Europe Essay, Research Paper
Friday, July 23rd — Paris, France
I spent my second night in a youth hostel in Paris last night. I arrived in Paris around 6:00am local time two days ago. The flight from LAX to Orly airport was ten about hours long. It wasn’t so bad, though. There was nobody sitting next to me and a nice, elderly French lady two seats away. The charter flight that I flew on was run by a French airline, and it seemed that the majority of the passengers were French-speaking. When we were taking off from LA, all of the announcements were in both French and English, but the frequency of the English announcements seemed to decline as we got farther and farther away from the United States.
Customs was amazingly simple. I breezed right though, and emerged into the center of the Orly airport. I was a bit disoriented at first. There I was, in Europe for the first time, and I didn’t have even the beginnings of a plan. I changed some money and found out how to get into Paris (Orly is outside of the city). I rode a rail system into the edge of Paris where it intersected the main Paris Metro. After a lot of staring at Metro maps, I finally managed to figure out what station the youth hostel I wanted to go to was near, and after some confusion, managed to get there. I felt victorious when I emerged out into the Paris morning at the Republique station.
As I was looking for the hostel, a man took one glance at me and pointed across the street. Wearing my big backpack and fumbling through my guidebook, I guess it was pretty obvious what I was looking for.
It turned out that the hostel was full, but the guy at the desk was sending people to another. When I was making a reservation, he accidentally thought that I was with two Swedes who were at the desk with me. I’ve been the honorary “third Swede” ever since. Their names are Karin and Torbjorn. They are both really nice, and speak English quite well — much better than I speak Swedish, anyway. I’ve decided that Swedish is an impossible language. Not only can I not understand a word, I can’t even make the sounds you need to speak the language. In particular, in order to pronounce the word for the number “7″ in Swedish you have to make contortions with your mouth that no person should have to be subjected to.
While they are quite fluent in English, they don’t know much slang, and are delighted whenever I teach them something like the proper pronunciation of the word “cool”. For whatever reason, Karin is completely fascinated by the phrase “inversely proportional”. She keeps trying to find things that are inversely proportional to each other just so that she can say the words. Strange people, these Swedes.
Even though they speak English perfectly well, they still have this annoying habit of speaking Swedish in my presence. Whenever they do this, I launch into my best impersonation of the Swedish chef to indicate that I have no idea what they are saying. Lately, they’ve gotten even sneakier, and will insert my name randomly into a Swedish conversation (”Dee hurden beeden luden Mike, borden shdrooden”) to make it seem as though they are talking about me.
The same day that I arrived, the Swedes and I went sightseeing. According to my biological clock, it was night, but it was still morning in Paris. I figured the best way to adjust was to stay awake until local night time. We went first to Notre Dame, where I took a brilliant picture of my camera strap.
We then took random busses all over town, miraculously ending up at the Arc de Triumph. We climbed the stairs to the top for a great view of Paris. We then went to find someplace to eat. We ended up walking around an African-Parisian area, and found a little restaurant. We all ordered the Menu — a fixed price meal including entree, plat (main course) and dessert or cheese. I had a ham entree, beef tongue (yes, I ordered that on purpose — it wasn’t a language blunder) for the plat, and chocolate mousse for dessert. The food was quite good, however the restrooms were my first exposure to the lovely custom of supplying nothing but a pair of footprints and a hole as fixtures.
After dinner, we went to the Sacre Cours. It is an amazing church atop a hill and is very beautiful inside. Although I’m religiously challenged, I paid my five francs, lit a candle, and placed it in one of the candle holders. The stairs in front of the church seem to be a place where young people gather to drink and socialize — there were many little groups passing around bottles of wine. Next to the church is a square where many portrait painters solicit business. After valiantly fending off the artists who wanted to render our likenesses, we went to the base of the hill and, after having a drink at a little cafe, rode a little elevator back up the hill to the church.
Torbjorn convinced us that we absolutely had to go to an area of Paris called Pigalle. It turned out that this is Paris’ red light district. The hawkers yell at you in English as you walk bye “Come on! Good *censored* show! You will like!” I got my picture taken with some mannequins in the entrance to one of the establishments, and the hawker got angry when we didn’t go in. After having our fill of such things, we returned to the hotel via the Metro. They were working on one of the Metro lines that we wanted to travel on, so we had to detour around it. On the way back, Torbjorn was accosted by a drunk Sri Lankan, and none of our combined language skills could figure out exactly what he wanted. Finally, we got back to the hostel around 12:30. It was great to go to sleep. I hadn’t yet slept since arriving in Paris and had been up for a good 36 hours at this point. Despite my long first day in Paris, I got up at 8:00 the next morning and had the complimentary hostel breakfast. This consisted of a piece of bread, jam, and a bowl of hot chocolate or coffee. Along with my Swedish friends I grabbed the metro to the Eiffel Tower. We rode the elevator to the top. Amazing view. This tower is really, really tall.
That afternoon, we ventured outside of Paris to Versailles, stopping for lunch in a little restaurant along the way. Versailles was quite beautiful — particularly the gardens. Touring the famous interior I found quite boring, however. It was frustrating being herded around with the hordes of other people also there. The highlight of my visit was obtaining a receipt that said I’d paid my franc and a half for the priveledge of using the Versailles bathroom. On the metro on the way back into Paris, we started up a conversation with a group of French people. It ended up being a French lesson, with one woman pulling all sorts of odds and ends out of her purse and telling us the French words for them. We then took a ride on the Bateaux-Mouches — boats that go up and down the Seine while speakers blare out the sites in several languages as you drift by. Cheesy tourist trap, but fun. At one point, you can see both the Satue of Liberty and the Eiffel Tower at the same time. How can this be, you say? Well, the French gave Liberty to the US, but they kept a small version at home.
We had dinner in the latin quarter at an Italian restaurant and wandered around for a while, checking out the Pantheon — Abutille Saint Germain. We rode the Metro back to the hostel, helping a couple of recently arrived Brits get their bearings along the way.
I got up at 7:30 this morning I’m about to have breakfast. I’ve got to call Mom this morning — she’s probably not sure if I’m alive or not.
Saturday, July 24th, 1993 — Gard du Nord, Paris, France
I’m just leaving Paris on a train bound for Brussels. My first train trip in Europe has already gone awry. I missed my scheduled train by about a minute. I’m taking the next one, but it will get my to Brussels a few hours late. I hope I can find a place to stay. I said goodbye to Karin and Torbjorn on the Metro on the way to the train station. They are off to Djon. It would have been nice to travel with them some more as I really liked them, but I have to take my vacation, not theirs. I got up yesterday morning and had the same wonderful breakfast in the hostel. I called Mom, but calculated the time difference the wrong way — it was 2:00am back in Saskatoon (my home town, in the province of Saskatchewan, Canada). She was groggy, but happy to know that I was ok. The Swedes and I wandered around a market for a while. A guy asked me, “Combien?” thinking that I was the vendor of a booth. It taxed my French to try to tell him otherwise, but that alone got the point across.
We then went to Place de Concorde. Torbjorn took a picture of me standing in the center of Champs d’Elysse with the Arc de Triumph behind me and traffic all around. He chickened out and didn’t let the cars get close enough, though. We had lunch at Chez Ronald (my name for McDonald’s in Paris). Quite a trip. The same old thing as in North America, except more expensive. They do sell wine, though (this is France, after all). We went to the Seine near Notre Dame and slept in the grass along the bank for a few hours. Afterward, we walked along the river past booksellers and musicians. We saw an attractive woman giving a man a massage in the grass, and I shouted, “Moi ausie!” She lookup up, quite embarrassed. Got to love being an obnoxious foreigner.
That evening, we went to Place de la Bastille. It is quite the hangout spot. There are motorcycles parked everywhere and all sorts of little bars and restaurants. We found a bumper car ride and had a blast smashing into each other. Some things are international, I guess. We had a drink in one of the local bars. Karin’s coke was 23ff. More expensive than wine! We returned to the hostel and met two guys from Edinburgh. One had had his passport, money, and the rest of the stuff in his money belt stolen the day before. They had slept in someone’s private garden the night before because they couldn’t find a hostel that had space.
Tuesday, August 3rd, 1993 — Berlin, Germany
I haven’t written anything for a while because I’ve been really busy. On our last afternoon in Hamburg, Carlos and I went back to the city center and had beer and bratwurst. We drank monk-brewed beer (brewed by the Franciscans) in big glasses and got a passerby to take our picture. The next morning, I hopped a train to Berlin, and Carlos was off to Paris to meet some friends he planned to travel with. He’s invited me to stay with him in Lisbon in September if I pass through Portugal. I just might take him up on it.
I barely made my train to Berlin — I was late, but luckily so was the train. I met two Norwegian girls on the train — Ann Christin and Charlotte. They are both 18. I ended up spending two days here in Berlin with them. The first day we got in about noon. The first hostel we tried was full, but we managed to get into another hostel out in the boonies in East Berlin. We went back into the center and went up in the TV. tower, getting a great view of the city. We then visited the Berlin Rathaus and saw the Brandenburg Gate.
We were there just at sunset and it was a very impressive sight. It was strange to think that I was in East Berlin. We went to the area around the Zoo metro station and wandered around for a while. We stopped at a beer garden and had some Lowenbrau. It was much better than the version we get back in the States. They had a live band playing and a large, drunk German woman was dancing out of control.
Afterward, while we were walking down the street, I was suddenly grabbed from behind by a guy shouting things at me. I thought I was being attacked by some crazy person, but when I turned around it was Torbjorn and Karin!! I was completely surprised and very, very happy to see my Swedish friends. I think I must have had a big grin on my face for the rest of the night. They had been to Djon, Strausburg, and Marseilles. They had randomly decided to spend a few days in Berlin on their way back to Sweden. What a coincidence that I should run into them. It turned out that it was Torbjorn’s 23rd birthday, so we all went out for ice cream to celebrate. They were meeting a friend of Karin’s the next day to go see a concentration camp outside of Berlin, so we decided to meet up with them and go as well.
The next day, before meeting the Swedes, the Norwegians and I went to see Checkpoint Charlie. The checkpoint itself wasn’t very impressive, but the museum they have there is fascinating. We had to leave after seeing only part of it and were still late to meet the others. We found them and went to meet what seemed to be half of the population of Sweden. Karin’s friend was with two other guys, and we then went to meet the sister of one of them. Then we hooked up with somebody’s cousin, and the another sister, and in the end I wound up in the company of ten Scandanavians.
The concentration camp was at the end of a train line and it took us a long time to get there. The museum was closed because it was Monday, but we were still able to walk around the camp. It was fascinating in a horrible sort of way. We saw the places where they carried out public hangings, the places where they would drop people into underground bunkers to die, the complex where they shot or gassed people and then cremated them. Particularly disturbing was a Pathology lab where they did unspeakable things. I found it very strange to know that I was standing on the exact site where all of this horror took place.
Over the course of the day, I remembered how much I liked Torbjorn and Karin. It’s amazing how close you can get to people over a short period of time when you are traveling. After returning to the city, we went out to an Italian place for dinner and then it was time for the Swedes to leave. We headed for Haptbahnhoff, the main train station, and I said goodbye to them for a second time. I feel certain that I will see Karin and Torbjorn again, either in Sweden or in California. Later that evening, I saw the Norwegian girls off to their train for Prague. I said goodbye to them and then I was alone again. I went back to the hostel and crashed.
This morning I missed breakfast because my clock was wrong and I overslept. I managed to snag some bread and cheese and headed off into the city. I went to the Pergamemnon museum, where they have reconstructed much of the ancient Greek city of Pergamemnon (a place in Turkey). They also had a reconstruction of one of the entrances to the city of Babylon. Leaving the museum, I stopped by a nearby cathedral where a brass band was playing for money. They seemed to be doing quite well for themselves. The inside of the church was quite impressive, but I’ve seen quite a few churches so far on this trip and they are getting kind of old.
This afternoon, on a whim, I went to the Berlin zoo. It was very comprehensive in it’s collection, but the conditions in which the animals were living was worse than most other zoos I’ve seen. Afterward, I went to try to get to a section of the Berlin wall that I’d been seeing a lot as I rode by on the U-Bahn (the Berlin metro). It took me a while to find a way it, but it was worth it. In once place there were three tanks stacked to make an arch. Next to it, there was a part of the wall that used to be a guard post. I went up the steps and out on the top. This was where the guards would have stood while patrolling the wall. Farther down, there was a large section of the wall that had memorials to those that had died trying to cross, painted on it. Because the area wasn’t very accessible, there was almost nobody else around.
Later, I went to Tiergarten, a HUGE park in the middle of the city. It was absolutely beautiful. After strolling around for a while (and noticing that clothing appeared to be optional), I went to Haptbahnhoff to check on the train situation. My plan was to go to Prague next. The woman at the international ticket desk spoke no English, and my German is almost non-existent, so I couldn’t manage to convey the details of my needs to her. The problem is that my rail pass isn’t valid in the Czech Republic, so I need a ticked from the German/Czech border to Prague. I’ve decided to deal with it en route, and just hop on the night train for Prague. I’m now in the station waiting for the train.
Thursday, August 5th, 1993 — Prague, Czech Republic
I met a guy from New York and two girls from Seattle in the station while waiting for the train to Prague. When the train arrived, we all piled into a compartment together. Because of my communication problem in Berlin, I didn’t have a ticket for Prague, so I was told that I had to get out at the border and purchase a ticket for the rest of the trip there. The ticket guy also said that I needed a visa for Czech Republic, but I knew that that wasn’t true — Americans don’t need visas there. We all fell asleep, and I awoke to find the train stopped. I found out that we were at the border, but I didn’t know how long we had been there. As I got off the train, a conductor made hand gestures to me that seemed to indicate that the train would be leaving soon. I ran around, and finally found the ticket office. The woman behind the counter spoke no English, but I was able to convey to her that I needed a ticket to Prague. She merrily rung up the price in Czech crowns — a currency that I had none of. To my surprise, she wouldn’t take deutchmarks.
Frustrated, I figured I’d get back on the train and deal with it when the ticket collector came by. I left the ticket office just in time to see my train pulling away, gathering speed. It dawned on my that my backpack was still on the train and that I’d better get on it as well. I ran alongside the moving train, and just as I was about to jump on like I was in some sort of action movie, I realized that it wasn’t my train! I’m not quite sure how I came to that realization, but I’m very glad I did. Jumping on the train, aside from being a less than safe thing to do would have placed me on route to god knows where in the Czech Republic at 2:00 in the morning, with my backpack bound for Prague.