Thursday, November 27, 2008

Week 34: And the Suprise is...

If you didn't already know, I'm back in Canada. A few weeks back I decided that I had enough city hopping and wasn't really interested in doing any other WWOOFing at the time. Those two reasons and the even bigger one that my bank account was hemorrhaging quite quickly brought me to the decision to return to Canadia on Nov. 24, four months earlier than planned.

My last week in Europe was a blast, though. I returned to the UK on Tuesday and visited the awesome people that I had met during the summer. My first stop was Earthworm. Always something going on there, the Earthworm folk were busily preparing for a permaculture course that weekend, the first they've ever hosted and of many yet to come, I'm sure. My contribution for the couple days I was there was to insulate and put drywall up in the events room. It felt good to be doing productive work again compared to my past two months.

I set from Earthworm on Thursday to visit friends at Brambles Housing Coop in Sheffield. Amy-Jane showed me around Sheffield Friday afternoon but this was just an excuse so she could steal materials from the learning stations at the Metalwork Gallery in the Millennium Museum and steal the silver card stock from the demonstration station. We also spent time preparing our costumes for the Cornerstone circus-themed party on Saturday. I dressed up as a bearded lady which went over great thanks in part to my gigantic beard and the awesome pink flowered hat the Amy-Jane lent me. She went as a human cannonball and I hope there are pictures of her costume because it was hilariously skimpy.

I had an a great time at the party, dancing my ass off, staying up all night and getting severely pissed (and then continuing on to the pub Sun afternoon). It was definitely a high note to end my trip on. I will miss all of the excellent people that I met while I was over there, though.

Well, I will be reducing the (intended) weekly posts to biweekly or monthly because, now that I'm back in Ontario, my life likely won't be as interesting. If it is interesting, I'll be sure to let you know.

- Kasza

Friday, November 14, 2008

Week 33: France, Belgium, The Netherlands

Paris
I finally visited the Louvre! Pretty frigging big. It's got art and stuff, ya know. The only noteworthy part of the visit was how hilarious it was to see people crowd around the Mona Lisa trying to a catch a glimpse like they were going to have some revelation once they saw it.

After the museum, I went to Le Grand Appetit, a vegan, macrobiotic restaurant and had the Grand Assiette (large assortment). Slightly expensive (because everything in Paris is more expensive) but very tasty. Despite all the random shit I've dealt with in the last little while at least I'm happily eating at veg*n restaurants frequently.


Brussels
I swear Europe is trying to kill me. It was incredibly windy when I arrived in Brussels, so my attention was divided between trying to orientate myself towards the hostel and not getting blown over. This took my attention away from noticing that the middle area of the road was raised, so there was a slight curb. My attention might have missed this but my foot found it and then my face found the ground as I couldn't maintain balance with the temporary 40lb growth on my back. The backpack did break my fall slightly though which was a mixed blessing; instead of being crushed by the bag into the ground, I only received two scrapes. The downside is that two bottles of wine were sacrificed (not the important ones thankfully). More frustrating is that I only found out an hour later as I was removing my wine drenched clothes from my bag.

The next day I visited the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée (comics museum). It's pretty hilarious that I spent nearly as long here staring at pages of Tintin and Les Schtroumpfs (Smurfs) as I did in the Louvre. I love comics quite a bit. The only disappointing bit is that the museum doesn't seem to have been updated to recently. The latest pieces seemed to be from the early 90's. But the Smurfs turned 50 this year, so there was a temporary exhibit explaining every possible aspect of the Smurfs which was pretty cool. I was very tempted to waste a lot of money books and figurines but I was held back by a lack of funds and the realization that I'll have to carry everything around on my back until the trip is done.


Brugge
Went to De Bron vegetarisch restaurant for lunch; holy shit it was busy. All the tables were full, so I just joined a four seat table that only had two people at it. It felt a little awkward for me but it seemed to be a perfectly normal for them.

Belgium has strong beers; I couldn't find one that was less than 6%. So, when I went out drinking with a couple of Brits, I felt the pain for the majority of the next day.


Amsterdam
I went to two raw food cafes while I was in Amsterdam which I was really happy about because I haven't seen any raw food places in any of the other major European cities I've been to apart from London. The first place I went to is called Rawfood Cafe and is housed the same building as a dance studio. I sort of got dinner and show because the cafe and studio are separated by sliding glass doors. I had the falafal plate and chocolate mousse. I enjoyed the salad that accompanied the falafals but it is amazing that you can make "falafals" that aren't deep fried while maintaining texture and flavour. But the pièce de résistance was the chocolate mousse; basically, it was to die for. And raw cocoa is pretty energizing stuff because for about an hour afterwards I had a bit of a body buzz going on.

The other restaurant is Unlimited Health which is a part of a Yoga studio (no show here though). The plate of the day, four separate salads, was premade (probably that morning), so it slightly lacked the fresh, crispness of a dish made per order but I still enjoyed it. It always fun to have a variety of items on a plate and the size was considerably better compared to the amount of food I have received at other restaurants for €10.

The hostel I stayed at is large and fairly impersonal, so I didn't make any friends. But I was determined to try legal 'shrooms whilst in Amsterdam, with or without accompaniment. I went to a smart shop and purchased a 35g packet of Golden Teacher. I planned on only eating half that night and then the other half the next day but after an hour I felt I wasn't getting an enough out of them, so I decided to eat the rest. Woowee, what a night. It was probably the best trip on mushrooms I've ever had. Of particular enjoyment was the exterior of the Rijksmuseum, the clouds/moon/sky as they moved about and the trees in Vondelpark (which is just out front of the hostel).

The only other thing that I have to say about the Netherlands and Belgium is how amazing it see so many people riding bikes and how much a part of their culture it is. Seeing the sea of bikes at the bike racks in the city centres or at the train station is incredible (and blinding on a sunny day).


Stay tuned for next Sunday's blog; it'll have a surprise.
- Kasza

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Week 32: Spain, Portugal, France

Originaly, I was going to write portions of this post the night of or day after the events occured to give a more immediate and honest description of my experiences but my days got pretty boring and I stopped doing it. So, the first couple days were written in that style and the rest was written over the last couple days through the cloudiness of recollection.


19/10
Just after I had posted the blog last week, while we were in line for lunch Brian told me that I'd have to leave Can Masdeu the next day because they already a bunch of friends and family expected to visit over the next little while and they take precedent. To be fair, he told me this was a possibility when I arrived. It's probably for the best because the vast number of people who live there and visit the social centre (attached to the house) was too much for my agorophobic sensibilities.


20/10
I wandered around some parks in Barcelona today after checking in to the hostel; nothing special. But I was thinking a lot about the last couple weeks and considering giving up drinking (for safety and spirituality).


21/10
Seven and a half hour bus ride to Madrid! It went by alright though; I slept a lot.

I walked around Madrid centre a bit and checked out Parque del Buen Retiro which had an awesome art exhibit starting (I might go back just to check it out again). The park also has a large paved area where rollerbladers go; it was sort of amusing to watch a bunch of people practicing how to stop on their little brakes.

It had been a few days since I had been out socialising and I felt I was up for it. I'm unable to socialise without liquid courage but I'm definitely gun-shy right now, so I limited myself to beer the whole night. Woo hoo, nothing bad happened to me! Nothing eventful happened either; just a lot walking from bar to bar collecting "free shots" flyers from people on the streets. My group would down the shots and then move onto the next bar for more free shots.


22/10
I have been avoiding museums/art galleries lately because I'm cheap (wish they were free like in Scotland) but I figured I might as well see some in Madrid, so I bought the Art Walk pass which allows entry to three of their biggest art galleries (predominately paintings): the Prado (pre-modern), Reina Sofía Art Centre (modern and contemporary), and the Thyssen-Bornemisza (medieval to contemporary). Although the Prado collection is impressively large, the constant catholic subject matter gets quite tiring. And I don't "get" contemporary art, so my favourite gallery was Thyssen which is not a huge collection but a great sampling of important artists and periods in Western art for the past millenia.

At night, some of us went to a jazz bar just across the street from the hostel which had great music but ridiculously overpriced drinks (330mL lager for €4.50).


Remainder of Madrid
The next day was beautiful out, so I went exploring the local parks. Although the locals congregate in Retiro as I experienced earlier in the week, there are some great parks to the west that were virtually empty. It was quite peaceful considering a hundred meters away there was the chaos of Madrid traffic.


Granada
Wow, after the pace and populus of Barcelona and Madrid, Granada was like heaven.

It took some effort to find my hostel because I only wrote down half the directions but eventually I found it. And what a view! The hostel looks out at the Alhambra. As long as you've got the necessity of some food covered, it'd be tempting to stay up at the hostel for days on end.

But alas I only booked one night and I had plans to start WWOOFing the next day in a small village in southern Spain.


Sierra de Yuega
Despite expecting a girl (Chris is a girl's name in Spain), my hosts were very hospitable. They were overly generous, constantly offering me different foods (despite my reluctance to eat a meal before bed as is the Spanish custom) and teaching me to speak Spanish. I think they expected I would know more Spanish than I did because they knew very little English. Our attempts at conversation were quite humourous.

It got tiring to be working with the old man though, who has little understanding of a person's capacity to learn and retain new words in a short period of time. It also didn't help that he needed to assert himself as the boss and master repeatedly. He means well, I know, but his personality was too much for my little sissy ego and after two days, I had had enough. It's unfortunate because everybody else was so awesome and I think I would have been able to communicate effectively in a week or so. Oh well, on to Portugal.


Lisbon
It pissed down the majority of the time. Other than that, all I can say is Lisbon is frigging hilly. It was like I had to walk double the distance just because I had to go up and down as well as across.

The best thing about Lisbon is that they have a vegan buffet restaurant, Oriente Chiado. That's right, I said buffet. All-you-can-eat buffet!!! I gorged myself. I'm still not used to European restaurant hours though (because I don't eat out often), so I hoped to beat the supper rush and headed over at 17:00. Silly me, they're closed from 15:00 to 19:00. The wait was worth it, though. I ordered a bottle of wine and tried at least one of everything that was available; so good. If you're ever in Lisbon and feel like having something other than meat or fish, go to Oriente.


Guarda
I decided to spend the weekend in Guarda, a town in the Parque Natural da Serra da Estrela. According to Lonely Planet, Portugal is not a country for hiking; the people just don't do it. But there are some trails in the Estrelas that are supposed to be good and Guarda is the largest town in the area, so I headed there. I never did find any trails but enjoyed the walk along the side of the road because the weather was alright (not raining).

My other significant experience of Guarda was that nothing was open Sat afternoons (I arrived at 15:00) or Sundays. Luckily, there's a supermarket on the outskirts of the town though which was open, so I didn't starve.

Oh ya, and for Saturday evening entertainment I went to see Tropic Thunder (god bless the Portugese for subtitling and not dubbing). I think half the jokes were lost on the locals but I enjoyed it.


Salamanca
More cold weather and rain; I guess that's what November means anywhere in the northern hemisphere.

Again, I'm not prepared for the culture: I head over to the vegetarian restaurant, Alcacil, for noon thinking/hoping they'll be open (they don't advertise hours, just that they're open for lunch); the waitress tells me they open at two. Waiting isn't that bad if you have something to do, somewhere to go. It's shitty out, so lounging in a park us out of the question and since this is Spain, everything else closed at 13:00 for siesta and won't reopen until 16:00. Still, the restaurant was the high point of Salamanca for me (the city also has beautiful architecture besides a great veggie restaurant). The menu changes daily (a great sign of quality), so out of a choice of three plates, I went for the pasta with mushrooms which was proceeded by bread, salad, and soup and followed by a plate of clementines (vegetarian restaurant, so the dessert wasn't vegan friendly). I was content and ready to go wait for several hours for my bus (nothing else to do, everyone/thing was on siesta).


Bordeaux
Walked around St. Emilion in the rain for the first day trying to find chateaux that didn't require appointments for visits. I probably would have been successful if the map acurately displayed the location of chateaux. Everytime I walked to an area where I expected to find a specific chateau, it would either be a field or a completely different chateau.

I left the task of finding chateaux up to a tour guide the next day when I visited Medoc. We visited and tasted at Kirwan and Chateau d'Arsac.

Of course, I had to buy some bottles while I was in Bordeaux, so I bought two in St. Emilion (one for that evening and one to come back to Canada) and one from Arsac.

I really liked Bordeaux; the city was beautiful and they've got a shitload of wine. If I'm ever in the area again, I would definitely visit again.


Nimes
Eagerly up at five to six to catch the 7:11 train to Avignon where I hoped to catch a bus to Chateauneuf du Pape. The scattered clouds and misty fog rising from the vineyards created an extremely picturesque train ride. An auspicious begining to the day.

As the sun pushed up through the haze it transformed slowly from a bright orange semi-circle into the fiery white-yellow of suns that mean warm days. But as I arrived at the station in Avignon, the fog caught up with the sun. Objects a hundred meters away were practically invisible. If I was driving maybe it would have bothered me but I was thankful it was warm and dry again (compared to the days earlier in the week).

Well, getting to Chateauneuf du Pape is easy... if you have a car. But the lady at the tourist office suggested I go to La Bouteillerie du Palais des Papes which is a wine shop in the Papal Palace. Three tastings later, forty euro lighter and three bottles heavier, I headed back to Nimes with the hopes of doing some more tastings in the afternoon.

I tasted two reds from the town of St. Gilles which has a cooperative wine shop in the town for all of the wineries. The price-quality ratio was the best I've seen anywhere; quite a few award winners and no bottles over €10. So I bought two bottles (good thing, one of them was corked).

I was disappointed that I didn't get to visit any wineries but five bottles in one day is a pretty good haul (hauling them around in my backpack should be fun too).

The next day I was greeted by quite a surprise when I tried to collect my ticket at the train station; my credit card wasn't in my wallet... or anywhere else on me. The girl at the ticket desk tells me she can't print the ticket without the card, so I think "Fuck it, I've paid for a ticket and I've got a reference number; I'll just get on anyway.". Well, the guy checking tickets didn't see it my way and gave me a fine which I was supposed to pay at the Paris train station. Again, fuck that. I already paid for a ticket. I'm not going to pay a fine because I lost my credit card (so, I'll write a letter to their offices explaining the situation). Looking on the bright side of things, at least it was a direct service and I wasn't kicked off at some random stop in the middle of France.


That brings us to last weekend. I'll post this weeks exploits in a few days.

- Kasza