This week flew by unbelievably fast and I've now been in Poland for 4 weeks and it's been a little over 6 weeks since I left home! It's going by too fast. :(
Brad and I had our first meeting with our Environmental Economics professor on Thursday. It's just the two of us in the class, so we sat around a table in the professor's office. Seems like it's going to be an interesting course with plenty of opportunities for Brad and I to suggest topics we would particularly like to cover. I already shared my obsession with transitions with the professor, so he knows that I'm going to be super interested in our lectures on the post-communist transformation and the transition process of accession into the EU. I'm really trying to dig for thesis material here!
In that vein, I've started reading a book called The Legacies of Communism in Eastern Europe, which has a juicy-looking section on the environmental legacy of the communist system and predictions for the future. But so far I'm only halfway through the introduction so I've got a ways to go before I get to the interesting stuff. I settled down last night for a good chunk of book-reading but was stopped by one sentence: "According to Marxist economic theory, the development of infrastructure was a low priority; production became the central element of the system." This sentence precipitated an impassioned rant to Rachel and ranting email to Chris. Does that sentence not set off little stupidity alarm bells in anyone elses' head? You simply can't have production without infrastructure, and attempting to develop production to the level that the Soviets did requires an equal, if not greater, investment in infrastructure development. Or else the whole system falls apart, as I guess everyone saw in the end. Anyway, I know the author of the book I'm reading is just summarizing one part of Marx's argument and there's more to it, but I still think the idea in that one sentence is really stupid. So today I spent the afternoon in the English bookstore, Massolit, reading a copy of The Portable Marx.
Rachel and I tried to go to a museum on the history of photography which was advertised as open but got there to find that it was closed. There was a little crowd of people outside the door, so we weren't the only ones who got the wrong message. We ate lunch at a delicious place in Kazimierz (the old Jewish quarter) called Bagel Mama. It's the only place in Krakow where you can get real, American-style bagels and real Tex-Mex burritos. Oh, and they have super yummy brownies. It's a little pricey so we don't go there often. The owners are really nice...a man from New York who came here 15 years ago and stayed because he fell in love with a Polish girl. Awww.
In other news, we got some information about the athletic situation (we're all getting a little antsy with the lack of exercise) and I'm going to try to join the swim team! Our program coordinator, Piotr, is going to take me to the practice tomorrow so we can ask the coach if there's still room in the program, since it's technically a "class." It would be pretty amazing and a great way to meet some more students! That's the only bad thing about our classes: 3 of them are just the three of us, and one is just Brad and I. Our language class doesn't start up again until the middle of March (it's part of the international European Erasmus program so it's not really on the regular university schedule) but there will be a lot more people in that class and from all over the continent.
Oh, we had our language and culture class exams last week as I've mentioned and they went really well. I have to keep studying my Polish, though, because we have to take placement exams at the beginning of the Erasmus class and I want to make sure I get into a class that will really push me.
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