Vacation in Deutchland

Date: Oct 1990

I finally managed to get out of Switzerland for a week. I went to Germany.

First I go to the bank for German money. It's really pathetic when you're standing in these huge lines, and you see all the Swiss there getting ready with their passports (Swiss passports are big red things with a cross on them) so they can get their money. Then I remember, 'Crap! I don't have my passport with me!'. Then it's my turn!! I know she's going to tell Big Brother a scummy foreigner is walking around without his passport and has the gall to want his money! Then I'll get fined again.

Just then at another line I hear: "Passports!?! We don't need no steeenking passports!!" and then these Mexicans start throwing burritos and stuff. Then the Americans start yelling 'Real Food fight' and war broke out as all the North Americans started fighting over a enchilada. The Mexicans being new here didn't know yet how valuable their ammo was. Then this dazed Australian bushman asks me if this is a local sport, and I tells him : "Thats 'Roo Meat, Mate" and then the Australians get into the fight. Now the bank-tellers have dove for cover under the desks behind the bullet proof glass separating us, even though they are completely safe. So I climb up on this African basketball players' shoulders and climb over the glass and cram my pockets with as much Deutsche Marks as I can. Luckily the cameras aren't picking me up since the transparent bullet-proof glass is now hopelessly smeared with burritos and enchiladas. The Swiss are still hiding under the desks. Then I quietly make my getaway. So now I'm ready to start my adventure in Deutchland!

First I go to München (Munich). It's a very nice city with lots of neat old buildings. If you go, check out the new RatHaus (House of Rats - City Hall) which looks a couple centuries older than the old RatHaus. And check out the old churches. They're amazing. And go to the Deutches Museum, which is probably the best science museum in the world. I only got to spend 2 hours instead of 2 days there. It is so big, it has several locomotives and submarines in it, and apparently a V2 rocket. Unfortunately I never made it to the Astro section. Oh, yeh, late Sunday night I wandered around in the rain and stumbled into Oktoberfest and watched people throw up. The young people in Munich are very nice and the ones over 35 are mean to you unless you pay them lots of money. I spent about 2 or 3 days there. You are very lucky if you find a place to stay and it has to be done early morning.

Then I go to Heidelberg. I really like Heidelberg. It's got this long pedestrian walkway of ancient buildings with lots of cafes and pubs that cater to the young. 1 in 4 residents here is a student. I hear that there are 17000 Americans there, mostly because of the Army I think. They got this great castle thats been wrecked lots of times. The last time one of the Princes was rebuilding it after a war, he just finished one of the 25 palaces and then God struck with a bolt of lightning. He took this as a sign and moved to Mannheim and built his castle there. In the wine cellar is the Fass (Grosse Fass - or great cask), the worlds biggest wine barrel that can hold 220,000 liters. I spent about 2 days in Heidelberg. I should have stayed longer.

Then I went to Mainz. The way I chose which cites to visit was mostly that you have to get to the next city in time for the tourist office to be open so they can find you a room. Otherwise you're screwed. So you spend the first part of the day traveling by train, then looking for a place and then everything is closed. You go on a quest for food, goof off and then go to bed. Then you either do the same thing over the next day, or spend the whole day in the same city or you won't see anything. So either spend several days at a place, or book your room in advance. When it says in 'Lets Go, Europe' to book months in advance, they aren't kidding.

So now I'm in Mainz because I knew the tourist office would be open when I got there. I got into the Youth Hostel. Nice well organized place run by some snot who must have had some Swiss DNA. It was Hell. About every 10 seconds I kept hearing Boeing 747's being dropped through the floor. I got up to punch out the jerks doing this, but it turned out it was just billions of doors slamming all over the place and it wasn't being done on purpose. The doors were designed to be obnoxious. Anyway, I spent all my time in Mainz on the right bus going in the wrong direction. I'm glad I carry a flashlight in my knapsack for when I get thrown out at the end of the line at night. I hate Mainz.

Then I went to Köln (Cologne). The only thing I really went to see was the Kolner Dome, the German version of the Eiffel tower AND IS IT EVER NEAT! At first I almost didn't spend the money to climb the 500+ steps to go up the tower cause I figure I have seen enough cities from high up, but I did anyway. This is a must! It's the thin spiral staircase, and the bell-tower and the architecture of the inside thats real neat. I wonder how many fat people have been stuck there. The rest of Köln is a big money trap. Postcards are about $1.50, and the people are rude as usual. (I didn't meet any under 35).

I really wanted to get north to see Bremen, Hanover and especially Berlin and steal whats left of their wall, but because the problems with room-hunting eating up my sight-seeing time, I had no time. I was also using a 4 day unlimited train pass, and I wanted to use the last day of it getting back to Munich (south) or else it would cost alot more.

So I end up on this train full of drunken Germans. First, it's full. So I'm sitting on the itty bitty stairs for exiting the railway car. After an hour or two I find a seat of somebody that the Germans threw off the train. Probably a Swiss guy. They're looped. There's empty beer cans and and an empty whiskey bottle at my seat. I accidently kick over a half full can of coke on the floor. One guy standing in the aisle almost gets his ass successfully set on fire by another comedian. I was getting ready to spray his ass with a shaken can of coke in case he did go up in flames too close to me. The guy on the other side of the aisle keeps slapping me to get my attention and say "gorp gorp gorp HAW HAW HAW gorp gorp". Then he starts calling me a crazy man.

I got off at Munich at 7 pm. I know theres no chance to find a room this late but I figure I'll try and if successful, spend the next day there, otherwise jump for a 4 hour train ride back to Zürich on my prepaid ticket. Well, there's no more trains back to Zürich after 7 pm. The lineup at the tourist office is ridiculous. I go on a quest for food. I come back. The lineup at the tourist office is ridiculous. So I pick out the best looking blonde babe in the line and try the line "Hey, weren't you still in this line 2 hours ago?" (turns out she was).

I'm trying to make arrangements to stay at wherever she and her friends might find. So finally her other Australian bushman friends who were inside come out and say "No room". So we decide that we're probably sleeping in the train station. She lends me a sleeping mat, and her bushman brother lends me a sleeping sack and they take off to go somewhere. So I kill time and then join my other 300 friends on the train-station floor. We watched screaming matches between young American female air-heads and other amusements. Then at 5:30 in the morning the Gestapo came in and started kicking me. I went and found my Ozzie friends. Then since I'm a non-European (ie: non-smoker) it was evident to me real fast that there was something in the air. So I ran for the exit and abandoned my buddies being gassed by the Imperial Storm-troopers. I never saw my friends again...

Then I jumped on the first train to Zürich at 7am. I spent about 900 Deutcsh marks. (around $600 CDN)

I heard through email from Tim Snider, a Waterloo person who recently escaped with the help of the English underground. Tim is the only North American who left Switzerland that I ever heard from again. I know now how Big Brother tracks people. Tim recently asked me to pay his dentist bill here for him. Luckily he had an American dentist, who warned me never to go to a Swiss dentist cause they'll find a big cavity and you'll end up with bugging and tracking electronics in your mouth. So I'm gonna let my teeth rot till I return to Canada or else I might disappear too when I try to leave.