As I sit down to write this, I am stunned by what I have seen and experienced in the past two months. I do not know where to begin and how to describe what I have seen and felt in words, but I shall try. I must. More so for myself than for the interest of the general public, since lately I feel that I am losing most of my memory and as rightly pointed out by George Santayana, 'He who forgets the past is condemned to repeat it'. So I must write down my experiences, not for you, but for me. However, it is my sincere wish that my account paints as vivid a picture imaginable for the reader and that the account presented has some useful information for my fellow traveler. Here goes...
'People search far and wide to find themselves or find something, but sometimes the most important things can be found very close to home' - guide in Krakow
My journey starts off with a harrowed and hassled flight to Aarhus in Denmark. I think it is apt to introduce my friend with whom I began this journey. His name is RCR. More on him as we progress. So RCR and I get delayed at immigration at Helsinki, our stop-over to change flights to Aarhus and chaos ensues. What followed was a dash to the boarding gate, only to find a Japanese dude called Hung Yoo (or that's what I think he was called) also waiting in the wings, no pun intended, well actually, maybe it is. The three of us were told that we were to be put on a flight to Copenhagen and would have to then take a flight to Aarhus from Copenhagen. This set us back four hours and we reached Aarhus at 8PM with not an iota of where to go and what to do next, for, the idiots that we were, we had forgotten our address in Aarhus.
A few phone calls later and we were off to Ego Habvej by bus, to a friend's place. The only problem - this friend was out partying and would be back, hopefully, by 11PM.
Ego Habvej, a desolate place amidst the woods. Here we were, two brown men, one clad in a freakishly long overcoat, lugging our luggage up a lonely road surrounded by tall trees and moonlight. We frantically asked the Danes who passed by for help but it seemed like us being brown and in monkey caps and I repeat - a freakishly long overcoat- didn’t help us too much. The poor guys scurried away to safety,while a few completely ignored us.
Finally we decided to wait at the bus stop after managing to hit a nearby petrol pump for some food for the night. Some dinner! Two bananas, two candy bars, a packet of chips and a bottle of water to survive the cold night in an igloo shaped bus stop.Hardly my idea of the perfect start to a euro trip.But hey, this is what happens when you seek adventure, I suppose.
My friend did arrive though, and we were saved. For now...
And we're off!
A week flew by and we had settled in quite well only for us to move again. Our destination - Sweden and Norway, the Nordic countries.
After booking the hostels in Stockholm and Oslo, we were off to Copenhagen. My eurotrip hardly began as I had imagined, sitting in a luxurious bullet train. I was forced to sit near the door on the steps of the train as we hadn't reserved.
More soon...
No comments:
Post a Comment