Brontides

These are getting shorter as we get closer to the finish. Slovenia still stands out, though, as being one of the most beautiful countries that I saw.

Hello chaps and chapesses!

Christmas was slightly lame this year, although, as discussed previously, I don’t consider Christmas to have occured until I am sick of the Pogues’ Fairytale of New York, and seeing as I haven’t even heard it this year I feel like I can justifiably claim not to have had Christmas at all.

Which is lucky, as Christmas itself was sort of lame. The youth hostel was pretty much empty apart from a horde of Latvians, who descended on Christmas afternoon, made the place smelly, then disappeared on Boxing Day morning. There were a few sketchy things going on – there was a kind-of pseudo flea market going on by the river, and some folk-singing on a stage in the main square, but that was about it. The cinema was open, but it was only showing King Kong and some Eastern European thing. In the end I went slightly further out to another cinema, which was again pretty limited in range, and watched A History of Violence, which was poo. And that was Christmas.

But judged apart from that, Slovenia was great. I choose to regard those two days as a sort of haitus, a rest-stop if you will, because the rest of my time in Slovenia was packed with action. I took a day trip to Bled, a beautiful little town on the Italian border, which is surrounded by the Julian Alps and has a church on an island that can only be reached by Gondola. I also tramped through two sets of caves, one of which was UNESCO listed and very pretty indeed; and on top of all that, Ljubljana itself was worthy of a fair few days worth of exploring, and looked particularly scenic in the two feet of snow which feel on Boxing Day. Slovenia was left pretty much unscathed by the Yugoslavian armies when it declared independence, which is fortunate, as the Old Town of Ljubljana and its surrounding villages are particularly nice. Boxing Day also saw the arrival of a bunch of Canadians, so I even had some company for my last few days there. So, yes, I actually had a really good week in Slovenia, if we discount Christmas Day, and that only because every other place was closed.

I’m in Zagreb now, capital of Croatia, which is about two feet deep in snow and only just above freezing at midday. It took me three hours to find my hostel yesterday, partly because it was dark and snowing, and partly because the Croatians seem to have a problem with road signs – maybe they think it will confuse the Serbs? Anyway, by the time I got here I was very cold, very exhausted and somewhat emotional, but happily I’ve regained some of my humour, and went to do some sightseeing today. Zagreb seems pretty functional, not terribly pretty but with a good atmosphere. There’s a pretty big party of French guys here, who seem decent, and quite a few Italians as well; oddly, no Australians, which I don’t really know what to make of, nor any Americans since the last ones went this morning. So I’ll be surrounded by Latinate folks for New Years, which should be amusing.

Speaking of New Years, I’m not really sure how I’ll be spending it yet. Chances are a small group of French and Italian people will go in search of a party, and I will probably join them. But I am sure you will all be having a far more glamorous time, so let me know the festive-season goss!

I must go as my feet are cold. A Happy New Year to all, and all the best for 2006.

So, the Megan story.

I met Megan in Gdansk in Poland. Hit it off pretty much immediately, so she invites me to stay with her in Budapest, where she’s doing a foreign exchange year. I do so; we spend about 10 days in Budapest together, before she goes home to the US and I move on.

We tried to keep it going as a long-distance relationship for a while, but for one reason or another I couldn’t do it – my head just wasn’t there. She offered to move to London for me but I was pretty sure that I didn’t want to be in London either. I didn’t see how it could work out, and I told her so. Gradually we drifted apart.

Sometimes I feel guilty, like I used her for that period, but I know that I meant it at the time. In different circumstances, I think that she and I would have been great for each other. Either way, I hope she’s happy now.

Budapest – again, undersold here but an amazing place, lovely enough that I am going back under my own steam. Also unmentioned in this post: Rachel, a really nice Australian girl (with whom I had an entirely platonic relationship, for those who are sniggering at the back ¬_¬ ) and stayed in touch with for a few years after that. Haven’t had an email from her in a while, but hopefully she’s doing well too.

Haha, what an amusing couple of days.

So, Krakow was pretty cool, although I probably stayed way too long there. It’s the kind of place that sucks a person in – a guy missed three planes in two days trying to leave, and it was basically a once-a-day occurence that someone would end up coming back to the youth hostel after failing to make it out fo the city. As it happens, I managed to get out first time, but only after 8 days of procrastinating and general timewastery. Met a whole slew of awesome people, though, and managed to see such interesting sights as Wawel Castle (one of the seven Chakra points, no less), the Salt Mines (the world’s oldest active mine), and a big man-made lump of earth, which may sound dull but was actually mildly impressive. Of far greater interest was the fact that the youth hostel I stayed at had its own private cinema, which, as far as I was concerned, was utterly incredible.

Of course, I also took in Auschwitz, and got pretty heavily submerged into the Jewish history of the area. The experience was bleak and somewhat depressing. Obviously, worthwhile, though. I guess I’m still mulling the whole thing over. More on that as it comes to me.

Something else relevant happened in Krakow, but I can’t remember what it was. Ah, yes, Team England! Four English boys descended on Krakow over the weekend; one got arrested on his first night for smashing a window but that was just the beginning. On the second night an Australian went out with them – and this was a pretty serious Australian, you know, 6’2″ with a pleanty impressive beer capacity of his own – and woke up the following morning missing “300 Euros, his wallet and his cock-ring”. Apparently, all he remembers was that Team England left him puking outside a brothel at 5am, and that the cause of the subsequent losses are unknown to him (although I can probably hazard a guess). Another Australian, incited by them, jumped out of a second story window. I’ve never been so proud to be English. In their honour, an English girl I met called Cath and I entered the hostel’s pub quiz on Monday night as Team England, and won conclusively. Being as I’m a non-drinker, this left Cath with the task of dealing with twelve pints of beer by herself; I hear that she aquitted herself well.

As Cath and I were travelling in the same direction we took the night train together. The night trains in Poland are awesome! They have a sketchy reputation for theft and violence, but we splashed out (haha, splashed out – the entire exercise cost about fifteen pounds) and got a private two-bed, and just locked and dead-bolted the door. It was super-comfortable, so we were happy.

Daylight found us in Budapest, jewel of the Danube. In Budapest I met up with Megan, a I girI met in Gdansk who I have stayed with for the week that I’ve been here. I have had the best time – ice skating, turkish baths (which are amazing, incidentally), the lot. Budapest is a beautiful city, if somewhat lacking in charm. It reminds me a little bit of London, actually. It’s like a mini-London; the people are slightly friendlier, the pollution less noticable, but the atmosphere similar.

This morning I took Megan to the airport and put her on a plane back to America. I’ll probably only be here for another day or so myself. Ljubljana and Slovenia are waiting.

I will almost certainly not be sending out another email before Christmas, so I hope you all have a wonderful festive season. Those members of my family who are doubtless already on the French coast, for when you get this, I hope you had a good time and I (was/will be) thinking of you; for everyone else, enjoy and be happy.

Love to all.

The sly allusion in the second-last paragraph refers to Megan. More on Megan when we get to Budapest, but for now: I met her in Gdansk.

Right, I’m going to try and write slightly less in these, as heaven knows you’re all busy people – especially this time of year, what with all that buying presents and eating cake.

So, since I left Vilnius I’ve spent the last two weeks or so Poland. First port of call was Warsaw, which is a very odd city to visit. Warsaw has been talked down to me so many times that I was prepared for the worst – dull, dirty and depressing was the impression that I had, and I was quite happy to believe it. I n the event, I was happily surprised. Part of the pleasure, of course, was that the city was buried under a chunky couple of inches of snow, which could only delight the child in my soul. But besides that, the city itself is quite interesting. The overwhelming majority is large and modern – almost ultra-modern, in fact, as Warsaw was clearly and obviously far wealthier than many of the other European capitals I had visited so far. At the Warsaw Uprising, towards the end of WW2, Hitler basically numbered the buildings of Warsaw in order of their cultural importance to the Poles, before detonating them with teutonic efficiency; thus, most of Warsaw has no truck with any of this ‘classical architecture’ malarky, giving the casual visitor the slightly unsettling feeling that he or she has wondered accidentally into some transported American or Australian city centre. There is a reconstructed Old Town, which has actually been rebuilt with a degree of sympathy, which is quite refreshing.

Some other things about Warsaw: it’s slightly post-Soviet, it has the largest outdoor market in Europe, and does a zesty business in illegal gun smuggling.

From Warsaw to Gdasnk, which used to be called Danzig until the Australians got to it (“G’dansk, yer flamin’ gallah!” It’s a bad pun but I won’t apologise). Gdansk is a nice place. It’s very pretty, very peaceful and quite boring. That last is unfortunate – Gdansk is attatched to all sorts of important historical happenings (it was the seat of the Hanseatic League, housed the Knights Templar, and was more recently the birthplace of Solidarnosc, the trade union movement that was probably most directly responsible for the downfall of the Soviet Union), but none of them are really in evidence there. Most places tend to wear their histories on their sleeves, but not so Gdansk. I’m reading Gunther Grass’ The Tin Drum right now, which was set in Danzig, and am finding it far more interesting than actually visiting the city itself was.

One other thing about Gdansk: you can fly there for 1p + tax with Ryannair. Many British people do this.

So now I’m in Krakov. I was going to stop for a while in Poznan on the way south but didn’t for numerous reasons, some of which are pragmatic (I’m running out of time and money, and Istanbul is still a long way away), some less so (but a gentleman does not talk of such things). I’ll be here for a week, in which I hope to see Auschwitz and the Salt Mines, plus many other things, while hopefully not getting totally rained on.

Hope you’re all well and funky!