I’m going deeper underground

Posted on October 18, 2008 by Hails

My birthday treat this year was a guided tour around Tallinn Old Town, including the secret underground tunnels and passages. Yay!

I got to picture the Old Town as it was all those years ago, and hear stories that made it come to life in my head. I was also delighted when, as we were standing in a dark underground cave, the guide shone her torch at the ceiling and said “and you can see here some stalactites – they are very little, but they are there!”. And they were indeed. I’d never seen stalactites before. They’re another of those things that I used to read about all the time in Enid Blyton books, and so they’ve got a strangely mystical, enchanted significance for me.

It added to the surreal feeling I always get from walking through hidden passageways. The faint light, the shadows, the echoes, the inexplicable urge to speak in a whisper… it was great.

“May I ask if anyone is scared of spiders?” asked the guide, as she prepared to lead us out of the magical stalactite cave into an uneven-looking tunnel. Several girls looked slightly nervous. The guide continued. “There is a spider who lives in the tunnels,” she explained gravely. “It is the biggest spider we have in Estonia… I tell you this because it is protected.”

I’m not overly scared of spiders, as you know, but really. This girl had just described some sort of legendary resident of the tunnels, probably about a metre tall.  I imagined a monster spider with hairy legs as thick as lampposts, who ate unsuspecting tourists, and would win every fight because it was protected by law, and perhaps even bodyguards. If this spider jumped out at me and started to gnaw off my leg, I would be powerless to stop it, because I’d be a convicted criminal if I injured it in self-defence. I began to panic about going deeper into the tunnels.

The guide seemed to notice my horror. “Oh, I don’t mean one spider, obviously” she added hastily. “I mean a type of spider. And when I say big…” She made a relatively unfrightening measurement with her thumb and forefinger. “And anyway, they are scared of light,” she concluded with the smile of one who had unnecessarily terrified several complete strangers, “so when you are taking lots of pictures they will run away and hide. You probably won’t see any. I just thought I’d mention it just in case.” With that, she led us further into the passageways, camera flashes going off all over the place as a kind of protective barrier between Us and It.

The tunnels are quite empty, but for the occasional bed here and there – the underground passages have, in the past, been used as bomb shelters. More recently, they’ve been used by the more resourceful homeless people! What was most intriguing to me was the fact that several of the tunnels were only discovered as recently as 2005, and that they still don’t know where some of them end, owing to a combination of factors such as them being both bricked up and flooded. Divers have been sent down to no avail. This is the sort of thing that gives me my Famous Five thrill, you know.

Best of all was hearing the stories behind the construction work that’s been ongoing at Tallinn’s Freedom Square for some time now. They’re building an underground parking lot, amongst other things, so obviously they’ve been doing a bit of digging. A bit annoying, then, to be going about your work and unexpectedly discover entire sections of old walls and evidence of a stone-age community, wouldn’t you say? It’s quite funny to go and look at the site, where you can very clearly see the deep, excavated area that they’ve prepared for the car park, but with incoveniently positioned bits of Very Old Wall in the middle. I’d imagine that caused a bit of head-scratching; they have, however, gotten around it by deciding to put a glass roof on the parking lot so that the unexpected discoveries can be exhibited.

I have not, however, heard any details about the who the bones belonged to. Yes, bones. It’s like a fast-paced drama series around here, it really is. You can read about the bone discovery by clicking on this link; in the meantime, I’m off to do some sleuthing of my own. I’ve packed my ginger beer and hard-boiled egg. Now, where’s Timmy…?

Filed under: caves, children's books, Enid Blyton, Estonia, Famous Five, Fear, fun, homelessness, spiders, tourists, unexpected | 4 Comments »

Taking the edge off your appetite

Posted on October 8, 2008 by Hails

So I’m wandering happily around the Rimi (local supermarket).

It’s late in the evening – my favourite time to shop, when there are no queues and the only other people around are those as disorganised as myself who still haven’t managed to make dinner by 9pm. Take… onnnnnn… meeeeeee! I sing merrily as I contemplate the cheese display. Not because I’m an especially devoted fan of A-Ha, but because the Rimi has the most wonderful selection of background music of any shop anywhere in the world. On one grocery expedition you can hear Whigfield, The Monkees, Dolly Parton, Franz Ferdinand and Spandau Ballet, one after the other, like some sort of really weird compilation album for the musically impaired. I love it. Take… meeeeee… onnnnnnn! I add, throwing some mozzerella into my basket and going to survey the pasta aisle.

I pick up a nectarine on my way past, as I’m pretty hungry what with the whole forgetting to eat until 9pm thing mentioned previously, and I always find it incredibly difficult to walk home with a rumbling tummy and a bag full of ingredients. This is dangerous – it’s the sort of thing that might lead a person to purchase a hotdog from a street vendor, and we all know how badly wrong that decision can go. Fruit is a much safer, healthier and cheaper alternative. Plus, it makes me feel better about the pint of cream I’ve just picked up for my pasta sauce when I see the nectarine sitting comfortingly in the corner of my basket, radiating healthiness and goodness (and partially concealing the crisps).

I indulge in a happy little dance past the freezers as S Club 7 begin to Reach for the Stars. The security guard gives me a troubled look. I expect he is sad that he is on duty and therefore cannot ask me if he can have the next dance, and I smile sympathetically at him, skipping breezily past him to the checkout, and put my shopping on the conveyor belt in time to the beat. Kas sul on kümme? asks the checkout girl. Jah, I reply, giving her the right change and trying not to look too pleased with myself. (Yesterday I went to the library, and asked the girl there if she spoke English… but now I can ask my familiar question in Estonian! It’s a nice change.)

I stride out into the night air, the opening chords of American Pie drifting after me, and rummage in my bag for my nectarine. It is not very nice, but this is only to be expected when you’ve been standing at the checkout staring at a display of sweets and chocolate. I concentrate on my feeling of nutritional superiority as I pass a guy eating a Snickers, and take another bite. It is only as I am passing under a streetlight that I happen to glimpse the large hole in the middle of the part I’ve just taken a bite from. The hole itself is not overly distressing. Nor is the decidedly brown colour of the rotting circle around it, all things considered. No, the part that concerns me most at this particular moment is the undoubtedly wriggly nature of the centre of the hole.

I stop mid-chew and try to calmly assess the situation. My calm assessment lasts for approximately an eighth of a second before I decide on an appropriate plan of action, and then I spit suddenly and forcefully. Bits of nectarine and worm spray elegantly into the air, and I gurgle panickily as I continue to spit in a slightly melodramatic fashion, oblivious to the disgusted stare of the Snickers man. Then I realise I’m still holding the offending piece of fruit, and fling it from me with an admittedly hysterical shriek. Snickers man makes a hasty decision, and walks away rather quickly.

I can spit no more, and yet I am terrified that a bit of worm may be lodged in my teeth or something, and will at some point slither down my throat and begin to build a nest in my colon and lay eggs there, or whatever it is that worms do in colons. The only thing for it is to ensure that any remaining worm in my mouth is well and truly dead, and so I grind my teeth furiously the whole way home, pausing occasionally to get the retching under control, and then dashing to the bathroom to brush my teeth somewhat violently for a very long time.

And this is why I shall never eat fruit ever ever ever again. The End.

Sorry, you weren’t eating or anything, were you?

Filed under: decapitation, Eighties music, food, freak-out, shopping, tears, unexpected, woe, worms lurking in fruit | 4 Comments »

Say it with swords

Posted on October 1, 2008 by Hails

Last night I finally got to go for dinner at Peppersack, a really nice Medieval-style restaurant in Tallinn Old Town. You know… good hearty cuisine, candles, wooden beams, waitresses in traditional costumes, sturdy furniture, stone walls, and a bit of a swordfight when you’re waiting for your coffee.

I’ll admit that this last one is a little unusual, but there really aren’t enough live brawls in restaurants around here, if you ask me. Bickering, yes – elderly American tourists are always good for that. It’s great when you find yourself seated next to Mr. and Mrs. “How Awful!”, although usually you’re not lucky enough to get much more than a bit of cringeworthy dialogue. Like the prim and proper couple in the Embassy Of Pure Food who complained in great detail about the dryness of the melon. Which they’d consumed in its entirety, with great enthusiasm. The poor waitress was extremely confused. It wasn’t like she could take it back and get a fresh one, nor did they want second helpings. They didn’t want an apology or to speak to the manager. In the end she just sort of stood there, hovering uncertainly, with no idea how to respond – but of course, all they wanted to do was make their point. Estonia is a terrible, terrible place, where all the melons are dry! It would never happen where we come from. Ah, America… now, there’s a country!

Slightly more dramatic was the “gentleman” in a nice little bakery in Vienna, where I’d stopped for some lunch. I was eating my Unidentifiable Pastry and people-watching at my table by the window when an almighty roar filled the air. I said I wanted coffee! The Texan accent boomed out as if through a megaphone, and everyone swivelled nosily to see what was going on. It turned out that Mr. Texan had been given a cappuccino instead of an ordinary coffee – which wouldn’t have been so bad in itself, if only he hadn’t already been shortchanged at the counter. The coffee just tipped him over the edge. I’d love to say “…and then the staff tipped the coffee over him“, but unfortunately they just grovelled and quivered and rushed around in a panic to get the correct drink and make the shouting stop. This was not good enough, however. A full-on speech about customer service and The Way Things Are Done In America ensued, for the benefit of not only the staff, but everyone in the place. It wouldn’t hurt you to smile, either, he finished up, glowering at the young girl who reached him his drink. Several people rolled their eyes. I resisted a very strong urge to get up and tip the coffee over his head myself as an act of assistance to the girl, who was clearly bound by the rules of her workplace and unable to give the necessary punishment without fear of reprisal.

I was a little surprised, then, when she gave him a beautiful smile and said in a clear, sweet voice Thank you, sir, and it would not hurt you to remember that you are no longer in a country where arrogant customers can say whatever they like to workers without the workers having the right to point out that they are being a complete asshole. Admittedly, her colleagues looked a little surprised too, so I can’t caim that this is the way things are done in Austria as a rule. However, I hope that it is. Abuse of staff by customers is one of my top pet hates (and I must remember to tell you about the time when, working in Sainsbury’s in Glasgow, I was verbally and vegetably assaulted by a screaming Chinese woman who later tried to sue me for racial discrimination), and nothing pleases me more than seeing one of the oppressed rise up against the – well, assholes. I nearly cheered. Someone at a nearby table gave a brief round of applause, though, so I decided to stay out of it and let that speak for everyone.

Last night’s was the best yet, though. We’d just finished dinner and were contemplating coffee when some bickering started on the old wooden staircase nearby. One of the waiters, it seemed, had been caught with one of the waitresses, who apparently belonged to another waiter… it all looked a bit complicated, and we couldn’t understand anything they were saying, but we got the general gist of it when the girl ran off and her secret lover was attacked by a rather irate young man waving a sword. To our great alarm, a full-on swordfight followed, and they came crashing down the staircase and almost into our table before finishing in a sort of stand-off back on the stairs. I found myself cheering when the girl returned and gave them both a quare slap roon the ja’, as they* say.

Probably completely staged for tourists, you know. But part of me desperately wants to believe that you can be sitting at your dinner in a medieval restaurant in Tallinn and witness two lovestruck young men in frilly shirts duelling earnestly to win the love of a woman.

* and by “they”, I obviously do not mean the Estonian people.

Filed under: complaining, contemplation, conversations, customer service, Estonia, fighting, foreign languages, fun, restaurants, swords, tension, unexpected | 3 Comments »

Feeling the Terror

Posted on September 15, 2008 by Hails

I’ve always been fascinated by the history of Hungary, after studying the 1956 revolution at school, many moons ago.

I was very excited, then, to actually be in Budapest and have the opportunity to see round the House of Terror – a step-by-step journey through Hungary’s history of Soviet occupation and ethnic cleansing. Sure, it doesn’t sound like your typical tourist’s idea of beer-soaked ‘fun’, but I’ve been looking forward to this for ages!

It gave me much the same feeling as the Anne Frank house: a sense of wonder as I walked around and felt history come to life, with a real chill as I realised just how horrendous this stuff actually was. The museum is really well designed – you start off up on the second floor, and walk through the exhibitions (each room with a helpful background leaflet in English to make up for the fact that everything else is in Hungarian), moving down until eventually you’re in the basement, which is full of prison cells and torture chambers.

The whole way, you’re accompanied by music that is at times soulful (I had to choke back tears in one room, where a child’s voice was reading out names of victims to a very moving soundtrack) and at others very dramatic and militant. It actually makes you feel quite tense and nervous, especially when you’re surrounded by all those Nazi uniforms and walking through Soviet offices and the like. I was a little thrown by the presence of numerous security guards, there to make sure nobody breaks the “no photos” rule. I’m sure that their uniform is a standard Hungarian security uniform, but the mind plays tricks on you when you’re being influenced by powerful images and emotive music, not to mention reading about terrible crimes against humanity by men in uniforms quite similar to the ones on the people prowling stealthily all around you.

By the time I got down to the basement, I was decidedly spooked. With a sick feeling in my stomach, I peered into prison cell after prison cell, including torture chambers (one was ankle deep in water, so that you’d always be cold and wet; another’s ceiling was about 4′ from the ground, so you could never stand up) and a padded cell, which was my first (but not necessarily my last) time in one of those. I sneaked some photos, jumping nervously every time I thought I saw a security guard, understandably frightened about what he might do to me, given our surroundings.

Waiting for a guard to disappear so that I could get a picture of the padded cell, I crept cautiously inside the warden’s office, which looked like nothing had been touched since it was in use. Old register books, a typewriter, an old wireless… turning round, I saw lockers, and a couple of old uniform jackets hanging beside them. It really did feel like the place was still being used, and that someone could come and catch me at any moment. Imagine my utter horror, therefore, when something in the dark corner above one of the lockers suddenly came loose of its own accord, and fell with a loud clank on to the top of the locker. The metallic sound echoed monstrously around the  musty room, and I was convinced I’d been shot or something.

I screamed. I really did. I screamed a really girly scream and backed away, bruised my leg on the desk, turned to flee, and ran straight into Stalin/a moustached security guard who’d come to see who was wrecking the museum. I was about to declare my innocence when I realised he was biting his lip hard and shaking with mirth. Well, really. Drawing my shoulders back, I fixed him with a haughty gaze and stalked past him.

I say stalked… actually, my knees trembled like mad for the rest of my journey around the museum.

House of Terror: full points for aptness of name.

Filed under: contemplation, Fear, freak-out, Hungary, unexpected | 4 Comments »

Drugs are bad, mmmkay?

Posted on September 4, 2008 by Hails

Would you like a smoke?

Random backpacker dude passed the joint to me and I looked suspiciously at it. I dunno I said warily, It smells potentially lethal. He shrugged, assuring me that it was pretty mild. Barely stronger than a cigarette, really. I sniffed it uncertainly, and was suddenly overcome with the desire to block out all the woes of Amsterdam. I realise that this was a little hypocritical, given that one of my woes was that everyone just seems to sit around getting stoned all day, but hey – if you can’t beat ‘em…

It was great, initially. I suddenly thought that these guys were the wittiest, most entertaining people I’d ever met. We laughed and laughed and laughed, and everything was now great fun. Until I stood up, at which point I realised that the room had been transported in space and time, and was now hovering dangerously on a magical flying carpet over an undefinable space-agey mass of land. Interesting.

Trying to appear cool and in control, I said my goodbyes and headed upstairs to the dorm. The dorm is on the third floor, which hasn’t caused me any problems to date other than a bit of sweating when lugging my bags up the stairs, but last night the stairs multiplied most unexpectedly. Seriously – they went on, and on, and on. And with every step, my ears behaved more and more strangely. They weren’t flapping around or anything (although, who knows?), but they popped and started to buzz quite alarmingly. Sounds started to fade into the distance.

As I entered the dorm, I became horribly aware of my own breathing. It sounded so distant, and my warped reasoning caused me to fear that if I could still hear it from so far away, it must be really, really loud to everyone else. I tried to hold my breath as I walked to my bed. I failed, and suddenly worried that I might pass out.

The next issue, of course, was the fact that I was sleeping on a top bunk – and the bunk beds don’t have steps, in hostels. You just have to sort of… haul yourself up. I contemplated my bunk for quite some time, worrying about all the disastrous possibilities that hadn’t been nearly apparent enough to me the night before. Most distressing was the presence of three girls playing cards on the floor at the foot of the bed. If my attempt to ascend failed spectacularly, they would all see.

I don’t know how I eventually got into bed. All I know is that as soon as I was there, I became as thirsty as someone who’d been trekking in the desert. Getting up and going back downstairs in search of water was out of the question, so I found a TicTac in my pocket and made do with that. I closed my eyes. That’s when it started: my body was suddenly being pushed and pulled in all directions. But by magnets. For a few minutes, magnets on the walls pulled my limbs in opposite directions, before suddenly switching sides, so that my left arm was being pulled through my body to my right side, and vice versa. This can’t be normal, I thought to myself, struggling against the forces. Wham! replied the invisible magnets, changing position so that they were on my mattress, trying to suck me inside.

Ten minutes later, and I was flying. Really flying. I’d always thought it would be great to be able to fly: liberating, exciting, exhilarating. It was not. It was most disconcerting. Mainly because I couldn’t seem to open my eyes or move my limbs to check where I was flying. What if I accidentally flew out the window? I could hear the girls at the foot of the bed, talking in Spanish, and I was interested to note that I could now understand them perfectly. I suddenly had the gift of understanding foreign languages, and I knew that they were talking about me as I flew around the room. Discussing my ability to fly. Envious of my talent.

I woke up twelve hours later, with an extremely severe headache. I really don’t think you could get dope like that when I was a student in the UK, you know. I’m staying well away from it from now on…

Filed under: confusion, contemplation, drugs, escapism, flying, freak-out, paranoia, unexpected, worry | 14 Comments »

Everything’s different here

Posted on August 9, 2008 by Hails

I haven’t had many positive experiences with customer service.

I spent several months at the start of this year wrapped in a duvet and making pleading phone calls to my landlord about the faulty central heating, only to be fobbed off every single time and left to freeze. I was at the mercy of Apple when my laptop broke down and they insisted that it wasn’t under warranty – had it not been for the confidence and patience of Le Flatmate in being firm with the appropriate people, I’d probably still be working from internet cafés. And dealing with the bank when I had my card stolen was an exhausting and frustrating experience that I’m struggling to forget.

So when the shower suddenly stopped working yesterday morning, I found myself despairing. Getting someone to look at it would be extremely difficult, what with my lack of experience in looking up Yellow Pages listings in Dutch and all. And even if I did get the hold of someone, what hope is there of getting a workman to come and help you on a Friday? Foreseeing an icky weekend in a grubby, unwashed state, I glumly put the coffee on and sat mulling over my limited options.

I happened to mention it to one of the neighbours, who called in to say hallo. Up the stairs she trotted, all purposeful and motherly. It is a strange shower – runs on gas rather than electricity. Matches were struck, Dutch muttering was done. I stayed out of the way.

She returned, shaking her head and announcing that it was indeed on the blink. I will call someone, she said kindly. If you want to shower in the meantime, you can use mine.

How lovely. I sat down and took a sip of my coffee, deciding to reply to a couple of emails and then nip across for a shower. Plan in place, I opened my laptop, took another sip of coffee, and saw the plumber’s van pulling up outside.

Huh?!

Half an hour later, the shower was fully operational. Where was the long wait? What about all the frustrated phone calls? Why no arguments about it being nearly the weekend and them absolutely not having any free time until the middle of next month? Or the half-hearted tinkering followed by No, there’s nothing I can do with this, I’ll have to come back approximately 10 times with a selection of new parts and tools? Where was all the drama and fuss? The great difficulty in doing what they’re paid to do?

I feel slightly cheated.

Filed under: Belgium, changes, conversations, customer service, foreign languages, friends, heating, landlord, unexpected, weekend | 3 Comments »

Kissing on a park bench

Posted on August 8, 2008 by Hails

I didn’t mention much about my Paris trip, mainly because it was a bit of a whirlwind visit – arrive, see as many tourist attractions as possible, attend book signing, visit a blogfriend, leave.

Having now had time to catch my breath and reflect, I have to say this: I love Paris.

Extreme temperatures aside, my only complaint is that I just didn’t have enough time there. My first couchsurfing experience was a positive one – I stayed with a couple my age, who have a beautiful apartment with gorgeous city views from their balcony. My hostess doubled up as my tour guide, and I saw a lot of things I wouldn’t have found on my own.

As for the Petite Anglaise event – wow! The realisation that Petite is actually an ordinary girl like me, who, bored in her job, discovered blogging… that was quite an eye-opener for me, with my tendency to get all star-struck and put people up on pedestals far above my head. I sat there, listening to her reading from her first book, and for the first time found myself thinking: maybe I could do it too! Maybe…

The next night, I went for (a truly delicious) dinner at Croque-Camille‘s. Naturally, I left far too early, clutching her step-by-step directions to her apartment in one sweaty hand, my half-litre of water in the other, completely prepared to get lost and dehydrated yet again. To my amazement, it didn’t happen. In fact, I got there with No Trouble Whatsoever. What’s going on? Am I growing a few strands of Common Sense in my head?

Anyway, ludicrously early for dinner, I sat down in a little park area to relax a bit and escape the heat. Three winos on a bench opposite me tried to harrass me and I stood (sat) firm, using my well-practised “I’m sorry, I don’t speak a word of French and have no idea what you’re saying” technique. Then, however, an old dude walking past happened to catch my eye. He smiled at me, and I made the grave mistake of smiling poitely back at him.

Old Dude descended upon me with the joyful grin of a long-lost friend. Ah, my little girlfriend! he exclaimed, to my alarm, doing a dramatic kiss-kiss of my cheeks. He babbled something else as I tried to shrink back in my seat, and I shrugged helplessly. Old French people are much more difficult to understand than the rest. The words are indistinguishable from each other, and to the untrained ear it just sounds like one long, gravelly growl. He finished and looked questioningly at me, and, still being polite, I explained that I didn’t really understand what he was saying. He wanted to know where I was from, and being Irish, it seemed, made me completely irresistable to him. I received more cheek kisses and one on the hand, and was incapable of doing anything about it, since I was sitting and he was standing and looming over me. So full of joy and love was his smile that to stand up and run away would have been downright heartless, leaving me riddled with guilt.

Did I want to go for a drink with him, he wondered. Erm, no. I didn’t. Maybe a coffee? Dinner? Anything of my choosing! Slightly freaked out, now, I dodged another kiss and explained that I was going to a friend’s house for dinner. Actually, I didn’t – the fear that he might decide to join me prevented me from doing this. Instead, I told him that I was waiting for someone. Undeterred, he asked if I might like to meet him later on for said drink. Erm, again, no. I am waiting for my boyfriend, I lied convincingly. Finally, he retreated, and I began to relax amidst a flow of “goodbye, so lovely to see you, take care!” type of remarks.

He caught me completely off-guard with his sudden return and kiss on the lips. I was speechless (other than an involuntary mmmmfff!), and a little embarrassed when he finally walked away and left me pretending not to notice the curious stares of the people on benches around me.

Who says the people of Paris aren’t friendly?

Filed under: book release, confusion, conversations, French, friends, how embarrassing, kissing, Paris, park, unexpected, weather | 8 Comments »

Birdwatching

Posted on August 1, 2008 by Hails

And don’t let that bloody bird bite you! warned House Owner as the family left for its holidays yesterday.

She’d been quite adamant about the parrot and its general hatred of humankind. There’s not a chance of me trying to befriend the thing now, animal lover or not. No, House Owners have shown me how to feed it by taking its dish out of a side bit of the cage – sort of like how you’d feed a cannibal in a prison cell. Slide the food through the slot and keep your liver. The parrot and I shall have minimal contact, I’ve decided. I talked to it as I was making my dinner. Politely, you know – friendly conversation. I told it what I was cooking, and it did a superb impression of a computer’s ‘error’ message warning tone. Familiar language – we were getting along quite well, I thought.

Then I walked back past the cage to put my plate in the dishwasher, and saw the bird sitting on top of said cage.

Wait, I said suddenly, staring intently at it, you weren’t there before. How did you get out? It looked smugly at me. Apparently the parrot can open its cage all by itself. Clever.

Throw a towel over it, House Owner had advised on the subject of parrot catching. It can’t bite you any more, that way.

The parrot wouldn’t bite me. I love animals, and animals love me. We have a bond. There was no way I was throwing a towel over the poor thing’s head. Here, Parrot! I crooned softly, edging up to it with a sunflower seed. It stared benevolently at me and I gained confidence. Good parrot! I added reassuringly, sidling over. It knocked the seed out of my hand, caught hold of my finger, and squawked loudly.

Argh! I shrieked, trying to salvage some of my finger. Get off me, you vicious monster!

I retrieved a towel from the bathroom and, sucking the blood from my finger, crept nervously towards the scary bird. It attacked the towel somewhat aggressively. No amount of gentle reasoning would persuade it to get into the cage, and now the dog was starting to bark because I’d locked it in the room with us in the fear that the parrot would make a bid for freedom out of the back door.

Unable to console myself at having failed so immediately at housesitting, I retreated to the garden with champagne and dog, and sat there wondering how many mosquitoes would bite me if I slept by the pool.

Hayley? I jumped violently, honestly thinking that the bird had followed me out and was taunting me from the side of the house, but it turned out to be two teenage boys, friends of the family children, whom I’d met earlier. They were calling in on their way past to check that I was OK and see if I needed directions to anywhere. With some miming and simplified English, I explained the parrot situation, and they leapt into boyish action. Of course, when we went inside, the bird was sitting innocently in its cage. One of the boys closed the cage door, and looked questioningly at me.

Erm… thanks, I said, feeling a little foolish. They left, grinning and talking in Dutch. It’s not too hard to take a decent enough guess at the type of things they were saying. I suspect that they’ll be back to check on me every few hours, as, let’s face it, I would clearly not survive for very long if left to my own devices…

Filed under: dogs, Fear, how embarrassing, Mishaps, pain, parrot, pets, rescue, unexpected, worry | 2 Comments »

Not the sort of adventure I was looking for…

Posted on July 14, 2008 by Hails

It’s never a good idea to make a comment like “Must go out and do something tomorrow – I have nothing to blog about!”, as I did yesterday.

That’s just asking for trouble. Today’s post, therefore, originally intended to report on the Bastille Day festivities on France’s national day, is instead about the scumbag who stole my purse when I was on the Métro on the way to said festivities. I have no idea how this was possible, given that they must have opened the velcro seal of my handbag, lifted the flap, unzipped the compartment, and removed the purse, and that I wasn’t sitting next to anyone, nor was there a big crowd of jostling people. I suspect a thief with powers of invisibility, actually, although I didn’t know how to explain this in French to the police, so I had to settle for Non, je n’ai pas vu lui.

As I climbed the steps out of the Métro station, I noted the sudden lightness of my bag and did the frantic, stricken rummaging of a person who knows perfectly well that they’re not going to find what they’re looking for. I was a long way from the apartment, I didn’t know the area, and my cash, bank card and remaining Métro tickets were, of course, in my conspicuously absent purse. In a panic, I approached the first person I saw: a tough-looking biker chick, who was removing her helmet and locking up her bike outside her workplace. In my own unique version of stumbling French, and trying not to cry, I explained my predicament and looked pleadingly at her in the hope that she would take control of the situation. Which, thankfully, she did.

Sandrine, my knight in shining leathers, put a cigarette into my trembling hands (now is not the time, OK?!) and took me to the nearest police station. Neither Sandrine nor the policeman spoke English, but they were admirably patient with me as I battled with tears and a limited vocabulary. Today, while certainly opening my eyes to the Big Bad World, also gave me a touching experience of the kindness of strangers. Sandrine even gave me her contact details, saying that she’ll make any phone calls I want to the Objets Trouvés office. The policeman, apparently saddened by my vulnerable appearance, actually apologised on behalf of the decent people of Lyon! I wanted to laugh, but I had to nod very solemnly and graciously accept his apology. Eventually I left with my copy of the police report and instructions to show it to the people at the Métro ticket desk, who would then let me on to the train for free in order to get back and cancel my bank card.

Not that the ticket desk is open on a national holiday, as I soon discovered. Tempted at this point to just slump to the floor and start to bawl my eyes out, I instead grabbed another perfect stranger and gave him my woeful, grammatically horrific tale. He let me squeeze through the ticket barrier at the same time as him. I feel decidedly like a beggar, but at least I made it back.

And the bank won’t send my new card to France, nor will they send it quickly. So by the time it gets to my parents’ house, and then to me, I reckon I’ll have starved to death or been beaten up as I beg for dinner money on the streets. So this is more of a goodbye post than anything else, really.

Au revoir…

Filed under: charity, conversations, French, Lyon, money, mysteries, pick-pockets, police, sad, sod's law, stress, tears, unexpected, worry | 13 Comments »

One night in Berlin

Posted on July 4, 2008 by Hails

I can’t say I was terribly taken with Berlin. Of course, I’m willing to acknowledge my extreme tiredness by the time I arrived there, coupled with my distress about the laptop death, and it’s perfectly plausible that I am just associating Berlin with these feelings now. Also, I didn’t actually see much other than, erm, the airport. However, I did think that the people I encountered were a little… abrupt. They weren’t exactly rude, but I didn’t feel very welcome, as a foreigner - the opposite of how I’ve felt in Estonia and France. 

In Estonia, most people speak English to some extent, and are happy to do so. In France, fewer people speak English, but they appreciate you making the effort to speak their language, and are very pleasant, patient and helpful as you stumble around in your faded memories of auxiliary verbs and the imperfect tense. Conversations take much longer, and can be quite embarrassing, but all my exchanges thus far have been friendly and punctuated with jokes and smiles. In Germany, I felt a bit stupid and snubbed every time I tried to ask for help or directions. Sad and weary, I finally retreated to a quiet corner of the airport and sat down to read my book.

An elderly gentleman approached with his luggage, indicating the space beside me and asking something in German. I nodded politely, indicating that the seat was free, and he sat down, arranging at his feet two battered leather bags and, quite inexplicably, a tightly sealed crate of bananas. I continued to read. The man fidgeted for quite a while, and then said something else, clearly hoping to have a conversation. This was impossible, because of my tiredness and the fact that I didn’t have a clue what he was saying. Ich spreche kein deutsch I said haltingly, shaking my head with an apologetic smile. He rolled his eyes and gave an annoyed grunt, muttering something under his breath. I chose to ignore this, and continued to read.

Eventually, he got up and just sort of shuffled off out of sight, leaving his luggage behind. I eyed the crate of bananas somewhat suspiciously, and decided to take advantage of his absence to move to a free bench at the other side of the lounge, where, exhausted, I curled up underneath my coat and tried to get some sleep.

I woke up to find myself staring at a gun.

This was a little unexpected. I blinked several times as I emerged from my doze, and let my eyes travel upwards to take in the uniform and face of the gun-wearer: an airport policeman who had apparently been told that I was seen talking to the Possible Terrorist who had abandoned his banana crate/box of explosives. Good grief. More than a little nervous, I explained my non-involvement, feeling the disapproval in his voice and expression, and hoping that he wasn’t going to arrest me. He looked at me with what I can only describe as a sneer, and nodded tersely before turning and walking away to deal with the bananas. Sleep was impossible from then on.

And that was Berlin. It was… an experience.

I note from my blog stats that I have some readers in Germany. I wish to make it clear that I have nothing against Germans – especially the ones who read my blog! Please don’t hate me. I’m simply reporting an experience. For all I know, they thought I was the rude one…

Filed under: airport, Berlin, confusion, conversations, Estonia, Fear, foreign languages, French, how rude, stress, tiredness, travel, unexpected | 6 Comments »

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