What an adventure Europe has been thus far. I finished up my classes, and came out on pretty well grade- wise. We saw a few more shows, including War Horse for the second time with dad, which was my favorite of the whole trip, and another interesting mixture of Greek plays called Welcome to Thebes.
Dad came out on the 27th, and I got to show him all of my favorite places of London, which was really fun. The first day we had together we went to the Duxford Airfield just outside of Cambridge. We took a train, and then a bus. The train was nice, but when we got on the bus what should have been a 20 minute ride turned out to be 2 hours because of congested one way streets due to construction within the city. We finally got there and got in to the museum for free since Dad’s a member (which was a nice surprise). It’s been nice having my own personal tour guide around… he knows everything about every plane that they have at the airfield, and didn’t hesitate to call them out before we even had a chance to look at the description. There were some pretty awesome planes there, and it was fun walking around and looking through the history of aviation in Duxford. We went to the American museum area, where we found a memorial tribute to Grandpa Roy among the archives. It was really neat to see something in honor of his life, and I know it meant a lot to dad, so it was cool to see.
On the bus back we were sitting near a Korean couple that were also on our 2 hour bus trip out to the airfield. We started talking to them, and they were some of the most interesting people we had ever met. The woman did her undergrad at The University of Redlands, so we talked about California for a bit, and she is now studying international studies at Cambridge. She turns in her dissertation on making peace between North and South Korea in 2 weeks! The man works for the South Korean Navy as a strategic studies instructor at the Korean Naval Academy. He is an Oxford grad, and is getting his doctoral in strategic studies from Cambridge as well- talk about an intelligent pair! We talked about politics and about the tension surrounding the area where they live. It was amazing listening to what they had to say about North Korea. The woman wants to be an ambassador some day. We could have talked to them for hours, but unfortunately we had to leave to catch our train.
The next day we went around to all the major landmarks in London; including Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Tower Bridge, Saint Paul’s Cathedral, and my favorite Hyde Park. It was fun, but we crammed a lot into one day, and we were really tired. I took dad to see War Horse because it was the best show that we saw in London. I had told him all about it, and it was really fun to see it for the second time and to be able to talk about it with him. By the time we got back at 10:30, I still hadn’t packed, and we were leaving the next morning at 5:30!
Needless to say I was up almost all night getting all my things together so we could leave the next morning. We made it without hassle to Paris and found our tiny little hotel room after navigating the French metro. We took a nap and after that we went and saw the Arc de Triumph and later in the evening the Eiffel Tower, where we had crepes. We met some other interesting people, like an American from Washington State that worked in a souvenir shop near the Eiffel Tower, and a man at our hotel who is a “pre- college” physics and math teacher working the hotel as a second job. But the most interesting person we met was a man named Kazim who worked at the Turkish restaurant next to our hotel. His English was nearly perfect and we talked about how he lived in Iraq for a while as a translator, and was imprisoned by his own Curdish people because they thought he was a spy. He spoke English, Arabic, French, German, and Curdish fluently, he has lived all over the world. He wants to make a documentary and write a book about his time in Iraq… he has had quite an interesting life.
The next day was on the verge of disastrous. We rented a car in Paris so we could drive to Normandy and see some of the beaches of D- Day, and navigating the city was almost impossible. While dad was driving I had to figure out the one way streets and complicated system they had in Paris. Their street sign system is horrible! I figured it out eventually and we made it to Normandy where we saw some amazing things, including Omaha Beach and the American cemetery there, where over 9,000 Americans are buried. It was incredible. Getting home was the single most frustrating experience thus far. The street signs, which are on the sides of buildings, are not lit, and you can’t see them until you drive past them. Then you have to try to turn around and go back to where you were, but there are so many round abouts and one way streets that it’s incredible difficult to do any of that. We got close to getting home several times, but ended up completely off track and in the French ghetto. After about 2 hours of being helplessly lost in the black hole that is Paris, we made our way back to our hotel frustrated, exhausted, and annerved. It is extremely tiring spending all day hunched over a map getting carsick in the car being completely unaware of where you are and trying to figure it out. NEVER AGAIN.
The next day we woke up super early, turned the car in, and made our way to Marseille by train. We got there and literally booked a hotel via the wireless internet from McDonalds at the station. It was a Holiday Inn directly across the station, which was nice, because we didn’t have to go out looking for anything. The hotel was amazing. We got a seaside view, a huge room, and a big shower. It was such a nice relief. The people at the desk spoke perfect English and were very accommodating and helpful. We spent the day at the beach, came home early, and relaxed after the day we had just had. Marseille is beautiful! Small town feel, but with an amazing port and harbor. It has old rustic looking buildings, and turquoise water. On the way back from the beach we stumbled across the Chateau D’If, like the one in The Count of Monte Cristo (my all time favorite book). There was even a tour boat called “The Edmund Dantes,” that took people out to go and walk around the island, but it was too windy to venture out when we were there, unfortunately.
We took long showers, relaxed to some quality French television, and went to bed early. Well, early compared to the last few nights. In the morning there was an incredible complimentary breakfast waiting for us, which we didn’t think was included. I ate so much food! We wanted to really load up for the day. We also took some baguettes and a baguette sandwich for the road. At the desk when we checked out we got some of the famous soap that Marseille is famous for for free. It smells incredible, I want to eat it. We were in love with that hotel, and all the people that worked there.
Train rides are interesting. We’ve had a lot of transfers and have been on trains all day. We went from Marseille to Lyon, Lyon to some other place that starts with a “C” that I can’t remember or pronounce, to Milan, where we stayed the night, and caught a train to Rome in the morning. While we were on the train to Milan we met another interesting man. He’s Egyptian, but he lives and works in Milan. He helped teach us some Italian words and phrases for the trip and translated some of the announcements that were coming on on the intercom. It’s hard not speaking the language. We heard “problema” and something about “tenchincalle” and it turns out there was a problem with the train to Milan and we had to switch trains a few minutes ago. Without him we would have had no idea what was going on. Our entire train had to switch on to another train, which was a pain in the butt with all the people and all the luggage. Once we switched trains all of a sudden there were “polizia” walking round asking for passports and studying each of the ones they looked at. They walked right past us without checking ours, but at the next stop they made a group of 4 men get off the train with their luggage. Dad thinks they were smuggling drugs or something. One of them was one row behind us, and the policeman just said, “Get up. Get your luggage.” And they got off. After that we met a really nice French girl who is writing a paper on why the school systems in America are failing... so naturally, dad had a lot to talk about with her. She was really smart and spoke perfect English. After we stayed at a crappy hotel in Milan, we got on our train to Rome, where we were not greeted well. An older Italian couple had the seats right next to us with a shared table, and they made it painfull obvious that they did not like us. I think they even talked about us in Italian. It was really rude.
Our first day in Rome completely sucked. We got off the train and went to go reserve our tickets for when we go from Venice to Salzbourg, and we waitied in line forver to do that. Then after that was all over we had to find where to get metro passes to get to our hotel, and it took forever because the signs lead you in circles, and no one around us would even attempt to help or communicate with us. No one wanted anything to do with us. Even some of the people working the information kiosks would jsut say that they didn't speak any English even if we tried to communicate with them in Italian. It was really frustrating, and we got agitated early on. Finally we got metro tickets, but we couldn't get a map or train/ bus schedule. We looked everywhere for one, and finally figured out that you have to buy it from one of the shops, which (1) is stupid, and (2) no one told us. THEN we had a really hard time interpreting the stops andstations in trying to get to our hotel, which was off the map. We kind of had to guess the direction it was in, so we hopped on a train and it took us to a bus station that we were supposed to get on, but the train number wasn't on the sign. We freaked out a little, and then all of a sudden this monk looking character came up to us and asked us if we needed help. He was wearing a burlap sack with a rope tied around the middle of his waist, no shoes, huge beard... the whole deal. He was one of those brothers who swore to a life of poverty for God, and he even told us he couldn't touch money. He called our hotel desk and asked them for directions, and then walked us to the bus stop, where he got on with is to make sure we got to where we were going ok. Dad thought he lost his metro pass for a second, and he was quick to give him an extra one that he happened to have. He transferred us to the final leg of our bus trip, and then we were on our way. It was amazing. That man was such a blessing. We were so lost and confused, and didn't have the best impression of Romans thus far. I wish we had had more time to thank him, but our bus was leaving and we just had to hop on. It was crazy how much he helped us. So we were on the bus and we found our next transfer place (yes, waaay too many transfers just to get to the hotel, we know), and we find where we're supposed to get off and wait for the next one. It comes, and we get on, but we miss the stop, because they're not written down anywhere or announced, and it's impossible to know when to right the bell or what the next stop is unless you live here and take the bus everyday. We just stayed on and looped around again, and the bus driver showed us where to get off. Now we're at the hotel. FINALLY. Just to give you an idea of how long that took, our train arrived in Rome at 9:30, we didn't get to the hotel until 2:30. Ridiculous.
It’s really annoying not speaking the language here. Conversing with a person is ok, because if both people are willing to try to understand, there’s really no problem. but we have no idea what any of the train announcements are saying and it’s frustrating thinking that we might have to change trains again or something like we did earlier. I hate the nervous feeling of uncertainty that comes with entering a foreign place. I know it wears off in a day or so, but it’s kind of scary. It makes me appreciate America a lot. I am sick and tired of being lost, dealing with rude, inconsiderate people, and being constantly worried about what comes next. At least we made it today, eventually. I lvoe seeing all the sights and things here, but I hate the traveling in between them part, especially when no one is willing to help us.
Tomorrow we're doing like 3 excursions at the centre of town (if we can get there). I’ll write more after we have time after some adventures in Rome. Hope all is well at home!
Mariner
Chateau D'If Tour Poster
