Saturday, May 30, 2009
I Didn't Divide This Post Up But I Probably Should Have
22 May 2009
Back to Innsbruck but this time with Lydia and Lori.
We had a great time in Berlin. We got to our hostel at maybe 6 p.m. but I’d accidentally left the directions on the train. We roamed around a bit asking people if they knew where the Mitte’s Backpacker Hostel was an no one seemed to know even though it was within a 7 minute walk from the station. We asked some police looking people. No help. We asked a cab driver, no help and an attitude. So we thought if we could just find an internet café we could find the address and Google Map directions. We didn’t find an internet café but we did find a hookah bar.
The guy working there didn’t speak much English and we only know four phrases in German, none of which included subjects like the internet. The guy behind the counter said, “Yes, yes! We have internet!” I expected wifi or a room with computers like a call center. Nope. It was a closet with a personal desktop. I don’t know if I would have used a computer in a closet if Lydia and Lori weren’t there with me but I was able to get the address and ask the guy where the street was. We said we’d come back, but we didn’t.
Instead we ate bread and cheese in the room and went wandering around Berlin. We stumbled upon a gallery opening of someone’s photography. My favorite photographs were arranged in pairs. They were sepia colored and kinda fanciful. There was one with a young boy wearing a paper hat in a field blowing into a paper towel tube and in the sky were hundreds of little birds. It looked like the boy was blowing the birds from his own lungs. I feel like that sometimes.
After that we went to a park. It was such a delightful park. Everyone was sitting around on blankets eating ice cream. I swear, every time I look out across a park I think of this one painting by Renoir or someone. It’s just a bunch of English people in the 1800’s hanging around a park on a Sunday afternoon. I feel like that sometimes, too.
So we ate Ice cream and then we thought a bottle of wine would suit the moment quite well. It also seemed like everyone else was drinking wine or beer while sitting on their little blue and white blankets. We walked to the little convenience store and picked out a bottle of wine. We realized that it was corked and we did not have a corkscrew. Nor did the little shop sell one. Now, we’ve voiced worries about being three young women wandering around Europe for an extended period of time. Perhaps if we were guys, we’d be a bit safer. Actually, being three young women has paid off quite nicely.
For instance: the other guy working at the convenience store was quick open the bottle for us by taking a flat head screwdriver to the cork and shoving it into the bottle. Would he do that if we were three dudes? I’d like to think not. But I’m pretty sure we’ve accumulated the equivalent of a case of beer and a bag of coffee beans just cuz we’re girls.
Anyway.
This post is a little outdated. It’s now May 30, 2009. A lot has happened between that night in Berlin when we sat in a park and tried to get an idea for how big we felt and how absolutely not big we really were.
We managed to not miss any trains to Innsbruck. Which was awesome. We had legit worries. We had to take a night train from Berlin to Zurich. That was cool enough. The chairs looked like they were made for a space flick in 1966. So what everyone in 1966 thought would be really stylish and functional in the year 2009. Which very well could have been the age of American colonies on Mars. Except that it’s not and reading Ray Bradbury’s book The Martian Chronicles has made me glad that it’s not. There were about twenty fifteen-year-old French kids in our car who were chowing down on Red Bulls and Dunkin Donuts. We obviously didn’t have a quiet night. But that wasn’t the part that we were worried about. It was the change at Zurich because we had about 25 minutes to find the ticket counter, buy 2 tickets, get breakfast, and find the track for the train to Innsbruck. It’s easy with a Eurail pass cuz you just hop on and off when and where you need. Not so much when you have to buy tickets at every place.
We decided Lori would get coffees and rolls while Lydia and me went to buy tickets. When we got off the train we left Lori pretty quickly without looking what track the train would be leaving from, and when Lyd and I got to the ticket counter, I voiced my fears about leaving Lori. It could have been really bad. As soon as Lyd got to the ticket counter I bolted to find Lori to tell her that it was track 9! track 9! By bolted, I just mean I waddled really really quickly in my flip flops and huge back pack, hoping Lori’d just stayed pretty much where we’d left her. And she did! Like they teach you in Girl Scouts when you’re lost in the woods! You stay where you are and basically wait for the world to find you. Maybe blowing a whistle if you have one handy. Note to self: Carry a whistle with me to the train station.
So we all got on the train and Lori’d gotten us these Delicious croissants filled with chocolate.
We got to Innsbruck and got on Bus F, which would takes us within a 3 minutes walk of Seb B’s mom’s house. I couldn’t wait to get there. We arrived about 3 in the afternoon and she had homemade Weiner schnitzel and potato salad and regular salad and coffee for us. And we got to meet Seb’s sister, Lena, who’s just home from studying in India.
I love Austria. There’s so much I can say about how beautiful and warm Austria is but it’s certainly beautiful and warm because of the people I’ve been honored enough to spend time with. I have been graced with so much generosity and hospitality that I hope I can repay even a third of it.
While in Austria we learned to surf in Niklas’ wave pool. We went shopping for shorts and a plant for Gabriele, Seb B’s mom. We celebrated Christoph’s 25th birthday with a huge cook out. Christoph is Niklas’ housemate. We went to the Café Bar Moustache, which is the bar belonging to their best friend, where we had a huge foosball tournament and Lydia and Stephan (another friend of Niklas’) rocked while me and Lori and Niklas did not rock. We went back to Moustache on Sunday night for the Sunday night quiz, which is done in English. The guy and girl doing the quiz threw in a few American questions for us because they met us at Christoph’s party and knew we were coming to the quiz. The questions were “What is Bill Clinton’s middle name?” “Which of the 5 great lakes in the US borders Chicago?” and, “Who was the only president of the south during the American Civil War?” We got 2 of the three. Robert is Not Bill Clinton’s middle name. It’s Jefferson.
We got to Innsbruck on Friday and by Friday night we were being urged to skip Venice and stay in Austria until Monday. By Saturday afternoon we’d confirmed “Forget Venice!”
Monday Niklas took us to this little lake about 50 minutes east of Innsbruck, but still in Tyrol, way up in the mountains. I cannot even describe to you how beautiful this place was. Niklas told us that this region of Tyrol was as Tyrolean as you could get. He’d never been there before either so it was new for all of us. We hung a hammock between two trees and laid out our blankets on these wooden platforms that were built because the ground was so soft and moist. The water was warmer than we’d expected. There were only two other families there with their little children and big dogs. I’ll post pictures, which still won’t do this place justice. In fact, it started raining while we were in the lake, it was only about navel deep, and we looked out across the water and the world was surreal. The sun was shining and the raindrops were massive and three quarters of them formed bubbles when they hit the water and the other quarter created diamonds that jumped up for a split second. Thousands of diamonds hitting the water and sinking to the bottom of the tiny murky lake, getting lost and buried under the muck and seaweed no one wanted to put their feet in.
We swam to a huge rock in the middle of the lake and Niklas started to climb up, finding finger and foot holds. He pulled his face up level with the top of the rock, which had grass and a tree growing on it, and threw himself backwards off the rock. “Let’s get out of here!” I thought he’d slipped and just didn’t want to try again. He was swimming away from us back towards the dock and said, “Snake!” We caught up with him and didn’t slow down until we got back. He’d looked a huge snake square in the face and after hearing it hiss at him, he decided it best to just get away. A bit of a thrill.
After the lake we went to the smallest town in Austria. We ate traditional Austrian food and Niklas taught us a traditional Austrian card game called Watten. It’s a lot like Euchre and you need four people so maybe I’ll teach it to you sometime, if you want.
Niklas got us to the train station with about 25 minutes to spare before our night train left and we suddenly had the urge to eat Burger King. Niklas ran into a friend who couldn’t make it to the party and we greeted him and offered to get him a sandwich. We got Niklas a cheeseburger and this guy a whopper. We gave them hugs and said, “Next time we’re in Innsbruck, we’ll hang out!”
We did not sleep on the night train. We did not receive futuristic 1966 space shuttle seats; we got regular, immobile, train seats. And it was uncomfortable. And Long. And we made it to Rome.
We did not purchase our train tickets for the next destination like we’d told ourselves we would. We hadn’t booked our ferry to Greece yet and we weren’t sure what time it’d depart. But we’d get the tickets anytime within the next 3 days. Our hostel was a 5-minute walk from the station.
Rome was strange. I liked it, but it certainly wasn’t my favorite place. We saw the Coliseum. Every day. The first time we saw it it was amazing. Breathtaking. Stunning. The second time it was still far from the hostel. By the third time we’d come across that building we were like, “How do we keep ending up here?” We went to the Vatican but didn’t go in. We went to the Pantheon. It was free. Raphael is buried there. But that’s not his original burial place.
Oh, our first meal in Rome we managed to piss off the waitress. There was just a language miscommunication and she brought us a pizza we didn’t order, or at least we didn’t think we ordered, and she took it back but wasn’t very nice to us the rest of the time we were there. The whole time I was eating the replacement pizza and I was wondering if I was tasting spit or if the cheese had been dropped on the floor or if they were watching and laughing at us eating something they’d taken their revenge our on. Maybe not.
We watched the Man U Vs. Barcelona game at Fergie Field near the Stadium Olympico. Only Manchester United fans were allowed in this field. The Barca fans had a different filed they could watch the game at. There was also supposed to be no alcohol sales at all the day of the game in Rome.
I’ve just decided that there are no rules in Rome. There are no walking rules, driving rules, parking rules, drinking laws, or fashion restrictions whatsoever. It’s a lawless ancient land where there are so many ruins and historical sites that they have to start turning them into cat shelters. I’m not exaggerating.
We came across some fenced in ruins that might have been small temples. They were discovered in the 1920’s and no one really knows what they are. We noticed a lot of cats. About 12 or so. That was a little odd, we decided. Just cats hanging out in the ruins. We then found a sign that said it was a cat refuge. Basically stray cats are found, spay and neutered, tested and vaccinated, and then put in a pit of ancient Roman ruins. Does this seem slightly ridiculous to anyone else?
What else was slightly ridiculous about Rome? Our hostel had free pasta dinners at 7 pm during the week. It was terrible but we ate there every night. It was free and you could bring your own wine and the people at our hostel were really cool. We hung out with a Ben from just north of London. An Alex from Vancouver. And a couple of kids from Montreal. By kids, I mean 18 year olds. I can’t believe that 18 seems young to me. I guess it’s cuz I’m a week away from 22.
One night in Rome, the night before the Champions League Game, we went to a café to get ice cream and we sat next to these middle aged guys from Manchester who were really drunk and really loud. They kept chatting with us and looking at Lydia’s paintings and saying things to randoms walking by like, “Don’t worry. She’ll be back! She’s not left you!” And they were singing, “The famous Man United went to Rome to see the Pope! To Rome to see the Pope! To Rome to see the Pope! The famous Man United went to Rome to see the Pope and this is what they said! Glory, glory Man United! Glory, glory Man United! Glory, glory Man United and the Reds go marching on!” to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Lydia decided to paint these guys and the one kept saying to make sure she got his black fascist socks in. Don’t forget to include my fascist socks. What ever that means. They also kept calling the waiter Tony, because every Italian guy is named Tony. And they also kept making references to his questionable sexuality.
I wonder what they were singing when Man U lost the game. Probably what everyone else was singing which was something about Man U never dying. On our walk back from the park there was a fire under a bridge. What would a football match be without a fire? Not a football match, that’s for sure.
Poor Lydia. On our walk back a very fat man in a black tee shirt pinched her butt. Lydia’s just corrected me, “squeezed her bottom,” she says. Which is after the tactful phrase of Ben North of London. A few blocks later we came across the perp. and Lori asked if she should beat him up. Lydia said no, but if you could give him a bottom squeeze, I’d feel better. Alex Vancouver and Lori Lue Ludwig grasped hands and went in for the kill. They ran up behind this very fat man in a black tee shirt and together squeezed his bottom. They then broke hands and ran off in different directions laughing and laughing while we pointed and laughed and laughed as well. Karma had been restored.
We checked out of our hostel at 11 on Friday. We didn’t leave the hostel till after 1. We had to book a hostel in Greece. Every review for every hostel made references to how dirty they were. Ugh. We weren’t able to book a train to Bari for our ferry that night.
I don’t want to talk about it. I almost flipped out. We’ve missed two of two ferries. We are 0 for 2 for making ferries. Like I said, I don’t really want to talk about it. But I’m sure there’s a phrase that goes something like “fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me.” But applied to ferry making: miss two ferries and what in God’s name is wrong with you? It was completely our fault. So we had an extra day in Rome we didn’t really want and we had to cancel our hostel in Patras, which cost us about 20 euros.
What do you do in Rome when you don’t really want to be there anymore? Go see Angles and Demons starring Tom Hanks in Italian. Of course. Certainly not visit the Coliseum Again. Even though you know you can’t understand Italian. So we watched about 40 minutes of the movie in Italian then snuck into the English version that started 5 minutes before the Italian one.
That’s probably the best movie ever to see in Rome. I felt like they’d just followed me around for three days, filming where I’ve been and then just superimposing Tom Hanks into my place. It’s also one of the worst movies ever. And Euan McGreggor has severely disappointed me by participating in that film. I may never forgive him. Then we went to McDonald’s for dinner. I ate a Big Mac and French fries and drank a coke.
We didn’t miss our night train to Bari. But it was uncomfortable.
Bari’s been giving us trouble all day. But it’s also given us a bit of comfort here and there. We got to the port at about 8:30 am. We were so tired. We tried to sleep on the benches. A woman kept telling people to sit up, even thought there were a total of 10 people in the huge lobby. I watched her force these three Canadians up and thought, “Screw that. I’m lying down.” A while later she came to me, saying something in Italian and without even opening my eyes, I said, “Oh my shoes. Sorry.” and just shifted my feet from the seat to the floor. I’m about done with authority. Seriously about finished. Especially knowing that for a second night in a row I won’t have a proper bed. Not sleeping will make you do some strange things. For instance: It was quite cold in the lobby of the ferry station so I decided to go to the bathroom and put jeans on. There were only two stalls and by 10 am the station was packed with loud people. The line was very long and a woman and wedged her way in front of me. I saw Lydia come out of one of the stalls and I looked at her and the 9 people ahead of me and was like “Right here.” So I kicked off my shoes and dropped trow right there. Lydia says it wasn’t enough that I had an intense look of determination on my face, but that the looks on the faces of the women around me. I don’t need to be understood. I need to be warm.
I tried to sleep for another hour but there was a kid across the lobby who was meowing and meowing as loud as his obnoxious lungs would allow and I said to Lori after about 10 minutes of this meowing that I’m not one for punching children, but that kid was really really unaware of what he was stirring up inside me. We decided to drop our luggage at some lockers and find a good restaurant. The luggage room was on the other side of the port and didn’t open until 11:30 so we sat outside in the sun and read. By the way, it was really windy and raining when we got to Bari. It was miserable.
We left our baggage and went walking around the town. We were whistled at, honked at, and cat called 10 times today. We counted. Can you believe that? It’s absurd.
Anyway.
We found an awesome restaurant and ate the best meal I’ve had in Italy. It was a typical Barian dish made of rice, fried potatoes and mussels. We then found a stonewall to lie on. For two hours. I fell asleep and I tell you, that stonewall in the sun was more comfortable than a padded chair on the night train. I slept on my stomach for over an hour then turned over and slept on my back a bit. I knew I was getting a sunburn on my arms but I was so tired I didn’t care. And I was getting hot hot. But I couldn’t move. When I finally got up Lydia was already awake painting. Lori was stirring as well. The piazza was full of people. We went in search of a grocery store. We compared weird sunburns. Lori has severe sunglasses outlines on her face. Lydia not only has a farmer’s tan (burn) but the crease in her elbow is pure white from how she had her arms folded. And she’s got a line down her left cheek from where she put her sweater over her eyes. I didn’t really get burnt at all. I’d slept on my stomach so my face isn’t pink and my arms are just a little red. I’ve been making a bit of fun of them all day.
By the time we got on the ferry (about 4 hours ago) I realized that I too was burnt. A sharp, bright red line across my lower back. It’s worse than theirs and in a terrible place when you consider that I have to walk around with a backpack for the next two weeks.
I just want to get to Greece. I don’t even want to go to Athens. I want to go to a beach and stay there for 4 days. I want to sleep in a bed. And I want to chill out.
Oh. And we were attacked by a group of Italian kids at the fountain.
We were walking back to the ferry at about 6 pm and we were out of water. We saw a group of kids filling water balloons at the fountain in the piazza and thought, well, let’s get some water here. The kids addressed us. English? They asked. Yes. English. They all laughed. We didn’t much like the scene, but we needed water, and we couldn’t let them sense our fear. Kids are like dogs and horses in that respect. Lydia went forward and filled the bottle. One of the smaller boys fake tossed a water balloon at me. I put my bag down and held out my hands, yeah toss it here, kid. I knew it wouldn’t break, even if it hit the ground because they were filling the balloons too full and weren’t puncturing the bottom with a needle sized hole so they’d burst on contact. He didn’t toss it to me, he full on threw it at me. It bounced and rolled behind me. I grabbed it and gave him an “oh, you’re in a bit of trouble now,” look. He bolted back a few paces and I held it out to him. I wasn’t going to throw it. He wouldn’t come close. So I put it on the ground and backed away. He came and got it. Just then two girls ran up from the right and started attacking Lori and Lydia. No no! We don’t want trouble! They were laughing and we were laughing and one of the bigger boys went after Lori, who squirted water from her bottle back at him and thought she could find safety by getting closer to a group of guys who were about our age. No dice. They just moved farther and farther away. Lydia and Lori got nailed. I got a soggy shoe. But I’d dropped my jacket and knew I’d have to go back into the danger zone to get it. I turned and saw one of the little girls, with a crazed look in her eye and foam at her mouth. What Lydia likes the call the Devil Child of Bari, Italy. These weren’t children. These were beasts. Children of the Fountain. We were slightly over our heads here.
There was a dad figure who’d picked up my jacket at the exact same moment that Devil Child of Bari, Italy did. I saw the scene and for a split second thought the dad figure would join them against us. No, that would have been absurd. But no more absurd than being attacked by a gang of bloodthirsty Italian children. Devil Child released on command and Dad Figure returned my damp jacket.
In retrospect, Lydia noticed that Dad Figure wasn’t laughing, but he wasn’t really surprised or really reprimanding the kids for attacking us. She reckons it’s a daily thing. “Eat your breakfast. Don’t harass the tourists.” And you accept it when you can get your kid to eat a bowl of coco puffs, even if they won’t drink their milk and you accept it when they attempt soak tourist with water balloons, but when they start to steal garments, they’ve gone too far.
We wish we could have seen the reactions of the other tourists and the other locals. Would the other tourists have helped if things got out of hand? Fight or flight? Which would it be? Were they thinking, “glad it’s not me! Let’s get out of here!” Were the other locals secretly wishing they could take the revenge on tourists their children were attempting, or were they horrified their children would treat strangers with such disrespect?
Either way, it was the second time we’ve thought about punching a kid. What has Italy and a serious lack of sleep done to us?
So! Present moment! It’s 11:55 Greek time and we’re on our ferry and we’ve taken over a little corner where we intend to sleep and we’ve eaten more bread and cheese and there’s a shower we can use and we’ve been chatting away delightfully with an older Belgian couple and Lori’s on her laptop and Lydia’s reading my copy of Brother’s Karamazov and if only we had a guitar.
And if only this Really drunk guy would leave everyone alone. But the staff already has a close eye on him.
This post is 7 and a half pages long in a word document. Whew! I’ve been working on it for days and I’m finally caught up but I’ve left a lot of details out. That happens when you’re trying to talk about 3 different cities in one blow. Hope I can be a little more regular with my posts.
58 days left in Europe. 93 till Josh is home from Iraq. 285 till he’s home for good.
Back to Innsbruck but this time with Lydia and Lori.
We had a great time in Berlin. We got to our hostel at maybe 6 p.m. but I’d accidentally left the directions on the train. We roamed around a bit asking people if they knew where the Mitte’s Backpacker Hostel was an no one seemed to know even though it was within a 7 minute walk from the station. We asked some police looking people. No help. We asked a cab driver, no help and an attitude. So we thought if we could just find an internet café we could find the address and Google Map directions. We didn’t find an internet café but we did find a hookah bar.
The guy working there didn’t speak much English and we only know four phrases in German, none of which included subjects like the internet. The guy behind the counter said, “Yes, yes! We have internet!” I expected wifi or a room with computers like a call center. Nope. It was a closet with a personal desktop. I don’t know if I would have used a computer in a closet if Lydia and Lori weren’t there with me but I was able to get the address and ask the guy where the street was. We said we’d come back, but we didn’t.
Instead we ate bread and cheese in the room and went wandering around Berlin. We stumbled upon a gallery opening of someone’s photography. My favorite photographs were arranged in pairs. They were sepia colored and kinda fanciful. There was one with a young boy wearing a paper hat in a field blowing into a paper towel tube and in the sky were hundreds of little birds. It looked like the boy was blowing the birds from his own lungs. I feel like that sometimes.
After that we went to a park. It was such a delightful park. Everyone was sitting around on blankets eating ice cream. I swear, every time I look out across a park I think of this one painting by Renoir or someone. It’s just a bunch of English people in the 1800’s hanging around a park on a Sunday afternoon. I feel like that sometimes, too.
So we ate Ice cream and then we thought a bottle of wine would suit the moment quite well. It also seemed like everyone else was drinking wine or beer while sitting on their little blue and white blankets. We walked to the little convenience store and picked out a bottle of wine. We realized that it was corked and we did not have a corkscrew. Nor did the little shop sell one. Now, we’ve voiced worries about being three young women wandering around Europe for an extended period of time. Perhaps if we were guys, we’d be a bit safer. Actually, being three young women has paid off quite nicely.
For instance: the other guy working at the convenience store was quick open the bottle for us by taking a flat head screwdriver to the cork and shoving it into the bottle. Would he do that if we were three dudes? I’d like to think not. But I’m pretty sure we’ve accumulated the equivalent of a case of beer and a bag of coffee beans just cuz we’re girls.
Anyway.
This post is a little outdated. It’s now May 30, 2009. A lot has happened between that night in Berlin when we sat in a park and tried to get an idea for how big we felt and how absolutely not big we really were.
We managed to not miss any trains to Innsbruck. Which was awesome. We had legit worries. We had to take a night train from Berlin to Zurich. That was cool enough. The chairs looked like they were made for a space flick in 1966. So what everyone in 1966 thought would be really stylish and functional in the year 2009. Which very well could have been the age of American colonies on Mars. Except that it’s not and reading Ray Bradbury’s book The Martian Chronicles has made me glad that it’s not. There were about twenty fifteen-year-old French kids in our car who were chowing down on Red Bulls and Dunkin Donuts. We obviously didn’t have a quiet night. But that wasn’t the part that we were worried about. It was the change at Zurich because we had about 25 minutes to find the ticket counter, buy 2 tickets, get breakfast, and find the track for the train to Innsbruck. It’s easy with a Eurail pass cuz you just hop on and off when and where you need. Not so much when you have to buy tickets at every place.
We decided Lori would get coffees and rolls while Lydia and me went to buy tickets. When we got off the train we left Lori pretty quickly without looking what track the train would be leaving from, and when Lyd and I got to the ticket counter, I voiced my fears about leaving Lori. It could have been really bad. As soon as Lyd got to the ticket counter I bolted to find Lori to tell her that it was track 9! track 9! By bolted, I just mean I waddled really really quickly in my flip flops and huge back pack, hoping Lori’d just stayed pretty much where we’d left her. And she did! Like they teach you in Girl Scouts when you’re lost in the woods! You stay where you are and basically wait for the world to find you. Maybe blowing a whistle if you have one handy. Note to self: Carry a whistle with me to the train station.
So we all got on the train and Lori’d gotten us these Delicious croissants filled with chocolate.
We got to Innsbruck and got on Bus F, which would takes us within a 3 minutes walk of Seb B’s mom’s house. I couldn’t wait to get there. We arrived about 3 in the afternoon and she had homemade Weiner schnitzel and potato salad and regular salad and coffee for us. And we got to meet Seb’s sister, Lena, who’s just home from studying in India.
I love Austria. There’s so much I can say about how beautiful and warm Austria is but it’s certainly beautiful and warm because of the people I’ve been honored enough to spend time with. I have been graced with so much generosity and hospitality that I hope I can repay even a third of it.
While in Austria we learned to surf in Niklas’ wave pool. We went shopping for shorts and a plant for Gabriele, Seb B’s mom. We celebrated Christoph’s 25th birthday with a huge cook out. Christoph is Niklas’ housemate. We went to the Café Bar Moustache, which is the bar belonging to their best friend, where we had a huge foosball tournament and Lydia and Stephan (another friend of Niklas’) rocked while me and Lori and Niklas did not rock. We went back to Moustache on Sunday night for the Sunday night quiz, which is done in English. The guy and girl doing the quiz threw in a few American questions for us because they met us at Christoph’s party and knew we were coming to the quiz. The questions were “What is Bill Clinton’s middle name?” “Which of the 5 great lakes in the US borders Chicago?” and, “Who was the only president of the south during the American Civil War?” We got 2 of the three. Robert is Not Bill Clinton’s middle name. It’s Jefferson.
We got to Innsbruck on Friday and by Friday night we were being urged to skip Venice and stay in Austria until Monday. By Saturday afternoon we’d confirmed “Forget Venice!”
Monday Niklas took us to this little lake about 50 minutes east of Innsbruck, but still in Tyrol, way up in the mountains. I cannot even describe to you how beautiful this place was. Niklas told us that this region of Tyrol was as Tyrolean as you could get. He’d never been there before either so it was new for all of us. We hung a hammock between two trees and laid out our blankets on these wooden platforms that were built because the ground was so soft and moist. The water was warmer than we’d expected. There were only two other families there with their little children and big dogs. I’ll post pictures, which still won’t do this place justice. In fact, it started raining while we were in the lake, it was only about navel deep, and we looked out across the water and the world was surreal. The sun was shining and the raindrops were massive and three quarters of them formed bubbles when they hit the water and the other quarter created diamonds that jumped up for a split second. Thousands of diamonds hitting the water and sinking to the bottom of the tiny murky lake, getting lost and buried under the muck and seaweed no one wanted to put their feet in.
We swam to a huge rock in the middle of the lake and Niklas started to climb up, finding finger and foot holds. He pulled his face up level with the top of the rock, which had grass and a tree growing on it, and threw himself backwards off the rock. “Let’s get out of here!” I thought he’d slipped and just didn’t want to try again. He was swimming away from us back towards the dock and said, “Snake!” We caught up with him and didn’t slow down until we got back. He’d looked a huge snake square in the face and after hearing it hiss at him, he decided it best to just get away. A bit of a thrill.
After the lake we went to the smallest town in Austria. We ate traditional Austrian food and Niklas taught us a traditional Austrian card game called Watten. It’s a lot like Euchre and you need four people so maybe I’ll teach it to you sometime, if you want.
Niklas got us to the train station with about 25 minutes to spare before our night train left and we suddenly had the urge to eat Burger King. Niklas ran into a friend who couldn’t make it to the party and we greeted him and offered to get him a sandwich. We got Niklas a cheeseburger and this guy a whopper. We gave them hugs and said, “Next time we’re in Innsbruck, we’ll hang out!”
We did not sleep on the night train. We did not receive futuristic 1966 space shuttle seats; we got regular, immobile, train seats. And it was uncomfortable. And Long. And we made it to Rome.
We did not purchase our train tickets for the next destination like we’d told ourselves we would. We hadn’t booked our ferry to Greece yet and we weren’t sure what time it’d depart. But we’d get the tickets anytime within the next 3 days. Our hostel was a 5-minute walk from the station.
Rome was strange. I liked it, but it certainly wasn’t my favorite place. We saw the Coliseum. Every day. The first time we saw it it was amazing. Breathtaking. Stunning. The second time it was still far from the hostel. By the third time we’d come across that building we were like, “How do we keep ending up here?” We went to the Vatican but didn’t go in. We went to the Pantheon. It was free. Raphael is buried there. But that’s not his original burial place.
Oh, our first meal in Rome we managed to piss off the waitress. There was just a language miscommunication and she brought us a pizza we didn’t order, or at least we didn’t think we ordered, and she took it back but wasn’t very nice to us the rest of the time we were there. The whole time I was eating the replacement pizza and I was wondering if I was tasting spit or if the cheese had been dropped on the floor or if they were watching and laughing at us eating something they’d taken their revenge our on. Maybe not.
We watched the Man U Vs. Barcelona game at Fergie Field near the Stadium Olympico. Only Manchester United fans were allowed in this field. The Barca fans had a different filed they could watch the game at. There was also supposed to be no alcohol sales at all the day of the game in Rome.
I’ve just decided that there are no rules in Rome. There are no walking rules, driving rules, parking rules, drinking laws, or fashion restrictions whatsoever. It’s a lawless ancient land where there are so many ruins and historical sites that they have to start turning them into cat shelters. I’m not exaggerating.
We came across some fenced in ruins that might have been small temples. They were discovered in the 1920’s and no one really knows what they are. We noticed a lot of cats. About 12 or so. That was a little odd, we decided. Just cats hanging out in the ruins. We then found a sign that said it was a cat refuge. Basically stray cats are found, spay and neutered, tested and vaccinated, and then put in a pit of ancient Roman ruins. Does this seem slightly ridiculous to anyone else?
What else was slightly ridiculous about Rome? Our hostel had free pasta dinners at 7 pm during the week. It was terrible but we ate there every night. It was free and you could bring your own wine and the people at our hostel were really cool. We hung out with a Ben from just north of London. An Alex from Vancouver. And a couple of kids from Montreal. By kids, I mean 18 year olds. I can’t believe that 18 seems young to me. I guess it’s cuz I’m a week away from 22.
One night in Rome, the night before the Champions League Game, we went to a café to get ice cream and we sat next to these middle aged guys from Manchester who were really drunk and really loud. They kept chatting with us and looking at Lydia’s paintings and saying things to randoms walking by like, “Don’t worry. She’ll be back! She’s not left you!” And they were singing, “The famous Man United went to Rome to see the Pope! To Rome to see the Pope! To Rome to see the Pope! The famous Man United went to Rome to see the Pope and this is what they said! Glory, glory Man United! Glory, glory Man United! Glory, glory Man United and the Reds go marching on!” to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Lydia decided to paint these guys and the one kept saying to make sure she got his black fascist socks in. Don’t forget to include my fascist socks. What ever that means. They also kept calling the waiter Tony, because every Italian guy is named Tony. And they also kept making references to his questionable sexuality.
I wonder what they were singing when Man U lost the game. Probably what everyone else was singing which was something about Man U never dying. On our walk back from the park there was a fire under a bridge. What would a football match be without a fire? Not a football match, that’s for sure.
Poor Lydia. On our walk back a very fat man in a black tee shirt pinched her butt. Lydia’s just corrected me, “squeezed her bottom,” she says. Which is after the tactful phrase of Ben North of London. A few blocks later we came across the perp. and Lori asked if she should beat him up. Lydia said no, but if you could give him a bottom squeeze, I’d feel better. Alex Vancouver and Lori Lue Ludwig grasped hands and went in for the kill. They ran up behind this very fat man in a black tee shirt and together squeezed his bottom. They then broke hands and ran off in different directions laughing and laughing while we pointed and laughed and laughed as well. Karma had been restored.
We checked out of our hostel at 11 on Friday. We didn’t leave the hostel till after 1. We had to book a hostel in Greece. Every review for every hostel made references to how dirty they were. Ugh. We weren’t able to book a train to Bari for our ferry that night.
I don’t want to talk about it. I almost flipped out. We’ve missed two of two ferries. We are 0 for 2 for making ferries. Like I said, I don’t really want to talk about it. But I’m sure there’s a phrase that goes something like “fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me.” But applied to ferry making: miss two ferries and what in God’s name is wrong with you? It was completely our fault. So we had an extra day in Rome we didn’t really want and we had to cancel our hostel in Patras, which cost us about 20 euros.
What do you do in Rome when you don’t really want to be there anymore? Go see Angles and Demons starring Tom Hanks in Italian. Of course. Certainly not visit the Coliseum Again. Even though you know you can’t understand Italian. So we watched about 40 minutes of the movie in Italian then snuck into the English version that started 5 minutes before the Italian one.
That’s probably the best movie ever to see in Rome. I felt like they’d just followed me around for three days, filming where I’ve been and then just superimposing Tom Hanks into my place. It’s also one of the worst movies ever. And Euan McGreggor has severely disappointed me by participating in that film. I may never forgive him. Then we went to McDonald’s for dinner. I ate a Big Mac and French fries and drank a coke.
We didn’t miss our night train to Bari. But it was uncomfortable.
Bari’s been giving us trouble all day. But it’s also given us a bit of comfort here and there. We got to the port at about 8:30 am. We were so tired. We tried to sleep on the benches. A woman kept telling people to sit up, even thought there were a total of 10 people in the huge lobby. I watched her force these three Canadians up and thought, “Screw that. I’m lying down.” A while later she came to me, saying something in Italian and without even opening my eyes, I said, “Oh my shoes. Sorry.” and just shifted my feet from the seat to the floor. I’m about done with authority. Seriously about finished. Especially knowing that for a second night in a row I won’t have a proper bed. Not sleeping will make you do some strange things. For instance: It was quite cold in the lobby of the ferry station so I decided to go to the bathroom and put jeans on. There were only two stalls and by 10 am the station was packed with loud people. The line was very long and a woman and wedged her way in front of me. I saw Lydia come out of one of the stalls and I looked at her and the 9 people ahead of me and was like “Right here.” So I kicked off my shoes and dropped trow right there. Lydia says it wasn’t enough that I had an intense look of determination on my face, but that the looks on the faces of the women around me. I don’t need to be understood. I need to be warm.
I tried to sleep for another hour but there was a kid across the lobby who was meowing and meowing as loud as his obnoxious lungs would allow and I said to Lori after about 10 minutes of this meowing that I’m not one for punching children, but that kid was really really unaware of what he was stirring up inside me. We decided to drop our luggage at some lockers and find a good restaurant. The luggage room was on the other side of the port and didn’t open until 11:30 so we sat outside in the sun and read. By the way, it was really windy and raining when we got to Bari. It was miserable.
We left our baggage and went walking around the town. We were whistled at, honked at, and cat called 10 times today. We counted. Can you believe that? It’s absurd.
Anyway.
We found an awesome restaurant and ate the best meal I’ve had in Italy. It was a typical Barian dish made of rice, fried potatoes and mussels. We then found a stonewall to lie on. For two hours. I fell asleep and I tell you, that stonewall in the sun was more comfortable than a padded chair on the night train. I slept on my stomach for over an hour then turned over and slept on my back a bit. I knew I was getting a sunburn on my arms but I was so tired I didn’t care. And I was getting hot hot. But I couldn’t move. When I finally got up Lydia was already awake painting. Lori was stirring as well. The piazza was full of people. We went in search of a grocery store. We compared weird sunburns. Lori has severe sunglasses outlines on her face. Lydia not only has a farmer’s tan (burn) but the crease in her elbow is pure white from how she had her arms folded. And she’s got a line down her left cheek from where she put her sweater over her eyes. I didn’t really get burnt at all. I’d slept on my stomach so my face isn’t pink and my arms are just a little red. I’ve been making a bit of fun of them all day.
By the time we got on the ferry (about 4 hours ago) I realized that I too was burnt. A sharp, bright red line across my lower back. It’s worse than theirs and in a terrible place when you consider that I have to walk around with a backpack for the next two weeks.
I just want to get to Greece. I don’t even want to go to Athens. I want to go to a beach and stay there for 4 days. I want to sleep in a bed. And I want to chill out.
Oh. And we were attacked by a group of Italian kids at the fountain.
We were walking back to the ferry at about 6 pm and we were out of water. We saw a group of kids filling water balloons at the fountain in the piazza and thought, well, let’s get some water here. The kids addressed us. English? They asked. Yes. English. They all laughed. We didn’t much like the scene, but we needed water, and we couldn’t let them sense our fear. Kids are like dogs and horses in that respect. Lydia went forward and filled the bottle. One of the smaller boys fake tossed a water balloon at me. I put my bag down and held out my hands, yeah toss it here, kid. I knew it wouldn’t break, even if it hit the ground because they were filling the balloons too full and weren’t puncturing the bottom with a needle sized hole so they’d burst on contact. He didn’t toss it to me, he full on threw it at me. It bounced and rolled behind me. I grabbed it and gave him an “oh, you’re in a bit of trouble now,” look. He bolted back a few paces and I held it out to him. I wasn’t going to throw it. He wouldn’t come close. So I put it on the ground and backed away. He came and got it. Just then two girls ran up from the right and started attacking Lori and Lydia. No no! We don’t want trouble! They were laughing and we were laughing and one of the bigger boys went after Lori, who squirted water from her bottle back at him and thought she could find safety by getting closer to a group of guys who were about our age. No dice. They just moved farther and farther away. Lydia and Lori got nailed. I got a soggy shoe. But I’d dropped my jacket and knew I’d have to go back into the danger zone to get it. I turned and saw one of the little girls, with a crazed look in her eye and foam at her mouth. What Lydia likes the call the Devil Child of Bari, Italy. These weren’t children. These were beasts. Children of the Fountain. We were slightly over our heads here.
There was a dad figure who’d picked up my jacket at the exact same moment that Devil Child of Bari, Italy did. I saw the scene and for a split second thought the dad figure would join them against us. No, that would have been absurd. But no more absurd than being attacked by a gang of bloodthirsty Italian children. Devil Child released on command and Dad Figure returned my damp jacket.
In retrospect, Lydia noticed that Dad Figure wasn’t laughing, but he wasn’t really surprised or really reprimanding the kids for attacking us. She reckons it’s a daily thing. “Eat your breakfast. Don’t harass the tourists.” And you accept it when you can get your kid to eat a bowl of coco puffs, even if they won’t drink their milk and you accept it when they attempt soak tourist with water balloons, but when they start to steal garments, they’ve gone too far.
We wish we could have seen the reactions of the other tourists and the other locals. Would the other tourists have helped if things got out of hand? Fight or flight? Which would it be? Were they thinking, “glad it’s not me! Let’s get out of here!” Were the other locals secretly wishing they could take the revenge on tourists their children were attempting, or were they horrified their children would treat strangers with such disrespect?
Either way, it was the second time we’ve thought about punching a kid. What has Italy and a serious lack of sleep done to us?
So! Present moment! It’s 11:55 Greek time and we’re on our ferry and we’ve taken over a little corner where we intend to sleep and we’ve eaten more bread and cheese and there’s a shower we can use and we’ve been chatting away delightfully with an older Belgian couple and Lori’s on her laptop and Lydia’s reading my copy of Brother’s Karamazov and if only we had a guitar.
And if only this Really drunk guy would leave everyone alone. But the staff already has a close eye on him.
This post is 7 and a half pages long in a word document. Whew! I’ve been working on it for days and I’m finally caught up but I’ve left a lot of details out. That happens when you’re trying to talk about 3 different cities in one blow. Hope I can be a little more regular with my posts.
58 days left in Europe. 93 till Josh is home from Iraq. 285 till he’s home for good.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
I Don't Wanna Be Homeless Anymore :(
19 May 2009
Sar-y Sar-y quite contrary
how do your travels go?
With canceled trains
and bus crashing pains
and 3 maids asleep in an elevator.
Every poem is a short story. So given the short story above, let me hash out the full story. In as much harrowing detail as possible.
Our departure from Oxford was nearly perfect. We were planning on taking the 5 pm bus to London but ended up taking the 5:30 bus. That afforded us a last cup of coffee with dear Seb B. Spirits were high and hearts were all aflutter with the exciting journey ahead.
We arrived at the Victoria Street station about 7:30 ish. All we had to do was hop on the tube from Victoria Street station to Liverpool Street station and catch the train to Harwich. Easy.
About a quarter of the tube lines were down due to construction. Scheduled construction. That we were unaware of. That’s ok. At this point we’ve still got plenty of time because the ferry doesn’t leave until 11:45 pm.
We manage an alternate route to Liverpool street via the Victoria line north to Oxford Circus, then the Central line east to Liverpool street. We made it to Liverpool Street at about 10 past 8. That meant we missed the 8:03 train to Harwich. The last train was the 9:03 leaving from platform 14. We rejoiced in the fact that we were going to make the last train of the night. If we’d left any later we might have been stranded in London!
So we sat on some steps and watched the mangy pigeons. We watched everyone walk by. We talked about fashion. Who/what dictates it. What you can tell about a person based on their shoes or hair. Basically judging people, I guess.
About 8:45 we decided to head towards platform 14. Didn’t want to have to rush to the train when it arrived. As soon as we got to the platform an announcement came on the loud speakers.
“The 9:03 train to Harwich departing from track 14 is canceled due to technical malfunctions. A replacement train will depart from track 14 at 9:33.”
They might have apologized for any inconveniences this may cause. At this point Lydia was about 11 and 1/2 percent worried that we wouldn’t make the ferry that night. I was a bit more worried than that. We had 2 hours and 12 minutes to make an hour’s journey. We’d be alright. Once we were on the train we’d have to take a bus replacement from Marks Tey Station to Manningtree Station, then get back on the train at Manningtree for the last 10-mile stretch to Harwich.
We got on the 9:33 train and the ride seemed a lot longer than it was supposed to be. We finally got to Marks Tey for our bus replacement. By then we had 45 minutes till the ferry left port. The driver of the bus was pretty old. He was pretty slow. He looked up how far it was from Manningtree to Harwich for us and said the bus ride from Marks Tay to Manningtree would be about 20 minutes or so. After the first stop he crashed the bus into a pole.
We couldn’t believe it but in a very Murphy’s Law way, we could believe it and almost expected it. The bus driver crashed the bus so we had to get a bus replacement for the bus replacement for train replacement for the cancelled train. We could still make it.
The second bus got us to Manningtree at about 11:24 or something ridiculous. There were 5 people on the bus and we said to the man working at the station “Next train to Harwich! Our ferry leaves in 20 minutes!”
“There aaarrh no traaains to Harwich toniiight.”
This was the end of the line. We weren’t getting out of England. We were stranded at Manningtree. There was one other person besides us trying to get to Harwich. A Shaun who’s actually from Harwich and in the Army and he was just as stuck as we were. He offered us his last three cigarettes and called a cab from Harwich to pick us all up in Manningtree to take us back to Harwich.
If only the cab could run out of gas or hit a deer. That would top off the night. But that wasn’t the cherry on our disaster sundae. No. That’s still to come.
We figured once we were at the station we could talk to someone and crash in the lobby. Or maybe since every single mode of transportation we’d attempted had been late, the ferry would be too. But this was a lofty hope.
We pulled up to the Harwich station at quarter past midnight. The ferry was gone. There was one train on the tracks that said out of service. The doors were locked on it. We tried the lobby doors. They were also locked. We thought we saw some security guards inside, but they were gone by the time we made it around to the other door.
There was nothing we could do. The cab had already gone to drop Shaun off. We didn’t have any phone numbers for anything. Several thoughts occurred to us.
Wishes were coming true left and right on this trip. Lori got to see Big Ben. Dream come true. I wanted a commissioned painting of Harris Manchester. Dream come true. Lydia Joy Fischer always wanted to know what it was like to be homeless. Dream come true.
We slept in an elevator.
Luckily we had a block of cheese, 3 bread rolls, a bag of peanuts, an orange, 2 bananas, 3 bars of chocolate, and a bottle and a half of water. We wouldn’t go hungry. And we’d all used the bathroom on the train.
When we bought the bread and cheese we thought about getting a bottle of wine but thought we wouldn’t be able to bring it on the ferry. We wished we’d just gotten it anyway. Maybe we would have actually slept if we’d split a bottle of wine.
We were thankful for the elevator because it blocked the wind, even if it wasn’t necessarily warm. We used our backpacks as pillows. Towels as blankets. Notebooks as cushions for those hard joints like hips and knees. The floor was cold so the more layers you could put between you and the floor, the warmer you were. But warm is a relative term.
Absolutely unbelievable. We spent the night in an elevator in Harwich, England. Who doesn’t? Would we get kicked out if a security guard found us? What if this was a real homeless person’s spot and we were taking over what didn’t belong to us?
What if we were each on our own? I refused to even entertain the thought. Lori said she would have had the taxi driver take her straight to the nearest hotel and not even try to get into the station. Lydia said that thought probably wouldn’t have occurred to her.
Things got cold and we had to huddle together and at one point I said to Lori, “Lori, do you need more space?” She said, “No, I’m trying to get closer.”
It was very bright in the elevator and I asked if there was a way to shut the lights off. Would that be too much to ask? What I found annoying (bright lights) Lydia and Lori found comforting. They’d rather the lights be on than off.
The luster of experiencing life as homeless wore off after a while and at some point in the middle of the night I moaned that I didn’t want to be homeless anymore. I wasn’t kidding. I groaned it in as much sincerity as I’ve ever possessed.
The station opened at 6:30 a.m. so we spent 6 hours in that elevator. We approached the desk and told the woman that we were supposed to be on the night ferry and we obviously missed it. She was quick to assure us we’d be on the 9 a.m. ferry to the Netherlands. We were prepared for maybe not trouble, but at least a bit of an explanation and a little persuasion. We’d reviewed the case over and over to determine if we’d made a mistake in this situation, but we didn’t.
When we told her we’d slept in an elevator she didn’t laugh. She was concerned. I guess we’d been laughing about it most of the time we expected her to laugh about it too.
We slept a nights worth in the middle of the day on the ferry and arrived in Amsterdam about 7 pm.
We often reference that night we slept in an elevator. If something goes a little inconveniently, we can always say, “at least it’s not an elevator.” And it’s pretty satisfying to say, “Slept in an elevator.”
I’m pretty sure that in 45 years I’ll be in the grocery store buying an apple or an orange and some small thing like an add for deodorant with a picture of several people cramped in an elevator and a tag line that says, “Don’t sweat it” or something equally as cheesy and I’ll laugh out loud at just the thought of being hot in an elevator.
Bit of an update:
The train from Amsterdam to Berlin was great until the last 2 hours or so. It got so crowded and stuffy hot that we figured the cosmos were trying to make it up to us for the cold night in an elevator by supplying us with a hot afternoon on a train. No, Cosmos. We appreciate your thoughtfulness, but let’s just call it even.
We’ve got today to roam around Berlin before taking a night train to Zurich and then a train from Zurich to Innsbruck. Lori’s bound and determined to get a leather jacket. Lydia’s in need of a good watch. I need shorts. Things are getting warm and jeans are heavy. It’s time to lose some layers.
Sar-y Sar-y quite contrary
how do your travels go?
With canceled trains
and bus crashing pains
and 3 maids asleep in an elevator.
Every poem is a short story. So given the short story above, let me hash out the full story. In as much harrowing detail as possible.
Our departure from Oxford was nearly perfect. We were planning on taking the 5 pm bus to London but ended up taking the 5:30 bus. That afforded us a last cup of coffee with dear Seb B. Spirits were high and hearts were all aflutter with the exciting journey ahead.
We arrived at the Victoria Street station about 7:30 ish. All we had to do was hop on the tube from Victoria Street station to Liverpool Street station and catch the train to Harwich. Easy.
About a quarter of the tube lines were down due to construction. Scheduled construction. That we were unaware of. That’s ok. At this point we’ve still got plenty of time because the ferry doesn’t leave until 11:45 pm.
We manage an alternate route to Liverpool street via the Victoria line north to Oxford Circus, then the Central line east to Liverpool street. We made it to Liverpool Street at about 10 past 8. That meant we missed the 8:03 train to Harwich. The last train was the 9:03 leaving from platform 14. We rejoiced in the fact that we were going to make the last train of the night. If we’d left any later we might have been stranded in London!
So we sat on some steps and watched the mangy pigeons. We watched everyone walk by. We talked about fashion. Who/what dictates it. What you can tell about a person based on their shoes or hair. Basically judging people, I guess.
About 8:45 we decided to head towards platform 14. Didn’t want to have to rush to the train when it arrived. As soon as we got to the platform an announcement came on the loud speakers.
“The 9:03 train to Harwich departing from track 14 is canceled due to technical malfunctions. A replacement train will depart from track 14 at 9:33.”
They might have apologized for any inconveniences this may cause. At this point Lydia was about 11 and 1/2 percent worried that we wouldn’t make the ferry that night. I was a bit more worried than that. We had 2 hours and 12 minutes to make an hour’s journey. We’d be alright. Once we were on the train we’d have to take a bus replacement from Marks Tey Station to Manningtree Station, then get back on the train at Manningtree for the last 10-mile stretch to Harwich.
We got on the 9:33 train and the ride seemed a lot longer than it was supposed to be. We finally got to Marks Tey for our bus replacement. By then we had 45 minutes till the ferry left port. The driver of the bus was pretty old. He was pretty slow. He looked up how far it was from Manningtree to Harwich for us and said the bus ride from Marks Tay to Manningtree would be about 20 minutes or so. After the first stop he crashed the bus into a pole.
We couldn’t believe it but in a very Murphy’s Law way, we could believe it and almost expected it. The bus driver crashed the bus so we had to get a bus replacement for the bus replacement for train replacement for the cancelled train. We could still make it.
The second bus got us to Manningtree at about 11:24 or something ridiculous. There were 5 people on the bus and we said to the man working at the station “Next train to Harwich! Our ferry leaves in 20 minutes!”
“There aaarrh no traaains to Harwich toniiight.”
This was the end of the line. We weren’t getting out of England. We were stranded at Manningtree. There was one other person besides us trying to get to Harwich. A Shaun who’s actually from Harwich and in the Army and he was just as stuck as we were. He offered us his last three cigarettes and called a cab from Harwich to pick us all up in Manningtree to take us back to Harwich.
If only the cab could run out of gas or hit a deer. That would top off the night. But that wasn’t the cherry on our disaster sundae. No. That’s still to come.
We figured once we were at the station we could talk to someone and crash in the lobby. Or maybe since every single mode of transportation we’d attempted had been late, the ferry would be too. But this was a lofty hope.
We pulled up to the Harwich station at quarter past midnight. The ferry was gone. There was one train on the tracks that said out of service. The doors were locked on it. We tried the lobby doors. They were also locked. We thought we saw some security guards inside, but they were gone by the time we made it around to the other door.
There was nothing we could do. The cab had already gone to drop Shaun off. We didn’t have any phone numbers for anything. Several thoughts occurred to us.
Wishes were coming true left and right on this trip. Lori got to see Big Ben. Dream come true. I wanted a commissioned painting of Harris Manchester. Dream come true. Lydia Joy Fischer always wanted to know what it was like to be homeless. Dream come true.
We slept in an elevator.
Luckily we had a block of cheese, 3 bread rolls, a bag of peanuts, an orange, 2 bananas, 3 bars of chocolate, and a bottle and a half of water. We wouldn’t go hungry. And we’d all used the bathroom on the train.
When we bought the bread and cheese we thought about getting a bottle of wine but thought we wouldn’t be able to bring it on the ferry. We wished we’d just gotten it anyway. Maybe we would have actually slept if we’d split a bottle of wine.
We were thankful for the elevator because it blocked the wind, even if it wasn’t necessarily warm. We used our backpacks as pillows. Towels as blankets. Notebooks as cushions for those hard joints like hips and knees. The floor was cold so the more layers you could put between you and the floor, the warmer you were. But warm is a relative term.
Absolutely unbelievable. We spent the night in an elevator in Harwich, England. Who doesn’t? Would we get kicked out if a security guard found us? What if this was a real homeless person’s spot and we were taking over what didn’t belong to us?
What if we were each on our own? I refused to even entertain the thought. Lori said she would have had the taxi driver take her straight to the nearest hotel and not even try to get into the station. Lydia said that thought probably wouldn’t have occurred to her.
Things got cold and we had to huddle together and at one point I said to Lori, “Lori, do you need more space?” She said, “No, I’m trying to get closer.”
It was very bright in the elevator and I asked if there was a way to shut the lights off. Would that be too much to ask? What I found annoying (bright lights) Lydia and Lori found comforting. They’d rather the lights be on than off.
The luster of experiencing life as homeless wore off after a while and at some point in the middle of the night I moaned that I didn’t want to be homeless anymore. I wasn’t kidding. I groaned it in as much sincerity as I’ve ever possessed.
The station opened at 6:30 a.m. so we spent 6 hours in that elevator. We approached the desk and told the woman that we were supposed to be on the night ferry and we obviously missed it. She was quick to assure us we’d be on the 9 a.m. ferry to the Netherlands. We were prepared for maybe not trouble, but at least a bit of an explanation and a little persuasion. We’d reviewed the case over and over to determine if we’d made a mistake in this situation, but we didn’t.
When we told her we’d slept in an elevator she didn’t laugh. She was concerned. I guess we’d been laughing about it most of the time we expected her to laugh about it too.
We slept a nights worth in the middle of the day on the ferry and arrived in Amsterdam about 7 pm.
We often reference that night we slept in an elevator. If something goes a little inconveniently, we can always say, “at least it’s not an elevator.” And it’s pretty satisfying to say, “Slept in an elevator.”
I’m pretty sure that in 45 years I’ll be in the grocery store buying an apple or an orange and some small thing like an add for deodorant with a picture of several people cramped in an elevator and a tag line that says, “Don’t sweat it” or something equally as cheesy and I’ll laugh out loud at just the thought of being hot in an elevator.
Bit of an update:
The train from Amsterdam to Berlin was great until the last 2 hours or so. It got so crowded and stuffy hot that we figured the cosmos were trying to make it up to us for the cold night in an elevator by supplying us with a hot afternoon on a train. No, Cosmos. We appreciate your thoughtfulness, but let’s just call it even.
We’ve got today to roam around Berlin before taking a night train to Zurich and then a train from Zurich to Innsbruck. Lori’s bound and determined to get a leather jacket. Lydia’s in need of a good watch. I need shorts. Things are getting warm and jeans are heavy. It’s time to lose some layers.
I May Never Be Back Here
May 17, 2009
Lydia, Lori, and I have left Oxford. We’re on the bus to London. The sky is nice and grey. It rained for us before we departed. Oxford is so perfect in the rain. I think it was quite appropriate that it was raining as we left because if my life were a movie, it would have rained to signify sorrow, but revitalization. Really Good goodbyes always happen in the rain.
Seb A said, “See you at the wedding!” as his farewell. That’s probably the next time I’ll see him. October 2010. Same with James K and Seb B. I am all too aware that I will not have a chance to visit Oxford again for a very long time. I’ll have to come back to visit Brent Lederle when he’s spending a Hilary term at HMC :)
The hospitality of the Sebastians was overwhelming. Seb A fully surrendered his room and none of us had to sleep on the floor because they’d arranged mattresses for all of us.
Lydia painted a watercolor for me of Harris Manchester. She spent Saturday afternoon working on it while I got my haircut and started writing a song. It’s a pretty simple song considering I know about 5 chords and have never really put my own words to music. The watercolor. Let me try and do it justice with words.
There’s a view of Harris Manchester that has always jolted my insides, making them a little too big for my outsides. I first noticed it when returning from a dance rather late one night. You walk up the street and the library is the first section of the building you see. The windows are stained glass and they positively glow.
This is the same view that I, when with Seb B, exclaimed the beauty of Harris Manchester’s library. It still gets me, though. So Lydia sat on the sidewalk, next to a random pair of 20 p pieces, and painted the most beautiful angle of that building. She gave it to me that night and, I didn’t think I would, but I wept.
I knew it would be priceless to me. There is so much represented in that painting that I cannot fully explain. It’s my favorite view of Harris Manchester. It was something that until then, I had experienced alone. Someone whom I love traveled across an ocean and saw it too. Took the time to internalize it, interpret it, and then share their view of it with me.
There are no people in the painting but people are implicit because Lydia painting from life means she me and interacted with the ones I love from Harris Manchester. My two lives come together in that painting.
Lori played soccer with the boys on Friday night. She was the only girl and I’m pretty sure the only American too. I think she went over well :)
Lydia played the guitar with James. We had a series of sing alongs and midnight jam sessions. Poor Seb B. We completely invaded his room on Friday night. He didn’t want to go dancing. He didn’t want to be out late. He wanted to sleep and our demanding rowdy attitude would not consent. So me, Lydia, Lori, and James went with him back to his room. Seb crawled into bed. We all poured a glass of Monkey Shoulder whiskey and played the guitar and sang until about 3 a.m. We wanted his company and by God we were going to get it whether he was asleep or not!
There are many little wonderful things that happened while we were at Oxford. We ate dinner in the bathroom. We started writing a few songs. By the end of this trip there will be an album, a blog novel, a photo documentary, a book of poetry, and a gallery’s worth of paintings to show for it.
Dreams that we’ve had since childhood will be fulfilled. Lori got to see Big Ben. A dream of hers now with a great big check mark next to it. Playing soccer at Oxford. She didn’t know it was a dream till it was happening.
I remember the very first day I got to Oxford and saw all the bicycles. I thought, “if only Lydia Joy could see this bicycle heaven!” And she did.
Having them around leaves a little less time for blogging and some aspects of personal reflection. But there is so much more to be developed between us.
By the way, within a few hours of getting to Oxford with Lyd and Lor, I finished Brother’s Karamazov. The three of us went to the park and sat for a few hours. Lori read. Lydia painted. And I finished Brother’s Karamazov. I couldn’t have finished at a better place than the University Parks. I bought a Ray Bradbury book called The Martian Chronicles. I’ve decided that I will only read books that Sheena holds in high esteem while on this trip. Even if that means I have to reread Le Petit Prince while in France this summer. It’s my way of keeping her very close while I’m painfully aware that she’s quite far away.
Seb B made an excellent comment today at our last meal together. He said that he loves the feeling of leaving a place because while it’s sad to say goodbye and go, there’s a new and unknown place yet to be discovered. And you’re once again reminded that, “I’m traveling!”
Lydia, Lori, and I have left Oxford. We’re on the bus to London. The sky is nice and grey. It rained for us before we departed. Oxford is so perfect in the rain. I think it was quite appropriate that it was raining as we left because if my life were a movie, it would have rained to signify sorrow, but revitalization. Really Good goodbyes always happen in the rain.
Seb A said, “See you at the wedding!” as his farewell. That’s probably the next time I’ll see him. October 2010. Same with James K and Seb B. I am all too aware that I will not have a chance to visit Oxford again for a very long time. I’ll have to come back to visit Brent Lederle when he’s spending a Hilary term at HMC :)
The hospitality of the Sebastians was overwhelming. Seb A fully surrendered his room and none of us had to sleep on the floor because they’d arranged mattresses for all of us.
Lydia painted a watercolor for me of Harris Manchester. She spent Saturday afternoon working on it while I got my haircut and started writing a song. It’s a pretty simple song considering I know about 5 chords and have never really put my own words to music. The watercolor. Let me try and do it justice with words.
There’s a view of Harris Manchester that has always jolted my insides, making them a little too big for my outsides. I first noticed it when returning from a dance rather late one night. You walk up the street and the library is the first section of the building you see. The windows are stained glass and they positively glow.
This is the same view that I, when with Seb B, exclaimed the beauty of Harris Manchester’s library. It still gets me, though. So Lydia sat on the sidewalk, next to a random pair of 20 p pieces, and painted the most beautiful angle of that building. She gave it to me that night and, I didn’t think I would, but I wept.
I knew it would be priceless to me. There is so much represented in that painting that I cannot fully explain. It’s my favorite view of Harris Manchester. It was something that until then, I had experienced alone. Someone whom I love traveled across an ocean and saw it too. Took the time to internalize it, interpret it, and then share their view of it with me.
There are no people in the painting but people are implicit because Lydia painting from life means she me and interacted with the ones I love from Harris Manchester. My two lives come together in that painting.
Lori played soccer with the boys on Friday night. She was the only girl and I’m pretty sure the only American too. I think she went over well :)
Lydia played the guitar with James. We had a series of sing alongs and midnight jam sessions. Poor Seb B. We completely invaded his room on Friday night. He didn’t want to go dancing. He didn’t want to be out late. He wanted to sleep and our demanding rowdy attitude would not consent. So me, Lydia, Lori, and James went with him back to his room. Seb crawled into bed. We all poured a glass of Monkey Shoulder whiskey and played the guitar and sang until about 3 a.m. We wanted his company and by God we were going to get it whether he was asleep or not!
There are many little wonderful things that happened while we were at Oxford. We ate dinner in the bathroom. We started writing a few songs. By the end of this trip there will be an album, a blog novel, a photo documentary, a book of poetry, and a gallery’s worth of paintings to show for it.
Dreams that we’ve had since childhood will be fulfilled. Lori got to see Big Ben. A dream of hers now with a great big check mark next to it. Playing soccer at Oxford. She didn’t know it was a dream till it was happening.
I remember the very first day I got to Oxford and saw all the bicycles. I thought, “if only Lydia Joy could see this bicycle heaven!” And she did.
Having them around leaves a little less time for blogging and some aspects of personal reflection. But there is so much more to be developed between us.
By the way, within a few hours of getting to Oxford with Lyd and Lor, I finished Brother’s Karamazov. The three of us went to the park and sat for a few hours. Lori read. Lydia painted. And I finished Brother’s Karamazov. I couldn’t have finished at a better place than the University Parks. I bought a Ray Bradbury book called The Martian Chronicles. I’ve decided that I will only read books that Sheena holds in high esteem while on this trip. Even if that means I have to reread Le Petit Prince while in France this summer. It’s my way of keeping her very close while I’m painfully aware that she’s quite far away.
Seb B made an excellent comment today at our last meal together. He said that he loves the feeling of leaving a place because while it’s sad to say goodbye and go, there’s a new and unknown place yet to be discovered. And you’re once again reminded that, “I’m traveling!”
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
I'm Innocent
May 12, 2009
It’s been a good day. I started today traveling by myself and I’ve finished today traveling with two friends. People I’ve known for longer than four months. There is something so different yet still so very much the same about traveling with friends compared to traveling alone. I have been waiting to share my time with Lydia and Lori out here in the great big world for about two months. And today was glorious.
I did face trials and tribulations, though. Let me remind you that when I got to England in January I had a bit of a run in with the immigration officials. They didn’t much like that I was studying in England and didn’t have a student visa and that I was allegedly going to study in France but had no paperwork to prove it as of then. He intimidatingly stamped my passport and wrote in SIX MONTHS. This, I found out today, was a bit unusual and a signal to all of England that I needed to be watched.
I flew to Ireland for a day and they gave me no fuss when trying to reenter. I left for Holland and England might have thought they saw the last of me, but England was wrong. I needed to pick up Lydia and Lori and show them Oxford and hang out in London! For less than a week.
So last night I got on a ferry from Hoek van Holland to Harwich, they didn’t get me with any crafty schemes this time and I even saved 10 euros on my ticket because of my Eurail pass. This morning I arrived at the UK boarder in Harwich and the gentleman looked through my passport. Asked me about my reasons for coming to England. How long I’d be. What’d I’d been doing there before. Studying? Why didn’t I have a student Visa? I explained about my studying at Oxford and then traveling till then studying in France. I’d be in the UK for less than six months. I had the paperwork and acceptance letters; did he want to see them?
They detained me. A severe woman came over to me and started asking me more questions. Where would I be staying in England? With friends at Harris Manchester. Two friends are flying into Heathrow from the States today; I’ll meet up with them, come back to the Netherlands and travel around before studying in France.
“You’re a student,” she asked. I confirmed. I had acceptance letters from Both Oxford and Aix on me. She required them.
When did I plan on returning to the States? July 28, after my summer term in France, I’ve got my flight booked from Heathrow home and everything.
“If you’re a student and not working, how are you living?” What the hell? She wanted to know how I was sitting there breathing and processing information and feeling humiliated and doing it all simultaneously while consciously making an effort to control the volume and tone of my voice (something my father’s suggested to me many times) while she sits there living too?
“How are you paying for this?”
And the indignation took a severe hold of my throat. And brow. And lips. And of course the solution protecting my eyes.
My husband is in the Army. He’s stationed in Iraq until September.
The solution submerged my eyeballs and my eyelashes directed the dangerous excess liquid down the crease of my nose.
Ugh, I’m positively volatile.
At this point there was no use in pretending I wasn’t upset and shaken. I spilled detail after unrequested detail about my scholarship to England. Paid for. About not being able to get Aix paper work until recently and how hard it was to obtain it. I think she did ask for my plans with Lydia and Lori and I said they’d just graduated college and we were going to travel some for fun: London to Oxford where we would stay with my friends who are still studying at Harris Manchester College, get a ferry to Amsterdam, 2-3 days in Germany, stay with the mother of an Austrian friend (whom I met at HMC) in Innsbruck, be in Rome for the game, get a ferry to Greece to spend about a week traveling around, maybe meeting up with a friend I studied with in high school who’s from Serbia but studying in (Thessaloniki) then planning, though the flight’s not been booked yet, of flying from Greece to Paris where we’ll spend about a week before then go back to England to fly back to the States and I go to Aix-en-Provence, which was paid for with a student loan.
Leslie was called away for something and I sat there trying not to look too lame. Leslie came back and said, in an intentionally non-comforting tone that if she’d been trying to get into the States the way I was trying to get into England, she wouldn’t have even made it as far as I had.
Who knows how many underlying meanings she was hinting at with a statement like that.
I showed her my flight itinerary. Those were covered in the scholarship, I over informed her with a needle or two in my voice.
She left again and spoke loudly to the man across the room from me, even though he was face to face with her. She sounded down right cold and mean. Mean and cold. Heart made of stone. Ice covered stone.
They called me over. They gave me six more months because I had my flight booked for the States already. They advised me to keep my paper work readily accessible for when I come back to fly home in July.
I asked them if I’d done something wrong. Partly because I Knew I’d done nothing wrong and wanted them to say it to me. They kind of did. They said it wasn’t about having done anything right or wrong, but putting together what I say with what I show them. They wanted to make sure I wasn’t just trying to keep reentering the country every six months.
But basically that I’d done nothing wrong.
And partly because I didn’t understand how it all worked. I didn’t realize the six months started over when you left. I thought I had six from the time it was first stamped until it expired. Then I’d have to get a new one just to fly home.
Negatron.
I wished them a pleasant day and even Thanked them. I thanked them first and then wished them a good day. I almost wish I’d left them with a “Right, later.” or something equally as non polite and slightly undermining. But as it were, I thanked them for questioning me and delaying my journey. I think they caught the vibe the “Thank you” was on, though, cuz it clearly wasn’t a grateful one.
I understand it’s not their job to be nice, quite the opposite in fact. But I still can’t be a little begrudging towards them after detaining me twice in four months. It makes me wonder how many ne're do wells they actually do catch. There honestly can’t be that many out there compared to the number of people who just wanna live and not be asked “How are you living?”
I’m living! Are You living, Leslie? Are you catching people who Aren’t living? People who Aren’t living the way You’ve been told they need to live or not live? I’m living and I love living and I hope you do try to go to the States and I hope the States let you live without too much fuss.
Despite those two border incidences, I love England a lot. And my first day with Lydia and Lori was magical.
It’s been a good day. I started today traveling by myself and I’ve finished today traveling with two friends. People I’ve known for longer than four months. There is something so different yet still so very much the same about traveling with friends compared to traveling alone. I have been waiting to share my time with Lydia and Lori out here in the great big world for about two months. And today was glorious.
I did face trials and tribulations, though. Let me remind you that when I got to England in January I had a bit of a run in with the immigration officials. They didn’t much like that I was studying in England and didn’t have a student visa and that I was allegedly going to study in France but had no paperwork to prove it as of then. He intimidatingly stamped my passport and wrote in SIX MONTHS. This, I found out today, was a bit unusual and a signal to all of England that I needed to be watched.
I flew to Ireland for a day and they gave me no fuss when trying to reenter. I left for Holland and England might have thought they saw the last of me, but England was wrong. I needed to pick up Lydia and Lori and show them Oxford and hang out in London! For less than a week.
So last night I got on a ferry from Hoek van Holland to Harwich, they didn’t get me with any crafty schemes this time and I even saved 10 euros on my ticket because of my Eurail pass. This morning I arrived at the UK boarder in Harwich and the gentleman looked through my passport. Asked me about my reasons for coming to England. How long I’d be. What’d I’d been doing there before. Studying? Why didn’t I have a student Visa? I explained about my studying at Oxford and then traveling till then studying in France. I’d be in the UK for less than six months. I had the paperwork and acceptance letters; did he want to see them?
They detained me. A severe woman came over to me and started asking me more questions. Where would I be staying in England? With friends at Harris Manchester. Two friends are flying into Heathrow from the States today; I’ll meet up with them, come back to the Netherlands and travel around before studying in France.
“You’re a student,” she asked. I confirmed. I had acceptance letters from Both Oxford and Aix on me. She required them.
When did I plan on returning to the States? July 28, after my summer term in France, I’ve got my flight booked from Heathrow home and everything.
“If you’re a student and not working, how are you living?” What the hell? She wanted to know how I was sitting there breathing and processing information and feeling humiliated and doing it all simultaneously while consciously making an effort to control the volume and tone of my voice (something my father’s suggested to me many times) while she sits there living too?
“How are you paying for this?”
And the indignation took a severe hold of my throat. And brow. And lips. And of course the solution protecting my eyes.
My husband is in the Army. He’s stationed in Iraq until September.
The solution submerged my eyeballs and my eyelashes directed the dangerous excess liquid down the crease of my nose.
Ugh, I’m positively volatile.
At this point there was no use in pretending I wasn’t upset and shaken. I spilled detail after unrequested detail about my scholarship to England. Paid for. About not being able to get Aix paper work until recently and how hard it was to obtain it. I think she did ask for my plans with Lydia and Lori and I said they’d just graduated college and we were going to travel some for fun: London to Oxford where we would stay with my friends who are still studying at Harris Manchester College, get a ferry to Amsterdam, 2-3 days in Germany, stay with the mother of an Austrian friend (whom I met at HMC) in Innsbruck, be in Rome for the game, get a ferry to Greece to spend about a week traveling around, maybe meeting up with a friend I studied with in high school who’s from Serbia but studying in (Thessaloniki) then planning, though the flight’s not been booked yet, of flying from Greece to Paris where we’ll spend about a week before then go back to England to fly back to the States and I go to Aix-en-Provence, which was paid for with a student loan.
Leslie was called away for something and I sat there trying not to look too lame. Leslie came back and said, in an intentionally non-comforting tone that if she’d been trying to get into the States the way I was trying to get into England, she wouldn’t have even made it as far as I had.
Who knows how many underlying meanings she was hinting at with a statement like that.
I showed her my flight itinerary. Those were covered in the scholarship, I over informed her with a needle or two in my voice.
She left again and spoke loudly to the man across the room from me, even though he was face to face with her. She sounded down right cold and mean. Mean and cold. Heart made of stone. Ice covered stone.
They called me over. They gave me six more months because I had my flight booked for the States already. They advised me to keep my paper work readily accessible for when I come back to fly home in July.
I asked them if I’d done something wrong. Partly because I Knew I’d done nothing wrong and wanted them to say it to me. They kind of did. They said it wasn’t about having done anything right or wrong, but putting together what I say with what I show them. They wanted to make sure I wasn’t just trying to keep reentering the country every six months.
But basically that I’d done nothing wrong.
And partly because I didn’t understand how it all worked. I didn’t realize the six months started over when you left. I thought I had six from the time it was first stamped until it expired. Then I’d have to get a new one just to fly home.
Negatron.
I wished them a pleasant day and even Thanked them. I thanked them first and then wished them a good day. I almost wish I’d left them with a “Right, later.” or something equally as non polite and slightly undermining. But as it were, I thanked them for questioning me and delaying my journey. I think they caught the vibe the “Thank you” was on, though, cuz it clearly wasn’t a grateful one.
I understand it’s not their job to be nice, quite the opposite in fact. But I still can’t be a little begrudging towards them after detaining me twice in four months. It makes me wonder how many ne're do wells they actually do catch. There honestly can’t be that many out there compared to the number of people who just wanna live and not be asked “How are you living?”
I’m living! Are You living, Leslie? Are you catching people who Aren’t living? People who Aren’t living the way You’ve been told they need to live or not live? I’m living and I love living and I hope you do try to go to the States and I hope the States let you live without too much fuss.
Despite those two border incidences, I love England a lot. And my first day with Lydia and Lori was magical.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Photos from the Past Adventures
Lago di Garda
Campsite at Lago di Garda
View of Innsbruck at night from Niklas' mom's house
Somewhere between Zurich and Innsbruck
The sea at night in Holland
Tulip Festival in Holland
Fish and Chips by the sea at Brighton Pier
View from the windmill at the Tulip fest
Sailor Sarah
Flying at the Osbourne house on the Isle of Wight
Dandy-lion field on my southern England country ramble
Guess where...
Even in England my Country's spirit in the form of a bald eagle is still sheltering me beneath it's loving wing.
Tate Liverpool museum. 
Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh
How Do You Say, "Where For God's Sake Am I?" In German?
It seems that this phrase, or some variation of it, has been haunting me since I got to Europe. I wish I’d been keeping a tally of how many times I’ve muttered it out loud to myself. I also wish I got a Euro for every time I said it.
I’ve asked this question out of awe, both reverently and disappointedly.
I’m asking myself this question about Antwerp. Well, not so much Antwerp but my Hostel in Antwerp.
It's always kind of funny when I find myself saying "What is this place? How did I get Here?" It can be really disconcerting. I didn't get to Antwerpen until about 11 p.m. That's ok except I realized at about 8:30 that I hadn't written down the name of my hostel OR directions to it from the train station. How could I be so base? My cellphone was dead too. Ugh. Luckily I remembered seeing a plug on the wall three train cars back. So I went and charged my phone for a matter minutes, just long enough to call Seb A to see if he was close to a computer. Fortunately he was! He got into my Gmail account and google mapped the directions for me. I love Seb A.
So I walked through the dark and eerie streets of the ghetto side of Antwerpen to my ghetto hostel. I had to walk through a very strange bathroom type area that looked like 70 years ago it would have been an open air section of the building. Is this making sense? The building is on a corner and I have a feeling there was a court yard in the middle of the building that was then filled in when this place became a hostel. There are bits of outer wall on the inside of the area. The whole place is confusing in an unnatural sense.
And they forgot to give me a pillowcase. And the pillow felt like a bag of cotton balls. I used my scarf to cover the pillow and fell asleep thinking "Where for God's sake am I?" And the bed tilted to the right. Noticeably.
I was actually rather cranky this morning. Someone's alarm was going off really loudly and they weren't shutting it off. After the second round of the William Tell Overature in cellphone beeps I realized freaking great, it's MY annoying alarm and I'M the idiot not turning it off. The seven other people in this room must Hate me. Luckly they all checked out this morning.
There was a free breakfast that was pretty decent. Toast, chocolate cereal, Unlimited coffee (of which I had 3 cups) fresh oranges, ham, cheese, and rolls. I ate a lot. And took some for later.
I finally got to Brussels and am having an alright time. It's a really beautiful day. I found a very cool place to order food in French and suck up the free wifi. I'm going to see a silent film this afternoon with a live piano player. For 3 Euros. I'm catching up on photos.
It's also Mother's Day and I'm missing moms.
I'll see Lydia and Lori in 1 day 17 hours!
So. Where for God's sake am I? I'm in Brussels! I'm in Belgium! I'm in Europe! I'm in the midst of European Adventure 09! I'm three weeks from my birthday! I'm 79 days from flying home and living in my house! I'm in awe! I'm in Love! I'm involved. I'm in safe hands, as well as my own.
I’ve asked this question out of awe, both reverently and disappointedly.
I’m asking myself this question about Antwerp. Well, not so much Antwerp but my Hostel in Antwerp.
It's always kind of funny when I find myself saying "What is this place? How did I get Here?" It can be really disconcerting. I didn't get to Antwerpen until about 11 p.m. That's ok except I realized at about 8:30 that I hadn't written down the name of my hostel OR directions to it from the train station. How could I be so base? My cellphone was dead too. Ugh. Luckily I remembered seeing a plug on the wall three train cars back. So I went and charged my phone for a matter minutes, just long enough to call Seb A to see if he was close to a computer. Fortunately he was! He got into my Gmail account and google mapped the directions for me. I love Seb A.
So I walked through the dark and eerie streets of the ghetto side of Antwerpen to my ghetto hostel. I had to walk through a very strange bathroom type area that looked like 70 years ago it would have been an open air section of the building. Is this making sense? The building is on a corner and I have a feeling there was a court yard in the middle of the building that was then filled in when this place became a hostel. There are bits of outer wall on the inside of the area. The whole place is confusing in an unnatural sense.
And they forgot to give me a pillowcase. And the pillow felt like a bag of cotton balls. I used my scarf to cover the pillow and fell asleep thinking "Where for God's sake am I?" And the bed tilted to the right. Noticeably.
I was actually rather cranky this morning. Someone's alarm was going off really loudly and they weren't shutting it off. After the second round of the William Tell Overature in cellphone beeps I realized freaking great, it's MY annoying alarm and I'M the idiot not turning it off. The seven other people in this room must Hate me. Luckly they all checked out this morning.
There was a free breakfast that was pretty decent. Toast, chocolate cereal, Unlimited coffee (of which I had 3 cups) fresh oranges, ham, cheese, and rolls. I ate a lot. And took some for later.
I finally got to Brussels and am having an alright time. It's a really beautiful day. I found a very cool place to order food in French and suck up the free wifi. I'm going to see a silent film this afternoon with a live piano player. For 3 Euros. I'm catching up on photos.
It's also Mother's Day and I'm missing moms.
I'll see Lydia and Lori in 1 day 17 hours!
So. Where for God's sake am I? I'm in Brussels! I'm in Belgium! I'm in Europe! I'm in the midst of European Adventure 09! I'm three weeks from my birthday! I'm 79 days from flying home and living in my house! I'm in awe! I'm in Love! I'm involved. I'm in safe hands, as well as my own.
I Could Use an Upright Bass
Post Saturday the 9th of May
It’s half past noon and I’m on a train. Again. I’m sitting at a table surrounded by a horde of twelve-year-old girls. I think they’re on this train for the long haul, like me.
I don’t miss being twelve. I don’t miss 6th grade. I think I was made for college.
Anyway. I spent the day in Vienna yesterday. Only one day. I could have spent another quite happily there, I think. The hostel had free instruments people could use. These instruments consisted of a piano, one classical guitar with strings, one classical guitar without strings, one ukulele with 3 strings, and a drum. It wasn’t completely disappointing because some people could play the guitar and would strum a bit and people would request this song or that song and if he knew it we’d stumble along. It was pretty delightful.
The night I got there I chatted with several Aussies, a couple Canadians and an Alex from Manchester, England. Alex knew bluegrass. We stayed up long after the Aussies and Canadians went to bed strumming through song after song. I got my laptop and we listened to a bunch of Carter Family and I showed him my favorite version of Gentle on my Mind by John Hartford. He was going to take a train to Budapest for a day trip but the Hungarian train workers went on strike so he couldn’t get to Budapest. Instead he and I went to the Leopold Museum where the largest collection of Egon Schiele’s artwork is housed.
We had a delightful walk there. We had delightful discussions. We ate delightful sandwiches and delightful chocolate cake, even though we were really after pie. We found our way to the Danube and sat by the water watching ducks, swans, and barges. I mean, the Danube is just a river. And that’s exactly what it looks like. We put our toes in the water for a bit. The water was quite cold.
We walked to some big building with a concert being set up and we climbed a tree in the park. We sat there for an hour or two chatting in a tree. People watched us but didn’t tell us to get down. We talked about traveling alone and how it lends itself to a lot of reflection, a lot of being quite, and a lot of people watching. We both confessed that we’d hoped to have epiphanies while traveling alone and so far, neither of us has had one. I don’t think they really happen, he commented. I don’t know, he’s still got a week left to travel so there’s still time.
After climbing down from our boughs, we went in the direction of the hostel to find a grocery store. We’d decided to eat peanuts and bananas for dinner. Apparently when you’re in a hurry this is the magical health combo. It’s a combination of all the right proteins and fats and what ever else. We got mango and guava juice, expensive vacuum-packed peanuts, bananas, and a loaf of brown bread. This amounted to about 8 euros and we could barely eat a quarter of what we bought together. Bread, peanuts, and bananas will fill you up, let me tell you. When we sat down to eat our meal we were like “what kind of food did we get?” Monkey food. This is what monkeys eat. Other people were eating pasta with sauce. Salads. Sandwiches. We were eating chunks of bread, handfuls of peanuts and bananas. What a silly life.
I accidentally left my guava juice in the fridge when I left this morning. :( I hadn’t realized it till I was half way to the train station and by then I wasn’t going to walk back to get it. I wish I had now.
After dinner we jammed with a few more people and we left for a showing of The Third Man. Alex had gone on a Sewer Tour that showed you all of the places where the movie was filmed there in Vienna. I’d never seen the movie so I was psyched to go see it and in Vienna, too! We took the train there and caught the 10:55 showing. I unfortunately drifted off for about 20 minutes there in the middle of the movie, which frustrated me, but I can rent the movie anytime. It was still cool to go and see it. It didn’t get done till about 1 a.m. and by then the subway had closed. We had a half hour walk back to the hostel. It felt like it was 9 p.m. because it was really bright and there were tons of people walking around.
So now I’m on my way to Antwerp, Belgium. I won’t get there till 11 p.m. or so. That’s alright with me. I’m looking forward to seeing the country my mom studied in when she was a little younger than I am now.
Hanging out with Manchester Alex made me miss England.
The train I’m currently on stopped at the Passau Hbf Station and there’s an old man with a blue driving cap, a blue button up tee shirt, blue jean shorts that are just a tad too short, dark blue socks up to mid calf and brown sandals. He’s standing at the top of the stairs waiting for someone to come. He paces a little to the left, turns, paces a little to the right. Looks down the stairs. He watches the people come up and greet the others around him. He paces to the left again, looks at his watch. I wanted to see his loved one meet him but we pulled out of the station before it happened.
It’s half past noon and I’m on a train. Again. I’m sitting at a table surrounded by a horde of twelve-year-old girls. I think they’re on this train for the long haul, like me.
I don’t miss being twelve. I don’t miss 6th grade. I think I was made for college.
Anyway. I spent the day in Vienna yesterday. Only one day. I could have spent another quite happily there, I think. The hostel had free instruments people could use. These instruments consisted of a piano, one classical guitar with strings, one classical guitar without strings, one ukulele with 3 strings, and a drum. It wasn’t completely disappointing because some people could play the guitar and would strum a bit and people would request this song or that song and if he knew it we’d stumble along. It was pretty delightful.
The night I got there I chatted with several Aussies, a couple Canadians and an Alex from Manchester, England. Alex knew bluegrass. We stayed up long after the Aussies and Canadians went to bed strumming through song after song. I got my laptop and we listened to a bunch of Carter Family and I showed him my favorite version of Gentle on my Mind by John Hartford. He was going to take a train to Budapest for a day trip but the Hungarian train workers went on strike so he couldn’t get to Budapest. Instead he and I went to the Leopold Museum where the largest collection of Egon Schiele’s artwork is housed.
We had a delightful walk there. We had delightful discussions. We ate delightful sandwiches and delightful chocolate cake, even though we were really after pie. We found our way to the Danube and sat by the water watching ducks, swans, and barges. I mean, the Danube is just a river. And that’s exactly what it looks like. We put our toes in the water for a bit. The water was quite cold.
We walked to some big building with a concert being set up and we climbed a tree in the park. We sat there for an hour or two chatting in a tree. People watched us but didn’t tell us to get down. We talked about traveling alone and how it lends itself to a lot of reflection, a lot of being quite, and a lot of people watching. We both confessed that we’d hoped to have epiphanies while traveling alone and so far, neither of us has had one. I don’t think they really happen, he commented. I don’t know, he’s still got a week left to travel so there’s still time.
After climbing down from our boughs, we went in the direction of the hostel to find a grocery store. We’d decided to eat peanuts and bananas for dinner. Apparently when you’re in a hurry this is the magical health combo. It’s a combination of all the right proteins and fats and what ever else. We got mango and guava juice, expensive vacuum-packed peanuts, bananas, and a loaf of brown bread. This amounted to about 8 euros and we could barely eat a quarter of what we bought together. Bread, peanuts, and bananas will fill you up, let me tell you. When we sat down to eat our meal we were like “what kind of food did we get?” Monkey food. This is what monkeys eat. Other people were eating pasta with sauce. Salads. Sandwiches. We were eating chunks of bread, handfuls of peanuts and bananas. What a silly life.
I accidentally left my guava juice in the fridge when I left this morning. :( I hadn’t realized it till I was half way to the train station and by then I wasn’t going to walk back to get it. I wish I had now.
After dinner we jammed with a few more people and we left for a showing of The Third Man. Alex had gone on a Sewer Tour that showed you all of the places where the movie was filmed there in Vienna. I’d never seen the movie so I was psyched to go see it and in Vienna, too! We took the train there and caught the 10:55 showing. I unfortunately drifted off for about 20 minutes there in the middle of the movie, which frustrated me, but I can rent the movie anytime. It was still cool to go and see it. It didn’t get done till about 1 a.m. and by then the subway had closed. We had a half hour walk back to the hostel. It felt like it was 9 p.m. because it was really bright and there were tons of people walking around.
So now I’m on my way to Antwerp, Belgium. I won’t get there till 11 p.m. or so. That’s alright with me. I’m looking forward to seeing the country my mom studied in when she was a little younger than I am now.
Hanging out with Manchester Alex made me miss England.
The train I’m currently on stopped at the Passau Hbf Station and there’s an old man with a blue driving cap, a blue button up tee shirt, blue jean shorts that are just a tad too short, dark blue socks up to mid calf and brown sandals. He’s standing at the top of the stairs waiting for someone to come. He paces a little to the left, turns, paces a little to the right. Looks down the stairs. He watches the people come up and greet the others around him. He paces to the left again, looks at his watch. I wanted to see his loved one meet him but we pulled out of the station before it happened.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
4 p.m. and my titles have gotten lame lame lame
Just spent a delightful afternoon in Salzburg. I think I really like that city. It was small enough but also had a nice big feel. I thought I was going to miss the Thursday market because I heard that it closed about noon. I arrived at the train station at half eleven and couldn’t manage to figure out the bus system. I spent 15 minutes trying to decide which bus I should take, finally asked someone and they said it best to just walk. So I did. I asked a few more people along the way if I was headed the right direction. Success!
I ended up taking a slightly different route but thanks to the trusty map Seb B’s mom gave me, I found the Mirabelle Platz the back way. I’m glad I took the back way because I was greeted with all the bread and sweets stands :) The front was all flowers and fresh produce. I decided to eat at the market. There were stands selling frankfurters with mustard and ketchup and Steigel bier. So that’s what I had. I then went back to the sweet bread stands and got a giant sweet roll.
Twice at HMC Seb B made traditional Austrian dumplings from bread his grandmother sent with him. The first kind we had with goulash and the second he made with spinach and butter. I was able to recognize the spinach butter ones at the market. I almost got about 6 of those. But I really just wanted to keep the memory of the homemade ones in my mind and on my palate.
I walked across the street to the gardens. They had a section that was basically a maze of skinny trees. It wasn’t a labyrinth. More like trees that had been planted really close together, creating enclosed spaces with little openings from people pushing their way into the center. This is what I did. I sat and listened to all the people chatting in German around me. I’ve become quite taken with German. Maybe I should start to study it.
After wandering around the park a bit I made my way to the city center. I wandered around a bit. Found a post card. Wrote it for James Kanimba. Found a post office. Sent it to James Kanimba. I also bought a roll of tape so that I can stick stuff in Lydia’s notebook and not have hundreds of little pieces of paper floating around my already stuffed and cluttery Paris purse. And shoved inside my delicate copy of Brother’s Karamazov. That poor book.
I have many things with me that are doomed to not make it back to the States. I feel a little bad putting my tennis shoes on every morning and saying “Shoes, you might not make it back to the States. Socks, you won’t make it back to the states with the looks of that heel.” I think it’s better to foresee these things though so that when it comes right down to the moment of truth I won’t hesitate and I won’t feel bad. Those jeans knew their travels were almost over.
Anyway.
After mailing that post card I walked next door to the panorama museum. I figured it was a euro 50. Why not? Basically this guy in the mid 1800’s went to some of the most far off and beautiful places in the world and painted huge pictures of them. I think there were 25 paintings of places like Mecca, the Grand Canyon, the Matterhorn, Jerusalem, Istanbul, the Sphinx, etc. So that was cool.
I then decided a coffee would be the right thing after that. I found a little places and I think it was called the Golden Duck. It really could have been anything. I managed to order one cappucchino, please, in German. That was good, but bad because my waiter then thought I actually spoke German. Of course the rest of the German I actually knew would not let me tell him I didn’t speak German and that I needed the check, please. So I had to out myself as a non-German speaker.
So I made a nice jaunt back to the station without the use of my map and without the direction of strangers. Yess.
Now I’m on the train to Wien. I can’t wait to get to Vienna. I’ll charge this laptop. Post these posts. Download photos. Shower. And talk to Lydia. Hopefully I can find some musicians to chill with. I need a bit of music in my life that I’m participating in.
I ended up taking a slightly different route but thanks to the trusty map Seb B’s mom gave me, I found the Mirabelle Platz the back way. I’m glad I took the back way because I was greeted with all the bread and sweets stands :) The front was all flowers and fresh produce. I decided to eat at the market. There were stands selling frankfurters with mustard and ketchup and Steigel bier. So that’s what I had. I then went back to the sweet bread stands and got a giant sweet roll.
Twice at HMC Seb B made traditional Austrian dumplings from bread his grandmother sent with him. The first kind we had with goulash and the second he made with spinach and butter. I was able to recognize the spinach butter ones at the market. I almost got about 6 of those. But I really just wanted to keep the memory of the homemade ones in my mind and on my palate.
I walked across the street to the gardens. They had a section that was basically a maze of skinny trees. It wasn’t a labyrinth. More like trees that had been planted really close together, creating enclosed spaces with little openings from people pushing their way into the center. This is what I did. I sat and listened to all the people chatting in German around me. I’ve become quite taken with German. Maybe I should start to study it.
After wandering around the park a bit I made my way to the city center. I wandered around a bit. Found a post card. Wrote it for James Kanimba. Found a post office. Sent it to James Kanimba. I also bought a roll of tape so that I can stick stuff in Lydia’s notebook and not have hundreds of little pieces of paper floating around my already stuffed and cluttery Paris purse. And shoved inside my delicate copy of Brother’s Karamazov. That poor book.
I have many things with me that are doomed to not make it back to the States. I feel a little bad putting my tennis shoes on every morning and saying “Shoes, you might not make it back to the States. Socks, you won’t make it back to the states with the looks of that heel.” I think it’s better to foresee these things though so that when it comes right down to the moment of truth I won’t hesitate and I won’t feel bad. Those jeans knew their travels were almost over.
Anyway.
After mailing that post card I walked next door to the panorama museum. I figured it was a euro 50. Why not? Basically this guy in the mid 1800’s went to some of the most far off and beautiful places in the world and painted huge pictures of them. I think there were 25 paintings of places like Mecca, the Grand Canyon, the Matterhorn, Jerusalem, Istanbul, the Sphinx, etc. So that was cool.
I then decided a coffee would be the right thing after that. I found a little places and I think it was called the Golden Duck. It really could have been anything. I managed to order one cappucchino, please, in German. That was good, but bad because my waiter then thought I actually spoke German. Of course the rest of the German I actually knew would not let me tell him I didn’t speak German and that I needed the check, please. So I had to out myself as a non-German speaker.
So I made a nice jaunt back to the station without the use of my map and without the direction of strangers. Yess.
Now I’m on the train to Wien. I can’t wait to get to Vienna. I’ll charge this laptop. Post these posts. Download photos. Shower. And talk to Lydia. Hopefully I can find some musicians to chill with. I need a bit of music in my life that I’m participating in.
May 7
Ha ha again I’m on a train. Again I’m glad to be using an American keyboard because my fingers have such intense muscle memory. I was using a German keyboard for two days while at Seb B’s mom’s house and the Y key was switched with the Z key. Also the @ symbol was on the Q key and you couldn’t use the regular shift key to get it, you had to use a second shift key. In place of the quotes/apostrophe key is an A with umlauts. There are many other differences but I’ll only mention one more. The question mark key is on the 0 key. You never realize how many Y’s are in an English sentence until you have to think about where to find a Y.
It’s the little things that make the world go round.
My two days at Seb B’s mom’s house were fantastic. It was a little bit like having a family again. Seb’s got 2 younger brothers, Laurence, who’s in his first year at college, and Felix, who’s 17 and was accepted to a school in Canada for his senior year. Laurence was in the middle of his exam week so I didn’t see much of him except at lunch and dinner. Felix also had several tests, but managed to play some music, go on walks with me, go to a concert, and dance with me in the dining room. I taught him some lindy hop and he taught me a cha cha routine. I realized I have a long way to go if I want to get back into the ballroom style. But it Will happen. It was brilliant to borrow some brothers for a few days.
I got a lot of business done while in Innsbruck so I feel good about that. I also started to put together a guest list for the traditional wedding celebration Josh and I are going to have in October. Man, my family is huge.
So I’m stopping in Salzburg, Austria today to catch part of their Thursday market. I’ll walk around the gardens across from the market. I’ll go to the city center. I’ll eat some lunch. I’ll get the train that afternoon to Vienna. I can’t wait to get to Vienna! I won’t get to waltz while I’m there but I’ll get to go to the museums and the hostel I’m staying at is decently priced and has instruments you can use. Please, God, let there be a bass!
Did I already mention that Lydia is bringing a mandolin and a harmonica with her when she comes? Well, she is. Guess I’ll be trying my chops at the harmonica for the next month.
I was trying to book a hostel in Brussels but they were outrageously expensive. And their facilities didn’t seem that expansive or good. So I figured I’d get a hostel in Antwerpen, about a 40 minute train ride from Brussels. That’s fine with me but now I’ve got a compromised expectation of Belgium. The chocolate better make up for it.
Felix was a little impressed with how much stuff I had in such a limited amount of luggage. And he was amused with some of the items I deemed vital for travel. Namely my dance shoes. I think I’d travel without a toothbrush before I traveled without my dance shoes.
I was thinking the other day that if I went deaf I could still dance. I’d know all the songs in my mind and besides, I’d have a partner who would lead me. If he just let me know that the song was “In the Mood” I’d know how I wanted to dance to it. And I dance without music quite a lot anyway. As long as he was dancing in time with the music, I would be too. I don’t know why this thought came to me. I think cuz my left ear was clogged on one of the train rides and I couldn’t hear perfectly through the left earphone. The point is I could still dance and I would still want to. It’d be a bit like Beethoven, only a little different.
The first night I was in Innsbruck Felix was going to a guitar concert. I went with him and the guy who played was a world renowned classical guitarist. He was so expressive in the sense that he distorted his face according to the mood of the chords he played. He hummed along with his own playing, sometimes singing a scat note or two. He opened and closed his mouth with down turned lips like a big grouper trying to shake the fishing line. He hunched his shoulders, threw his right arm in the air after a particularly intense strum like a rock star. The guy was not just a musician, Felix said, he was a comedian. During the first few movements of the first song, Felix and I were suppressing laughs. We couldn’t look at each other or we would have disrupted the silence of those sitting nearest us. When he finally finished his first full piece he struck the last note, slightly lifted the guitar away from his body, replaced it on his lap, and hung his body over it like a marionette. The crowd clapped and released the laughter they’d all been stifling like Felix and me. After that the musician made a joking comment or two and the audience finally knew that it was acceptable to laugh when he did something unexpected or quirky. There was now a relationship between the performer and the audience. He played some more modern pieces near the end of his concert including a classical guitar homage to Jimi Hendrix. For his encore he played 2 original pieces, the second of which was almost bluesy, almost funky. He’d tap the body of the guitar for a percussion sound, he’d strum and pluck high on the neck like and 80’s metal guitarist. You could just about dance to it.
Have I mentioned the mountains much? They look like ant hills covered in moss. Only they’re mountains covered in trees.
I’m going to Salzburg where “that terrible film that everyone knows about except Austrians” was filmed. The Sound of Music. Seb’s mom is awesome. She grew up there so she gave me some advice on what to see.
Bis Bald!
(A German saying which basically means see you soon but it’s used when you know that you will definitely see that person soon. So I say it to you.)
It’s the little things that make the world go round.
My two days at Seb B’s mom’s house were fantastic. It was a little bit like having a family again. Seb’s got 2 younger brothers, Laurence, who’s in his first year at college, and Felix, who’s 17 and was accepted to a school in Canada for his senior year. Laurence was in the middle of his exam week so I didn’t see much of him except at lunch and dinner. Felix also had several tests, but managed to play some music, go on walks with me, go to a concert, and dance with me in the dining room. I taught him some lindy hop and he taught me a cha cha routine. I realized I have a long way to go if I want to get back into the ballroom style. But it Will happen. It was brilliant to borrow some brothers for a few days.
I got a lot of business done while in Innsbruck so I feel good about that. I also started to put together a guest list for the traditional wedding celebration Josh and I are going to have in October. Man, my family is huge.
So I’m stopping in Salzburg, Austria today to catch part of their Thursday market. I’ll walk around the gardens across from the market. I’ll go to the city center. I’ll eat some lunch. I’ll get the train that afternoon to Vienna. I can’t wait to get to Vienna! I won’t get to waltz while I’m there but I’ll get to go to the museums and the hostel I’m staying at is decently priced and has instruments you can use. Please, God, let there be a bass!
Did I already mention that Lydia is bringing a mandolin and a harmonica with her when she comes? Well, she is. Guess I’ll be trying my chops at the harmonica for the next month.
I was trying to book a hostel in Brussels but they were outrageously expensive. And their facilities didn’t seem that expansive or good. So I figured I’d get a hostel in Antwerpen, about a 40 minute train ride from Brussels. That’s fine with me but now I’ve got a compromised expectation of Belgium. The chocolate better make up for it.
Felix was a little impressed with how much stuff I had in such a limited amount of luggage. And he was amused with some of the items I deemed vital for travel. Namely my dance shoes. I think I’d travel without a toothbrush before I traveled without my dance shoes.
I was thinking the other day that if I went deaf I could still dance. I’d know all the songs in my mind and besides, I’d have a partner who would lead me. If he just let me know that the song was “In the Mood” I’d know how I wanted to dance to it. And I dance without music quite a lot anyway. As long as he was dancing in time with the music, I would be too. I don’t know why this thought came to me. I think cuz my left ear was clogged on one of the train rides and I couldn’t hear perfectly through the left earphone. The point is I could still dance and I would still want to. It’d be a bit like Beethoven, only a little different.
The first night I was in Innsbruck Felix was going to a guitar concert. I went with him and the guy who played was a world renowned classical guitarist. He was so expressive in the sense that he distorted his face according to the mood of the chords he played. He hummed along with his own playing, sometimes singing a scat note or two. He opened and closed his mouth with down turned lips like a big grouper trying to shake the fishing line. He hunched his shoulders, threw his right arm in the air after a particularly intense strum like a rock star. The guy was not just a musician, Felix said, he was a comedian. During the first few movements of the first song, Felix and I were suppressing laughs. We couldn’t look at each other or we would have disrupted the silence of those sitting nearest us. When he finally finished his first full piece he struck the last note, slightly lifted the guitar away from his body, replaced it on his lap, and hung his body over it like a marionette. The crowd clapped and released the laughter they’d all been stifling like Felix and me. After that the musician made a joking comment or two and the audience finally knew that it was acceptable to laugh when he did something unexpected or quirky. There was now a relationship between the performer and the audience. He played some more modern pieces near the end of his concert including a classical guitar homage to Jimi Hendrix. For his encore he played 2 original pieces, the second of which was almost bluesy, almost funky. He’d tap the body of the guitar for a percussion sound, he’d strum and pluck high on the neck like and 80’s metal guitarist. You could just about dance to it.
Have I mentioned the mountains much? They look like ant hills covered in moss. Only they’re mountains covered in trees.
I’m going to Salzburg where “that terrible film that everyone knows about except Austrians” was filmed. The Sound of Music. Seb’s mom is awesome. She grew up there so she gave me some advice on what to see.
Bis Bald!
(A German saying which basically means see you soon but it’s used when you know that you will definitely see that person soon. So I say it to you.)
May 6
I’m on a train back to Innsbruck. I might end up in Vienna, Budapest, and Brussels before picking Lyd and Lor up in London early on the 12th.
Back to the story. The one guy, Arthur, who was with us got 4th place in the race out of over a hundred bikers. Pretty cool. He was alright with 4th place. Next year. There’s always next year.
We ate a lot of good Austrian bread. And cheese. And sausage. We ate alphabet soup and thought about playing word games but I don’t know that much German. And it was dark. We made pasta al pesto and drank tea in the morning with more bread and cheese and sausage but also sweet bread and nutella.
We hiked up a mountain. It wasn’t that long, about 45 minutes to the top. Get ready for three and a half thousand steps, Niklas said. Couldn’t have been that many. Anyway, I didn’t count. Along the hike we’d stop and drink water and breathe and internalize the lake and mountains. There are still World War I bunkers in the mountain we climbed. When we got to the top there was a clearing that was the roof of the bunker. There we ate cookies and napped in the sun. Funny how we find new uses for old things.
We brought bikes. We rode all over the little city. We went to a little town outside of Garda with a killer pizza place. It was a completely residential area with just a few local shops. And this pizza place.
I noticed that the kids play everywhere. We’d been to three or four little towns in the area and every town seemed to not only be having a festival of some sort, but the children would run around and play hide and seek Everywhere. Every café has outdoor seating and the kids would run around the tables. Man, life Rocks when you’re a kid. And it Rocks when you’re 21 and hanging out in Italy. The places we went were filled with 3 kinds of tourists, Niklas told me. The rock climbers. The bikers. The chic women on vacation. You can spot them all by their terrible clothes and corresponding accessories. Shoes are also key to identifying why a person’s at Garda.
I learned some German while in Italy which helped me communicate with Niklas, Arthur, and Mati. It hasn’t helped me so much in the rest of my time in Italy.
I realized very quickly when I continued my journey south to Ferrara that I knew next to no Italian. Ciao. Prego. Gratzzia. This made things a little difficult. Never in my life have I not been able to communicate like this. I remember working at Enzo Pizza and encountering people who only spoke Spanish. I knew a little. Pointing helped a lot.
But when I had to order food on my own (because Rhi had classes on Monday) I couldn’t help but feel incredibly stupid. And alone. The waitresses were nice enough. They were not by any means rude or uncompromising. I still couldn’t help but feel like I was doing things the wrong way or that I wasn’t understanding completely.
After sitting there for a bit a man of about 45 or so came in. The people behind the counter started singing happy birthday and brought out a flat chocolate cake with candles in it. The man was absolutely tickled. I watched and missed Enzo Pizza a lot. It reminded me of the regulars that would come in and bring us homemade cookies and cake and other sweet treats. It was like when someone who worked in another store at the mall had a birthday and they came down and we all signed a happy birthday card and gave them a free meal. ::sigh:: I miss Enzo Pizza and I think I always will. It was the best job I’ve ever had and I feel like I grew up there.
As I stared at them involuntarily, thinking all these longing thoughts about home and Enzo’s, the birthday man turned and addressed me in Italian. The waitress then addressed him in Italian informing him that I couldn’t speak Italian. So he spoke to me in English! He offered me cake. Now, mind that I’m the only person in the restaurant. He asked where I was from. Mentioned his love of Frank Zappa. Told me Bush was (indicating crazy with his index finger making circles around his temple) and that things will get better with Obama, because they can’t get worse. He laughed. He offered me more cake because I’d taken so little. He gets coffee there everyday and they knew it was his birthday and couldn’t wait to surprise him.
I love it when people have that kind of home. A place where they can go that’s not their house and the people aren’t blood relations but there’s still an unmistakable sense of belonging. I don’t belong there in that café/restaurant in Ferrara. I was a temporary on-looker. I was just one of the many minor characters that’s on stage for part of one scene, adds a bit of interest, allows the character of the main characters to be tested, and then exits stage left while the cast continues to encounter one entertaining situation after another.
After that lunch I tried to go to a museum that was closed. I had three hours until Rhi was done with classes so I went to the main Piazza in front of the cathedral. I basically sat there the whole time in the sun (until the shadows slowly rolled around) an I wrote and doodled and watched people and made up stories about their lives that included many of the places I’ve been in Europe as backdrops.
I really should remember to blog a little more regularly because it’s so hard to capture all the little things when I wait a week because so much happens in week. Less than a week. I’ve got two new bands to listen to. I’ve got a partly nice tan and a partly pink sunburn. I’ve learned some German. I’m in the midst of planning European Adventures ’09 starting Lydia Fischer, Lori Ludwig, and Sarah VanVlerah. I predict a lot of Greek beaches in the very near future.
Though I am a bit of an internet junky I was very proud to have spent a solid 3 days not on my laptop. I don’t think it’s so much the internet I’m addicted to. I sure it’s communication. It’s relationships that exist across time zones and molecules and miles and all kinds of spacey things. I don’t use my phone cuz it’s obscenely expensive, or I’m sure I’d always be on the phone. I think the only people I’ve called in the states are Sheena (on her 22nd birthday), my Grandma Jo (on her somethingith birthday) and Enzo Pizza (to see if they’d deliver to Liverpool).
Like I said over 1000 words ago, I’m going to Innsbruck again. This time to see Seb B’s mom. I just really really can’t wait to hug a mom. I have to say I miss my own quite a bit but I’m a big girl and I’m in Europe and I’ve been here for four months and I’ve got another three to go and I chose this and I’m happy with all of that. But. I still can’t wait to hug a mom. And drink some coffee with her.
I sometimes find so many things delightful it’s overwhelming. I see so many beautiful things and I have trouble breathing at a normal pace. I start to lose control of my arms and legs and my hands grab out for the sky and my feet pound the earth in disbelief. “Earth! Are you still here? Is this what you really look like and feel like? Earth! You’re so soft and green right here but over there you’re hard and grey.” How great thou art, my fingers seem to read when they touch the bark of trees and their leaves and the tiny pebbles from the water and the miniature snail shells hidden in the dirt. My shoulders draw towards the sun and beg for more vitamin E. And with a slightly puppyish energy I sniff and smell for flowers and grilling meat and the sea and the air way over here, so far from where I’m used to.
The third morning I was at Garda I woke up, put on my flip flops, started to dig around for bread and cheese and thought, “Have I really looked at the mountains yet?” I hadn’t and I owed them their due.
I’ve been writing basically the whole time I’ve been on this train. So since one. It’s now 3:45. My laptop’s got 34% battery left. I’m going to listen to Abbey Road and drift off for the next 45 minutes till I arrive in Innsbruck and get a good mom hug.
Oh! Wait! I have a house! A house in Indianapolis on Terrace just north of campus and I’ll be living with 3 of the 5 coolest girls in the world: Lydia Fischer, Lori Ludwig, and Lyndsay McBride. (Sheena being the 4th and me being the 5th. I’ll obviously be living there but Dear Sheensta will be moving to France in October to teach English, maybe for the rest of her life. Who knows with that whimsical young woman).
There were fears (and somewhat legitimate ones) that I may also leave the country and just never find my way back. Let me put those fears to rest for now. I’ll come home but there’s not guarantee I won’t be off again to a new place. Though I won’t be solo then.
Back to the story. The one guy, Arthur, who was with us got 4th place in the race out of over a hundred bikers. Pretty cool. He was alright with 4th place. Next year. There’s always next year.
We ate a lot of good Austrian bread. And cheese. And sausage. We ate alphabet soup and thought about playing word games but I don’t know that much German. And it was dark. We made pasta al pesto and drank tea in the morning with more bread and cheese and sausage but also sweet bread and nutella.
We hiked up a mountain. It wasn’t that long, about 45 minutes to the top. Get ready for three and a half thousand steps, Niklas said. Couldn’t have been that many. Anyway, I didn’t count. Along the hike we’d stop and drink water and breathe and internalize the lake and mountains. There are still World War I bunkers in the mountain we climbed. When we got to the top there was a clearing that was the roof of the bunker. There we ate cookies and napped in the sun. Funny how we find new uses for old things.
We brought bikes. We rode all over the little city. We went to a little town outside of Garda with a killer pizza place. It was a completely residential area with just a few local shops. And this pizza place.
I noticed that the kids play everywhere. We’d been to three or four little towns in the area and every town seemed to not only be having a festival of some sort, but the children would run around and play hide and seek Everywhere. Every café has outdoor seating and the kids would run around the tables. Man, life Rocks when you’re a kid. And it Rocks when you’re 21 and hanging out in Italy. The places we went were filled with 3 kinds of tourists, Niklas told me. The rock climbers. The bikers. The chic women on vacation. You can spot them all by their terrible clothes and corresponding accessories. Shoes are also key to identifying why a person’s at Garda.
I learned some German while in Italy which helped me communicate with Niklas, Arthur, and Mati. It hasn’t helped me so much in the rest of my time in Italy.
I realized very quickly when I continued my journey south to Ferrara that I knew next to no Italian. Ciao. Prego. Gratzzia. This made things a little difficult. Never in my life have I not been able to communicate like this. I remember working at Enzo Pizza and encountering people who only spoke Spanish. I knew a little. Pointing helped a lot.
But when I had to order food on my own (because Rhi had classes on Monday) I couldn’t help but feel incredibly stupid. And alone. The waitresses were nice enough. They were not by any means rude or uncompromising. I still couldn’t help but feel like I was doing things the wrong way or that I wasn’t understanding completely.
After sitting there for a bit a man of about 45 or so came in. The people behind the counter started singing happy birthday and brought out a flat chocolate cake with candles in it. The man was absolutely tickled. I watched and missed Enzo Pizza a lot. It reminded me of the regulars that would come in and bring us homemade cookies and cake and other sweet treats. It was like when someone who worked in another store at the mall had a birthday and they came down and we all signed a happy birthday card and gave them a free meal. ::sigh:: I miss Enzo Pizza and I think I always will. It was the best job I’ve ever had and I feel like I grew up there.
As I stared at them involuntarily, thinking all these longing thoughts about home and Enzo’s, the birthday man turned and addressed me in Italian. The waitress then addressed him in Italian informing him that I couldn’t speak Italian. So he spoke to me in English! He offered me cake. Now, mind that I’m the only person in the restaurant. He asked where I was from. Mentioned his love of Frank Zappa. Told me Bush was (indicating crazy with his index finger making circles around his temple) and that things will get better with Obama, because they can’t get worse. He laughed. He offered me more cake because I’d taken so little. He gets coffee there everyday and they knew it was his birthday and couldn’t wait to surprise him.
I love it when people have that kind of home. A place where they can go that’s not their house and the people aren’t blood relations but there’s still an unmistakable sense of belonging. I don’t belong there in that café/restaurant in Ferrara. I was a temporary on-looker. I was just one of the many minor characters that’s on stage for part of one scene, adds a bit of interest, allows the character of the main characters to be tested, and then exits stage left while the cast continues to encounter one entertaining situation after another.
After that lunch I tried to go to a museum that was closed. I had three hours until Rhi was done with classes so I went to the main Piazza in front of the cathedral. I basically sat there the whole time in the sun (until the shadows slowly rolled around) an I wrote and doodled and watched people and made up stories about their lives that included many of the places I’ve been in Europe as backdrops.
I really should remember to blog a little more regularly because it’s so hard to capture all the little things when I wait a week because so much happens in week. Less than a week. I’ve got two new bands to listen to. I’ve got a partly nice tan and a partly pink sunburn. I’ve learned some German. I’m in the midst of planning European Adventures ’09 starting Lydia Fischer, Lori Ludwig, and Sarah VanVlerah. I predict a lot of Greek beaches in the very near future.
Though I am a bit of an internet junky I was very proud to have spent a solid 3 days not on my laptop. I don’t think it’s so much the internet I’m addicted to. I sure it’s communication. It’s relationships that exist across time zones and molecules and miles and all kinds of spacey things. I don’t use my phone cuz it’s obscenely expensive, or I’m sure I’d always be on the phone. I think the only people I’ve called in the states are Sheena (on her 22nd birthday), my Grandma Jo (on her somethingith birthday) and Enzo Pizza (to see if they’d deliver to Liverpool).
Like I said over 1000 words ago, I’m going to Innsbruck again. This time to see Seb B’s mom. I just really really can’t wait to hug a mom. I have to say I miss my own quite a bit but I’m a big girl and I’m in Europe and I’ve been here for four months and I’ve got another three to go and I chose this and I’m happy with all of that. But. I still can’t wait to hug a mom. And drink some coffee with her.
I sometimes find so many things delightful it’s overwhelming. I see so many beautiful things and I have trouble breathing at a normal pace. I start to lose control of my arms and legs and my hands grab out for the sky and my feet pound the earth in disbelief. “Earth! Are you still here? Is this what you really look like and feel like? Earth! You’re so soft and green right here but over there you’re hard and grey.” How great thou art, my fingers seem to read when they touch the bark of trees and their leaves and the tiny pebbles from the water and the miniature snail shells hidden in the dirt. My shoulders draw towards the sun and beg for more vitamin E. And with a slightly puppyish energy I sniff and smell for flowers and grilling meat and the sea and the air way over here, so far from where I’m used to.
The third morning I was at Garda I woke up, put on my flip flops, started to dig around for bread and cheese and thought, “Have I really looked at the mountains yet?” I hadn’t and I owed them their due.
I’ve been writing basically the whole time I’ve been on this train. So since one. It’s now 3:45. My laptop’s got 34% battery left. I’m going to listen to Abbey Road and drift off for the next 45 minutes till I arrive in Innsbruck and get a good mom hug.
Oh! Wait! I have a house! A house in Indianapolis on Terrace just north of campus and I’ll be living with 3 of the 5 coolest girls in the world: Lydia Fischer, Lori Ludwig, and Lyndsay McBride. (Sheena being the 4th and me being the 5th. I’ll obviously be living there but Dear Sheensta will be moving to France in October to teach English, maybe for the rest of her life. Who knows with that whimsical young woman).
There were fears (and somewhat legitimate ones) that I may also leave the country and just never find my way back. Let me put those fears to rest for now. I’ll come home but there’s not guarantee I won’t be off again to a new place. Though I won’t be solo then.
May 5
Hello computer! Hello laptop! Hello internet! I’ve been away. I haven’t touched my own laptop with an American keyboard in 4 days or so. I’m not complaining. Because these past 4 days have been filled with wonder and excitement. Adventure and thrills. Views from the top and clean mountain air.
I’m writing this post on May 4, 2009. I’m currently in Ferrara, Italy with an old friend from Raquette Lake. She’s from Wales but she’s studying here for a year.
I left Amsterdam on Wednesday morning nice and early. It was about 13 hours of travel from Amsterdam to Innsbruck, Austria. I don’t mind long train rides at all. I looked out the window about the entire time. Holland is beautiful. Germany is lush. Switzerland is stunning. Austria is unbelievable. Northern Italy is simply unreal.
When I got to Austria my friend Niklas picked me up in his VW T3 camping van, which is pretty freaking cool. It’s white with all kinds of black and white stickers on it with black and white checkered hubcaps (which he pained himself) and we applied a strip of black and white checkered tape around the whole van as a border.
We first went to his mother’s house for a glass of wine and to see literally the best view of Innsbruck in the whole city (photos coming soon). He lives half way up a mountain and seriously it takes a very skilled driver to maneuver (or manoeuvre if you’re English) a giant van up the side of a mountain.
Unfortunately I’m going to make a long story short and just rave about the mountains. Holy cow. The mountains are unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Niklas assured me that Lake Garda would be “nothing like Lake Michigan.” It was nothing like Raquette Lake either. While Raquette Lake was in the mountains, the smooth rolling mountains are nothing like the Imposing Monstrous snow-capped beasts framing Lake Garda. I was in shock. Driving through the towns there were grape vines Everywhere.
I also had a plastic bag full of all my wet clothes with us. I’d done laundry at Niklas’ house the night before we left for Garda and we found out (during my attempts to do laundry) that the dryer was broken. So the first thing we had to do when we got to the campsite was to string up a clothesline for tee shirts and underwear. I hung socks in the trees. Jeans over the van doors. We quickly made the place “home.”
There was also a free ride biking race that weekend that two of Niklas’ friends were competing in. This is some seriously intense mountain biking. The bikes are equipped with triple hydraulics and all kinds of important fancy things to make mountain biking easier. Niklas couldn’t compete this year because he’d recently broken his right arm pretty severely so he has some righteous scars, some metal plates (like wolverine) and a mind to take it easy for another 4 or 5 months.
I’m writing this post on May 4, 2009. I’m currently in Ferrara, Italy with an old friend from Raquette Lake. She’s from Wales but she’s studying here for a year.
I left Amsterdam on Wednesday morning nice and early. It was about 13 hours of travel from Amsterdam to Innsbruck, Austria. I don’t mind long train rides at all. I looked out the window about the entire time. Holland is beautiful. Germany is lush. Switzerland is stunning. Austria is unbelievable. Northern Italy is simply unreal.
When I got to Austria my friend Niklas picked me up in his VW T3 camping van, which is pretty freaking cool. It’s white with all kinds of black and white stickers on it with black and white checkered hubcaps (which he pained himself) and we applied a strip of black and white checkered tape around the whole van as a border.
We first went to his mother’s house for a glass of wine and to see literally the best view of Innsbruck in the whole city (photos coming soon). He lives half way up a mountain and seriously it takes a very skilled driver to maneuver (or manoeuvre if you’re English) a giant van up the side of a mountain.
Unfortunately I’m going to make a long story short and just rave about the mountains. Holy cow. The mountains are unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Niklas assured me that Lake Garda would be “nothing like Lake Michigan.” It was nothing like Raquette Lake either. While Raquette Lake was in the mountains, the smooth rolling mountains are nothing like the Imposing Monstrous snow-capped beasts framing Lake Garda. I was in shock. Driving through the towns there were grape vines Everywhere.
I also had a plastic bag full of all my wet clothes with us. I’d done laundry at Niklas’ house the night before we left for Garda and we found out (during my attempts to do laundry) that the dryer was broken. So the first thing we had to do when we got to the campsite was to string up a clothesline for tee shirts and underwear. I hung socks in the trees. Jeans over the van doors. We quickly made the place “home.”
There was also a free ride biking race that weekend that two of Niklas’ friends were competing in. This is some seriously intense mountain biking. The bikes are equipped with triple hydraulics and all kinds of important fancy things to make mountain biking easier. Niklas couldn’t compete this year because he’d recently broken his right arm pretty severely so he has some righteous scars, some metal plates (like wolverine) and a mind to take it easy for another 4 or 5 months.
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