Holidays in Europe

Icecaps on the Spree River, running through Berlin.

I decided to take advantage of the cheap Ryan Air flights to Europe and spent the holidays in Berlin, Warsaw, and Bologna.  I traveled with another American who teaches in Fez, and the two of us enjoyed lots of delicious food (including a good share of pork), drinks (anything alcoholic will do), and Christmas cheer - all things that are hard to get in Morocco.

The 'Eastside Gallery', a 1.3 km section of the Berlin Wall where artists have created murals to explore the notions of the wall and its meaning in society.

We stayed exclusively with couch-surfers, or connections made through couch-surfing, an online site for travelers seeking couches, people seeking travelers, and all of the positive exchanges that happen in between.

Here we are in the kitchen before a traditional German meal, the name of which eludes me now, of meat, potatoes and beet salad.  

Brandenburger Tor, central Berlin, with Christmas tree

The main square in Warsaw, Poland, at sunset. It was even colder here than in Berlin, reaching -12 degrees celsius (10 degrees fahrenheit).  Burr!

A cappuccino and a bologna sandwich in Bologna, Italy.  

Bologna is full of arcades, pedestrian passages on either side of the street.

Pisa is not the only city in Italy with a leaning tower.  Legend has it that if university students go up the tower before they finish school, they will not graduate.