Tucked-away in Ljubljana

(Ljubljana)

Perhaps, you wonder now, who is writing this blog? The writing styles are distinctive, or should look so to anyone who notices that sort of thing, as are the topics of focus. So far, just Pam, Bob and Martin have written, so a primer:

Pam's writing style is distinguished by hyphens, which separate connected or not-so connected thoughts. She intends for someone else to turn this writing into sentences, which as of yet has not happened. A sample:

We went to the Alt Museum , which had older pictures including one painted by 17-year-old Leonardo da Vinci of the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus; art critic said he had not mixed his paint correctly, thus had ripples in the face of Mary. Also a number of Ruebens, which Bob was smart enough to not comment on. We also went to the Modern art museum where Bob's German came in handy - we lost Martin, the museum was closing, and the museum staff signaled to us we had to leave - he did not speak English. But we were not leaving that warm museum restaurant for 22 degree weather to wait. Luckily, Bob knew the word for Son - Junge - Thus he helped us discover Martin was already out waiting for us in the cold.

Bob's style is more formal, though nearly equally strewn with hyphens, but one can spot it by looking for references to World War II, as seen in this sample:

We ate what was really a snack at the oldest restaurant in Munich (1348) that unfortunately had to be rebuilt after January 7, 1945 (probably need to look in a B-17 bomber's log for where they were that night). We were fishing for change to pay for the meal and the German couple sitting next to us thought we were broke and offered to pay for the meal. Not sure how they got the idea we were broke except we ordered one meal for the four of us. We finally discovered a grocery store and found that the real prices in Germany were really reasonable i.e. a soft drink for 27 cents-we were buying in street markets assuming they would be better-oh well, its just the real stores are not near the town center where we've been hanging out.

Martin's style is distinguished by his critique of his parents' writing style. But, fear not, all the blog is read by all members of the family before or after it is published.

And, also, remember that "now" means our now, meaning when we wrote the text, not the now in blog-time. Just remember that when you're playing the ever-popular game of "Where Are They Now?"

We're now in the Hauptbahnhof waiting for our train to Ljubljana, Solvenia, which everyone assures me is a real country with stores, places to sleep, etc. The train leaves at 1130 at night and gets us in sometime in the morning, saving us a hotel room (not sure how valid that theory is). The public transportation is amazing- a number of really cool things-escalators that stop when not in use and then reverse themselves if you're going up rather than down; also no one takes your money for the subways and trams-totally honor system-just pay a one time fee that no one seems to check. The Germans seem to love speaking English to us so little opportunity to show how bad my German really is. Again, Munich is a beautiful and thriving city that shows what urban life should be-the park was twice the size of Central Park in New York for example and the malls were outside with plenty of room to walk and no interference with cars; bicycles are everywhere and people of all ages are riding them.

We're discovering that it is hard to find places to post these updates so a lot stuff will be on fewer postings. We are now in Solvenia after a long train ride––train was packed and we didn't have reserved seats or platz; people kept getting on and wanting us to move plus we were woken up about every 30 minutes by either the conductor or customs checking passports-so not the best trip-probably try a bus on next journey. We checked into the hostel at 8 am but can't sleep there until 3 pm so bumming around the town which is gorgeous in the old section and like Newark in the new-the Soviets did a crummy job here when in charge and their buildings are falling apart. We're finding prices considerably cheaper here but have to go through another conversion process- in Germany it was $1.30 U.S. to 1 Euro, here it is 175 Sits to $1.00 U.S. We got some money at the ATM thinking we were getting $50 U.S. and think we actually got $250.00 U.S- so we're flush and probably need it all since we might stay here a while-maybe go to Bled or even Venice, Italy which seems close. We're in another café drinking coffee…

And with those ellipses, we'll close for now, as we've not done much else today besides walk and drink (relatively) cheap coffee and eat good food. So--don't feel too sorry for us. It's not even that cold here, though others may disagree.