And 2007 is here!

I'm not quite sure how four months passed without an update, but they did. Suffice it to say that I was in Europe for four weeks in August, I came back for a funeral, and I also began spending more time on a certain extra-curricular endeavor. Nevertheless, now, after 2006 has passed and 2007 brings new challenges and opportunities, I'll sit to summarise the time since my last entry.

Sixth annual west coast nephews reunion
Shortly after returning from Europe and bidding farewell to TLC, I went to visit my UT and AC in San Mateo, CA for the sixth consecutive year. My cousin, Chris, and two brotherly friends, Devlin and Mark, were in attendance this year. We enjoyed some good wine, great food and plenty of high-quality and well-intentioned banter of the sort that comes with years of familiarity and love between people.

It's funny how a place ~3,000 kilometres away has become such a home for me. Even our adopted (step) family out west have become great friends and I always savour the moments spent with each of them. Whether up in Duncans Mills or in San Carlos or in good old San Mateo, it is good to re-acquaint and build the bonds that tie us in the family tree and vine.

One specific highlight of the trip this year was when my old friend and travel buddy, Colleen, stopped by UT's house on Labour Day. She brought photographs from Granada, including many of me, and even a few of Mark. We had many a laugh just remembering our first European adventures. And of course it was interesting to hear tales of her recent adventures as an assistant district attorney!

San Juan, Puerto Rico
Without much time to settle back in the Palacio, I hopped on a flight and headed to Puerto Rico. This trip was somewhat difficult because, until 21 August, I was talking with Tracy and Mark about having them come to visit me in San Juan. As I enjoyed the September sun and Puerto Rico's sticky humidity, I frequently thought of how much fun it could have been... and how much she would have enjoyed the time.

But, on the other hand, I felt it my obligation to enjoy as much as possible for the sake of TLC. I stayed in Old San Juan this time, and was able to walk down Fortaleza for dinner most nights. On Friday night I ventured to La Plazita #11, where several streets surrounding a market were blocked for pedestrian use only. I ate some of the dirtiest fried food I've ever had in my life, drank some Puerto Rican beer and watched the Boricuas dancing in the streets. I also wrote the following during that moment:

15-Septiembre-2006
La Plazita - Por cuatro lados, la Plaza de Mercado esta enrodeado por gente. Gente afuera bebiendo sus cervezitas o bebidas comprado de una de las promodoras de Budweiser, Coors, Bacardi, u otras. A las 8:00 por la noche, la gente come cosas fritas que no pertenecen en el sistema de seres humanos. Music, proviene de todos lados y hay un ritmo en el aire. ahora no, pero seguramenta van a bailar aqui en las calles. Y Yo, Yo como, bebo y bailare con ellos. Pero ahora, a las 8:05, me siento. Callado, pensativo, y observando lo que puedo ver y escuchar. Estan llenando las calles. El ruido crece. Todavia ho hablo. Espero otro momento. Todo estara bien. En ese moment, todo sera perfecto, sere otro persona, vivire mas que pienso, bailare mas que observo, pero a las 8:15 de la noche, estoy aqui. Callado, esperando, observando. Contento, pero en otro momento, todo mejorara.

Nothing too special, but I was inspired by the energy of the people and little disappointed in not having the gumption to try to meet locals. Anyway, I ended the night by walking through Old San Juan and stopping at a few watering holes that had live music. One place had a guy who was playing Silvio Rodriguez cover songs (nice!) and the other had a band playing sones. Very nice!

On Saturday, I went to my favourite breakfast spot in San Juan, El Bombonera, where I had some good cafe con leche and some Malaguenas. Saturday was fairly laid-back, but Sunday I ended up meeting a couple of new friends at the Condado beach. We spent the day at the beach, just tanning and occasionally swimming. I could get used to that!

Cousin's wedding and Raleigh visit
The weekend after Puerto Rico I went to my cousin Amy's wedding. I also visited my friend's Deen and his wife Wendi that weekend. My cousin's wedding was on the beach and the groom and groomsmen wore guayabera shirts. For some reason I never realised this fact until I got back from Puerto Rico!!! So, upon my return I went in search of a good guayabera shirt. Shockingly, it was a lot harder to find in Chicago in September than it would have been in San Juan! I did end up finding a nice short-sleeved shirt, but I will have to be sure to purchase a suitable guayabera shirt the next time I go to San Juan!

The beachside wedding was beautiful, and I enjoyed visiting family during the wedding; however, as a wannabe latino, I was left wanting when the ceremony concluded at 10:00 PM without much chance to dance. Thankfully, a fellow latino has married into the family, and so my cousin-in-law, Immer, and I went out for a few more drinks. We stopped at the House of Blues and continued onto Gracie's(?), which was down the street from the hotel.

I only danced briefly, but memorably! Three young ladies unexplicably approached me, surrounded me and danced around me for about a minute. Admittedly, I was flabbergasted and unsure what to do, perhaps my lack of gut-reaction ruined my chances with the ladies? I'm not sure, but I am certain that Immer and I enjoyed several laughs about the mysterious occurence!

I should not forget to mention that the night before the wedding I visited Wendi and Deen in Raliegh. We stopped at Duke's campus, UNC's campus, where I saw the place where Deen proposed to Wendi. I must admit that UNC's campus was a lot nicer and reminded me quite a bit of good old U of I. That Friday night, Deen went out for a few beers and caught up on old times. It was generally a great visit.

Two weeks after the wedding, the weekend of 13-15 October, I was able to host UT in the Palacio. Additionally, Uncle Scott came in from Florida, so we had several family get-togethers. On Friday, Chris, Abby, Dan, Margie, Devlin and I took US and UT to Tutto Italiano. Afterward, we went to the Butcher's Dog for a few brews. I was very impressed with the uncles ability to keep up!

On Saturday, no less than eleven family members came to the city to celebrate Breakfast and Brunch Club ("BBC") at Wishbone in the west loop! A highlight for me was finding out that I was sitting where Alicia Keys was sitting just a few days later. After BBC, the family headed north to a potential residence in Lakeview, and then to Chico Blanco's new apartment in Andersonville. We ended up coming to the Palacio for drinks, guacamole, snacks and Lou Malnati's pizza.

It was great to have so much of my Dad's side of the family together. My second cousins Jim and Marci even ended up coming, although they missed the early crowd by about 10 minutes! After such a long day of visiting, entertaining, eating and drinking, UT, Devlin and I ended the night by watching some of "Da Ali G Show"... and the next morning, after BBC, I headed north on the Blue Line, while UT and Chico Blanco headed south in Billie to visit the family in the 'burbs...

Buenos Aires
My friend Eva was in need of a vacation and it seemed logical to escape late October cold in exchange for the spring of Buenos Aires. For me, it also meant that I was unable to rest, working during the day, and dining/drinking every night! But I can think of no better way to do Buenos Aires. And, thanks to Eva's knack for finding the coolest spots, my co-workers, Eva and I had a very successful bar crawl through Palermo on Friday night... and on Saturday we went shopping in the day time, and out to dinner and drinks with our friend Erica during the night. On Sunday, we went to Boca, and relaxed a lot.

During the whole trip, I was very concerned that Kevin's new progeny would be born before I got back. So far, I've been outside the country for every niece or nephew's birth, and I think it's a good streak to keep. So, I was grateful when I received a text message on 27 October 2006 announcing the arrival of my niece, Cannon Ellerie!

Another unusual occurence during my B.A. trip was the moment when I was gtalking with Brian, who was in Bogota, and my Dad, who was at home, at the same time. The former was cool because it was the first time Brian and I were in South America simultaneously, the latter nearly knocked my socks off because my Dad, who doesn't know an email address from a disc drive, was actually using gtalk! Of course, reality struck when, after the dialog screen disappeared while gtalking with Brian, he became concerned that Brian might be stuck in the keyboard!

Three weeks after returning from Buenos Aires, and after getting to hold Cannon for the first time and catch up on life, I went one another trip of a lifetime...

(Germany), Austria, Slovenia & Slovakia
While I was originally thinking of going to a sunnier spot during week of Thanksgiving, I ended up finding a much more reasonably priced flight to Munchen, Germany. As would be the case, Mark was easily convinced to join me, and, since Bratislava is not too far from Munchen, Allan was excited to host us during this trip! And so we went to Europe.

I left alone on Sunday, 19 November for Munich. After laying over for eight hours in Brussels and finding enough time to fit a Belgian waffle, Belgian chocolate and some Belgian beer in my stomach, I arrived in Munich at around 7:00 PM. I departed immediately for Salzburg, Austria.

One of the reasons I wanted to go on this trip was to research my family roots. My maternal granfather's father came from a town called "New Church, Austria," and based on that I wanted to see if I could trace my Mom's maiden, Crepinsek, name further back.

After finding a suitable hostel for my first night in Salzburg, I walked around the town to stretch my legs and eat a Frankfurter, but I didn't stay out too late, because I aimed to catch a 7:00 AM train to Neuekirche bai Lambach!

Somehow, I made the train and found the town. I was the only person on my car when I got off the train, and the only person who got off at the Neuekirche bai Lambach stop. I looked in every direction and did not see evidence of civilisation beyond farms and a heating room for anyone waiting for a train (duly noted). I chose a direction and walked before I saw a sign that let me know that Neuekirche bai Lambach was back in the other direction, and so I did an about-face with more confidence of my direction.

After a few kilometres of walking, I came upon something like a sub-division, except that one of the houses had horses in its acre-plus yard, and there weren't side walks, and no commerce to speak of ... alas, but there was a church!

As has been my custom in other ancestral towns, I walked the cemetary in search of any relevant surnames. And, as in other ancestral hometowns, my search was in vain. My best guess is that one needed money to bury oneself at the church, and most of my ancestors did not fit that description. In any case, I enjoyed the 15 minutes it took to comb the cemetary, and I walked toward what appeared to be the main street. I must say that, besides one restaurant/pub that was not open (at 9:00 - 10:00 AM), and a post office and fire department, there wasn't much going on! But, on my return walk, I noticed a building next to the church that had someone in it. And, having nothing else to do, I went in!

Three kind ladies greeted me with smiles and German phrases. I responded with one of the few German phrases I know, "Sprechen sie Deutsch?".

"Nein," was the unfortunate response! But my query was simple and I proceeded to butcher the German language in such a way as to make the ladies understand that I wanted to know if there were any birth, baptism or other records of my great-grandfather, or others with his last name. I explained to them (again with butchered German) that he was a Slovene who, on his U.S. citizenship papers, indicated that he was from Austria, which would have been the Austro-Hungarian empire at the time. They graciously offered to look into the kellar for any useful evidence! And I exchanged emails and returned to Salzburg.

I considered heading to the second Neuekirche (am Grossvenediger) that same day, but, as it was a 2 to 3 hour train/train/bus ride away, I opted for an afternoon in Salzburg, reading in a trendy cafe called Carpe Diem, which served Kombucha!, and otherwise enjoying a stroll through the town.

At dinner time, I returned to the hostal and was reading when I met a South African-Canadian. He, a Korean girl and I went for a quick dinner and then returned to the hostal to share some drinks and conversation. The Korean girl found two friends from Buenos Aires and the five of us sat and talked of travels, cultures, politics and, of course, the Sound of Music! It was a lovely time, but I retired shortly after midnight in anticipation of another early morning train to Neuekirche am Grossvenediger.

I took a two hour train to a connecting train to a bus, which brought me to the beautiful resort town of Neuekirche am Grossvenediger("NaG"). As I got closer, I got further into the Alps and further away from English-speaking Austria! Of course, besides the possibility of finding my ancestral homeland, this was a lot of the fun! And so, when I got on the bus, I once again used my limited German to communicate that I would like to go to NaG, and the bus driver kindly pretended to understand!

My walk through the mountain village of NaG was just as delightful as the previous, but the scenery was much improved, as was the church. I once again did not find any relics of Crepinseks in the cemetary, nor did I find anyone at the church to talk to. But I kept walking in search of someone who might help. I ended up finding a tourism office, who referred me to a community centre on the second floor. The lady in the community centre not only offered to look into the archives of NaG, but she also offered to look into the other five Neuekirches as well as the Neuenkirche, on the chance that "New Church" might have changed its spelling to Nine Churches.

The beauty of my Austrian experience is that I went where few travelers would bother to go and met people that few travelers would meet. The disappointing part is that the lady in NaGa has already written back stating her inability to find any of my ancestors. I'm still waiting for Neuekirche bai Lambach, but now I'm beginning to think that New Church might have originally been "Nova Cerkev".

And so, on Wednesday night, after returning to Salzburg, I headed southeast toward Ljubljana, Slovenia!

Ljubljana, Slovenia
For a few reasons I really wanted to go to Ljubljana. First, my great-grandfather spoke slovenian and was a slovene, so, regardless if he was born in modern-day Slovenia or Austria, I consider him to be Slovene and therefore, I consider myself to be slovene. Second, Slovenia is part of the new wave of EU members (joining in 2004) and was going to convert to euro usage in 2007. And, third, it's a lesser-visited, small and humble European capital. My interest in Ljubljana was further piqued recently when a girl I met mentioned a prison that was converted to a hostel. Naturally, this is where Mark and I wanted to stay!

On Wednesday night, I arrived in Ljubljana, checked in at Hostal Celica (the converted prison) and went straight back out to walk the streets. I didn't stop anywhere, but I got my bearings and sufficiently exhausted myself for a good night's rest.

On Thursday morning I walked the city, visiting Tivoli Park, the History of Modern Slovene History, and walking the old town and the business district. I stopped off at a few cafes along the way to write or read. And then I returned to the hostel to recheck in and, as luck would have it, I was able to get a cell for Thursday night! (I stayed in a dorm-style room in the new section of the hostel the previous night).

I entered my cell and met my cellmate, a French photographer working in Brussels, and trying to make contacts for his eventual return to cover Slovenia's impending EU presidency. He and I had a great conversation about our respective governments and societies, and about traveling, working and many other things.

Eventually, the time came to eat dinner, and we left together to grab something quick in town. After dinner, we met for a beer in the hostal's bar. A group of slovenes he knew came to sit with us. They offered me a kind of bread that had swirls of a rainin/pecan/walnut mash. I immediately recognised it as 'potica', the same bread my grandmother makes every Easter! They were surprised/impressed that Slovene culture might be known in Chicago! They also let me in on a slovene belief that a woman who makes good potica will make a good wife. Way to go Grandpa! (and, of course, Grandma!)

After eating potica (which wasn't as good as Grandma's, for the record) and finishing my beer, the Slovenes invited me to go salsa dancing. And so, for Thanksgiving 2006, I went salsa dancing! I must say that slovenes impressed me with their ability to dance, and with their knowledge of English-language culture, including familiarity with "Da Ali G Show"!!

I ended up staying out kind of late and going to bed thinking that Mark would text me when he arrives. Unfortunately, Mark did not have his mobile phone. And, needless to say, I had little reason to doubt that he woul darrive at 6:30 as his train was scheduled to do. But, in an altered state, I chose sleep over heading to the train station without hearing from him (sorry Mark!). Eventually, at 9:00 AM, the hostal receptionist woke me up and let Mark in. And, after showering and leaving our bags, we hit the town.

We toured the entire town and scoped out places for the most important event of Friday in Ljubljana... PSN! As has always been the case, PSN Ljubljana was a success!

Onward to Bratislava
On Saturday morning, in a very tired state, we got on an early train to Bratislava. Instead of confirming our connections, we slept... and slept and woke up a few minutes after we were supposed to have gotten off the train for a different connection! And so, we spent more time than we would have liked in Maribor, Slovenia, but at least we were able to find roasted chestnuts and sing about it to several passersby.

Eventually, we made it to Allan's home away from home, Bratislava, and Saturday became PSN Bratislava - aborted. For reasons I cannot discuss, PSN Bratislava was aborted and we plan to re-do it soon.

On Sunday, we woke up early, had a european breakfast, walked around the town all day, learning about Bratislava from Allan and catching up on many things. We spent a good amount of time at the Christmaskindlmart, and eventually visited with some of Allan's friends on Sunday night. On Monday, we similarly walked the town. We ended the day in Bratislava by eating a goose dinner at the Slovak Pub. And what a dinner it was! We had to order it 24 hours in advance, I guess they had to kill the goose in the meantime!

Monday night we commenced our journey homeward, Bratislava/Wien/Munchen/London/Chicago for me, and to NYC for Mark. I got home late Tuesday night and had to pack for a trip to Memphis the next day...

Memphis
The good thing about flying 24 hours after getting back from Europe and after 20+ hours of trains, planes and metros is that I was so exhausted that I forgot about jet-lag! So, after work on 29 November, I flew to Memphis for a two day work trip. I must say that I liked Memphis. Beale street was barren on Thursday night (due to inclement weather), but I still enjoyed some music. And I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the people in the office.

But I was glad to return to Chicago on Friday night.

December
The first weekend of December included a night out at Caliente for Mark's birthday dinner, followed by a visit to Tropico Club. Tropico is a place that was identified by Tracy as a diamond in the rough, with a great location, great space, but horrible management. Since then, Mark and I have dreamed of what we would do to improve it if we were so lucky as to buy it. That has inspired several visits to one of the dirtiest bars in town.

December 2006 was a good month for catching up with friends. As I was in town for the entire month, I celebrated many BBCs and have enjoyed night-time activities around the city. And, as has been my adult tradition, I spent Christmas eve at my parents' house, and woke up on Christmas day to the greasy, but ohh so tasty elephant ears. I shudder when I think of how many ounces of Crisco are still flowing through my blood due to that one morning! But, I'm sure that I'll do it again next 25 December!

New Year's Eve
This year, Allan was in town for new year's eve. He came to the Palacio that night, and we went together to a party hosted by an ex-Andersen friend, Kari and her boyfriend, Jeff. We brought some Illinois gin with us and some cookies baked by Allan, and had a genuinely great time. I don't much care for New Year's Eve, but I always enjoy a night with friends, especially when the party was just eight blocks north!

End of year / beginning of year reflections
December was a good month to catch up and to remember the blessings of 2006. Two trips of a lifetime, the Polish road trip and the Slovenia/Slovakia trip took place, not to mention that I was able to chase my ancestry. I continued to enjoy my job, even if I am starting to feel less and less challenged by the work. My brothers and sisters-in-law brought two new sobrinos for me to love! And a few other goals were accomplished. It was a good year.

In 2007, I have a few travel ideas, namely, a return to Poland for a wedding in August, to be combined with a trip to visit extended family near Krakow. In preparation for that, I plan to learn Polish; I've heard that my Polish cousins do not speak any "American". I'd also like to travel to a sunnier spot. And perhaps this will be a year to make significant career changes. We will see what God brings my way. I am sure it will continue to be a good ride.

And, if I really feel inspired, maybe I'll post some photos from the year. But I'm working on a myspace website, so I think I'll share my photos there instead... look for myspace to be announced soon!