Feels like home to me / Happy birthday in Adventures in paradise

I’ve made it back home!

I tell you what though. It feels bloody weird being back. I know I was only away for a month.
I think it’s because my eyes were opened, seeing a liberating country like Netherlands with their open pot-use, drinking and legal prostitution.
Then there was Germany, first Kohn, which reminded me of Brisbane except that it had a gigantic gothic cathetral!
Berlin was very open-minded in particular. Sitting at a bar with a bunch of strangers, all from different countries, laughing whilst hardcore gay-porn played on screens either side of the bar on big flatscreen TV’s.
And then how could I forget Paris?
Especially right after the terrorist attack that happened.
No-one was rude to me. The citizens were getting on with their lives as though nothing had happened. That’s what damn-well impressed me. How strong they were, and are. I ended up being there for almost an entire week!
I climbed the Eiffel Tower with my friend and an awesome tour guide who provided so much history and knowledge, and I went to Disneyland where I got motion sickness but went on them anyway. No lines anywhere.
That was where I also stayed in that quirky guy’s Gay Guesthouse haha.
It was also where I got with the hottest guy of the entire trip.

Yeah I probably didn’t plan things the best for my first trip. I mean, going through Brussells three times without actually stopping turned out to be poor planning. The third time was interesting though, given the strong security and having my bag thoroughly searched. Just as well everything was in plastic bags.

England was where I spent most of my time. And it was nice to fly from Berlin into Manchester. The customs officers in Germany were a bit scary, especially when they saw my Australian passport and they couldn’t initially find the stamp from English customs (it was just faintly stamped, that’s why).
It was great to be able to see a city other than the centre of London, and I definitely left Manchester with a smile on my face.

The flights back weren’t too bad at all. I had extra-legroom on both flights, although the second flight had a damn thing in the way next to the exit door, so it kind of blocked a lot of the freedom I would have had. I just had to invade the personal space of the 6 foot 6 guy next to me. He doesn’t really have a choice when it comes to plane-seating. He was very friendly and we chatted for a lot of the flight.
My first flight, the seat next to me was spare, but there was a big guy at the window seat. It was funny whenever the trolley would come around. He’d order like 4 cans of coke each time, so by the end of the flight, the spare seat next to us looked like a rubbish tip with all of his coke cans haha. He was a big fella.

I just watched a fuckload of movies. That’s what helped pass the time and I think I watched about 8 on the first flight and about another 5 or 6 on the second. I was glad Qantas had a lot of Australian films I’d wanted to see, such as ‘Oddball’ and ‘Last Cab To Darwin’. Wow, ‘Last Cab To Darwin’ was pretty full-on! Love Michael Caton’s films.

I filled in the landing card and I wasn’t sure whether to declare my chocolate I’d bought (English truffles), as I thought they’d be classified as dairy, and also the pair of shoes I’d bought, as one of hte options said to declare shoes that had been in contact with soil. I hadn’t walked much in those shoes because they weren’t worn in yet, so I just put a ‘-‘ next to them, which meant ‘not sure’ and I went via the ‘Items to declare’ section.
Luckily they were very friendly and helpful and it wasn’t that busy, since my flight arrived just after 5am. The shoes I didn’t need to worry about but they X-Ray’d my bags and I was glad I declared the chocolate truffles because I did need to. Turns out they were fine too.
A guy went through the stuff in my bag and he said he was happy and I went on my way through. Woohoo! He did look at my teabags for a while, until I said they were tea haha. I suppose criminals could try to put anything in there.

I caught the train home, glad there was still money on my Go-Card, and I pretty much had a much-needed shower after 24 hours of flying and went to bed. The bad thing is that I barely slept on either of the flights :( I dozed off briefly at one point but there was a 4-year old behind me (the tall guy next to me’s kid) who kept stealing my pillows which were against the window LOL. I just went for a walk and grabbed a spare one, as the flight wan’t full.

So it was a comfortable trip home and the moment I was sitting at the train station in that beautiful warm Brisbane morning air, I had to think to myself if the trip I’d just embarked on actually happened.

I can finally say I made my first overseas trip. I didn’t expect a terrorist attack to happen in one of the destinations I was going to, nor did I expect arrests to happen the day before in a city who’s train station I was trans-sitting at the following day, but no-one can predict these things.
It was beautiful going in their Autumn. I was so glad I did.
Yes it was cold and wet and windy, especially in London, but so cool to be around all of those different accents and cultures and languages.

I left my damn adapter on a French train. I left my towel in Berlin, and I left my dignity in pretty much every country.

But fuck I had a good time.

It’s going to be weird adjusting back to reality.

I’m writing this at 3:03am, since I clearly haven’t adjusted timezones yet. And it’s my birthday but damn it doesn’t feel like it.

Last updated December 04, 2015