Its only 4:15 pm here, but it is already dusk and the cold is finally getting to me as I sit here typing this. My day started off with me eating a nice hostel breakfast. I've forgotten how much I've missed these. They are normally pretty simple with bread, cereal, tea, coffee and such, but at Greg and Tom's (my hostel) they do a traditional Polish breakfast that has all of that, but some meats and oddly enough there were pickles there this morning too.
After breakfast I took the tram to the Jewish Museum to start my day of exploring Jewish History. To my pleasure and surprise they were having an exhibit on the Jewish population in Lviv Ukraine, which use to be part of Poland. It was really informative about the city and its Jews past. It was kind of freaky looking at the old pictures of Lviv and seeing how it really hasn't changed much. They also had quotes from Jews who had lived there during the time of World War Two about their experiences. It really made it a lot more personal and I had also read a book called "The Girl With the Green Sweater" which was about living in the swears in Lviv during the war, and she had contributed to some of the quotes so that really made the exhibit hit home. At the end they had pictures of everyone and their families. It was good to put a name with the face. In the rest of the Museum they had pictures and captions of all the old Jewish places in Poland and what they looked like today. They also had a little bit on concentration camps like Auschwitz.
I then wondered around for a bit until I ended up at Isaak Synagogue. It is one of the oldest synagogue in Krakow and was built in 1600s or something like that. I am not a tour guide I can't keep track of dates. A lot of the frescos on the walls have faded or are gone all together. There wasn't too much to see really, but I enjoyed it all the same.
I then took off wondering around again and this time I ended up at the Old Synagogue and let me tell you its really old, like 600 years old. This one had more to it then Isaak which was more like showing you a synagogue in its natural state and this was more like a museum on the history of Jews in the Krakow area and in general that happened to be in an old synagogue. I learned that you have to wait an hour at least in between eating meat and dairy for kosher food. I had always wondered how that worked out. Now I know and you know too.
After that it was time for me to wonder home. I had taken the tram there and thanks to my expert since of direction I just walked back as it wasn't too horribly cold out. I stopped and got a lovely pastry filled with some kind of red fruit jam, it wasn't raspberry that's all I know and that it was tasty. When I got back to my hostel I couldn't find my keys to get in and thought I had lost them, but no they were just in one of my other pockets. Good to know that I am nice and organized here too.
Now I am just sitting patiently waiting for my Polish dinner of dumplings. I hope they are good or I am going to have to go out in the cold and forage for food.
Also here is a link to my photos from today on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2082364&id=1218690440&l=2ac6ef6627
