It all started in Italy and ended in Bastardlona
It's been a very long while since I actually posted to my blog I know, but I have been extremely busy and once I left Asia it was a lot harder, and a lot more expensive to connect to the internet than it previously had been. So I am updating.
I would like to relate to you the tale of my run of bad... no... terrible luck. It all started in Roma....
I loved Italy a lot, I had my birthday there which was celebrated in many ways over many days (will blog about that later) and while I was in Venice I met a man from India named Manish... we met by accident actually, as I was trying to find some accommodation back in Rome the night before I had to fly to London. I had been online for a long time and the max was about 15 minutes so when I saw he was waiting to use it I offered up the seat immediately. But he had seen how frustrated I was at the computer (I must have been muttering at it, I sometimes do that with electrical things.. they hate me, I swear) and offered to help. So he sat down next to me and we continued my frantic search for a room in Rome. Not long after that a force of nature from New York arrived. The incomparable Sandy and Di, two lovely ladies from New York, New York... and boy were they New York... or rather.. Noo yawk... within minutes they too were helping me find some accommodation and about 2 hours later I had booked back into the Camping place I had stayed at before I left Roma for Tuscany. We all decided to meet up the next day and go sight-seeing, Manish was leaving in the afternoon so we arranged to meet at the Vatican when I arrived back in Roma. My first attempt at the Vatican was terrible. I went with a woman named Mary from Perth who pretty much had to Mother me for most of the day we were out thanks to a nasty bout of food poisoning from McDonald's that developed shortly after we made it through the line INTO the Vatican... so within about 30 minutes of entry... all I saw was the nice white colour of the porcelain throne. We made it into the Cistine Chapel but I was so sick I couldn't have cared less... I just wanted out... so that's what we did, we left. Anyway, that was my first attempt at the Vatican and when Manish suggested we go together I thought it was a great idea. So we arranged to meet at 8am out the front entrance where we would then join the line.
So... I got up at 5:30 to make sure I had enough time to get the bus and train back into central Roma and check my luggage into the baggage hold at Roma Termini. That is not, however, the way things turned out. Everything was going great until the man at the baggage hold refused to take my luggage.
"No take." he says flatly.
"Why?" I enquire.
"No take." he says again and gestures that the bag is too heavy to lift.
Now I would have been okay with this had the man refusing to take my bag not been 6 foot something tall and muscly all over...
"WHAT?" I say exasperated.... "Too heavy?? I'VE been carrying it around and I'm only a 5'6" female!!"
"No take!!!" He says to me again getting annoyed.
At this point I was completely stunned and had no idea what to do. So I just left and went to the first internet cafe I could find to tell Manish I could not make it and because I didn't have a phone I could not call him and had to stand him up. (I'm SO sorry again Manish... at least I made it up to you in London.)
So anyway, I decided that seeing I was stuck with all my baggage I would just head to Campiano Airport early and check my luggage in there and then head back out, but it was a hell of a journey to get there and I left the internet cafe in a rush to make sure I made the right train.
When I arrived with my bag that was too heavy for a healthy 6 foot strong man, I pulled it off my back and onto a trolley that was lying around. The airport was surprisingly full of people considering it's brother Leonardo Da Vinci was the more busy airport so I immediately looked for a place to store my luggage and when I couldn't find it I asked information, only to find out that the crappiest airport in Roma does not HAVE a baggage hold.... so, there I was, stuck in the tiniest, busiest, crappiest airport ever and that's when I realised I had left my flash drive in the computer back at Termini. I slapped myself on the head and tried to think what was on it and whether or not it was worth lugging everything back into central Roma on the off chance that it might still be there, or just give it up for lost. It was a hard decision as it had a lot of information on it that I needed but the thought of going all the way back killed me so I stayed put.
When it was time for my flight I was so relieved to be getting on it and on my way to London. It kind of felt like I was going home for some strange reason and it would prove to be that way in a matter of hours after arrival.
ARRIVING IN LONDON
The arriving part was fine, it was the waiting for the tube to open part that was awful. because I had the last flight out of Roma I arrived in London just after midnight, which meant that the underground was closed and I had to wait until 5:30am for it to open again before I could get to the hostel I was checked into. So all night, I tried to sleep in chairs, in a coffee shop, on the marble floor with no heat whatsoever... this is the second most crappiest airport I've ever been to after Campiano. Absolutely terrible. When morning came I booked myself on the Terranova bus to Liverpool Street Station and marvelled at the fact that I was on a bus going through the English countryside heading for London. I was finally here.
I worked out the train system pretty quickly and made my way to the St Christopher’s Village where I was booked into and because check in wasn't until 2 (it was 10am) I had to put my luggage in storage and find something to do. As I was heading down the stairs a guy behind me asked if I needed some help but I refused and kept going and when I saw he followed me into the luggage room I smiled and realised he was actually an Aussie. Ryan is from Perth and he is a dentist and he is responsible for helping me get acquainted with London. Within the first 10 minutues of us talking he had invited me to breakfast and over a chat session he suggested that he introduce me to the manager of the Hostel's cafe about an interview for the job I had seen on an advert back at Reception. So the next day I went for the interview and the day after that I had the job and a place to live.
So with everything going so well in London I was looking forward to seeing my friend Ingrid again in Spain. I had booked my ticket two weeks beforehand back in Roma through Ryan air and left for Stansted again a few days after arriving in London. It was an early flight out and I had to sleep in the airport again because there was no way of getting to the airport in time for check in at 4am, so once more, I slept on the cold, marble floor... all the while battling a cold I had picked up after doing the same thing ARRIVING in London. So I knew this wasn't going to be good. I couldn't sleep though and sat awake the whole time just waiting for check in to start which actually went well. It wasn't until boarding time where things went wrong. Everyone was lined up to board but there were delays so we were all told to wait. People began sitting down to make themselves comfortable and I thought I would do the same which turned out to be a BIG mistake. Within seconds of sitting down I fell asleep from sheer exhaustion and when I awoke there wasn't a soul around. There was a young man (more like a 17 y/o kid) still sitting at the boarding desk (which happened to be right next to where I was sitting) and I approached him and asked "Excuse me, has the flight to Girona boarded yet?"
To which he looks at me and says with annoyance "Yes. Boarding is closed now."
At this point I almost swallowed my own heart as it jumped up into my throat.
"Oh." I said meekly.
"We've been calling your name for over 20 minutes." he snaps at me.
"Really? I've been sitting right here all along." I said, pointing to the seat next to the boarding desk.
“Well!! We have!” he says rudely. “You’re sequence number 28 aren’t you?”
I was confused at this. In all my travels I’d never been referred to as a sequence number before and I had no idea what I was talking about.
“What do you mean?”
“SEQUENCE NUMBER.” He says to me sarcastically like I hadn’t heard him. It’s the number on the ticket.
So as I scanned my ticket for the number he was talking about and found it, I thought to myself… OHHHH, you mean the number in the botton left corner printed in the smallest case possible??? Riiiiight.. yes, I am sequence number 28 you little pre-pubescent shit.
“Oh.” I say to him. “Wait… were you calling my NAME or the sequence number??”
This must have hit some kind of understanding with him because he suddenly goes bright red, making his flushed cheeks even more purple than they were and he says quietly…. “Oh….right..”
SILENCE…..
“Has the flight left yet?” I asked.
“No.” he says.
“Is there anyway I can still get on the flight?”
“The Captain has closed the gate but I will go and ask.” And almost before he stops talking he sped off hot footed to the Captain and within seconds he was back saying that I could board. The little shit. Yeah.. my name is sequence number 28 and I am ready to board. So, you can imagine my shame as I boarded the plane and took the first available seat as everyone else watched me. Here I was thinking that I was the reason the plane was delayed and yet it sat there on the tarmac for at least another half an hour with the Captain making announcements about delays in the traffic of the airways or something. They weren’t even waiting for me nor did they offload my baggage when “sequence number 28” failed to board. Ridiculous. If you ever get a chance to fly with Ryan Air please do because they are the “best” in the world. You get HEAPS of legroom with every seat being completely booked to your ticket. Their customer service is fantastic and their communication skills are HIGHLY commendable… AND they employ 17 year old boys to run boarding!! It’s GREAT!! AND… as an added EXTRA bonus… they ONLY talk to you via loudspeaker and charmingly apply a cute little number in replace of your birth name!!! (despite the fact that he was calling me by a number, he could have actually turned to his right to see me sitting there… right next to the desk he was sitting at… and walk the two steps towards me and wake me up and ASK me if I was “sequence number 28” but noooooo…)
So anyway, the plane finally took off and I was on my way to Spain.
BASTARDLONA
I was looking forward to Barcelona and to seeing Ingrid again and we were going to have so much fun. It almost all never happened though thanks to Ryan Air, the plane was late (not to mention what happened above) which meant that all my connecting trains and buses into Barcelona were pushed back making Ingrid think I wasn’t coming. She was ready to give up and quit waiting for me when I arrived on the last train in. We headed straight back to where she was staying so I could dump my things and then we headed out so she could show me some of Barcelona. That night we went to a Spanish Restaurant where we shared a litre of Sangria and ate some traditional Spanish food. Ingrid read my palm and scarily told me about Harley and said she was still with me (which I know anyway) and we laughed at the ridiculous piano version of “Light My Fire” by The Doors. When the waiter came over to ask us if we liked the music Ingrid commented that it was a little lame. Within minuted the music had been changed and Ingrid realised that the music we were listening to was actually a man ON a piano just out of our sight. She almost died of shame that he had heard her criticise his playing and changed it accordingly to please her. It was hilarious. So after we were thoroughly stuffed we headed outside into the rain and ran all the way to the nearest tube stop and headed back to our room.
We went out the next morning to do more sightseeing and more shopping. We headed up to the top of the mountain where you can see almost all of Spain and took some great photos but the rain became to much so we decided to head back to our room. The day had been a kind of disaster and it was good to get back and have a hot shower. We were planning to go out clubbing that night and wanted to get back to shower and wash our hair. We had met up with Ingrid’s friend Rachel (a Londoner living in Barcelona) earlier and set it all up so all we had to do was have a nap and get ready. That’s when we found the note under the door. Paolo (the moron the owner had left in charge while she had gone to the south of Spain) had left a note under our door saying that he “thought” we had to leave tomorrow and could we please call him. Ingrid was confused about this as the room had been paid for up until the 14th when she was leaving for Morocco, so we looked for the Receipt and when we found it we realised he had made a mistake on the initial booking receipt and only booked her in until the 13th, not the 14th… he had stuffed up on the dates. After much thought and discussion we decided it would be best if she said she couldn’t find the booking receipt so we ignored it for a while but then Paolo arrived at about 10pm and Ingrid went down to ask him about the note. I had to stay in the room because even though the room was booked for two people, Ingrid and Eirin (she was in India) I was not Eirin (although I'm convinced he thought I was) and we thought it best I not show my face while she confronted him about him “thinking” we had to leave.
The next few hours were just awful. As I sat upstairs I had to listen to my friend have a screaming match with this asshole Paolo. He refused to let her see the hotel receipts, he wouldn’t let her speak to the manager nor would he allow her to speak with the owner or realtor. It turns out that when Ingrid and Eirin were first booked in some 5 weeks beforehand Paolo had written the wrong date on the booking and no one had picked it up until now. He had realised when he went to make a booking for someone else but had us still in the room and these other people waiting for the room we were staying in. He had completely stuffed up and double booked and because Eirin was in India with no way for us to contact her we had no proof that we were booked until the 14th. We tried to call and email Eirin so we could get her credit card receipt but it was to no avail. We were up packing until about 2am and in the morning Paolo comes to us and says..
“You can stay in a dorm tonight. But you have to move from this room.”
“And we don’t have to pay?” Ingrid orders.
“No pay.” He says back , which I heard with my own ears.
But when Ingrid went down to tell him we were ready to move to the dorm he says to her “So how would you like to pay.” Which resulted in another shouting match and a warning from Ingrid to the people checking in (most likely the people he had given our room to) not to stay there.
We left shortly after and told him he was making a huge mistake.
Thankfully, Rachel let us stay at her apartment for out last night in Barcelona so it seemed that things were going to be okay, we weren’t going to be homeless for a night.
With all the stress of that behind us Rachel, Ingrid, myself and a bunch of other girls decided that we would cook dinner, go to see The Devil Wears Prada and then head to the famous nightclub Catwalk for a night out.
Everything was going so well and I was having so much fun and I even accepted a dance with a gorgeous man from Sweden before we both commented that we hated to dance and decided to take a walk along the beach instead. We must have talked for hours because before I knew it, it was 3am and I thought I had better head back to the girls but when I sat up from laying in the sand looking at the stars I had a massive heart attack.
“OH MY GOD!!!” I exclaim with a mixture of calmness and panic in my voice.
“MY BAG! It’s GONE!!!” I cry.
Then I realised that my companions jacket was also gone, in which he had his wallet, camera and passport.
I wont go into too many details of what happened after that point but for a split second I was terrified and sickened. I couldn’t believe I had gotten myself into a situation that had left me so exposed to…. Many terrible possibilities and I was hating myself for it.
Immediately my companion rushed to the people nearby asking if anyone had seen anything, and on the second or third attempt, he had found someone who had. Two French girls who spoke perfect Spanish had seen a black man walk from where we had been sitting in the sand with a handbag and a jacket, and that’s when it hit me. I had been robbed of all my important possessions. It all added up to about $6000 Australian dollars… my camera, the lens, my video camera, my money, my identification, my credit card… all gone.. and what’s worse… all the photos that I had taken during my time in Spain. It’s still taking a while to register that everything is gone and that I basically have to start again, but with the help of some new friends I am slowly getting back on my feet. It’s been so difficult though and there is no way I could have done it had I not already landed myself a job and accommodation before I left for Spain. So many people back in London have come to my rescue and I probably will never be able to thank them enough for the help they have provided me with.
So with all that summed up (in a condensed version of the whole story believe it or not) there were only two things that I liked about Bastardlona (yes, you read right... I think it deserves the title more) and one of them was seeing Ingrid again. So there you have it folks. I am no officially a photographer without a camera. It’s like having my hands cut off and my eyes poked out. It’s so painful. I am working my ass off to save for a new one but it will take forever. Let’s hope I can do it before I get a photography job!
posted by Lucyspeak @ 3:38 am
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