Living the Dream

So it has been about two months since my last post. I am evidently a poor blogger. I am rather unabashed about this, but then again, what is the point if I never commit anything to this.

The world speeds up when you leave home and college. The hours go by faster and there are simply more things to worry about. This was probably the most startling discovery that I have made about growing up. The worst part is the worrying. I never used to worry about anything, and now there are many things that merit some extra thought and attention. Knowledge may well be power, but ignorance is indeed bliss. Either way, these notions are for another time and another place, we shall move on to more significant things.

The general update: I placed 6th overall in the 2008 Beer Mile. Although I was shooting for a top 5 finish, my time was two minutes faster than last year and my performance was much better and stronger than my first attempt. Next year if I knock another minute off of that time, I should be sitting pretty. As far as other hash events go, I have not been going very often. I have classes on Thursdays and usually am spending my weekends catching up on rest and generally being unmotivated to do much other than spending as long as possible at leisure. Speaking of classes, I started grad school. It’s really not so different from undergrad. The caliber of student is higher, but that’s to be expected. Otherwise, its been busy. Between weddings and football and TNDC and school and work; there is little time for other activities. So instead of being boorish, here is an account from the travel days. Enjoy!

May 16, 2006
Landing in Lisbon was a familiar feeling. I do not care all that much for airports, but this one is rising on my hit list. Oh well, at least I knew where I was going. I jumped on the 44 bus across from the BP gas station just outside the airport and went straight to the Oriente train station. On my first trip to this majestic city on Portugal’s coast, I went to the top of the Mall Vasco de Gama and had a meal to celebrate my arrival to Europe. Since it was my first footsteps on European soil, I had no idea how the trip was to unfold and setting off into the relative unknown was bold exciting and intimidating. This time however, there was no dawdling, and I got lucky and only had to wait 10 minutes for a train to the interior of the country. Joao will be meeting me in Coimbra and it looks like I will stay with him, as he has offered to share his new apartment with his old roomie. It feels strange to be back. Like I never really left, but just went away for a long weekend. Everything is familiar and normal. I am in Portugal again. I love this country.

May 20-The Algarve, Notes on the First Days
Taking stock of the last few days, I would have to say that my experiences thus far have been mixed. I finally got out of Coimbra yesterday. I ended up staying there a day longer than I would have liked to, and if I didn’t still have many friends there, I wouldn’t have gone there in the first place. I arrived in Faro yesterday. I have had a headache that has now lasted for several days. On the bright side, Coimbra was fun. I saw Dave the night of the Champions League final between FC Barcelona and the Arsenal. For a few seconds, he acted like nothing was strange seeing me there, standing next to him in the bar. Then he jumped about 2 feet into the air, and asked me what the fuck I was doing there in his telltale Bristol accent. It was good to see Carla again, though she had changed little. By and large, nothing of note had changed in Coimbra. It was a similar feeling to when I returned home from my initial trip to Portugal. Everyone was in much the same general state of confusion and slow movements which come with spring and summer afternoons in the somewhat sleepy country of Portugal. I stayed with Joao, my roommate from Lisbon, who had moved into an apartment that overlooked the soccer stadium at Dolce Vita. It was good to see him again, and that first night, Christine, Joao, and I returned to the shots bar for hopefully what will be the last time in my life. I don’t remember much past ordering the second round of shots. I called Carolin about 5 that morning, hammered out of my mind and telling her to be ready, because Germany was on my list…She is still laughing about that one.

The party at Casa Vermelha was very typical. It was just like old times really; beers and more beers. It was great to see all those guys again. I took many pictures, but only remember them up to a certain point. After that point, everyone in the pics had blue marker all over their faces, myself included. I also have the biggest shit-eating grin on my face. I had a great time that night, except that nobody really knows what happened in the hours around sunrise. I certainly don’t either. I don’t know what time I hit the black box, but when I realized that was going on, I was standing in the praca do portagem, making out with this Italian girl that I only vaguely remembered from the night’s festivities. I think her name was Adriana, but I won‘t ever be sure about that. Forgetting what had happened the last 4 hours and how I got down there is something that I won’t soon forget though. After drunkenly mumbling “a presto” I stumbled into a taxi and was only able to say “dolce vita”. Upon being dropped off, I ran into Joao, who was on his way to class. He stopped me in the hallway and tried to determine what had happened to me that night. Being that I was unable to articulate what I remembered (either in English or in Portuguese), he bid me good day and told me he would return later. I immediately entered the now rather messy studio apartment and flopped onto a cushion on the floor for some much needed rest.

When I awoke several hours later, I felt a little bad. I lived in this city for 6 months and woke up hung over many times. There was absolutely nothing special about this afternoon. It was exactly the sort of thing I had vowed to avoid, which was falling into comfortable patterns. This trip was supposed to be the last hurrah before forging out into the world on my own. It was the farewell tour to irresponsibility and the welcome tour to accountability. It affected my mood for the rest of the day, and by nightfall I was sure about one thing. I had to escape from Coimbra. A fantastic and beautiful city indeed; but I had to get out. The next morning, I had my last meal in Coimbra. The thought had struck me that I would not likely see this city again for many years, if ever. Reflecting on my time spent walking, running, and stumbling through the narrow streets snaking their ways up and down the hills and through the baixas in the Old City; it occurred to me that the city would never again hold the appeal that it once did. Those people that shaped and molded my experiences there would return home, taking with them most of the remaining impetus for me to travel back to Central Portugal. Joao drove me down to the train station and bid me farewell. Like a moebius loop, I was leaving from the same station, Coimbra B, that I had first arrived at almost one year in the past. I remember that day vividly. I was utterly confused and had no idea what I had just gotten myself into. I remember the smell of the city. I had only been in continental Europe for four hours, and I was hooked. I didn’t know what the meaning of being Portuguese was, and even now I can only speculate; for it is possible that not even they do not understand it fully. I remember my first days, lonely and wondrous, wandering through the meandering streets; lost more often than not. I remember my first days of class there. Everyone was a stranger; yet there was something that had drawn each of us to this small country on the western periphery of the Old Continent. That we all had this in common was comforting and intriguing. Most of us had come there alone, without classmates or friends or family. We had all mostly just been dropped off in an alien environment, but somehow we all expected to do well for ourselves. What resulted was the meeting of some of the greatest people I have ever known. Like I said before, I was the only American in the program there. I was taken in like family by my friends there. I shall never forget them.

I left Coimbra with bittersweet memories floating around in my head. The train ride was several hours down to the southern coast, so I busied myself by reading and taking in the vistas on the way. As you get closer to the Algarve, the terrain to the South of Lisbon turns increasingly rocky and jagged. The stone is mostly all the same tan-orange color, and it looked beautiful in the afternoon sun of Portugal in the summertime. It was a very warm day, but upon arriving in Faro, the breeze coming in from the ocean made it more than bearable, and even pleasant along the water. I waited about an hour for James and Caroline to arrive. Of all of my great friends from the Coimbra days, those two were among my favorites.

Upon arrival, we arranged a place to meet. Walking towards the two of them filled me with happiness and when James opened his mouth in a wide smile, I stopped. Apparently, during his time in Seville, one of his front teeth had fallen out. I immediately was in stitches. I later learned that this tooth was originally knocked out during a hooligan fight in Sheffield, and that only the cap had fallen out. Upon greeting these two, we sat down at the nearest watering hole to rundown how things had gone since my departure from Portugal 4 months earlier. They were now both studying in Southern Spain; and basically loving the hell out of it. At the time, I had never visited the Andalusia region of the country, but my first impressions were to become treasured memories of lazy, sun-soaked afternoons on the southern Iberian Peninsula. After some beers we lazed our way through the streets until we happened upon a hostel. This particular hostel, the name of which escapes me, sets on the edge of a small esplanade ringed by jasmine trees. The aroma in the late afternoon was intoxicating and refreshing; full of laziness and goodness. After checking in, we set off for dinner and had a great meal in a seafood place not far from the hostel and overlooking the harbor. After dinner we went on walkabout through the city. The cool sea air blew in on us and made our after dinner walk a most enjoyable experience. Faro is not exactly what I thought it might be. There were not a great deal of tourists around. I suppose that one has to go further West to Sagres to find them in greater amounts. Nonetheless, the night was capped off by James and I retiring to the bar to indulge ourselves in some whiskey drinking before turning in for the night. It was great to catch up with the guy and I felt happy as a clam for being in that small corner of the world at that time and place in history.

The next morning we arose and got breakfast, then packed up to head out to the beach. It was a clear and bright morning, and even though I was still tasting whiskey when I got up, I felt great and was ready for a day in the sun. We took a bus out to the coast, which runs right past all the salt flats that smell so terrible along the way. At some point when the bus had a scheduled stop, a tall, blonde guy jumped on and started walking towards the back of the bus where James, Caroline, and I were sitting. I glanced up at him and then did a quick double take. It appeared he had done much the same thing when he said “Hey! Remember me?!”. It was a German student I had met in Coimbra all the way back in the last fall. His name was Aleksander and he was now living in Faro, taking classes and thoroughly succeeding in being a first class beach bum. Hard knock life. It reinforced my idea that the world truly is a small place and that I have run into friends in such strange parts of the world that one who was more superstitious than I might interpret those chance meetings as some strange form of fate or destiny. Personally, I just thought it was weird.

Along the circuitous route to the beach, the bus passed by salt flats and low causeways connecting the various islands. When the bus finally arrived at the beach, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the beach was as picture perfect as advertised. With the warm Portuguese sun beating on our backs, we made sure to enjoy the day and revel in our vibrant youth and enviable lives at the time. It was the kind of day that one looks back upon with relish. After another tremendous dinner, we retired to the hostel to rest up before heading back to Spain the next day. While I knew that it was not to be the last day in Portugal, I knew that my return trip in a couple months would be the curtain call on my European adventures in this era of my life. There was a certain feeling of loss when we crossed into Spain by ferry the next day. I had little time for reflection however, and by the time we arrived in the white Spanish city of Ayamonte, I had other things to wonder about and a brain to make switch tracks to Spanish.