I’m now in Bern, staying at my dad’s classmates brothers house. Been here for only a few hours but had to use the PC super badly to transfer my pictures to my iRiver.
There’s a lot of things to recap. *Takes a deeeeeeeeep breathe* Let’s hope I don’t get bumped off this pc before I’m done recapping everything.
Side note, Bern is a Swiss-German area of Switzerland, and the keyboard I’m using reflects as such. The “Z” is replaced with the “Y” and the punctuation is ALL OVER the place. I’m typing like a turtle. Ergh. On the other hand, I’ll try to upload some pictures if I can! Oh, and the blasted “!” is not where it’s supposed to be. My fingers are very twitchy by this start-stop movement that I have to go through to type something.
So after that previous post, we went to have a supposedly free dinner at one of the staff’s friend’s workplace which happens to be a bar called Chequers Pub. Managed to persuade the 2 boys to join us (Mark and Blain - Blain was our roomate and was occupying Carol’s upper bunk during our stay in David Inn, find his travel blog in my links) and found out that dinner was just a way to get the people to drink more as salt was used very liberally in the preparation of the food, but it was a decent spread with choices of pasta, sausages, meat, bread, and the likes.
After dinner, we all walked a few KM to Piazza Michelangelo which included a good hike up the mountain side via “stairs” that would bring us to a beautiful sweeping view of Florence at night. Blaine and Mark were good walkers and the 3 of us were huffing and puffing after the 3rd landing. Or at least me with my heavy camera. Hung out at the top for a bit when we went back down again and retired for the night.
Woke up early next morning to catch the train to Pisa. The layout of Pisa’s most captivating sights were located about 20 minutes walk straight north from the train station’s exit. Very straightforward and found the leaning tower with no problems. The 3 main sights for Pisa, aside from the leaning tower, are the cathedral and the baptistry, ALL leaning. The area that they’re all located in is called “Campo dei Mircoli” or loosely translated as Miracle Square in English. Took the pictures, walked the grounds of Campo dei Mercoli and saw many many many couples making out on the grassy area near the baptistry. Sigh. These Europeans.
On the way back, we stopped by a bar for some Macchiato, and stopped by an internet cafe for some cheap internet and printing. Oh, and if you ever need to print something in Italy, the exact name for “Printing” is called “Stampa”. I found that out after a long game of charades with the shop owner. I couldn’t find anything that remotely looked like a printer in the shop, but it did have a fax machine, and a few photocopying machines. And I chose the fax machine because it looks most like the regular household printer.
Me: *Points at fax machine and does a paper coming out of machine movement* “Printing? Print? Print machine???
Shop owner: *Looks puzzledly at the fax machine* *Points at fax machine* “…. Fax…”
Me: -_-”
(Note to those who have no idea what -_-” means… -_-” is a smiley for *sweat*)
After awhile, I kinda gave up, paid her for 15 minutes of internet, and then accessed my email and just clicked on Print. I use PCs often enough to know exactly what the button location is in English, so good thing for that as most pcs there are all in the local language.
After printing out the hostel confirmations, we went on our way back to Florence. A garden was recommended by one of the staff at David Inn and we walked and walked to reach it. Just to find out that it was a private garden and inaccessible. So we walked back and rested for the rest of the day. That’s when we met Doug and Steve (2 Canadians) who were munching in the kitchen at David Inn. Another American guy who was our roomate who I forgot the name shared his champagne that he bought in Venice with us. It was FANTABULOUS! And this coming from ME, that champagne was really something. I can’t remember the name either. So all is lost. Boohoo.
May 10, Tuesday.
Took the eurail to Venice the next morning, and arrived at about 11.40am. Took the Vaporetti to the Zittele stop to check in to our hostel. The Vaporetti is the equivalent of a bus in every other city, only that it’s a boat that goes up and down the watery streets of Venice. There are also cabs in the “streets”, only that they’re boats too. The only thing that they don’t have a city equivalent of are motorcycles. I don’t know why, but I think zooming up and down the “streets” in a jet ski is pretty cool. Maybe it’s just not feasible. *shrugs* Oh, and they have speed limits as well.
Venice would be the first time that we would be staying in a HI hostel and err… I don’t have that good an opinion of it. Most of the HI hostels are really clean, and have breakfast, and cheap meals and all that jazz, but it’s just so soulless. Unlike the other 2 places that we’ve been staying in… And it was considerably blander after the great people we met at David Inn… The David Inn people were so cool! The check in time was only from 2pm, and we were there at abuot 1.30pm. We had lunch at a nearby cafe, took some pictures, then went to line up and check in at Ostello Venezia. Somehow, we always seem to be grouped with other Asians (who by the way, do NOT speak English) and they’re never sociable. The dorms were also unisex, girls on one block, and boys on another. There were plenty of toilets, but there were no charging outlets. Perhaps they’re afraid that we would hold a barbecue up there and burn the whole place down or they were just cutting down on electric bills. Whatever the excuse, it wasn’t cool with me at all. I needed to charge my handphone and my iRiver badly. Pooh.
After unpacking, we caught the vaporetti across to the other side to Piazza San Marco, which is the must-see place when visiting Venice. We passed by the Bridge of Sighs, which according to legend/history, was the bridge where prisoners crossed over from the prison over to where they get beheaded, and the bridge has a window where they get to see their last glimpse of daylight and that’s when they go “sigh” before they went *chop*. We got to go in to the Doge’s Palace and the Bridge of Sighs is part of the palace. The Doge was Venice’s Grand Duke who holds the equivalent position as our Agung of Malaysia. Like a King, he makes certain decisions, but everything else is done by a governing body like a Senate or a Parliament.
Doge is not actually a name, but a title. We went in after walking around St. Mark’s Square (and swatting away a lot of pigeons while we’re at it) and taking in the Basillica that was next to the Doge’s Palace. The palace has been turned into a museum housing all the treasures that the Palace has been hoarding over time. The weaponery gallery was AMAZING. And they maintained the look of Palace as olden times, and we got to admire the “keterlampauan-ness” of the super rich. Some rooms had this ceiling that was like an art gallery that would put the Sistine Chapel to SHAME. Of course it was no Michaelangelo, and the artwork was just alright, but the amazing thing about it was HOW it was all done. The paintings on the ceiling were accompanied with super elaborate wood carvings gilded with GOLD.
We went in one room, and it was the first of 4 rooms with the gilded rooftop decorations. It was a decently sized room but it raised my eyebrows when I first went in. Then I went in to the next room, and my mouth mouthed “whoa”. Then I went in to the third room, and my jaw dropped. I thought 3 was it, but I went in to the 4th room, and was totally floored. I think I exclaimed out loud “WALAUehhh!!!!”.
Ya see, these 4 rooms were the “reception room”, “meeting room”, “senate room” and the “grand room” thing. You see one, and you just can’t imagine another room that can be more elaborate than the previous room. Well, after that was the weaponery room and then we crossed the Bridge of Sighs, and that was one of the most enjoyable museums we have visited.
The weaponery room was cool because it showcased weapons of different times, different races, and different sizes and different killing methods. If you go to Venice, I would say see this over the Grand Canal if you had limited time.
We bought a travel day pass and decided to get our money’s worth, and caught a bus that goes up and down the Grand Canal. Much cheaper than forking out 60 odd euroes for the Gondola where they commit daylight robbery to take advantange of all the tourists wanting to recreate what they see in movies. The Vaporettis are freaking expensive. A trip may cost anywhere from 3euros to 9.50euros and that is, I repeat, PER TRIP. Venice is expensive, period. Which is why we went back to our soulless hostel for a cheap dinner. You pay 9euros for a starter (normally a pasta dish of some sort), then a main meal (choice between fish or pork), an apple, and a drink.
Then we did some laundry at a fully automated laundromat. It freaked us out when we found out that the doors would close 11.30pm automatically, but we didn’t know that at first because the times listed on the door was 10.30pm and we were still washing our clothes at 10.25pm and still needed to use the dryer which would take another 30 minutes after that. Then of course we found the warning lights which would light up and show the status of the laundromat. 10.25pm would be the last time you can start doing laundry, 10.50pm is the last time you can start using the dryer. We placed the fast assed Frommers guide to block the door just in case the door would slam shut on us. I could have paid 2 euros for 15 minutes of internet, but I didn’t want to after finding out the price in Pisa (1 euro for 1 hour).
May 11, Wednesday.
Next day, we had a nice time sorting out our schedule. *sighs* We woke up and had breakfast, and the plan was to leave our luggage at the train station, and then spend our time at the Rialto street market before catching our midday train to Genova. BUT. When we went to train station, and were just checking out when our train would depart, we saw a notice that said TrenItalia would be going on strike on the day we would be travelling from Genova to Milan (Thursday 9pm to Friday 9pm). So we ended up lining up for information and trying to sort out the schedule to see how it would work out.
Our plan according to our schedule was suppose to be travel to Genova on Wednesday, then go visit Monaco-Nice on Thursday morning/afternoon, go to Milan in the evening, then catch the Milan-Barcelona train at night and arrive in Barcelona the next day on Friday morning.
That would be the start of the 3 day headache and panic. But because I’m typing this out now, it all worked out just fine. But huhuhuhu… At THAT time… -_-”
We went to the info counter at Venice, and asked if our train from Milan to Barcelona would be cancelled on Thursday. When we were lining up, we were saying that we would already be on the train before 9pm, so chances are, it won’t be cancelled. But we lined up just to check anyhow. And still at this time, we weren’t familiar with train procedures and we learned tons of stuff about the TrenItalia and the Eurail pass. We bought the 2month Eurail pass thinking that it would save a lot of cash, but then my sis was asked to pay 20Euros on one of the trains that we were on going from Rome to Florence. Before this, we thought it was just going to be ALL FREE with the Eurail pass. So my sis was suitable pissed about this because later we met up (she has the 1st class Eurail pass and Carol and I have the 2nd class Eurail pass) and then we were very suprised that she was asked to pay 20euros.
We LATER found out that we were on the ritzier Eurostar train which requires a reservation to get on and if you have Eurail, you “just” pay an upgrade fee of 12euros irregardless of how far the train is travelling, and you pay that as long as its a Eurostar train. And if you were on that train and had no reservation, you would be charged 20 euros.
That was just one of the many soon-to-come discoveries. Like when we got to the info counter to ask about the Milan-Barcelona train, we found out that the train runs on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays ONLY. Problem number #1 surfaces. We were supposed to go on Thursday and have already made the booking for the hostel. That’s problem #2. What to do about the lodging. Then.. Our schedule is knocked off by a day and also we were facing some problems with our lodging in Bern. Which of course, worked out because we’re here. But BACK then…. -_-” That was problem #3. Then the information lady told us that a reservation was COMPULSARY for that train, and we can’t book it from Venice, and we should try it when we get to Milan. But unfortunately, the train from Venice to Genova which stops off at Milan, would only give us 5 minutes to get off the Venice train, and run over to the Genova train in Milan. No time for making bookings. That was problem #4.
And we still wanted to go to the Rialto market. Problem #5. How to solve our problems so that we can go to the markets. In the end, after a lot of thinking of possibilities, we ended up with scheduling to go to Genova and then stay an extra night and use that time to see Genova. That would give our Bern lodging a bit more time to confirm with us. I rang up Sun & Moon hostel in Barcelona and requested a change in our arrival date, which worked out fine. And then we went to the Rialto markets. Bought a few items here, including an Italia tshirt, and some souvenirs.
Went on the train, and was thinking of what would happen if the Bern lodging turns up negative. Mom suggested a change of location to go to Strasburg in France to give more time to the Bern location as that could still be a yes, and we didn’t want to pass up at a chance of any offers for free lodging. But we really preffered to stay on course as finding out how to get to Strasburg would require a ton of schedule reworking and might mean a few different “special” trains which require “special” reservations which would equal to more money spent. At that time, we still didn’t know the cost of reserving on the overnight trains. We thought it would still be the 12 euros as it was a “special” train.
Anyway, we got to Genova just fine. And the journey to our 2nd HI hostel location was interesting. I think ALL HI hostels are located out in the sticks, therefore the cheaper prices, but then you have to take in the account the price paid for travelling. Anyhow. Genova didn’t have much choice. So not really grumbling about that. And we did get a nice view of the city. (That was how far it was from the city. It was up in the mountain and all. Lucky thing Genova is a pretty dull place.) We arrived at about 8pm as there are 2 train stations in Genova, one is the main train station, and that’s called Genova Piazza Principe, and the other is called Genova Brignole which is located in town. We needed to get bus #40 from Genova Brignole (we could get it from PP, but we didn’t know what bus number was from there). All that basically educated us on the Bus workings in Genova.
Arrived at the hostel about 8pm (bus journey up took about 1 hour - made tons of stops along the way up) and just unpacked, showered and slept. Oh, that was before hogging one of the toilet power outlets and plugging up all our chargers to charge our badly under-energized equipment.
May 12, Thursday.
Woke up at the crack of dawn, and then went to Monaco. Language in Monaco is mostly French and the tourist information answered us with “absolutely nothing” when we asked what was there to see in Monaco. But she circled an area which could be “of interest” that we could visit in about an hour or so of walking. That area she circled was called Place du Palais. I didn’t really understand much of what that area was about, just that it was up in a hill and there was a nice view. We could see the F1 track and took some pictures of the view from the top. Monaco is a very clustered up seaside town. Oh, and the “seaside”, hmm.. Well, in Malaysia, when we say seaside, you will automatically imagine a beach and then sea. Beach of course is made out of SAND. But for Monaco and Nice, beach = rocks. But Monaco, being all rich and everything, got sand imported in and they have a very dismal strip of beach if you call it a beach. Nice on the other hand, which we went to see after Monaco, does not have that kind of moolah to spend on finely grounded rocks which we get naturally, so they have a beach of pebbles.
I can honestly say, that if you ran on the beach, and fell… the chances of you getting a concussion is quite high. Or if you kicked or threw sand into someones eye, you’ll get some SERIOUS shiner. A “grain of sand” is about the size of my palm. Some smaller, some bigger. There’s a whole variety of “sands” sizes. This seaside area was called the Baie des Anges (Bay of Angels in English).
I had a nice lunch in Nice, but not Jasz and Carol as they ordered something else. We ate at Atmosphere Cafe, and I had a 16.50 euro set meal that had a starter (I chose gnocchi with a tomato base), a main meal (grilled LAMB!!!!!) and a desert (cream caramel). Damn that lamb was goooooood. Jasz and Carol ordered a Nicoise Salad (as that was the specialty in Nice) and shared a Napolotine Pizza. It was both SALTY. Mine was great. *beam*
Ah, and we come to another interesting section. We wanted to catch the last possible train to maximize our time in Nice. So we HAD to make the train. NO MATTER WHAT we HAD to catch it. Unfortunately, we wanted to see the Le Chateau that was on a hill and it had a nice view of Nice. THere was 2 ways of going up that hill. Walk up the stairs OR pay 1euro to use the elevator. Guess which I chose. Jasz went with my choice and Carol said that she’ll do the hike. So we said we’ll meet up there, and then went up. HOWEVER. When you’re downstairs and you look up, it seems like there’s only one way of going up, but once you get to a certain landing, the stairs just start to branch out EVERYWHERE. And each set of stairs would lead to a different area. So when we went our seperate ways, we though that there would be just one set of stairs to meet up at.
Long story short, we lost Carol. Carol is our official timekeeper, accountant, and scheduler. Good thing I kept asking about the time that we’re supposed to catch our train as I kept forgetting it, and even then, I could just remember to be at the station BEFORE 6pm. The train would leave at 6 something, but I remembered be at the station before 6pm. We lost each other at 5pm when we went our seperate ways. We wandered around and took pictures up there while keeping an eye out for carol. There were a few different landings and areas up there, and it was apparent that we must have been on seperate ends looking for each other. At about 5.25pm, we were on the highest platform and shouting down random stairs for Carol. “Caroooolllllll!!!!!”… *waits”…. no response.. Okay, next set of stairs… “CAROOOOLLLLLLL!!!!!!”….. nothing….
We were geting a lil worreid as it was nearing the 5.30 mark. And the walk to the beach from the station was QUITE BLOODY LONG and it took about 25 minutes. So we kinda agreed we would wait till 5.30, and then would start going to the station. 5.30 came. We didn’t find Carol. So we started looking for the elevator. But because that area up there is kinda big and the signs and maps are 100% USELESS, we lost the entrance to the elevator. We found it about 10 minutes later, after circling the area a few times and going down a few set of stairs and then back up again… I kept looking at my watch the whole time…
We got downstairs, looked down the long straight road that we would have to walk half the distance of, then make a turn and then walk a LONGER distance back to the station. We didn’t see a small asian girl ANYWHERE.
-_-”
I was SURE Carol would find her own way to the station. So we went on our own way. 5.45pm. We’ll have to run. I can’t run. Not when we’ve already walked so much and especially not with the pouch and the camera of mine. Need I also mention that I’m unfit. My sis on the other hand.. Has been keeping relatively active the past few YEARS.
So she walked fast, and I tried to walk fast, jogging occasionally so as not to completely lose sight of her. And of course I knew the consequences of NOT making the train. We HAD to make the train NO MATTER WHAT. There would be no other alternatives. NONE. Well, there’s taking a bus, but that would take 6 hours or MORE and there’s a curfew at the hostel that is set at 11.30pm. And besides, Carol was having my Eurail pass. So making the train depended on how fast I could carry myself to the station.
Nice was doing roadworks at that time oso lah. So the pedestrian walkway was reduced to 2 lanes, enough for people to walk on the left and right, one for “to” and the other for “fro”. The roads will occasionally widen a wee bit to allow 3 people. My sister, who was way in front of me, was MOWING people down. Only slowing for the older people, which on that day, seemed to be EVERYWHERE. She would check back occasionally, and I would see her do that, and I would weakly wave my hand in the air to signal her to keep going. As I knew that when it would come down to it, she would hold the train no matter what.
*phew* Thinking about it makes me wonder how we made that walk and caught the train just in time. My sis went into the train station about a minute earlier than I, and when I finally staggered in to the station, I saw her and Carol talking. In the end, we made the train by about 2 minutes to spare. We were the last ones to get on that train. That was how close we were to missing that train.
Turns out later after swapping stories with one another, Carol WAS looking for us at the opposite ends of the place. She left for the station earlier than we did. But it all worked out in the end.
-_-”
Went back to the hostel in the end at about 10.30 and slept early. We had the earlier mentioned problems in the back of our minds the whole time.
May 13, Friday.
Friday the 13ths have been pretty kind to me before this. BUT NOT TODAY! Remember I mentioned the strike that would start on Thursday 9pm to Friday 9pm? Yep. So the train that we normally take from Brignole to Principe takes only 2 minutes, and the bus would take about 15 minutes. We haven’t taken the bus before this, so when we got to Brignole, we saw that ALL trains were cancelled. Great. So we found the tourist info and found out how to take the bus to Principe. We HAD to do this to get an estimate of what time we’ll have to leave our hostel to make our train to Milan, and then the following train from Milan to Barcelona. Also, we wanted to find out if our train to Milan was still on. Turns out, it would be the ONLY train to Milan. But no matter, according to Carol, our scheduler, we would have ample time.
Oh wait. I’m getting ahead of myself. The tourist info at Brignole told us to get bus 14 to go to Principe and it would only take about 10 minutes. We got on bus 18, and ended up in god knows where after 25 minutes of travelling. The bus did NOT pass by Principe at ALL. We got off, and tried to find out where the heck we were. We asked some people where Principe station was, and all we got was a LOT of Italian back with a lot of pointing.
-_-”
We decided to get the same bus back, then we saw the map and noticed that we could stop somewhere near the Principe station, plus a 5 minute walk. After reaching Principe, turns out the tourist info lady gave the wrong info about the bus, and it was bus 28 and not 18. *sigh*
Half our Genova day was soon gone and we were there, lining up and running back between tourist info and travel agency and train information and train ticketing counters, and etc trying very very hard to book that damn ticket to Barcelona. After one hour of asking a billion people about our tickets, it was concluded that there was absolutely NO way to book the ticket, and that we could try to do that at the Milan station when we get there, and we MIGHT be able to buy the ticket on board, but no one was sure of that. We got a few “no you can’t buy on boards”, and a few “I dunnos” and a few “you mights”. But one thing was certain, that damn reservation was a MUST. Well, after looking at our schedule, we did have an hour after reaching the station to try and get the ticket. We’ll just have to see how that will turn out. Of course, need I mention again that the trains only run on Monday, Wednesday and on Friday?? And there’s only ONE time that it will run on those 3 days.
-_-”
Well, nothing we could really do about that, and we were told that a few thousand times as well. So we got the hint and went to sightsee Genova. Whatever little we could. We wanted to see the aquarium which was apparently the biggest in Europe, but that chance has long gone.
Oh! And the transport system in Italy works on this honour system where you buy tickets and you validate that ticket in this punching machine which timestamps your ticket. But we noticed that NO one does that. Then again, maybe they have monthly passes or year long passes. But even if you get daily passes, you don’t have to timestamp. So all day in Genova, we were timestamping that same damn ticket all day. If you’re caught, you get fined 40 euros or something like that. We were kinda frustrated about the whole train thing already and we weren’t about to pay more money for something which we can get away scott free for.
Of course, I had a perfectly valid ticket sitting in my pocket which I would use when I go to the station later today, and if anything were to happen, I can always flash that ticket instead. But as we expected, nothing did happen.
Anyway, we basically saw a lot of Genova on the bus when we travel back and forth, and I can close my eyes now and imagine roughly the bus route of bus #40 because we used it so often within those 2 days we were there.
So after that Principe fiasco, we went on to check out an interesting market that was set up opposite the station. Carol bought a musical bracelet for 1Euro, to her absolute delight. I just perused, but nothing caught my fancy. After, we had lunch at the station in a fast food pizza place called Pizza & Vizi. Then we caught a buy to an area called San Lorenzo and saw the house that Christopher Columbus grew up in. We saw some other stuff like a fountain and a shopping area in the main area of town and a church.
Doug (one of those Canadians that we met at David Inn) mentioned that his mom called her trip to Italy could be summarized to “many bus trips to ABC”. ABC = Another Beautiful Church. Every town in Italy will have an ABC. Genova was no different.
We were just killing time till 3 so that we could take the bus back up to Ostello Genova (or Hostel Genova) and collect our bags. They allowed us to leave our bags there for free, but they will be lcosed from 1 till 3.30 for cleaning. So we wouldn’t be able to collect it till after 3.30pm. We wouldn’t pass up an oppportunity to save money, or at least Carol wouldn’t, so we saw that we COULD actually leave our luggage there till 3.30 and then use their toilets one last time to pee (as opposed to paying 0.50euros to use the toilets in the station), and then go on our way.
We also met 2 nice people there, one a Brazillian girl who we met on the day before this, and she was telling us about how she was caught up in a station because of the strike and she gave me her metro schedule of the Barcelona metro trains. I didn’t catch her name though. And we met David on the way down to the Brignole in the morning who mentioned that he was from Sao Paolo and how he was there for the free education (if you know enough Italian, you can sit in on classes in Genova, but you will have to pay if you want to sit for the exams). He mentioned that Sao Paolo was such a big place as compared to Genova and how after spending only 3 days there, he was already bored of Genova. He then held his head and said that he would be there for a few months. Poor guy. Genova is a pretty boring place. Even though Christopher Columbus grew up here and Genova was once a great port town thing. But that’s about all they have.
Got a little sidetracked there.
Anyway, we made it to the station with time to spare. And turns out EVERYONE who was stranded at other places, were using this Milan-bound train as their way to get to a more central station to try and catch another connecting train to another place that would bring them either to their destination, or at least closer to their destination.
*sigh*
I ended up sitting along the corridor of the train the whole way to the Milan station. I also managed to reinforce my ATS (all terrain sleeper) status by actually managing to sleep on that little seat that I had while hanging on to my bags.
It was sorta fun though.
UNTIL WE GOT TO THE MILAN STATION.
-_-”
I knew we had only one hour to find out where to buy the reservation, look for the platform, get to the platform and board our frickin train. But because Milan was THE station to be at because of the centralness of its location, train info counters were full of people who have bought tickets but no train to get on to, and other kind of dilemmas that many people were facing. We 3 split up in an attempt to try some travel agencies and ticketing counters and whatever other means to find out how and where we can get that BLOOMING reservation. I was directed to EVERYWHERE inside and OUTSIDE the station in an attempt to buy our tickets.
Time check. 30 minutes left. Check the departure board (Partenza in italian) and noticed that the train was already here! Maybe we can buy the ticket on board as all the tickets counters in the train station were closed, and of course, we were told by those ticketing counters the exact same few lines that we were told when we tried to do the same thing in Genova.
We went through the first check point. A few spanish police officers asked for our passports. We showed our passports, and then went to the midpoint of the long train where the train officers were checking tickets. A bunch of American girls were in front of us, and we noticed that they were NOT letting them go on the train without the tickets. They were showing that same Eurail pass that we have. &%#@!!!!!
20 minutes left.
-_-”
We tried our luck with another officer and he told us the same thing. We were not allowed to get on the train without reservations or tickets. We explained of course that we have been trying VERY VERY hard and that the Italian railways have been on strike and all ticketing counters were closed.
Of course, at that time, and ONLY at that time, I noticed that this was a SPANISH train. Whoop dee doo. I explained earlier that the Eurostar train is a special train and would need a reservation to get on, to which if you don’t you pay 20. We were fine with getting on the train and paying 20 because it was aboslutely DIRE that we get on this train.
Spanish train = different “special” train prices.
So after talking and begging to be let on, they were persistent and very adamant that we will not be allowed on unless we have the ticket.
-_-”
-_-”
-_-”
WONDERFUL.
So we walked back and while walking back, Carol said, “let’s get on the next carriage”. The train has got many carriages. And the train officials were only at a mid point of the train, and the first section of the train till that mid point is pretty empty and there were a few open doors. And like I said, WE NEED TO GET ON THAT TRAIN.
There was another option to this train. Pay 100 euros to catch the plane to Barcelona which would arrive roughly at the same time as the train. That wasn’t an option. Not even in the slightest.
So we glanced back, saw that the officials were checking a few other people’s tickets, and we grabbed our 10KG lugages, and shoved ourselves into the train. Found out that was the meal cart, and we went past the kitchen, and then went into the first available carriage that we saw. Time check. 15 minutes till the train leaves. We just sat there, alone, in that cart…. And of course, breaking the law or rules or whatever it is that we broke by getting on board the train without a ticket came flooding into my mind. The what ifs, and the what woulds. Will we arrive and be thrown into jail for this? Would this be how we would spend our time in Barcelona? Carol of course, was worried more about the cost of the whole thing. When I said that I would try and buy the ticket before the train left. Ran out, then ran to the train officers, asked one of em if he can just WAIT for me to buy the ticket. I NEED to be on that train, and I would buy the ticket, but the ticket line was really long. Give me 15 minutes. The guy just said okay. And I ran off.
I ran back to the ticketing counter. Panicking all the time of course, because I secretly knew no train would wait for ME. So I called Jasz up and told her to try and hold the train. I will buy that ticket.
Now, this ticketing counter was a mile long with people who have problems as well. And I queued up behind the American girls who were also denied entry to the train. Only that ALL my luggage is on board that train, and so is Carol and Jasz.
-_-”
I get a call. And Carol says that I would have to get back to the train NOW. They are leaving in 2 minutes and there’s no way the train is waiting for me. I say %&@#, and run back to the train. I hop on the first available cart and notice that it’s the first class carriage. Huhuhu. But good thing, I didn’t get stopped.
I run back to the carriage that we snuck in to, met Jasz on the way, and then went back to our carriage, sat down, and … well… -_-”
Eventful isn’t it. Stupid Friday the 13th.
So what happens you ask?
Well, we went through some possible scenarios with each other. But all those will fail if the ticketing officers that we first met are the ones that would check our tickets. There’s no way a story such as, “the cops let us on, so we just got on the first available cart”. And sure enough, the guy that comes in and knocks on the door, was one of the officers that didn’t allow us on.
………………………….
Of course it all worked out lahhhhh. The guy said that we’ll need to pay, and charged us accordingly as we would have if we bought a reservation. All that worrying for nothinggggg….
Phew. I’ve typed damn a lot trying to recall the whole day and I’ve been doing this almost all day since I got here.
Barcelona was fun. Stayed in Sun and Moon hostel but we had to lug our luggages through a maze of tunnels to get to the metro train track #3 to Liceu.
I’m cutting this short, but Barcelona won the Spanish league by drawing 1-1 on Saturday when were there. And the streets were just bursting with fanatical football fans. The atmosphere there was absolutely incredible.
Will expand on our Barcelona days later, maybe tomorrow.
Till then, auf wiedersehen.
———–
Back again to write more in an attempt to make it last a good minute of scrolling down to reach all the way to the end of this entry.
Yeah. The Sun & Moon hostel was more like a hotel-hostel. They had free internet, but the PC was crappy as all hell. It was running on Windows 98 or NT and it didn’t even have USB ports. I had to crawl and stick my head into a cupboard to find this out, which I only did because my memory cards were running low. The rooms in this place, forthwith referred to as S&M (… why? what’s wrong with the abbreviation?), are freaking HOT. Not hot like in sexy hot, but hot like in Malaysia hot, only without the humidity. The airconditioner was BROKEN and the temperature setting seemed like it was set to burn-me-to-a-crisp right before it decided to die and leave the temperature settings as it was. It was uncomfortable. That isn’t good because I go to sleep in fresh clothes that I will wear the next day. Blah. We shared the room with 6 other girls, 3 of which only spoke French, and the other two were from Canada. The other, err.. I didn’t see much of her.
So after dumping our stuff in a luggage room because the rooms weren’t cleaned yet, we went for a stroll along the main street, and that street is ever so lively. There’s tons of street buskers there, and a majority were mimes. The first one we saw was a devil who was having a cup of coffee in a McD’s street cafe, not part of the act, he was just catching a cup of coffee before he started. I should have taken a picture, only that I had my suitcase in one hand, and a backpack on my shoulder, and my jacket on the other hand, and the pouch was round my waist, which required some maneuvering to get it out. The ones we later saw came in all shapes and sizes. There was one who painted completely gold, and he added some nice shadow effects to give it the aged statue look, and he was decked in a complete Roman soldier uniform. The others were an angel, charlie chaplin, michael jackson, a demon and angel playing chess, and a few others. All very unique. It’s common courtesy to give a tip if you take photos of them, and I didn’t have enough coins to go around. Not to mention 1 euro is about RM 5…
Some other street buskers include tumblers, and they would perform on a section of the street at a time, moving down the street when they are done. They were pretty good, doing 4 tiered piramids and jumping up and down and back and forth and cartwheels and backflips and so much more.
When we got to the end of the street, we reached the pier, and then walked onwards towards the beach. Trundled around in the sand for a bit, and good thing was, this time, it was real sand and not the crummy rocks you found on the “beach” in Nice. Touched the water, it was freezing cold, took a customary photo, and then tread back towards the pavement while carefully walking around some sunbathers. Some were naked, some were not. Being Asian, I didn’t know where to look, I look ahead, and I see a naked sunbather, look to the left, naked sunbathers, to the right, naked sunbathers. And I had to look at where I was walking or I would have trodded on someone. The weather that day was superb. Sunny, with a crisp cool breeze. So the people were out in droves.
Speaking of which, I think I’m bloody dark now. And I think I have got a glasses outline on my face. Ahhhhh wellll…
Europeans like being tanned. Some are difficult to tan because they’re so white, that the sunlight just reflects off them like a mirror. But they all like to find parks and just lie in the grass out in the sun, or on a beach, and tan. They’re everywhere! I mean, I look at myself, and I compare my hands to my other tan lines, such as my belly, and HOLY MOLEY! I AM D A R K.
So yes, there are a few open grounds in Barcelona where you can find many people sitting and lounging around, soaking up the sun.
We walked till the end of the harbour, and stopped to turn around when the areas up ahead didn’t look interesting anymore. Went back and brought our luggages up to our room on the 5th floor. They had an elevator of course. That was when we found out that our room had that extra “sauna” feature. The heat was a bit much, but we unpacked, and then left shortly afterwards to hunt for dinner.
We had pita that night. I wanted to eat Spanish food, as with all the other places that we go to, just to know the culture a little better, but paella and tapas were both super duper pricey. I’m talking about 16-35 for paella, and 6 euros for a SMALL dish of tapas. The tapas normally came in a set meal, like 6 dishes for 30 euros, and etc. I didn’t want to eat it THAT much, and besides, we get some good tapas in La Bodega. Mmm.. Spicy sausages… So that’s the reason we went with pitas. It was decently cheap, and you get to stuff as much salad into your pita bread as you can.
Oh. I just recalled what we had for lunch on the first day before walking the streets. We ate at a fast food chain called Pan & Co. They serve mostly sandwiches and healthy stuff. Now, I don’t know Spanish. And there were very pretty pictures of the food. I saw what looked like a pepper steak sandwich with brown sauce. Heck. It looked damn bloody good. And that was what I ordered.
The meaty thinghy which I saw… turns out to be eggplant.
…………
I DON’T EAT EGGPLANT. Ptui! AH SPIT ON YOU!
That was a huge bummer for me. There was no brown sauce either. And it was pricey. Well, like 9 euros. I can’t afford to call another thing. No meat, no brown sauce, and replace all that with a purple icky EGGPLANT. Augh. And the sauce was from the eggplant. IT WAS SEEPING INTO THE BREAD!
Okay, I had to calm myself down. Repeat to self, eggplant is yummy. Eggplant is gooooood. Eggplant is yummy. Eggplant is good. Eggplant is yummy. Eggplant is goood. Then I tried to eat it. After each bite, swallow everything down with a huge swig of Coke. Praise Coke. Eggplant is good. Eggplant is yummy.
I think it was when I got to bite down on the eggplant, and the green pepper, was when I went YUCK. I’m no fan of green peppers either. That’s one of the reasons why I hate the chicken version of the Prosperity Burger. Why the green pepper???
I hit the breaking point when a big piece of eggplant fell out from the back of the sandwich, as well as a piece of meat. Oh yeah. The sandwich had chicken in it. The eggplant was so horrendous that I totally forgot about the meat. That’s horrible.
Anyhow. Carol said that if I pick up the meat, I’ll have to pick up the eggplant. My head screamed out “OVAH MY DEAD BODEEEEEE!!!!”. I thought about it for a little while more. And decided that I paid too much to NOT enjoy my food. So I said screw that, and de-eggplanted my sandwich and the green peppers as well, and muched on it.
Now, remember I said that the sauce was from the eggplant and it was seeping into the bread. Ew. It was too late to save the bread. I removed that as well. Ended up eating just the meat. And drinking my Coke. And finishing the fries that came with it.
Ugh. Never again.
Yeah, back to after dinner. It was a Saturday night, and all the bars had bigscreen tv’s and there were already people standing in the streets, watching the game. We didn’t know that it was going to be an important match, so we went back and sorted out of stuff and turn in early. Besides, we didn’t want to come back late and fight for the shower. There was only one bathroom to share amongst 8 girls. Sure enough, when we got back, the room was empty.