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.

I Heart Prague

Everyone says that Prague is beautiful. And in this case Everyone is right.



We got into Prague two days ago and after five minutes of wandering narrow streets, gazing at the river and the copper spires turned green with age, we stumbled upon an open air performance.

It was modern dance, performed in full suits to harsh repetitive electronic music and with a dozen or so desks as props. Chelsea and I stood entranced for the whole thing. They managed to work in people dropping pages out of phone books from the five story buildings surrounding us and a naked man in a window with a cell phone.



This is the first city where the tacky “I heart 'insert city here'” t-shirts has been tempting. We love Prague.

Also – 1 USD works out to nearly 20 kroner here. And as opposed to Denmark where a similar phenomenon meant nothing, here we got Indian food for two people for less than 10 dollars. As stated: We love Prague.

We spent most of the day, roughly 9ish hours, walking around today.



This though I blame on Paris. A result of our stay in Paris is that we got used to small spaces on city maps taking us a long time to traverse on foot. Paris is huge, so an inch or so on my Paris map is roughly 15-20 minutes walking. But now, in smaller cities, and especially old city centers, we tend to cross whole blocks of the map without noticing – hence we missed Amsterdam’s red light district the first time we walked through it.

So in Prague, when we look at a map with our hostel and the zoo literally on opposite sides and then gauge from our walking the day before that it really wouldn’t be that bad of a trek we shrug our shoulders and head out.



And as we are heading back, it is less of a bother to walk than to try to figure out the bus.

We are safely in the hostel now – tomorrow we take off for Vienna. Our feet hurt and we could stand to do laundry. Soon. But we love Prague. Ciao!

Second Recap

Okay – For everyone’s sanity I’m going to do another recap. We will surely backtrack a little in a few days here, as we have been doing, but I figured it might be good to mention some highlights and where we are now.

Since we left Nice a lot has happened.

We got to Geneva, met my sister (YAY!), climbed a tower (awesome, but we feel like after Monteserrat it takes a lot of stairs to impress us), and witnessed what Chelsea has dubbed simply “The Spew”



After that we went to chill in Heidelberg, and experienced, once more, the power of chocolate and the pure ingenuity of the German varieties of this godlike substance.



From there we hid in Bad Homburg, and with the kind and timely help of the Von Wuthenaus, we recouped.

down time + excellent people = happy Chelsea and Hanna



And then back to Paris. The city of lights and love did not disappoint. Well, actually, considering what we were warned to expect in Paris, we were happily surprised. The people were nice. The streets were as clean as one might hope in a huge city. And of course, there was something of historical/literary/aesthetic/artistic significance on every other street corner.



After an epic misadventure involving a cathedral and twitter (which deserves its own post) we met up with Jane and Kiyash. Who, in turn, addicted us to Pierre Herme macaroons (which we hunted, purchased and consumed on each successive day of our stay in Paris. They don’t ship the macaroons. We were sad.)

And that brings us to Amsterdam. Amsterdam has a certain reputation. In order to fully experience the city we did the only thing possible. We went to the science center! Yes, we spent our one day in Amsterdam playing at the Nemo with a bunch of science happy Dutch children. It was brilliant.



From there we took the sleeper (or tried to) to Copenhagen. After running 3.5 hours late (“too late”, according to our charming conductor) it left us in Padborg.

Never heard of it? Well, neither had we. We arrived in Copenhagen 5.5 hours later than planned with an extra Ethan we picked up along the way. He probably deserves a post too.

That brings us about up to the present. We met Lee yesterday – fellow contributor to Auslander (theforeigners.tumblr.com) and are traveling together today. Assuming his train is on time.


Cheers!

Ocean (Sans Ponies)

Most of you know that three years ago I did the Semester at Sea program – studied on a cruise ship while it sailed places and wandered those places when we got there and there were no diamond ponies in the ocean.

*brief skirmish*

(and I got my computer back from Chelsea…)

I blather about it often, so I beg your indulgence if I go back to it briefly.

Before Semester at Sea I was hugely excited about spending so much time close to the ocean. I’ve been relatively close to Lake Erie most of my life, but it isn’t quite the same thing. The oceans, the seven seas, have inspired so much. Poets and explorers alike have been captivated by the sea for thousands of years. And I admit, I was looking to be impressed.

And I wasn’t, really. It was vast, incomprehensibly so – I remember realizing that it would take me an hour or so walking straight down to reach the earth beneath my feet – but not what I was looking for. It also gave me horrific motion sickness.

I found the ocean fascinating in the way a screensaver can be, or the DVD symbol bouncing ever closer to the corners of a TV. While diverting, it was not the stuff of poetry.

And thus it remained for the first week or so. Then we hit rough water between Hawaii and Japan. The waves were double my height, and the forbidding storm grey, steel gray that is the province of poets. The sun set on this ocean, unobstructed save for the horizon and I leaned out on the slick rail. Sea spray hit my face and I tasted salt. And I have loved the ocean since.

And I have missed her for three years.

So getting to spend time in places near the various oceans and seas has been important, like running into an old friend. Who still makes me queasy if I’m not careful.

We’ve skimmed over our ocean voyages so far on the blog – mostly because the first few we slept through, and our last was governed by incredibly rough water and our gloom at having departed the Englands and England.

I would like to put in a good word for the Irish Sea, as providing a gorgeous backdrop for Wicklow and a sunrise I had not intended to see over it. The residents insisted that it was possible to swim, but Chelsea and I declined.

In Barcelona and Nice we actually went and fluttered about in the ocean. In Nice especially the waves had a kick to them, enough to knock the knees from under you if you weren’t paying attention. And I find it strangely comforting to be so very small and to play, carefully, with something so very big.

In Nice too we got to see jellyfish. Chelsea noticed them first – small black leaf-like critters – and decided it was best to evacuate the area.

She did not tell me what led to her haste. I chilled in the water for another moment and upon perceiving that Chelsea was done with the water I too climbed out. Then she explained why she retreated to dry land. To her credit, she was not sure they were jellyfish, they might just as easily have been leaves and paranoia.

A minute later an older man came towards us, holding out a Pringles can. As Chelsea and I tried to politely decline his offer of chips he showed us a tiny captive jellyfish. He had mistaken it for a condom until he noticed there were lots of them.

We have since learned that these were velella velella and they are Chelsea’s new favorite jellyfish. We have also learned that they are harmless to humans, although one should wash ones hands before touching ones eyes and face after handling them. And nudibranchs eat them.

Now we are on the way to Geneva, and away from the ocean. For now.

(ps. the ponies will make sense next time. Promise)