakfast served @ 11:00 pm.  Landing 25 minutes ahead of schedule @ 12:30 am (7:30 am local time).   I’m already looking forward to my hotel bed at the end of the day, but I’ve got one more flight and an afternoon to kill in Warsaw before we allow ourselves to crash. –Carolyn

“It was just a plane ride to me” –Adam (who is fighting a head cold and trying to conserve his strength).

Mystery of the time post solved. Carolyn has the blog set to Lublin time thinking that are next posts would be from Poland. Oh, well. Just subtract 7 hours from the posted time to see what time you are reading it (or look at your watch).
Leaving for the airport shortly.

The previous post was posted at 9:27 p.m. Wednesday the 19th and this post a minute later. I don't know why it shows the 20th.

AND THEY'RE OFF.........not really. Icy runways, closed airports, delayed flights, missed connections, and all in the matter of a few hours. Back to the beginning.
We arrived at ICT early and got checked in. Unfortunately, Carolyn's bag weighed in at 63 lbs. and the limit was 50 lbs. Overweight fee = $200. OUCH! A very helpful United gate agent suggested that we re-arrange the weight to the other bags. Unfortunately, Delaney's bag weighed exactly 50 lbs, Adam's was 49 lbs. and mine was 43 lbs. For you math challenged, that means trying to cram 13 lbs. into an available 8 lbs. Second very helpful suggestion from the gate agent was to purchase another bag ($25) from the gift shop and check it as a second bag for only $35. Done and off to the gate. A short while later the gate agent announces that the airport is now closed due to icy runways and the plane that is to take us to Chicago is circling and unable to land. A few minutes later the agent announces that the plane is diverting to Tulsa. It is now clear that we are going to miss our connection. I stand in line for re-booking, and another very friendly and helpful gate agent begins looking at options for us. While he is trying to rebook us to Warsaw, he tells me that the computer is not letting him into our records because it appears that someone else is working on them. Turns out that Scandinavian Air somehow found out that we were going to miss our connection and was re-booking us on a new flight. How wonderful is that? United re-booked us out of Wichita Thursday morning to Chicago, then we depart on Scandinavian Air later that day for Stockholm, then onto Warsaw, arriving Friday 12:00 p.m. Warsaw time.
Sadly, it is not often that you hear of airlines doing well in the customer service department, so I would like to rectify that. Wichita is very fortunate to have such friendly and helpful United Airlines agents, and Scandinavian Air was on the ball rescheduling us even before our original flight departed. It is people like them that keep the airlines afloat. Uh... I mean in the air.
One more night in our own beds. Many thanks to Kelly M. for coming to get us and take us home, braving the icy roads and for Maggie M. for agreeing to take us tomorrow a.m.
G'night.

Leaving today

It must be almost time to take off...the kids have noted that there is "nothing good to eat in the kitchen", we're putting in our last load of laundry.  The bags are packed.  The house is almost clean.  A few last errands to run and we'll be on our way to the airport.  The kids have spent every minute of the 4-day weekend with friends, so as friends head back to school today it will be a little hard.  We've rented several movies to help Delaney pass the day.

Last minute random thoughts:  we're REALLY going!  This will be the last day that I drive a car for 6 months!  Will my Polish suffice?  What if there are flight delays?  WSU classes started yesterday - UMCS classes don't start till Feb 15 (I guess since UMCS finals are in June this is nothing to gloat about).

Intinerary

We leave Wichita on Weds evening, stopping first in Chicago. We leave Chicago at 10:00 pm and fly to Copenhagen, arriving at 1:00 pm on Thursday.  A few hours in Copenhagen, then we head to Warsaw on a regional jet, arriving at 5:00 pm.  We'll stay in Warsaw several days and then take a train to Lublin on Monday.

Travel possibilities

I spent some time yesterday looking at train connections and travel times, as well as discount European airlines, to figure out where we might try to visit during our stay in Poland.  Results: Polish trains are pretty slow.  Warsaw is about 60 miles from Lublin, but takes 2 1/2 hrs by train.  Many different airlines fly in and out of Warsaw to all over Europe.  Discount airlines also fly out of Krakow (4-5 hrs by train) and Rzeszow (also about 4 hrs by train).  I poked around on the Polish train site further and found a handy printout of all of the stops on each train route.  Below is a partial printout from Lublin to Rzeszow.  There are 45 stops, most of which are about 3-5 minutes apart.  This is the *fastest* route!  Once we are on a Eurorail connection (mostly out of Warsaw), the connect times are not as bad (8 hrs to Budapest, Vienna, Berlin).  Since I love train travel, this is not a big deal, but good to know when planning trips...

Delaney - school reflections

I am excited about my new school.  I loved getting several emails from my teacher in Poland.  During recess she says that we get to take walks if its not too cold and if it is too cold, we play in the gym. They have a swimming pool at the school and we get to swim once a week.  After school we can do other lessons like dance and music.  I will ride a city bus with Adam to get to school. -Delaney

final preparations

I finally feel like I'm making progress in fighting my hydra-headed to-do list (cross one thing off, add two more things!)  It was nice to walk out of my office today with my desk completely and totally cleared off. 

As we move through this week doing our usual things for the last time (for the next 6 months anyway), I'm feeling a bit nostalgic.  Tomorrow is the last day of school for the kids and Delaney asked for cupcakes to share with her class, so we're baking cupcakes tonight.  Adam has asked for a final Laser Quest game with some of his friends, so we've scheduled that as well.  Delaney has been swimming at the Y with her friends twice in the past week and had a sleepover last weekend.  I'm really going to miss all of our friends at church.  Sunday will probably be a hard day for me, saying goodbye to everyone. -Carolyn

Magic Jack

We now have a Wichita phone number that you can reach us at in Poland courtesy of Magic Jack. We will be making the number available to friends and family. It works through the computer so you can call us in Poland and it will be just like calling Wichita. We can call the states and it will be just like calling from Wichita. We even have voice mail. If you have never heard of Magic Jack, I suggest you look into it. For $40 a year you get unlimited calling within the U.S. My nephew, who is an exchange student in Germany this year uses it to call the states and it works very well, just like a regular phone.
Our cell phones will be suspended as of January 29 so you will not be able to call us on those numbers. Once we are in Poland, we will be getting prepaid Polish cell phones. I was able to get the unlock codes for our phones, so all we will have to do is to buy sim cards and put them in our existing phones. In Poland, prepaid is the way to go. All incoming calls do not count against your minutes. Only out going calls do, and NO contracts.
Only 15 days until departure.
-David