Lesson 14: Take a Deep Breath

I sat on the curb at the Venice bus station, holding back tears as I reflected on what a crappy afternoon it had been. My feet hurt, my head felt like it was going to explode, and I felt completely helpless and pessimistic. You know when interviewers ask questions like “Tell me about a time when everything went wrong”? This day will be my answer.

It had started out so great. I had decided I wanted to see Ireland. I had received an email from a Workaway host, who just happened to be in Ireland. I finally had a plan! I just needed to get some Venetian souvenirs and book a flight, then I would be good to go.

Easier said than done on both counts, unfortunately. I had been on the lookout for a good mask to take back to my dad and stepmom. Venice is famous for its Carnivale masks, with shops on every street corner, so finding a good one shouldn’t be a problem. And it wasn’t. Not long after entering the city of canals for the day, I found a great hand-painted mask that I knew would look perfect on their wall. But my day was just beginning – I didn’t want to carry the mask around the city for hours. I figured I could come get it later, or maybe even find a similar one in another shop for a lower price.

That was my first mistake: thinking I could find anything in Venice. Sure, the Rialto Bridge and St. Mark’s Square are easy, there are literally signs for these sites on every street. But to return to one mask shop among hundreds with only a vague idea of where it might be? Impossible, as I found when I tried to relocate the shop that afternoon. Nor could I find another mask that compared to that first one I had liked. Not that I didn’t try – I walked around that maze of a city until I couldn’t walk anymore. (Mini-lesson: cheap Converse knock-offs – call them Nonverse or Con-Cons or whatever – are not good walking shoes.) I ended up returning to the hostel maskless and footsore.

Somehow, I missed the hostel bus stop. Luckily, the airport wasn’t far, so it didn’t take me long to hop on a bus in the opposite direction. I missed it again, but just barely, leaving me to walk 100 yards or so. Finally I was able to sit down and find a flight to Dublin. Ryanair sucks, as any budget traveler will tell you, but they’re still in business for a reason: sometimes the low cost is worth the crappy service. They were the only company offering a cheap, convenient flight from Venice to Dublin for the next day. I gritted my teeth and accepted all the stupid charges they add on, entered alll of my information, and paid for my ticket.

Or at least I tried to. Over and over again. For some reason, the site would not accept my payment information. I even tried using a different card, to no avail. I must’ve re-entered the same info ten times, using every address it could possibly need for my card, with no differing effects. My frustration was seething out of me and I was starting to stress out a bit. There were no other flights to Dublin for another three days and I needed to get there immediately.

Finally i decided I would go to the source and buy a ticket there. Unfortunately, Ryanair only uses the most inconvenient, out-of-the-way airports possible. The bus to their Venice location was half and hour from the station, which was ten minutes from the hostel. But what else could I do? I took a bus to what I thought was the train station (it wasn’t), got anther bus to the actual train station, went through hell trying to communicate where I wanted to go to the ticket man, and finally got an €18 return ticket to the Treviso airport.

This is when I sat on the curb, doing my best to keep the tears from spilling down my cheeks. It didn’t help that it was a Sunday, meaning bus routes ran less frequently and if I took too long at the airport I wouldn’t have a bus back. I was stressed, I was fried, and I didn’t know what to do.

Finally, I just had to take a deep breath and think things through, step by step. Firstly, I told myself that the whole situation wasn’t as big of an issue as I was making it. If I couldn’t get a ticket for the next day, it wasn’t the end of the world. I could get there by the end of the week anyway. I had a ticket to the airport in hand – I could use it now, make the 1-hour round trip and try to get a ticket for the morning, or I could just go there in the morning and see if I could get a ticket then. Being completely fed up with public transportation for the moment, I decided on the latter. It saved time and effort. Having made that decision, I got on the bus back toward the hostel, feeling better already.

Just when things were looking up, I find myself at the end of the bus route, with no idea when we had passed my stop. I actually think I just got on the bus going in the wrong direction, because I swear I was paying attention. Either way, I was just lucky that I had a very, very nice bus driver who took me all the way back to the hostel, which was somehow half an hour away.

Let me pause to recap the fact that I had just endured three hours of botched bus rides and pure frustration, and I was still in exactly the same position as when I left.

I got back to the hostel and immediately grabbed a beer. Can you blame me? Luckily I had a few new friends to share it with. As I sipped that first pint, I checked on backup travel options. I found that Air Lingus had a flight from Milan to Dublin the next day. It was a later flight, so I had time to go the three hours from Venice to Milan beforehand. I decided that sounded much more appealing than dealing with Ryanair and their shit, not knowing if I would even be able to get a ticket. So I booked with easyJet. My card was accepted on the first try.

I breathed a sigh of relief and finished my beer. Screw you, Ryanair.

(No wonder it took me so long to write this post. I feel stressed and annoyed just thinking back on all that!)

Sorry?

Well, I’ve done it again, as I knew I eventually would. I’ve gotten behind on my blog. I start out so excited, posting every day, but then I get busy and the posts stack up and I don’t want to write because I’m so far behind and I’m so far behind because I don’t want to write. I’ve been in Ireland for a month and I’m still writing about Italy!

Just to give a quick update, I am currently living in a small town a couple hours out of Dublin. I’m working and staying in a castle (yes, a real castle!). The people are great, the food is great, the place is great. I’m sure I will tell you all about it soon enough. But for now, I gotta catch up! Maybe you guys should bug me about writing more often.

Rimini in a Nutshell

Rimini is a place for beaches and nightclubs. It has little in the way of hisorical sites, shopping, or other activities. If you want to get a tan and party a lot, go there, and stay in one of the Sunflower hostels. That is all.

Lesson 13: How to Accidentally Sneak into a Club

On to Bologna! What is there to say about Italy’s supposed food capital? Well I did have some pasta Bolognese, and it was damn good. Didn’t see any bologna, though. Must be an American thing? Beyond the food, I did really like the town. It’s a place I could see myself staying in for a while. Everything is in walking distance and there are plenty of supermarkets, shops, and parks. And Bologna is one of those places that has a lot of history nonchalantly  mixed in with the modern world. I love places like that. Even the porticoes lining most of the streets give the city character and differentiate it from other places.I climbed the tallest of the city’s many towers, all of which seem to be leaning. It’s always nice to get a bird’s-eye view of the place I’m visiting. I also visited a couple of the local churches. There are always churches to visit. Also, a friend of a friend let me in on the “seven secrets of Bologna“, a couple of which I struck out to find. Neptune’s penis was easy and the canals aren’t hard to find if you aren’t lazy. However, I couldn’t really make use of the whispering corner by myself, and the other “secrets” evaded me completely. 

Beyond the historical aspect of Bologna, I was interested in checking out the city’s nightlife. I had heard good things, with it being a university town and all (the oldest university in the world, in fact). Every once in a while, I just feel like going out on a Saturday night, so I did my research and picked one of the hottest clubs in town to visit. I marked it on the map, put on my shirt and tie, and headed off, not really knowing what to expect.

As I approached the point on the map, I crossed a bridge and was distracted by the events in the area below. There was a park-like area off to the left, where a bunch of people were sitting on the grass, watching a film on a giant projector screen. I thought this must be the “Bio in the Park” event I had seen advertised in the main square. Connected to the park, but separated by a chain-link fence and gate, was a stage, an outdoor bar, and a huge seating area. Some sort of event was going on on the stage, while lights flashed and music played in the almost castle-like building behind it. Was this the club I was searching for? It looks like it could be a club. It’s in the right area…. But how do I get down there?

It took me a few minutes (and some light stalking) to locate the door, but nothing is ever as easy as just walking in. I needed a special card to enter, which I was told to buy somewhere down in the courtyard/park area. I made my way down into the park, into the swarm of people, with no real idea of what I was looking for. It was a bit of a mess, with the film viewers on one side of the fence and the club-goers on the other. I looked around for a while, but still had no idea where to get this card.

The most logical step in my mind was to ask the bartenders, so I went through a gate to the other side of the fence to wait in line at the outside bar. It struck me as slightly strange that it was free to get into the courtyard and outside bar, which were clearly connected to the club, but the building itself had a cover and card-requirement. I brushed it off as a cultural thing. Finally, I reached the front of the line, where I asked the bartender, in what I thought was pretty decent Italian, where I could buy the card to get into the club. She immediately turned and got her coworker, who spoke English. Damn you, Italian, I thought I had it!

A conversation chalk full of confusion on both sides ensued. I wanted to know where to get the card, she asked if I was a student, I said that I was just visiting, she said I didn’t need the card, I explained that they had told me upstairs that I did. “Who told you?”

“The people at the door.”

“No, you have to go upstairs and talk to them.”

“…That’s who told me I needed the card. They told me to come down here somewhere.”

Finally, it boiled down to this statement from her: “Well they already let you in without the card, so you don’t need to get one.”

…They let me in? But I didn’t pay anything… Was I supposed to pay when I went through the gate?

And that’s how I accidentally snuck into Cassero.

So what to do now that I was in? Let me tell you, going to clubs by yourself sucks. Unless you’re super outgoing and can easily strike up a conversation with a random stranger, I don’t recommend it. I can be outgoing at times, but it’s a little harder when you don’t know who speaks English. The first hour or so at the club consisted of me awkwardly drinking by myself and people-watching.

Finally, just as I was about to give up and call it a night, someone took pity on me and introduced herself. From there, I met a whole slew of new friends! We danced and drank, and they quizzed me on my American life. I had never been called “exotic” before that night. So overall, the club, and Bologna itself, was a success. Yay for new friends!

Lesson 12: The Best Florentine Meal

Alli, Karen, and I had three dinners in Florence. They were all very delicious, extremely enjoyable experiences, and quite cheap. How, you ask? How, in one of the most touristy cities of Italy, does one find a meal that breaks the pizza-and-pasta monotony at a reasonable price? Well, I am here to teach.

In Cinque Terre, we had been fairly isolated. It was solely a tourist area, not much residential life – which meant no super markets. In Florence, however, we could find actual groceries. Since we wanted a cheap meal the first night, we just went to one of those. What I had thought would be a dinky little meal quickly became a feast! We each grabbed a packaged salad, choosing between those with corn, walnuts, olives, and croutons. Each one came with parmesan cheese, salt, oil, and vinegar. To accompany the salads, we got maize bread, a think chunk of cheese, and some cheap but quality wine. (Mini-lesson: All wine is Italy is good, even the €2 bottles.)

It may not sound like much, but it was really good, and it was exactly what we were craving. We took our spoils and found the nearest, most convenient place to sit: the wall of the street above the river, in a fairly busy area of the city. People ogled as they past, tourists and locals alike. They were all jealous that we had the guts to swig our wine straight out of the bottle right out in the open. All of the older Italian men smirked in our direction, a hint of approval accompanying the amusement in their eyes.

The second night, we visited another supermarket and received a blessing: a small rotisserie chicken at half price! It was only €1.80 and it was delicious. A perfect compliment to our salad, bread, and wine. This time, we traveled a bit farther for our seating area. We really, really wanted to get into this park that was marked on our map. We walked almost all the way around it, but the darn thing was walled-off and we just couldn’t find a way in! When hunger overcame us, we plopped down on a bench in a nearby playground/park area.

It was an interesting meal. We watched the young kids play on the playground, the  teenagers play soccer, and the old men and woman gossip. Again, I felt the Italians approved of our meal and wine. As did the dog who sat and stared at us the whole time, with strings of drool dripping onto the sidewalk.

The final night, we repeated the ritual: supermarket, salads, bread, cheese, wine, find a bench. The nearest bench this time happened to be next to the carousel in one of the city squares. We watched children go in circles on fake ponies as we munched on our final Florentine dinner, contemplating jumping on for a free ride.I almost did, but my nerves gave out when I saw the ticket man collecting.

In the days after Florence, I missed those meals, and those girls. I continued to get the salads whenever I found them, but it’s not easy to get bread, cheese, and wine for one. Eating simple things in interesting places ended up giving me some of my best memories from a city full of art museums and tourist attractions. I guess attitude is everything. 🙂

Ciao for now.