White Nite Craziness!

nice pic2

Nice pic from Rome

White Nite in Rome…lost again but with no car this time!

So today we went for lunch. Got lost of course trying to find a restaurant the GPS told us to go to, but were eventually able to find it. It was closed though! Me and Peter then parked the car and talked about how we were going to manage the driving/directions for Rome. Since the driving was quite aggressive in Rome I was going to drive all the time. I’ve gotta say, Rome is very different though cause all the roads go in bazaar circles and everything merges weirdly. But I’m getting used to it now and Peter and I have worked out how to give/follow routes. We went looking for another restaurant but it was closed too. So we went for gas. We used the GPS to find a gas station and I used the automatic self serve since the gas station was actually closed. Luckily there was a grocery store and restaurant nearby so we did some shopping and had lunch. Our lunch was very cheap and tasty…pizza of course hahahaha. Then we went back to the hotel (without getting lost) and got ready to catch the courtesy bus to the central city. We got on the bus and went to Rome. It’s sooooooooo nice. It was raining really hard though which sucked but that gave us an excuse to stop and have gelato and other dessert which were delicious by the way. When the rain stopped we did a lot of walking and went to the coliseum and looked outside some museums. It’s nuts how many tourists there are walking here. I was able to get us in to the Coliseum for free hahaha. We went to a travel booth on the way and found out that today was White Night or ‘La Notte Bianca’ and that all the museums/stores would be open till 6 am all night. We thought that was awesome so we decided to stay in Rome till the last bus back to the hotel which comes at 11. We went for dinner and then when we came out there were literally thousands of people walking on the roads! The major streets in the city center were all closed and all these people we walking around and going places. It was crazy how man people there were! What a great day to get lost hehehe. Anyways we looked around a little more and since it was getting late started heading back to the bus pickup point. Interestingly enough the road there was closed so I had no clue how to get back to the hotel! We ran into a ton of tourists from the Sheraton, Hilton, and Holiday Inn who were in the same situation as us. Some of the girls were really good looking of course and English speaking but that’s besides the point of course. I tried calling the hotel to find out what was going on. The hotel gave me retarded directions to a different location that the bus was waiting at. We ran around for like 1 hour like chickens with our heads cut off and I called the hotel at least 5 times…no luck! When we got back to where the original bus stop all the other tourists were gone – so did we miss the bus or did they all give up and take taxis? What to do now, here we are stranded with thousands of people parading the streets and no idea how to get back to the hotel. Oddly enough we ran into a couple from Australia who had also missed the bus and we split a cab back to the hotel. Turns out the bus left without us (who knows where it was) and man did I bitch at the hotel people. Not only did I have to pay for the cab but I wasted so many minutes on my cell phone! Anyways, we got back to the hotel safe and sound and man am I gonna yell at the Manager for taxi/cell phone money tomorrow. Other than that ‘adventure’ the day was awesome and I can’t wait till tomorrow!

My hotel!

In Rome and already lost!

I caught the 10:00 pm flight from Toronto to Frankfurt and had lots of trouble falling asleep on the plane. I only ended up sleeping like 1.5 hours on the 8 hour flight. That’s probably because I was flying economy class and by legs are just too damn long! But it’s no big deal – anyone who knows me knows I can survive on little sleep hehehehe. It was funny though cause there was an old Indian guy sitting behind who kept getting angry at me when I was tossing and turning on my seat. Otherwise the first part of the flight went quite smoothly. Customs didn’t give me or Peter any problems and I watched ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ on the plane - it was ok.
When we got to Frankfurt we had to kill like 4 hours to wait for the switch to Rome, so we went for lunch. I was pretty full but surprisingly enough Peter was not at all. I guess my metabolism has really slowed down a lot in the last few years – though I can still beat anyone in Pizza Hut buffet when I have to! Anyways we went to a restaurant in the airport and then walked around the plaza in the airport for a little while. I’m surprised at how laid back the luggage security was with my handbag, but that’s a good thing of course. When we got on the plane I was surprised that there was no space anywhere up top to put my luggage so I just put it on the food tray in front of my chair. The flight attendants were very relaxed and very good looking too hahahahaha.Now the fun began. We got to Rome – again security was very relaxed and it was an interesting adventure trying to find the rental car booth. Peter’s eye was got irritated for some reason so he was walking quite slow but we were able to find the rental guy and finalize everything for the car. Turns out the car is SUPER nice and much better than I could have imagined for the price we got it for. We got some basic directions from the rental guy to get to the Holiday Inn I had booked and then loaded our luggage into the car. The STUPID GPS was not working for some reason so we had to go by what the guy told us and hope we could get the hotel which was only 14 km away. This is when everything went crazy. I made a wrong turn and missed the Autostrada Rome highway ramp and then went in a circle and ended up on some other highway. We ended up stopping at an Avis rental store somewhere and didn’t get any help cause they didn’t speak English, filled some gas and then drove in a huge circle again…pathetically trying to get back to the airport and start over again! Speaking of which the gas station guy never gave me a receipt and gas is super expensive here. Anyways back to the story we ended up exactly where we were somehow again (near the Avis) and then I saw a Marriott hotel nearby and stopped and asked them to get to the Holiday Inn. They laughed of course but gave me directions. We then were on our way. I was able to make it as close to as within sight towards the hotel but then went in some weird circle (they’re a lot of those in Rome!) and ended up on some other highway! Luckily somehow the GPS started working and it gave us directions (though somewhat inaccurate) to get back to the Hotel. After at least 2 hours of mindless driving we were able to get to the hotel which was only 14 km from the airport! Once we got there we unpacked and figured let’s go look around for dinner nearby. Since we were going to look for somewhere close we didn’t bother bringing the GPS – big mistake! I drove onto the loopy road thing again and accidentally ended up on the circular Rome highway again. This time though we recognized things quite a bit (since we drove by them like 10 times earlier) and we were able to get back to the hotel. I then drove on the loop road again and didn’t go on the highway. We drove around nearby and couldn’t find anything to eat. It was getting very late now so we just went to the hotel bar and had some cheese sandwiches. This ends my first day in Rome… I still don’t have internet working though.

All set and ready to go!

It's incredible how things have come together in the last few days. One week ago I seriously doubted we would actually be able to do this trip cause everything and anything was going wrong. I’m so excited about leaving for Rome tonight!!!! I magically was able to get a buyback lease for an automatic!!! Peugeot 307 Station Wagon in less than a week’s notice which is unheard of - usually you need to book these 45 days in advance and they were actually “sold out” a month ago but I spoke with the Manager of AutoEurope’s Canada division and he was able to pull it together somehow for me. This is really good because you actually have to be 25 years old to rent an automatic premium car of this type in Europe. Other than that we have mostly everything else in place and planned out.
It’s actually quite funny though cause my boss freaked me out yesterday telling me that we might need to delay this trip (which I’ve spent over a month planning!) and go to Japan first, but that’s a long story and let’s just say I’m still headed for Europe, for now at least! I would’ve loved to visit Japan though.
Other than that I can’t believe this trip is actually happening and I’m really looking forward to it.

The start of it all!

Why doesn’t anyone who I tell this job description to believe me! It is true - I am going to travel across Europe (and get paid) to measure video signals and I’ll be doing it with Peter Wong, another co-op from UW. It might sound crazy but that’s what I’m doing until the end of December!!!
It’s be interesting to see how a religious, vegetarian, brown guy from Canada will survive traveling all across Europe.