Homeward Bound.

I'm sitting in the Athens airport, going to head home soon. The entire flight is full of teenagers in big groups, like young ambassador type programs.

Yesterday, I climbed the Philopappos hill in Athens, and then I took a bunch of naps and walks. I got really hungry and had corn I bought from a street vendor. For dinner, Yoni, a guy on the trip who also had an extra day here, brought me to a restaurant he really liked. We split a Greek salad and two appetizers and it was delicious. I got to see my professors one more time, and Yaron, our resident "Silver Fox And Breaker of the Hearts of Straight Women" (a title awarded by Sammi), held my hand and told me what a great writer I was and how much he enjoyed my journal entries for school and I blushed. I am going to really miss a few people on this trip, and he is certainly one of them.

After dinner and some more walking, I went to my room to wait for Josh to get back to share the sketchy cigarillos that Yoni had bought. Josh never materialized and I fell asleep, so Yoni woke me up. Our plan to access the restaurant on the top floor of the hotel was foiled, so we didn't get to have our great view of the Acropolis. All the same, a good way to spend the evening.

Some other girls from the trip were also around and tried to invite themselves to our dinner but Yoni and I just looked at them and they got tired of being awkward and found their own table, far away.

Only 13 more hours until Atlanta and free water and my boyfriend and my parents and my friends and my guinea pigs :) And for now, I am going to start my Bill Bryson book; I have been saving it since I bought it in Amsterdam.


Note: we just got an announcement that the plane is going to be 15 minutes late. What the hell, Delta?

We're in Athens now, doing classwork after visiting the Acropolis this morning. After we returned, we all ate lunch and most of us then took naps. Long naps. I am still sleepy, even though I didn't go out last night. (After the mess that was Rome, I am pretty ready to not go out again; we got accosted by Neo-Nazis, and then I drank too much and then got cornered by a drunk girl on the trip who proceeded to cry at me and require sympathy because people got angry when she made bad decisions and endangered both herself and others.)

We took a boat from Brindisi to Patras and then a bus up to Athens. We stopped in Corinth, at the Canal, which divides the Peloponnesian Peninsula from mainland Greece. Athenians have so far been very nice, but the other tourists get on my nerves, especially today at the Acropolis, where people were pushing each other on the stairs and generally acting inconsiderate. The Acropolis itself is really pretty, other than the herds of tourists. We also went to the New Museum of the Acropolis, which opened about a week ago. We each got in for a euro. There are exhibits for the marbles Elgin stole from Greece: here the Greeks get really upset if you call them the Elgin marbles. In fact, they are still so extremely pissed about the whole situation that they uninvited the British to the opening of the Museum, and asked if our group was British because British visitors wouldn't get the special rate.

I wrote that yesterday, and the internet at the hotel has something against Blogger so I will post it later. For now, I am riding in a train on my way to Thessaloniki, which was, before the Holocaust, a huge center of Greek Judaism. We are spending the night there and then returning to Athens. I asked the hotel reception about booking a room for my extra night, and it's pretty reasonable- in the neighborhood of 68 euro for a single. I would try to split a room with someone, but I am more than ready to sleep alone.

Tomorrow.

Downstairs at 6:45
Rome Trastevere 7:14
Rome Termini to Brindisi: 7:31-13:22
Then a ferry, The Endeavour: 18:30-12:30 the following day

Friday:
Private Bus: Patras-Athens


Today I saw the Pantheon, the synagogue in the Ghetto, the Trevi Fountain, the Fountain of the Four Rivers, the Spanish Stairs, and the Capuchin crypt, which is amazing and terrifying.

Oh and then we all had dinner as a group. And got drunk.

Rome!

We are in Rome! The train detoured today into eastern Italy, which was NOT okay, since it was not at all where we needed to be. A four hour train ride took us about eight and it was miserable. Tomorrow we will explore real Rome, which I am excited about.

Last Venice Update

The day before yesterday we spent the day in the ghetto- the Ghetto Nuovo, which is the original ghetto and the origin of the use of “ghetto” as a quarter for minorities. We visited three of the five synagogues, and then we took the vaporetto to the Lido, a barrier island in the Adriatic, where we visited the old Jewish graveyard. Venice has been home to a lot of Jews, including Italian Jews, who settled in Italy after the diaspora, Sephardim who settled after 1391 and 1492, the Ashkenazi from Eastern and Northern Europe, and Levantine Jews from Turkey and Greece.

While I'm on the subject, a quick word on “ghetto”: originally it was geto, but the Ashkenazi Jews who were put thee were unable to say the soft g, so it became a hard g. Geto is actually a reference to the iron foundry, where cannons were made, around which the ghetto was built. The New Ghetto is actually the oldest, but it is the New Ghetto because it was built around the new foundry. By the time the Newest Ghetto was made, the term meant “Jewish quarter”. There was once a community of about 5000 Jews in Venice, all crammed into the ghettos New, Old, and Newest, so there were a lot of gravestones in the cemetery to examine. Many of the Sephardic stones are easily recognizable, as the Sephardim indicated their former hidalgo status on their gravestones, since they could no longer display the symbols above their doors.

After the cemetery, I went to the beach and walked. Then we all had dinner back in the ghetto and celebrated a classmate's birthday with cake.

Buona sera from Venice

I am pretty sure I could live in the Netherlands. I visited Bruges, Belgium, last Sunday and spent much of this past week in Amsterdam with a day in Leiden. Also I took an overnight train from Frankfurt, Germany, to Milan, Italy. We didn't stop in either city long enough to do anything besides change trains.


A canal in Amsterdam.

I promise I am still alive. I have journal entries to type up here from Amsterdam and a LOT to say about our train ride and even more to say about Venice. But internet is six euros for an hour here, and that is frankly highway robbery AND I have been too busy getting lost on purpose in Venice to write.

That said, I am not actually sure what day my flight home is on, and I am getting nervous.

Some photos.

I still want to come home, but I bought a camera today and Other Katie and I took some pictures. But before that happened, we went to the Louvre, where we saw the Mona Lisa "just to get it out of the way". I saw it and thought, "Yep, that sure is the Mona Lisa" and was thoroughly unimpressed. On the other side of the painting's wall are some Titian paintings and those are frankly more exciting.

A quick recap of the last few days and then pictures:
Wednesday was a day off, so I went to the Musée D'Orsay and spent many hours there. I looked at almost everything, including a bunch of Renoir, Van Gogh, Cezanne, Lautrec, Manet, and Monet.
Yesterday my whole group went to hear the Paris Orchestra play some modern classical music. It was very strange and very experiential and I liked hearing a song start and then sound as if it was actually exploding. Afterwards, many of us went to the Eiffel Tower to see it light up. I forgot a sweater so I didn't go up it, but I had crepes, and that was all I needed.
Today I didn't go up the Tower either, because I am afraid of falling and therefore of heights. Also, I didn't want to wait in a line to spend money to be somewhere that would make me nervous, at least not without someone to hold my hand.
Before that, we went to the Louvre and had lunch in which the server basically fleeced us out of money, which was quite distressing, and then he had the audacity to tell us that tip was not included. Yes, really. We also moved out of the old hotel and into our Shiny Two Star Hotel next door. It is more expensive, but we have separate beds and they don't use smelly chemicals here; the old hotel staff used very strong chemicals in our room (for what, we aren't sure) and it was making a bunch of us nauseous and I think it is why I have been miserable in Paris.

Anyway, here are some pictures.
Jardin de Tuileries.


One time I took a nap here when I was 15. Champ de Mars.

Under the tower.

Still in Paris.

I talked to the right people, and I don't think anyone is going to make a big deal about room stuff (to my face, at least) anymore.  I come home in 20 days, and while I actually really like Paris so far, I am really looking forward to Amsterdam and then home, because at home I will be able to be ALONE and it will be QUIET.  I am alone right now, though, and it is because I am sick- not much of an appetite, weak limbs, sore throat, falling asleep all day after 7 hours of sleep.  Tomorrow is a day off, and I will be taking care of travel arrangements for Sunday and then going to the Musee d'Orsay.

I like being here more than I liked Spain since my French is MUCH better than my Spanish.  I was able to help out a German couple who were trying to log onto the hotel's computers by speaking to the hotel clerk in French.  I also can get directions and help and most people speak enough English to fill in the blanks.  Also the food is good here.  Even a totally plain omelette here is better than anything I had in Madrid.  (In Seville, the best thing I had was the tuna that put me in the ER, so you can draw your own conclusions.)

I am not sure how well Amsterdam is going to go since we will be staying in rooms of five girls apiece and sharing communal bathrooms.  We have a resident germphobe on the trip who insists she will NOT be showering AT ALL in Amsterdam.  Um, ew.  

Since I am off this weekend, Other Katie and I had to find a hotel- we will be staying in the Alhambra in Paris, next door to our current hotel for a little over 8o euro a night.  It is definitely a downgrade from the Alhambra we saw in Granada :)  I will also need a better jacket for Amsterdam, since it will be even chillier and rainier there than it has been here.

Paris

We are officially here and I have figured out free wifi.  I went to the laundromat with Other Katie :) and two other girls.  I am glad I speak enough French to get by- the four of us figured out the machines.  There was a minor crisis when my washer got stuck shut, and this French woman came and beat the crap out of the door until it opened.  So far, no one in Paris has been horrible, with the exception of the cab driver, who refused to give us a receipt and screamed at us to get out of the cab.  

I slept for nine and a half hours last night, which was glorious, and I could have slept longer, but I felt like laundry and breakfast were more important.  Parisian breakfast would have given Dr. Atkins another heart attack: a small baguette and a croissant with hot chocolate, orange juice, and butter and jam.  

I have gotten shuffled around so much on this trip because some of the people freak out if they don't get to sleep in the same room as their temporary bff's.  I am really tired of the drama.  I love the travel and the cities- especially Barcelona- and what I am learning, but if I had known there would be so much drama and middle-school-type behavior, I would never have come on this trip.

There is this girl on the trip who is here clearly to just drink and get fucked up and hook up with foreign guys, and she keeps sighing about how much she loooooves Paris and France and tries to act worldly and cultured. Yesterday we were taking the train from Barcelona to Paris and we stopped in the south of France- somewhere south of Narbonne. We peered out the window, trying to figure out where we were, and she announced proudly we were in Sortie.

Sortie means Exit. She was reading an exit sign.

Today: Barcelona to Montpellier, 8:45-13:22 Montpellier to Paris, 14:23-17:49 Hopefully we will stay out of fights with other passengers this time. Kind of excited about Paris; I am going to miss my Barcelona hotel though.

Barcelona

Tomorrow we leave for Paris. Last night, I went out with some people to a bar. I'm staying in a different hotel than my classmates because there was some sort of mix up with the rooms and so a professor and I are staying together. It's gorgeous!  There are TWO pillows here and they are perfect. There's also a swimming pool, which I will take advantage of later.  I was up till 4, and then Maria and I got up at 9:30, had breakfast (almost a real breakfast, not ham and cheese sandwiches like in Sevilla), and then dropped off our clothes at a wash and fold place. I just picked them up, and my clothes look so neat and tidy, all folded up and clean. Other than that, because today is a day off, I have been sleeping and reading.  One of our professors, Yaron, leaves us here, so we are going to have a goodbye dinner for him.  He will join up with us again in Greece.  

One of the things I wonder about here is the racism.  We visited a recently-discovered synagogue that hasn't been used since the Jewish population was destroyed/converted/expelled in Barcelona in 1391.  There's a sign on the wall of a building near it to let people know it is there as it's a historical site, but it's been graffiti'd over with "Libre Palestina" and I think a swastika- they washed it off best they could, but it shows up if you take a photo with flash.  The other signs for the synagogue are taken down at close and put back up when it opens to avoid having them destroyed.  If you were next to the door, you wouldn't know it was a synagogue, unless you knew to look for a low doorway with a space for a mezuzah.  In Granada, we saw graffiti equating the star of David with a swastika.  There's a lot of anti-Semitic sentiment here related to Palestine.  I know there is a small Jewish community in Spain- people were talking about visiting an Orthodox synagogue last night for Shabbos, but it didn't happen- but I cannot imagine why they would have come back to Europe to live.  The other thing I noticed is more familiar.  The laundry place was going to deliver our clothes to the hotel, but Maria and I were nervous because they weren't here at 1:45 and the place closes at two.  Anyway, the guy who works there and who also does deliveries is black.  The woman who we talked to asked us to let the front desk know that there would be a black man delivering our clothes as a lot of people won't get their deliveries since the front desk guys freak out when they see him and refuse to help the delivery guy.  I could see Maria feeling really awkward as she let the front desk know that there was a "negrito" man coming with our clothes before 2 p.m.  I can only imagine how much more awful it would be to actually BE the delivery man.

Oh, also, yesterday I went to the Sagrada Familia, which is Gaudi's fabulous cathedral.  The outside is just beautiful but because the inside is so unfinished and construction continues, there isn't much to see unless you go up top, which requires a long wait and an elevator ride that costs 2.5 euro.  Seven of us elected to go to lunch instead and we found a little restaurant where we had a long, long lunch and consumed three bottles of wine before going to our lectures in a hot stuffy room on Judeo-Arabic and the Disputation of Barcelona.  For the rest of today, I am going to pack, read, swim, and then go to dinner with the group.  

Hello from Sevilla.  We were in Cordoba yesterday, where we made everyone hate us- there was even an epic shouting match with a French tour group over whether or not we should continue to have access to the statue of Maimonides.  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maimonides)  TA Josh got stuck at the Cordoba train station watching all of our bags before we all returned from the city and traveled to Sevilla.  Compared to Madrid, Sevilla is Paradise.  Gorgeous Muslim-influenced architecture, tiny medieval streets (taking a taxi here is both thrilling and traumatizing), and friendly people.  Oh, and the food!  The dinner I had last night was delicious- a huge change after the greasy food and negative service in Madrid.  

While we waited for the check, my mouth and lips started to go numb and then to burn.  I thought that maybe I had not applied enough chapstick and that was why.  Then my face started to go red, and I thought perhaps the wine was hitting me harder than I thought.  I felt my skin get hotter and hotter, and then finally I asked someone if my face was red.  Sammy said, "You look like you have a sunburn!" but we hadn't been in the sun much at all that day and I always had worn sunscreen.

On our way back, I started to feel itchy and my head was pounding.  I had only had a glass of sangria and a lot of water, so I couldn't figure out what was going on.  Then we got to the hostel, where people started to remark on my redness.  I removed my jacket and was shocked to see that my arms were red and blotchy!  Drew gave me Benadryl and Sammy made me tell Maria, the TA, and Maria and Katie and I hung out in my and Katie's room to wait for the Benadryl to work.  Meanwhile, my headache was worse, I was alternating between freezing and burning, and the rash was spreading.  When the rash continued to spread and to get redder and redder- by this point, it covered my shoulders, my head, and my neck- Maria, Katie (who is an EMT) and I decided the hospital might be the best option.  (It was more their idea than mine, since I decided it wasn't such a big deal, really.  I am a moron and was nearly a casualty of my own medical machismo.)  Maria and I got in a cab and went down to the hospital.  Rash status: splotches on my chest and some on my lower back.  Trouble breathing.  I am pretty sure the Benadryl started to work when we hit the hospital, because breathing wasn't a problem again and I got really loopy.

Let me just say this:  Everyone against socialized medicine tells me that it takes forever to be seen, the quality of care is lower than our standards, and that it is really a terrible idea.  I left for the hospital around 11:30, arrived at 11:45, was originally considered a level 2 issue, and was quickly elevated to level 1 (I was BRIGHT red, shaking, and obviously not all right, even though I was cracking jokes and, as everyone told me this morning, "being a trooper").  Once we convinced the doctor I did NOT have a sunburn- Maria assured her I was "white as paper" two hours before- she called in another medico, and, later yet another, more senior one I decided was Spain's answer to House.  They poked and prodded as per usual, but they didn't ask if I smoked or if I might be pregnant, which is standard in my ER experiences.  They also touched the rash which HURT.  They decided to give me an injection of cortisol and something for the itching and pain and keep me in the ER for 30 minutes.  t was decided that I probably reacted to something I ate, not the dogs who live in our hostel- either the tuna, mushrooms, bread, or sangria that made up my dinner.  (Benny, our professor, says "Over my dead body you will have mushrooms again!") We waited about 45 and then went back.  While we waited, several other patients made a point of telling me my color was much better now and I looked a lot better.  This sort of amuses me because I didn't realize they saw me when I came in and because I initially reacted poorly to the cortisol shot.  It HURT, they used the biggest needle I had ever seen, and I cried, but the first doctor held my hand and soothed me in Spanish.  I was trembling from panic and steroids, but it did help.  After that, we caught a cab and went home, arriving around 2:30.

Do you seen what I left out here?  It was totally free, since it's paid for by taxes, because Spain believes its travelers also have a right to medical care.  I'll spare you the sermon.   That said, since I don't pay taxes here, I am probably going to pick up some souvenir type stuff- I am not sure what else to do to repay Spain!

Today we went to the Juderia- the old Jewish quarter- and then the Catedral, one of the largest- if not THE largest- church in Europe.  I will be posting poor-quality photos of those places and of Cordoba later, but for now, I am going to share my laptop. 

Overdue from May 29

May 29, 2009

I still haven't gotten access to my money, because of Wachovia, but fortunately, my awesome parents got involved and transferred money to my account to tide me over till the 2nd.  Tonight for dinner, we went to a restaurant/cabaret called Gula Gula.  One of our TA's, Maria, tells me that "gula" is Spanish for "gluttony".  The food was pretty good- we were mostly eating from the salad bar, but the real reason people go is the drag show.  A few of our boys got short- unsolicited- lap dances from the performers, and after the show, argument ensued over whether or not the attractive woman tending the salad bar was biologically male or not.  (She sounded female to me and to the males on the trip, but I am assured by some of the other girls that she was not.)  We also got ragged for being Americans by one of the emcees, who pointed out that we '"didn't understand mierda", which was true, but we laughed and clapped at the right times, which is what matters.

Yesterday we went to Toledo.  Toledo is a medieval city about 30 minutes from Madrid by bullet train going at 250 km.  It's one of the oldest urban centers on the Iberian Peninsula, and there a Jewish community there for ages and ages until the pogroms in 1391 and the expulsion of the Jews and Muslims from Iberia in 1492.  There are two synagogues which were both eventually turned into churches and whose architecture has Muslim influence; this same influence can also be seen at the Catedral in Toledo, which has a Mozarab chapel.  Josh (one of the TA's) and I walked around the Catedral while he snuck photos, often behind me or over my shoulder. (In many European churches, there are signs that say "cameras prohibido" and employees who yell, "NO PHOTO!'")  One of the stunning things about the church is that there are paintings by El Greco all over- he lived and painted in Toledo and you can visit his home, which he bought from a prominent Jewish family- and the fresco on the ceiling of the sacristy has, in the place of an image of the Creator, the Hebrew characters that spell "Elohim".  Pretty cool, huh?

A group of about six of us got lost in Toledo and ended up getting ice cream and taking the bus back to the train station from the residential area, which was an adventure in itself.  I loved that the ice cream vendor greeted us genially in Spanish, Italian, and English: ("Bueno dias, señoras.  Buongiornio, signorias.  Good day, ladies.") The bus driver was less cordial, telling us to get on the bus in a rough voice and then kicking us off without telling us what was going on- we had to change buses- but at least he was looking out for us. 

The day before yesterday, Katie, Leah, and I went out for dinner.  We found a pizza for 10 euro and split it amongst ourselves and then split two helpings of chocolate con churro.  In the Plaza del Sol, which is the dead center of Spain, about a quarter to half mile from our hotel, we saw a band of young men performing with a circle of people around them.  Leah convinced one of the boys that I was Spanish and he pulled me into the circle and twirled me around for a few minutes and then asked me how I liked the music in Spanish.  I told him I was estadounidense and he switched to English.  Apparently they were all there from a Portuguese music school called Tuna ("not the fish").  It was a pretty cool night.

Tomorrow we are taking a walking tour of the old Jewish quarter here in Madrid as well as an exam, so I will save this to post  a later date and get to work studying and working on my school journal.  

Dinner and a Crisis

We had dinner tonight as a big group, and when we got back, some people discovered that the valuables, i.e. laptops, iPhones, and iPods which they had locked in their room were missing, as well as a backpack to carry all this stuff.  Needless to say, this is upsetting and problematic, and the hotel is not being helpful at all.  Their security cameras in the lobby are all dummies, and all of us are pretty sure that it was an inside job.

I didn't know about this until I got back to the hotel after a thirty minute walk down by the Prado, during which I had been musing about how safe I felt in the city.  I cannot tell if Madrid reminds me more of San Francisco or of somewhere else (maybe Boston?) but I do know that I am comfortable here and that everywhere I look,  I see something beautiful.  There are also a bunch of dogs in this city.  Their owners sometimes hold their leashes while the animals run around, sometimes even into cafes.  I saw a woman walking four Pomeranians and two Bichon Frises, and one of the bichons was off-leash.  I waited at the crosswalk near the Prado next to a golden retriever who, upon the light's change, promptly took off across the street and headed purposefully down the sidewalk into a fountain.  

As it stands now, the people whose stuff got stolen are in a different room, and the girls whose room safe was broken have also moved.  

On a side note, we are all grouped on the fourth floor, but as it is a European hotel, that means I am ACTUALLY on the fifth floor and use the stairs as such.  I am definitely feeling the burn.  A bunch of people are going out tonight, but with a seven forty-five wakeup time and jet lag, I think I am going to bed early... ish.  I also won't be using my phone tomorrow, but I probably will the day after that.  I have less than two euros' worth of credit left and I can't access my debit account until June 2nd.  Here's hoping I regain access a little sooner and then I can not only use my phone, but also buy drinks.

I'm in Madrid! And I made a point of charging my camera battery before I left so guess what is still on its charger at my place in Atlanta: that's right, my camera battery. I bought a third party battery and will be hunting for a third party charger- till then, iPhone photos will have to suffice. Most of the people I have interacted with here speak some English, with the exception of my cab driver and a waiter at the café we went to, who thought I wanted a caffe de leche when I was really trying to remember how to say ATM. The cab driver pointed out landmarks and repeated their names over and over until I pronounced them correctly. It may have been sort of a rip off, but it ended up being a boon when I was dragging my jet-lagged butt around and suddenly realized I was a bit lost. We aren't far from the Prado Museum. (Or the "Praaaah-doh.")

We don't have anything to do for three hours, so I am fucking around on the internet and trying to figure out my phone situation (I may just buy a cheapo new phone since this SIM keeps telling me something in Spanish that goes, "I'm sorry SOMETHING SOMETHING SOMETHING Bye!") and my roommate is sleeping off the jetlag. A bunch of us went out for coffee, so my pre-trip worries about loneliness seem to have been unnecessary and my jetlag is minimal, despite only two hours of sleep on the plane. I am not really ready for food, though I haven't eaten since 7 or 8 local time. We've been blessed to get a hotel room with a giant bathroom attached, but I would trade it in for a working air conditioning unit in a heartbeat.