Aran Islands

At the cliff outside Dun Aonghasa

Right now, I'm on Inishmore in the Aran Islands, off the west coast of Ireland. Originally, I was only planning to spend a night here before returning to happenin' Galway. I get the sense that this place could be pretty popular during the summer (if such a thing exists), but right now it's very quiet- perfect place to stop and relax and catch up with the world as well as catch up with myself.

On my first day, I had some good weather (light showers) and walked most of the island. The highlight was Dún Aonghasa, a fort built in the 2nd century BC. That's B.C.! Click the wikipedia link, they explain it better than I could.

                                    Panorama video from inside Dun Aonghasa

I also was blown away by all the stone walls. I haven't done any research but it seems like they were built both for herd rotation and to clear the rocky land for crops. A fellow traveller told me that there are something like 20,000 miles of stone walls on the island, which is remarkable because it is only 9 mile long and 2 miles wide.

I took a self-timed Giordann pose photo along one of the walls for all the sibies, Greeny in particular, roughly a year after the Barcelona trip. I'm not going to explain this photo for the rest of you bc it's not possible. I couldn't explain it to the Irishman tending to his herd on the other side of the wall either, so don't feel left out.

Yesterday, I barely left the hostel. It was raining, it was pouring, the old man was snoring, it was windy and I was lazy. Around sundown, everything calmed a bit an I decided I needed to earn that frozen pizza, so I took a short walk along the sea. If I learned anything from Vrango, it was that any island, no matter how small or how often the ferries run, has a football field. I was beginning to have my doubts about Inishmore because I had already found the school and there was no sign of a pitch (nice terminology, Sam!). But sure enough, along the beach, I found it, complete with rugby goalposts and probably something for hurling too, but I don't know what hurling is yet.

Today, I set out on a wander and came upon Teampall Chiarain, an 8th/9th century church. I found myself thinking about two people I care about greatly who are in poor health-my great grandmother Gackie and my uncle Freddy. It was an incredibly peaceful place and I found it a great place for a long stop and think, which I dedicated to them.

Eutin Tigers

I took a side trip to Eutin, Germany to meet Bob Alexander, coach of the Eutin Tigers, a premier youth club basketball team.

I'd grown frustrated by the lack of basketball I've seen thus far on the trip. I saw a few kids bouncing balls on the streets of Berlin, but they couldn't even string multiple dribbles together. Occasionally I'd see a court from a distance and hear the sounds of competition, but when I got closer, I always found street soccer.

So, the Eutin stop was refreshing first because I got to get in a gym on the first day of preseason for Swarthmore basketball 2011-2012 (Watch out Centennial!). I got some shots up in my running shoes, which felt great but also made me miss the game more because I wanted to get some live action, but knew that my glass ankles in lowtop NewBalances was a bad combination.

It was great to talk to Bob about basketball and travel. Basketball has taken him all over Europe and he has gotten to coach great kids in Germany and Croatia. Basketball has taken me many places as well-as a player, coach and fan-and I can't really imagine my life without it. Get that labor deal done, the only thing between the Knicks and a 'chip is this lockout!

Vrango

I woke up in Gothenburg with no plans. I had heard good things about the city's pub culture and the previous night confirmed them, but the city wasn't renowned for it's sights or daytime entertainment. A South African guy who'd been there awhile (because he lost his passport at the pubs) recommended the islands off Sweden's west coast, which were only a tram and a ferry away, so I headed out.

The port

I took thee ferry to the last stop, a small island called Vrango. I had no map, plan or any clue what this island was about and I was keen (talkin like an Aussie) to find out...as long as nothing resembled Lost.

The first thing that struck me was that there were more ice cream stands (5) than cars (0), although it looked like the stands were closed for the winter. Boats were the primary vehicle. To get around on land, locals walked, rode bikes or rode on the back of a friends bike. These people never needed cars, never wanted them and probably never will. Props to them.

As I walked along the "main" street I was surprised to see so many Swedish flags. These people were pretty self-sufficient, so I guess I expected a more independent attitude. Every house had a blue and gold flag waving proudly-some had two or three.

The water-as it was in the middle of Stockholm-was so clean, a perfect crystal blue, very inviting despite the whipping winds. In Stockholm, when the weather allows, you can jump right in off the docks in the middle of a metropolis of 2 million people. Try doing that in the Schuykill and you'll emerge with an extra leg and missing an ear.

After covering most of the perimeter of the island, I stopped to check the island map posted in the town center. They had little icons for the ferry, the helicopter and the fotbolsplan. I should have known there would be soccer out here. I followed the signs and stumbled upon the local mens soccer club playing a squad from one of the other islands.

It was an interesting lineup-some of the players were balding, some hadn't finished puberty, some were fat and some were tall and skinny. One of them, who I believe is Doug Yeates' Swedish cousin, was wearing fullbody Under Armor under his jersey. They weren't terribly skilled, but were having a blast playing in front of a small crowd of their neighbors and friends. They must have thought I was terribly lost.

Swedish Doug

Stockholm

Due to some time issues with trains in Germany (they do exist), I got to Sweden a day later than planned, but after a great night's rest in a Hamburg business hotel comped by the DB.

My first night, I sprang for a pricy bunk in a converted ship. The idea was cool and it was a pretty comfortable hostel, but the novelty of sleeping on a ship wore off very quick. So someone better like these pictures...

From my bunk

View from the ship at night

That first night, before I had given up on finding reasonably prices in Sweden, I wandered downtown looking for a place to eat. After an hour I hadn't found anything under 20 dollars and had resigned to starve. I did find a bar with 4 dollar beers and decided it was as close as I'd get. After ordering a beer, I noticed every Swede was glued to a projection screen of the Swedish national soccer team's Euro qualifying match against Netherlands, a World Cup finalist. The Swedes were underdogs, but needed the win to qualify and were the home side.

I found a spot near the tv between two locals, one in his 60s and one about my age. At first, they were skeptical about sharing their bar shelf with an American basketball player. By half-time I'd proven that I knew a little about the game and that I was rooting for Sweden and they warmed up to me.

Sweden came from behind to win 3-2. Much celebration and many cheers' ensued. After the game the older Swede walked me back to the pier because I hadn't found a free map yet and was rather disoriented from my failed food search.

He showed me the exact alley where the Swedish prime minister was assassinated in 1988(?).

The guy's name is unspellable unfortunately, but he did tell me it meant "peace lover" in Slovak, his native tongue. I asked what brought him to Sweden and he gave me his entire (but wholly intriguing) life story. In 1968, when he was 19, he went to Sweden by himself to visit a girl. While he was there, the USSR invaded Slovakia. He was sentenced to a year and a half in prison for traveling abroad, but never served time because he didn't go home. His grandfather served five years for not turning in all his savings from his fur factory to the communists. His father also served time for a small offense.

This man's story was especially interesting because I just from Berlin, where we heard stories about families separate for years by a Soviet wall. Also, in Prague, we went to the Museum of Communism which traced the history of the USSR's involvement in Czechoslovakia.

I moved to a slightly cheaper hostel for my final two Stockholm nights. It was still 35 dollars, but had free pasta you could cook for yourself. I did.

Mauer Park flea market

Acting on a tip from Rory, who's studying in Berlin, my mom and I went to the Mauer Park flea market on Sunday, our last day in the city.

I've been pretty proud of my pack job. Many of my fellow travellers have had bigger backpacks than mine, which has been a small source of pride. Whenever my teammate Ryan and I would travel or go home for break, we would compete to see who could pack lighter. I think I picked Ryan up from the airport last spring break and he had checked a bag, which a true light packer would never do. he hd some excuse, but it wasn't good enough to remember.

The last few days in Berlin were pretty gray and wet, however, and I began to rue my last minute decision to ditch my extra sweater on the way to the airport back in Burlington. With a week in Scandinavia on the horizon, I knew I needed another layer. The Vikings levy pretty serious taxes for their welfare state, so an impulse buy sweater would cost a pretty penny.

After scouring the grounds Mauer Park for a couple hours I was about to buy a screen printed sweatshirt from a Berlin local designer when I saw a huge Pelle Pelle sweater in one of the second hand alleys. I'm a sucker for random stuff like that-a second hand Pelle Pelle sweater in Berlin?-so I had to have it. At a price of four euros I couldn't even haggle. Also, if I decide I hate it, maybe I can probably sell it for 100 krona in Stockholm since everything's so expensive there. But by all accounts, the Swedish are very stylish, so who knows.

Pelle Pelle

I also snagged a watch and a shirt for my bro's birthday. Happy birthday Tom!

Content with my haul, we headed out the side of the market and noticed a crowd gathering around an outdoor stage. We followed and discovered Bearpit Karaoke, which was definitely an experience and a more uplifting way to end our trip than all the Holocaust and Berlin Wall history we had been absorbing.

Emceed by a funny Irish guy, the karaoke wasn't great, but it was entertaining and a very unique scene. There may have been 3,000 people in the crowd and another 500 within earshot playing awful basketball, juggling or just hanging in the park. I was expecting some impressive singers because I couldn't imagine going up in front of that audience unless I knew I was good. Or at least knew the words. I learned that other people are much more willing to fail or look like a fool in the name of good fun.

Some of the crowd for karaoke

The crowd favorite was probably an older German guy named Detlef (shouts to my Seattle crew) who sang a rousing German version of Praise the Lord. And gave a remarkable amount of bows afterwards. There were some flops, each met with the proper amount of sharp criticism from the host. Aside from Detlef, there were singers from Boston, Belarus, "Gay" Paris (his own emphasis) and a random guy in a king costume who seemed to have gotten lost on the drama club annual outing.

I had a lot of fun and have a lot of respect for them all going up in front of a large audience to do something they're not very good at. Kinda like Alex Rodriguez!

Wroclaw

We ended up in Wroclaw by geography alone. It was right smack in-between Krakow and Berlin and we didn't want to do ten hours straight on a train.

The university city really surprised us. The old town center was our favorite-over Prague and Krakow (Berlin's doesn't exist). We found an incredible restaurant right on the square named Lwowska. I had pork ribs and perogies. There's been some pretty stiff competition, but I can confidently state that it was the best meal of the trip- so far.

Halfway through our meal we heard a commotion on the far corner of the square. It got closer and closer and turned out to be a type of protest. There weren't too many people but they were plenty pissed about something. About what, we had idea, but we figured it must have been pretty controversial because they were followed by many police officers in riot gear. We forgot about it a couple minutes later because the perogies were so damn good. Maybe ten minutes later we heard commotion again, but it was noticeably louder, more coordinated and more peaceful. Judging by the rainbow colors and signs reading WrocLove, we guessed it was a gay pride rally. We then surmised that the previous group was the anti-gay rally.


After wandering the city for a few hours, we crossed back through the main square. As I reluctantly was checking the map, we heard the now familiar sound of Polish free speech. This group was bigger than the other two. Some of the group was rowdier than the previous groups and some were more peaceful. I should have been able to tell what they were protesting at that point, but it wasn't until I saw the mass of green clothes, dreads and Bob Marley flag.

Guess which rally

I'll leave you to make your own conclusions about the most important issues to young people in Poland.

Auschwitz-Birkenau

An hour and a half outside Krakow, the notorious Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration/extermination camps provide an uncomfortable reminder of the vicious crimes against humanity committed by the Nazis.

Entrance to Auschwitz: "Work will set you free

I'm not sure I'm capable of explaining my reaction to the camps (can anyone?) so I'll try to explain the lasting images that will stick in my head probably for the rest of my life. As depressing as the place is, I highly recommend seeing it. I don't think I'll ever go back.

In Auschwitz, they had several collections of things that were taken from prisoners, each more and more dehumanizing.

Books-take away their education, entertainment and concept of an outside world.

Eyeglasses-take away their sight.

Hairbrushes, toothbrushes, shoe polish brushes-take away their ability to control their appearance and basic sanitation.

Human hair- take away their personality. There was a display the width of a basketball court of human hair. In one hall, pictures of male prisoners lined the left wall and female prisoners lined the right. The inmates were almost indistinguishable by gender.

They also preserved the punishment barracks to show the different types of torture employed-suffocation, starvation, standing for days on end, arm breaking, more.

There was a wall between two Barracks that used to be used for firing squads before the gas chambers were developed. The Nazis found that the firing squad was too inefficient and personal. They wanted something of greater scale and with no human contact.

Our guide told us that the guards at the gas chambers often made the prisoners believe they were taking a shower. They would tell the prisoners to take off their clothes and remember where they left them, but they obviously never got to collect them.

The last and most chilling image that's etched into my memory are the fingernail scratches on the walls of the gas chamber.

Praha Hooliganism

During high school and college I grew into a bit of a soccer fan. I played the game growing up but gave it up before high school. At MMU and Swarthmore I loved going to games and cheering and jeering (always very respectfully). In Prague, I may have met my match.

I went to a game with Jordan, Pete, Jake and some other guys from their program.  I've been to rowdy pro matches before, most notably a match in Argentinawhere things were so heated that they locked the home fans in the stadium for a half hour so the visiting team could get out of the city safely. I still think the Prague game was rowdier because it was between the two top teams in the city, AC Sparta and SK Slavia Praha, and the crowd was pretty evenly split between the two sides.

As we circled the stadium looking for the ticket office, we noticed that we were most certainly in the outskirts of town and this was not the Swarmore-Haverford game. From the metro station we could hear the chants and although my check is awful I'm fairly certain that they weren't saying "safety school." There was a fairly impressive police presence, half in SWAT gear (again, not the SWAT gear that shows up to Swarthmore games) and half on horseback. In the process of finding the ticket office, we saw five fans forceably removed, each still screaming his allegiance while being carried out by ten officers.

Once we got inside the stadium and saw what the non-delinquent fans were doing, I got to wondering what the other fans could have done to get thrown out. We were a little late and were surprised to even get into the game, so we took whatever tickets they gave us, which ended up in Slavia Praha's section, which was the away team since the game was in Sparta's stadium. When we got to our section, we couldn't even get to our seats because everyone was standing and it seemed like fans from other sections came to our section because it was the rowdiest Slavia section. We went to the section directly below and were surprised to find the first ten rows from the field completely empty. We took a row and quickly realized that there was a stream of spit, beer, trash and potentially piss coming down from the second deck.

For the second half, we relocated to a sheltered section and were able to focus more on the game. We couldn't figure out who to root for or how openly to cheer. We were in a Slavia section, but were right next to the Sparta section. The language barrier also complicated things. Jordan, self-described as a "Swattie for life", was proudly wearing a Garnet Swarthmore hat until he was yelled at by a Slavia fan and we realized that Sparta had practically stolen our logo. Pschh...safety school...

All said, it was one of the few soccer games where I didn't constructively criticize refs or make comments relating to any player's family members. I am looking forward to going to a soccer football game where I can safely join in on the hooliganism.

Mini-toberfest

After the Alps, we were understandably pretty high on Salzburg. We all had plans to continue on to Munich for Oktoberfest and were expecting a nice quiet night to rest up for the worlds biggest party. Salzburg surprised us though. The little city didn't go down without a fight.

We went out to a great traditional Austrian restaurant and ate in the roof beer garden. Halfway through my first-and still my best- schnitzel, the city erupted with fireworks.

After dinner we walked down to the center of the old town to see what the commotion was about. We stumbled into Salzburg's version of Oktoberfest. It was obviously miniature and slightly tame in comparison to Munich's version, but no less the experience.

Since there was only one tent, every type of recalled was under one roof. Oktoberfest has its college age tent, its American tourist tent and its local tents. We arrived during the peak of the night- tables packed, festive singing and red-faced Austrians. We ordered the customary liter beers and were lucky enough to find some space at a table. On one side of us, there was a group of older couples who we enjoyed trying to talk to. The language barrier was a little strong but they loved it when we pretended to know the words to the songs and the women thought it was hilarious when I stood up on the bench and towered over them.

Nice Austrian bunny ears

On the other side of us, we had a group of three middle-aged guys who clearly had been at the tent since breakfast. The first spoke no English, which wasn't a problem because after introducing himself he promptly put his head on the table and passed out. The second spoke no English as well, which was a problem because he went back and forth between giving me elaborate handshakes- think the type of celebration handshake baseball players do in the dugout- and challenging me to box and arm wrestle through drunken sign language. The third guy DID speak English, which was a problem because of the things he was whispering to Dana.

Guy #2

When the music ended, after one last Prost, the older group left. We stuck around a little longer, but as the English speaking guy got creepier, we learned that at an Austrian party, you gotta go home when the music stops.

The next day, Brinton and Dana headed off for the big leagues, Oktoberfest. I scrapped my far-fetched plans of spending a half-day at the festival and catching a 5 am bus to Prague to meet my mom. Instead, I caught a train to Prague a day early.

Austrian Alps



Dana, me and Brinton-Untersberg, Austria

 Brinton, Dana and I woke up in Salzburg with no plans. Dana pushed pretty hard for the Sound of Music Tour, but luckily it ended up being a bit too expensive. We looked at some of the advertised options on the back of the free map from the tourist office and settled on taking a cable car up into a mountain in Unterberg, a neighboring town.

Like my mother and grandfather, I am sensibly cautious about heights. My sister and grandmother would each call this "scared of heights." I was a linguistics major for a semester, so I think I would know what it's called. This past summer, I took a cable car up Jay Peak in Vermont with my family, elevation 1176m, and did great (in comparison to my dog and my mother), so I was pretty sure I'd be all good.



Clouds caught on one side of the mountain



It wasn't until I was in the cable car that I really realized that these were the damn Austrian Alps and we were headed for a 1972m peak. About 5 minutes into the cable car ride, we reached what I thought was the end of the cable line. I would have been happy to get off there because it was plenty high and would probably get some cool pictures. I was also slightly concerned that we were in such thick clouds that we couldn't see the cable even 5 feet ahead of us. So much for nice views or sensibility.

Five minutes later a second peak appeared and I was pleased when the car started to slow down and we were able to get off.  On the Salzburg side, the views were very impressive and the skyline was still dominated by the Salzburg fortress miles away. On the opposite side, we couldn't see much because of the thick clouds.

After a quick hike to the highest point, we decided to hike down the opposite side to get to the famous ice caves. It was an impressive view once we got out of the clouds. By the time we got to the ice cave, we decided that if we took the 45 minute tour, we would have been cutting it really close to make the last cable car back down the mountian. As impressed as we were with the views and terrain, we were fairly certain that we didn't want to sleep in the Alps.

Patu Patu to Salzburg

On my first night in Vienna I met Steve and Claire who are road tripping around Europe in a van before moving to London. Like most of the people I've met in hostels, they were Australian. I can't decide whether this is because every young Aussie is in Europe right now or because Aussies are remarkably friendly. Probably both.

Along the way, they have picked up many hitchhikers and are used to having an extra body in their van every once in a while. By the end of the night, Steve had recruited four of us to come along on the drive to Salzburg, a smaller city along the German border, conveniently close to Munich's Oktoberfest but just far enough away to have reasonable accommodation prices.

In the morning as we left the hostel, I was struggling to picture the van. Steve described it as a converted Ford Transit that several groups of friends have driven are driven around Europe over the years. I asked Steve if the six of us were going to fit. He assured me that there would be no problem. While six passengers would be their personal record, the van who goes by Patu Patu Bang Bang (Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in Samoan) has seen more.

So we had Steve driving (on the right side!), Claire in the middle and fellow Aussie Brinton riding shotgun. The Americans, Dana, Ian and I, were in the back-sometimes on the floor, sometimes on the couch/fold out bed, sometimes sitting up, sometimes lying down, sometimes reading, sometimes gazing out at the Austrian countryside.



Aussies up front

 

Cargo/´Living quarters



Patu Patu was riding great with her(?) new Croatian diesel pump. The back window was a collage of stickers from auto repair shops around Europe- a testament both to her resilience and territory covered. I asked Steve how many kilometers she had racked up over the years, but he didn't know.  The odometer resets at 100,000km and someone along the line lost count of how many times it had started over.



With a Salzburg city bus and a SmartCar for comparison



Blog is alive

I'm not giving up, I promise! I've got some good stories to share/places to write about but I can't do them justice without the pictures I've been taking.  Since I last posted, I've visited Salzburg, Prague, Krakow and Wroclaw.  My mom met me in Prague and we have been travelling together for the last week.  Berlin is our next stop (and last for mom, who flies home in a week), but we hit a minor bump in the road this morning.

We got up at 6:15 this morning to catch the train to Dresden, a 4 hour trip. We got to Platform 4 right on time and got on the train. I remembered reading in my travel books that sometimes there are multiple trains at a platform. This was an important train and the Wroclaw station was undergoing major renovations and things were confusing and Polish, so I decided to double-check with the conductor. I stepped  off the train and asked in English if this train was going to Dresden. He gave me the International Facial Expression for "I don't speak English you damn American who assumes everyone speaks English," so I said "Dresda?" and pointed to the train. I have no idea if Dresda is how you say Dresden in Polish, but it felt right and I went for it. He said something in Polish that I didn't understand, so I gave him the thumbs-up sign and got back on the train.  I have generally used thumbs-up to mean, "I don't know what is going on but am going to pretend like it's all good. Please stop me if I'm doing something wrong," which I'm just assuming everyone understands. the conductor responded by pointing at the train and saying a few Polish words before returning to his phone. I interpreted this to mean "Of course, we'll take you wherever you want to go. If you say Dresda, then Dresda it is. Also, nice beard. You look wise and classy."

I may need to reevaluate my hand signals. That was the wrong train. Thirty minutes later and several miles in the wrong direction, the same conductor came by to check our tickets, stamped my ticket, looked at my mom's ticket and told us we were on the wrong train via translation from a Polish guy in our compartment who thought this all was hilarious. He's headed for the Russian border without a visa and I'm not exactly rooting for him. Seemed like a good guy though.

I'm chalking up this travel error to two things, both food related.  I neither ate breakfast this morning nor ate a kebab during my time in Wroclaw.  I've had one in every city I've stopped in, even Linz, Austria, where I had a 30 minute train layover.  I just ate breakfast and will likely correct the kebab mistake at the train station before we leave.  This unexpected extra time in Wroclaw gave me some time to upload pictures and I'll catch up on the blog from Berlin.

A Vienna Flyby

I was pretty excited to take the Danube ferry from Bratislava to Vienna. In retrospect I don't know why I got so hyped for a mode of transportation that was a half hour longer and five euros more expensive than th train. It rained the whole time and this stretch of the Danube isn't the most picturesque in Europe, even if it is one of the most integral. The Danube flows through ten countries and has another eight in it's drainage basin. The river's historical importance was evident in the industrial factories and warehouses along its shores. In Budapest I could practically see the riverside markets and traders unloading foreign goods a century or so ago before trains took over. All said, however, I think I may have appreciated the river more from a highspeed train.

I don't feel qualified to comment on Vienna as a city. I didn't give it a fair chance-staying less than 24 hours in a world-class capital city. The old town had several museums and incredible buildings, but I didn't explore any beyond a fleeting snap of my camera. I got the feeling that there's a ton to see and do in Vienna if you're there for a week, but if you're only there for a night or two, you don't know where to start.

...so I skipped town in a converted Ford transit with three Aussies in the front seat and three Americans as cargo. It was the type of plan that could only be hatched after the right mix of Pilsner Urquell and VB .

Making million dollar blogs on my iPod

Rick Ross famously bragged that he is "making million dollar deals on his iPhone. I don't believe him for a second but it is pretty wild what these little rectangular Apples can do. I've been using my iPod touch to communicate with people back home, link up with people I meet over here and now blog. There is wifi in all the hostels and train stations over here, so even though I deleted all the music from my iPod I've been using it all the time. Time will tell whether I can survive going cold turkey on Frank Ocean, J Cole and The Weeknd.

Bratislava was initially underwhelming due to grey, rainy weather and unrealistic expectations set by an incredible weekend in Budapest. The Slovenian capital turned out to be a pretty cool little city though. Very relaxed and lots of places to sit and read.

On the second night I walked downtown from my hostel and got caught in a pretty tough rainstorm. I ducked into the nearest bar to dry off and wait out the downpour. There were a dozen or so middle aged Slovak men watching a soccer game and they wanted nothing to do with me. I can't really blame them-I was wet, foreign and speaking English.

Back at the hostel, just as I was about to chalk Bratislava up as a loss I met a group of young Bratislavans celebrating their friend's birthday in the basement reggae bar. I don't know how they got into reggae but they were hardcore about it and it was soon clear that the hostel bar was a reggae bar because this crew took it over as their regular hangout and made it that way. They were very interested in the US, California in particular. One of them even had a homemade Tupac leather jacket.

In Budapest I started to think I was pretty good at foosball, Eastern Europe's bar game of choice, because I beat Jordan in a 3 game series. I stepped up to the table against two Slovakians and got destroyed. Stepovers, pass fakes, intentional back passes. I'm only playing Americans from now on.

Budapest

I'm writing from the basement basement bar of a hostel in Bratislava.  They decided that it would be cool to go with a theme based off of Quentin Tarrantino's Hostel. Bloody bathtub, fake dead body. Home sweet home.

I arrived yesterday by train and bid adieu to Jordan and Becky after a weekend in Budapest, Hungary. Budapest was incredible and a city I could have spent a week or five in.  In three nights, however, I feel like I got a pretty good slice of the city, which is probably why I feel so tired and worry that I might be searching in vain for a relaxing night in this Tarrantino loving hostel.

Other than three close calls involving money and valuables, I loved my time in Budapest.  When I got to Budapest on Thursday, I was rejected by all the ATMs and all the check cashing places declined both of my credit cards and had already spent my first emergency cash stash on pizza at the Amsterdam airport. I had a second emergency stash of 30 British Pounds that my grandmother Bebe sent me, which I wasn't planning to use until I got to England, but quickly exchanged for 7000 Hungarian forint. Sounds like a nice exchange rate, but kebabs are 700 forint. So I had gone through two emergency cash stashes before even entering the Budapest city limits.

I've got this black journal that sort of doubles as a folder. I feel very important and grown up carrying this thing around, but have twice proven that I'm not mature enough for a black book/folder. Before I even left Vermont, I lost the damn thing on the way to the airport. Dad/Chuck saved me that time for my free pass.  Then today, o the way to make a train reservation, I stopped at an ATM to withdraw some cash (my card's batting around .500 at ATMs now) with my non-refundable train pass in my cool black book and set it down on top of the ATM next to a half-empty cup of beer someone left from last nights street festival and kept right on going down the street.  About 6 blocks later I remembered the book, turned on a dime and sprinted back to the bank, jaywalking/running all over the place (which is definitely a faux-pass in Hungary). It was still there and so was the old beer.

My nervousness from these bouts of stupidity and poor luck were calmed by Budapest, the friendly fellow travelers in my hostel and my central European-savvy friends from Prague, Jordan and Becky.

As soon as I got to my hostel, I sat down at a table with a bunch of Canadian, Australian and British backpackers. I was visibly frayed (their words, not mine) and they assured me that their debit cards were all working and convinced me to come to dinner with them. I was running on fumes from an overnight flight where I didn't sleep, but decided to avoid jetlag completely by hitting the streets of Pest, the section of the city to the east of the Danube River.

After some Hungarian goulash and a chicken sandwich (one step at a time with adventurous eating), we headed to what is known as the Ruin Pubs. Great atmosphere, great city, great crew. Every time I started to doze off and felt like heading back, I was convinced/pressured to plod on. It was an easy sell because I had no clue where I was and was having a great time when I was able to keep my eyes open. One of the bars we went to, Szimpla, is an instant classic. It had a great vibe and a very pub-nite feel. I took Becky and Jordan back the next night.

On Friday, I wandered around with some hostel-mates and broke in my new travel shoes, the New Balance 373s (sponsorship pending).  Becky and Jordan arrived from Prague in the afternoon and with the help of Google, I was able to call their phone from the hostel computer and we met up for a great Hungarian dinner at Vorosmarty Ter, a main square in Pest close to the river.  After dinner, we walked across the bridge to Buda's Castle Hill for some views of Budapest's nighttime skyline.

On Saturday, we went to the Turkish bath, Széchenyi, on the outskirts of the city. Very impressive architecture and a relaxing experience that was necessary to combat the lingering effects of a cramped overnight flight.

After the spa, we stumbled into the Hungarian National Gallop, held at Hero's Square. The Gallop was a huge annual horseracing event where towns across Hungary send a representative to compete for national honors. Great greasy fair food. I can still taste the garlic potato pancakes.

We continued our local experience by heading to Budapest's summer party hotspot, Margaret Island, for the season-ending party. The club we went to was incredible. I would try to compare it to something I've seen before but there's no way I could ever get into a place like it in the US. (Especially not unshaven and wearing my New Balances and shorts. Hopefully pictures will do it justice, but they still served $4 beers. We were very surprised to be the only non-Europeans and didn't hear anyone speak English the entire night.

Pictures to come. I didn't take many and am going to steal Becky's and claim them as my own.

Sam

Gametime

Tomorrow: Burlington-->JFK-->Amsterdam-->Budapest

This summer, I've read a couple hundred pages of my two massive guidebooks. I've also thumbed through another couple dozen at the Burlington Borders that I didn't buy (and they wonder why they're going out of business...). All of my friends who have studied abroad have endured my long-winded emails full of questions. Thanks for all the suggestions. I'll certainly heed many but reserve the right to make my own mistakes and learn some lessons the hard way.

I fly into Budapest and fly home from London 70 days later. I've come up with a general direction of central Europe-->north to Scandinavia-->southeast towards Paris-->ferry to Ireland-->UK. I don't intend to overplan and will likely freelance much of the trip. I've got the Eurail Global Pass so I have some freedom to make last-minute decisions. One possible itinerary I've worked out on Google Maps: LINK

I first blogged two summers ago when I drove cross-country with Matt, Matt and Danny. At first I thought it would just be a way to pass the time in the passenger seat and to send out signs of life to our parents over the internet, but found that chronicling my experiences for an audience (however small) was fun and occasionally caused me to think critically about the places we drove through. Two years removed, it's now fun to read through as a digital souvenir of the trip. If you're bored: http://brodtripthemovie.blogspot.com/

As you can see, the blog fell off around Las Vegas. This was not because what happened in Vegas stayed in Vegas, but because we were so tired from 10 days of driving that we crashed at midnight and were too ashamed to keep blogging. Hopefully that doesn't happen this time.

I've spent a couple days trying to come up with a blog title. This was the best I could do. For all the time I've spent reading travel books and looking at my friends' pictures of their abroad adventures, all I can really think of are the 3 euro kebabs I ate daily in Barcelona last fall break. Cheap, filling and available super-late: truly fine European cuisine. I'm sure in a couple weeks I'll be a little sick of street food and may hate this title, but I'll take that risk.

Gotta pack.

Sam