catapult magazine

Hey folks. I’m taking off for Europe next week Tuesday, for a few months, and I know there are a bunch of you that have done Europe. I’ve been there before, but haven’t travelled extensively. Yet.

So. Anyone have any advice/stuff not to miss/etc.?

NOTE: I don’t have much cash, so I can’t see Phantom of the Opera in downtown London. Or even Prague. Even if it’s not Phantom, but just a stand-up comedian. Or even if it’s a street performer in a Romanian slum.

I’m starting in London, with vague ideas of drifting South as it gets colder, getting as far as Spain or perhaps jumping down to Morocco. But I was thinking I should hit Germany. I’m not going to try to get to Greece, even though I know it rocks. Generally I’m not looking for the incredibly engaging stuff, because most of that costs money. I’m looking for the out-of-the-way stuff, maybe off the beaten path . . .

So if anyone would like to help a poor vagabond with a plane ticket, please enlighten.

Wait. Who’s whitey?

And why doesn’t anyone capitalize the beginnings of sentences anymore? Lazy slobs. Lazy AMERICAN slobs. (contemptuous sneer)

Jason. I said who’s whitey.

-Adam, Farnborough Abbey, Farnborough, G.B.

HEY!!! You’re there!! Good to hear from you! Exclamation point!

How was the trip, was it good? Is Europe cool? Have you had any good experiences yet?

To answer your question: Whitey is the man.

Who cares about Whitey, how is Europe? Hey, maybe you should have your own *cino blog, to keep us all updated on your trip, or a livejournal. It could be titled something clever about Adam’s european vacation. Whatta ya think?

Maybe next time I should do that. For the time being I’m kind of trying to be a little bit antisocial. Yet here I sit, in front of the computer, doing e-mail and posting on cino. Oops, I meant Catapult. I guess you can take the American out of the jungle, but you can’t stuff a rat without sand.

Saw stonehenge, finally. Too many people.

Staying at a monastery. Very cool.

Get out of bed, God! You’ll miss the best part of the day.
No, mother, I won’t miss the best part of the day because I haven’t created it yet. See, God can be a clever kid.

i too am doing the europe thing; more studying than traveling but i hope to spend the month b/w fall and spring term on the road. i’am wondering if anyone has suggestions for places to go in france, austria, italy, and swizterland well because those are the countries on my list of ’i’ve wanted to go there since i learned they existed’. i have some places that i am looking into, such as paris, versailles, chartres, reims, the loire valley, strasbourg, geneva, glarus, salzburg, vienna, graz, venice, tuscany, rome, and turin, but are there places i should skip, although the guide books recommend them or things not necessary listed in the guide books?

You should also go to budapest, bern, monaco, nice, barcelona, madrid, lisbon, innsbruck, berlin, sarajevo, copenhaagen, moscow, kiev, szatumare, prague, passau, luxembourg, amsterdam, malta, instanbul, debrecen, strassbourg, oslo, and vilnius. Seriously, I recommend you go somewhere warm if this trip is in the middle of the winter. Go to Spain or Italy or Greece. Winter north of the Alps sucks.

Ok so it seems Adam, you’re back in the land free of sin. So can you tell us all what your favourite things were and what places we should all avoid?

Well . . gee. Funny thing is, I didn’t actually visit many exotic places. Hitchiked in the U.K. for awhile, spent a few days in Edinburgh, Newcastle, Liverpool, London. Newcastle has the buttkickinnest concert hall I’ve ever seen, architecture-wise(you can probably find a picture if you do an internet search). It looks like a giant slug with mirrors for skin.

Working for a spell here and there was great—a different cultural experience, because you get to see the humdrum life in addition to the touristed life. What was nice about that was that almost no one fit into a box. Some construction-type guys were as educated as a professor, and some acted like ex-cons—because they were, I suppose. I then went to the NL for a bit, France for a few days (grrr.), Madrid for a few weeks (yay), and Morocco for a few weeks.

Morocco: For me, the end of traveling is simply to get a bigger picture of the world. And, having seen parts of western Europe before, I liked Morocco the best to that end. It was challenging: it’s sort of 2nd-and-a-half World. It’s not as poor as some countries, but it’s definitely Africa and not Europe. I got hassled constantly, and hustled once (grrr.). The majority of people you run into in touristed areas are after your money. Aggressively. Deviously. Fervently. You have to get nasty to get down the street, the hasslers are so forward. However, there is also hospitality that is unheard of here. You meet someone on a bus, speak with them for 5 minutes, and you have a meal and room for the night at their home. So there’s this confusing mix of greed and generosity. At first, I thought to myself “Man, everyone thinks I’m so RICH,” and then, “Oh. Yeah. I am,” even though I had been patting myself on the back for how minimally I had packed. Amazingly beautiful country. Learn at least a little bit of French (trust me), read up, and then GO. It seems to be a great destination for someone who’s at least travelled a little, but wants to get a little dirtier than Europe.

I stayed in a monastery outside London for a total of 3 1/2 weeks. That was very good as well. I recommend it. The simplicity of life—very utopian. The quiet—delicious. Plus, they form their sentences really well.

Best food: Morocco—like anything.
Best experience: Getting invited into a poor guy’s house first night in Morocco, eating his tajine, playing music with his family, smoking hashish with his brothers while listening to a Bob Marley tape, Britney Spears poster proudly displayed over the door (a present from another American friend), throwing up, then going to sleep for about 12 hours.

Sorry. This was a bit long. Anyone got related stories to swap?

Oh yeah. One last thing: the vast majority of people I talked to were willing to give individual Americans a chance even though they hate the country overall—and they even said that when I was undercover posing as a Canadian. (Yup. I did the whole Canadian-flag-on-the-backpack every now and then. And it really did help. Sorry if that offends any super-patriots.)