Wednesday, April 26, 2006

top five

while traveling, i often find myself reminiscing about travels past. and so, i find that i would like to illuminate the cities of my travels that i have enjoyed visiting most.

1) Prague, Czech Republic
I visited prague in the spring of 2003 with my friend john. unlike most of my ventures on my exchange year, i was not surrounded by a gaggle of friends (we usually traveled in groups). after a rather difficult time getting visas (we had to travel from leuven to brussels several times), i was simply hoping that it would prove to be worth the trouble. it did. first of all, prague is extremely scenic. as with most cities that have rivers, it was beautiful. lots of hills and lots of archectural adaptions to fit these hills. being ex-communist bloc, it has an extremely interesting history. the hostel was nothing to write home about. except for perhaps the location. very central. we were there shortly after easter, and in the main square, there were the remnants of a very festive spring holiday. think streamers in trees, many stalls of goods, lots of people. i took some of my favourite pictures from atop the church beside the castle. i would remember names, except that, unfortunately, it was a long time ago. usually there is at least once drunken story that comes out of a weekend away. however, with prague, i don't believe there are any. which means i liked the city for the city itself. bizarre. i do remember spending hours looking for a flea market which turned out to be simply a market of junk. i am always disappointed when the shopping i expected does not pan out. i loved prague. it was cheaper than many other cities. it was full of attractive, friendly people. it has interesting legends (i couldn't get enough of the golem), many levels of old city and new city, and it was bright. i remember that. there was colour there.

2) London, England
I loved london when i was here in 2002. my dad was working and i tagged along. he was staying at a hotel out by the airport, so i had to take the tube in each day. i felt like a commuter. i know which tube to take, which tunnel. i had enough time in london that it felt familiar. i did most of the touristy things: british museum (rosetta stone), sherlock holmes museum (i still have the photo of me in the get up), the beatles store, tate modern, the millenium bridge, the london tower, buckinghamd palace, big ben, i did it all. i even saw a show. i shopped, i bought, i coffee'ed. i loved the archetecture, the style of the people, the random streets. this time, i did not play the tourist game very much. i still loved london for all the above reasons. but i now doubt whether i would choose to live there. if not for the people, i would.

3) Budapest, Hungary
okay, new year's 2002-03. jane, john, mike t, heather and i had been traveling for a few weeks now. after a terrible debacle wherein john and i were separated from the others in some no name town in hungary, we finally found the other three at the main station. in the company of the infamous zig. and they had all been drinking. but we had the most random fun. we stayed at zig's flat. i never really figured out what the deal with zig was. apparently, he maintained his rent by catching backpackers at keletti station. all he seemed to do was drink and get high. but he was warm and friendly and took us to little pubs and let us warm up in his friends kiosks at the station. we even watched him get into a fight. okay, looking bad, that seems like more good than bad. but somehow, it aboslutely wasn't. budapest is hands down the most beautiful city in europe. i don't care what anyone says. it simply isn't reproduced anywhere. its amazing. this is the only city in europe where i was ticketed on the subway. which is terribly ironic, because it is the only city where i bought a ticket. (the reasoning: who knows what the punishment would be) but, apparently, we took the wrong ticket for the wrong connection, and sure enough, got busted. it was seven euros as a fine. at the time, it was a real pain. all of us were running out of money. budapest was one of the poorer cities that i visited. there seemed to be a culture of alcohol, but, i might have been exposed to that because of who we were staying with. there were more homeless people in the train station, and a general sense of seediness, than anywhere else. but, the people were friendly. they even allowed a restaurant to run a buffet which, along with food, included alcohol. i am rather proud to admit that i, and john, got kicked out. apparently there was a time limit.

4) Berlin, Germany
spring 2003. this was my only girls trip with stef and saskia. perhaps that is why it remains one of my favourite places. my year abroad was largely charged with testosterone. i didn't make any close female friends until spring time, which is a real shame, especially because i have since learned that i missed out on a lot of fun. we took a walking tour of berlin to help us acquaint ourselves with the city. and then we drank ourselves silly in the hostel bar. i remember having a great deal of fun in that city. despite the history, it was an exciting vibrant place. hitler's bunker no longer exists, the wall has been torn down (though you can still buy pieces)...it has a whole new future. i bought a pair of birkenstocks, direct from their home. why don't i remember more about berlin? i'll simply have to go back. i remember expecting so much from this city. how could it not possibly be incredible? i wondered if you could feel the history. if somehow, the people reflected it. i was disappointed. like most places, people forget. they adapt. but some moments, it felt very real. the remnants of the berlin wall are rather terrifying. there is no marker over the bunker of hitler for fear that someone would want to turn it into some kind of shrine. i did not find any visible marker of nazism in berlin. but, for the most part, people were willing to talk about it. they just didn't want to honour it.

5) lagos, Portugal
spring 2004. i visited this rather random little portugese town. there is more english spoken here that portugese. it is almost entirely populatd by tourists of university age. and it is a complete blast. beautiful beaches, beautiful water, beautiful cliffs. kids would tell stories of coming to europe for three months and spending two and a half in lagos. they'd make money handing out flyers for bars, getting extra for the number of people they brought in. this was my european victory lap, the summer after i returned from belgium. julia and i, who quickly partnered up with katie and april, beached and swam and went out. i even won a drinking contest. no joke. i have the t-shirt to prove it. sagres was a break from europe: it was a break from hours of walking and touring, of seeing everything you had to see, of forcing yourself into old churches, into museums. you have to earn sagres.
are there others that i enjoyed? absolutlely. and i didn't put on this list the cities that i lived in--leuven, of course, will always have a special place. but the places that i love most are ottawa and bowmanville. places that i grew up, that i loved, that i learned. those other cities, though incredible, are not home to me. and for the first time, perhaps in my whole life, i am realizing how important that sense of home is. and i think you might find it with family, friends, and love, rather than with archetecture, history, and bars. although i love to visit, i love to do so for more than one reason: to see and experience to what i have never seen or experienced before, but also, to remind me, that home is a wonderful thing. (isn't it so much harder when pieces of it are spread out, across the country, across the world?)

1 comment:

akd said...

okay, either i'm majorly pmsing, or you're a really good writer, b/c that end bit seriously almost made me cry.
how true it is, and how priviledged we are to be able not just to experience it all, but share it too.