Venice - Part 1

Venice. That's the only word I could think of to describe this weekend. There are no flashy words that package it up nicely and there is just too much to say in a short time. So, as I often try to do, I will simply write stories about the weekend and about experiences that were had. There's no way around it, this is going to be long. Very long. So I'm going to break it up into each of the five days that we were there and just go with that.

Day 0:
I actually have to throw in an extra day because the adventure started on Thursday night of last week, six days ago. All of Team Venicore (as we aptly named ourselves) met up in Neumann Hall to make some pre-game crepes and breakfast. We made a plethora of crepes, muffins, jams, apple dips, and other great things in order to prepare for our trip. Well, the thought was good, but in reality…we ate all the food. So no crepe/muffin breakfast. We had leftover apples and such, but yeah…nothing crazy. To be honest, I knew that would happen, but it's still kind of ironic that we eat all our food the eve of.

Most of us were wise and got to bed relatively early, but unfortunately, I was not a member or that wise group, but for good reason. First of all, I was dinking around with Dwight in his room checking out last minute hostel stuff when there was a knock on the door and who is it? None other than our good friend, Chrissy! Chrissy was, unfortunately, out of the country (as in, back home in the States) for the past week due to a death in the family. It was quite good to see her back up and home with us here in Lithuania. Rita cooked her some delicious food for her and we all conversed for a while. It was super nice. Honestly, how she made it back here to Lithuania is a mystery to me. She had some serious grace from God because nearly every other flight on the East Coast, except for hers, was cancelled due to the heavy snowfall. It ended up working out perfectly. Following a hearty dialogue with her, Will, Rita, and in and out pieces of Natalya (due to a school project) we ended heading to out rooms around 2a. I got to crash on Will's floor and it was surprisingly comfy, thanks to his roommate lending me some blankets and sheets and stuff. Will and I chatted in and out with his roommates between German and English and we scored some late night pillow talk and had some good conversations. The roommates were in and out for smoke breaks, but it was great regardless, good company, nice floor, and the smell of smoke. Three things that have good memories for me.

Day 1:
5:45. Alarm goes off, DJ wakes me up, and I am left to wander in between consciousness until he steps out of the shower. Inward I step into the awkwardly designed shower and it is warm. That's a good start. It's snowing outside. That's a bad start. We round up the gang one by one as well as the Paris group, who is bussing it up with us. Me. Check. Dwight. Check. Elly. Check. Rita. Check. Amanda. Check. Jessica. Check. Natalya. Check. So far so good, 7 out of 7.

We make a slow trek to the bus station, which is about a mile or so away. There is light dusting snow and it's very annoying. Walking has become so normal here that walking a mile is like taking a brisk breath of fresh air. No bigs. We proceed to the bus station and there, waiting for us is…no bus. It's ok, we're thirteen minutes early. We wait. It's cold. We keep waiting. It keeps staying cold. 6:50 rolls up. A bus pulls in. Perfect timing. Psych! It's not our bus. This looks bad, everyone looks at me, the ticket-booker, with looks of confusion, hope, and slight petulance. I give a goofy smile back that kind of says, "Hey…crazy huh?". The driver throws out some Russian and Natalya translates for us. The bus is late. Sigh of relief. Kind of a close call, but not so much because it wasn't even our (my) fault.

Seven O'clock in the AM and our bus pulls into the station. Not especially incredible, but it's coachy so we pile on thankful for the glad tidings that we really are going to Latvia and that we really may travel outside of Lithuania. The bus ride is mostly uneventful this side of Lithuania. People are napping, snacking, and doing the like. I'm bickering with Amanda. The usual. Latvia is in sight. Our bus stops.

The guy who boarded our bus was slightly stocky, but in a muscular kind of way. He is wearing an enormous amount of Green with a little hat to add to the mix. He has some barely pronounceable surname. He's checking passports. He makes his way to the back where I happen to be sitting, along with Natalya, Rita, and Amanda. One by one, they are good. He sees Natalya's last name, and despite her U.S. passport, he rattles off to her in Russian. She responds. I remain clueless. He takes Rita's passport. And trouble hits. It didn't hit like a light drizzle on a beach, it hit like a tsunami on a small Latin nation.

Rita isn't supposed to travel in Latvia due to her Mexican passport. Not good. She is supposed to have a visa, but alas, she doesn't have one. More Russian is exchanged. I sit by very impatiently and very much distraught. Rita looks horrified. I can't blame her. Latvia-man leaves the bus with Rita's passport and says that he'll be back. Time goes on. Tick. Tock. Rita is freaking out. I'm freaking out. Our whole bus is freaking out. Latvia-man comes back, gives Rita her passport and says something along the lines of "хорошёй дороги" which translates roughly into "travel safe." I let out a huge sigh of relief. Obstacle 1 of X is overcome.

What is funny is that we were playing Hearts in the back row of the bus when we hit Latvia. During this craziness, the cards were drawn up and put away. We didn't look at them for a while.

We make it to Riga without any other crazy incidents. We left in the morning from Klaipeda, Lithuania and we were standing proudly in Riga, Latvia. Two out of Four countries down on our daily travel guide. We check in almost immediately and then grab some snacks before we pass through security. But something goes wrong. Natalya had put her nationality down on her boarding pass, which is Russian, but her passport is from the US. To her credit, the website was massively confusing, but sadly, she got some slack a warning from the Ryanair clerk. But she made it through. Obstacle 2 of X completed.

We ate oranges, apples, peanuts, and other assortments as we waited before going through security. We had a 14:25 flight to Sweden and it was about 12:30 as we were eating lunch. We made it to Riga in about 4.5 hours. Lunch passes, security is a breeze, and we are off to Sweden. We wait a little extra and board our flight a tad bit late, but we have no more hassles and, before long, we are airborne to Stockholm (region), Sweden. An hour later we touch down. Three out of Four countries.

Stockholm Skavsta Airport is small. Tiny, rather. If you compare it in Bethel terms, the whole terminal area is about the size of the BC, ground floor. Not small generally speaking, but very small airportly speaking. This is a good thing. We have 1.5 hours before our last flight to Venice-Treviso, and it makes that time seem endlessly long, and I'm OK with that. We land, check in, and fly through security. People in Sweden are funny. They speak in in very melodic, Indo-European language and they sport their mullets proudly.

One muffin, Fanta Exotic, and a few Cokes later, Team Venicore was packing it up from Sweden. It had been about twelve hours since we left home base and now we were packing up our bags and about to head to Italy. I seriously didn't think we would make it. It was preposterous to think that in just a few short hours, we would be this close to somewhere so far from Lithuania.

Onboard. We're in the waaaaaaaay back row. Last row. Me. Amanda. Natalya. Natalya is good at sleeping in/during any condition so she is gone within the first fifteen minutes. This left me and Amanders to basically chat it up for the two hours to Venice. We had some good conversations. And we played cards. Lots of cards. It was actually a really great plane ride and we were even the first people off! And not only were we off the plane, we were in Italy!!

Italian people looked exactly like I pictured them. Dark skinned, medium-dark hair--soft eyes. They looked like they belonged in a movie or something. I wanted to put one in my baggage, but I only had a carry-on, so it wouldn't have worked out. We all gather in the airport, making trips to the bathroom and other such things. There was a dude walking around with a sign with my name on it. I flagged him down and he gathered us like chicks to his van and began the awkward drive to our hostel. Since I was organizer-man, I had to sit up front and chill. He spoke broken English, so I just tried to look contemplative, like I was tired and had a lot on my mind. I think it worked because he didn't ask me many questions. He dropped us five off at our hostel and then DJ connived him into dropping them off at their hostel, all for the price of 10 Euro.

All five of us walk into the hostel. This could be either a great experience or a horrific experience. Our reception dude greets us. He gives us the bill, we split the cost. Yadda Yadda Yadda. Then, he goes nuts. He whips out a map and circles everything important in Venice, right down to the best gelato in town. He shows us museums, boat schedules, bus schedules into the city, shopping district, etc. right on down the line. Information overload. He gave us all the info we could ever need to know about Venice tourism and then some. He gave us the map, explained how to get on the busses to the city and then showed us to our room.

Our room was epic. It was a seven person, divided into three bedrooms. Natalya and Amanda got one room, Rite and Jessica another, and I got a room to myself. Score. We basically got our stuff settled in, threw the map out on our table and figured out our game plan. Plan: Go to Venice, buy transportation tickets, have good time. Something like that. Since it wasn't needlessly late, we also decided that we should go out that night and talk a walk around where our hostel was. In all reality, our hostel wasn't in a very incredible location, and it was about 30 minutes from Venice, but we were able to locate the bus stop we would to use the next day and then we found a small scale, low key Italian restaurant. The owner sent us upstairs to the dining room.

Culture Shock. I never thought it would set in between a new culture and my Lithuanian culture, but it did. First thing that was surprising: people were loud. There was some big Italian family party going on at one table. And the people were having a good time.

We sat at a quiet table in the back and what was on our table? Italian breadsticks! No, these were not like at the Olive Garden, rather, they were like long, narrow crackers. Like something you would put in your soup. Kind of awkward. Kind of a letdown. But the food was no let down. We got pizza and the pizza was crazy cheap (5 Euros)! It was some of the most amazing, delicious pizza known to mankind, and it was mega odd for what I normally would like. One pizza was grape tomatoes and basil and it was bombsauce; the other was artichoke with some other goodies, and it also was mostly incredible.

Following this, we walked back, gathered our agenda for the next morning and we all spent our very first night in Italy, under the clear sky. A brisk thirty kilometers outside of the city of Venice.