31 May 2009

Vienna and Budapest

Hello again to anyone bothering to read this.

I've just got to Brasov in Romania with Michael, and he's gone to sleep for a bit, even though he got way more sleep than me on the train, but whatever, it makes a good time to do a blog post.

Vienna was nice, and that's all there really is to say about it. Lots of nice buildings with nice shops and nice horse drawn carriages with nicely dressed drivers (or riders, I don't know). It lacked a lot of personality, just really touristy and.... nice. The hostel was pretty much the same, clean and looked good.

Day one in Vienna I just wandered around a little bit then had some drinks in the bar and met a few people. In general the people were also just nice. There was a few Australians and Canadians, no Brits. The only person that I can remember having any interesting stories was a Canadian called Jack, he said that he had been on a train on the toilet as they went through border control, and because it was at the platform he didn't want to flush it. He was adamant that on this train it just dropped straight out onto the tracks, I'm pretty sure it doesn't, but he said it's more likely the more eastern you travel. I'm in Romania and still haven't seen it (he said if you pressed the flush a hatch dropped down and you could see the railway underneath, nonsense). But back to the story, the border guys were banging on the door, and he was saying "occupied, occupado" and any other foreign sounding versions of the word occupied, because he didn't know what they were saying. Eventually he just flushed, supposedly onto the tracks, and left.

Day 2 in Vienna. I had a bigger look round at the niceness of everything, unimpressed, tourists everywhere, then went to the park and chilled out for a bit. There was a weird fish swimming close to the surface of a pond, and a duck kept pecking it and the fish would swim down then swim up again and the same thing would happen, possible proof for the 3 second memory thing, I don't know, but I can't have been enjoying it. Went back to the hostel and met some of the guys from the night before and some new people. Chatted to a guy from America with a guitar that had been deported from England. He said he had told the security that he would be playing in open mic nights in bars and stuff, which isn't paid, and they asked him "If someone gave you money though, would you take it?" and he said "If someone GAVE YOU money would you take it?". I guess it's a little cheeky, but a bit silly to deport him because he'd take money if it was given to him. He was really good on guitar, he also had a thing that went around his head that he put a harmonica on, and played that at the same time. Everyone was getting really into it, but then he had to stop because the neighbours were complaining. After that I met the guys that were in my room, and we played ring of fire, but they used rubbish rules, one of which was "never have I ever", which pretty much all drinking game enthusiasts know suck. We also had 4 is whores, which means girls drink, fun with no girls even playing.....

Day 3 in Vienna, I went to the palace, which was quite good compared to the rest of Vienna, I saw a red squirrel on the way there too, which was probably the best bit of Vienna. Then it started to rain, so I got the train to Budapest.

I nicely managed to navigate a train, metro and tram to the hostel with few problems. Dumped my stuff in the hostel and went and got something to eat. Later that night in the hostel I met two French girls, who I can't remember the name of, two German girls, called Christine and Marina, and an Australian called Belinda. We kind of watched the Champions league final in the hostel, but mainly just had a few drinks and chatted.

The next day me, Belinda, Marina and Christine went up to the castle/parliment /palace things on the hill in Buda, there was a good view from the top, and we watched the changing of the guards which was silly and dragged out, like those kind of things normally are. Then we went to the top of the Basilica, which had a great view. I think all cities should have at least one thing that you can go to the top of and see everything from high up. We then went to the island in the river and relaxed for a bit, which was good, untill some kind of ninja kendo man turned up with a bag of wooden swords and made me fight him, which was pretty weird. He was hungarian, so none of us could really understand him, he asked something about where the sports club was and we pointed in the direction, but he just stayed with us for ages.... He gave me his face mask thingy and a sword and made me fight him, I wasn't sure whether to just go nuts or to be really careful not to hit him in the head. Eventually I hit his hand by accident so we stopped, yay! Then he was showing us bits of judo and all sorts, and then he gave us his life story. We understood very little, but there was three main parts:

1. Unix operating systems and researching DNA
2. Teaching the sword fighting and judo thing
3. Teaching the organ

He managed to drag them out over about 20 mins, then he asked me to sword fight or wrestle with him again, I quickly declined and he left soon after. That night us four along with three guys from essex called Simon, Simon and Paul went out to an open air concert club thingy, we drank, danced, played a bit of table football, it was a good night.

On my second full day in Budapest I went to the Monument Park in the morning with Christine and Marina. It's where they keep all the old soviet statues and stuff, it was pretty good. The girls got some good photo's which I think are on facebook now. I took a few, but I can't be bothered putting them on yet. In the afternoon we met up with Belinda, got some pizzas delivered to the hostel, then went to the market hall which had all the usual crap that you find in these places. Had a few beers in the hostel that night, some people went out after, I didn't. Christine and Marina were leaving at 6 the morning after, so we all said goodbye when everyone went to bed.

My last day in Budapest. Michael (guy I met in Bratislava) and I had been emailing each other during our time at Budapest, which is a difficult method of conversation to use to organise a meeting time and place in another city. We were meant to have been in the same hostel, but Michael couldn't find it, so he stayed somewhere else. We'd kind of organised to meet at 11 am, so me and Belinda went to where we thought he was staying and he was at the train station he thought we would get off at, so we ended up missing each other. Me and Belinda decided to go to a park where there was a castle and stuff, when we got there we discovered there was a circus so we did the usual cheap skate traveller thing of wandering in as far as you can before you have to pay, which ended nicely with us getting to watch the second half of the circus for free, as we just happened to arrive during the interval. There was quite a lot in it, Lions, a man that juggled hats and could put them on his head in crazy ways, ridiculously bendy people, it was really good. Then we had a wander around the park a bit until it threatened to rain. That night lots of new people had arrived at the hostel as others had left, so 8 of us went for a meal, including a guy that worked for google, which sounds awesome, they have playstations and pool tables in the office. I was thinking about getting his email address and persistantly asking him for a job, but I forgot. I went to get the train that left at 23:13 for Brasov in Romania, as I had heard that Bucharest is horrible from lots of people, and surprise surprise, Michael was there, so now we're both in the same hostel in Brasov, and I think we're going to go to Bulgaria together aswell, before he goes off to Croatia and I go to Turkey.

To sumarise, vienna was nice, but Budapest was really good fun and definately worth a vist.

Also are these posts to detailed, I feel like i'm writing too much "then I did this, and then I did this, and then I did this....." I dunno, tell me what you think, it's kind of hard to cut bits out.

byeeeeeeeeee

25 May 2009

Krakow and Bratislava

I got to Krakow at about 8:30 pm, having spent all day on the train, but I couldn't find the hostel until about 10. Didn't do much that night, got a pizza, chatted to a few other backpackers and went to bed.

The next morning I got the free breakfast, it was really good because they had loads of cheese spread and bread, so I ate a lot of sandwiches. Then I just wandered around town, went to the castle and the main square. I had a kebab for tea that was pretty good, lots of different stuff on it. I had another early night because I wanted to go to Auschwitz the next day, so I had a couple of beers and chatted to people back at the hostel. I arranged to get the bus with an american called Bryon to Auschwitz, but he said he was going to set off early. Bryon had been travelling for a couple of months around Europe, he had a three month rail pass and he had been to a new city pretty much everyday, getting the night train somewhere, getting off for the day, getting the night train somewhere else. In Oslo he'd even got a night train somewhere so he could sleep, then changed trains and got another night train back to Oslo, so that he didn't have to pay for a hostel.

I got up at 8:30 expecting Bryon to have left, he hadn't, so I got some cheese spread sandwiches and expected to head out. Bryon spent ages faffing around and we only left at about 9:45, then we were rushing for the bus and he was walking as if he had his shoe laces tied together, the smallest steps i've ever seen anyone take. We just about managed to get the bus, but I abandoned him shortly after arriving at Auschwitz, he was a pain in the arse and his stories about night trains were starting to annoy me. Auschwitz was as shocking as I expected it to be, I wont talk you through it all but there's one bit where they have all the hair of the female victims, and there's tonnes of it, and although its behind a glass wall, you can still smell it.

When I got back I met a guy called Henrik from Sweden. I destoryed him in two games of connect 4 and he decided he didn't want to play anymore. Then came the hostel's "shot night", me, Henrik, a Californian called Steve, two girls called Laura and Toni, and an older couple called Bob and Anne. After a few drinks I couldn't resist telling Bob that I had a dog called Bob, thankfully he took it the right way. After the shots me, Henrik, Steve, Toni and Laura went to a few bars, Toni and Laura left part way through, we had a couple more drinks and then Steve and Henrik had a Kebab, I was waiting so I could cash in on the cheese spread the next morning.

My last day in Poland. Steve had told me about Couch Surfing. It has a website like facebook, with profiles and pictures and stuff, but then If you ever go anywhere you can send a request to other surfers asking if you can stay with them, and others can do the same with you. Saturday happened to be the day of a big couch surfers picnic, so we went to it along with some other couch surfers that were staying in our hostel and had come to Krakow just for the couch surfing events. The picnic was incredible! There was about 150 people there, all chatting to each other, drinking and eating. There was also one Couch surfer who had earlier been to a supermarket and bought 200 quids worth of food and beer for everyone, I didn't get his name but I shook his hand. There was a barbecue, also paid for by the supermarket guy, someone else had brought a tight rope that you can put up between two trees, which everyone was having a go on, I only managed about 3 or 4 steps maximum whenever I tried it, I was rubbish. People were playing other games too. After that some couch surfers went to a party, I had to get the train later so decided against it. Me and Steve and a few other surfers went to a soup festival and got free soup, then we had a beer before I had to pick my stuff up from the hostel and get the train to Bratislava.

I actually had a bed this time on the night train, it cost about 8 pounds (I dunno where the pound sign is on this keyboard) to reserve it. There were 6 beds in the room, but only me and an Australian guy in it. Amongst the things he'd done were work in a pub in England and work in a restaurant in Bordeaux. I slept ok in the train this time, but it arrived in Bratislava at 5:40 so I had to get up early. As I knew nothing about Bratislava and had some time to kill, I saw something on a hill and decided to head towards it, I quickly went the wrong way and ended up just walking around the city untill a cafe opened so I could have breakfast, it was Sunday, so everywhere was pretty dead. At about 10 I dropped my stuff off at the hostel and headed towards the centre for a look round. It's a really nice place, and the castle is good, a lot better than the one in Krakow. Now that I had a map I also found my way to the thing I saw when I got off the train, it was a WW2 monument, not massively interesting, but had some good views of the city around it.

I wandered around the town at night to see if there was much going on, there wasn't, just lots and lots and lots and lots of couples, boring. I went back to the hostel and talked to a guy called Harry from Milton Keynes, then we both talked to a guy from Seattle, called Michael, and two Finnish guys who told me "Mita Vittua" which means W.T.F. in Finnish. After a few beers the Finnish guys decided we were all, along with a couple of british girls, going to a Karaoke bar. It was closed, Sunday, so we went to another bar they liked, it was closed, Sunday.... We all went back to the hostel, and one of the Finnish guys got a Guitar and played songs, he was really good, then Harry played Wonderwall, everyone sang along.

Today I checked out and got the train to Vienna, I hadn't planned on going to Vienna, but the train ride was only an hour. I'm here for two nights, then I go to Budapest, where I meet Michael again, as he is going there straight from Bratislava and we are in the same hostel.

And once again I can't put pictures on, I have to pay for the internet here, which sucks, and they have some really limited version of Linux on it that doesn't really give me access to anything apart from Firefox. I think the Budapest hostel has free net, so i'll try to do it there.

Mita Vittua

21 May 2009

Night Train and Berlin

The night train sucked. There's three types of carriages, 1st class, which has beds in it but I think costs roughly $1,000,000 to reserve. There's also Couchettes, which sound lovely, and normal carriages. I didn't specify when I reserved my place and ended up with a couchette, this is just a room with two rows of seats facing each other, impossible to sleep in, there's no where to put your head, I think they designed them with pointy bits on all the edges that you could lean on. When we first set off I started talking to two american guys and a dutch girl that were in another couchette, we discussed how Holland was so flat and the Dutch girl said around half of it is below sea level, I said "is that where all the cheap houses are then?" she asked what I meant and I said "with part of them being underwater", "No, they're dry" came the response, she really didn't get my crap joke and stopped talking shortly after.

I got to Berlin at about 6 am and couldn't work out the train system, so I just got off and headed towards the tv tower. I got a few cool pictures of places that would normally be really busy but because I didnt have a map I couldn't find the Reichstag or brandenburg gate, which I was a bit sad about, because when I did go back to the brandenburg gate they were setting up some big celebration (I think it was 40 years of something), so it was really noisy and there were cranes about and stuff. My hostel was awesome, it was called generator and was huge, i think it had floors, it had a massive common room, bar, free breakfast 7 euros a night. Oh and the bar had happy hour between 5 and 7 so I could get bottles of Schofferhofer Black (Kind of like Newcastle brown) for 1.25 Euro's.

On my first night in the hostel I met a lot of people, first I met two guys from Georgia (U.S) called Slaton and Jake. Then we all started talking to an Australian (there were lots of Australians). Slaton asked "Hey you're from Australia, do you know a guy named John Cantor", "Yeah we ride the same fuckin Kangaroo to school" came the response, aparently everyone from anywhere knows someone from australia, and when they meet another australian a lot of them ask if they know them, pretty silly when australia is as big as it is. I didn't ask if he knew my relatives. Slaton (who hadn't drank for a month and a half and was keeping up with me and quite drunk by this point) also asked "do you guy's have Outback?", "we have THE outback yeah", "No Outback the australian themed restaurants, they do these things called Bloomin' Onions and they dip them in Ozzy sauce" , "Whats Ozzy sauce?", "Sauce that you Australians eat". Needless to say, when I saw Slaton the next day he was feeling a little hungover. Also on the first night I met some Canadians, and also after everyone had gone to bed I had a beer with Macca from behind the bar, Felix, who was massive and did the night shift on reception and a girl who was just starting and did the breakfasts.

Monday morning, I woke up to late to do the early free walking tour, so I had a look round then did the later one. It was really good, not as humourous as the one in Amsterdam, but contained a lot. I went to the place where Hitler shot himself, but its just big buildings and a patch of grass where people don't pick up their dog's poo. Also went to the Berlin wall, my Grandad wanted me to bring a piece back for him, but there was a fence around it to stop people, kind of a blessing in disguise, would have been silly carrying a bit of concrete around the world. On the tour I met a guy called... I can't remember, but he was alright, we went and got some food after, then I went back to the Hostel to make happy hour.

Karaoke night..... A large group of Australians enjoyed it at least, and a few times I heard "The next song will be sung by John Cantor". I met some Americans that had been studying in Sweden, and were now traveling bits of Europe. And later the guy who was in the bed below me came over, his name was Sam. After we had all talked for a while a girl turned up who knew Sam from school, but they didn't know each other would be in Berlin, Sam didn't seem pleased. I also met a girl from Edinburgh called Katie who does that kind of stop start animation but with glowsticks, she showed me some on her Camera, they were pretty good. Later Sam and Katie got their Ipod's or whatever out and we listened to music each other liked, I've left mine at home to make sure I didnt just sit and listen to it on my own all the time, otherwise I would have showed them some Animal Collective or something.

Tuesday, rented a bike and bombed it down the hill to get to the TV tower before there was a big queue. From the top you can see everything, it's really cool, I think all citys should have something big that you can look out of. I went up another floor to the rotating restaurant, and ordered a small and overpriced orange juice. I drank it really slowly and waited for the restaurant to do one full turn, while the waitresses were coming over and asking again and again if I wanted to order breakfast. After the TV tower I went to the Reichstag, there was already a big queue, so I had to wait for about 45 mins, was pretty cool though. I also had a ride round the park and went to the Holocaust memorial. That night I tried to go on a pub crawl organised by the free tour people, but I missed it so I ahd a few beers and chatted to some Gremans, but not much of interest happened, so I went back to the hostel and met up with Katie who had met some new people. We all talked for a bit, there were a couple of Americans that had just arrived from Krakow, which was quite cool because I was going there the day after (yesterday). I got Katie's email address and went to bed.

Yesterday I got the train to Krakow, 9:40 to 20:00, but wasn't to bad, slept a little bit, I think I only averaged about 5 hours a night in Berlin. The hostel here seems really good, a lot smaller than the one in Berlin though.

Yes Nutter I just go up to people and talk at them, sometimes they respond, never has anyone said sod off. Was a bit weird at first, but getting better at it, only got one photo of people so far though, seems strange taking them of people I don't know.

I'm running out of net time now though, so I'm off.

Byeeeeeeeeeeeeee

16 May 2009

Amsterdam

So, I've been on my trip for 4 days, getting a plane and train on my own was hard work, but I managed to do it without making any mistakes, which should make Davies proud.

My hostel while staying in Amsterdam has been pretty rubbish, as far as I can tell it only has one massive room full of beds, and no proper lights. It also has a reception area with two sinks in it and two toilets and two showers behind thin doors. The main problem with it is not having anywhere that people can just hang out and meet each other.

On my first night, I saw the hostel was crap and just went to a bar up the road, got myself a pint of Jupiler and started talking to a guy called Paul. He was here with his friend, but his friend didnt drink so he stayed in the hotel. Paul said he'd been and done it at the red light district about an hour before, but he didn't seem like he'd enjoyed it. He was a bit weird so I left him after a while, met some Canadians in another place and then went to bed.

I spent most of my first day there just wandering around soaking up the atmosphere of the city and nearly being killed by cyclists. I watched some street performers in Dam square, one of them was absolutally turd, it was a fat man in a rubbish spiderman costume stood on a ciclre of carpet, i've got a picture of him but my camera cable is in my bag in the hostel, so can't put it on yet. The other I watched was a guy that basically just shouted abuse at people and did a bit of juggling with an apple, knife and stick thingy that was on fire, he was pretty good. I went to a few more bars that night and spent most of my time with a guy from Hampshire and two guys from Belgium.

The next day I went on a free walking tour, but I gave a donation because it was really good. Some of the more interesting things the tour guide said were that pot actually isnt legal here, it's just that if you're smoking it and not causing any trouble the police look the other way. He said he once saw someone smoking a joint, drinking and pissing in the redlight district shouting "whores, whores, whores" and the police came and fined him for drinking, smoking, pissing and being abusive in the street, but he then said the police look away if you aren't causeing problems for others. I went and had a look round the red light district that night, it's a lot weirder than i'd imagined it, I thought they'ed be high up and set back a little bit, but they're right next to you in some places, and some of them are really good looking. The tour guide said earlier that some of the really good looking ones get a lot more money doing this than they would do in a modelling career.

Yesterday I went to the Ann Frank Museum, I found it really interesting but I think i'd have got a lot more out of it if I knew more about the war. Her diary is the second most translated book after the bible. Went to some bars later, met a post man who moved here 24 years ago from Ethiopia, he was pretty cool, bought me a pint when he left aswell.

Today I've just had another wander, found a market and bought some fish things, I don't know what they were, but they were quite good. I'm getting the night train to Berlin at 7 so that'll be interesting.


byeeeeeeeeeeeee