[lyrics to every song including the word "Hello"]

So apparently I have a bit of a growing readership on my hands... Well, hi everyone! I'm really glad you seem to be enjoying my EuroJournal; at least, I assume you're enjoying it, as I haven't heard anything to the contrary.

This isn't another epic post, mostly because I need to focus my "giant chunk of writings!" skills on a couple of papers for tomorrow rather than documenting my sleeping/vegging/studying weekend. I just wanted to say hi, thank you, and I hope you have fun reading!

-Bekka

February 25 (Day 38): Recovering Post-Carnival with Makeup Remover, Cough Drops, and Hopefully A Return Trip to the Thermal Baths

carnival |ˈkärnəvəl|
noun
1. a period of public revelry at a regular time each year, typically during the week before Lent in Roman Catholic countries, involving processions, music, dancing, and the use of masquerade
2. That week where Bekka's face was pretty much anything except necessarily a face.

Not kidding. The whole point is "put disguising things on, then go run around being absolutely nutty in the middle of the day but it's awesome because nobody actually can say for certain if it was you" and let's just say the Castle kids complied. (Well, mostly.) So much for my "recovery weekend" being last week...

I realize it's been another week-plus-long hiatus but things have been getting crazy around here; Carnaval kicked all of us directly and repeatedly in the shins with cleats, midterms are next week, the Madrid excursion/Free Travel Week is directly after that, and on top of everything I woke up this past Wednesday, of course the day after the festivities ended, with a horrible cold or something that's finally heading out now. It's been a double-healing kind of week, so I'm actually glad I didn't book a trip for this weekend, as it would have probably been miserable for me and equally miserable for my travelmates to deal with someone trying to flit about Europe with a box of tissues in one hand and tea in the other.

So first things first: Last Monday, Feb 13th. What on Earth could I be doing that far in the past, you ask? Well, it has something to do with last Saturday, and with the upcoming Madrid/Barcelona/Oporto week. Fun fact about Monday: I ordered my first package to the Castle, two bathing suits to pick from because I was a complete space cadet while packing and didn't bring a swimsuit! They were expecting the delivery by Friday, one day before a group of us - the group who didn't want to get daydrunk in Venlo - went to the thermal bathhouse in Arcen. Perfect, right?
LIES.
On Friday:
8am: Wake up, hear Dusseldorf is cancelled due to 75% group illness.
12pm-10: Wake up again. Walk around Well, see a lot of closed shops, realize Jaq makes around €700 just on us every Wednesday, get groceries, order my first Kasteel pizza, watch Tangled.
11pm: Go to the Linden on a non-American Night night and see what happens*. *Elderly gentlemen playing billiards and a corner of Americans hanging out

On Saturday, the schedule went something like this:
10:45, I check at OSA if my package has arrived and maybe hasn't been properly archived yet - meet with disappointment.
11:00, our group leaves for my favorite place in The Netherlands, Klein Vink. Everyone understands why I started walking after 20 minutes of waiting last time.
11:40, we get a group discount for entry and I scour the 50%-off rack for anything that could possibly work - at first meet again with disappointment, then settle on the first reasonably designed and priced option available.
At 12, I finally get into the locker rooms - actual rooms, kind of like spacious bathroom stalls without the toilets, with lockers on the side that are thankfully easier to finagle with than the Amsterdam train station lockers.
Around 2:30ish, I resist the urge to follow the crowd into the 1. nude (manageable) 2. mixed (not so manageable) sauna and instead head into the most intense shower stall sauna I will probably ever be in, with beyond-boiling eucalyptus steam replacing all air with cough syrup water droplets for fifteen minutes of calming (but slightly painful) solitude. While my skin was the softest it's been in ages, I'm certain, without a shadow of doubt, that horrible people are reincarnated as lobsters. (Honestly, it would suck to be a lobster. Religion hates on you and then you're boiled alive to be cracked open and eaten with butter. Think about it, Mainahs.)

The rest of the day was hanging out watching How To Train Your Dragon and prepping my prop for the parade (say that 5 times fast), and pulling an insane Carnaval costume out of my existing, clean, normal clothes for deBuun's party at 9:30.

We realized later that I probably should've been in front of a plain background instead of Emily's open wardrobe. Oops.

This "costume" consists of: my brightest tank top, my brightest cardigans (strategically intertwined, don't ask how I did it because I'm honestly not sure), the new spring skort, multiple necklaces, multicolored hair elastics, and all of my favorite eyeshadow colors at the same time. The only part of this outfit that I would not normally wear on its own: the pigtails. At least, not at that height.

Ms. Match and the French Pirate

I honestly don't know what name, if any, my costume would have, so I'm just calling it Ms. Match the Broken Doll, because when in doubt, make your eyes look ridiculous, put up pigtails, blink at people a lot, and just go as a doll. (Yes, I wore my gold shoes again.)

Saturday night was the first time I saw the Dutch going harder than us on American Night, and we... we have been put to shame. The Beerfloor situation was so epic I could hardly lift my feet at times, there were feathers and glitter flying everywhere, literally everyone was hollering along with the Dutch songs (regardless of lyric understanding), and the bartender even teased me when I downgraded from a Disaronno and [whatever cherry-flavored liqueur he'd put in instead of the cranberry juice I'd asked for] to a small beer when it got too hot to be in the dance room.

All in all, a very good night.

Sunday hit us all square in the face the next morning, but by no means were the Dutch done with us. After breakfast, we reorganized to paint each others' faces for the parade. Our theme was "Around Europe in 90 Days," where each of us dressed up as a different European country's stereotype and walked the three-mile parade tour through Well.

Belgium, or as Talia guessed, "the trash of Germany?"

Yes, those are Chokotoff and Côte D'or wrappers on my shirt. (Yes again to the gold shoes.)

We walked as a group of near 50 people to the far reaches of Old Well and waited for the call to walk, huddling and dancing for warmth. Why so drastic? Well, the moment we turned into the driveway, literally as my feet were crossing the threshold, the beautiful sunlight we'd been walking through tagged in a sudden hailstorm.

Represented here: Greece, Belgium, France, Italy, and two Scotlands

 EUROPE WHAT

I was very glad that my Belgian Waffle prop could also serve as an umbrella. However, it is now toast. (No pun intended, but seriously that cardboard is ruined)

We started walking at 2:11 (11 is the number of Fools), followed shortly by the sun making an appearance. We sang our way through Old Well, picking various strains of various songs until we forgot the words, trailed off, and waited for the next person to fling a new melody into the crowd. A good portion of us (myself included) dropped out at the Kasteel station where Dojna and Dulcia were handing out free hot dogs to the paraders; we spent the next hour or so actually seeing the crazy people we kept hearing, dodging spinning floats and waving to everybody. Jacqui, in a highly colorful Flamenco dress on loan from OSA because they seem to just have things like that floating around, was the unspoken Hot Dog Girl/Savior of the Day - she'd somehow skip down the road with a fully loaded tray, pass up said tray to a 10-foot-high platform, then dance back for refills and never seemed to get tired. The only time she dropped one was when a group of boys biking around in bunny suits tried to grab food on the go and missed.

Meanwhile, the Dutch boys from the Linden were lighting up a gigantic joint behind us and inviting everyone to hang out, but as I honestly prefer being able to feel my toes over getting completely blazed in mid-February hail flurries with Dutch high schoolers dressed as giant neon bunnies, I went inside and spent twenty minutes washing my face. Priorities, people.

 I was sitting down to tape my next video for the 1114ers when I realized something was amiss - the thistle necklace I'd gotten in Edinburgh during the 2008 Fringe Festival was nowhere to be found. I looked around my room, the hallway, the castle grounds, but after a fruitless search Facebook was notified. Thankfully it doesn't hold much sentimental value, so unlike the frenzied search for Margo's bracelet, I sighed, hoped it'd turn up, and perused Etsy for a pendant that would actually mean something other than "I'm pretty and (assumedly) of Scottish heritage!"

Sunday night, or Dutch Rager Part Two

For the hour or so before our next deBuun party started up, my room suddenly transformed from "single bedroom" to "public makeup station" - in the course of one night, my room hosted: 1. a sea witch (Emily), 2. A butterfly (Mel, who did her own makeup but used mine to great effect), 3. France, 4. Brazil, I guess, although Lucas didn't actually do much, 5. A zebra,  6. A marionette, and 7. A pinup/porcelain doll (when I finally remembered that I might need a costume too).

Erin the Marionette and I in her room

The costume tonight: black skirt, black tank top, black tights, black boots, classic pinup makeup (complete with filled-in eyebrows, and man that looked weird), and my bathrobe.

Yes, my bathrobe. (I was out of ideas! Also clean clothes.)

Some of the people I went with:

Sarah as some sort of fae and Taryn the Zebra

The party tonight was pretty different from last night, primarily because there were awards given out for the best floats, and also because the bartenders had switched shifts so the atmosphere was quite different. It was still fantastic, not to mention that almost everyone who'd traveled had gotten back during or right after the parade - we all wound up screaming the English lyrics along to a Dutch version of some 80s hit or another, intermingling with the locals, and at various points taking over the stage.

This was one of those points

Eventually I had to check my bathrobe, as deBuun got way too toasty for full sleeves, and wound up running into the bartender from last night. Minus the extra layer, life suddenly got far more manageable - until the music trailed off around 2am, and we all had to leave. It sounds like the student trajectories were not necessarily straight back to the castle, as there were rumors of afterparties floating around, not to mention several blooming international relationships. (Ooh lala!) I got home without incident and slept through to lunch, sorely needed after all the insanity.

Monday after class, I took a bike ride along the parade route to try scouting out where my necklace could have dropped, but again - no luck. "Okay, maybe EUOR will have something that could work in the meantime? I need tissues anyway..."
Oh look. All the stores are closed. BRILLIANT.

In my defeat, I pedal solemnly back to OSA for more laundry tokens - only to find that not only did Dojna have plenty more laundry tokens, she also had my necklace! Apparently it fell off Sunday morning during breakfast and had been sitting in the dining room until Monday afternoon.

Monday night was the Light Parade in New Well, complete with fireworks off deBuun, freezing temperatures, lit-up floats (a lot of which poked fun at Greece's situation, but political jokes are expected for Carnivale)...

One of my favorites of the night: papier-mâché Euros conveyor-belting through dry ice to a Greek temple.

... not to mention the bratwurst stand. (Yesssss)

Tuesday was hectic, as usual for me, but when we arrived at deBuun for the 2:30 Ethics class we stumbled into the Daytime section of Carnival.
Yes, it was still going. At 2:30 PM. WHAT
Class continued (of course) despite several interruptions by curious (and costumed) elementary school boys and from Spice Girls blasting through the floor, both of which severely inhibited focus on the chimpanzees.
Tuesday night was the Burning of the Bird in New Well, symbolizing the end of Carnivale and the beginning of Lent.

Wednesday morning hit me like a truck with yet another cold, just in time for 90's themed American Night - or rather, so we thought. Turns out the Ash Wednesday tradition around here is to go to the Linden to peel and eat herrings.
From 7-12pm.

Let's just say American Night was a bit of a bust this week but at least we all looked slammin'.

Since Wednesday, it's been a constant push towards midterms, planning our Free Travel Week (I'm going to stay in Madrid an extra day, then go to Barcelona and Oporto (in Portugal) with Mel and Lucas), and in my case fend off the sickness. I finally got a chance to go to yoga practice on Thursday, buy tea, honey, soup and various sources of Vitamin C, and wash my sheets; I woke up today feeling miles better, so hopefully I've jumped onto a one-way train to health. Skyping with Mom & Dad was a little painful though, mostly because I look horrific today - so actually, when my video feed cut out, it kind of worked. I could see them, they couldn't see me, so blowing my nose right in front of the screen wasn't an issue.

WHOO epic post.
Anyway, if you're still reading this (Mom), yes I just got your fb message. I think you'll have put off the vacuuming for a bit more than "a few minutes" by now. If this delay caused any sneeze fits, I'm sorry.

Feb 17, Day 30: Italian Whirlwind, Titanic Waterworks, and Another Fast Week

 Oops... it's been a bit longer of a break than I hoped, so this is going to be a bit longer than you hoped. Sorry!!

So as anyone who knows me knows, this weirdly-shaped little pup is Valentine Lamonea Lamonie, called Vallie for short. I've had her since Valentine's Day 1994, so this year (as of Wednesday) makes her 18 years old! We've been all over the world together, and while she won't be getting a Jell-O cake for her birthday like in 1999 (no cooking allowed :c), I wanted to commemorate the rather special date for both of us.

As for that whole thing where I'm actually a college student, this past weekend was Lucca and Firenze (or Florence). For those who are wondering (Mom), no I did not get a chance to go to the Blanco [Boar] - however, I did have boar for dinner on Saturday and it was positively magnificent. (Also a bit rich and Alessandra had to help me finish it. The carnivore in me is truly ashamed.)

So the trip there wound up being a full 12 hours, with the taxi company suggesting we get to the airport by 12:30 for a 3:15 flight. While we waited, we all tried this Dutch beer (in Germany, go figure) called Grolsch at the airport café. I didn't get a picture but it was really good! The plane ride was fine, a bit bumpy, followed by a - surprise surprise - one hour bus trip actually into Milan, then a train ride from Milan to Florence.

This was where the drama got going. I accidentally bought the last second-class ticket to Florence through the kiosk, which wouldn't accept my own credit card so I had to use the emergency Parental Fund (I later realized that I'd put my own card in upside down). Meanwhile, the other three girls ran through the line and got their - wait for it - first class tickets. We got to the train and I somehow, again accidentally, seated myself into what I think was possibly business class - there were business men in front of me and we got served by the trolley, but I was scared to ask for anything in case they asked for my ticket, realized I was in the wrong place, and kicked me off the train or something. I was fine though, I studied up in my (well, Katie's) Italiano phrasebook and read the tour book on Lucca; we all met up in Florence and apparently Emma had combed (almost) the entire train twice looking for me, oops. 

Somewhere in the shuffle of reintegrating me to the group, we missed the connecting train from Milan to Lucca. Well, I say "somehow" but mean "because we were looking at the Arrivals board instead of the Departures board." Oops. 

An hour or so after finally landing seats to our goal city, we made it to the wall of Lucca; an hour or so after that, we'd meandered through the inner streets, meowed and awwed at wayfaring cats, and finally found our B&B - with a very tired-looking man, Marco, at the front desk. He got us situated, we decided against trying to find the late-night gorgonzola/pear mac & cheese spot, I realized I'd left my contact case in Well, and (after I fashioned a poor woman's contact case with some plastic cups and a book) all crashed into bed.

The next morning arrived with what will probably be the most splendid breakfast I'll ever have, prepared and served inexhaustibly by Marco's mother, the owner of La Torre. We were all stuffed by the end, but she kept trying to feed us pastries, nuts, eggs, coffee, anything, and by the second morning we were all instructed to call her Nona, so I'm pretty sure she liked us.

Filled to the brim with coffee, blood orange juice, and food, we struck out into the city, Alessandra leading the way (as the return visitor and as the only one of us who speaks Italian). Our first stop: the top of Guinigi Tower, known for its rooftop oak tree garden and view of the city.

Lucca!

The store downstairs was filled with beautiful home-spun items like bags, scarves, hanging lights, and covered journals. Emma bought one of the journals and I had my eye on a gorgeous purple and white bag, but as it was €32 I contented myself with waiting on it and petting the shop owner's collie.

She was such a sweetie and even posed for us later

We kept on going, walking along the wall until a photo op by one of the churches (which we later went into, I to a special section with the Sleeping Beauty tomb).

We just kept trading cameras around for pictures, it was really silly

 We wandered around the city for the next 5 hours - the great thing about Lucca's city structure is that if you keep walking long enough, eventually you will hit the wall. If you wanted to not get to the wall, just bang a Uie (how do you even spell that? Youie? Uey?) and keep walking until you find the shopping street. A few stores later, we stumbled onto an archaeological church - that is, a church that has been further excavated to reveal the previous 12 centuries of church structure on that exact spot. We were all geeking out about the old architecture and stonework, and even threw coins into the ancient baptismal bath for a wish.

 

It was freezing in the church, so we went back outside to explore one of the center squares (on the way I found a bead for my charm bracelet) and find lunch. Gino's Café, thankfully not just a café, suited us quite nicely with water, bread and olive oil, bruschetta, delicious local wine (nothing below 13.5% though, yowza), and our various plates of pasta. I don't honestly know what I ordered, but it sounded like "boar" and had parma ham so I got it. Good choice.

 

There wasn't actually any boar involved but my god was it good

I'm guessing that whatever sounded like "boar" actually meant "leek," but regardless of the ingredient list it was delicious.

After lunch was more wandering and generally being in love with the city, including a stop at a ridiculously cute café/bar (apparently it was also gender-segregated, considering how the local boys kept walking straight past the counter ladies and us with the pastries and coffees to the dark back section with male bartenders and alcohol and whatnot). It took a few tries to get to the Anfiteatro (the old amphitheatre), but eventually we made it there, shopped around in the center (I almost had a gorgeous pair of €10 blue heels, they even fit my wide toebox, but the shoe was too long!), shopped around on the main street (including at the United Colors of Benneton outlet, what in the world it was doing in Lucca I don't know but Emma got great shoes there), and eventually went into a 70% off store that we'd seen earlier but had agreed that "it's probably 70% off for a reason, etc etc."

Well, that reason is apparently "because it's a lot of really cute clothes in the same color sets and we had too many at the other store so here they are, go for it!"

And oh, did we go for it.

 We all tried on at least one dress (the same dress...), but looked around for the better part of 30 minutes. Well, I tried on about seven dresses, a sweater while I was waiting in the sleeveless dress for one of the three changing rooms that we four were all using simultaneously, and a grey peasant blouse. Let's just say that the peasant blouse was a unanimous winner, the responses were embarrassingly nice, and it was also 70% off of €24.90 (or €29.40) down to €8.something. Um, yes please. The sweater I'd grabbed off the shelf to cover my shoulders was also a winner - beautiful light green color, very soft, gorgeous cut, and around €10. All in all, I'd call it a good buy.

We dropped off our bags back in the B&B, hunted down the restaurant I'd read about only to find that it was full, then went down the street to another place we'd seen. This wonderful little restaurant satisfied my boar craving, then (after we accidentally stayed past closing time and grazie'd our way out) we played Follow The Local Youths Because They Probably Know Where The Demographically-Correct Bar Is to a crowded little spot a few blocks from our B&B. I had my first whiskey sour that night; don't let the short glass trick you, those bad boys are fierce. We were all only planning on one drink, but the bartender - who must've taken a liking to at least one of us, we're pretty sure Mollie - brought us whiskey shots on the house and insisted we try them. When in Lucca...

Actually, they weren't harsh at all - not to mention, those sugar-covered orange slices were tasty!

 The next morning was not as much fun, as we only had time for a short breakfast before racing off to catch a train to Firenze. We got a bit turned around and it was snowing when we got there, but all things considered it wasn't a complete wash of a morning. We dumped our bags at the station bag check and bustled off into the wind to see what we could in the four short hours before our next train.

Turns out, we could see a lot.

The Duomo

Chocolate bears (and pipes, and wrenches) at what was possibly a chocolate festival

Ferocity at the Accademia Gallery

In front of the Ponte Vecchio: Mollie, Me, Alessandra, and Emma

Right after we took this, I noticed from afar a beautiful red and grey scarf at a street cart- I actually went with its tan/neutral twin - and later Alessandra and I each found a charm in the bridge jewelry shops.

And of course, despite the weather: GELATO!

Strawberry and blackberry, mmm!

This was followed by a cup of tea that at least kept me going until the train station. Again, we were split up, but in 2-1-1 this time instead of 3-1, and we'd actually bought specific cars and seats this time so it wasn't really an issue, just funny. We landed in about two feet of snow in Bologna, at which point we had about three hours to wait for our plane - a good three hours to have, considering how my boarding pass had somehow shuffled itself to the bottom of my bag and I had the distinct honor of unpacking my weekend in public to find it. 

After a bizarre airport dinner and some truly grating gate switches, we waited around for twenty minutes in line, then huddled in a bus, for the shuttle to literally go in a circle around the airplane to drop us off.

Seriously. We waited. For the better part of half an hour, we waited. On an outdoor staircase. Within meters of our plane. To go into a shuttle. TO GO IN A CIRCLE AROUND SAID PROXIMAL PLANE.

Italy, WHAT

The plane ride itself was fine; we had extra space, so I actually got some homework/napping done (woohoo!) before we got home around 11; good thing, too, because I went upstairs shortly after getting home to hear about the Budapest group's and Najah's Paris experiences around Europe. 

AS FOR THIS WEEK

it's been a lot of shopping, but I'm home for the weekend so it works out.

I went grocery shopping on Monday (then again today for things I forgot), got presents for an early birthday package for Alyssa (she's in Venice this weekend, turning 20 on Sunday!), and got some last-minute things for my Secret Valentine. 

Tuesday, Valentine's Day, marks Vallie's 18th birthday and what was possibly the least socially engaged V-Day ever. It was awesome. V-Night, on the other hand, consisted of 15 girls (and Chris B) watching Titanic with a huge pile of Rolos, eventually whittling down to Emma, Alyssa, Val, and I watching to the end. Emma and Alyssa had been sobbing for the better part of the second half, but I didn't snap until Rose died and then...

"She met him at the clock! Everyone's applauding their love!"

 Happy Valentine's Day, ladies and gentlemen.

 

The big Secret Valentine reveal was on Wednesday: we all sat in Sophie's for an hour or so, watching performances and having our names called out to deliver our valentine gifts by hand to whoever we'd pulled. I'd actually been working on mine for a good four days, leaving "postcards" - printed-out pictures glued to cardboard with a little poem on the back - with a chocolate or something in her mailbox. The big package on Wednesday was a set of "tattoo" glitter body pens (thank you EUOR) and chocolate bottle-opener (yes, you read that right) from Florence, but the piece de resistance was a blue paper accordion calendar that I had to give late because it wouldn't fold together in the five minutes I had between class and the party.

My secret valentine had put a letter covered in hearts with a hand-drawn bear saying "Have a blast!" - so I was pretty sure whoever'd gotten me was a girl. Actually, it was Bryan from next door, known since Prague as Big Papa or Dad, who brought over - in front of everyone - a Targé bag filled with Cheetos (god knows when those got to Europe), Chokotoffs (my third bag since getting here!), a Milka bar, and mints from our favorite restaurant in Prague. He even signed the card "From Dad" and drew a dog and bear on the front - what detail!

American Night was Carnaval-themed this week (meaning come in a costume and the best one wins drinks and a crown); I got there late, as our ethics professor sprung a four-page paper on us on Tuesday, due Thursday, but went as "Partly Sunny With A Chance Of Rain." I didn't take a picture - my makeup was so not up to par - but it involved my gold shoes, grey dress, and quite a bit of eyeshadow. I'll do it again someday though, so pictures will come.

We're all preparing for Carneval, so I have a cardboard waffle mostly cut out for my Belgium costume - it'll be done by Sunday - and the stores are closing down for the weekend. Alessandra, Emily, Lane and I were planning on going into Dusseldorf today to go shopping, but all three of them woke up still feeling pretty sick so we nixed the "Go Out and Spend Lots of Money!" plan for the unanimously loved "Sleep Four More Hours, Walk Around Well, Eat Inexpensive Food" option.

Today has been a lot of PJ time, let's just say that. I just had my first Well pizza and it was not bad at all; there were definitely some unfamiliar flavors involved but it was overall perfectly adequate. Currently I'm debating between staying in or going out, but I finally found a Gilmore Girls link that (kind of) works (when it wants to) and I think it's raining outside, so there's that.

Hopefully my next post won't be so epic! Phew, that was a lot. Brownie points if you got this far.

- That kid who buys too much and writes even more a.k.a. Bekka