The first story that I am going to relate is about the pickpockets of Europe.
The first one happened to my friend, who is one of the four who went to IAG UCL , Belgium on student exchange. The story goes such. We had a great week in Italy, and had taken the night train to Munich from Milan. The train passed through the austrian alps and it was snowing like crazy and everywhere you could see the white blanket of snow. So we decided that we would traceback our journey after reaching munich and check out the snow and so we did. We had a great time. So everything went well here, so why am I telling you this? Well, its quite central to the whole story, just have some more patience.
So where was I? yes, we went to Austria, and had some fun in the snow and returned to Munich to take the 3 pm high speed train to Brussesls. We were in time and we finally started on our journey back. But as fate would have it there was a railway workers strike the very same day and so after some two hours of journey we found ourselves stranded along with thousands of other passengers in Cologne. All was not lost though, there were still some local trains operating, and we both boarded one such train which took us to the last stop on the German border. Unlike India the railway people felt responsible for the inconvenience we faced and they booked a bus for all the passengers who had to go to Brussels and Liege in Belgium. And thus we found ourselves on the bus, hoping that the time it takes quite some time to reach Brussels. Basically, we wanted to spend the night in the bus rather than in the station where there'd be no heating. But to our badluck, the bus driver drove really fast and by 12 15 in the night we were in Brussels-Midi train station. The last train was gone, the first train in the morning was at 4 45. We had no option but to spend our night in the railways station.
The stage is set -more in the next post
Ciao.
Deft Hands & European Pickpockets - Part One
The European Sojourn
Student Exchange Program( STEP, as we call it in IIMC) means that you get to spend a full term in a foreign university. Thus I was in Belgium for the last three months in a university which i am sure you will have never heard of. Nevermind. I was not there for the university in the first place.
Travelled a lot. 12 countries to be precise. Thats like the avergae number of countries any stepper in europe travels with some people even touching 18.
So whats in store for you?
There are so many things you know about Europe, about foreigners, about foreign land ... but I believe there are so many other things you don't really know. For example, roaming around on the streets of Amsterdam you realize that a place is not just people passing by on bicycles, the trams the canals, the monuments ... its much more ... And that much more will I try to express in the posts to come through personal anecdotes, observations and plain description ... for your sake and for my sake ... so that I never forget ... so that its for keeps...
I leave you with a picture of a place called Cinque Terre in Italy on the Mediterranean Coast. Probably one of the most beautiful places I have been in Europe.
Why this to start with - probably because I sat on the rocks of the craggy coastline, and sat still for an hour on the rocks, feeling like a traveller. Ironic you may say, but thats how I felt :)
So Long.
