From intensive hike to intensive conversation

Trip Start Sep 01, 2010

Trip End Nov 07, 2010

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Where I stayed

Villa Siesta Vysoke Tatry

(Vysoke Tatry hotels)

Flag of Slovakia Novy Smokovec, Presov, Slovakia
Saturday, September 18, 2010

Totay was a very good day because I got to hike the Tatras Mountainsgy. There were two options for hiking: the intensive hike with Ken where we would hike to the top of the Tatras and back down (a 7 hour journey), the easy hike with Jiri (our field director) where we would take a cart to the top of another, lower mountains, then hike for a couple hours. Initially I was going for the easy hike because I struggled with the mini hike up to the cave yesterday. But when I woke up this morning I decided to go on the intensive hike. And I think it was worth it.

The hike started at 10:20Am. We first took a cable cart for about 10 minutes halfway up the mountain. From the cable cart, we walked up the blue trail, which was a very rocky place for a good hour and then to the orange trail, a very dangerous, rocky and snowy trail. Several times I sank down after stepping on snow. I also nearly twisted my ankles several times, but thankfully, I had really good shoes. Tough, the hike was difficult for me, (after all, I am a city boy and am not used to the outdoors) the scenery up the mountains was breathtaking. We saw two beautiful lakes. At the second lake, two students and I decided to call it a day and stay by the lake to have lunch. We did this because it was too stressful moving up the dangerous rocky trail at such a fast pace. We didn't even have time to enjoy the beauty of the mountains because we were going so fast.

So after sitting by the lake for 15 minutes, having lunch. We decided to go back the same way we came in. To pass the time, we decided to play the supermarket game. It was very fun.

We got back to the hotel around 5, at the same time as the group that went on the easy hike and we all had dinner afterwards.

That marked the end of my intensive hike, after dinner began my intensive conversations. The first one was with Anushka and Ken about student race and religion in the context of Carleton and the United States in general. It was a very powerful discussion. Then, I had a conversation with Jiri, Heather, and Collin about Jiri's experience with CET as well as his own personal history. It was such a wonderful conversation. Then, the conversation moved to a very intense analysis of the religious atmosphere in today's society as well as our own personal family histories. It lasted from 8PM to 11:30PM. Wow. But I was happy it happened. My passion and opinions seriously came out. And it made me consider changing my major to religion because I doubt I can remain the objective scientist I need to be for psychology.