We're on the plane. We got dinner menus, the first flight I've ever been on with those. Turbulence…Andy and I were just trying to play canasta. Bad idea, the tray tables are just too small. I think we'll try rummy after dinner. We're getting ready to land in London now. We never played rummy. I'm taking the disposable toothbrush. Neither of us got to sleep. I got more than Andy, but we didn't get enough to count. I'm not tired though. Contrary to everything we've heard, it's sunny, 9°C. Everything looks green from the air, and the land isn't so geometrically sectioned off as in California.
3:50 London Time. We have this 5 hour layover here. We're about halfway through the layover. We had a light lunch at Garfunkel's (a restaurant here at the airport), and we couldn't leave a tip. We had no pounds, and they couldn't put the tip on the credit card. Doh. We apologized to the waitress. The other near-disaster that's happened here so far is that Andy lost his passport. He had dropped it by some chairs where we were sitting. Actually it fell out of his pocket. There's so much shopping here it's like a mall.
The weather turned gross outside now. Dark and foggy. Andy bought cigars at a duty-free shoe (Cubans!), and they stamped his boarding pass from the duty-free store.
We tried to go to the Vatican, but it was closed. The Colosseum is pretty far so I don't know that we'll get there. After our flight last night, we had an amusing time getting to our hotel. We ended up hopping a train (the one we really needed had stopped running for the night), and had to get a taxi from the main train station. I broke off part of the first taxi we were going to take, when the taxi-driver started shoving our stuff in. Some other guy took us, and it was ~20,000 lira. We saw one of the conductors arrest some pickpockets, and they were just little kids. There was a big commotion and he literally threw them out of the platform area. He was shouting "Pickpockets" (or something, it was in Italian) to warn everyone.
So far we can really spot all the Americans, although I don't know that we look it too much, because people keep walking up to us and speaking in Italian. We might try and see an opera tonight, tickets are as cheap as ~16.000 lira or a little less than $10, and everyone is supposed to go to see the opera here.
There are tons of street vendors, and a bunch of them have these weird dancing Mickey & Minnie Mouse dolls. We haven't been able to get a-hold of Simone yet, and I couldn't get the phone to dial Lisa right. Bah. We're at the Castel Sant'Angelo now, and I think we're going to go in. We ate a couple of hours ago at this little pizzeria, and the assistant to the guy behind the counter was all excited because we were Americans. He brought out one of the other helper guys from in back to see me. It was funny! I guess not many of the Americans go to that place.
I'm sitting on a bench on the side of a walkway outside of the Castel, and it's the first calm quiet place I've been in Rome. Everything is loud and overwhelming here. We need to find Simone. There are tons of pigeons here too. Oh yeah. The weather is sunny and breezy not too cold at all unless you're sitting in the shade where nothing blocks the wind. I'd say it's ~62°F today or so.
5:10 p.m. We just got our room for the night, it's a penzione called "Hotel Katty." The lady who runs it is named Lucy. This place cost 50.000 lira for the night, or about $30, which is as cheap as we're going to find, I think. I'm going to take a picture of our room. It has a pretty cool tile floor. There is no TV in here, and the bathroom is across the hall, but this is super cool...very European. I hope we can stay here tomorrow too. It's the right price, and it's about 2 blocks from the main termini. It's amazing, last night we were so frustrated, and were wanting to give up, but today was much better, and we're already way more accustomed to Rome. We've pretty much figured out the metro, and when we go back to the Vatican tomorrow we'll know how to get there. I think we'll go back to the termini in a few minutes and get our stuff from the lockers. I'm liking Rome a whole lot more now, even though my feet hurt, and my back is tired. Dad would love it here, there are a ton of monuments all within a quick monument pace of each other. Andy likes to monument pace. We're really going to get our luggage now, and then dinner. I called Simone and his phone was busy all day, which explains the problems I'd been having calling. Yee haw!
8:00 p.m. We just got back from dinner. We got the "menu turista," guess they knew we weren't real Italians. The tiramisu was a little different, but the 1L of wine for 8000 lira was way better than what we'd get in the States. Simone is coming to pick us up at 9:30, so we have until then to rest. He's going to take us out, and he has a car so whoo hoo! That will rule. Another thing, our room key at the penzione is like an old castle key. I'll try to get some postcards tomorrow and write everyone. We just used the foot spray. Andy said, and I agree, it's the best thing I brought. I've been so happy to spray my feet after walking all day, I can't even express it.
We went to the Sistene Chapel and Vatican earlier today. The line stretched out and around the block by it, but moved very quickly. We spent a couple of hours there. The Sistene Chapel was incredible. One of the guards had to keep hushing people and it was very crowded inside the chapel itself. I really liked the map room at the Vatican too. I'm going to try and find postcards of some of the old maps. After we left the Vatican we walked around and bought some bread, cheese and water at a store where they didn't know any English at all. We are improving!! We got enough cheese for two and some hollow rolls. I'm eating one of the rolls right now.
Last night we finally met up with Simone and he took us to many of the sights. I forgot my camera at the penzione, and wish I hadn't. I want to get postcards of all the stuff we saw yesterday. He took us to the colosseum and Pantheon, and to a whole bunch of other places. We went to the Fontana di Trevi and threw in a coin, and as legend has it if you do, you'll come back to Rome one day. Simone brought his friend Fabio last night too, although he didn't speak much since he didn't really know much English, and our Italian is pretty paltry. Last night we went to a festival in the Piazza Navona. Simone said it is usually empty there, but last night it was filled with games, booths, and even a carousel. They still have all the Christmas stuff up here, and the witch who comes and delivers candy and gifts doesn't come for two more weeks. The witch is sort of like our Santa Claus.
Tonight we're going to meet Simone and he's going to take us to a pub after we all have dinner. It's 4:30 now, and we're going to meet at 8. We have a new room in the Katty night-it has a bathroom, but the shower isn't warm. It wasn't for me this morning either. It think Andy wants to go now, so I'll quit writing. I kind of want to find postcards and a coffee shop and just sit and write.
Andy has been having problems contacting Mike. I tell you, the phones over here are confusing! I'm up from my nap, so time to go, my feet have partially recovered.
P.S. Our new room has a marble floor
Almost 1 a.m…just got back. Simone brought another friend Giuliano tonight, and he was also very nice. We've all promised to keep in touch. Simi and I by e-mail and since neither Fabio or Giuliano e-mail, we're going to write. Fabio wants to practice his English by writing us. We are going to Florence in the morning. We saw a bunch more sights tonight, the Piazza Barberini (Bolonese or something), and they took us to see the hookers. The hookers cost ~50.000 which is a pretty good bargain compared to the U.S. Haha! I think we got to see a side of Rome not many tourists get to see.
We went out to dinner at Cartoon Pizza; which, believe it or not is not an American joint. There was no munu turistica, and I had a pepperoni pizza, and the best appetizers ever!!! We had the bread with tomatoes or olives, artichokes, and one slice had proscuitto and some green vegetably thing. There was also this appetizer that's name escapes me, but it started with an 's.' Something like scucci. Anyway, it was crispy breaded outside with soft rice, mozerrella and pomodoro inside and almost a hint of nutmeg flavor. They were sooooo good! They looked like long hushpuppies.
After a night of sleep, I remember they are called supplí.
7:25 p.m. Got up this morning and went to the termini. I finally bought some postcards, and have only written one (to mom and dad) so far. I wrote a little on the way to Florence (Fiorenze), but then stopped. The train ride was nice. I expected the trip to be longer, but it was only 1.5-2 hrs (maybe less, it really seemed short). We're waiting in the station now for the train to Munich. Hopefully I'll be able to sleep, all the cuccette were full, so we'll have sitting seats. The train ride to Munich leaves at 9:30 and it's about 9 hours long.
As for our day in Florence, all I can say is I wish we had more time. We went to the Uffizi Musei today, and saw some DaVincis and some Botacellis. We saw a ton of other Renaissance art too, but we didn't have time to go and see the David. Apparently the line to see him is very long. The line for the Uffizi was very long. It cost L12.000. I'd say we waited about 45 min-1hr in line, and then got in (about 1.5 hours before closing). The museum itself was crowded, but everything here in Florence is less crowded than Rome. Another good thing about Florence is that it is much slower paced and less crowded…that was a good change.
I'm really tired of monument pacing, and I'd kill for a spa and footrub, but I'm settling for Advil at the moment. I saw two women today at the Uffizi that we saw the first time we went to the Vatican. Wee talked to them a bit, I think they had been speaking Spanish.
I haven't really gotten any souvenirs yet, but I bought postcards so hopefully people will be happy with those. Eating is pretty expensive most places. When we were on the street earlier today, a man tried to warn us about some pickpockets, and I totally didn't understand him until after the fact. It was something like…"Oh! Carteristas!" The pickpockets aren't supposed to be as bad here as they are in Rome. I also had some gelato today that was L10.000 which is super-expensive, but it was because I ate it there. I think it would have been L3.000 if I'd have taken it to go. Doh! Guess I won't be a "stupid American" anymore. That was the last of my lira though, so now I don't have to worry about changing money.
Here are some of my impressions of Italy, well observations:
So far the whole story I've heard about the italian men following you, etc. is not true at all. Maybe I just look rude, or maybe it's the lack of cleanliness I've been exhibiting.
Last night we also found another cultural similarity...riding in the back seat middle is called "riding bitch" in the US, and something similar in Italy. Simi and the rest thought that was so funny, and we all laughed for a few minutes.
We had a not-so-fun train ride to Munich (Munchen). The trip was about 8 hours, and we couldn't get a cuccette. We arrived in Munich at about 6:30 a.m. It was the coldest it's been so far, although since it was 6:30 it hadn't really warmed up yet. It was sunny and not windy at all yesterday. Mike showed us around the old Olympic park, and we wanted to climb this tower thingy, but it was closed. We then caught the Ubon to Marienplatz where we saw this gigantic glockenspeil (which did cool stuff on the hour even though my neck hurt after awhile). We ate at some Bavarian restaurant and I had sausage and sauerkraut with my beer.
After eating, we walked around some more and saw quite a few more sights. We went into a cool-looking church where there is a footprint in the floor, where a devil supposedly stepped years ago. After that we climbed and climbed and climbed millions and millions of stairs, and went up this huge tower. From the tower we could see many places around the city.
The train is about to arrive in Amsterdam now, so I'll stop and write more later.
The continuation of our adventures in Munich...
The tower was really cool, but it was really crowded in the outside walkway and the stairs made my ankles hurt like crazy. We were so tired after the tower that we hopped the UBon to somewhere where there was a big statue and huge lion statues. It was quite a monument. There are tons of churches in Munich, and every hour the bells chime. I thought it was pretty cool, but Mike said it got really annoying.
We went out to dinner at another traditional Bavarian restaurant, and I had more sausage and sauerkraut...and beer of course. In most restaurants in Germany they have a basket of pretzels on the table, and some places charge you if you eat them, while others don't. Another thing...in Germany they always go over your bill with you, and you hand your money and tip to the server right then. It's considered rude to leave your money on the table. Thus concludes the Munich segment.
We got a coachette for the Amsterdam trip. It cost aobut 32 marks apiece. It was so nice having somehwere to lie down and sleep, although it was 6 people to the room. We were hoping it would be only us, but then 2 Germans came. That would have been fine, but this freaky guy who walked by ended up getting in our cabin. He just stared at me. It was quite disconcerting. I did not like him at all. He was really creepy. He satred at the other girl in the coachette too. I'm glad Andy and Mike were there, because he was so creepy. CrEEpy.
We made our beds up, and Mike and I decided to get a beer. The conductor guy of our car was in charge of the food, and we got a couple of beers for cheap. It was really hot in our cabin so we were hanging out in the hall being silly when we met these two Austrian guys in a cuchette right down from us. We ended up hanging out with them, and talking with them for awhile. They both spoke good English (better than my atrocious grammar anyway), so we all understood each-other. Their names were Andy and Stephan. We'd all been hanging out awhile when some guy came out of his cabin yelling and told us to be quite, he had to be up at 6. Andy and I couldn't really tell what he was saying though. The next morning we (Andy, Mike, and I) were up before everyone in our cabin, and we hung out and talked with Andy and Stephan some more. When everyone in our cabin woke up (and crEEpy staring guy left)we got breakfast. I had some pate that tasted like liverwurst, and that everyone was calling catfood, on a roll. It wasn't really that bad though.
After that we arrived in Amsterdam. Right when we got off the train, some girl came up to us about staying at the hotel/hostelly thing where she works. We decided to do it. It cost us ƒ35 each and we had a shower and sink in our room. Apparently the shower even had hot water.
We got to the hotel though, and had to go up the narrowest staircase I'd ever been on. It was also very steep, and was kind of scary with my suitcase.
We walked into the lobby and there was a ton of marijuana smoke. Such is Amsterdam. We hung out in the lobby/living room of this place (called "My Hotel") for awhile, until our room was ready. They have cats everywhere here. There was one at the hotel, one in the restaurant where we had dinner, and I saw them in lots of shops.
Anyway, after that we walked around and got some lunch. From the window of the restaurant where we had lunch, you could see a sign for a Chicos Tacos. I took a picture of it. After that we walked and looked at stuff and then went to the Sex Museum. It scared me.
We thought we should pay for our room, so we went back to pay for it, but nobody was there; so we ended up paying them this morning. It was funny, but nobody really seemed to care.
We found a bar and had some beer after the big blow out of trying to pay. Then we ate dinner, got lost and walked around the Red Light district. I'm compressing everything now, because I've been writing forever!
We walked around Red Light for a few hours, got some beer and saw some hookers. It's weird to see them in real life. Anyway we stopped at a bar where we could see the hookers, and ended up seeing Stephan and Andy walk by.
We left awhile after they passed (Mike tried to catch them, but didn't see them). Then we saw them at a bar; so we stopped and hung out with them for the rest of the night. It was starting to rain and get cold, but we all decided to leave the bar anyway. There was a scary chick on cocaine who was dancing like she wanted to be a hooker. We had to get away from her. We asked the boys if they wanted to see a sex show (after all, that's what you do in Amsterdam, right?). We went to one. That scared me too. There was a fat lady in it who was scary, and we all kept warning eachother not to make eye-contact.
After the show, we ended up splitting up. We all went home for the night. Mike might meet up with them tonight, since Andy and I are going to a work-dinner of his.
Today was similar to yesterday, we got our new hotel. The first super real shower in ages. I'm clean and warm now. The hotel is super fancy. We took a bus downtown and walked, ate, and looked around. We went to a club like Hooters called Babes & Teasers. I felt like such a winner there. We made our way back home, and Andy is watching Jerry Springer with Dutch subtitles. We're concerned for the future of American television. Anyway it's time to go. More tomorrow.
On the train to Brussels
Here's the list of stuff I forgot to write yesterday.
Last night (and yesterday)
Andy went to meetings all day yesterday, so Mike and I hung out. We went to the tattoo museum, which though small was quite cool. From there we went to this Hemp Education Center (the Hemp Museum was too expensive), and they had this peephole at the bottom of the stairs where you could see this huge pot farm. Inside they had all the standard informational stuff, and some different kinds of seeds. For ƒ10 more you could go down into the farm and take pictures. I'm pretty tired of all the drugs and sex now though. Amsterdam has tons of both. There's pretty hard-core porn in store-windows and it's really weird. We got tired of the Red Light pretty fast.
Yesterday was so cold!! Mike and I would walk awhile trying to find something, and then stop for a beer. That seemed the best way to get out of the cold. It was fun seeing so many different bars in Amsterdam. You can't go to the coffee shops there, because none are real coffee shops, they're all hash bars.
We kind of wanted to go to the Van Gough museum museum, but it was pretty far out of town, and neither of us was in an arty mood. We wanted to tour the Heinekin brewery and were supposed to meet the Amsterdam guys there, but the brewery was closed, and they never showed. Mike and I waited in teh cold for too long (about 20 minutes), and then went into town.
Anyway (this all seem to be out of order), we hit a lot of bars, and this church that had a Spain exhibit. The church was beautiful, but the price was too high for the exhibit. We ate in the museum coffeeshop right before that.
After this we kept souvenir shopping and wound up at a fake Hard Rock called Rock Planet. It was the coolest place, and some buy there bought us a beer. He was from Boston. Right when we finished, we had to get back to the hotel, so I could go to the dinner thing.
The dinner was nice, adn we kept Mike in the room and kept smuggling him food and drinks. We've all been in a state of dehydration on this trip. No restaurant serves normal-sized drinks. I'd kill for a super-tanker pepsi. Instead I get a 6oz non-refillable drink for ƒ3.00 Fie! Fie on them!!
After the dinner we went up to our room and I had some freaky rash on my fadce. Andy and Mike messed around with cards, and crushed a box of them.
There was a caricature guy at the dinner, and Andy and I wanted him to draw us, but since I was having a rash attack, he didn't. Well, we didn't go back down there. Then I went to sleep.
Today we slept in a little and met Mike about an hour late. The company gave us fleeces and a golf umbrella. I like Andy's company. They give presents and nice hotel rooms in foreign countries (not to mention this trip).
After meeting Mike, we went to Anne Frank's house and were freezing cold all day. It was clear out, but the puddles kept freezing. We ate at a Mexican restaurant, and now we're on the train to Brussels where we'll transfer to Luxembourg. That's about all the significant stuff for today, although we got the giggles at Anne Frank's house when we saw on eof the diaries in the gift shope was written in "Fries." What kind of language is that?
Andy wants to find a postcard with photos from death camps and sent it "Lovin' Germany, Wish you were here." It's horrible, but we were laughing hysterically.
The Dutch language was really cool. It was like English, only you need to cut out the extra vowels. There were some parts like German too, but the best part was that everyone spoke English.
On the train from Luxembourg to Brussels
We spent the day in Luxembourg. It's really cold here. "I'm so cold and I want to go to sleep." That is mine and Andy's motto here. Lux wasn't too exciting. We got in about midnight last night, and stayed at this cool hotel for about 1800F or less than $60. Everything else here cost that much. Lunch and Andy's chocolates.
Andy thought the ATM ate his card last night, and he went on like a broken record about how he couldn't believe the thing ate his card. He found it this morning in his wallet.
We got free breakfast with the largest amount of beverages I've seen to date in Europe.
We walked around today a bunch, and some some of the Luxemborgian sights. Did I mention it's really cold? We bought a beer at a bar for 55F a piece. That's super cheap. Cheaper than coffee. That's all. We're off to London, and we're taking the Chunnel.
Oh, the forts and buildings carved into rocks were really cool. I also forgot my umbrella at the hotel, and some crEEpy guy with a stitched up ear tried to rip us off at the lockers. He had a couple of black eyes like he'd been beaten up doing it before.
We took the Chunnel from Brussels to London-Waterloo. It was really cool, becasue we were in the first compartment and nobody else was in it. We like the fact that everyone here speaks English, although it's kind of hard to understand them. When we arrived in London, the customs people completely ravaged our stuff. I think it's because we were in Amsterdam.
We're staying in a tiny room at a hostel, which is still expensive compared to everywhere else we've been. It costs £17 a night apiece. London is just expensive though.
We went ot the Tower of London, London Bridge, and the Tower Bridge yesterday. It was cold and rainy. The rain finally stopped when we were leaving the Tower of London. We had really good lunch at an Irish pub. I had Irish lamb stew, and it was expecially good in the bad weather. The beer doesn't have any carbonation here.
"Mind the Gap."
"Mind the Step."
Two expressions I've become quite familiar with while on the Underground. The train system here is great. I wish we had something at home like it.
Andy and I bid a tearful goodbye to Mike yesterday, as he insisted on leaving us. We shuffled around like lost hobos for awhile, but having a full meal of tasty Indian food in our stomachs from when we were with Mike made us strong enough to go on. We looked at the pamphlets upstairs for something to do, and found a rather interesting one titled "Jack the Ripper" walk. We promptly went to the train station as it was near the 6:45 meeting time for the walk. The leader was an interesting-looking Sherlock Holmeslike character. We got our stickers (so we wouldn't lose our group), and went inside the station to wait.
It was there we met the three other fellow Americans and only other persons interested in this walk. The wals was promptly cancelled for lack of interest, and we were pawned off to another company. Same price (£3.50) though. They started 30 minutes later, so we warmed our insides at a nearby pub.
The other members in our American party included Jen (from NY), and two girls from Indiana. Jen, Andy and I ended up partaking in the replacement walke while the other two opted to try the next night with the original group.