Europe 2006

I'd better start to get into the habit of writing in this blog regularly, especially once I actually start traveling, or else my family and students who have had this blog address thrust upon them won't, when they don't bother to check it, be missing much. I haven't actually left on my trip to Croatia yet, but I've been planning the stuffing out of it, and I think it's actually so uber-planned that even the most anal of uber-planners (read: me) would be satisfied. For the time being. So what do you think of this itinerary:

• Calgary-Milan
  
• Milan - Lecco (hello, Noor! More on him later)
  
• Lecco- Menaggio
  
• Menaggio - Treviso
  
• Treviso - Pula
  
• Pula - Trogir
  
• Trogir - Dubrovnik
  
• Dubrovnik - Milan
  

WOULD YOU BELIEVE that my husband's cousins in Dubai, as well as my brother-in-law in Victoria BC, are all going to Croatia around the same time as we are... but our itineraries are all off to a sufficient degree that we won't be seeing each other. Incredibly frustrating. A frustrating coincidence. My brother-in-law is renting a boat and sailing with friends from Split to Dubrovnik. Oh no, I wouldn't say I'm JEALOUSSSSS.....

Has anyone found a better way to get from Dubrovnik to Milan other than to fly SkyEurope to Bergamo and take a train or bus from there? It's pretty cheap, and doesn't take two days and an overnight in Ancona. Love to hear your thoughts on the matter.

So, last blog (I know you all read it), I said I was going to mention how the Jewish girl became big sister to the Muslim. Considering what's going on between Isreal and Lebanon at the moment, my story is even more meaningful (in my opinion, of course). Here goes... two years ago November, my mother falls ill while traveling in northern Italy. Someone from the family needs to go over there and take care of her, then bring her home. My siblings and I, spread across Canada, discuss it briefly over the phone, and we decide that my brother will go over first, then I'll meet him there.

End of October, flying from Frankfurt to Milan, watching a huge orange harvest moon from the inside of an airplane, leaving my husband and two boys behind (not to mention my job). Perhaps the most depressing day of my life. Worried sick about my mother, who is battling pneumonia with two tubes down her throat in an Italian hospital.

I finally arrive in Lecco, after two flights, a bus, and a train. My brother meets me at the train station and we walk to our hotel (Hotel Moderno, I highly recommend it). To shorten this long story, our visits overlap by a day, during which he shows me the route to the hospital, and a bit of the old city to orient myself.

Two weeks I spend in Lecco, visiting my mother twice each day in the hospital. Two weeks watching her in desperate discomfort, not knowing when she'll be released, or how permanent the damage will be. I suppose I wasn't tripping lightly through the stores when I bought my groceries or used the internet cafe, and one day the gentleman who owned Planet Net struck up a conversation with me (we actually blundered through some fractured French until I figured out he spoke perfect English). He was probably wondering what a sad Canadian girl was doing in Lecco in November. After hearing about my mother, he took me under his wing, driving me here and there, buying me coffee, showing me pictures and telling me all about his beautiful fiancée Irum, and encouraging endless stories about my family. We eventually got around to the Star of David around my neck, which I presumed would come up eventually, as my new friend Noor is a devout Muslim, originally from Pakistan.

We talked about the formation of the state of Isreal; we talked about the international situation and the atrocities committed in the Middle East. We talked about my life as a Jew in Canada, and his as a Pakistani Muslim in Italy. I don't think there were too many topics that we didn't eventually cover.

After two weeks, my mother had recovered sufficiently to be air ambulanced home, after having received small gifts and many good wishes from a dozen merchants and small business owners in Lecco who passed their messages to her through me (Noor included). Noor drove me to Milan and saw me to my hotel; when we said goodbye, he told me that I had shown him Judaism in a new light, and he considered me his "sorella". When I finally returned to Prince Rupert, I filled my husband in on the latest news regarding my mother, then told him all about Noor. I don't know who was more grateful for a stranger's friendship in a time of crisis: myself, or my husband.

So, Noor (and his new wife Irum) and I have kept in touch over the past two years, and the ONE and ONLY reason we are flying into Italy rather than Croatia is so that I can see Noor (my "fratello"), meet his wife, and have them meet my family after all this time.

It's so easy, especially if one is a jew or muslim, to think of the conflict in very black-and-white terms. Black and white ain't always right. Get out there and meet some people, see some things before forming opinions.

So, if you read my last blog (and I just know you did), you realize that we are meeting not ONE but TWO sets of friends on this trip. Can't wait!

Lots done since the last blog entry, including the actual take-a-deep-breath-and-pay-for-the-tickets stage: four place tickets from Calgary Alberta to Milan, return. Not a bad price, but still contributed to a nothing short of whopping Mastercard bill. I haven't taken the plunge yet for the Eurail passes, but that's coming.

This isn't the first time we've gone over to Europe, and our memories are interwoven and glued together with incredible experiences with wonderful people we've met there. Take Vincent and Beillou, for example. We met them in Ayuttaya Thailand in 2001; a boyfriend and girlfriend trying to have a romantic dinner beside a rowdy family of four with two young boys (actually, my husband Martin and I were the rowdy ones). They were a French couple living and working in Taiwan. One thing led to another, and the six of us decided to take a canal tour of the local wats together. It was gorgeous! I felt that the friendship was truly cemented when Vincent and I decided at a wat-stop that we needed to head over to the bathroom, which was a light-year away, and when we headed back we found that part of the grounds had been cordoned off in our absence, and sprinting across the forbidden area motivated guards to scream and give chase. Upon returning to the boat, our respective partners were less than pleased. It was worth it. I really had to go.

The next day Vincent and Beillou were driving to Lopburi, what I affectionately call "Monkey Town" as it is lousy with monkeys, crawling with monkeys, rife and overflowing with monkeys. Monkeys on the streets, on the rooftops, on hydro poles, and especially in the ruins of wats where people leave food for them. Monkeys sitting in corners, monkeys sitting in rubble, monkeys examining their genitalia while sitting atop a Buddha. But I digress. I'm sure you, my fellow travelers, understand the joy and excitement I felt when our new friends offered to drive the four of us to Lopburi, if we were heading that way. A free ride offered by interesting people? Oh, I think so. On the way Vincent was a captive audience to my rant about the Swiffer, patiently listening until I had finished then disclosing that he works for Proctor and Gamble, the company that makes them (can we count this as a business trip now??). He also inducted us into the Pringles fan club, and we became Pringles addicts on that trip; ducking into grocery stores to find the most exotic flavours (I thought I had won when the grocer told me the mysterious tube of chips was "apple" flavour; it was in fact beef soup flavoured), popping them open on trains to down with a Fanta. Ahh.

Four years pass. We have had two further trips abroad, one to Germany, one to Italy. I'm cleaning out my desk at home, and whose business card do I find, but Vincent's. I smile as I remember their kindness and generosity, not to mention the monkeys and the Pringles. I dash off an email to Vincent, not altogether sure that he'll remember me, and after a day or two I receive an email in reply, followed by one from Beillou. They're married now, with two children, and have a beautiful home in Sartrouville, France. We emailed a few more times, then began planning our next trip; I teach French at a high school here in Prince Rupert, so I was really pushing for France. Martin, who is at all times a good sport, and who also remembered that we had been twice to his Fatherland, agreed. I requested a suggestion from Beuillou for a hotel in Paris, and received back an invitation to stay in their home. They drove us to Auvers to see where Van Gogh had died, and to Giverny to see Monet's lilyponds. They cooked incredible meals for us, took us to parks and markets, and were incredible hosts. We fell in love with their children, who treated us like Uncle Martin and Aunt Nancy, and our two boys like big brothers. They have since sent us French CDs for my French music units, and Van Gogh postcards for my French art unit, along with dozens of pictures of the kids. And the best part about this story is that Vincent and Beillou and their two perfect children Arthur and Morgane are going to meet us in Croatia!

I guess it wouldn't help to say that I'm married to the bald one... Vincent is the one standing, beside his wonderful wife Beillou.

I love this picture of Vincent and Arthur. We were just coming back from a farmer's market near their home. The flowers are for Beillou.

Next: How the Jewish girl met the Muslim man and became his big sister.

Yes, I really do look like this.

So, who are we, and why are we writing a blog? We are a family of four: one mom, one dad, and two teenage boys. We are one lawyer, one teacher, two students, three music lovers, two fishermen, two avid readers, and one soccer player. And we are all four of us travel junkies.

I tend to overplan things. Ask any of my friends, students, or family members. Be it lesson plans, dinners, or vacations, each city, each train trip, each night's accommodation is planned in advance. "Oh, woe betide the unspontaneous Nancy" scoff my friends, but I think back to occasions such as when we reclined on the teak porch of the "Little Home" inn in Chiangmai, nibbling on fresh mango and chilis as the dusty travelers wandered in and then wandered out again, searching for last-minute accommodation for the Chiangmai Flower Festival, and finding none. Unspontaneous Nancy had booked the inn two months earlier, and from Canada to boot. Boring? Sure. Best seats in the house for the parade? Yep.

So now I add another layer to the anal pre-planning of our next trip, and that is to blog it senseless three months before we get on the plane. I probably just like the sound of my own typing. More to come!

Perhaps I look like I've had several glasses already? I could only wish.