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Misery

Monday, June 26th, 2006

So here is that lovely post I promised, the one I accidently deleted… I’ve basically cut/paste it from an email I sent my mother and edited for your benefit, it’s not for the faint hearted.

28 May 2006–No, homesickness was not the kind of sickness Kara was refering to when she emailed my mother to let her know that I wasn’t in my best form, but not to worry, they were doing their best to take care of me. I had a nasty bug, probably food poisoning. It started out with some “pleasant” trips to the bathroom, and the next day involved three bouts of vomiting. The part that worried me most was that I couldn’t keep water down and was getting more and more dehydrated.

Now, two mornings ago is when it started. That night, Kara and I went to get dinner and I felt like I wanted to explode. Kara wanted to walk along the water, so I walked a bit of the way and then turned back. I don’t think Kara realized how sick I was. But I think she got the idea when she had the pleasant experience of listening to me retch, as did everyone else at our hotel. The hotel is made of concrete with a courtyard in the middle so you can hear any noise above a certain decibal from any corner of any room. That first bout, I’ll admit, was self-induced. I’ve battled stomach bugs enough to know that sometimes you just have to get it out, and a good way to do that is to chug water.

Upon hearing the lovely sounds, the hotel employees put on a pot of tea they said would help my stomach. I knew it wouldn’t stay down even if I did try to sip that concoction, the smell of which made me want to vomit on its own, but Kara, wanting to help, pressured me that I should. “It’ll help clean out your stomach.” You’re damned right it will; it’ll do the exact same thing the water did, but water tastes better. I took a few sips anyway, and 15 minutes later, they got to hear bout two.

I knelt with my head in the toilet, barely able to breathe. When my stomach was finished, I collapsed on the cold tile floor until my breathing slowed and my muscles stopped trembling. I peeled myself off the floor and crawled back into my bed where I tried sleeping until Kara came up to report that I ought to finish the tea because the hotel staff said they would be needing the glasses back. I had finally found a position on my left side, my hand at my knee, where, if I concentrated hard enough, my stomach would stop churning. But I finished that tea anyway, and that’s when I had bout three, and that’s when I cried a little bit, and that’s also when Kara and the hotel staff went off to find me a doctor. But as it turns out, doctors in Essouira don’t work on Saturdays, and are fairly worthless anyway. They’ll take your money (and then some, if they see your a foreigner), and send you to the pharmacy to buy something you could have bought had you not gone to the doctor at all. Antibiotics and intravenous are not readily available there. My throat, parched from dehydration because I lost more water than I was able to keep down, would have to wait for my immune system to do the work itself. Luckily, it did.

Now my stomach is doing a hell of a lot better (I had breakfast of a bit of fruit and cereal), and the rest of the system is also having an easier time of it. Now my biggest problem is homesickness. I really cannot wait until we get to Spain. Spain is a developed country and by god I want to be in a developed country!!!! Never in my life have I appreciated so much being born and raised in a developed country. Sanitation, hygeine, medical care, these are things I used to take for granted.

Oh, I called my mother first chance I had to leave the room without wreching. The phone was a pay phone and I was only able to talk for 20 seconds or so, and the sound of my mother’s voice sent me into tears. The woman working at the phone place held me to her shoulder as my tears fell on her scarf. People here are wonderful, if only it werent so easy to get sick in countries like Morocco!

For anyone wondering or worrying. I am now safely in London and enjoying it. Stories about my other destinations will follow some day.

The Croatia Fiasco

Friday, June 23rd, 2006

My friends let me keep the crackers. They were preparing to spend the night on a warm steam vent in Rome’s Termini Station, and I was boarding a train to Bari.

“See you in New York” I said as we did our best to hug goodbye with an extra 30lbs on our backs.

It was the first time on this trip that I would be alone since Barcelona. The train I was taking was headed for Bari on the South East coast of Italy where a ferry departs bound for Dubrovnik. That was the plan, catch that ferry and catch a ferry back from Split four days later. Dubrovnik and Split are two cities on the Dalmatia Coast of Croatia and according to every review is a place not to be missed; so naturally, I didn’t want to miss it. Croatia is also a country recovering from a war, and recovering well according to an acquaintance of mine who worked with refugees in the Dubrovnik area several years ago.

I chose a seat in a little cabin with a Canadian backpacker. Not long after, we were joined by a man who informed us he was from Punjabi. He had a way about him that made a warning alarm go off in my head. He had an insistance in speaking in English, a language of which he knew absolutely nothing. His smile did not match his eyes, which could barely stay open except when he forced them every few seconds.

We were soon joined by another Italian man whose seat I had apparently taken, but he assured me it was fine, and the four of us arranged ourselves in the most comfortable manner possible, stretching across the aisle, my purse as a pillow for my shoulder crammed in the corner.

Several hours into the ride, I was jolted awake by the Indian who had begun shouting and kicking the Canadian, and the Italian, who, lucky for me, was a buffer. The Indian, still seemed to be sound asleep as his hands began to work their way towards the Italian and Canadian’s pockets. I moved myself out of that car first chance I got.

As I disembarked at 7:30 in the morning in Bari, I went to the information office which was locked and dark. Like magnets, the other English speakers, two from Canada and two from the US, and I picked each other out of the crowed. Together we warmed a stone bench as we waited for the bus to the port.

When we were almost to the port, the bus driver had a confrontation with another Italian.  His hand gestures and tone of voice were the kind you would see on an episode of the Sapranos.  The only word I could make out was “respect.”  Five minutes later, he finally sat back down, and continued the two minutes around the corner to the port.

I sat with the Canadians and Americans, waiting for the information to open at 10.  But it seemed all the ticket booths were for ferries to Greece.  so I asked.  And sure enough I was at the wrong ferry terminal, so I left my newfound English speaking friends with my leftover crackers as peace tokens, you might say, and headed to the other ferry terminal. 

When I arrived, everything was closed.  The company I would need to buy the tickets from to Dubrovnik (the only company with ferrys to Dubrovnik) didn’t open their office until 6pm.  9am, I wasn’t ready to wait.  So I went back to the busstop to wait for the bus.  That’s when an old Italian man on a bycicle came up to me and told me to go to the information desk, which was closed, to take another ferry to Montenegro and catch a bus to Dubrovnik.

A younger man joined him, telling me, “Listen to me.  I tell you stay here take the ferry tonight.”

The men at the baggage drop told me that the ferry wasn’t running today, Sunday.  THe next ferry would be running tomorrow at 10pm.  Two days in Bari, and two days to spend in Croatia?  Not worth it.

THe younger man, piped up, “listen to me.  I tell you stay here.  Take the ferry to Albania.”

The older man asked me if I wanted to come get some food.  He patted the seat of his bycicle for me to sit down.  He wrapped his arm around me and kissed me on the cheek, but it wasn’t the sort of kissing both cheaks greeting I’m comfortable with.  So I was done with their ‘help.’  I had formed a plan.  I got on the next train to Milano and fell asleep in my seat.

“Don’t Worry; I’m Indian.”

Wednesday, June 21st, 2006
I wrote the following my journal on 8 June 2006 immidiately after it happened: I was waiting in front of the Florence train station for my 8pm to Milano. An Indian man just came up to me. I gave him the ... [Continue reading this entry]

Fes Visuals

Wednesday, June 14th, 2006
Morocco 050.jpg

The first picture is actually of the McDonald's in the Paris airport before we left on Royal Air Maroc. Stylish are the French, ey? The rest of the photos are all ... [Continue reading this entry]

HOLY POPE!!!

Thursday, June 8th, 2006

We sat, or folded you might say, into our Trenitalia seats, incomplete with only a lumbar and headrest that bent the upper half of your back into an uncomfortable C with your chin resting on your chest.  No amount of ... [Continue reading this entry]