Archive for May, 2008
Greece’s rail network is dilapidated because the rugged terrain is more easily traveled by buses not excepting eurorail passes. Not realizing this, I dawdled about town and missed my infrequent southbound train.
The town of Patras extends from the sea up one mile to the top of a dry Mediterranean bush mountain, where a fort stands in vigil. This was going to be my home for the evening but every road that dead ended into the hillside, looked like it would give me access. But when I approached the actuality of it, was a 8 foot triple barbwire fence, with no way around. It wasn’t possible to slug my 18kg (40 lbs – just had it weighed) backpack over sharp metal 8 feet off the ground, in midday, without drawing attention to myself. I had to find another way.
The only access was through a old mans backyard… and there he was. A short, fat, old funny looking, bald man, who’s silver hair reached back like the head of a cobra. His large eyes were covered by years of wrinkle buildup, leaving only the two beady remains. I pictured him wearing a fedora and carying a violin suitcase.
“Yep he’s ex-greek-mob,” I thought.
He was struggling with brooms to shift large sheets of corrugated metal on his half finished carport. I smiled as I walked by, thinking of him gunning people down and taking territory for the Greek Don. He saw my smug tourist look and my large backpack and said, “Hallo!”… I returned him a ‘Yasu’ and offered him help with the roof in hope he would let me camp in the backyard.
“Jus a minute! Jus a minute!” he said and thought to himself. It started me, not because he stopped to think, but the way he shouted just a minute and repeated it twice, as if he had turret syndrome. “Not outside! No. Stay inside. I haf a e’tra room. Nece batchlor paed!”
Turns out he is a Greek slumlord maniac.
“COME, Come! Follow me! Follow me!” he shouted excitedly as we descended a flight of stairs into the basement and then another into the deeper darker sub-basement. Like a journey through the earth, it was musty and damp I half expected to dodge stalactites hanging from the ceiling. We finally reached were the magma was and he traverserst over to a narrow corridor, walked all the way to the end, flung the door open and said, “Your room! Bachelor paed!”
Exactly as I expected, solid concrete box with a crapper in the corner, sink, bed, and no windows. I thought, “Oh goodie! When does my cellmate arrive so I can get rapped, shank him with a widled down mess hall spork, forcing me into the Arian brotherhood for protection, where ultimately my ass gets tossed around like a baseball for membership fees.”
“Looks good,” I told him.
“You have book to read?” I noded and he disappeared into the dark corridor, door slamming behind him. I carefully studied the room. The walls were painted bright white with one torn wallpaper accent wall, of some generic flowers and stripes, the wallpaper was once pink but now was a faded yellow. In the center of the wall was a tacked up colored paper plate for a wall hanging, as I approached, it developed into stuffed striped jackalopes from a child’s television program called ‘The Fimbles’. They were creepy little devils and the Dr. sussian background made them seem that much more ominous. The bed was firm, but in a good way, which I enjoyed. The pillow was a rectangular chunk of styrofoam that condensed as much as a block of granite and was twice as sharp. The crapper flushed by reaching inside the tank and pulling up on the stopper. Good thing was, access inside the tank was easy; the lid was missing. Hanging on the sink was a toothbrush, shampoo, warn underwear, and a leather belt. I wondered about the last person who was in here and why they left their belongings behind, when George, that was his name, burst through the door with a can of Amstel Beer and a platter of vegetables and bread dipped in olive oil.
“You are hungry,” he demanded and I was.
He dropped the platter on the bed, asked what time my train was leaving and again, if I had books to read, then disappeared as fast as he came in.
I read a frighting, deep, section of my book before bed. It was about the main character. He carelessly knocked up a girl and is forced into the streets of New York searching for an illegal back alley abortionist. He failed and she was forced to find her own. I had nightmares.
In the morning, George knocked on the door. I told him to come in and in he did, he flew in. His large hands holding coffee, cookies, and a bottle of brandy.
“Goud start to a day!” he shouted. He poured the brandy into a shot glass he brought out from his pocket. ”Hafe some!”
“I don’t want to drink alone, have one with me.”
“I already ded. DRINK! Drink!” he laughed as he poured me a second one.
I told him yesterday I would help him a bit more on the garage before taking off at noon. Every time something worked out right he responded with a crazy wine and smile. ”Goud ‘s Gould!” Sometimes he would go into some yelling frenzy about a key and one hundred euros. I never understood, but nodded accordingly, sometimes adding a ‘that’s not fair’. We worked for about an hour before he stopped.
“Jus a minute! Jus a minute!” he huffed. “You work to hard. Les rest and eat.”
I had no objections, but couldn’t help thinking that this isn’t be the same nervous, wild George? Laziness overtook him and he was like a collapsed bridge. The bottle rocket of George had popped, but he had been making a large pot of vegetable chicken potato stew. It tasted alright, but then he produced this gorgeous brick of the BEST FETA I’d ever tasted. I made up my mind to spend another night helping out this nut and finishing this great block of cheese.
“Goud ‘s Gould!” he exclaimed and poured me another glass of wine.
“Sure is,” I thought, licking my lips… staring at the cheese.
May 31st, 2008
The day shot off with a bang when I traded a used Italian version of Dante’s Inferno, purchased for a euro on the street, for two deep rich down to earth novels. The kind that make you feel insignificant and hadn’t accomplished anything in your life. But then there was that feeling, again. A deep, woozy and uncomfortable felling. Like a foreign insect, trapped withing the bowls of my stomach, and laying devilish eggs that turn into swarms of ravage flys. I killed those bastards with a swig of leftover jagermister.
But, in a night of the living dead sort of way, the flys returned as I boarded the farie to Greece. It took the remaining bottle to fully drown them all… but it also killed my inhibitions.
After storing a backpack, I then wondered the ship like an overachieving eager child solving a labyrinth. Upon reaching a corridor with rows of hotel style bedroom doors, I remembered a story a buddy had once told…
“He was aboard a cruise ship. Bound for some distant exotic place, when he locked eyes with a gorgeous Spanish girl. She didn’t speak a word of English, but it didn’t matter, because she spoke the universal language of love. One thing led to another and he had a place to sleep for the night.”
With this tempting thought in my head, I searched the rows in a fanatic mechanical way, almost maddeningly but…. There she was, a suitable candidate. She was tender, soft, and sweet and smelt of lavender. I could tell she dyed her hair and her makeup was semi-messy, but messy in a cute precious kind of way. Her mannerisms made me fell young again like I was magically transformed into a giddy child. Yes my friends, I found my match. A 75 year old woman, fumbling with her key card.
“Can I help you with that?” I said, in the most tender voice I could muster.
“I just loathe these things,” she sighed in her strong English accent.
“Good,” I thought, “She speaks English. Now I don’t have to try seducing her.”
Thinking that made me laugh out loud, semi-startling her, but I wiped it from my memory and smoothed on the charm.
“Les see what we can do,” I said, “These things are always a pain.”
We tried putting that flimsy card in every direction; bent it in certain spots; even preformed a trick my mother used a the supermarket to get warn credit cards to work, by putting it in a plastic bag. Nothing would get that door open.
“Let’s go to reception so they can figure it out,” I then smiled and poked out my escort elbow and she took it and grabbed her bag with the other. “Here, let me take that from you.” and she reluctantly handed it over.
Turns out the card we were swiping was her meal voucher and her matching door card was safely in her purse, I looked at the card again for any indication of a meal ticket and saw none. Except for a few lines of text they were exactly the same.
“Are you thirsty?” she said, “I want you to meet my husband.”
Knowing perfectly well there was only two twin beds in her room, like a packet of sugar, I dissolved my hope into a glass of jack and coke she purchased for me. We took a seat with three elderly people, her husband and another couple. I smouzed for a little while with these English folks. Then, as they say, excused myself for the Lou.
“Yes!”I exclaimed as I saw the shower in the bathroom and took one immediately. The water was freezing and I felt stumbly when I exited, most likely my overuse of bug killer, but at least I was clean.
I found the younger crowd up on the top deck bar. I bought a German beer and joined a rowdy mixed group of Australians and Americans. They were studying at some university in Italy and heading to Greece during there off week. After nervously introducing myself, I replied with a reverse form of a joke from the movie, Dumb & Dumber.
I exclaimed, “Austria, huh? Gudintah… ince, thrice… hassieustervald!” (the only semi-German sounding words I could come up with at the time)
The joke received mixed reviews… mostly pity laughter.
I answered the usual crap travel questions, “where you from, how long you been traveling, blah blah, etc.” Then, I reconfigured a story told to me by an actual Aussie I met in Florence, but changed key words, like his name and made them my own.
“I was in Melbourne a a pretty fancy dinner party. My buddies where there, this wild guy from the bush that would always speak his mind, some others I didn’t know, and these three beautiful foxy ladies that nobody seamed to know. The guys were a bit apprehensive and kinda wanting to impress these hot women. So, taking the lead, my buddy spoke up and told a story of a crazy woman he met at a party. She wouldn’t leave him alone and was trying to pick up on him all night. He added of course – ‘its wasn’t that she was bad looking, or anything. I simply didn’t have a thing for her personality. So I gently had to let her down and tell her I didn’t like her, she went off crying… ‘ He then made a point of saying how bad he felt about the situation. Then looked to us for some support. We looked at these beautiful girls and shook our heads in reassurance… This wild guy chimed in just then… “AWW! F#@k ‘dat, mate! I wou’da smoked ‘eh. Done ‘eh rotten!”
The beautiful girls looked grossly appalled and we tried best as possible to keep in our laughter, but he most likely just blown his chances and ruined our chances as well.
I finally had the laughter I was looking for at the beginning and I settled down. After about 30 minutes of chit chat I felt comfortable, as if I was amongst an old group of friends. I began telling another tale about how I almost was killed in Chico by a drunk maniac. (I love telling this one because it makes me feel animated and it’s a true story.) During the middle of the story the boat started rocking just a bit too much… and I said abruptly, “Excuse me for a moment.”
The flies weren’t dead and they wanted out. I rushed for the side of the ship and let them fly. I just hung over the sea with a green face for what seemed like a hour. “So much for a bed,” I thought as I swung my head over the rails for the last time and slept on the cold hard deck.
May 29th, 2008
Yeah thats right, I’m going to briefly talk about the movie Highlander. If you would like to skip this, just scroll down until you reach the bold line about Mark and if your not familiar with the movie consider watching it. (Its quite good for a 1990′s semi sci-fi action drama.) However, the usa network (same folks that brought us the award-winning series Monk, played by Tony Shaloup) created a Highlander series that was fantastic, even without Sean Connery. Then again, you listening to a guy who owns the first three seasons of Battlestar Galactica. NERD ALERT!
Ok so I see we lost 90% of our readers — Let me explain. There is a class of humans locked in a epic universal challenge. These so called humans can live forever, with but one weakness; death by decapitation. Upon their decapitation all their power, and the powers of those they killed will be transfered to the killer. Throughout time battles have been won creating very powerful people, but in the end, there can only be one…
Whoops lost the remaining 10% — Mark would have stopped me from writing this… Oh yeah, there is my point!
Mark has gone home to California.
Mark is like Sean Connery in the movie. He paved and prepared me for the path of world adventure, gave me the opportunity, and just like Sean… left me without a companion and fellow traveler. No he didn’t die, but he changed his final departure date and flew back to California a few days ago.
I’m not fully qualified to tell you his reasoning behind this, complicated as they were, one would need a human psychology doctorate in order to begin to devolve. So, feel free to ask him yourself and maybe you can find the answer your looking for… but all I know is he found his.
To tell you the truth I envied him when I boarded the train to the south of Italy. I too was a little homesick. Friends and loved ones faces blurred through my mind in a Los Angeles beaming highway fury. Clawing the landscape has left dirt between my nails and having a place to actually call home, and feelings of settling have already started a foundation… Living like a bum these past few months, with much excitement and many worries., has taken a few years off my existence.
But these feelings instantly vanished as I found my next makeshift home! A vacated haunted mansion at the top of a hill overlooking the city of Salerno on the famous Almalfi Coast of southern Italy. As Robin Leach would say…
With four stories, roof access, and over 20 rooms… this haunted gem boast not only ghosts but fine beach style living fit for a young homeless pauper. Valued at the price of free, as long as you don’t mind the sheets, chains and moans.
The white ghastly beast hung four stories high, on a small cliff side surrounded by trees and a clashing orange building fence, even the color contrast had an hypnotic effect that drew me to it. The bottom floor was all boarded up as if to keep whatever lurked in its confined prison, but there was a bit of scaffolding on the side… where I made my intrusion. Dust scattered, the entire place was gutted but I couldn’t tell if it was a complete renovation of just being hatched.
I carefully and quietly chose a room near the scaffolding, in case a quick exit needed to be made and naturally, the one with the best seaside view. As the sun set on rooftops, I boiled watter for tea, yawned, and swiftly prodded the dust into a pillow.
As I lay shifting restlessly, I heard the sound of footsteps and seen movement amongst the shadows made by the orange low glow of street lamps. I rose from bed, stuck my head around the corner from a spot in the shadows, I carefully checked for visitors. Nothing. It was most likely my vivid imagination but I felt just then: this house had vibes, bad ones.
Even in sleep my body was restless, left and right sides of my mind were racing and just like all the other times, my logical side was losing. I fell into nightmares. They were some of the most terrifying I had ever experienced, jerking me awake and making me breathing heavily. The one I could remember had gleaming bright lights that blinded me as stark white faces looked away from me into the pasty white scenery, as I would attempt to approach to get a better look, ghastly amounts of blood would soak clothes, sheets, and floors; white dissolved into red. Then with a loud “wham” the faces shot around, they were disfigured and bloody, no smiles… just piercing eyes of people I couldn’t recognize.
After two nights of noises and dreams, the last straw fell, making me leave my private mansion. At witching hour, I awoke, looked around and saw nothing. Defensively, I rolled over so my back was against a wall and starred into the room, more importantly the doorway. There I lay apprehensively, sometimes tossing my head upwards when hearing creaks and other sounds in the room above me. The room felt dense and hard to breath. Then finally I relaxed after what seemed like an eternity of stillness and my eyes closed.
Just then, whispers of inaudible hot breath flowed through my ear. I let out a loud “whaa!” and sat straight up and scurried against the wall in fear.
I left early the next day… and only looked back, once. Clouds gathered from behind the mansion and it rained for the next few days. During my hikes through the coastal mountains, the rain felt sticky, like saliva from the condensing warm breath of a mansion coaxing somebody into its dry grip. I never returned.
May 24th, 2008
The blue sky and sunshine almost made me forget the frigged north blown showers that pummeled my makeshift shelter. The well-warn blue tarp protected against the poring rain, but the night air was so cold my breath would instantly condense on the inside, soaking my sleeping bag. After awaking in a strong knotted fetal position, the rest of the morning was spent warming myself beside a pond on a sunlit bench, cradling warm tea, watching the ducks, and attempting to dry my possessions. This utopia, however, was short lived and I had to meet Mark for an early morning train ride further south.
We departed to train around 2:00 PM and wondered the new city of Rotterdam in search of a hostel for Mark and an alley or park for myself. The dorm Mark chose had free luggage storage and a much needed clothes dryer in the downstairs basement. I programed the dryer for Sahara and left for local homeless hangouts to ask around for good sleeping grounds, but on my way I came across the perfect spot in some nearby city garden. Then, returned to Mark’s hostel to check on the status of my clothing where I found trouBle with a capital “B”. Yes my friends, that “B” was a full bottle of Bacardi Rum in another hostel guests hands. He invited me to sit and watch some television and indulge in a few drinks of his Bacardi.
I was one cup short of finishing the bottle with my new companion before Mark wondered in to join us. Realizing there was not enough booze to go around we decided to head out and find a liquor store. In most cases my small body is more than capable to handle this volume of liquor, but because of the absence of food this day and my lack of sleep the night before; this wasn’t going to be one of those cases. I completely blacked out shortly after leaving the basement…
In my entire life, I have only blacked out for this length of time, once. In the safety of my own home in Chico — I was dared to finish a yellow tinted toxic bum wine, that literally turned your mouth black, called Thunderbird. The alcohol caused me to end up naked upon the lawn of an identical looking house, half a mile away from my own. But that is a story for later.
… so I awoke in a weird sleepwalking state down the side of a sidewalk, recalling a dream of me as a ninja running along the rooftop and hopping into the street. At first it was quite normal and relaxing, moonlit stroll along a city landscape. Then, I slowly started recognizing that this walk was real and not a dream. I wasn’t sleeping… How did I get here? Where is my backpack? Why is it night time? And most importantly, where the heck am I?
I desperately plunged my hand into my pocket and searched for a map, thankfully, it was there and allowed me to navigate my way back to the city center and to Mark’s hostel. Along the way I encountered a couple of Asian backpackers trying to locate a place to sleep and told them to follow me.
We pressed the front buzzer and the night watchman answered. Using the couple as a distraction, I rushed downstairs into the basement to grab the backpack I left. It was missing! Not knowing what room Mark was staying in I regrettably had to ask the night watchman.
“Get out of here!” he said.
“I just need to talk to my buddy and find my backpack. His name is…”
He interrupted, “I’ve already kicked you out once tonight!”
“What!?”
“Get out!” he screamed and thrust me out the front door and locked it with a sneer.
Totally confused, I had no choice but to stand outside until he finished signing the Asian couple up for a room. He then opened the door allowing me to speak. After much persuasion, he forced me to sign up for the night. Knowing full well that at the start of the night I only had 10 Euros, I told him that I couldn’t afford to stay. To prove my point I pulled out my wallet to show him, but it was bursting with over 50 Euros. Flabbergasted I payed the dorm fee and walked upstairs to find Mark.
“Hey Mark! Do you know where my backpack is?”
“Did you get my note?”
“No.”
“I gave you a note. Your backpack is right there.”
Needing to find out the entire story I dumbfoundedly walked down into the lobby to ask the night watchman what happened.
“I found you asleep in the kitchen and asked if you were staying here. You just got up and left without saying a word.”
Mark and I attended the complementary breakfast after a restful nights sleep. We agreed he would tell me the entire story during breakfast. We walked into the dining area where quite a laughing few guests reconignised me, and a few came up and shook my hand. “What the hell happened last night, mark?” I asked.
(For your consideration — Even though we insisted on the web site maintaining its PG-13 rating, we both concluded that there would be no other words to describe my actions other than that of, complete asshole. Sure, we contemplated a substitution for the word, jackass but it didn’t convey the complete lack of immorality and disrespect for others that I encountered.)
In the words of Mark here is what happened that day…
Will be continued in the next article. When he bloody writes it! Hurry up Mark!
May 10th, 2008
