Ta barbarone gar doula panta plen enos

Hopefully all of you who are interested have had a chance to read what happened to me in Paris. If not, it's the next post down, and you might want to start with that one for some context. From Paris, though, I hopped on a train headed to Strasbourg, which I found absolutely marvelous. It was a beautiful city, filled with lights that I admired during my stroll by the river. It seemed like most of the town was out, walking around and talking despite the cold. I had a strange idea that this was the kind of place I would like to retire to, though I'm not sure what prompted that idea. I spent a good three or four hours just wandering and looking around, before settling down on a bench in the station where I started memorizing my first declension in Greek. This was, though I didn't know it, one of the last tranquil moments of the next few days.

The real story begins, as such stories often do, with a drunk German in the Strasbourg train station.

I was on the platform, trying to get on the train to Vienna, when this big, drunk guy starts ambling into my path. I instinctively try to maneuver out of his way, but with that amazing drunk sense, he manages to run right into me. He instantly starts to lean on me, shifting his weight so that I'm suddenly supporting most of it. He mumbles at me in German while I try to get him to sit down, lay down, or something so that he's no longer on top of me. He, however takes this as an attack. He suddenly goes from eloquent drunk to angry drunk, marking the occasion by punching me right in the gut. It hurt; it hurt a lot, but I did have the satisfaction of seeing him shake off his hand in pain. Anyway, he decides not to mess with me anymore and I make it onto the train.

I was reeling somewhat in pain from being punched, but I at least had a good night's sleep to look forward to. Given the pain caused by the guy's rings, I figured it would be a little difficult for me to just drop off to sleep, but I thought I could make it work. I made it to my compartment, and found I was sharing it with two other men. One, I found out instantly, spoke English and German. The other seemed to speak a little German, but later I heard him talking on a cell phone in what I guessed was Hindi. The first man was very enthusiastic about the trip and was telling both of us all about it. To make sure both of us got the gist of his stories, he translated every sentence between English and German. The other man and I, who couldn't communicate at all, shared a look at one point which clearly said, "Why won't this schmuck just be quiet?" So, both of us, in our respective tongues, told him politely that we needed to sleep. "Sure" he says. "I have some work I have to get done anyway." And he pulls out his laptop. I figure that I've slept next to people typing before, so I relax as much as my bruised stomach will let me. However, I immediately find out that this man is completely insane, as he narrates what he is writing the whole time! I asked him three times to quit talking while typing; each time he apologized and agreed to stop, and each time a moment later he would start it up again. When he got off, the other man and I shared another glance that transcended languages.

The train was late to Vienna. This was bad for many reasons. First, it was bad because I wanted to look around the city, but only had twenty five minutes at the station. It was also bad because this was where I had been planning on withdrawing some Euros to pay for the visa into Turkey, something which I neglected to do, which will cause unfortunate consequences later. Anyway, instead of being able to walk around the city, I rush to reserve a seat on the train to Budapest, and get on without much trouble.

The ride between Vienna and Budapest had no problems. I mention this now because I realize that unique aspect after the fact.

Hungary, I noticed somewhat to my surprise, did not use the Euro. This kept me from simply withdrawing a good amount from an ATM to use in anticipation of the visa for Turkey. No big deal, I thought. I'll just withdraw a certain amount in the local currency and change it. First, though, I decide to take a walk around the city to stretch my legs; given the two train rides and the delay on the first, I had been sitting pretty much for the past fifteen hours.

For the most part, Budapest wasn't bad. I got some food at a very American-like mall. Budapest reminded me, in fact, of an American city more than any European city I have seen. Partly this is because many of the buildings are brand new, while others are falling into disrepair around them. Also, it seemed like there were advertisements for Western products everywhere. I kept seeing advertisements for a Disney movie in Magyar, which is incredibly surreal. I was heartily enjoying myself for a couple of hours, and my stomach wasn't hurting nearly as much, but problems were ahead. I was searching for a certain cathedral I had seen on a map when I was confronted by some guy who was blind in one eye. I'm not sure if that's an important detail about his life, but he was certainly using it to try to intimidate me. He talked at me rapidly in Hungarian, so I just said "no" noncommittally, trying to walk away without even noticing him. He doesn't accept this. He starts to follow me, asking, "English? Deutsch?" and I keep saying no, and am now looking for a place to walk to away from him. I notice, incidentally, that there is a bulge in one of his tight sleeves which looks to me suspiciously like a large knife. So, in a fit of rather desperate genius, I say, "hablo espanol, tu hablas?" which seemed to stop him in his tracks and gave me an exit.

I continued to head around the city, thinking that my problems in Budapest were over. At one crosswalk, though, I saw a reflection in a passing bus: I noticed that the same guy was now following me around. At this point I was slightly worried, so I made my way back to the train station, only stopping to note that the Bureau de Change was closed, and in a creepy area outside the station to boot. I was tired, and figured I'd be better prepared to deal with it in Bucharest. Since I didn't want to go out of the train station, and since Hungary has seemingly not invented public benches, I waited for three hours standing, half asleep, in that cold station because some crazy nut in Budapest disliked me at first sight. I made it onto the train, found my seat, and practically collapsed.

I thought, reasonably, that I would at least get some sleep on this train ride. Not so. For the first five hours some Russians decided they were going to throw a party in their compartment, with music blaring and people conversing loudly in machine gun Russian. I think I could have slept through the noise, but the fact that they came to my compartment every ten minutes or so inviting me to have some cocaine with them was a little distracting. This was especially true because it was the same guy every time; he must have been so high that he forgot that he had just asked me the same thing. At about one in the morning they passed out, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

About this same time a Romanian family came on board and decided to share my compartment. When they came in, I cursed silently, but I figured that this man, woman, and child would want to sleep immediately. What I found out, though, is that Romanians don't sleep. All of them, including the seven (ish) year old kid spent the whole night talking as if I wasn't there. As soon as they found out I couldn't speak any Romanian, they kept chatting away as if they were the only ones in the compartment. They did drop off eventually, around seven in the morning or so, so at least I got some sleep.

Also, my good luck when it comes to weather decided to play its part. While I have hit heavy rain or snow in Ireland, Germany and France, apparently that is not enough to satisfy whoever doesn't like me upstairs. The main route to Bucharest was snowed in, so they had to go around. This meant I would be late, again.

Here comes the good part of my story. I make it to Bucharest station. I find that, being late and with the time zone change, I have fifteen minutes before the train to Istanbul leaves. I've slept three hours maybe in two nights. I don't speak a word of the language. I still need Euros for the visa. I take a deep breath and plan a course of action. First, I get money from the ATM, and change it for Euros. I ran into the Change, pretty much thrust the money in the womans face saying, "Euro. Euro." She looked at me like I was insane, and very casually started the transaction. I felt every second tick by, as she took her time to make sure I received the right amount. Turns out the Romanian currency is worth more than the Hungarian: I pulled out nearly two hundred Euro. Running out of there left me about ten minutes, so I ran to the ticket counters. When I got there I nearly despaired. There were massive lines, no discernible order, no handy sign saying "International Tickets" or its translation, and, if my experience with my fellow passengers and the lady at the Change was correct, no desire to engage in communication with anyone who didn't speak Romanian. Alright, I thought. The train to Istanbul couldn't be very crowded, and I had seen a man on the train to Vienna buy a ticket on the train itself. I figured, I already had a ticket, all I needed to do was pay for a reservation. If anything, they were so lax in these Eastern European countries, they wouldn't care at all. So, I got on board and relaxed thinking that all my problems were over with. I had a ticket, I had money for a reservation and the visa, I didn't have any reason not to sleep; in something like eighteen hours I'd be in Istanbul and would at least have a friend who knew her way around.

The conductor comes nearly immediately. I give him my ticket. He accepts it, but obviously wants more. I offer him money. I believe he thinks I'm offering him a bribe, which I would have done if I thought it would help. He decides, though, to use me as an example to other passengers who want to the bend the rules, and literally pulls me out of my seat (luckily I had the foresight to grab my luggage) and pulls me to the door. I think for a moment that he will just push me out of the train while it is moving, but he kindly waits until the train stops at the next station before pushing me out.

Here I am, then, alone, tired, starving (I didn't have a chance to get breakfast, or indeed much of a dinner) with no reception on my cell phone and still no perceivable language skills in the middle of nowhere, Romania.

I think, as best I can, of what my options are. There is nothing around the station for as far as I could see. The old men sitting on the bench look decidedly sketchy, and since there wasn't a schedule saying when the next train back would be, I decided I was probably better off just walking back to the only place in Romania I knew, following the tracks. My best guess, by how fast I walk, was that it was about three miles. By the time I got there, I made an accounting of what my options were. I could try to find a hostel, food, and a reservation for the next train to Istanbul, but in my condition, I didn't think it was very likely I would succeed at doing any of those things.

Anyway, I called it quits. I grabbed a taxi, got to the airport, noticed that the flight to London Heathrow had been delayed, bought a ticket and the rest, well, you know what they say.

Needless to say, I made it back to Oxford with no problems. By now, I've pretty much recovered, and I've begun second guessing myself. The lines were long at the ticket counter, yes; but they were moving pretty quickly and I probably could have made it back in time. Or maybe finding accommodation wouldn't be hard at all; after all, most places have hostels right near the stations, and from there it wouldn't be that hard to get food, etc...

The gist of this is, I'm really disappointed I didn't make it. On the other hand, despite getting punched in the stomach, being stalked by a crazy guy with a knife, being kept up all night by three sets of crazy people, and getting into a tussle with a railway conductor, I think I made it out of there relatively undamaged. Maybe next time.