Leaving Brazil and my little Euro tour
Trip Start
Jan 18, 2007
1
11
17
Trip End
Jul 01, 2008
Latvia, Northampton, Nijmeigen, Barcelona, Bristol and Milan,
Italy
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Sound Track: the Wombats.
Fucking jet lag. I hate it. At least it gives me a little time to update y'all on what I've been up to these past 7 or 8 weeks.
My last week in Brazil proceeded a whistle stop tour around Europe. It was a fairly emotional week for me to be honest I was leaving behind an apartment, a beach and a city I had really fallen in love with. There were a number of friends I was unlikely to ever see again and a football stadium I was going to miss. All this said it was a pleasant last week. I moved to a hostel around the corner and just chilled out, or at least I tried to. On my first night 4 very gay very Swedish boys came home at about 05:00 turning on the lights and looking at each others photos, I got up as I needed a piss. When I returned they were all asleep and snoring which, combined, sounded something reminiscent of a group of chav boys off to race their old bangers across the park.
I knew I wouldn't be getting back to sleep so I decided that my revenge would be sweet.
I set my telephone alarm for 08:30 and let it play on whilst I sat on the internet. When I returned at 09:00 a groggy eyed Swede was fumbling about trying to turn it off.
Now I would have left it at that had they not repeated the act the next night. So this time I emptied my pockets of all their sand on each of their beds. By the third time they'd kept me awake I decided it was time for drastic action. The two main offenders had again woken me up. This time I was really mad and decided the only way to get them back was to remove at random 6 of the last 20 pages of each of their books. Something which they wouldn't find out for a good while. YES, REVENGE.
My last days in Brazil passed with little or no event other than my vaguely sinister acts of revenge on those intent on depriving my of much needed rest. I mean I had been spending all my days on the beach I can't think of anything more exhausting.
I met a few guys from Northampton in Lord Jims, where I used to go to watch the football when it wasn't on ESPN. We had mutual friends as is always the case when you meet someone from the seemingly inescapable black hole that is Northampton.
On my last day we played football on the beach ate Cervantes one last time and then I got on the plane to fly home.
My flight was fairly uneventful, I had a change which left me flying into Gatwick instead of London City, 4 hours ahead of schedule. This change had clearly not been signalled to the airline companies and upon checking in again a fuss had to be made by myself and a number of other fairly disgruntled passengers.
I arrived at Gatwick at 16:00, it was dark, I got depressed very quickly. After making it back across London in rush hour, with no fucker letting me sit down on the tube despite carrying about twice my body weight on my back, I jumped on the train to Northampton and was back by 19:00. Nothing had changed. It was great to see Sarah again and in turn my family and friends but I had things to do. So I packed up a small bag of clothes slung them over my shoulder and off I went to see Mum in Latvia.
I was worried about going to Latvia, it was going to be cold. Coming from 40 degrees in Rio to minus 4 in Riga was a bit of a shock to the system and Mum took me to a spa to kill all those horrible germs that had suddenly started to multiply. At the spa I had a sun bed to try and maintain some semblance of tan, which has now faded to a kind of dirty smear. It worked I felt infinitely better.
I was now ready to face the Latvian winter and a few classes with my Mum.
In these classes Mum had asked me to talk about myself and my trip. This as I'm sure you all know came very easily to me and from what I could tell a number of her students took quite a shine to me. Well who can blame them. I am devilishly attractive and rather charming to boot.
I had a great time seeing my Mum it'd been nine months since our previous meeting and apart from Ellies wedding it was the last time we were likely to see each other again for a fare old while. All this made leaving Riga a bit of a tug because I really just wanted to spend a bit more time with the old dear.
I got back into Stansted Airport where I was met by Josh and Toby. We sped our way back to Canterbury where I was to spend my next 6 nights catching up with my old Uni Cru. I had a blast, now I'll admit we did very little apart from sit around all day, mostly as Josh was working an i am extremely lazy. Sarah however did come down and met the cru, which was nice, it added a bit of spice to the occasion. I got a horrendous hangover, which left me bed ridden until 18:00, after drinking only 4 drinks.
Thursday arrived and I had to bid my friends a fond farewell. Now I can't really remember how I got to the airport, I think I took the train but I can't be entirely sure. Anyway I was back at Stansted, again waiting for a Ryan air flight, AGAIN.
This time however I was embarking on a journey not only to see my super great Dutch compadre Jasper, whom I had met in Buenos Aires, it was also the start of a little euro tour of some Stadia. Something we all know I am fairly obsessed with.
My first night in Nijmegen (forgive me for spelling it wrong Jasper but you Dutch may be the coolest race on earth but you don't half have some fucking stupid spellings) was spent in bars doing our best to get stupidly drunk with Nigel (Jasse) a good friend of Jaspers. We succeeded, unsurprisingly, and ended up stumbling home after a few more drinks in Jaspers old student union. Friday was also lovely we played football in the evening, we lost. Badly. Mostly due to the first 2 goals being if not scored by Jasper (into his own net) then set up by Jasper. I also realised that my surging runs down the right flank were pretty useless as the term "one more" isn't often used by the Dutch, funny that.
The next day was the big day a day I had been looking forward to for a long time. We had decided that as I had never been to Germany Jasper would take me there so we jumped in the car and got on our way. Before we got too far though we noticed the sky was full of smoke. So we grabbed Nigel and headed over to the fire. It was a textiles factory in the less affluent side of town. Imagine for me if you will a warehouse burning down in the eastern district of Northampton. Basically we got there and it wasn't the smoke polluting my lungs I was worried about it was the vast amounts of scum around us.
It was later reported that 2 people were arrested for not moving back when told and 2 were admitted to hospital for...... smoke inhalation. Wankers, when you see a big black cloud of smoke surely the best thing to do it stand away from it rather than in it. Ahh well what the poor will do for entertainment is beyond me. After we'd had out share of fun we went to Germany for coffee, I tried my hardest not to mention the war but as soon as we crossed the border I just had to scream "The War" at the top of my voice.
We then returned to The Netherlands and back to Best to Jaspers family home. We ate dinner with his Dad and the chef for the evening, Jaspers disgracefully attractive sister, who's name I have completely forgotten. Whether I even paid attention to what it was in the first place I don't know as I was simply gawping until it was time to leave for the big game. Philips Stadion here we come. The game itself wasn't the most eventful with top of the Table PSV hammering the shit out of bottom of the table Excelsior but only managing to score 1 goal. In the 80th minute I said to Jasper I had a bad feeling about the last 10 minutes. 50 seconds later, an equalising goal from some shit Dutch guy, I felt thoroughly deflated. That was until in injury time Kovermans popped up with a last minute winner, beer throwing dancing and celebrating ensued. The last minute goal turned the game from being frustrating to being a classic. A great way to start my football tour. That night we watched match of the day and ate Dutch food before going out, again. It wasn't until the next day that I realised that that was the most exciting day anyone had ever had ever, in the history of time.
The Sunday was nice, we went for a stroll in the park where we came across a 12,000 seater stadium which had been built in a ditch (dug in the depression) and watched another game. This time it was struggling NEC vs Utrecht. NEC won with 2 goals in the second half.
My time was running out but I still had time to watch the Dutch match of the day . The next day I left. Back to sunny blighty to see my Family in London.
I was picked up at the airport by my Nan, auntie and Uncle. After failing to reach them at home they wondered past me trying again to call them.
I was told by my Nan (whom I'd not seen for 9 months) that I was going to see David (my cousin) in London the next day. Now this was no issue for me whatsoever I was glad to see him. It was my Nans reasoning which caught me. "Well you can go and see David tomorrow can't you..... I am going to the pictures". Brilliant.. Pure class.
I had a good day with David watching him slowly drink himself into a stupor which I found highly amusing. We shopped the next day for clothes for the wedding and the final book in the Bret Easton Ellis collection I had started in Rio.
It was again time to leave so I said my farewells and jumped on a train to meet Bobek whom I hadn't seen in about a year.
I got to Gaywick about an hour before Bobek, Matt and Melissa so I just stood around singing and dancing to DJ format, which disturbed a number of the people readying themselves for their holidays.
We were last on the plane, I blame Bob, Matt and I got seats quite close to each other and decided that it was a good time to start getting fairly drunk. So in our 80 minutes in the air we drank the plane dry of it's red wine which was only five 33cl bottles but it was enough to get us on our way. We got a cab to the hotel and went out and hit the town. After much mischief and getting kicked out of the final bar we were in we decided to wonder back along the Ramblas. For those of you who know Barcelona you'll know that's kind of the main street there. Bob and I walked along, baring our behinds and making general twats of ourselves. This reaching its pinnacle when I got on Bob's shoulders and we went along talking sorry, shouting at each other in a made up language, the best thing was only we knew what we were saying and we understood each other perfectly.
The next morning Matt and I were feeling a little tender. Bob walked into the room to see me hunched naked over a bin vomiting violently and Matt fully dressed passed out on his bed. What was most disturbing to Bob however was the fact he'd paid on his credit card for the room and Matt and I had apparently thought we were Rock Stars and had trashed the room. The flimsy table just couldn't take Matt's weight and TV's do always look better upside down. I wasn't very good for the rest of that day. I'm bad with hangovers.
The next day was the big day, we ate Foie Gras and Stuffed squid for breakfast. Mmm. Later came my second visit to Camp Nou. Matt and I went, Bob and Melissa stayed at home because they are gay. Matt and I had fun watching boys run around a field though. Despite the fact we got rained on and the game was a dull affair, only coming to life in the last 3 minutes with a well worked goal from Xavi. It was good to mark off Messi on my world class players to see.
We then went and got stupidly drunk and watched the super bowl singing Billy Bragg in our support for New England Patriots. I don't remember leaving the pub really I do remember going to buy Matt some fags and coming back to him being hit on by someone from Middlesbrough and Matt just abusing him.
Monday was better for me my hangover was non-existent and it was the day for seeing sights. At each sight it was decided (by me of course) that we should all take our tops off and pose. Much to the delight of the sightseers, oh how I enjoy being the centre of attention. Bob came up with the "Beach and Pub" poses. Matt came up with a classic Line "Bodies built for Sin" and how right he was. If you want to see the pictures have a look on facebook and the group "Bodies built for Sin". Why not join and add some yourself.
We went home again and I was back for a bit. 16 days in Northampton and 4 in Bristol for the wedding. I have spoken previously about the wedding so I shan't say anything other than it was fucking awesome.
Northampton was uneventful I worked a few shifts at Barratts. I also acted like a complete arsehole to a certain person. Other than that I was just readying myself for my next trip.
Milan with dad and Geoff. A place to complete my set of 5 dream stadia.
I've spoken about these 5 before. The stadia I have wanted to visit since I was about 6.
we went on the first day to the San Siro tickets weren't on sale but we did get to look at what I can only describe as the most majestic stadium I've ever visited. It is huge and beautifully built with the extensions almost unnoticeable.
The next few days we wondered around the city looking at Castles, Cathedrals and the like. We ate some ok food too.
Duomo Cathedral was awe-inspiring just a massive Gothic structure in the middle of the city. The Central Station was also massive and great. There was a very nice fashion mall housing the Prada flagship store, just across from McDonald's, Gucci and D&G.
We spent Saturday in a bar watching football and Rugby. We then went for a pretty nice meal. Upon leaving the restaurant I must add now a fairly attractive German (rare I know) girl gestured at me in a manner to ask why I was leaving so soon. Which put me on a bit of a high. We then went to a cool bar with free table football, internet and PS2. I beat Dad and Geoff at table football then we watched the closing stages of England Vs France in the Rugby. After which we returned to our end of town which had been shut the night before. It was open on Saturdays and we drank a few rum and cokes and what seemed like a pint of sambuca.
The next day I woke up feeling slightly jaded. Geoff on the other hand wasn't in a particularly good way and we walked him around a bit until it was time for the football by which point Geoffy was feeling fine.
The first half was fairly exciting, in front of a crowd of 50,000 it was 1-1 at half time. Geoff predicting the first Milan scorer correctly.
The second half was rubbish. I did tell Geoff not to worry though because in all the games I'd been to there had been late goals. 2 minutes into Injury time Pipo Inzaghi scored (I had predicted he would score also).
We left feeling contented. The only real event the next day was me paying little attention to the Milanese street furniture and walking straight into a boll(ock)ard. It had me in a heap for a little while but it was highly amusing I must admit.
So it was back to the UK again for my last 6 days. I prepared things said goodbye to people and built bridges that had been stupidly destroyed in the first place.
My leaving do was great with the Canterbury cru coming down and drinking up all night long. It was a great way to say goodbye to everyone again.
Sunday came and I was on my way. Ready to get the 20:10 Oasis flight to Hong Kong.
I want to wait and see how today goes until I update you on my interesting first day away from home.
All I can say is I don't think these blogs are going to dry up too soon.
Big Love to you all. I miss you already
