Dear Eastern Europe, *
Hello, old friend. I know It’s been a while, but you’ve been on my mind quite a bit lately.
It started when I began thinking ahead to my summer vacation, and made the decision that this was the year I was finally going to fulfill my long-held dream of visiting Slovenia. I spent hours researching and was amazed at just how much there is to do in that tiny country alone. But why am I so surprised? You never fail to amaze, and you are full of so many wonderful secret destinations that I could spend a lifetime exploring you and never run out of things to see and experience.
You know you’ll always hold a special place in my heart for one particular reason: you were the first place I ever lived abroad. My year in Praha taught me so much; not just about the city but about how to survive, and perhaps even thrive, in a totally foreign environment so different from the one I was used to. It was immersion and sometimes a bit of a trial by fire, but we made it through together.
And every now and then, I realize how much I miss you.
I miss your beautiful cobbled streets and old towns that give a glimpse into what life was like centuries ago. I miss your pastel houses glowing in the spring sunlight. I miss the stunning architecture of Old Town Square in Praha and Rynek Glowny in Krakow. I miss the imposing red-domed Parliament building that dominates the Budapest skyline.
I miss your cafes. I miss being able to walk into Kavarna Slavia and use my handful of Czech words to order a horka cokolada, then spend the afternoon sipping it while reading my book and gazing at the Vltava River just outside the window. I miss going to Café Louvre with my students and whiling away hours talking about life, and travel, and anything that struck our fancy (all in the name of English language practice, of course).
I miss weekend road trips to Budapest, seeing the city in fall, winter, and finally spring. I miss Café Gerbaud and its gorgeous fin-de-siecle interior, and sitting inside our outside on the patio with my friends devouring chocolate cake and marveling at how lucky we were to be in this beautiful place together.
I miss living in a place so full of history, both good and bad. I miss walking across Wenceslas Square in the course of my daily commute and contemplating all the earth-shaking events of the twentieth century that had transpired over the cobblestones beneath my feet: the Nazi invasion during World War Two; the arrival of Soviet and Warsaw Pact tanks crushing the Prague Spring rebellion in 1968; and of course, the peaceful transformation of the Velvet Revolution in 1989, when your citizens finally rose up and seized a brighter future for themselves, showing the rest of the world that it can indeed be done.
I miss all these things; everything that makes up your unique essence. There is nowhere else in the world like you.
But never fear, Eastern Europe; we aren’t done yet. Our journey will continue. As I flip through my new guidebook I feel almost overwhelmed by how much of you I have yet to experience and all the places I still want to see. This summer it will be Slovenia and Croatia: Ljubljana, Lake Bled, Zagreb, the Plitvice waterfalls, and whatever else I can fit in. And I will return to see even more in future visits: Tallin’s Old Town, Riga’s art nouveau architecture, the Bay of Kotor in Montenegro, Lake Ohrid in Macedonia. And of course, I will finally make it to Russia (though that’s a subject for a different letter altogether).
I know I’ve been off exploring other corners of the planet lately—South Africa, Thailand, Argentina, Israel—and you may have felt a bit neglected by me in recent years. But rest assured, I have not forgotten you. You are under my skin, part of my spirit, and I have no doubt you will be a lifelong obsession for me.
Until we meet again—thank you.
XOXO,
Melissa
*I know that the Czech Republic/Hungary/Poland etc are more properly classified as Central Europe, but I’m using the generic “Eastern” title for this post to encompass the whole region.
Have you been to Eastern Europe? What are your favorite places there? Is there any region of the world that keeps calling you back?