Europe 2003: The Emails
Jul 24, 2003
Above: A view of the Neuchwanstein Castle in Bavaria, Germany.
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: where's my roomate?
Date: July 4, 2003 1:53:01 AM PDT
Well I'm finally in Munich and out of greece... Although I think I had reached a certain comfort level there knowing my way around and such. When I arrived in Munich (having become used to the 90-100 degree weather in greece) it was raining and about 60 degrees... I of course was wearing shorts and a light t-shirt... I went to marienplatz where I was hoping to meet up with my roommate but I guess he hasn't gotten my emails yet so I got stuck waiting for nothing... I did however see a picture that is normally only in children's book drawings - there is this castle-esque looking building in marienplatz and the rain cleared up just long enough for a giant double rainbow to emerge in the sky right over the castle building... it was quite a sight... and definitely made hanging out there worth it. I do have to say it is definitely nice to be in a place where you can get an hour of internet for only 1 euro again! Anyways if anyone hears from my roommate Corbin tell him i'm looking for him... and Ian and Chris I'm off to go buy tang from the turks...
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: munich... who new?
Date: July 6, 2003 10:35:02 AM PDT
Well first off I finally found my roommate! It was great seeing him and we basically just walked around aimlessly for a while telling each other all kinds of stories... Munich has been amazing though! We stayed with my friend Annette who I actually had met last summer in Prague and her Aunt and Uncle totally pampered us! We ate sooooo well it was great - we didn't want to leave! Yesterday we went to the Neucwanstien (or however you spell it! Sorry Annette!) Castle... It was beautiful - its the castle that the one at Disneyland was based on. It was about a two hour drive from Munich and it was really nice being able to go by car because we were able to stop at places on the way and we also took a really scenic route back (which with me holding the map we somehow ended up in Austria...) But anyway really nice trip all together!
I have never seen so much beer consumption as I have here! every turn there is another brewery or beer house or beer garden and they are all busy! all day! Its crazy! The beer does taste good here though... Apparently it is made with no chemicals all fresh right at the place where you drink it...
We also went to the BMW museum which actually was really lame... and today we went to the Mercedes factory showroom that only gets opened to the public for two days every year. The rest of the time its basically just a showroom for the very wealthy... It was really cool! And it was funny cause Annette had already left to go back to where she actually lives (near Hanover) and Corbin and I spent the rest of the day hanging out with her Aunt, Uncle and cousin! They were so nice it was wonderful!
Lets see there was also plenty of drunken debauchery as a result of all the beer gardens and the such... We hung out last night at this cool fountain type thing... its kind of meant to look like a pond I guess with metal lilly pads with water coming out of each one... well we started jumping around from one pad to the next! and then my roommate saw a long board up against a wall and came up with the brilliant idea of making a bridge from across a gap between the lilly pads... Well we started doing all kinds of stupid stuff on that and Corbin actually did a summersault on the like 6 inch wide board over the water! Of course on his first try he slipped and his foot fell in the water... but the second try he got it! It was a lot of fun!
there is so much more that we have done but again I'm running out of time! We're planning on going to Interloken next but we missed the last train for today (we were hanging out with annette's aunt and uncle in a beer garden) so we might and up going somewhere else... we'll see... anyways hope all is well and more to come later i'm sure!
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: paragliding in interloken
Date: July 8, 2003 6:16:39 AM PDT
hey all...
hope you don't end up getting this twice but I don't think it worked the first time... I went paragliding to day in interloken! it was awesome! I want to again! Anyways i`m either off to prague or pamplona for the running of the bulls next not quite sure yet... talk to you later!
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: da bulls
Date: July 10, 2003 1:42:01 AM PDT
So we decided on pamplona and the running of the bulls... We got here yesterday afternoon with no place to stay and realized that everyone else was in the same boat and planned on sleeping in the park (the guidebook actually recommends which parks to sleep in!)... Anyways I was amazed at how spanish the event actually was... I know that sounds dumb but I figured there would be a lot more tourists. When I went out at night it was the first time in europe that I didn't find one place playing american music. Everywhere I went was spanish music that everyone in the club was singing along to. I actually felt pretty out of place and ended up walking out to the main square where I found a guy wearing a USC t-shirt (small world)... I ended up hanging out with him all night (Corbin had already gone to sleep in a park). We hung out in the area where the running of the bulls takes place and ended up meeting 4 norwegians that we hung out with for the rest of the night and watched the bull run with in the morning. We had a really amazing view but the event itself was kind of disappointing... It was past us in about 20 secs so we never really got to see anything. But it was a pretty cool experience nonetheless and I'm glad I came. I'm amazed that the spanish are able to keep that pace going for a week straight... the streets were literally filled with people 24 hours a day! Its crazy.
Anyways we leave tonight for the Love Parade in Berlin. A nice 21 hours on trains ugh... but its definitely going to be worth it! After that we are planning on continuing to zig-zag across Europe and go to Marseilles on the 14 to see the Tour de france. Should be fun!
Talk to you all later!
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: the long silence
Date: July 16, 2003 8:39:46 AM PDT
I have received a few emails regarding my "long" silence... I have not forgotten about all of you I have just been moving at an extremely fast pace lately! Anyways I think the last time I wrote was about the running of the bulls in pamplona... which was cool but my roommate and I are mad at ourselves now for not having run. From there we went to Berlin for the Love Parade. Once again it was amazing and the craziest party i've ever been too... We didn't stay up all night at a forrest rave again this year because the weather was actually pretty bad but we did spend the night at a really cool german club. We actually had a place to stay this year so we eventually did wander home and get some sleep. After our quick stint in Berlin for the love parade we made an even quicker stop in wolfsburg to see the VW plant. The factory tour was actually closed because it was a weekend but the auto park was open and we got to go into numerous showrooms for all different types of cars.
It was still worth going I think and it was definitely better than the BMW museum! I ended up buying a replica of my car while I was there since I haven't been able to find it anywhere else so now I am stuck carrying another bag around which also seems to keep getting bigger! at least I come home soon... From there, we went straight to marseilles in oh about 22 hours of train riding... We got there on the 14 (Bastille Day) so there was a huge fireworks display which we ended up watching with a huge group of people from my hostel. the next day we spent 6 hours waiting for the tour de france (I believe we actually took our spot on the fence before the stage of the race had even begun in Gap) Anyways we had an amazing spot though right at the 50 meter mark and the end was actually really close on this stage so it was pretty cool to see. we got more souvenirs here thus adding to the extra bag I am now carrying... We left Marseilles early this morning and arrived in Nice around 10. Our group has become three as we picked up one other guy going our way at the last hostel and when we got to nice we decided to rent a car to get to Monaco and this one little town on the way called Eze. It was a fun trip and it was definitely nice driving again! Tomorrow I'm going my own way again and heading back to Germany. My friend Annette who's Uncle we stayed with in Munich invited me to see where she lives in a small town outside of Hanover called Gottingen. I'm going there and then to watch her play in a Lacrosse game in Kiel. From there I will probably go to Hanover for a day and then head back to Munich were my flight leaves at 6am on the 23rd! I'm sleeping in the airport on the 22nd... Hope all is well with everyone! and let me know how your all doing!
Talk to you soon
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: random acts of forgotten stupidity
Date: July 17, 2003 2:33:06 AM PDT
ok so I forgot to include the funny stories in my last email. First off, when we got to marseilles we decided to go to a supermarket to get a cheap lunch. when we got there it ended up being on of those Walmart style places where you can buy your vegetables and tvs at the same time. Well by the time we finally left, we had picked up so much random stuff that we needed that we had spent 35 euros and still only had bread and milk for lunch!
Another food related story... We get to Nice and decide to go out with our friend mike for dinner. we walked past a couple chinese food places and get roped in by the smell of food we haven't had for months...
there were a few meal deals that seemed pretty cheap but for some reason none of them actually worked with the food we wanted (i've never heard that steamed white rice would cost more that fried rice!)but we still ate there for some reason... we realized in the middle of the meal that we were in the french riviera eating bad 10 dollar chinese food watching french who wants to be a millionaire and asked ourselves "is this really happening?" Later that night we gave up and went to see Charlie's Angeles...
and finally... I think my big toe is broken. I cant bend it at the joint except by using my hand and when I do that I don't have the ability to resist it! plus it kinda hurts when I walk on it... but hey what are you going to do. Talk to you all later
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: almost home
Date: July 20, 2003 10:12:57 AM PDT
So my stay in europe is almost over. Gottingen was pretty cool - it was a total college town. And definitely an amazing and beautiful place to go to school. Kiel was a little bit bigger of a city but I didn't spend too much time walking around there... The Lacrosse playoffs that I went there for were awesome though! And Annette's team won the game I watched so they are going to at least finish second in Germany. I was amazed walking around the lacrosse fields because there were so many americans! I felt like I was back home! It was actually pretty cool because I, not knowing anything about lacrosse, was able to pick up a lot of the game from this one insane New york coach and the refs that all spoke in English, as well as some randoms americans I would start talking to. I left Kiel yesterday and decided to go up to Copenhagen since it was so close... well it was supposed to be anyways but the trains didn't quite make it work out that way. I ended up getting into my hostel at about 2AM after trying two others and finding out they were full. I think the only reason the one I got in had room was because it was so hard to find... The only reason I made it was because each time I got lost I found something completely american to keep me going - the first was the guard at the american embassy and the second was the cashier at a seven-eleven! So american... anyways I basically just walked around the city all day and am heading back to munich tomorrow to fly home on the 23rd! I cant believe I'm almost done! Hope to see you all when I get home...
jon
From: jvidar@usc.edu
Subject: i'm back
Date: July 24, 2003 9:34:06 AM PDT
Well I'm finally back... I was a little sad about ending my travels when I was on the plane but when I got to customs I was greeted by this old black man with a James Earl Jones voice that looked at my declaration card, looked at my passport, and then looked at me and in his low voice said "welcome home." I looked at him and said "its good to be back" and it was. My friend chris picked me up from the airport and within 20 minutes 4 people had called trying to figure out what we were going to do last night... Its nice to be settled again but the apartment building next door is being remodeled so I now get woken up to jackhammers rather than someone snoring in a hostel... I think i'd prefer the hostel ;) anyways I'm back in town so whoever is around give me a call!
jon
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