Nice, Cinque Terre, and Florence
Today was another busy day, spent mostly on trains, yet again. I left Nice this morning to try to get to Cinque Terre, Italy before the sun set. I knew the train left some time around 10am. I wanted to check the time before I left, but Madamme Martine, the hostel owner, was too busy playing solitaire on the computer to let me on. She is quite the interesting woman. Last night, she was telling me about how she has some kind of psychologic disorder that causes her to suddenly become very agressive in large crowds and push people through glass doors? Maybe something was lost in translation, but she clearly said “I am very dangerous” multiple times. Things like that make it difficult to fall asleep at night. I am grateful that she was so friendly, though, because she told me a lot about the area and gave advice on where to eat. Sometimes not the best advice, but between my terrible ability to understand spoken French and figure out directions, I can hardly blame her.
Anyways, I grabbed breakfast, got to the train station at about 10:10, and found that the train left at 10:05. Figures. I kicked myself quite a bit for that, and considered going straight to Florence since I wouldn’t have much time in Cinque Terre. After talking with Information, though, it still seemed possible. I had to make 2 stops to get there, but the timing could be right.
At one of the stops in a city in Italy I can’t remember at the moment, the woman at the Information counter did not speak English. French and Italian. Great. So, I start speaking in Spanish slowly. “Si hablo en Espanol, me entiendera un poquito?” and she nodded yes. That worked out pretty well. If we both spoke slowly enough, the message seemed to get across. At some point as she was walking to check something for me, she said something like “it’s easy to understand Spanish if the person speaking wasn’t born into it”. So, at least my terrible Spanish accent allows for Italians to understand me pretty well. I find that amusing.
My last train ride to Cinque Terre, the sun began to set, bringing quite a downer on my hopes for seeing Monteroso, the first of the 5 cities. As I got off the train, I talked a bit with some Americans who had been staying there for a week, and followed them to the old side of town at twilight. It is absolutely breathtaking. I walked up a pathway which goes up a cliff overlooking the city and took some great photos, which I’m sure hundreds of thousands of people have already taken. At least now I have a copy. It was so beautiful that I began to cry. I could have sat there for a day… but I didn’t.
I was considering spending more time there, at least dinner, maybe getting a hotel room. But, trying to find dinner was near impossible, as everything was closed. Hmm… maybe this place isn’t for me after all. I can’t even find a place to eat at 7:30pm. So, I hop on the next train to get myself to Florence. And, here I am. I met a girl who goes to school in Albany, and we may go to Venice together if things work out right. I may want to spend more time in Florence than she would like to, though, so we’ll see. This hostel is full of people, and the walls are filled with much-welcomed grafitti. I hear Espanol all around me, which is comforting. Part of me can’t wait to get back to Spain… then I remember I’ll have Catalan to listen to, not Castillano. I’ll live.
Now that I’m in Italy, I can eat all of the pasta and pizza I want and not feel bad for doing so.
If there is one thing common around the globe, it is pigeons.
Ciao.
Barcelona & Nice
So… I’m in Europe. I knew this was coming, but it wasn’t real until I got out of the airport in Barcelona. Then, it REALLY settled in when I woke up and was still in the same place, confirming I wasn’t dreaming.
Much detail could be gone into about the voyage… but all in all it went smoothly. I didn’t end up in Australia and I kept all of my baggage. There was a slight delay on my last flight, and a family of 4 sitting a row ahead and to the left of me had some very bad hygeine problems that caused many on the plain to gag. I left my bags with another Arcadia student, Eleanor, and got myself a hostel not too far from her place and the station.
We had made tentative plans to go out that Friday night, but I just slept and woke up at 5am to go to the train station and head to Nice, France.
The trip to Nice is surprisingly long and requires 2 transfers. 12 hours on a train! Look at a map… they’re really not that far apart. Japan has forever spoiled my train experiences. Nothing will ever again compare. On the plus side, I met a nice Canadian couple who now live in France, and we hung out a bit and sat by each other on the train to Avignon, then went our separate ways.
Finally, I got to Nice. At the train station, I couldn’t find anybody who could (willingly) speak English. This surprised me, not that I expect them to speak English in France, but because this is quite the tourist town. You would think they would hire multi-linguals for information booths. Somehow through gestures and latin roots I was able to get some kind of directions to my hostel… if I could even call it that at that point, considering I hadn’t even called to see if rooms were available. The EU has made it really easy to travel between countries. Calling between countries, however, remains quite expensive and confusing. On that note.. since my parents probably won’t read this… somebody call them and tell them what’s going on.
Last night was fun. I went to a Chinese restaurant because it was so late. The food was good, and I ordered a Rose table wine that was excellent… only 0.80 Euro for 2 glasses worth. Yum. I then went to a dance club and stayed out until 5:30am… fun stuff.
Oh, that reminds me. Europe works on standard college time. Wake up late, dinner at 10pm… go to bed at 2am. If you stay up late, then you’re watching the sun rise. I think I’ll like this. Tonight, though, I’m heading in early.
Nice is a beautiful city. The people can be hit or miss on friendly or spiteful. I went to some ruins today, walked around the Mediterranean along the promenade des Anglais to watch the sun set. There is also a contemporary art museum. They had a pitiful display of Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol and Rothko which hardly represented the actual styles we’ve come to know and hate by them all. At the top of the museum is a buch of very oddly shaped terraces which you can walk around. I watched an intersection for a while, and some chaos that insued over a car trying to make too sharp of a left turn. No damage occured, not even any form of contact, but everybody got out of cars yelling at each other on who should be moving where (in French, making it even funnier for whatever reason. I guess French is just not a harsh sounding language).
I suddenly became really sad standing way up there watching down on the city. Part of me feels like I want to be a part of this city, country, continent. Then a realization that I never could be and never was was just overwhelming. I’ll be seeing so many great places that I’ll never truly be a part of, but certainly wish to be. I wish I knew all of the language and customs. There is just no time… no way. Not in the short spans that we are given on Earth. Sobeit. I’ve decided that for now I am a ghost watching a live history book, that is, until I get back to Barcelona.
Bonsoir
Año Nuevo
So this is the new year, and it might be the first one where I actually feel different. This change is not just a tick of a clock and the rolling of the year’s least-significant digit. This year actually marks yet another new era in my life. William wrote about era shifts in his own live-journal, something that was heavily based on a thread of e-mails that he, Derek, Matt and I had shared.
2001 was the mark of graduating from High School and moving on to a new city, a new school, new life, new friends. 2001 was the mark of an era shift, and a good one at that.
2006 marks yet another new era. In 4 days, I will be leaving the country for a fairly extended period of time. I had a feeling that this wouldn’t make itself entirely apparent to my conciousness until after new-years-eve, and I was right. It hit me fast and hard. Out with the old, in with the new. Gone with the home-country and friends, in with the unknown and foreign.
5 months from now, I will be back here. By “here”, I don’t mean here where I sit (Ohio), but here in Rochester. However, it will not be back to the regular Rochester routine. I will not be taking any more classes of Computer Engineering. I will not be starting yet another co-op at Harris. I will not be sitting at Java’s attending weekly Spanish Hours. Instead, I will have yet another large era shift – graduation. This period should get its own year. Let’s call it 2006.5
Shortly thereafter will come yet another whirlwind to my life. Moving to Texas will be something exciting, interesting, and yet sad. I’ve spent so much time developing lives in Ohio and Rochester, and will have spent a relatively shorter but intense amount of time doing the same in Spain. All of that effort will hopefully prove itself worthwhile. My close friends will filter themselves out from the aquaintances. This is a natural progression, and I expect that I will be able to handle it, though it will be difficult.
If anything is comforting, it is that Austin may mark the first time in my life where I could see myself actually settling. It is early to tell, of course, since I’ve not even lived there yet. However, from a purely logistical standpoint, I’ll have completed high-school, my undergraduate studies, and done my long-desired study abroad. There really isn’t anything requiring a relocation from Austin, so long as things go smoothly with AMD (and I expect they will). It is somewhat relieving to finally see that option of settling down somewhere. Who knows, though. Maybe I never will. Maybe I’m a nomad at heart.
Whatever the far future holds, 2006 will be a year who’s face will stand out above the crowd. It is a year I look forward to and dread simultaneously. It is a year which I will look back upon and relive the moments which I have yet to sculpt from the material we call time.
