An Update!

For those of you who check this often, I apologize for not updating in a while. However, there really hasn't been much going on so you haven't really missed out.

The most significant recent events were last Thursday and tonight, Monday.

Last Thursday, CACI, the company I work for, sponsored a night dining off-post for its employees here on Camp Bondsteel. This is supposed to be a monthly event so I'm looking forward to those. We went to a place close to base called the "Kruja Restaurant". I have no idea what "kruja" means, whether it is someone's name or if it means something significant in Albanian, but the food was pretty good. I had the "Skenderbeg Sword" which is really a skewer of grilled beef and some vegetables covered in what I assume to be Skenderbeg sauce. It was pretty tasty. Most everyone else opted for the "filet mignon" and I use quotes because it definitely did not appear like any filet mignon I've seen in the States. And Albanians automatically cook their meat well-done so there wouldn't be any point in ordering it even if it was real filet mignon. I also had 9 Peja beers, which, after the first beer I ordered took 20 minutes to arrive, I ordered two at a time. CACI paid for everything so all in all, we had a really good time. Go see the pics here.

I signed up for the ACE (Analysis and Control Element - the office where I work) softball team and tonight we had our first game which we lost. In my one at-bat (we have a lot of people on the team), I hit a single to start a two-out rally in which we scored 3 runs. It was fun but also a weird sensation after not having played softball or baseball in over 10 years.

So that's all that's new with me. I'm planning on going down to Skopje for the weekend so maybe there will be some excitement down there.

San Sebastian

San Sebastian was the main focus of my trip and Saturday was supposed to be a full day a relaxation since that was the only day of my five days off in which I wasn't travelling. Unfortunately, it started raining at about 2 AM on Saturday morning and still hadn't fully stopped by the time I left on the train for Madrid on Sunday. It was mostly a drizzle, as compared to real rain, but it was enough (and with enough cloud cover) to turn it into a dreary day.

Besides the rain, San Sebastian was beautiful and would be a great place to go back to, as long as it didn't take so long to get there. My trip started on Wednesday when I left Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo and headed down to Skopje, Macedonia. I spent the night there and then flew out Thursday afternoon, first to Budapest, then on to Madrid. My flight was delayed a little bit, so I landed late in Madrid and didn't get to my hotel until just after midnight. Me being me, I checked in to the hotel and then headed right back out to find something to eat and drink. Friday I got up early and then made the hour trek by subway to the train station for my 6.5 hour ride to San Sebastian. I took a different train back on Sunday, so the return trip was only 5.5 hours, but still that was too long to spend on the train. My flight back from Madrid started at 8:30 Monday morning and what was supposed to be an hour and a half layover in Budapest turned into 3 and half hours. I really don't mind long layovers when I'm flying as long as I know about them before hand so I can be ready to find something to do with that time. I am not a fan of surprise layovers.

Lesson learned: If you only have 5 days of vacation time, do not spend 4 of those days travelling to and from wherever it is you're going.

Other than the getting to and getting from, I had a great time in all the places I stayed and plan on going back. But I'll be in Skopje (an hour and a half drive in bad traffic) sooner and more frequently than I'll be in San Sebastian.

Skopje Pics are up too

You can find them right here.

Spain Trip

Madrid Photos are up! More to come soon...

¡Feliz Cuatro de Julio!

Happy Fourth of July from San Sebastian, Spain! I hope everyone back home who is keeping up with me and checks this thing is doing well. I´m having a great time on my trip so far and will write and post a bunch of pics as soon as I get back to Kosovo. Much love to all the family and friends who are checking up on me!