It's Not Goodbye, It's See You Later

Well, this is it. Today's my last day in Scotland and tomorrow morning my flight leaves to go back home. I’ve recently been doing a lot of reflecting. The crazy thing is, the main reason I originally thought about studying abroad was because most of my friends from Cornell were planning on going abroad and I didn't want to miss out. And I chose Scotland fairly randomly as well. I didn't know much about it, but I knew they spoke English and I'm part Scottish, so I thought why not? 

Now, I can't imagine what my life would be like without this experience. I always say that there's a reason for everything, and I believe that if I hadn't come to Scotland, my future would be very different. Even little things that happened here, like breaking my foot ended up mattering. It was the longest I'd gone without running in years, and once I was able to run again I gained an appreciation and perspective on running that I'd never had before, which led me to sign up for my first marathon! (Philadelphia, this November.) 

Summiting Ben Nevis with Owen absolutely scared the shit out of me but I also inexplicably loved it, and I predict that Ben Nevis is only the beginning of the relationship between me, Owen and the mountains.

Probably the most important revelation I had here was regarding careers. I didn't talk about my classes much, but one that I particularly loved was Environmental Pollution. It was in that class that I truly discovered how fucked up the world is. (Oh, darn it I'm trying not to curse. My grandma and her friends who read my blog thought I cursed like a sailor in the last post, so I would like to apologize for that). But in talking about the situation of the environment, I believe a strong curse word is appropriate. Basically, we needed to start caring about how dire the situation is years ago, so we're waaay behind. Anyway, I learned about a career path: ecotoxicology, which is essentially studying environmental contaminants (ie. pollution) in the soil, water and air, predicting how certain chemicals will affect us, and trying to figure out what the safe levels of chemicals are (if any!). The past year or so, I realized I wanted to study pollution but I wasn't sure how; I had no idea what job to type in a search engine for that. Now I've got my answer! So, I'm really excited to see where this new idea brings me. 

So what have I been up to these past few weeks? I spent too many hours in the kitchen, studying for finals with my flatmates which was fine; my finals went pretty well, but a side effect was that my food consumption turned into cheese, cheese flavored chips, and macaroni and cheese. 

I also did a few days of adventuring in between finals. My heydays of hitchhiking now just a thing in the past, I looked to public transport once again to rely on. I can’t say my faith had been restored. I missed an early bus I was trying to take to St. Andrews, a town an hour or two away from Edinburgh, so I had to take the train, which was twice as expensive. If you don’t know already, I am pretty frugal with my money. So you can imagine my annoyance at coughing up the dough for the train. When I finally made it to St. Andrews, I told the man at the travel center, “I’m not spending any money today. What can I see?”

The coast in St. Andrews

 The man, thank you kind sir, actually did an excellent job planning out a money free day for me. Putting me on a road as close as possible to the castle without going in, finding a free museum, wandering the golf course, exploring coastal paths, it was perfect. The train ride home was way better than the bus could've ever been. A group of guys were playing music, no less The Beatles, and that’s something we can all enjoy. A man sitting nearby was so happy that he shared a few beers with strangers sitting behind him. You don’t get that experience on a bus, do you.

 

Castle ruins

Another day, I went to this “island” which is an island half the time- you can walk there during low tide but once high tide comes you’d be stranded! Don’t worry, I didn’t end up stranded and thank god because the island was quite creepy. I’m not sure if it was the anti-Jew graffiti (which was so horrible), the broken bottles, the unmarked tent, or the building labeled ‘dangerous, do not enter.’ But after some timid wandering and a quick lunch, I was outta there! The beach back on shore was much less sketchy and I spent the rest of the day walking along the coast. And getting caught in a hail storm and hugging a tree for cover. Come to think of it, later that day back in the city center I got caught in another hail storm on a run. C’mon Scotland, really?!

 

On the way to the island

The path out to the island

Sadly, I’ve also had to say goodbye to some really amazing people who put up with me this semester. Kerry was the first of us flatmates to leave last weekend, and our last day all together was more perfect than we could have planned: shopping, free icecream, sun (a rare sighting, I know!), dinner, movies, and maybe a drink or two. I’ve said it before, but I truly got so lucky to have such wonderful flatmates. They didn’t make fun of my complete lack of cooking skills in the beginning, or the fact that I was always eating some combination of cheese, chips, and peach rings, or that I was always running out of food. Oh, who am I kidding, they thought my food habits were pretty weird. But we became so close that I didn’t mind. They had my back when I broke my foot, when I went hitchhiking and updated them with safety texts, when I went exploring without a cellphone. I really hope I get to see these girls again!

 

Our last night together

Yesterday I climbed Arthur’s Seat with Kathryn, thank gosh she was in two of my classes as we deciphered the strange Scottish academic ways together! Today I got dinner with Laura and Miren and a few others, we shared some wild and amazing nights together this semester! And even though they live in Spain, I know that this isn’t goodbye forever, it’s see you later.

This morning I went on one last run in the park around Arthur’s Seat and somewhat accidentally ended up going to the top of it to say my goodbyes. The rest of the day was spent packing, perusing used book stores, and panicking. But I think mostly everything is done and accounted for, and I am so ready to be back on US soil tomorrow!

 

Scotland at its finest

I want to thank YOU ALL for reading my blog over the past few months. I know it hasn’t been so regular, it’s been infused with curse words, and some of the posts were dreadfully long. As challenging as it’s been, I have had a lot of fun writing it and I sense that I may be blogging more sometime down the road.

Cheers,

Breann

Honest Homelessness Part 2

Day 6: “I really just want to be a caveman because they don’t have to deal with police”

For the first morning in awhile, the first thought I had when I woke up wasn’t “thank god no one found us.” We spread our stuff out to dry everything, packed and repacked our bags, and did a food inventory, all without feeling like we were about to get kicked out. Though the park that we wanted to spend the day at was only a few miles away, we were feeling pretty lazy and had had such good success hitchhiking in Croatia so far that we tried to get a ride along the way to the park. And it worked! Plitvice Lakes, which I had been anticipating most out of all places in Croatia, was surreal. We took so many pictures that even an old man, supported by his granddaughter and son (or that’s what I imagined anyway) passed us! I’m blaming David for most of it though- he’s worse than someone’s mom on prom day. But thanks to him, we did get some amazing pictures. The day was filled with waterfalls and raisins (the only food of sustenance that we had left).

We stayed at the park til closing, then hitched a ride with GP Guy (he was a doctor) and his mom. Actual age: somewhere around 30, though he could have been mistaken for a very mature frat brother. He cracked us up with hilarious stories from his childhood about throwing CD’s out the window after watching scary movies and complained that girls don’t go for nice guys anymore. Not only did he make us laugh, after overhearing us muttering about our dwindling food supply, he stopped and bought us dinner at a Croatian food hut along the side of the road in his home town, Imotski. Later, we explained to him that we were too cheap to pay for a hotel, so he took us to what he figured was the best camping spot in town- a Turkish fortress, which was apparently overlooking a huge lake that we could only just barely make out in the darkness of the night. What a guy. The spot was absolutely perfect, despite the fact that we switched tent sites three times. The first time, we heard footsteps and freaked out, and though it was only a flag waving in the wind, David was so nervous that we moved spots and got our Croatian letter explaining the hitch at the ready. Actually, I think the story goes that it was me who was so freaked out… Then, finally when we were all settled in with no thoughts of monster footsteps approaching us, it started raining. After a long debate in which we tried to muster up the energy to move by convincing ourselves that our cheap tent had essentially zero chance against the rain, we threw everything that was still outside into the tent and carried it up these winding, narrow steps praying to god we wouldn’t rip right through the thing. We selected a cave-like structure, felt for glass with our hands (there was some) and finally got to bed.

Day 7: Destination Dubrovnik 

What was the Blue Lake like in the light of day? Let’s just say that my morning pee was arguably the most beautiful pee spot I’ve had thus far. And I’ve been to some pretty beautiful places. After packing up, we wandered around Imotski, bought groceries (not enough, we ate everything all in one meal, plus the sub-par bland cheese put a damper on things) and made halfhearted attempts at hitchhiking, then got a ride with GP Guy to Split, which he had offered to us last night. Once in Split, we sat by the side of the road for awhile eating lunch, feeling more relaxed than ever about hitchhiking thanks to Brohannes. At one point, 15 or 20 cars pulled over on the side of the road and we thought we were getting surrounded by some sort of drug cartel- turns out it was only a funeral procession. But for those few minutes, I really thought we were about to get attacked by the Croatian Mob. Anyway, we then picked up another ride with Futsol Ref. I had never heard of futsol either, but apparently it’s like soccer juggling, played indoors. Basically, this guy’s life sounded awesome. He dropped us off at a restaurant on the side of a small road, but before he left bought us drinks and made us promise if he was ever in the states that we would return the favor.

 

Football stadium

The Blue Lake

The next few hours, we proceeded to get absolutely poured on and lost all shred of hope we had of making it to Dubrovnik, the southern-most city in Croatia and arguably the most beautiful one. Oh also, Dave got cheated out of 50 cents. But in Croatian money, it was a big deal (6 kuna)!  Luckily, I had just gotten a truck driver to agree to take us to Dubrovnik, so he simply glared at the cashier and ran out. This truck driver, I honestly don’t even know what to call him, ended up being our very last hitch of the entire trip. And he was probably our most favorite one of all. He gained our respect by telling some dirty Chuck Norris jokes, then later on in the ride explained that he had to pull over for about 45 minutes. It wasn’t because of any driving time restriction, it was to stop at his favorite beach, a stop he makes every time he does this drive. So there we were, with the sun setting, the waves lapping at the shore, skipping rocks and walking along the beach with a truck driver we had met only an hour or two ago. And he felt like an old friend. As Dave describes it, “he shared with us his most precious thing in the entire world.” Pretty much.

 

Skipping rocks with our truck driver friend

He dropped us off at a bridge leading to Dubrovnik, where it was pouring like mad. We knocked on the only building we could find, which turned out to be a sort of traffic control room. The only guy working, who spoke barely any English, turned out to be a life saver. He helped us find a hostel, called a cab for us, explained to the cab driver where we wanted to go, and set a price for the ride. He even showed us some of the traffic control devices. Though it wasn’t a lift, it was just as helpful, if not more.

When we first arrived at our hostel, I thought I had walked in on a family relaxing after dinner. Turns out the hostel was run out of the family’s home by an adorable older couple. We got cake and honey brandy, the next best thing to having dinner. We were exhausted and after hot showers went right to bed. And when I say went to bed I mean I actually got to sleep in a bed. A rare event in the life of hitchhiking Breann!

Day 8: Tourists at last

The shift from homelessness to touristness was nearly complete. We were clean, we had slept indoors (for the first time since London!) and we didn’t have to hitchhike anymore. As much as I missed hitchhiking already, it felt good to be on vacation. Though there were a few more illegal actions later in the day…

We spent the morning walking along the rocks next to the water (Dave’s idea), where I got 20% of the day’s cuts. Along the way, we found this unreal cave bar, it was just about the classiest thing I’d seen the entire trip. I cleaned my cuts, and more importantly we bought a milkshake. Once we wandered down to the old city of Dubrovnik, we honored our promise of swimming in Croatia and jumped off a dock. It drew up quite a crowd of old people, I guess it’s not very common plus it was still pretty frigid; two older ladies even gave us candies which was supposed to warm us up somehow? After napping in the sun to dry off we got yelled at and took that as our sign to stop sleeping and move on. Next up, breaking into the city walls! Walking the walls of the old city was something you had to pay for, I’m not sure why, but being cheap, young and able bodied, we hopped a fence (where the following 80% of cuts occurred) to get in within paying. I have to say the blood loss was worth it. The beauty of the city left me breathless, but even more shocking was the fact that we had gotten to it by spending nothing!

We had planned a wild night but instead got sidetracked by the internet and emails and life in general... I tried to be Brohannes about all my unread emails but failed miserably. On a positive note, I found out that I had gotten a research grant for this summer J

Day 9: Does it count as being homeless if all our possessions are in a shopping cart?

After another luxurious night sleeping in beds, we awoke, packed up our two backpacks worth of belongings, and headed out for one last excursion in Dubrovnik: riding a cable car up to a mountain overlooking a city. Maybe it was because of the gorgeous views, maybe it was because of the friendly couple we got wrapped up talking to, but we lost track of time up there and had to run through the city to make our bus to an island that left that afternoon. Damn you public transportation. Then, once on the bus, not only did we get yelled at for having our backpacks with us, we had to pay for said backpacks and stow them underneath. Oh, and on top of that, out of an entire bus full of people, we were the only two to get our passports checked. Clearly public transportation isn’t for us. Wait, there’s more: once the ride started, our sign which we had stored above the seats fell on a grandma! I was completely horrified and thought we were going to get kicked off the bus, so you can imagine my surprise when she replied with a smile and “it’s OK, I’m pretty tough.” That’s my kind of lady! And she turned out to be a huge help to us, telling us how long the bus stopped for each break, how the transfer unto the ferry worked, and finally once we got unto the island, which stop we needed to get off at. While Dave was busy entertaining her granddaughter, she told me about her life, how she had met her husband in Dubrovnik and how now she had retired on an island with him where they grew olives. So cool!

Anyway, she clued us in to something very important: the port that we were planning on leaving from at 6am the next morning was about 50 KILOMETERS from the main city on the island. Damn, it was a big island! Seeing as we had no intention of walking over a marathon’s distance at like 2 in the morning, we slightly changed our plans. Instead of getting off the bus in the main town, we took it across the island close to the ferry port. We didn’t arrive until the evening, so our island touring consisted of walking to a grocery store a mile or so away that we could see high up on a hill to replenish our food stock. We (I) went hog wild in the store, throwing various cookies and candy in the shopping cart before settling on 4 Kit Kat bars and a bag of cookies (I was hungry!). That night, we set up camp in a sort of farmer’s field near the grocery store and sat under the Croatian stars pigging out before heading to bed.

Day 10: Partying with the Croatians

We woke at an obscene hour, with hopes of making the catamaran out of the island. Trouble was, the catamaran left at 5:30am and we had given ourselves approximately two minutes to pack everything up. No catamaran for us. Instead, we took a ferry that left at a ‘more reasonable’ 6:15am. Since we knew (hoped) that we’d be sleeping in a hostel that night, we sadly said goodbye to our tent and left it near the side of the road in the hopes that someone who needed it would pick it up. Once on the ferry, we napped, ate sandwiches despite the fact that it was still very clearly not lunchtime, and planned out a few things to do in Split.

Upon arrival in Split, we found a hostel and showered immediately, hallelujah! Then we were off to explore the city, which consisted of napping in the sun, finding gelato, hiking up to a gorgeous viewpoint, shoe shopping, and encountering what I’d like to think of as an icon in Split, Bad Santa, so named for his big belly and white beard. We had heard that there was some sort of light festival going on that night with free food, so naturally we went to check it out. I can honestly say that after watching the parade, getting free food and drinks, listening to the band and watching the fireworks, we still had absolutely no idea what the festival was for. Better start reading up on my Croatian I guess! Another reason I wish I knew Croatian: that night at a grocery store when we were trying (and failing) to pick out drinks to buy a kindly man noticed our struggles and pointed to what was apparently the best one, amongst the laughter of the entire store.

Oh and of course, Bad Santa made an appearance that night, dancing in the moonlight and clearly loving the free food and drink.

Day 11: Home

Our last day in Croatia, sadly. We took a bus to Zadar, where our flight was leaving from. We were short about 25 kuna ($4) to buy two bus tickets to the airport, cue to act homeless once again. We tried to trade euros for kunas, but most people weren’t having it. Though one kind woman gave us her change of 5 kuna! Finally, at the brink of desperation, someone agreed to trade kunas for euros and we were able to buy the tickets.

The next order of business was giving away all our things that couldn’t be taken on the flight back home. Dave gave his knife to a kind taximan who then did a mini photoshoot of us (weird? friendly? you decide). I offered what looked like two backpackers the remains of our peanut butter and Nutella. Turns out they were about to fly too and couldn’t take it. Turns out they had just done the same charity hitchhike as us! We spent the bus ride to the airport trading stories with them about our crazy experiences. Once at the airport, we pooled all our kuna change together and had enough to buy one donut, which we split amongst the four of us. That, plus an apple, was all I had eaten that day. Also at the airport, we put our whiteboard sign to rest, after it had served us well on our journey. We split up from the other team after our flight from Croatia arrived in Somewhere in England, United Kingdom. Real name is East Midlands Airport, but who’s ever heard of that? Dave and I practically, OK fine literally, ran to a café once we landed and each bought and devoured 2 foot long sandwiches. I didn’t think I had it in me, but oh I most certainly did. We then had a connecting flight to Edinburgh where my bag got searched because I tried to smuggle/wanted to see what happened if I left my exacto knife and a more than 100 mL sized sunscreen in my bag. Livin in the edge! While the Croatian airport apparently doesn’t give a shit, the United Kingdom unfortunately does.

 

RIP, whiteboard

And after we arrived in Edinburgh, well that was pretty much it. My post hitchhiking days are certainly not as exciting. To spice things up a bit and to remind myself of my hitch days, I’ve made some questionable (according to my flatmates) snacks, most of which involve cheese and another food item that typically isn’t eaten with cheese. Finals, studying, blah blah blah snore have also been happening. Hopefully there’s more excitement in the near future!

Thoughts:

It took us 22 rides and 5 days to get the 1500 miles to Zagreb, Croatia. From there, we got 8 more rides over 2 days, taking us another 500 miles to Dubrovnik, Croatia.

On the morning we were about to set off on this trip, I woke up with the song “Home” by Phillip Phillips blasting in my ears, oddly. And on that morning I am ashamed to remember thinking, I just want the trip to be over and I want to be back home here in my room, safe. Despite the concerns from my parents, friends and boyfriend, I had assured them all that I would be fine, that nothing would happen to me. But on that morning, I couldn’t help but have a shred of doubt and think, damn I hope I’m right.

I just looked up the lyrics: 

Hold on, to me as we go/As we roll down this unfamiliar road/And although this wave is stringing us along/Just know you're not alone/Cause I'm gonna make this place your home/Settle down, it'll all be clear/Don't pay no mind to the demons/They fill you with fear/The trouble it might drag you down/If you get lost, you can always be found

Looking back, this song describes the hitchhike perfectly. Because of the kindness of all who we met, I found a home on the road, one that I love. Before this trip, I had no idea how touched my heart would be by humankind, by those who didn't know us, by some of those who couldn't even really understand us. In small ways, like mints or candies and in big ways, like driving us hundreds of miles through Europe, we were helped in some way by each and every person we interacted with. I want to thank Old Couple for being our first ride and making my start to hitchhiking a good one, that truck driver I saw with no pants who made me a bit more cautious about approaching you guys, our last truck driver for sharing with us something very special to you, Albert for taking us along a beautiful scenic road without it being creepy at all, the army wife for the lucky dollar bill you gave us, and lastly my friend David for doing this with me, and putting up with me the whole time :)

If you've enjoyed reading my blog, if you'd like to support Link Community Development, the charity I'm raising money for, or if you have a few spare dollars laying around that you wouldn't mind parting with, you can give through my website! 

Honest Homelessness* Part 1

*Term coined by David

I HITCHHIKED TO CROATIA! Many of you already know, but I had signed up to do a charity hitchhike to Croatia with my friend David. Well, we made it back unscathed two days ago (actually that’s not true, I have a few bruises and cuts but that’s another story). Despite the fact that I felt homeless every night, despite the hours we spent in the rain trying to get rides, despite the bread and cheese that we ate for nearly every meal, it was probably my favorite trip, ever. Wanna see why? Read on, my friends!

Day 1: “You’re not a couple of nutters, are you?”

After days of meticulous planning, er after one day of running around gathering random crap we thought we might need, we were off! We had looked up tips online about hitchhiking out of Edinburgh, and followed the advice we found; we took a bus (£1.50) to a petrol station right outside of town.  When we arrived, we were greeted by none other than two more hitchhikers from the same charity hitch we were doing! Since they were hitching on the side of the road, we hit up the people in the convenience store and at the gas pumps. A woman we approached couldn’t give us a ride but gave us advice, offered us tea, and wished us well. We were in high spirits already! By around 10am, we had gotten our first lift, ever, from Old Couple, an adorable British husband and wife. They told us about their grandkids and gave us mints.

The old couple!

They dropped us off at what we later realized was a luxury service station, complete with a moat-like design and fresh, locally produced sandwiches. After asking around, we got our next lift with Scottish Man, who told us about his favorite places in Scotland to visit and his love for rugby. Our third hitch of the day was with the epic Suit Guy. He was sporting sick aviators and a full suit, and when we approached him for a ride, he responded with “You’re not a couple of nutters, are you?” We immediately liked him. He was British, but living in a small town in Pennsylvania not too far from me with his wife, and on business for a week here. We argued about the benefits of snowboarding versus skiing, and he told us about his side job as a radio DJ. After he dropped us off, we had trouble getting another lift, and asked around for maybe an hour or two. Then, when our spirits were at their lowest of the day, we were saved by Hippie Couple! I think they were actually just friends, and on their way to a gig in Holland. We were offered homemade vegan energy truffles and licorice. The woman had hitchhiked her way through Europe, solo, back in the day and gave us contact info for her friends living in cities along the way to Croatia. I was fascinated that she hitched solo as a woman, and picked her brain for tips on staying safe. They dropped us off at a service station near Stanstead Airport outside of London.

Originally, we tried to get a ride right into London (Dave’s girlfriend had offered to let us sleep in her flat) but when we realized no one was going straight into London/no one was friendly enough to take us straight into London, we accepted a ride (and a chocolate bar) from an Irish couple to the airport and figured we could sleep there if necessary. Once there, we had another stroke of good luck- we begged various bus services to take us to the center of London for free and the last company we tried, EasyBus, finally agreed. Once in London, we met up with Celeste, David’s girlfriend, and (barely) convinced a bus driver to let us on for free after we explained that we were doing a charity hitchhike. That night, we pigged out on cheesy bread, took showers, and I emailed my family to let them know I was alive.

Day 2: On the fast track to Germany

We had looked up how to hitch out of London online, so we followed those directions: paid about £5 for a train, then begged our way onto a bus for free. The bus dropped us off about an hour outside of London where we then proceeded to walk a few miles through farms and on tiny dirt roads to the nearest service station. We got a ride with Kiwi Guy, a English native who lived in New Zealand for a few years with his family. He brought us to the infamous Maidstone Services, which was to become our gateway to mainland Europe. After a lunch of meat and cheese wraps with various toppings smuggled from nearby eateries, we got to work trying to find a ride. After maybe an hour, we found the golden ticket: Holland Pharma Guy, who works in pharmaceuticals and was driving through the Eurotunnel and could take us all the way to the Netherlands! We drove through England, France, Belgium, and then finally Holland, and ended up being in the car with him for over 5 hours, damn what a good ride. Our last ride of the night was with Belgian Light Fixtures Guy, who drove fast and was slightly stern, but overall harmless. He dropped us off at a service station, where we decided to set up for the night. Our goal for the day was to get to Germany, and we had made it!

Our fancy lunch

We splurged and bought dinner- McDonalds and bratwurst. After scoping out the place, our best option to set up our tent was in the woods behind the service station, near this creepy alter building thing. I was too scared to go inside, but Dave checked it out. We just prayed that no one would go there in the middle of the night and notice our tent!

Some thoughts about hitchhiking:

I felt very much like a homeless person, mainly because our success depended entirely on the generosity of others. Walking the two miles today to the service station felt so good because we were entirely in control. Though people are kinder than I expected. We’ve talked to a lot of people that don’t give us lifts but offer help in other forms: contributions to the charity, food, advice, and stories. Also, I’m very curious as to how others perceive us. Desperate? Happy? Crazy? Unintimidating?

Day 3: Fuck You, Karlsruhe

Though we woke as early as our bodies would let us, the sun was already up, a sketchy van was parked near us, and people were walking dogs all around our tent. So much for staying hidden. Our first lift of the day was with Public Health Woman, from Germany who had studied at Harvard! She gave us her contact info and wished us well. Next up, Busy Dutch Couple (they had 8 kids and a huge van for all of them). They didn’t speak much English, but we had fun making conversation with them about all their children and how old everyone was. Our next ride, Albert (actual name), was one of my favorites. He took us on a scenic route along the Rhine River. After seeing only highways, I was so appreciative to finally see what Germany was actually like. The small towns we drove through were adorable! We exchanged contact info and he kindly offered us a place to stay that night if we needed it. The service station he dropped us off at was rather small and after trying for a few hours we were about to give up when alas, we found a ride! This was with Ethanol Guy who was from Germany and had very strong opinions about not only ethanol but everything really. It might have been because we had had such a long day, but we just did not get along with him. Though we tried to explain to him that we wanted to be dropped off at a service station, he took us instead to a tiny petrol station in a town.

Where we had slept for the night

Let’s just say it was a rough night. Frantic hitchhiking attempts ensued, followed by our realization that there was no way we were getting out of Karlsruhe that night. There was creepy Charlotte, a woman who claimed to love helping lost people, “the more lost the better,” wtf does that mean?! Because we were too cheap to pay, we begged for free beds at a jugendherberge (youth hostel) and several hotels unsuccessfully, and finally came across what looked like another jugendherberge with a group of guys sitting in front of it. They said it was like a jugendherberge, but not quite. Umm… what? They had trouble explaining it in English, but we finally realized it was a college dorm! Finally, with no other options we set up our tent at the back corner of an open square, behind a gym. We wolfed down dinner inside the tent, hours too late for it to even make sense to eat. All night, we laid in mild terror, hoping that none of the drunk German guys, the dump truck unloading something in the middle of the night or the people closing up the gym would discover us. We even put out a letter in German explaining that we were doing a charity hitchhike, in the hopes that if the police came, this would save our asses.

Day 4: Brohannes

Johannes (referred to from here on out as Brohannes) was our beacon of light today. We were relieved to wake up not having been arrested. We ate a quick breakfast of one cookie each and a few raisin handfuls, then packed up all our stuff. We asked for directions at the hostel (the guy thought we had stayed there, yup. Room number? Uh… bye!). Then we walked through the city in the direction of the temple that Charlotte had told us about that supposedly you could see from everywhere. Not quite, but we eventually found it. Plus, en-route we walked amongst beautiful gardens. Karlsruhe really is charming, and I found myself cutting Charlotte some slack, as she had really just wanted us to love Karlsruhe as much as she did. The highlight of the morning (besides not getting arrested) was a little bakery we found where we replenished our bread stock and got sausage and cheese baugettes. After a long walk with futile attempts at hitchhiking, we finally made it to the gas station from last night. We tried hitching there, along the road, next to the traffic light, and at the mall with zero luck. I had a mild breakdown at a snack shack outside the mall after trying to get help from the guy who worked it and realizing he didn’t speak any English. I then proceeded to laugh until I cried (not in a good way), when the man noticed us moping around and gave us what we would like to think of as a pep talk, though he kind of just shouted to us in German so for all we know it could have meant to get the hell out. But his words were what we needed so we got up and left to try hitching at the traffic light again.

The temple

Enter Brohannes, the Hitchhiking Guru, a lanky, goofy bespectacled red head wearing a bright yellow jacket. He took one look at us, shook his head, and took our hands. Not really. But as a fellow (more experienced) hitchhiker, he led us to a better spot where he claimed it had taken him a half hour max to get a lift. There was something about Brohannes that completely calmed us, and I knew that with his help, we would make it out of Karlsruhe. Another hitcher even turned up, just a little farther down the road. “A good day for hitching” were Brohannes’ wise words, not “Oh shit, we’ll never get rides.” We only knew him for 10 minutes, but he completely changed our outlook on hitchhiking.

Here are some lessons learned from Brohannes:

·         Assume a casual stance alongside the road, giving a small half smile when a car drives by and crooking your thumb along the road

·         Never, ever get too invested in one ride, that way no matter how many cars drive by and refuse you, you don’t get disappointed

·         If you get tired, take a break and read a book or just relax. Who cares?

·         Overall, generally don’t give a shit. You’ll get a ride eventually.

After a short while, we watched as the hitchhiker ahead of us got a lift, and having newly adopted the Brohannes stance, she picked us up too. We parted ways with Brohannes (he was going a different way). And on April 19^th, 11:47am (or something like that), we fled the town of Karlsruhe and never looked back. Wherever in the world you are Brohannes, thank you.

Our hitch was with German Woman, who had an old beater car filled with junk, but hell I didn’t care. She dropped us off near Stuttgart, where we split off from the other hitcher and took showers at the rest station using vouchers we had received from a kind lady yesterday. The day was already looking, and smelling, much better! Even better, we ate “gourmet” sandwiches for lunch: bread with melted (microwaved) cheese, apple slices, and spicy mustard that we had picked up from a previous rest station. All this put us in great spirits and we were able to get a hitch soon after we started looking from an army wife from the US whose husband is stationed in Germany. It was great to talk to a woman since most of our rides are from men, and I especially felt close to her since my boyfriend is in the army as well. She seemed relieved to hear an American accent again, and wanted to donate but only had one US dollar bill. I kept it in my pocket the rest of the trip as a good luck charm and as a piece of home.

 

Evidence of the playpen

Our next ride was with German Workmen, two guys in a big van. After that, we stood in the rain for awhile and eventually got a ride with Ski Bum, who owned a ski resort and drove upwards of 200 kph on the autobahn in his fancy car. What a rush! He dropped us off at a “luxury” rest station in Austria, and because it was still kind of early in the night, we just sat and relaxed for a long time and marveled at our good luck for awhile. I was still shocked to be out of Karlsruhe to be honest. After splurging on a meal (aka McDonalds) we sat and talked for awhile, unpacked our stuff, and eventually settled down in the McDonalds playpen (I’m serious, we gotta sleep somewhere!). It ended up being crap (weird looks from people, bright lights, music playing), so we moved upstairs to a rooftop terrace area, which was cold but quiet.

Day 5: Welcome to Croatia!

What a day! We had a super early wakeup, a quick breakfast of oranges and Nutella, then started hitchhiking. It’s funny, the first day of this trip the idea of hitching was so strange and foreign to me, but by today we were old pros. After about 45 minutes, Thai Lady, who has been living in Austria the past while and had a huge ass van for all her friends apparently, picked us up. We got dropped off at a service station, sat inside to regroup and rewrite our sign and within minutes we had secured another lift- our first time in a lorry (tractor trailer)! The two truckers were dressed surprisingly well, and one had a wife and kids. We were warned that if police were at the Austria/Slovenia border two of us would have to duck down and hide, but to our luck there were no police! I’d never been inside the cab of a truck before and this one was pretty neat- music, computer, weights to work out, dream catcher. They brought us to an Slovenian rest station, where we ate our standard lunch of bread, meat and cheese at a restaurant’s table; the lady working there started to yell at us to leave but after she saw how pathetic we looked, she just laughed at us and let us stay.

 

Our sad looking lunch

OK, next hitch: with Classic Trucker, complete with a big belly, old ripped t-shirt, drinking milk right out of the carton, ranting about the US government in a mix of Slovenian, Italian, and English, and playing folksy Eastern European music. And we absolutely fucking loved him. David even stood on his dinner table by accident, it was only the center console really but the trucker freaked out, but forgave us pretty quickly. Though he didn’t speak much English, we ended up finding a way to communicate, and even joke around. Because of the number of people in the truck restrictions, he had to drop us off right before the Croatian before. So after 22 hitches (yes, I kept count), 5 days, and 1500 miles, we had reached the border solely because of the kindness of others. So it felt that much better to be able to cross the border on our own two feet. After getting some weird glances and showing our passports twice, we were home free!

 

Zagreb Please, it felt so good to write a city in Croatia

Our next ride was shitty, partly because as Dave was getting out of the truck a ladder fell on his back and partly because we got dropped off at the opposite of where we wanted to. But a kind Croatian English teacher and his mom helped us quickly recover: they brought us to a toll booth going in the right direction. From there, two hippy Croatian girls brought us to a campsite near Plitvice Lakes National Park, where we took hot showers and finally slept legally again!

 

Our campsite

How did we spend our next 5 days in Croatia? Read my next blog post, coming soon, to find out! 

Basking in Barcelona

After my mom and sister left for home, I spent a few fun-filled days doing physical therapy, managing to go on my first post-fracture run, and wrestling with our laundry facilities (we’re 1-1 right now, they made me bleed, but I managed to get 2 loads done, it’s a long story), then I went on holiday as it’s called here, to Barcelona!

Theme of the trip- that's 72 ºF

How do I even describe the feeling of being warm, truly warm, after 3 months straight of mostly cold, grey, evil, gloomy weather? My body felt like it had been flooded with drugs. I got sunburned (and subsequently learned how to use sunscreen quickly after that), I took a nap outside, I sweated, all which would be considered small miracles in Scotland.

This singer sounded like Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam

To be honest, I knew little, if nothing about Barcelona before this trip but with the help of my guide book and an extremely and knowledgeable hostel host, my friend and I managed to see what seemed like the best of Barcelona in three and a half days.

Cool structure on the beach

The attitude of the city reminded me of other Spanish-speaking countries I’ve visited: a much slower, relaxed pace, friendly and outgoing locals, and still figuring a few things out. Like the tap water situation, for example. In many places, the tap water wasn’t potable, or even worse, the locals didn’t really know for sure if it was potable. Which led me to have a mini breakdown at first (I never drink bottled water, in summary I think it’s a waste of money and unsustainable), then the last day to succumb to my dehydration high on a mountain and buy bottled water, then to wonder why much of Barcelona doesn’t have clean drinking water or why the locals don’t even know if it is clean. 

My face at drinking bottled water

Though the city was pretty flooded with tourists, we got to see La Sagrada Familia, a cathedral designed by Gaudi, a famous architect. Construction started on it in 1882, and it isn't projected to be completed until 2026! Talk about a slow pace, Spain. We also saw some of Gaudi's other works; I could list them all out but if you're anything like me, you're probably not interested in the names. But in summary, all the buildings and parks he designed were really whimsical- almost like caricature buildings.  I'm not sure why more architects don't take risks as extreme as Gaudi had. As weird as his work was, the uniqueness of it all was a breath of fresh air. 

Building by Gaudi

Another treat we got in Spain was... seeing the FC Barcelona team! Their infamous soccer team, of course. No, we didn't go to one of their games, but we had the privilege of watching them be herded from a hotel they were staying at onto their tour bus, along with hundreds of other fans, all of us held back by police. What a crazy experience! Later that night, we wandered over to the stadium to try to buy tickets from scalpers with no luck so we headed to a local bar and watched the match on tv with a handful of other locals. Seeing grown men jumping with joy after Barca scored made it all worth it :)

Police with the FC Barca bus in the background

 Our last day, weathered by days out in the sun, we ducked into a free art museum and stumbled across an awesome exhibit- out of hundreds of ribbons, all printed with different wishes written in English, Spanish, and Catalan (another official language in Barcelona), you could choose one wish and tie it around your wrist. Beautiful.

The Spanish ones here say "I wish that politicians weren't corrupt" and "I wish that my father would find work"

Our last night in Spain we met up with one of my friends from Cornell who's studying in Barcelona and  were mesmerized by a spectacular fountain/light show. It truly felt like summer!

Cool shot of a museum building

Now I'm back in Edinburgh just for a few days. Tuesday I leave for my hitchhiking trip to Croatia! You can support me here if you're interested. You can follow our journey here- we'll check in at least every day by 4pm UK time (5 hours later than EST). Myself and my teammate David Leeds are group number 212. And of course, I will be sure to blog about our travels once we arrive back in the UK, which will be the night of Friday, April 26th. Can't wait to start our journey!

Parlez-vous anglais? Our trip to Paris!

My mom and sister visited last week! Besides showing them the typical touristy things, I surprised my sister with tickets to a football match (aka soccer).  The “Hibs” (Hibernian Football Club), based in Edinburgh, played a team from northern Scotland.  We stuck out like a sore thumb once we arrived at the stadium- everyone around us was wearing green in support of the Hibs. To make up for it, Kelli and I got our faces painted, our entire faces painted… the result was quite scary, I’ll be honest, but people definitely knew who we were rooting for. As we were getting them done, the girl brightly remarked that we were the oldest ones to get it done; before us the title belonged to a 12-year-old. Excellent.

We celebrated what I like to call a “Jewish Easter,” but first let me tell you what happened on Jewish Easter Eve. I was sleeping over at the hotel my family was staying in, and around 5am Easter morning, the fire alarm went off! I poked my head out the door and sure enough people were trudging out of their rooms, so we followed suite. Outside, some guests were wearing nothing but towels, or even worse, no shoes! I can only guess they had thought they had woken up anywhere but Scotland. We had to be at a bus tour early that day, and when it looked like we weren’t getting to be let back in to the hotel anytime soon, I had visions of thrift shopping extravaganzas (we were only wearing our pajamas). Maybe for the better, we were eventually let back in, so no thrift shopping ensued.

This bridge on the way to the Highlands is almost 1.6 miles long!

We spent our Jewish Easter up in the Highlands on the same Hairy Coo tour I had taken my boyfriend on. After a long day of touring, we feasted on a dinner of pizza, chicken wings, and garlic bread, eaten in the comfort of our own hotel room. Room service, you ask? Nope. This was our own special picnic dinner, inspired by my new idol Rick Steves, who writes travel books and has amazing tips on traveling cheaply. The picnic dinner idea he suggests is divine. If you don’t have a room to go back to, just pop a squat wherever you please and voila, your picnic meal is served.

Ha! Good to know.

After spending a few days in Edinburgh, we headed to the wondrous city of Paris. Did we speak a lick of French before we got there? Nope (unless bonjour counts). Everyone had assured us that “it’s so touristy, everyone speaks English.” Well, apparently not the checkout counter lady who yelled something incoherent to us followed by the only English words she must have known- “quickly, quickly!” You want us to do what quickly? (It turned out we needed to weigh produce before going to the checkout counter. Crisis averted.) And the lady who we later figured out yelled at us to not take pictures of the plane when traveling back to Scotland. At the time, the best we could do was give a nervous laugh and walk away. That was actually our strategy most of the trip. Just smile and nod, and assume we weren’t doing anything that France deemed illegal.

Cool street artist at the Sacre Coeur

Our other winning strategy, suggested by Rick Steves, was to revert back to a caveman dialect. For example, when we were in the Louvre searching for the elusive Mona Lisa painting, I would go up to a museum worker, say “Mona Lisa” and they would point us in the right direction. Or there was the time when, after Kelli’s requests, I asked “The Last Supper?” only to be answered with the word “Italy.” I must’ve seemed real brilliant. The first day, we spoke four different languages- English, feeble attempts at French, Spanish by accident, and Italian, also usually by accident and also on purpose at the Italian restaurant we ate at for dinner.

The Louvre!

Besides the language barrier, we loved Paris! The city has so much variety- Indiatown (not its official name, just what we called it), where we got lost on our way to our hotel, the typical touristy sections, super lavish streets, adorable parks, and bustling artsy centers. Sneaking into a tour group at a perfume museum, enjoying a quiet moment inside the Notre Dame, emerging from the Metro station directly below the epic Arc de Triomphe, tearing up at the adorable lock covered bridges, admiring the designer stores along the Champs-Elysees, lounging in the grass at the Sacre Coeur, strolling leisurely along the Seine River… it made me woozy seeing all these iconic places. The best was the Eiffel Tower lit up at night- for 10 minutes once every hour, the lights twinkle. Cue the tourists darting around like madmen, ravenous to get the “perfect” picture. Ok fine, we may have done it too…

The picture!

So while I loved Paris, I could never see myself living there. I need a place where I would feel no shame walking around in sweatpants on a lazy day, and Paris for sure would not tolerate that. Someone would probably yell at me in French J

In front of a lock covered bridge

After returning back to Edinburgh, for better or worse my mom and sister stayed in my flat since they hadn’t booked a hotel for the last two nights here. What I learned is that family should never stay in college apartments, flats, houses, whichever you prefer. Our flat is probably one of the cleanest in our building, but that didn’t make up for the lack of heating in my room, or the towel that they had to share, or the sweatshirt that my sister used as a pillow, or the sleeping bag they used as a blanket, or the nuts and Nutella “dessert” we had one night… 

Their last day in Scotland, we journeyed to the distant and unknown Glasgow (aka Scotland’s other major city only an hour’s train ride away). Glasgow is known for being a rather rough city so I was pleasantly surprised to find myself frankly loving it. The plentiful free art museums were of the modern type, which I much prefer over everything else, we climbed a tower and got superb views of the city, and the city was buzzing about with people protesting (in a non-violent way I promise) and others shopping. So when we ventured out of the city center to find a cathedral only to turn around two minutes later because the streets got kind of terrifying, I wasn’t upset. We might not have gotten to know the real Glasgow, but we weren’t mugged either. I’d say it was a win.

The streets of Glasgow

My mom and sister left the next day, and a few days later I traveled to Spain for a short trip! Next post coming soon. And to close, something amusing we saw in Glasgow:

 

Funny, and honest bathroom sign