Lippstadt, Bielefeld, Cologne, Belgium, London
Kind of a lot to squeeze in, but let's catch up here.
After seeing Anja, I drove up north to visit my friend Anne in Lippstadt. The driving in Germany was not as interesting as Sicily, the roads are more like the US and the traffic much more civilized. Anne and I met hiking the Tiger Leaping Gorge in northern Yunnan, China at the end of last year. We spend a day together in Lijiang and I thought it might be nice to stop by her hometown since I was in the neighborhood. We took a short walk around country roads in her town which is very farm-like, and then after saying hello to her family I bid her farewell to drive to the nearby town of Bielefeld to connect with my old college friend Lance, who I haven't seen for 6 years. He recently relocated from New Jersey to pursue a career in music, and to try out some new territory I think. He also got married, so upon arrival I met his wife and we spent about 24 hours on a high-speed trip down memory lane. We got drunk, listened to old Berklee recordings which are now 10 years old, and played some metal. I had decent Italian food. I saw basically nothing of Bielefeld other than the apartment where Lance now lives, though from what I gather it is an unremarkable town. Lance seemed to enjoy his new home and spoke highly of the music scene there and the openness with which his favored genre of exploding metal is embraced. I plan to return to spend more time hanging out and by then he'll hopefully have some gigs and I'll have some more time. It's good to catch up with old friends, especially in distant lands.
After Bielefeld I was due to return my rental car in Cologne. I spent two nights there and reunited with two Couchsurfer friends, Caro and Manu. They gave me a heroes welcome and it was really great to see them. I forgot how energetic and fun they both are, since it'd been probably a year since I saw them last during their visit to New York when they stayed with me for a while. I had time before seeing them to explore Cologne on foot to a fairly significant extent, to get good middle eastern food and scope out a number of vegetarian restaurants, and to stand in the shadow of the most giant cathedral for some time as well as to climb to the top of it. Then we had beer.
Things accelerated as the trip drew to a close. I took a train from Cologne to Brussels and got a hotel room near the train station. I killed a few hours walking around Brussels, then a quick train to Ghent to meet my friend Ilse for dinner, another CSer I met last year who stayed here in New York with me. The old town in Ghent is really beautiful. I had so little time to spend in Belgium, actually less than 24 hours I think, but it made me think that it might be worth a visit one day so in that sense it was interesting. That being said, Brussels was kind of run down and sketchy in many parts, although the tourist area was pretty of course.
Finally, the last night in London, at Ee Lynn's very tiny apartment in the very interesting neighborhood of Soho which has renewed my faith in London even though it is painfully expensive to do anything there. It's a tough place to visit and I never appreciated Couchsurfing so much until I saw how much dorm beds cost in London and in fact throughout Europe.
I'm glad for everything I saw in Europe, especially the friends with whom I connected and for the family experience in the Ukraine and Germany which was truly beyond anything I could've imagined until I was there. That being said, my next trip will be back to the third world and just about anywhere except Europe. I miss Asia, I'm interested in the middle east, South or Central America, and Africa. That'll come in another post soon after I retroactively sum up the remainder of my 8 month old trip in the Philippines.
After seeing Anja, I drove up north to visit my friend Anne in Lippstadt. The driving in Germany was not as interesting as Sicily, the roads are more like the US and the traffic much more civilized. Anne and I met hiking the Tiger Leaping Gorge in northern Yunnan, China at the end of last year. We spend a day together in Lijiang and I thought it might be nice to stop by her hometown since I was in the neighborhood. We took a short walk around country roads in her town which is very farm-like, and then after saying hello to her family I bid her farewell to drive to the nearby town of Bielefeld to connect with my old college friend Lance, who I haven't seen for 6 years. He recently relocated from New Jersey to pursue a career in music, and to try out some new territory I think. He also got married, so upon arrival I met his wife and we spent about 24 hours on a high-speed trip down memory lane. We got drunk, listened to old Berklee recordings which are now 10 years old, and played some metal. I had decent Italian food. I saw basically nothing of Bielefeld other than the apartment where Lance now lives, though from what I gather it is an unremarkable town. Lance seemed to enjoy his new home and spoke highly of the music scene there and the openness with which his favored genre of exploding metal is embraced. I plan to return to spend more time hanging out and by then he'll hopefully have some gigs and I'll have some more time. It's good to catch up with old friends, especially in distant lands.
After Bielefeld I was due to return my rental car in Cologne. I spent two nights there and reunited with two Couchsurfer friends, Caro and Manu. They gave me a heroes welcome and it was really great to see them. I forgot how energetic and fun they both are, since it'd been probably a year since I saw them last during their visit to New York when they stayed with me for a while. I had time before seeing them to explore Cologne on foot to a fairly significant extent, to get good middle eastern food and scope out a number of vegetarian restaurants, and to stand in the shadow of the most giant cathedral for some time as well as to climb to the top of it. Then we had beer.
Things accelerated as the trip drew to a close. I took a train from Cologne to Brussels and got a hotel room near the train station. I killed a few hours walking around Brussels, then a quick train to Ghent to meet my friend Ilse for dinner, another CSer I met last year who stayed here in New York with me. The old town in Ghent is really beautiful. I had so little time to spend in Belgium, actually less than 24 hours I think, but it made me think that it might be worth a visit one day so in that sense it was interesting. That being said, Brussels was kind of run down and sketchy in many parts, although the tourist area was pretty of course.
Finally, the last night in London, at Ee Lynn's very tiny apartment in the very interesting neighborhood of Soho which has renewed my faith in London even though it is painfully expensive to do anything there. It's a tough place to visit and I never appreciated Couchsurfing so much until I saw how much dorm beds cost in London and in fact throughout Europe.
I'm glad for everything I saw in Europe, especially the friends with whom I connected and for the family experience in the Ukraine and Germany which was truly beyond anything I could've imagined until I was there. That being said, my next trip will be back to the third world and just about anywhere except Europe. I miss Asia, I'm interested in the middle east, South or Central America, and Africa. That'll come in another post soon after I retroactively sum up the remainder of my 8 month old trip in the Philippines.
posted by Dan at 12:45 PM
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