words, words, words

Holland: It’s all about bikes.

The past few days I’ve been in Holland. Amsterdam, Utrecht and Nijmegen (where I am staying). It has been very interesting. It is a country that seems much more civilized than anywhere else in the world I have been.

The bike laws are a good metaphor. There are thousands of bikes here, it is insane, everyone rides and apparently they have cars, too, but I haven’t seen them.

The laws for bicycles are very strict: special lanes, you must signal to turn, etc, but nobody wears a helmet. This is basically how things are here. They pass laws for the general good, viz. if the laws weren’t strict for bicycles there would be mayhem. But when it comes to the personal choice of weather or not to wear a helmet, you get to choose.

The food was invented on a dare. Today I had haring, which is herring, raw with onions. It was actually good, but it seems like stuff that they thought up one cold day when it was too windy to milk their cows. French Fries are cardiac arrest in wax paper to go. The actual fries themselves are normal, but the amount of mayonnaise that they put on them could kill a *INSERT FARM ANIMAL HERE*.

The People: are thin and tall. This, notwithstanding the food (see above) is no small accomplishment, probably related to the amount of bikes (also see above). They are kind of Viking-y looking. Lot of blue-eyed blondes in wool sweaters, all you have to do is add a helmet with horns.

The fact that they eat weird food, pass liberal laws and ride bikes everywhere aside

The people are really great. They are very helpful and kind. Not as much laughter and jaleo as in Spain, but you get the sense that the people here actually get things done. They obviously aren’t afraid to improvise with their laws and they have achieved good results in some cases. The Dutch aren’t late and they aren’t lazy.

I’ve been using the bell on the bicycle too much. Practicing my 20 words of Dutch. Much to the chagrin of the lovely Nederlanders that I’ve crossed (bike) paths with. Dutch is sort of like English with a mouthful of mayonnaise. Hello is Hallo. Goodbye is Doei. God knows why. Thank you very much is Dankyouwell, or something similar. Everyone speaks English. Which after Madrid, where NOBODY speaks English is a bit of shock. No more public-private conversations, you can’t bet on English-ignorance.

Zijn fiets daar. Means his bike is over there.

Tomorrow I go to Berlin.

Era una vez…

I think that the folers in my Yahoo account have become the bookends for epochs in my life.

A wandering glance reveals the passage of time.

I need a job. I just wasted a bunch of time at an attorney´s offce and they suggested I get married to get papers.

Needless to say, I don´t think I´m getting papers.

I am back in Madrid, looking for work.

So far the prospects are dim. I´m starting to feel a bit desperate.

I was planning on travelling around the Middle East but my bags were too heavy, it was too hot and I don´t want to get blown to bits or lynched becuase of my goverment´s rather sinister foreign policies.

Madrid.

The Pyramids, or “How I Survived the Baksheesh Boys”

I just went to the pyramids at Giza.

It was very impressive. They are bigger in real life than in pictures. This is unlike the Sphinx, which was a bit disappointing.

I filled three disks of pictures, which, as always, will be uploaded eventually…

Here is the deal. You arrive and then have to walk up a long road to the plateau.

It is here that the hustling starts. And these guys are professionals. They first con is to get you off the road in to the paddock with the camels and horses. They lure you by telling you first that it is the way to the pyramids and then change their tune to show you that is cheaper to take a camel than to pay the entry fee. Which is not true.

So then you pay your fee to get in, hopefully using a student id (we all need a con). Then you are in.

They are big and old.

Me at the Pyramid. (check out the camels)

Like a lot of things in the world, I suppose. But this site is the only of the 7 Ancient Wonders of the World (trademark), which you can visit.

The inside of them is surprisingly tiny. You would think in these enormous pyramids they would have good-sized passages but once you get in they are incredibly tight. Something I would not recommend with any with a propensity toward claustrophobia.

I was hanging out with an Ozzie who kept trying to climb the pyramids, which is illegal and he also had the bright idea to climb into the sarcophagous (sp?, yeah yeah) in the tomb.

Baksheesh is tipping. This is the way the Middle East works, everyone gets a tip.

Surrounding the pyramids, there are policemen that are supposed to guard both you and the pyramids. They are the Tourist Police. However, they will also take a picture of you in front of a Big Old Thing if you give them a tip - or baksheesh.

It may take a while for the my visit to the pyramids to sink in because there were hundreds of people harassing me the whole time I was there.

Camel rides, water, soda, tour guides, etc. Everybody was selling and they all want your money.

I am still not sure if I am going to sacrifice my ticket to Europe in order to go through the Middle East some more. I need to do more research.

I have safely arrived in Cairo… sans my luggage, thanks to Air France.

Here is view of the Nile from Johnny’s hotel room.

Da Nile, actually the river in Africa.

So far so good, not bad for a culture that reached it’s peak 2000 years before the birth of Christ.

I spent the day at the Museum. I can’t prove it yet, but I think aliens have something to do with it….

I returned from Morocco today. I have a couple of interviews so I thought it would be a good idea to get back here.

I am feeling a bit rough. I haven’t slept in two days. If it weren’t for Dunkin Donuts, I would be in a coma. Thank god for chocolate frosted donuts.

The final train from Marrakech to Tangier was exhausting. I had sprung for a couchette, but in the compartment were two Spanish women and a Moroccan woman with her three 18 month old girls. Triplets.

It was absurd. I couldn’t stop laughing, we were all a jungle/gym and trying to keep an eye on all of them was like trying to herd cats* (more gratuitous buzzword bingo). They were leaping all over the place, pulling each other off the ladder to get to the top bunk, etc. Then some enterprising person turned on the light and they all started crawling around trying to get comfortable to get to sleep. One of them wound up in my bed and seemed happy to sleep next to me, splayed out like she paid for the bed herself. Until Momma retrieved her.

Last night on the bus from Algeciras to Madrid they played a loop of “Point Break”, even when dubbed Keanu Reeves sounds like a moron.

So that is my current mental and emotional state. A bit fragile, but improving. I will have a place to stay here in Madrid at about 5:00 or so, thus I only have a few hours left until I can shower and sleep and all that good stuff.

But back to Morocco…

What an incredible experience. It was eye-opening. I had a bunch of prejudices going into the trip based on past experiences. Some good, some not so good. I suppose that is how pre-judging works. But nothing was like I expected.

The rumors about Moroccan hospitality are 100% true. They are not exaggerated in the slightest. For example, on the way to Agadir from Essouira my traveling companion and I met a young man sharing our Grande Taxi who invited us to his home. (BTW, Grande Taxis are Mercedes with six passengers for traveling large distances between cities. Not to be confused with Petite Taxis which travel around within city centers and cannot take more than 3 passengers.)

We were invited into their home and then they began feeding us. It was a very modest home, basically in a shanty town, all cinder blocks and rebar (sp?) but their hospitality was unsurpassed by anyone I have ever met. They were extremely kind and were reluctant to let us leave. They were also reluctant to let us stop eating and I was painfully full for the first time in a while. Part of this hospitality is Berber tradition and part of it is based upon Islam. In Islam a guest is considered a gift from Allah. Unlike our American idea about fish and company beginning to smell after three days, their view of visitors is that they are to be cherished. They don’t want you to leave until you have spent at least three days.

Islam is pervasive in Morocco. 5 times a day you hear the muezzin call. This is a bit hard to get used to at first, and the quality of the muezzin also varies greatly at times sounding like a song… at other times, not so much… But nevertheless it is a constant reminder that you are not in Kansas anymore.

I also had some misconceptions about Islam.

Here is the first like of the Koran, or at least one version of the translation,

“In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.”

That, I think, is my type of God.

Not vengeful and angry.

The culture in general is a huge mix, from Western to Traditional Berber to a bit of West Africa as well.

It seems like the crossroads of Africa.

I will have some pictures that I will put up soon. I haven’t actually had a chance to sit down someplace and use my laptop and pull the pictures into something cohesive.

But I will!