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.