Shanna Williams

Final Post

hornetshanna — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 19:14:34 +0000

Well this is my last and final bog post. I was requested by the Public Affiars and Marketing department to blog about our presentations on Thursday. It was a huge success, and I think we are all glad everything came together. Everyone’s presentation was over something different. I did mine over my blog, and how I came up with the idea to do it. One person did a video of all our pictures, which turned out very well. Again I would just like to thank the Public Affairs and Marketing office along with ESU for the wonderful opportunities.

Here We Come!!

hornetshanna — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 16:45:45 +0000

We are almost ready to come home!! I think everyone is ready to come home, but they have had the time of their lives here. Today a lot of London ground was covered. Some of us got up and went to a Methodist Church across from Westminster, some of us went shopping, others went to Wimbledon, and the rest slept in. The sleeping in group definately had the best plan for the day, because we found out some news last night. The first tube (underground subway transportation) that leaves our tube station on Monday morning isn’t until 5:40am, and it is a good hour to Heathrow Airport. This is not good because our flight leaves at 8am and we have to be there at least 2 hours before our flight. So we get to spend the night in the airport TONIGHT!!! WOOHOO…..talk about an experience of a life time. Yes, that was definate sarcasm, but we don’t have any other choice. I think everyone is making the best of the situation, and we will just sleep when we sleep. So we are still leavning London at 8am, landing in Chicago at 10:30am, and return to Wichita, KS around 2pm. Definately a full day of traveling, but it was well worth it!!

I turuly cannot put into words how much fun I have had on this trip, and how many life lessons I have learned, that could have never been learned in a classroom. We are all very excited to get started on our projects, and present them to you all when we return. Well, this is Leadership study abroad signing off! It’s been fun, and I cannot wait to see everyone back home!!

Cheers-

Shanna Williams & the Euro Gang

P.S. Thank you to ESU for supporting us through this wonderful journey. Thank you to Public Affairs and Marketing for sponsoring the blog site. Thank you to everyone who read the blog and made comments. Thank you to Mary Shivley and Dr. Pat Neufeld for putting up with us crazy students for 3 weeks! Thank you to Phil for navagating us around Europe.

Ready or Not

hornetshanna — Sat, 23 Jun 2007 15:12:44 +0000

Well guess what US of A? You are about to have 15 amazing leaders return home to you. We made it to London for round number 2 around 4:00pm Saturday. It has been a full day of traveling, and waiting. It was really hard to leave the nice hotel knowing we were coming to a hostel here in London……it’s not the best or the worst! I think everyone is very excited to come home and share our wonderful experiences with all of our friends and family. It has been the experience of a lifetime.

We don’t have any group things scheduled while here in London, but I think everyone has a list of things they want to see before leaving. Some of us are going to a comedy club tonight. Then tomorrow I think a few of us are getting up a going to a church we found last time we were here. Then it looks like Notting Hill and possible Wimbledon is at the top of everyone’s site seeing list. I think it we be a day used for resting and seeing what we can before we leave this amazing place.

Sorry I don’t have much to write, it’s kind of hard to write about flying all day.

Dr. Neufeld left for the states this morning and will be returning around 8:30pm. We all wish her safe travels!!

Chow!

HALLELUJAH!!

hornetshanna — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 16:51:43 +0000

God answered our prayers. It is raining here, and it feels WONDERFUL!! We were a little cautious as to what was going on at first, because it came up really fast. The wind started the blow like crazy, and tree branches were breaking off. Everyone just does not know what to do with the coolness.

Well our time in Europe is coming to a close very fast. We had our last museum tour today, and I think I speak for everyone when I say we are museumed out! It has been a GREAT learning experience, but doing some of those tours back to back was a little overwhelming, and for three weeks straight……that is a lot ot take in! We toured the Winter Palace of the Schunbrunns. All I can say is, they had enough dinnerware to feed an army! From here on out, we will be in smaller groups picking out things we would really like to see in Vienna and London, before we cross the pond. Tomorrow I think some people are going to get lost in the city, tour the United Nations here, go to the Aquarium, and many other things.

I am truly very thankful that I was able to keep everyone updated on our wonderful adventures. I am glad everyone has had the chance to read them, and make comments. I hope everyone back home is not too hot, I will send this cool rain your way!!

Chow!!

What I wouldn´t give for…

hornetshanna — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 15:57:24 +0000

Air Conditioning. It is very hot in Vienna and many places do not have AC, a luxury of living in the USA. Other than being REALLY hot….Vienna is beautiful. We toured a Palace this morning, and it was amazing. I think I found the place where I would like to have my wedding.

In the afternoon we went to an open-air market, and then headed to the Prater, which is a big amusement park and park. Some of us endured the heat and enjoyed the thrills of the rides. Some of us explored the zoo, the ubahn (the underground subway system), and many other sites of Vienna.

I think we are all slowly started to wind down on our wonderful exploration of Europe. It has been a wonderful experience, and I am very thankful that I was able to share it all with you back home. That is all for now…I am going to go find a place to cool off.

The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Music

hornetshanna — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 20:20:03 +0000

Well we had another great day of traveling. We left Prague around 1:30pm and arrived in Vienna around 7:30. We all enjoyed the train ride–the scenery is beautiful.

We arrived at Hotel Kaiser Franz, and realized this is going to be a great experience. Not only do they not usually allow student groups, but we are going to getting at wake up call of 6:45am and eatting breakfast all together at 7:15am. We have an early day tomorrow; exploring what Vienna has to offer, and getting lost in this beautiful city!! Well that is all for now…..the keyborad is different than any other computer, so sorry for any mispellings!! Ta Ta…

The Lucky Number 3

hornetshanna — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 15:24:37 +0000

Greetings from Prague, again! Today was another restful day. We took the “Lucky Number 3″ tram to a Weisel Square. The square is has a couple of famous statues in it, which relate to the Prague Spring. The Prague Spring was when Alexander Dubcek came to power, and the liberation of Czechosolvakia in 1968. Phil told us to imagine chaos everywhere, tanks everywhere, and just complete confusion. Something that some people might remember is when two young men lite themselves on fire to make a point known to the world. There was a statue in the sqaure dedicated to the two men.

After a good walking tour around the square, everyone broke off into small groups and went about the day. Some of them went back to the Charles Bridge for more souvieners, some of us hit up some cute shops in the square, and most of us navigated our way back to Sir Toby’s using the “Lucky Number 3″ tram. We have good luck with the number 3 on this trip, and will continue to do so in Vienna.

Speaking of Vienna, we leave tomorrow afternoon on a train heading to Austria. We will be staying in a hotel, so this might be a new experience, because we have been staying in hostels the whole time.

Something else interesting happened today. Willie and Shane bumped into Angelina Jolie on the street in the Jewish Quarter today. (Not really, but they were eating at a restaurants, and the other side of the block completely closed down, and everyting cleared out of all of the shops and restaurants. They noticed a lot of security and lots of vans along the street. The noticed a woman walking in to eat, and she looked like Angelina. She is filing a movie it Prague, so the chances are in their favor that it was her!!)

I am receiving lots of completements about my blog, and it really makes my day to know everyone back home is getting use out of it. I have enjoyed doing it!! Just think one more week, and we will be back in the US of A.

We’re in Prague, Czech it out!

hornetshanna — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 18:48:12 +0000

God works in mysterious ways. That’s what we were all thinking after we ran into a lady who graduated from ESU. How crazy is that? You come all this way to meet a fellow hornet! Courtney George had an ESU shirt on, and they stopped her and said, “Emporia State?” Everyone was in total shock. Her name is Mona Brown and she lives in Washington D.C. I will get you more details when I talk to Mary.

We meet Mona Brown at the Jewish Museum, which is where we started our day at today. Then we went across the Charles Bridge and toured the grounds of the Prague Castle. It was a good little hike up a HUGE hill to get to the castle, but the view from the top was definately worth it. After we finished our tour everyone shopped til they dropped! We definatly found some good buys today, and cannot wait to share all of our goodies back home.

Prague is a beautiful city, and we all wish we were staying here longer. We have definately covered a lot of walking ground these past couple of weeks. Today we did 8.5 miles. Luckily Dr. Neufeld has a pedometer that keeps track of how many miles we do.

Tomorrow we are hoping to catch the Clock Tower of Prague ring at 3pm, because something really cool happens at this hour. We’ll let you know what all the fuss is about. Ta ta for now!

Choo….Choo….

hornetshanna — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 16:26:18 +0000

I think a lot of us just experienced our first train ride. We left Krakow, Poland at 7:10am and arrived in Prague, Czech Rep. 7 hours later. It was a good experience to have under our belts. There were little cabins with 6 people per cabin. There was a lot of book reading and music being listened to.

After arrival we learned the Prague is known for its pick pocketers, but we worked together as a team and everyone got to the hostel in one piece with all of their belongs. After some back tracking we finally made it to Sir Toby’s Hostel!! The hostel is really nice with lots of computers to use, and a couple of phones to use to call home.

We have some free time this evening to explore the city. Tomorrow we will be going to the Jewish Museum and short visit to a castle here is Prague. The weather here is really nice, usually in the mid 70s and mostly sunny.

Well sorry for the short post, not much to blog about when you travel all day!!

P.S. Happy Father’s Day to all of the Father’s back home and Happy 18th Birthday to my brother…..look out world for another adult!!

Undescribable

hornetshanna — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 15:16:13 +0000

This is what we are were saying after visiting the Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps. We spent most of our day there, and luckily we had a tour guide. (She was really good!) Well here are a few thoughts of what we all thought of the day:

There were two campus; Auschwita I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau. Birkenau was the larger of the two camps. Some of the barracks were old army barracks or horse stalls. Then later on some of the Jews had to build more to fit everyone.

We were a day short of missing the anniversary of the first people being brought to the camps. This happened on June 14, 1940. Most people that were brought to these camps via train were immediately selected for execution by lethal injection, medical expirimentation or gas chambers.

We toured some of the barracks and saw the horrible living conditions everyone had to live with. Some of the barracks were turned into a museum and they had pictures up, documents from the camps, and display cases. Some of the display cases were as big as 30 yards long, 10 yards deep, and 5 yards deep. They were HUGE. In these display cases there was hair from all of the women and children who had to cut off their hair upon arrival. (After liberation of the camps there was documentation of up to 7 tons of hair found.) Some displays had shoes of all of the people, suitcases, toys, and the one that touched everyone was all of the disabled people’s critches and prosthetic legs and arms. Very moving.

Approximately 1.5 million people died at these two camps. This is more than the total population of the country of Estonia. It is just so overwhelming and unimaginable that someone could do this to others. Some of us talked about how that “one” person didn’t deserve to be considered human for doing such a horrible thing.

At the Birkenau camp the Germans tried to cover themselves up by buring down some of the barracks and the crematories. The remains are still there today. Some people on the trip have been to the Holocaust Musuem in Washington D.C., and they said that going to both places brought them together. At the D.C. Museum you can hear testimonies from survirors, and then seeing everything we saw today made everything come together.

This is just a little of what we all experienced and saw today. Tomorrow we will be walking to the train station with all of our luggage to catch a train to Prague. The train ride is about 7 hours so another long day of traveling. We are all excited not to be flying and trying a different mode of transportation. Hello to all back in the states.