Coda

(I wrote this a few months ago and never got around to posting it because it felt too sentimental. Rereading it today it didn't sound so bad. Here is a last post for Videza. For now.)

So this blog needs a coda. We made it back in one piece, twelve hours on a plane not withstanding.

This is hard to write because I do not have anything revelatory to offer. I don’t actually travel with the purpose of reworking my perspective on life, or finding deeper truths.

I travel because I love it. Because waking up somewhere new, learning a new set of streets, new words for “entrance” and “exit” are exciting. Travel makes time for other things, for thinking and brainstorming without the intrusion of routine, for breathing space.

It’s almost three weeks since I got back to Ohio. Life is different and the same. The strangest part is realizing that most people, everyone except Chelsea, can’t really understand the anomaly of the last three months. It was three months for most people – they worked, they read, they studied and lived.

And for me, looking at the pictures, at this blog. Remembering everything that happened and was said off the camera, it feels intangible. It would not take much to convince me that I never left. That it was a dream.

Which is why it is best to travel with someone you trust, because they will remind you that you were awake. Of the moments when you put your foot in your mouth and the pictures you deleted. And of the occasional dumb wonder that struck at unexpected times, when we realized that first a week, and then a month and then three had passed.

Well, I know you all believed in us, and knew we’d make it safely home. But now we are, and the fact is perhaps better comfort than your confidence. Thanks for reading and traveling with us.

Cheers.

Here and Now

As you gaze across the bobbing sea of heads and cameras, meeting Mona Lisa’s eyes across the room, as the echoes of the constant murmur of “no photo” from Italian polizia fills the Sistine Chapel, as the man next to you exclaims, “It’s a unicorn,” and laughs at the absurdity of the Crown Jewels, one begins to ponder the nature of tourism.

On this trip we have spent not an inconsiderable amount of time in what I would term “dead” monuments. The Tower holds no more executions, no kings live in Neuscwanstein, and the last battle in the coliseum, well, you get the idea.



It’s part of why I enjoy visiting places of worship. Because most of them are still alive.

Now, I will not pretend to be the most reverent of visitors to these embalmed places. I quite enjoy the imagined consternation of the Hapsburg ghosts as they see their venerated grounds invaded by the masses. But why do we go? Where is the line between overprotective snobbery and appreciation, between good humor and a loss of wonder?

When we were wandering the Louvre Chelsea and I were passed by a gentleman with a camera. He walked directly to each case in the room, snapped a photo and walked on. Without looking at what was there. This baffled us then, and still does. Where is the worth in that? What was the point of your admission? To say that you were there?

(And again, I am not above doing some things for the mere purpose of making a factual statement. We took a train ride to Malmo and back, and proudly count Sweden on our itinerary. Yes, yes, laugh at us.)



All of this makes Venice an interesting case. Venice, we were told, is a city of tourists. The old town, the part everyone thinks of when we think of Venice, gave us no evidence to the contrary. We heard a lot of languages, and very little Italian. There were street hawkers and cheap masks, gaudy gondolas and plenty of “I heart Venice” shirts.

And yet.

Some mask shops boast finer ware: fragile metal butterflies and swirls of stiff fabric, glittering crystal and delicate flourishes of gold. Some canals are still a breathtaking aqua, and some streets are deserted, left for the dreamers who wish they were wearing cloaks and lace and had important business about in the floating city.



And then it is back to the irreverent noise of cameras coming on and gelato running down your fingers. And the ice cream is marvelous, and you’ll be glad you got that shot later, when you are trying to convince yourself that you ever traveled halfway around the world.



If any of this seems to contradict itself, then I suppose that’s my point. I don’t know if there is a solution. I don’t know if there is a problem. I’d be sad if these treasures were locked from sight, I am sad that our dead have so little weight.

Dodge the Ferrari

So before Orange and Avignon, Chelsea and I spent a few days on the Cote d’Azur, wandering the various seaside towns of the French Mediterranean. We spent some time in Monaco and Cannes, but stayed in Nice.



Now, we have spent nights in various sorts of accommodation on this trip. Mostly dorms found on www.hostelbookers.com or in the occasional one star hotel near the train station. We also had our fabulous evenings with the Englands. The dorms have all been quiet, although averaging 8 beds or so. Some hostels have had owners we sat and talked to, like in Wickow, and others have been more like hotels.

The hostel in Nice however was our first truly ‘hip’ hostel.

Coming into Nice we met a French girl on the train also looking for a hostel. She ended up following us to ours, and when we got there, no one at reception spoke French. It was disconcerting. After spending around a week in countries that do not speak English we’ve grown accustomed to apologizing and communicating with one or two words and smiles. And here, not only the receptionists, but the massive staff (bartenders, cooks, shuttle drivers, laundresses, etc…) all spoke English. Most, I would guess, were Australian.

We were told where the bar was and directed to the signs for that night’s dinner. The hostel had a bar as well as a kitchen, half of which was public, with the other half reserved for a few fellows cooking pizzas and making salads for the general crowd. For which, I will mention, we were grateful – a long day of traveling with food at the end is much preferable to a long day of traveling followed by a search for food.

As we sat waiting for our meal, bouncing our heels to the loud music and sipping our drinks, I realized something odd. My drink was still cold. It had ice in it. I’d gotten so used to drinks with no ice that it felt strange.



Looking around I felt stranger still.

All the girls at this hostel had done hair, and I think I counted five or six that were not wearing short skirts.

I think Chelsea and I might have stood out.

Her bright orange pants and my ragged baggy ones, our hair, which while cute is not coiffed, and our distinct lack of interest in good party spots or guys might have set us apart. Also our lack of social skills.

Give us nudibranchs and fantasy novels, games or politics, and conversation zooms. But what we did last night? Ummm . . . slept.

I don’t know how we both missed this skill. Talking to the woman in the chocolate shop about food and Los Angeles? Easy. To Trish in Wicklow about Facebook? Peaches. To Veronique about organic farming? Done. To our peers with loud music in the background and alcohol available?

Epic fail.

That said, it was an awesome hostel, and we did have a good time, just not the same way everyone else did.

Monaco was a different kind of disconnect. The streets were not actually as bad as I thought they would be. The people on the streets were mostly tourists like us, here for a day to glimpse the casino. The people driving were a different matter. Hence the title. All my stereotypes were fulfilled by a youngish gent driving a Ferrari with slicked back hair, a polo shirt and aviators that probably cost more than everything in my backpack.

The yachts were also impressive.

We choose to spend a chunk of our time at a Haagen Daz Cocktail Bar a few blocks from the Monte Carlo Casino. We paid ridiculous prices for excellent smoothies while catching snatches of the conversation next to us that seemed to consist of the words “Dubai” and “investment”.



All in all we learn more about ourselves, our limits and comfort zones and our ability to laugh at the ridiculousness of a situation, even as it happens.

Peace, my friends.

Barcelona is a Dangerous Place

As we climbed down the stairs to the entrance of Parc Güell, Chelsea and I were damning Barcelona. Our feet ached and bled, the various straps of our bags had embedded themselves so deeply into our sunburnt shoulders that to shift them even slightly sent sharp pains through our skin, and our legs were raw from rubbing together as we walked.

And as we came down these stairs we stopped. Music echoed up from an artificial cavern conceived by one of Barcelona’s patron saints, Gaudí. A man sat over what looked like a metal tortoise shell, and by bouncing his fingers on the indentations of this instrument he produced a sound similar to a steel drum, but sweeter and so full of color that it matched the mosaics marching along the walls. And we forgave Barcelona.

This city made us forget, in one moment, how tired and resentful we had been a second before. The bitterness came back a short distance down the road as our flip flops dug into the tender flesh between our toes, and yet the enchantment lingered and we laughed on our way to the hostel.

Barcelona is a beautiful city, from the Gothic Quarter’s narrow streets to the curved and colorful architecture of the aforementioned Gaudi. And these too, have their dangers. The danger of the fabulous architecture in general is very mundane: one looks up rather than where one is walking.


This phenomenon is made more dangerous not only by the usual hazards (walking into other people, walking into each other, walking into walls, telephone poles, street vendors, bicyclists, etc…) but by the fact that around each of the many trees littering the streets and adding to the urge to look skyward, there is a pit. Now this is not always a deep pit; some are scarcely six inches. Others range to about a foot or so. One can, I hope, readily see the dangers inherent in this.

You are not convinced yet of the dangers?

Would you like to know how many pairs of pants we have bought in the two days since we arrived?

Four.

And this only, by exercising the greatest restraint.

Now, in my defense, three of these four are Chelsea’s.

In her defense. Well. Nothing.

I joke. These are giant poofy pants that come in all manner of colors and textures (including orange and soft. Chelsea got one of each. Well, two orange). They are magnificent and full of win. The pants have been our splurge. But so much more could have been.


The clothing here is amazing: bright colors and strange designs (http://www.desigual.com/#/videos/). And the sandals. You know there is something strange going on when Chelsea and I have to resist shoe shopping. And possibly also with somewhere where we both wanted to go to the beach.



One final word of warning: Chocolate con churros are wonderful.


Adios amigos!

Old and Young

In our hostel this morning (now in Ireland, catching up on blogs *blushes*), a fellow traveler out of Derry asked us why we went to York. And we were like, “well, it was pretty, and there were walls…” His expression blanked.

And so we explained that in America anything over a hundred years old is considered historically invaluable. And so a wall, from which the good men of York could shot those pesky Scots, in days when bows and arrows were the ranged weapon of choice is enchanting and unique for us.

He nodded. “Yeah, we have a wall around Derry, and it’s like 400 years old. We climb on it, me and my friends.”

Hopefully we enlightened him slightly concerning American’s interest in the old and crumbly. We just don’t have it at home.

Which leads me to York, and the old with a bit of crumbly.

York is what one always wanted in a stereotypical English town. At least if you can imagine one that gets sunshine along with the rain. It has narrow cobbled streets. The walls have crenellations and slits for arrows. The Minster soars majestically above the town and from it’s heights you can see the bleached ribs of a ruined monastery.

My dear Ray took a day off from his dissertation to meet us and share interesting historical tidbits. It is apparently still legal to shoot a Scotsman from the walls after dark with a bow and arrow. Or something along those lines.

Ray also expressed a peculiar regret. When I asked him what he would miss about England he replied that he would miss the food.

He is the only person I have ever heard say that. Albeit we were dining like kings on meat pies at the moment in the “snug” room of a pub off the main drag of old York, so maybe it was just the atmosphere getting to him. Or maybe not.

We climbed to the top of the Minster (read “cathedral, but special”) – 265 tiny spiral steps up. And 265 back down again.

I’m not going to try to describe the Minster.


I couldn’t do it justice.

Our other stop was the aforementioned ruined monastery. Part of which included this:

And we are back to that age difference. Trying to wrap our minds around the idea that the Romans were here building at a time when Rome was the center of the world, before the Europeans knew there was another continent across the Atlantic, is boggling. And almost more boggling because the place is alive still. People were picnicking and kids were pretending that the foundations of a wall laid down in whatever lost century was a pirate ship.