Here i am again, sitting alone in a room which is not mine - I'm staying at Richard Berry's house, and shivering in his youngest daughter room. Tonight is the last night.
The past 4 months whizzed past- of flights, train rides, coach rides, hostel beds, new places, foreign languages, postcards, wind chills, snow, school, karaoke nights, beer, grocery shopping at Tesco & cooking in the kitchen.
My last trip which spanned 3 countries & 4 cities, involving painful 12 hour & 18 hour coach rides, was all in all an eventful one. (It's always eventful for me eh?) Not everything went smoothly as planned, but ultimately, it's all part of travelling, isn't it?
Amsterdam was really cool. It's one of my favourite cities now. The highlights include smelling weed everywhere, getting space cakes, having those red lighted windows, pretty slanting/sloping houses, a terrifying history & a sound economic reason for every single thing that they do. It's amazing how they balance pragmatism with freedom. Only in Amsterdam, people have sex in hostel rooms with the lights on. Don't need to pay for peep shows anymore!
Paris was pretty alright, but it has its own grotty places as well. Most visitors skip those areas, so everyone thinks that its the prettiest city in Europe. It might be, but it's not my favourite city. We met some scary characters in seedy neighbours and many places including the supposedly hip latin quarter were just uber touristy. I like French people though. Especially the French boys we met in the French Alps in our dorm in Alp D Huez. Alright, before that, we visited the really gorgeous Versailles. The gardens i mean. the interiors were just like any other castles you would have visited in Europe. The Effiel Tower was nice & it felt pretty surreal to be there, being physically there with such an iconic landmark. We saw the mona lisa in the flesh as well & it's actually a small painting in a huge room with a huge crowd of people taking tons of photographs of it. Not a pretty sight.
So we took the train to Grenoble after Paris. We didnt explore much of Grenoble, except to the supermarket to fill our tummies while skiing up in the Alps. We took a bus ride up to the winter wonderland, the alpine scenery was breath-taking. Our first day was pretty much ruined by lots of waiting & miscommunication with the people there. And it feel downright disappointing to know that your dormitory has no linen, pillow or blanket when the weather is subzero degrees & you have been freezing your ass off for the past hours waiting for the man to pick u up. Thankfully it got better from there, as we made friends with the Parisian boys who could speak English. Just imagine our excitement! Well, they were reallyyyyyy cute as well. Now french boys are ranked number one in my books. haha. Especially the shy one who offered me some sausages when i popped into the kitchen. haha. Other than boys, we did proper skiing and our skii instructors were Cute tooo. The alps were just overflowing with goodlooking french boys & adorable french kids who always tried to cut the ski lift queue. haha. Great times skiing in the bright sunshine (i got sunburnt!), having self-prepared meals & sleeping at 8pm every night. It was too cold for us to get a proper sleep, so we were tossing & turning in fitful half-asleep state amidst loud snoring sounds.
Getting from Grenoble to Prague was quite a nightmare. We had to travel to town in the dark, through fresh snow & ice with all our luggage. I'm glad we survived a 2h bus ride to Grenoble city centre, then a 18h bus to prague with a ridiculous number of stops & a horrible wait in subzero temperatures in Strasbourg, Germany while we changed buses. Prague was frighteningly cold which is why beer is dirt cheap & its good. Everything is cheap, unless u end up at a tourist trap, which is more expensive than in the UK. :( The countdown party was so strange, it was really really cool. I felt like i was in the 80s with all the cheese music & old musicians performing. Combined with the free-for-all, set-off-fireworks-at-your-own-risk option, the town square transformed into a battle field. We described it as controlled anarchy, it was a really fine line between violence & just having fun. One wrong move would have tipped the situation into a really ugly one. We were running along the streets trying to avoid fireworks which were going off 2mm next to your feet on the sidewalk, & then taking cover in the underground metro station. That was how cool NYE was. This more than made up for the unfortunate Xmas eve which we had.
Weary & frozen stiff from running around western & central Europe, I actually look forward to the balmy weather in Singapore to thaw my poor bones. But this means no more wearing of nice shin high boots. :( No more large coats to cover any excesses up. :( I take comfort in the fact that I can finally wear dresses, skirts & shorts & expose my pasty skin to the blazing tropic sun. I get to wear pumps & flats & slippers & sandals. I don't have to use the same functional brown bag for every occasion. Yay.
I still don't want to go back. :(
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