Looking out the window...

Updated: I had been hosting my template pictures on a different server and they were NOT loading quickly so I am not hosting them elsewhere so hopefully everything will work properly now.

I've been running around since being back like a chicken with it's head cut off and because of that I've barely posted anything about my trip and even less about what I've been doing for almost a month. So I'm going to quickly recap on what's been going on:

Saturday June 11th: Tom, Sean and I went to North by Northeast to see Peter Katz. I had never seen him before but he is absolutely riveting in concert. He has fantastic stage presence!!! It was a great show, and thankfully airconditioned because it was SO hot outside!! I almost fell asleep driving home because the highway was stopped due to an accident.

Sunday June 12th: Discovered that I was a good poker player while playing with Sean, Julie, Dave, Tom, Jaime and Cassy (with help for Jaime and Cassy by Mike and Brian)

Monday June 13th: Had some yummy ice cream with Em and Ryan

Wednesday June 15th: Went with Em to watch "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" and while I'll deny it if you ask me, I actually enjoyed it. Very chick-flicky but it had something about the closeness of friends that mattered.

Friday June 17th: My Grandma's birthday but also Jen and Matt's wedding at Casa Loma. It was a beautiful venue and Jen looked incredible as did Karen. Karen was my best friend growing up but she has moved away FOREVER ago and while we have kept in touch it has been 6 years since we last saw each other. We danced and drank a lot and all around I had an absolutely fantastic time!

Family Portrait

Karen and I

Jen and Matt's first dance

For more pictures please check out the online album

Saturday June 18th: My Dad left for a 24 hour mountin bike ride early in the morning so it was just my Mom and I all day. We spent time together doing errands including an excrutiating trip to the garden centre where it took my Mom AGES to pick what she wanted! Then that night I had some people over (At some point or the whole night: Dave, Cassy, Tom, Sean, Richard, Jaime, Em, Sarah, Carmen, Mel and Mike [who only stopped by for a few because everyone had left]) The weather was a lot cooler than it has been up until then but the pool was hot so we spent a bunch of time in there playing games *hehe* Oh and Tom dyed his hair BRIGHT red which looked very cool but kind of scary :)

Tom dyed his hair

Sunday June 19th: Father's Day! Since my Dad wasn't home until early afternoon because of his race it was just my Mom and I for most of the day. My Mom and I went to the hospital (as we do every day and two or three times on weekends) to see Grandpa and wish him a Happy Father's Day. For my Dad we (I thought of, found and bought them) gave him tickets for the Santana concert which was last Friday. He was very please with that which I hoped he would be.

Monday June 20th: CASSY'S BIRTHDAY! Cassy turned 19 so we all went out to the bar (including at some point if not the whole time: Tom, Sean, Dave, Cassy, Em, Richard, Tara, Jaime, Sarah, Mike and Heather) It was a good night, and while I had nothing to drink and went home early it was great to catch up with everyone. And at the end of the night all my boys kissed my cheek in the same spot making it warm and slobbery *eww* which theoretically means they each kissed the saliva of the person before them.

Wednesday June 22nd: Work was horrible so I called K when I got home to see if she wanted to meet up for dinner. She did so I trained it into Toronto and we walked to East Side Marios *YUM!* Em joined us about an hour later and by the time we all left we were all stuffed but had a great time catching up.

Friday June 24th: Since it was Carmen's birthday the next day and she would be busy we spent Friday at Sharkey's celebrating her turning 20.

Saturday June 25th: Busy busy hot day! First on the agenda was visiting Grandpa in the morning then straight from there we went into Scarborough for my (Great) Aunt Mary and Uncle Herb's 60th wedding anniversary. My Aunt Mary is 86 and my Grandma's sister, her husband, my Uncle Herb is 96 and his health is not that great. It was strange being there without my Grandma, some people asked where she was and others offered their condolences, but it was good to see Hannah and Sarah. Sarah is as cute as ever and smiles at everything. It was good to see my Aunt and Uncle as well since we don't know how much longer they will be around. It was boiling hot in the church that the party was held in since it was so hot outside.

(Great) Aunt Mary and Uncle Herb at their 60th Wedding Anniversary

If you would like to see more pictures please look in my online album here.

After we got back and had some dinner my parents went out to a surprise party for some of their friends and I went out with Mike to see Batman which was a FANTASTIC movie and definately worth seeing!! After that we went to visit some of friends in Toronto who ended up having a party at their house (much to our surprise) when we got there and we stayed up until 4am then crashed on couches for the night. Buuutt I couldn't sleep so just after 5am we drove back home. I didn't know that it would be light out at that time of the morning, but it sure was. And even stranger was walking in my front door at 6am bringing the paper from the front porch.

Sunday June 26th: Finally a day of relaxation!!

Tomorrow my Mom, Uncle Brian, his girlfriend Joanne and I are going to see a play, Anne of Green Gables, at Stage West. My Uncle gave the tickets to my Mom for her birthday back in March but Joanne had to have radiation and was too sick to go back then so we are going now.

Then on Thursday I am getting my hair cut, it grew so much while I was away and the length is really bothering me. I used to always have long hair but for the past year and a half I have loved my shorter hair and now miss it!! So hopefully that will look good!

And this past weekend, in our garden, my Mom found DUCK EGGS! Yes, that's right, 3 duck eggs. We have seen ducks swimming in our pool so I guess on one of their trips they left some eggs behind in the garden. Unfortuantely we don't think the Mamma Duck will be back because we haven't seen her in a few days and the eggs can't be alone that long. We don't want to touch them though, just in case.

Duck Eggs

Closeup of Duck Eggs

As I was getting in the pool after work today I looked in the skimmer to make sure that our chipmunk friend wasn't in there since he almost fell in yesterday and instead found two dead birds (very young ones). I didn't go in the pool.

Before I end this, here are some of the strange people have found my site while searching:
"pictures of my trip" naked sex (Yahoo)
GRANDPA'S having sex with nieces. com in bed (Google)
pictures+of+melted+skulls (Yahoo)

Labels: Emily, Family, Friends, Mike, Pictures, Recaps

Suddenly I felt Lija sit straight up in bed, I could feel the urgency in her movement.

"What time is it?!" she asked me with panic in her voice.

"I don't know!" I rolled over to go back to sleep.

"I think we slept through the alarm"

I looked at my watch, "SHIT... shit... shit... it's 7:43!" We had to be at the bus by 7:45 and it was to leave at 8:00. We both jump out of bed and mindlessly throw on our clothing, stuffing out pjs in our thankfully packed packs. "Shit.. shit.. shit!"

We ran out the door by 7:48 and started our penguin run to the meeting spot, "shit... shit... shit!" As we waddled closer we could see a herd of people in front of the hostel still waiting. I slowed down and tried to catch my breath, when Lija caught up I raised a shaky hand to point and say, "they *gasp* are still *gasp* there!" We slowly walked towards the bus our hearts racing. We quickly explained to everyone our disheveled appearance while we waited for the bus. Five minutes later the bus still hadn't showed up, but the busabout guide came out to tell us that there was a little delay and it was on it's way. Fine. Fifteen minutes after that still no bus and I'm thinking "So.. I could have showered!??" Finally, twenty five minutes late we get ushered into the bus, the explanation for the delay? None.

Lija and I never really woke up that morning, I didn't have a shower, which I had badly needed, and we were in such a rush we didn't get a chance to relax before hoping on the bus. The drive to Berlin was long yet uneventful. We didn't have any pickup/drop offs and there was nothing really along the way planned except truck stops, so it was rather boring and I got a lot of reading done. We got into Berlin about 30 minutes late and had to go through this big check in talk at the hostel. They told us that the next day (we arrived on a Sunday) was a bank holiday, so upon paying (the full amount in cash since the promised credit card machine wasn't set up yet) I asked if there would be somewhere I could exchange travellers cheques the next day. They assured me that there would be somewhere, and if I had any problems finding somewhere they would point me in the right direction. I smiled, thanked them and paid my whole amount then ran upstairs to our room so I could quickly jump in the shower.

The hostel was fantastic, brand new and clean! It had only been open for a month and a half when we got there and besides being up to date it was also spacious which allowed some privacy regardless of the dorm room conditions. I wanted more than anything a shower, nice hot water warming me up, cleaning me up, and waking me up. I ran down to the shower, jumped in and was surprised to see no divider between where my clothes went and where the water would hit. Oh well, I wasn't putting those clothes back on anyways. That was just the first issue with the shower, not that there were many, but it was hardly a relaxing experience. The showers had a timer on them so the water would only come out for 30 seconds before you had to push the knob in again. This meant that it took two pushes to get my hair wet and about 15 to get the soap out. It was incredibly annoying and the last thing I needed that night. Nonetheless I was in a rush, we had to meet downstairs for our pub crawl very shortly and I didn't want to be late for any free drinks they might have been handing out before hand.

When we got to the magic meeting spot there were two guys holding bottles of alcohol pouring them into plastic cups and handing them out. We of course grabbed one and drank it down, I discovered that I don't like prune schnapps. Our pub crawl entailed a lot of drinking, as you would expect at a pub crawl I suppose. We drank for about 15 minutes on the street waiting for everyone to show up before heading to our first bar, considering it was a Sunday night I was wondering where all they would take us and how busy these places would be.

The first place was rather small, we filled the bar so luckily there weren't many customers already in there. I didn't much like that place, the atmosphere was very rich and we were just looking to have a good time without the snootiness that richness brings. At each bar we went to we were given a shot, so I didn't purchase anything right off the bat, I was on a rather tight budget and planned on drinking as much between bars as I could so that I wouldn't have to spend a lot of money. It was at the first bar that our guides made us play an introductory game with one another, I hate those games because they usually involve memory (and at this point I had already had 3 drinks) but this one was just a silly game in which you said your name, where you were from and which celebrity you would like to sleep with. I picked Chad Michael Murray.

We had two Canadian girls with us (Miranda and Celeste), we had met them on the bus and then they happened to be in the same room as us at the hostel, so I was instantly drawn to them, at this point we had been travelling for a week and I had yet to meet anyone that wasn't Australian.

At the second bar, which was just two doors down from the first, the atmosphere was a lot friendlier. We felt as though we could be loud and have fun, there was youthful music playing and beers being served. I bought a beer and accompanying it was another free shot. Generally I go with the "Beer before liqueur never been sicker, liqueur before beer and you're in the clear" saying but this night I just didn't care. Lija mixed her shot with her drink, it was pineapple with vodka I believe so it was just a lot more vodka than anticipated.

I should probably just sum the night up, it involved a lot of drinking and included Lija and I taking a picture of ourselves in the most disgusting bathroom at one of the bars. At the end of the night I remember walking to Mick's hotel where three of us got our pictures taken, but I don't remember walking from his hotel to our hostel through any of the many secure doors with swipe card access, nor do I remember changing into my pajamas but I do remember changing the batteries in my MP3 player.

I woke up the next morning in my sleep sheet on the mattress because I hadn't made my bed the night before, and my hair a mess because not only did I sleep intoxicated but it had rained while we were out bar hopping. Despite the late night, we woke up rather early, it wasn't as early as we had been getting up previously, but it was still pretty good considering how we were feeling. Lija hadn't drank very much the night before, so she was up at the crack of a god-forsaken hour doing her laundry. When I woke up I was planning on doing the same, but the way it worked at the hostel was you paid them and they did it for you, wash and dry. Fantastic! Well, no. I didn't want a large majority of my clothing to go in the dryer, and since I couldn't stipulate which clothes were and were not to go in I decided against using their service.

We had decided the day before to do a walking tour through Berlin which took place in the afternoon, so while everyone else in our room was still asleep, Steph, Lija and I took off into the city to visit Checkpoint Charlie. On our way we searched for a cash converters, we found about six, none of them were open, they lied to me, I had exactly 26.15 euros in my wallet and a full day to go, Lija said she would lend me money but I was determined to somehow make it work.

The walk to Checkpoint Charlie was kind of long (for anyone familiar with Berlin our hostel was right by the TV Tower) but very nice, the weather was perfect, not too hot yet not cold with a nice breeze. We stopped to get some breakfast first off, I got a .99 euro cent croissant and about an hour later when I was dizzy from dehydration an iced tea. Everyone else had these delicious looking baked goods with cappuccino and orange juice, but I was happy with my cheap selection. Checkpoint Charlie is said to make people step back and say "Wow" and while I did find it very interesting it also had a very museum-ey feel so you didn't quite get the suffering that these people were going through. For anyone who isn't aware, Checkpoint Charlie was one of three gates in the Berlin wall (which was erected in 1961 to separate East and West Germany) named with the NATO phonetic alphabet. Checkpoint Alpha was situated at Helmstedt which is the autoban checkpoint passing from West Germany to East Germany. Checkpoint Bravo was at Dreilinden where the motor vehicles left East Germany and entered West Germany. And Checkpoint Charlie which for residents meant separation but also for Easterners freedom. It was through Checkpoint Charlie that many tried to escape, some were successful but many not. Inside the museum they show different ways that people tried to escape, inside guitar amps, under trunk covers, everything really.

On either side of the street just outside the entrance to Checkpoint Charlie is an art installment of crosses. There are rows upon rows of these crosses all reaching over 6 feet tall and adorned to them a little sign with a name and how that person passed away while trying to escape. I found that with things marking situations like this you need to almost block out emotions or else they will overwhelm you.

After Checkpoint Charlie we walked back to the hostel, Lija and Steph got lunch but my budget just didn't allow for it. The walk covered pretty much everything there was to see in Berlin, it was 4 and a 1/2 hours long so we hiked a good distance. Half way through I had to get some food because I was a little dizzy and still had a lot more walking to go. We passed all the historic landmarks, the buildings, and monuments that make Berlin's history. We were told that all the black we could see on the buildings was caused not from pollution, but from nearby explosions during the war. A very disappointing thing about Berlin is that while authentic looking, many of the buildings had to be recreated after being blown up.

We walked past the Berlin wall, there is so little of it left yet it had such an impact on the lives of thousands of people. I don't know if there is anything you can say about the Berlin wall besides historical facts, which you can find online easily. The main emotion you feel when looking at the wall is anger. Anger that this could have happened and that people let it happen. Anger that so many people died trying to escape, anger that it is even part of their history. Now the wall is just this small piece of concrete covered in spray paint and exposed metal.

On the walk we went by where Hitler killed himself. He had a lair underground which he lived in and it is where him and his wife died. The spot is now a parking lot, they try not to advertise it because they don't want scary people coming and doing bad things. We went past another tribute this one for those who were killed in and those who survived the Holocaust. Past the Brandenburg gate and to the Parliament building.

It was already dinner time by the time we finished the tour, so after getting back to the hostel we went to a restaurant in the "square" near by. We went to this large restaurant that doubled in size by it's outdoor patio, it was full so we were lucky to get a table for all 13 of us.

We realized that with such a large crowd expecting fast service was asking too much, however we did expect some service. After being seated (we asked if they would rather us split into smaller tables but they said no) we waited about 20 minutes before our drinks orders were taken, which was still fine, we saw that it was busy and understood the delay. When we had eventually ordered our food we figured it would take longer than normal but not too long. We waited 50 minutes for the fist batch of food to come out, but the other 6 never came. Never. After everyone had finished and it was 2 hours since we had been there we finally got a manager out since the waitress didn't seem to understand the problem (again, the language barrier was something that we expected). The manager told us, too bad that they still had to pay for their drinks but the food had never been imputed into the system. If they wanted to wait another 40 minutes for meals to be re-ordered they could, but there wouldn't be any sort of discount nor apology. We were absolutely floored by the lack of service. Those who had not eaten (Lija was included in this group) decided that they would rather leave and got food at a local Thai restaurant. This was our first meal in Germany, and we were very disappointed.

Those of us who had eaten went back to the hostel bar to hang out, we played some Euchre (my team won.. I think..) But mostly chatted.

The next day the first thing I did was exchange money, I had somehow managed to live off my 26.15 Euros for the Monday but needed more for the Tuesday. Also, we had to exchange money into Czech as the next day we left for Prague.

We had decided to go to the outskirts of town to Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace) which was supposed to be incredible. It was just a big house and to be honest, it wasn't that great. We were really disappointed, especially since you weren't even allowed to enter without a paid guide and the gardens were closed because of rain. We didn't stick around long because of the above.

It took about 35 minutes to get to the palace via public transportation and our tickets were only good for 90 minutes so we really had to hurry to get back without having to purchase anything else (which we didn't want to do). My feet were absolutely killing me, I realized while walking around that they had zero insole left and no support, they were so painful that it felt as though my feet were bleeding. Nonetheless we still walked a ways from the train station to the Jewish Museum. It was very big, and because of my pain I am sure I wasn't attentive enough. One of the girls ended up spending like 4 hours there, we spent around 1.5. They had pictures on the walls with stories under them about the people, how they lived and often how they died. It was very sad to read some of the stories, especially those about children.

On the way to the museum we had stopped and gotten some food as well as picked up some shopping items, which for myself was a new pair of insoles. The second I got back to the hostel, and I mean the second, I cut them to fit my shoes... *ahh heaven*. Okay so my feet were still sore from everything else I had been doing but it was a large improvement.

We decided to avoid going to a restaurant for dinner that night, it had gone so poorly the night before that Lija and I just went to the Thai place she had been to already and got some dinner. After, we did as we usually did, and went back to the hostel for some drinks in their bar.

Berlin was by far one of my favourite cities, while there it was my favourite but that was only the start of the trip, things would change but Berlin would always be special to me. Berlin is so clean, while it is a big city you would almost be able to eat off the sidewalk. The streets are wide, so you don't feel cluttered and there are trees everywhere. It is definitely a place I would recommend for someone to visit. Once you get over the shortness that many German people have you can live to love it, they are very abrupt but very intelligent.

Pictures so far

Today would have been my Grandma's 82nd birthday, she loved birthdays. When I was little she would always want to be one of the first people to wish me a happy birthday so she would drive down from Toronto for lunch with her friend Cora. We would have sandwiches with coldcuts and potato salad and she would always bring me my gift with a card. She always made sure to point out that I wouldn't be getting anything when she came with the rest of the family, that this was my gift, yet she would always bring something. For her birthday we would always take her out for dinner, or if it was on a weekend for lunch. Her favourite was St. Hubert but she also liked Swiss Chalet and well, anywhere else really. I gave her a broach almost every year either for her birthday or Christmas and we usually gave her tickets for some show, usually a musical. I remember one year we gave her tickets for the Lion King, she loved it, and so did I.

There are very few times that I am still sad about my Grandma passing, I think I have accepted her death and know that she is in a better place, wherever that better place may be. The only times I get really sad are those times when I think I have forgotten her, then I realize that I think about her in everything I do, that I have many of her characteristics and that she will never be forgotten because she is part of my heart and soul.

So, Grandma, Happy Birthday, I hope that wherever you are that you are happy. I love you.

June 17, 1923 - December 13, 2004

[Side note: I typed up the entire post on Berlin yesterday and my computer crashed and I lost it, so I'm kind of annoyed right now and will type it on Monday, they take so long to do and I don't know if anyone cares to read them, but it helps me remember when I write them so hopefully at least one person enjoys it :)]

Labels: Death, Family

We didn't have time to get breakfast before catching our bus in the morning, so every time we drove past a fruit stand or bakery, our mouths were watering. Lija and I had run for our bus, we weren't late but we didn't want to miss it, this was our first day after all. The bus wasn't there when we got there, but there was a huge crowd of people with packs on so we figured we were in the right spot. This girl in a busabout shirt told us that the bus would be picking us up down a bit further so we waddled down to where she pointed to wait. When the bus pulled up it was rather unimpressive, big and white but nothing like they had raved it would be, they advertise that you can see their buses from miles away. When we were on board, Jules explained that we were on an old bus and that the new bus would meet us in Berlin but wasn't ready yet.

Jules was nice. It was his first time doing a trip on the bus and he had the bluest eyes. With Busabout it isn't a tour company but there are on board tour guides, they tell you a bit of information as you pull into a city but the main purpose of the bus is to be a transportation network, like Eurail. The drop-off/pick-up between Paris and Amsterdam is Brugge, Belgium, we got off for about 45 minutes and fell in love. It's the most adorable little medieval town with cobblestone streets and big churches. It was an incredible place to see, and would have been a great place to spend some time. People talked about going out to WW1 battlefields and the amazing effect it had on them, just seeing how many people had died in such a small confined area and being shocked at how many of those were Australians (most of them were Aussies on the trip) and Canadians. On our way back to the bus we stopped in a little chocolate shop and got the most delicious truffles... they. made. me. drool!

The drive to Amsterdam was rather uneventful. We watched a movie, and had a bunch of rest stops, upon entering Holland we saw a bunch of windmills in the distance and a ton of cows, but it was just a drive. We didn't know anyone on the bus yet so we didn't have anyone to laugh with, we just chatted with each other and I wrote in my journal. Jules had informed us that the area our accommodation was in was a bit "sketchy" (it was located in the heart of the red light district) so we checked into a recommended hostel with everyone else and went on a mission to find an authentic coffeehouse. I don't think we looked for five minutes before we saw 15, but we picked one (just because it was there) and walked down the rickety staircase to the basement lair. You could see the smoke sitting heaving along the ceiling, and the guy behind the bar was openly smoking a joint. The boys bought a big bag and sat down to roll, I had my first authentic Dutch beer (Heineken!) and we sat back to relax. The atmosphere down there was strange, I don't know that I would want to go in alone, yet it didn't feel dangerous. It was dark because it was underground and the happenings were of the darkened room nature. You could buy all sorts of grown drugs from the bar, but they don't sell anything that isn't natural, that stuff isn't legal (although very easy to get from one of the many pushy drug dealers you walk past on the streets).

After we left the coffeehouse we had to find somewhere to sleep on our last night in Amsterdam. The place we were checked into only had room for us the first two nights, then they were kicking us out on our butts and I was not about to sleep on an Amsterdam street corner. We went everywhere, and I mean everywhere in that area to find somewhere to stay and every. single. place. told us that we couldn't book for one night on weekends they only accepted two or more nights. We were cursing our current accommodation because they would have known that we wouldn't be able to get somewhere but didn't recommend that we only book one night with them so that we could get in elsewhere for the other two. We finally found one place willing to give us a bed, we had to pay way more than we had wanted, but it was clean (hopefully) and available (thankfully). It happened to be at a gay hotel, which didn't bother us, but when we made our booking they awkwardly informed us expecting, I believe, that we would back out and run scared down the street. We didn't care, although we were a bit offended that we couldn't pass as a lesbian couple... I mean I know we aren't, but why couldn't we be! Apparently gaydar is better than we expected.

The actual search for somewhere to stay took literal hours, about 3.5 maybe 4 hours. By the time we were done it was almost dark and we were hungry. With limited options of things that could get us food fast we chose Burger King, a huge mistake. It was our first fast food on the trip thus far and it tasted terrible. We ate about half each and even that was too much. The cool thing about the Burger King in Amsterdam however was that the garbage cans had a spot where you pour out your drink before throwing the cup away, it was really cool, and a pretty good idea if you think about it. Another cool thing in Amsterdam were their garbage/cigarette butt can cleaners. The big truck would drive down the street and one guy would be walking beside it leading this huge Snuffleupagus hose which he would proceed to put into each can and suck out the trash/cigarette butts! It was really cool and kept the garbage stink to a minimum... the canals still smell... but the cans were good :)

After dinner we walked around a little bit, but being two girls in a strange city at night was slightly frightening. The thing about Amsterdam, as most people know and as I have already somewhat mentioned, is that smoking grown substances is completely normal regardless of where you are, as is prostitution. When tourists come to Amsterdam they get high, drunk and cat call women, it's quite demeaning, you don't even have to be in the red light district for it to happen. It is a scary place to walk around at night, besides the cat calling there are also the locals standing on street corners selling illegal drugs and they have no problem coming up to you telling you what they are doing. It'd intimidating. So because we were chicken... and it was quite late, around 11:00, we headed back to the hostel bar and met up with some people there for a couple of drinks.

The next morning, after "sleeping" through a night of people screaming in the halls and outside the bedroom window, we made plans to go on the infamous Mike's Bike Tour. But that didn't start until later in the day and it was only just morning so we walked over to the "museum area" where you can find the Rijksmuseum (pronounced Rykes-museum) and the Van Gogh Museum, while the Rijks is architecturally an amazing building and is world renowned for it's exhibits, it's currently under construction and a lot of it is closed right now, so leaning more towards my interests we went to the Van Gogh museum.

It was this modern building with a rather open concept and a staircase right up the middle. Only two and a half floors were of Van Gogh, the rest were of people who influenced him, which was alright, but I had wanted to specifically see him! I saw some of my favourite Van Gogh paintings which was great, but some of the ones I was interested in were not there. We only had about two hours in the museum, which ended up being more than enough time since we really only intently stared at two and a half floors, and spent about 20 minutes in the gift store picking postcards. I got this set of four which I plan on framing and putting in a series in my bedroom next year. They aren't one of the official series but I liked the way they looked together, kind of haphazard yet flowing. I also got a postcard of his sunflower painting, which happens to be one of my favourite so that made me happy, I'll probably put that up somewhere too.

After the museum we had some time to wait around. As I was sitting on a bench waiting for Lija to get her ice cream this homeless man came up to me asking if I had any cigarettes, I didn't, but felt sad that even though he had no money for food he was still addicted to nicotine. The square between the two museums is amazing with trees and a big long man made fountain/pond. It's very clean looking and quite still, with a big edge to sit on. I was watching everyone around me, for a while there were these kids playing on the other side of the water, jumping up and down on a music maker and laughing. It doesn't matter where you go in the world, kids are the same.

Our bike tour took us through the city part of Amsterdam and into the country. We started by biking to Dam square which is physically and geographically the centre of Amsterdam. In the middle of the square is a big monument erected to honour Dutch soldiers who died in WW2, also in Dam Square you can find the Koninklijk Palace (Royal Palace) and Nieuwe Kerk (New Church). From there we made our way into the start of the red light district where the Old Church stands and has stood for many years. We continued along the canals stopping on bridges and street corners to learn about the city. The reason the canals are so dirty isn't pollution like you might think, no, it's from faeces, yes shit. All of the canals are filled with houseboats and before modern technology these unplumbed houseboats would flush their toilets right into the canal. Today, they still flush their toilets into the canal, but first everything is held in a tank which uses chemicals to clean it before emptying into the water. Regardless, I wouldn't be swimming in any of those canals.

We also learnt that the reason houses lean forward is because they are so narrow that in order to move furniture into them they were built with a big long rod a pulley sticking out of the roof, you attach your furniture to that and pull it up the front of the house into a window which is designed to pop out. The houses are titled forward so that if a couch or sofa or grand piano were to sway while lifting there would be less of a chance that it would hit the exterior of the building. Now the houses that are titled sideways are bad. That is because Amsterdam was built on stilts and some of the wood is rotting, so the houses are slowly leaning whichever way is worse. Eventually when a house gets too bad the government decides to evacuate and tears it down building a new one on metal stilts.

As we made our way into the country looming ahead of us was a big windmill. Yeah that's right, they really do have windmills in Holland and they are 100% functional! The people who live in them are paid by the government to keep them authentic looking and working, which is a nice little deal, except that you have tourists in front of your "house" all the time taking dorky pictures. At the end of the tour (which was really the middle because you still had to go back to the start) we reached a farm that specialized in cheese and clog making.. yes that's right, CLOG! We got to learn how they made both and at the end they had free samples (of the cheese not clogs). I bought some cheese for my Mom (goat) and some for myself (normal) and we were on our merry way, into the wind back to the start. It was painful and it took forever and we wanted to curl up and die! At the end of the tour it was already arranged that we go to this bar and have some drinks, I had one, but to be honest, was just ready for bed! But sleep was not the point of this trip, so after we had returned our bikes we went to get tickets for Boom! Chicago comedy show the next night and some dinner. They told us that the show was cheaper tonight, so we bought tickets for then deciding that we would just have to find something else to do our last night in Amsterdam. We grabbed some delicious Italian food for dinner, (I love Italian food!) and then walked around the red light district since the comedy show was late.

The red light district was absolutely appalling. There were all of these women in windows prostituting themselves, which was fine, if that's how you want to make money then it works, what was disgusting was the way the men outside the windows carried on. Yelling rude comments, not only to the window women, but also to any woman who happened to be on the street. Grabbing the butts of random people passing by and just demoralizing women in such a disgusting way. I wanted to leave about five minutes after we got there, but nobody else wanted to and I sure as hell wasn't making my way out of that place alone. As we walked by this open door a big burly man stepped to the side of us, "See the biggest dicks of your life" he promoted. I couldn't believe a place like this existed and was completely legal!

The comedy show was good after everything, they were a bunch of American's so at least it was in English, but it was improv and some of the audience's suggestions were less than stellar. Overall though I enjoyed the show so it was a good way to spend the night.

On our last day in Amsterdam we had already seen a lot of the city that we would normally walk around in while on bike so it was just a matter of seeing the remaining museums on our figurative list. We had heard from many people before us that the Anne Frank House gets a really long line up, so we went nice and early to avoid the rush. Even though we were there before the doors had opened the line was still wrapped around the corner but only took about 20 minutes once able to go inside. We weren't allowed to take pictures in there so explaining what I saw is going to be very difficult. Check out this website, it has a graphic reconstruction of the house. The rooms were just so small, you could barely turn in them and they didn't even have furniture, I can't imagine what it would be like with furniture and people. I suppose it would be better than a concentration camp, but just knowing that people had to live there as a better alternative was heart wrenching. I couldn't imagine being a young girl growing up like that.

I think we were all effected by what we had seen, after we left we just kind of wandered around for a bit thinking, not saying much. Lija and I decided to get some lunch after a while and the guy who was with us went back to the hostel. The afternoon held for us big plans, at least for me it did. We made our way towards the greatness that is the Heineken Brewery for our tour. Yes, we toured a brewery :) With the tour you get three drinks (if you don't drink alcohol then you can get orange soda but otherwise it's beer) and at the end a free gift, which is this really nice tin holding a Heineken beer glass. It was an awesome tour, very interactive and informative. It was interesting to learn that Heineken, in all it's splendour has only been operated by three people, all in the same family, of course.

After the tour we went back to our hotel, I was feeling great (but three beers in an hour will do that) but we didn't want to carry around our glasses all night. For our last night in Amsterdam Lija wanted some traditional food, we couldn't find any, so we had Italian again (yay!). It wasn't as good as the first place, but still very yummy. We didn't have anything to do for the night so we kind of wandered around hoping to bump into someone we knew, luckily we did and went to a bar with them on the other side of town. While sitting down in the bar, which was also a hostel upabove, this girl runs downstairs screaming to call an ambulance. One of the girls with us is a nurse but she was in the bathroom, so Lija ran and got her while Mick went upstairs to try and help the person who needed an ambulance. It turns out this girl had taken too many shrooms and was unconsious-not breathing (according to her friend.) When Mick came down he told the guy behind the bar that he could cancel the ambulance the girl was in face consious with her eyes open and hadn't stopped breathing at any point, she had just fallen off a chair. Crisis adverted... lesson learnt... DON'T DO SHROOMS!

Mick walked us back to our accomodation because we were near the red light district and he didn't want anything happening to us, he is a great guy and we found out that we would be traveling with him until Florence which was almost the end of our trip, so that made us happy. I slept like a rock that night, the hotel had a fabulous duvet comforter which I just melted into. So much nicer than hostel bunk.

Pictures so far

The pigeons were swarming the happy tourists as they gawked upwards at the mass that is Notre Dame. Little kids were throwing them croissant and chips as they progressed forwards menacingly. One dove towards my head and I ducked left and right just narrowly avoiding death by bird, I would later discover that this would be a common trend in my trip. We sat down on the edge of a statue platform, we weren't quite ready to move on, yet we knew there was only so long we could sit in one spot. We moved to the Archeological Crypt which contains remains of buildings dating back as far as pre-Roman times. We tried to be interested, I'm sure to some people it was a great museum-type-thing, but to us, it was just a lot of rocks and it smelt bad. We walked around there for a bit, taking advantage of our free admission then escaped pretending we had enjoyed ourselves.

We headed back to the hotel to rest our feet a little bit, then decided to see if the Opera was still open, it wasn't, but on our way up from the metro the woman ahead of me let the door slam in my face, as I was turning to Lija to say how rude the woman had been the door swung back the other way and went right over my big toe ripping off the nail. At first it was alright, it didn't hurt it just stung and it wasn't bleeding, I took a couple of steps and it started to bleed a little bit, then a couple more steps and the blood was oozing out into my sandal filling it up quickly. There weren't any washrooms so I could clean it off, and the first aid "kit" that I brought was back in the hotel... so I wrapped a kleenex around my toe and tied it on with a plastic bag handle, and I was ready to go. It still didn't hurt, only stung, and the kleenex, while tacky was working fine. [Eventually I fixed it up at the hotel with Polysporin and guaze]

I was getting hungry by that point, the only food I had eaten since landing in Paris was that crepe, so we wandered around the Latin Quarter looking for the best deal and ended up in this dodgy looking restaurant that had excellent food! Although it's debatable whether or not that chicken was actually chicken or if it was those pigeons that had pissed me off earlier. We had a 3 course meal, and French wine and when we came outside expected it to be night time. Apparently the sun doesn't set until 10:00 in Paris, so we were able to explore a lot more before calling it an early night.

Bright eyed we woke up the next morning, happy to still be alive after a night in our sketchy hotel room and were greeted (by going downstairs) with a complimentary breakfast -croissant, baguette and orange juice -served to us by a rude French woman. Lija had never been to Paris before, to me it was old news, but as every tourist must do at least once (in my case twice) we lined up for the Eiffel Tower. I remembered from last time how windy and cold it was up there, so I was prepared this time. The scenery hadn't changed since the last time I was up there, but it was nice to see Lija gape at the new. We got our picture taken, another tourist must, and checked out the gift shop before getting bored and heading back down. As we were walking under the tower I noticed these ropes dangling in front of me, the little voice inside my head said, "SWING ON IT!"... the voice of reason said, "Don't be an idiot! Look up." Hanging from the tower were these little firemen, they were climbing up and down practicing... COOL! I like firemen ;).

Following the loop that are tourist sites our next stop was the Arc de Triomphe. It was just after VE Day so they still had all of the flowers laid out. It made me think about all those that were being honored. Not just those who died at war but also those who came back, scarred by what they had seen, their lives were never the same again and neither were the lies of their families. I'm glad that "my generation" hasn't had a war, some may argue with me because of Iraq but as a youth in Canada, it hasn't become part of my life. I don't know anyone at war, I don't even know someone who knows someone at war, not a Canadian. Anyways, we decided not to go to the top of the Arch, a panoramic bird's eye view from the Eiffel Tower was enough. As we were walking back through the tunnel to the "right" side of the street (the arch is in the middle of a round about) some woman came up to us pointing to the ticket booth asking if we knew how to speak English. We assumed that she needed help in getting her ticket... wrong. As I pointed to the ticket booth as well she grabbed my finger and started tying strings around it, twisting them up. She then takes it off and ties it on my wrist before I can even pull my hand back. "Now you buy," she tells me... "No thank you." I respond. "Yes!" Clearly I wasn't getting through to this woman! "No, thank you." I reply once more. "Why not?!" Geez! "Well," I say, "I have no money." And just as fast as she tied it on she cut it off and gave us a nasty look. Serves her right.

Next we headed to the Louvre, finally. The trick to the Louvre is to go in through the underground and buy your tickets from one of the machines, then there is no line up... so we were cruising among some of arts greatest within minutes. We made a bee-line for the Mona Lisa, Lija isn't really into art so she didn't care to be there, but I wanted to see some of what I had learnt about up close. The size and magnitude of the works were enough to make me speechless... yes, ME SPEECHLESS!

We did see the Mona Lisa, and I will be honest, it wasn't that great. It's small and I didn't think her eyes followed me across the room. I was happy seeing the postcard that Mike sent me last year instead. I think Lija was a bit disappointed as well, I mean, this was the whole reason we had come here and the painting on the other side of the wall was just as if not more remarkable. We ended up spending a couple of hours in the museum, just looking around and checking things out. They say that you could spend a week in there, but I think your feet would get too sore :)

By this point Lija and I were dying, of hunger and foot pain. So we went and grabbed some crepes (with ice cream and nuts... not very lunchy) and sat for a while. While we were at our outside table this car was trying to park in a spot too small for them, so they hit the car in front and behind them until they moved enough that he could squeeze in, then he just left! I laughed, Lija was appalled. It was great. Energized and rested we headed to the Opera to look around then made it to Sacre Coure... only to find that it was at the top of a very big hill... we took pictures from below. We did go half way up the hill by the funicular to the "square on the hill" this adorable part of Paris that is old and secluded so it's quiet and peaceful. Up there we visited the Salvador Dali exhibit, spending more time in the gift shop than the museum. Reluctantly we went down to the bottom of the hill for dinner, everything up top was so expensive, we couldn't afford anything substantial. By the time dinner was done it was already dark so we went to see the Eiffel Tower lit up, then got scared of the creepy men and ran back (by metro) to the hotel for the night. In the morning we would get on our bus destined for Amsterdam, our journey would officially begin on Busabout.

Pictures up to now

As I hugged my Mom good bye it was all I could do to stop the tears from welling up in my eyes, "I am a big girl, big girls don't cry when saying good bye to their Mom!" It wasn't that I was worried about missing home, it was more the apprehension of leaving for a month to travel around unknown countries, the worry about running out of money, and the concern that I wouldn't be able to communicate with anyone all the while not having my parents to rely on. I've done this before, it wasn't as if it was the first time, but I have never been good at good byes.

As I wandered around the airport, trying to kill the remaining 2 hours of my 3 hour wait I found myself constantly taking out my phone to check the time, but my phone was off, solution: buy a watch. I can't believe I was planning on traveling around the world without a watch! My flight boarded on time, so that was already a good start, and the layover in Montreal wasn't that bad. I called my Mom from the airport and she was already telling me stuff about home that I had missed in the 5 hours since I'd been there. As we got the airplane for our final destination I noticed a nun seated two rows in front of me, I knew my plane wouldn't crash. I'm not a nervous flyer, but that was still nice to see.

The flight was long and filled with anticipation and apprehension as I wondered what Lija would be like, would she look the same? Would I recognize her? Would she recognize me? What if we had changed so much that we didn't get along? What if we ended up hating each other? Needless to say my concerns were unnecessary. Lija was exactly the same, except she had dyed her hair blonde so we didn't look very similar anymore. While we could still pass as sisters you had to ignore the haircolour and look at our faces. We had an awkward hug, I was wearing my pack with the day pack on the front. She looked well rested, I looked like shit, I had just flown all night and landed in Paris at 10am, she flew for 21 hours and slept for 11 just before landing in Paris.

We sweated our way to the hotel, carrying packs in the underground is not easy, in fact it's down right difficult. We checked into our hotels, showered, and made our way into the city by noon, destination: Louvre. Well newsflash travelers! The Louvre is actually closed on Tuesdays! So that deflated our big first day plan, we needed a new plan, fast. Lija insisted we look at a map, me, being the vetran Parisan that I am decided we should just wing it... well we made it to the other museum then ate a yummy crepe smothered with Nutella, yes, Nutella. Talk about ruining my French heritage! My Mom was shocked when I came home and told her about it, she said our ancestors are rolling over in their graves. Anyways, we decided that our big plans for the day should become visiting Notre Dame.

Last time I was in Paris I decided against going inside the church, there are a wide range of reasons. This time however, I felt I had something to prove to myself, and to other people in my life, plus, I was curious. I think I took 3 steps before I was completely won over. The light warmed me as it streamed through the windows in every colour imaginable while rays of sun danced around the floor. We sat down in the pews, just staring at what was around us, taking it in. Before I left I lit a candle and said a prayer. "I'm not a religious person, I don't go to church, but if you're listening please watch out for my family while I'm over here, and little Savannah, and please let my Grandma know I miss her."

When we stepped outside of the church we were met by overwhelming sunshine and we once more had to face reality of the world.