Over winter break several of our students traveled to Poland and Czechia. We asked Saki Tatsumi, from Japan, to share highlights of her trip with us. She said they choose to travel to Poland and Czechia because they had friends living there that they could visit and personally she has a strong interest in European architecture and art. She shares that she met these friends will studying in the United States. Her friends are currently studying in Poland, so she felt extra lucky to be able to reconnect with her friends as well as see a new part of the world.
Saki shared that one of the big highlights of the trip was being in a different country over Christmas. She said they went to many churches and worship services. They sang songs, prayed and commented that “it was a really sweet time to be in community with all of these people at church. Each church we visited had different styles of service as well as architecture, making them all beautiful in their own way.”
Saki also spoke on how peaceful it was to see families with their pets at parks, enjoying the sunshine and the overall familial atmosphere she experienced on the trip. Something unexpected about her trip was that everything was closed because of the holidays. Saki explains that she had to change her plans and be flexible while traveling because she expected every restaurant and store to be open when in fact everything was closed so her travel party ended up cooking a lot of meals where they were staying.
Speaking of food, Saki exclaimed that she did get to try traditional pierogis. She tried a wide variety including pork, cheese, barbeque, strawberry and blueberries with cream. She liked the blueberries with cream pierogi the most.
Saki reiterated how much she loved the architecture when speaking of something from the trip she’ll remember for a long time. She said, “I can’t forget the night view of the city-- walking around city center, everything was covered in warm light.”
Overall, it was a fantastic trip! Saki lastly shared that the only challenge of the trip was returning to the United States due to weather. She said she got caught in the airport for 8 hours waiting for a winter snowstorm to pass! She hopes to be able to travel more in the future and looks forward to experiencing new foods and different cultures soon.
