Written by: Cedric Reese
Dzień dobry, week 7 already, I can’t believe it! This week was slightly less busy then the last few. However, there’s been quite a bit of commotion over the past week or so about the outbreak of coronavirus in Italy. Two people in our group were supposed to travel to Italy this week, but they both had to call it off and book trips to other locations instead. It’s odd because I both agree and disagree with this choice. On one hand it’s a dangerous disease we don’t know much about. Even if there’s a small chance of getting infected in Italy, it is probably a good idea to minimize the risk. At the same time, I think people are giving into fear a bit, it has only infected a couple hundred people, and it doesn’t seem to spread very quickly. I just hope no one’s study abroad experience is ruined due to paranoia over the disease, here or elsewhere. It’s going to be interesting seeing what’s going to take place in the next few weeks here.
In lighter news this week we had our first group trip, on Friday we went to the Wieliczka Salt Mine. It is Poland’s oldest salt operating salt mine, being in operation for over 800 years! The mine was completely different from what I was expecting. Inside the mine there were many statues, exhibits, and even chapels. The whole place was tourist centered but most of the stuff wasn’t created specifically for tourists. The miners would make these statues and other artistic pieces in order to make life in the mine less depressing. There were over 20 different chapels located in the mine, including one very large chapel carved directly into the salt stone. There were places in the rock that were nearly pure salt, over 99%. Deposits like this looked like they glowed, it was so cool! All of the rock contained massive amounts of salt, I tried licking one and it sure was salty! The mine is apparently massive, with the tour guide having said that if anyone got lost, they could be trapped for days! There were massive caverns with under water streams and other deposits of water. The lighting made it difficult to take pictures, but it was certainly breath taking and I wish I could show you everything!
The mine wasn’t as cramped as I had imagined it. What surprised me more was the sheer amount of wood everywhere. There were parts where wood columns covered everything, and you couldn’t even see the rock on the walls. There were various transfer chambers where, if you left both doors open, the air would get sucked out and you’d begin to suffocate for a small amount of time! After learning this I realized how difficult it must be to supply the whole entire mine with air. What was really cool was that all the souvenirs were really cheap, which I thought was odd as souvenirs from touristy places like that are often pretty expensive. Almost everything in the shops were made from salt, the souvenir salt barrel I got had chunks of actual salt on it which is pretty awesome! The mine was really cool to see, I just wish we had had more time in there as we only looked around for about one hour and a half.
Last thing is now I have some papers and exams coming up. Its hard to get back into that study mentality when we haven’t really had much schoolwork to do over the past two months. It would be easier if they were spaced out better, but all the professors decided to have their first papers be due basically the same week, but I think I’ll have plenty of time to get stuff done. Next week I’m going to Bratislava with my friend David. I’m really excited to go to Slovakia as I don’t think it’s a super common travel destination and just being able to say I’ve been there sounds really cool. Until next week, take care!
Comments