My Last Post.... Written in December: Posted a Month Later

(Written Dec. 18^th)

The past two weeks have been a blur, hell the past six months have been a blur when I stop to think about them.

Eleven Countries in 133 days is no small feat! In order I have visited: France, South Africa, Italy, Scotland, Germany, Turkey, Greece, Croatia, Denmark, Spain and Belgium. (Technically I was also in Switzerland, Austria and the Netherlands, but since I only passed through I don’t’ feel right counting them.)

Now on my 19^th of 20 individual flight segments, (yes, I went back and counted) I find myself in the bulkhead row of business class on Air France. Unfortunately my in-flight entertainment seems to be on the fritz so I thought now would be a good time to blog about my most recent adventures.

I spent the last two weekends in Florence after nine weekends on the road. I could have made a trip to Austria to go skiing with some people from my Italian class but 500 euro was just too steep for my dwindling budget. After completing my finals last Thursday I finished packing my two enormous suitcases, which combined weighed in at exactly 116 pounds according to the scale at the airport this morning.

   Thursday evening I said my goodbyes and with the help of one roommate we each heaved my luggage down four flights of stairs and waited for my cab. Slightly stressed out, I had less than 20 minutes to spare when I arrived at the Santa Maria Novella Station for my night train to Paris.  When I got inside I saw on the reader board that my train was delayed by 55 minutes. On the one hand I didn’t need to worry about missing the train or rushing to get all my bags on. On the other hand, S.M.N is an open-air station so waiting around in the low 30s for over an hour wasn’t exactly ideal.

After getting some help lifting my bags onto the train I very slowly and clumsily drug and pushed and heaved and shoved all of my crap down the narrow corridor on car number 96, until I reached my ‘sleeper couchette’ (more like sardine can.) Once I got inside the compartment, not only was it pitch black, my bags were too wide to fit in the aisle, too heavy to lift onto the storage racks and there was already someone asleep in the compartment with me. Frustrated and not wanting to disturb the sleeping lady, I finally ended up with the two suitcases balanced on top of each other in the aisle, I was on my ‘bed’ spooning the top suitcase, (to keep it from falling over) with my backpack under my feet and my trench coat as a blanket I thought to myself, this is going to be a long night. Soon after there was a knock on the door, the conductor needed to check my ticket and passport, but of course I didn’t realize he would be taking my passport with him overnight so I sat there stupidly with the door wide open, waiting for him to return, until the sleeping lady kindly informed me I would get my passport back in the morning. Now that I knew she was awake and in good spirits I quietly went about stuffing my bags under the bed properly and located some bedding. Finally comfortable I drifted off into sleep as our train headed to Paris.

Sometime in the middle of the night, my beauty rest was interrupted. A man attempted to break into our compartment but thank goodness the lady with me sprung into action and yelled in Italian for him to get lost. At the time I really didn’t know what was going on, but the next morning when we were given back our passports the conductor informed us that a man had been trying to break into compartments to pickpocket guests, with the aid of some kind of tranquilizer to sedate his victims. Apparently this isn’t an uncommon occurrence either. The lady in my compartment explained what had happened to us during the night and confirmed his description with the conductor. Needless to say the night train to Paris is straight ghetto in my opinion, and I couldn’t have been happier to be leaving for the U.S. in less than 24 hours where gypsies don’t interfere with my daily life.

After schlepping my bags off the train, I caught a cab to the Sheraton at the Charles De Gaulle airport. There I enjoyed the comforts of wifi, room service, the elliptical machine in the gym, a movie (Inception) and a spacious bed with no fear of pick-pocketing-gypsies disturbing my sleep.

After checking out the next morning all I had to do was roll my suitcases down to terminal 2E where I checked in for my flight to Chicago and now here I am, still pissed about my lack of in-flight entertainment but grateful for the ample leg room, reclining seat and free drinks.

I know the post is getting a bit long, (and lacks photos) but seeing as it will likely be my last on this particular subject bear with me a little longer as I reflect briefly on the past 133 days.

Obviously Africa is in a league of it’s own. Words still escape me when I try to describe the beauty of Cape Town and our trip to the Cape of Good Hope. I still am baffled when I look at a map a realize how far away South Africa is, and that I actually went there. As for the safari, nothing can really hold a candle to spending hours every day photographing wild animals, especially fluffy little cheetah cubs. I will have those memories for a lifetime and I would love the chance to do it all again.

As for Europe I feel I can’t compare my trips because it would be like comparing apples to oranges. I have a feeling I might get the question, “what was your favorite place/trip?” when I get back and I honestly don’t have an answer. I can’t compare a weekend alone in Scotland with a student tour to the Amalfi coast just like I can’t compare a cruise with my parents to my weekend in Copenhagen and Sensation white. I’m not saying every single moment was sheer awesomeness because of course there were some low point along the way. Lows points came in the form of things like getting food poisoning in Munich or getting swimmers itch in Cinque Terre. Not ideal situations but they weren’t deal breakers either.

   I know I should be having deeper thoughts on my study abroad experience as a whole and everything I have learned from it, but truthfully I haven’t emotionally reached that point yet. (Probably because I am still mad I can’t be watching the new Wall Street during this stupid flight!) Right now all I want is to make it back to Seattle with all my baggage accounted for. I want to spend the holidays with my family and friends and I will worry about the next chapter of my life when I am ready to. Right now I don’t feel that living abroad has had any major impact on the person I am but I don’t think I can make that assessment until I have spent some time adjusting to life back home.

As for the future of my blog… I must admit I only began this as a way to keep friends and family updated about my adventures without sending an annoying amount of emails every week. However, I have to say I have thoroughly enjoyed documenting my travels and I could see myself continuing to blog in the future assuming my life will still be interesting enough that I want to talk about it.

 Ciao Ciao!