Travel Weary?

It was one of those days today; I rolled off the wrong side of the bed. Groggy and dismantled, I KNEW today was going to be hell; I knew the only thing that could fix it was sitting around in my pyjamas, reading short stories, listenin to Ira Glass, and drinking warm, comforting drinks--but unlike all of the other times this feeling occurred, I was in Budapest.

This is not an ugly city by any means, filled with awesome architecture, huge churches, a major river, and fun people. Everywhere around me, there is something going on, things to see, places to be. Sensory overload, in some respect. I have dreamed all my life to come here.

It is just that I woke up on THAT side of the bed...


For 20 days, I have been travelling light, making my way to Istanbul from Italy and Greece, and then finding my way back through Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Austria, and Switzerland. The trip of a lifetime, and man, I have enjoyed it; but something keeps telling me that I was going overboard. Travelling like this, one encounters many thoughts throughout the journey...

why am I doing this, alone? I miss home. I don't technically have enough money for dinner, but if I eat this meal, I can skip one tomorrow. What time does the train leave tomorrow? WHERE IS MY PASSPORT? oh. right here where I had it five minutes earlier. This whopper may cost 8 dollars, but, by the name of God, it is what I need right now!

But today was the product of too much. One too many touts asked me if I was interested in some expensive Danube boat ride which, of course, did not strike any interest today, yesterday (when he asked me the same question), and the day before (when I actually was lured on the expensive Danube boat ride (not)). I had seen one too many old buildings of which had no signification to me either because I am not familiar with the local history or because it is just another old building, in Europe. One too many terrace restaurants offered me AUTHENTIC hungarian gulash and paprika chicken for over 2500 hft. I walked out of my hostel today in a frenzy, and I went and plopped myself down near the market and got a coffee and CHILLED for about 2 hours. I was angry at the world.

After drinking my overpriced coffee and lemonade (all coming out to be about 1150 HFT (about 8 euros)), I went to the market and started freaking out at all the activity around me like a hermit who decided to go to anamusement park. I ran out the doors to the first business which seemed quiet to get my mind off of the situation:

a pool hall. I played pool all of my life, and especially after my Dad got the pool table. When I was young, I always loved to play pool and think about nothing else, especially on days like these. It was relaxing. I played about 10 racks all together, and just as I was regaining my former gumption, my credit ran out. After my time was done, I had gathered enough sense and strength to go back to my hostel and take an afternoon nap.

It was glorious.


Why is it that it is hard to be content when the dreams of your life are coming true? Is it that I keep turning my sight from God, almost ignoring the fact he is the one that gave me the means to go to Budapest? What would he have to say about the way I exit the bed in the morning? Would he be OK with the excuse lasting for the whole day?


I start my day anew at 6:00 pm, going to the royal parks and parliament building. I know my day will be different.

A journal entry on my trip to athens

Its here I make my mid-afternoon hiatus, in a sunny square situated right outside the national library in Athens. The wistful sound of Greek folk music hangs low in the air as people croise to make their midday errands. Perched underneath a Starbucks umbrella, I think that there could have been a million other places I should have stopped to enjoy the area, even other, more Greek, coffee houses. Being that starbucks had the most customers chatting outside (in Greek, mind you), I would have thought that it had the best coffee in Athens.

I am very American. I am OK with that. Plus, any company that gives my friends their big break in the music industry is a company worth paying 3 euros for a Gold Coast blend (or god coast blend, as i so like to put it :) ).

My train ticket to Istanbul sits neatly tucked between two pages of this very book (my journal of which this is written); half in turkish, half in Greek, who would have thought that such a thing would bring an adventure only conceived about in an 8am Differential Equations lecture. Standing in line at the train ticket guichet, an over-whelming sense of fear loomed over me due to the new found chaos that Turkey, namely Istanbul, is dealing with at this moment. Words like coup d'etat, revolution, and change have always been a sense of excitement to me. Romantic stories of french revolution heroes saving orphans from certain doom, or George Washington crossing the Delaware to soon slaughter my great-great x3 grandfather Rahl enter into my head...

But they were always viewed from the safe distance of my history book.

Yesterday, in Turkey, a rigged election caused a march on the street which questions the very basis of modern government in Turkey: separation of mosque and state. Islamists want their country to come back to Muhammed much like an 8 year old wants a candy bar in a gas station window. Turkey's seemingly only connection to the west is that separation.

The turkish army vows to defend this ideal using all force necessary.

For some odd reason, this revolution seems less valiant than that which I would envision. Is it because it hits so close to me?

My dad told me he would strongly reconsider this trip. I told him I will keep a watchful eye, and head to the American embassy if there are any problems.

This will be a very exciting time to go.

Now, the revolution seems very far away. Here under the commercialized shade of the Starbucks umbrella, memories of great conversations passed in similar settings flash themselves before my eyes. I can only drift to the security and comfort that home provides.

I feel as if this is my last chance to see the world like I am doing. This is why I must stare my fears directly in the eye because if I do not now, when? I am getting older, and I will soon have commitments that will inhibit my progress in travelling. Americans are scared of Turkey--They seem to be afraid of everything. Should I be the one to start an off set? How much different is it, really?

On another note:

American coffee is delicious, and starbucks does have the best coffee in Athens.

until later

j

disappearing into the crowd

hey all

my birthday was well spent. i got myself a present--an interrail pass:

http://www.interrail.net/

this puppy will allow me unlimited travel around europe, eastern europe, and turkey by train for the 22 days! i end my intership in the laboratory on april 26th and shove off to an adventure that will sculpt itself. some prospective places that are on top of my priority list to go see:

florence, naples, athens, istanbul, the black sea, translyvania, budapest, krakow, bratislava, croatia, and geneva

this will be my final european hurrah before i come home! i dont know exactly how i feel about living in america again. it has been a LONG time, and i have blended into french culture very well, almost too well. when asked what our culture is like, i have trouble recapping anything original--always eluding to past news reports and french views of our culture...it is exactly how i viewed france before i came here, like a rivendell where nothing bad really happens. life does not get lived in america, it gets enjoyed! oh, i know i am wrong, but it is wierd understanding this whole grass-is-greener-on-the-other-side-old-man-reflecting-on-life melange into one big emotional smoothie, and i dont know who else could really relate.


after buying my interrail pass, i battled it out with france telecom on my rights as an international to have my contract not changed. somewhere in the past few months, probably after my cellphone/ipod/wallet got stolen, my contract soon got changed to the 180euro a month plan, with unlimited sms AND talking without my authorization. i go to my bank account and see the 180 missing, and, as normal, i froze my account and went straight to the source--France Telecom.

i fought, and fought, and fought for 2 hours, getting it across that they had no right to change my account. they kept eluding that in France, law practice is not like in america--that they were able to change contracts without the customer's signature or previous knowledge...i called the bullshit, and demanded my old contract back. they eventually caved in and gave me back the money and my old contract.

they say you are good at a language only when you are able to argue your way out of sticky situations. i am there. my dream has come true.

for dinner, i had 20 of my good friends at one long table in an italian restauraunt, eating, talking, having a great time. we then drank beer at our local belgium pub. it was classic.


my friends here are great, and i will miss them all. we have all been brought together under the same situation--wanting something different with their lives. we have been great support for eachother, and i feel as if i have found some life-long people with whom to keep in touch. if i ever want to travel around the world, i know who to call on!

well, thanks for listening

jeff

apologies to all

i have not been writing. sorry.

i will try to write more.

j

transition anyone?

i want to scream. the stagnacity of my academic life is pushing at me from all sides like a bewildered diver in a decompression chamber gone awry--feeling the pressure from all sides, all he can do is slam his fists against the lifeless 10-inch thick steel door to signal to the person in control that something is wrong...

research has been appealing to me since i have started it in france. doing different experiments everyday, all of which piecing together to a big puzzle, all of which contributing to a bigger scheme that will hopefully someday grace public light through a scientific paper or a thesis of some sort, has been infinitely interesting to a student with not enough background to see the bigger picture. thinking it would be the perfect detour to the french academic life of going to class for 8 hours a day, not studying due to fatigue or time, and hoping to piece together a credit here or there to get my degree in a timely fashion, i dutifully elected to be in a lab for 7 hours a day and to be taught directly from a prominent organic chemist in his field of duty...

and i now realize that which was different every day has changed...

like the little kid with a new swingset--when he first starts out, everything is a new experience; the swingset's pendulous motion gives hours of instant fun at the kick of his legs, the cargo net's physical challenge to mount into the keep strikes fear and exhiliration at each step...and then, it all changes. 3 months after the playground was brought before his curious eyes, the kid moves on to the new interesting toy, leaving the playground to rot in the backyard. what was new and interesting, through familiarization and extensive overuse, has become old and menial.


i am ready to move on with my life. i am through drifting for now. i want consistency to base my habits around, and i want to learn about interesting things again...

finally having reflection time...

i should be studying. i should have been studying this whole semester. looking back at the last six months and the things that they have brought, i can say that i should have done a lot of things. i should have found my church sooner. i should have moved out of the madames place at the beginning of the semester. i should have been to more french independent music events. i should have spent more time taking pictures when i was at home.



but should have dones dont make did...


i do not regret the things that i have done, but that which i did not do...

and as i look back, there was not much that could be placed into the category of waiting or wishing to be done. i have not had a normal day since i left; each day is different, full of adventure and sometimes painful. the transition into the culture has given me much to be proud about.


imagine this--

imagine leaving your family, friends, community, and life behind you in order to replace it with a very strange culture that you dont understand. imagine being reduced to a running vocabulary of a 6 year old, and imagine trying to explain politics, quantum mechanics, and religion with your peers with simple phrases and cute observations. imagine being tired at 6pm and wanting to go to sleep at 9 in order to better understand what goes on the next day. imagine failing all of your classes NOT because you dont know the material, but because you become blocked since you know many languages.

imagine being in a shroud of confusion for 6 months...

and the thing is, your old life still happens back at home. your friends still live life, get significant others, mourn, become sick, and go to school. the world does not stop because you left, it just adapts.

the separation becomes bigger with each passing second...you are shattered constantly, only to rebuild yourself into what you thought you were...

only for something else to hammer down on the warbled mess that exists...




and it keeps happening until you realize that it is useless to rebuild yourself any longer, but to reshape into a newer being...

let your experiences carve you into the creation you want to become.
















yes, i sit here in what would be the french equivalent of the student union sipping my espresso, listening to french music, making observations and procrastinating not because it is what i should be doing, but what i need to be doing. the christmas lights penetrate the dark sky as the sun sets at 4pm. vin chaud, with its sweet, cinnamon-like smell engorges the senses while people sit, talk, enjoy life and other people's company. i have nothing to anticipate but my next journey and who i may meet along the way...

i am happy. i am complete. i am nothing

congratulations, you have been reading a dream come true.

Corsica, and the great beyond

here is the story of the past week:


we started out 2 hours late because we took too long saying good bye

alex's package with our tent, his sleeping bag and hiking shoes ultimately did not come. so, he bought a cheap, light sleeping bag fit for 10 degrees celcius, and used his running shoes for hiking. we did not have a tent, nor could we buy one because we were in such a hurry...

we also got to nice in a total of 3 hours, reaching speeds of 180km/hr on the autoroute to catch the ferry--not the best idea...

but we made it in time.



we arrived in corsica at 2am and slept on the beach of calvi. originally we were supposed to go to ile rousse (just down the shore from calvi), but, for some odd reason, the ferry took us to calvi. when we arrived, we went to a hotel to ask for a map of the city...it went like this:

me: pourrais-je voir une carte d'ile rousse
clerk: comment?
me: une carte (using my huge hand motions making a motion of a map)...umm...un plan, de la ville....ile rousse...(emphasis added)
clerk: Non.... non non non non non...vous n'etes pas en ile rousse...vous etes dans Calvi...

the look on my face was priceless, according to alex and erik...

the clerk turned out to be austrian, and alex wooed her with his austrian charm and german language skills...she then showed us a beach where we could sleep...




after sleeping on the beach, we took the train to vizzavona thinking that there would be an atm machine there, we were hurried again in the morning, so no chance to go to a bank before departing--they are everywhere, right?.




no. the town of vizzavona included 3 buildings--a train station, a place for eating, and the house of the person who runs both the train station and the place for eating. so we embark on the trail with no tent, crappy sleeping gear, and no money...

and i forgot my jacket in the car thinking "hey, it's corsica, it will be warm...."

we left at 12:30. we arrived, after climbing 2 ridges (about 1000m ascent), at the first refuge 10km away at 5:30; found out that refuges cost money, 9 euros per person, at 5:45; and that there was no chance to get money between here and our destination at 6...

so we did what any self respecting hiker would do: begged random austrians for some money...thank God alex could speak german...

we decided to press on to the second refuge that night...we took the high road as well....

which was covered with clouds, which is like fog...only so thick that one could not see his hand in front of his body...and night fell...





we did not make it to the second refuge in time. so we were in the darkness, with fog, with a heavy wind and cold temperature (with my jacket in the car), with our headlamps, searching for each marker 10m ahead of us. we did this for 2 hours, and we ended up losing the trail. we then decided to demount and head down into the valley, where we then found the trail randomly, and went the wrong direction on it. at one point, before we were lost, we were actually 2 minutes away from the next refuge...but we ended up finding a goat farm on the other part of the trail, and, thinking it was the refuge, slept there for the night...

until the goat farmer, who only spoke corsican, came...you can connect the dots on what happened next...(just imagine big angry hand motions....)




the next morning, we woke up, ate a hearty breakfast, and shoved off to climb 2 more mountains, one of which required ropes, and was probably the highlight of the trip...and we stopped after 10 km...at a refuge without room for us, so we ended up sleeping outside. that night, it was 2 degrees celcius, and poor Alex had no more clothes to wear...

that is where erik and alex got sick.



also, that night, while we were cooking, we went to wash a pan, leaving our food supplies out in the open thinking "people would watch it"...no.

1/3 of our supplies were stolen, mainly bread, sausage, cheese, and jelly...

_____reality ends for a second (just to make sure you know)

and then a bear attacked us. we defied it by shoving erik down its throat to choke it, and, using our knives, we cut erik back out, used the meat for new provisions, and the fur for a new sleeping bag and tent...as well as nice viking-like clothes for the trip!

_____reality begins again

the next day we did 30 km...passing through valleys...to get to the next refuge at 2300m...
where the guardian of the refuge was an angry old corsican...he advised us to sleep outside...






luckily we didnt heed his advice...that night, it was hovering around 0 degrees with a 200km/hr wind on average with rain. the wind was so strong, that the door of the sleeping chamber kept blowing open...

that was when we made the decision to head down to the nearest town. we also decided that a trip like that is the best way to combat culture shock...



(one of these pictures is of monte cinto under clouds)

dazed and confused, cold, without food or moral, we went to bastia, got a nice hotel room, went to a tex-mex rest. and had a beer or two.



tex mex is incredible.

we walked a total of 80km in 4 days...summited 7 mountains, the highest being at 2400m...


so i have been doing good. grenoble has become like home to me, i realized that this past week. school has started, nothing really too deep. i am taking courses in genetics, cellular components, advanced organic synthesis, quantum chemistry, thermodynamics, crystallography, and spanish.

i love languages, and i am going to take my time to learn as many as possible before i die.

besides that...all is well.

Here are some photos of me on my travels:


Me with Mt. Blanc in the background



Me with the Submersible of Jacques Cousteau...my childhood hero.



The view from the aiguille de midi, next to Mt. Blanc



This is my group of traveling buddies in Lausaunne, Switzerland



A picture of me and a group of friends in Nice



Me in a tree in the royal gardens of Monaco



Me with a view of the ocean near the national oceanographic museam in Monaco



Monte Carlo Casino...heck yes.



Me and a good friend