Random people, sleepless nights and sushi

These, my friends, area few of my favourite things. Sure, I try to be responsible and sleep enough so I can function with a full deck. I know that my phase of sleepless nights is behind me (unless I ever get around to that business of procreating, but that is an entirely different topic).

The thing about travel for me is it makes me feel I am truly alive. Seeing new things that are old things, interacting with different cultures, trying to find locations when street signs aren't posted and all I have is a crap map, forcing myself to ASK for help, to interact with RANDOM PEOPLE, to laugh with strangers who speak the same language, be it verbal or physical. You can tell so much about people by their interactions.

Our last three nights of travel: arrived late in Prague on a Friday and checked in at our YOUTH (and I mean, youthful) hostel. Nothing in their ad indicated the building was directly under a train track, so that night's sleep was nearly lost. We had a gorgeous Saturday, walking around and enjoying parks and castles, bridges and Bohemian glass. Prague is an amazing city, too bad we were among the way too many tourists to make it authentic.

So our last Saturday night, we decided to go out and asked the man at our hostel where we should go. We decided to take his advice and go to a pub called the Akropolis, where the real Czech people, not just tourists, go. After a few beverages in the lounge, we were advised we could go downstairs to the dance club as the lounge was to close at 1am. So we went downstairs and did some dancing. It was so much fun that I didn't even look at my watch until 3:15am at which time Jenna said she didn't want to know what time it was. We were distracted by a pair of hilarious guys dancing in sync and with anyone who would join in. They were wearing matching green t-shirts that had stick figures of a man and woman getting married. The caption beneath the design read "GAME OVER". It cracked me up. The one guy reminded me so much of an old friend of mine I could hardly believe it.

Then an adorable French boy was being flattering so we talked with him quite a while when I indicated to Jenna we had to go soon. She agreed and I said, "No, I mean it's twenty minutes until this place closes," to which she responded, "It's almost five?" Yes indeed, but these are the nights that remind me I am not so old as my age states. I am not as unattractive nor as dull as I often perceive myself. I only wish we had gone out more!

Sunday was rough and we were both agitated with other tourists and a little worse for war, but we still were up by 10 to go to look at tourist stuff. Then I went for a glass of wine with my new random French friend, returned to the hostel for a drink with Jenna and the next morning we were off to the airport.

Back in Kuwait, it's hot like, well, Kuwait. Unbearable during the daytime, really. I have not met all the new teachers yet but apparently there are several Western Canadians, including a young Calgarian who is excited to meet me so I can teach him to make sushi, so says my friend Joe.

With that, I will be off.

Happy 29th B-Day Susan!

I miss my friends at home but have had many hugs and feel like this is a second home, at least for the good and true friends I have made. Will post pictures soon.

all my love,
R

Stupid Tourists are Us

I am sitting in a basement in a Budapest internet cafe. This is our third day in Hungary and the second cool and overcast day in a row.

We arrived here early Friday morning on the night train from Sighsoara (Romania) and were quite tired and a sleep on the train is never great, especially when border crossings and passport checks are involved. With the one hour time difference, we arrived at 7:30am. Since we could not go in to our room at the hostel until later, we decided to walk around and see some sights. It was a gorgeous day and we were all hot and sticky but since we were walking it really did not matter.

We also decided to take some local transportation, which is plentiful in Budapest. We bought transit tickets and hopped on the tram, then tried to validate our tickets in the machines. With most such machines, all you do is stick the ticket in the slot and it validates the ticket. There were 4 Dutch boys and Jenna and I who did not notice that you had to pull a little button forward to validate the tickets. So we rode along hoping to see others validate so we could do the same. Before we were so fortunate a very large man came along and began to check the tickets. When he saw ours were not validated, he yelled at us and told all the English psekaers to get off the bus. So we were stopped off and this man and a friend tried to intimidate us, make us pay a fine that was the equivalent of 10 Euros each and threatened to call the police, who would make us pay a larger fine. We decided that we would not pay anything as the whole thing seemed pretty sketchy. These men had no officical ID tags. Then they got a man who spoke better English to come along and continue to yell at and intimidate us. This did not work because we kept our collective cool, and refused to take out money or passports. So he left, and the original two continued to yell at us, get in our faces and even gave one of the Dutch guys at little push. They continued to threaten calling the police and we continued to tell them to go ahead and do so. We would be happy to walk to the police station.

Finally about 15 minutes and no police phone calls later, they told us to go home and yelled rudely at us as we walked away. I think they called us idiots about 20 times during the encounter, or some Hungarian word that sounds an awful lot like IDIOT.

The day got better as we continued to see some sights and take pictures, drink some beer enjoy the day. Then we got back to the hostel to find our room was to be shared with two guys, but this mistake was quickly cleared up and we got a double room. By this point, we were exhausted, hungry and sticky from sweat. The room was a college dorm room with no character and although relatively clean, not great. The washroom had a shower and no toilet. The toilets, which reeked, were down the hall. I was prepared to find another place as even for me, this seemed like pretty low standards. But. The trouble is there is a huge outdoor mousic festival on right now and there are heaps of youth from all over Europe taking up all the hostel spaces and there was not too much chance of getting another space unless we wanted to book an expensive hotel. So we decided to stay, and although the bathrooms stink, the shower is consistently hot and has the best water pressure of any shower I have used.

I like Budapest as a city but seriously, they rip tourists off like nobody else. We did not pay attention one day to a printed cost and the woman charged us the equivalent of maybe 50 cents to a dollar more for transit tickets. How rude! Apparently this is very common in Budapest, and it is crucial to pay attention to prices in restaurants and such so as not to get ripped off.

As it turns out, transit inspectors all have red arm bands and the men who hassled us did not. This, too, we learned, is a common scam. Thank goodness we stayed cool.

And after all that, I think I should be going. I like it here, though Romania did capture my heart. Farmers use horses and ploughs. Grass and weeds are taken care of by sicles and man power and I am not exaggerating. It was like stepping back to Saskatchewan pioneering days. I could spend a long time in Romania, and the language is somewhat manageable because is is a romance language similar to French and Italian. Magyar, the Hungarian language, is complicated and I do not undestand all the accents on the letters. But I digress.

My friends, we live on a beautiful planet full of many amazing cultures and wonderful people.

peace,
r

Finding Inner Peace dot com

Greetings, my friends. My goal is to create a post to get you up to date on where I am without posting several spelling mistakes. My typing skills have never caught up with my spelling and grammar skills.

First off, the yoga retreat I went to was funny and not always in a good way. The whole Ananda centre in Italy is based on the teachings of an Indian Yogi, Paramhansa Yogananda (Autobiography of a Yogi), who brought yoga to the USA in the 1920s. Then one of Yogananda's disciples, J. Donald Walters, interpreted much of Yogananda's philosophies and wrote many texts, hymns and even a couple plays. J. Donald Walters, whose spiritual name is Swami Kriyananda, only knew Paramhansa Yogananda for 2.5 years before the Indian philosopher and yogi moved on to his next spiritual life.

Since yoga is about union, I was skeptical about the one-sidedness of the materials. I found it disturbing that the program was equally ritualistic as Catholic Mass. I was not expecting to feel the ceremonial aspect of my Catholic schooling while at a yoga retreat. But life goes on.

Some of the highlights were:

1. The best (vegetarian) food I have ever eaten, consistently. And by this, I mean better than I can cook. I am not sure if it was all the olive oil, the fresh cream or the fresh produce, but it was amazing.

2. Meeting several Germans who shared my cynicism and will allow me to visit them next summer in their homes. Wanna come, Mom?

3. Speaking French with one of the German girls who is a French and Spanish teacher.

4. Teaching a yoga class to my German and Dutch friends one day when our "Yoga for English Speakers" class was cancelled.

5. The gorgeous view from my window and fabulous storms and cool mountain weather. I actually wore the jacket I brought!

6. Breakfast and dinner in silence, but only the first 20 minutes because trying to keep the Italians quiet for any longer than that and you'd be faced with a lynch mob regardless of the peaceful intentions of the setting.

7. Espresso grade coffee and hot milk at breakfast.

Once the retreat was over, I made my way to Rome to fly to Bucharest.

I awoke early in the morning in Rome because my hostel was hot and noisy, like all hostels in Rome. As I walked to the train station, I thought it was nice to be out on my own, not many people around. At 5:30 in the morning in Rome, it is as busy as Saskatoon mid-morning. Not quite rush hour, but lots of movement. The train station was home to many weary travellers who laid their heads to rest and avoided wasting 25 Euros on a room in which it was darn near impossible to have a decent night's sleep. I digress.

The train station smelled of urine and was just as dirty and unpleasant as I recalled from my travels 3 years ago. The train to the airport was nice, quick and clean, though pricey. I had no problems at the airpost except after we had boarded the plane, they realised a passenger was missing. Due to International Regulations, we could not take off until the passenger's luggage had been taken off the plane. So that was a nice 90 minute delay. Better than techinical difficulties, I suppose.

Luckliy I was armed with a good book, a Romania travel guide and the nicest young (Romanian) woman sitting next to me. Between our collective effort of my Italian and her English comprehension, we had a few pleasant conversations.

Thank goodness when I arrived in Bucharest, Jenna was waiting for me at the airport. This morning we made it to Brasov and are staying in an apartment for 2 days. The apartment is Eastern Bloc communist architecture and very functional, not cute or pretty but with character nonetheless. And inexpensive.

Most Romanians speak English and are friendly and hospitable. I like it here and the countryside is a fairy tale landscape of mountains and mist, castles and old buildings. We will spend two more days in the area, exploring castles and hillsides, rural life and Urusul (local blonde ale). We love it here.

I would like to add a small recommended reading list:

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime (forget the author) and
The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs by Alexander McCall Smith.

Thanks to Sue for passing these along to me. But now what will I read???

Well, friends, my internet hour is nearly through. Thinking of you all and hoping to hear from you soon.

Pace,
Ramona