American Life In The Summertime #29 - The Baltics

After the friendliness of Vegas and Oktoberfest, at first glance the Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania did not appear to hold the same promise of a warm welcome.

However things quickly picked up in these former Soviet satellite states. Estonians are nothing if not opportunistic. Already occupied by Russia just before the October Revolution in 1917, in February 1918 the Germans were moving in on the Estonian capital Tallinn, and so the Red Army withdrew. In the 6 hours between the withdrawal of Russian troops and the arrival of the German occupation, Estonia promptly declared independence. The fact that they were immediately re-occupied by first Germany, and then Russia again (in World War II) before finally achieving their freedom for good in 1991, does not stop Estonians from continuing to celebrate February 24 1918 as their "Independence Day" (they also get to hold another one celebrating freedom from the Soviets on 20 August 1991. Both of these, satisfyingly, Estonians take off as national holidays).

To stop the Soviets from destroying the city in order to rebuild it in the Soviet image - as was their wont at the time - the citizens of Tallinn had established a habit of turning the lights out at night, making it impossible for Soviet bombers to find. This strategy actually worked until Women's Day 1944, when the Estonians kind of forgot they were supposed to be hiding from Russian bombers and let off so many fireworks that Tallinn was promptly located and a bombing raid hastily organised. Sadly, the men of the Russian air force proved to be so hung over (yes, from Women's Day celebrations) that women were forced to operate the aircraft, and bomb the city that had been revealed due to Women's Day celebrations. Yay, equality.

Estonia clearly took their Stupid Ways To Destroy Your City lessons from neighbours Latvia. 100 years before Tallinn's Women's Day celebrations, Napoleon's army was sweeping toward the Latvian capital Riga, and rather than fight a superior force the Riga town leaders had the contingency plan to burn down the city as they escaped, leaving Napoleon nothing to take (the fact that this "scorched earth" policy was copied by the Russians 100 years later & allowed them to withstand the German assault during World War II, and eventually fight back & eventually occupy Latvia themselves for six decades is an irony apparently lost on the Latvians, judging from the small sample I took). Anyway, one day the Riga lookout noted the presence of an approaching army and duly signaled the town guard to burn the city. Several hours later, with no sign of Napoleon, scouts were deployed to observe that the approaching army was, in fact, a herd of cows, making Latvia the only country in the world where the citizens burned down their own capital city to avoid capture by cows.

After spending the better part of the past 18 months in parts of the world as varied as Africa, the US, and Europe, I have regularly noted a very satisfying phenomenon. I am pleased to report that the Baltics share this affection. On a recommendation, we went to a bar in Estonia and discovered that it was student night. Despite initial concerns that this would mean a night suffering through music which might charitably be described as "after my time", student night apparently involved a large screen being set up in the middle of the bar on which a succession of 80s music videos were shown, and a succession of Estonian students stared transfixed at them, moving awkwardly in the kind of "dancing" I know only too well. Not merely your average 80s songs, these videos were absolutely the top of their game, some of which even I had forgotten: dudes with huge curly perms, girls with severe power mullets (the female version of which I like to call the Mullette), double denim everywhere, and my personal favourite of the guy laying back playing the sax bare-chested in bed (he was "Hungry For Love", you see, although how this could have possibly been the case with the image he was presenting the world I don't know). Best was the prehistoric technology in evidence at the start of the MTV era, where video sets involved a backdrop of a plain black curtain into which had been embedded a modest number of bare white light bulbs, which blinked in rudimentary co-ordination and represented the very height of video clip production available at the time. Needless to say, I was very pleased. The Baltics might have only joined the western world in the last 20 years, but they seem to be paying eternal homage to the popular culture of the time they achieved their freedom, and that's completely alright with me. The Baltics are definitely worth a visit. Just stay inside during Women's Day, and don't annoy the cows. 'Til next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #28 - Scandinavia

When Scandinavians like something, they stick with it. Identical buildings along an entire street or cliff top? Build a few more of those, thanks! Blonde hotties with perfect figures and perma-tans that would make Michael Jackson turn in his grave? By the barfull. Understandable perhaps in a people whose climate practically demands that similar genes like blonde hair and blue eyes will thrive, Scandinavians nevertheless do love uniformity, to the extent that all those blonde hotties get around with the same colour jackets and city planners paint all those identical buildings exactly the same colour, which makes it awkward to stumble around after a few drinks trying to find the right entrance (to the identical buildings, not the blonde hotties. Although I guess either mistake is more understandable after a few drinks).

Scandinavians are also incredibly friendly, usually resulting from an understandable amazement that anyone is visiting this part of the world at all, and a shameless curiosity about anyone who would do so. After spending a ridiculous amount of money simply to get up to the North Cape in Norway, the most northerly point in Europe, and then being left with spending a similarly ridiculous amount to get down the other side back to anything remotely resembling civilisation, I found myself in the pleasant but very remote town of Karasjok, in far northern Norway about 10km from the Finnish border, with the only bus south for the day already hours gone & darkness quickly approaching. I found a bed at a local camp ground and, with literally nothing else to do for the night, walked into town to find the local bar. I had just entered the bar's carpark when a car full of young locals got out and walked toward the entrance as well, reaching the door at the same time as me. One of the guys immediately looked at me and, with sharp powers of observation aided by the fact that I was neither blond nor related to him, reached the conclusion that I was not a local and asked me where I was from. His amazement at the answer "Australia" was matched only by his insistence that I come sit with them, and that they buy me beer all night and invite me to a house party later that evening ("That one, that one and that one I've slept with, that one's my cousin but you could have her I guess - which one do you want?". Evidently the chance for an addition to the gene pool outside one's immediate family is the prime consideration for nookie in this part of the world). Things however turned more interesting with the arrival of one guy's uncle. Uncle was just on his way to Thailand the next day, and had turned up for a quick dozen stiff drinks with his nephew before heading off. Uncle spoke very little English but has was friendly enough and in any event I'm not sure he would have had sufficient teeth to form some of the trickier sounds. He did, however, as with most non-native English speakers, understand more than he could speak. During the sort of polite conversation only possible with someone's drunk, non-English speaking uncle at the home of people you have known for exactly one hour, I made the mildly humorous observation that he should watch the girls in Thailand and make sure they were actually girls, for which I was rewarded with the reply "I don't care!!". Clearly, dark hair and skin outweighed minor issues such as gender in establishing another important consideration for choosing a mate in Karasjok and it was good to see the elders in this part of the world passing on to the kids these important tips for the propagation of their people.

The Finns, however, easily take the prize for idiosyncratic behaviour in Scandinavia (technically, Scandinavia includes Denmark, Norway and Sweden due to shared heritage and language root, but not Finland.  But who the hell knows that?). I caught the ferry from Helsinki to Tallinn in Estonia, which left at 8am. By 7.30 the boat was full with Finns who had already descended on the bar and proceeded to drink themselves stupid during the 3 hour ride. The boat actually had a full ballroom dancing band going on, with the floor full of twirling Finns double-fisting drinks in each hand and sometimes with another couple back at the table, something I haven't seen at 8am on a Monday morning for some time. Even more praiseworthy was the knowledge that all these Finns were simply making the journey to stock up on cheap alcohol in Estonia, and then turn around & come straight back with entire supermarket trolleys overflowing with hard liquor in a few hours time.

These ALITS updates have now got to the point where I have been asked more than once whether the events described within are in fact 100% true. I can assure you that I would not be witty nor clever enough to make up some of the stuff that has happened, as will be demonstrated with this final story. Due to the distances involved, it was actually quicker and cheaper to fly to Nordkapp, the most northerly point in continental Europe (even though Nordkapp is actually on an island and therefore not actually attached to the mainland, there is now a bridge and so it qualifies. Presumably if they build a bridge to Greenland it would then become the most northerly point in "Europe". I digress). And so I found myself on Scandinavian airlines winging my way to Alta to get a bus the final way. Being a morning flight, they served breakfast, and so it was about half an hour into the flight I was presented with the airline version of breakfast, including a tub of yoghurt. Attempting to shake the yoghurt before opening, the lower pressure at altitude had left the tub expanded dangerously close to bursting point, and as I shook the foil top gave way and proceeded to coat the area with a thick layer of yoghurt, including, horrifyingly, the attractive girl in the seat next to me. Those small tubs can contain quite a lot when it is distributed over a person, and she was pretty much instantly left looking like the final scene in a particularly enthusiastic adult movie. Worse, the yoghurt arrived with such force & quantity that the girl, who had fallen asleep virtually as soon as we took off & managed to sleep through to this point, woke with a start to find herself covered in a suspicious substance & the guy in the next seat looking at her with a guilty expression.

Nothing in my life had ever prepared me to deal with such a situation. The thing had exploded after only one shake - a situation not repeated even in my earliest teenage years - and I had not even had time to react myself before the girl woke up. For the next several minutes we tried to laugh and talk about the humour of the situation, but all the time it was obvious we were avoiding the large elephant sitting in the corner of the plane, which was that it looked for all the world that I had been sitting next to her watching her sleep and become so overcome with lust that I had just taken matters into my own hands and delivered a mile-high money shot before I could help myself. I can only be thankful that it merely landed on her clothes and nothing made contact with any part of her actual body: hands, face etc, although at least I was considerate enough to have made it strawberry rather than, say, asparagus. And it was only when this forced conversation petered out and I returned thankfully to the solitude of my iPod that I realised the song that had been playing as I made my mess: Heat Of The Moment, by Asia. And with one more female safely turned off for life, it's time once again to quote the great Jerry Springer and remind you - 'Til next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #27 - "RED MAN!!!"

Virtually nobody uses my actual name, except my mother, and so when I hear it I always assume I've done something wrong.  As a result, over the years I have accumulated more nicknames than virtually anybody I know, however I now appear to have accumulated one more.  For Oktoberfest, I had booked with the same tour company that I used for the Running of the Bulls, and as I walked into the camp ground to register in Munich, the first staff member saw me from 50 metres away and rushed over with a huge yell and a hug.  OK, I thought, it's nice to be remembered, but I then proceeded to be welcomed with open arms as a long-lost brother by a total of 7 staff members I had met in Pamplona 3 months earlier.  The friend I arrived with was looking at me like "What the hell did you do last time?" and given that there were almost two thousand people in that group I was starting to get a big head about the impression I must have made, but it was the last one that finally twigged it, as he rushed over with a yell:   "RED MAN!!!".

Ahhh.  Of course.  I had forgotten that on the day before the opening day of Pamplona, I had arrived back at the camp ground virtually nude and completely red from the fake blood from my unexpected participation in the Running Of The Nudes.  This seems to have cemented my legacy with Festival Adventures staff and by the end of Oktoberfest I was receiving free drinks, about 4 breakfasts per morning (highly sought after) and offers to come back and work with them next year.   Clearly wandering around in underwear and a strange colour is the "right stuff" for which they are searching as a staff member for these events.  I even got to keep the underwear, crucial for adding an extra day to the rotation when you are travelling this long, although they are so red that they can't really be worn without rubbing off on the rest of my clothes to look like I have stabbed someone with my groin, an alarming image whichever way you interpret it.

Welcome to OKTOBERFEST, just about the most fun you can have in September with leather pants.  As friendly as Las Vegas was, the locals at Oktoberfest have raised this to a completely new level.

After such a warm and frankly promising greeting, Oktoberfest was always going to be an interesting time.   Lederhosen.  Oom-pah bands.  Dancing on tables.  And beer.   Lots and lots of beer.  Which means lots and lots of bathroom stops.  Now as much as I love the Germans, there is one thing they don't really seem to get right, and that is bathrooms.   The urinals for guys were set up facing each other, but instead of being on opposite sides of a wall they were on opposite sides of a very low shelf, and so you stood there gazing awkwardly into another man's eyes as you expelled your last 4 beers.  It was like an open plan office where everyone had suddenly stood up to compare.  I very rarely have my tackle out in the office these days, and almost never in an open plan office, so I must admit it was a little unsettling.  And the bizarreness doesn't end there.  At one point I walked in to find a guy at the sink shaving.   This is in the bathroom of the largest beer tent on the opening day of Oktoberfest, and here's old mate all lathered up with the razor as ten thousand people file past him to pee.  No idea why he suddenly decided he needed to shave, or indeed why he had his razor and shaving cream with him in the pub at all, but in all I was left with the feeling that German bathrooms are just a little too familiar for me.

Oktoberfest was also important for learning all you need to know about the mating strategy of the Italian male:  wear her down.  We were sitting at a table with some American girls and a bunch of Italian guys on a bachelor party.   It was like being back in Turkey but without the classy garbage man "hell of a dumper" pickup lines.  Hyper-aggressive, about 8 guys were steadily crowding the 3 American girls until they were all virtually sitting in their laps as they tried to kiss necks, give foot massages, put arms around waists and at one point take photos down tops as the girl was distracted by yet another Italian trying to touch her.  Of course, the instant any of them gave up and failed to remove the hand that was now on her leg, this was interpreted as a sign to continue to the next step, and so on until soon they would all be lying on the table in one big pile.  The guys had little English but they knew enough to get their message across:  at one point one of them - the guy getting married the next weekend - leaned over to me and said in a conspiratorial and rather drunken whisper: "That girl - I want to........dick!", a confidence which was in any event completely unnecessary to share as it was obvious to people living on Mars, in a cave, with their eyes closed and their fingers in their ears, that he wanted to dick, let alone to me sitting right next to it as he leaned over half the table to lay his head on her breasts.

All in all, Oktoberfest was everything you have heard.   I drank a lot of beer, ate about 4 pigs and 51 chickens.   I danced on tables and met random people from all over the world.   And above all, I sang ridiculous songs in German at the top of my voice, which has now completely gone except for returning sporadically in an uncharacteristic high falsetto so I sound like I am 13 again with my gear caught in my lederhosen.  The following drinking song, translated into English, tells you everything you need to know about Oktoberfest and how much sense it needs to make:

"My hat, he has three corners

Three corners has my hat

And had he not three corners

He would not be my hat."


Agreed.  And so this seems yet again a good time to leave the update, as we remember the wise words of the great Jerry Springer and remind you 'til next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #26 - "Vokuhila"

Once in a very great while something happens which reminds you why you travel. Such a thing occurred recently when we went out to watch a soccer game at a local bar with a couple of people from the hostel. At one point the camera focused on one of the players and, being somewhat of an expert myself in my younger days, I made the throwaway comment that you could always count on the South Americans for a decent mullet. A German girl with us looked at me quizzically and I explained the finer points of everybody´s favourite "business on top, party at the back" hairstyle, made famous in the 80's and enjoying a recent, if somewhat tongue-in-cheek, resurgence (as should all things from that most awesome of decades). "Ahhh", she said in recognition: "vokuhila".

Now, I had assumed that the English term "mullet" was pretty much universal and would have been absorbed into the language of foreign cultures like so much else, so I can´t describe what pleased me more on this occasion: the fact that the Germans have so much reverence themselves for this fashion statement that they have independently come up with their own word for it, or the word itself - it is, with typical German efficiency, a shortening of the first 2 letters of the words "vorn kurz hinten lang", which translates literally as "front short back long". Words cannot even describe the greatness. Even better was the deep, throaty German inflection with which she delivered the word, indicating the awesome power & presence that such hair demands, like Jabba the Hutt sentencing Princess Leia to a lifetime of slavery and servitude in the gold bikini: "VOKUHILA". Excellent.

Welcome to Germany, home of sausage, sauerkraut, and strange words. Like VOKUHILA (which from now on will be capitalised, italicised, bolded, underlined, and increased in font size and made a more powerful colour if I can manage it to truly represent the awesomeness of this word), the Germans do like to make up words. Typically they do this not by creating a new word for something like in English, but by continuing to combine existing words until they have something approximating what they are trying to describe, but which is impossible to translate literally. Thus, CPR becomes "herzkreislaufwiederbelebung", or heart-circle-run-again-enlivenment, and "rolltreppenbenutzungshinweise" means rolling-stairs-use-tips, which is of course advice on the correct use of an escalator, obviously a major issue in average German life. The best thing about this method of word creation is that you can, if fancy takes you, substitute words in the chain to make new words which are also entirely valid, so "Donaudampfschiffahrtskapitänswitwe" might be an actual word which means Danube-steam-ship-line-captain's-widow, but "DonaudampfschiffahrtskapitänsVOKUHILA" is far more satisfying. And if the mullet of the captain of a steam ship on the Danube doesn't deserve its own word, then I really don't know what does.

The Germans, bless them, do also like things to be ordered. Chief among this is the German preference for pre-booking travel, so that everybody knows that they wish to go by train from Munich to Nuremberg on exactly a particular date in 13 weeks' time. As a result all public transport in Germany operates like airline tickets, with huge discounts for early booking of trains and buses, making the walk up, last minute prices for shmucks like me who decide on a whim where to go next and simply turn up at the station, hideously expensive. To combat this, the Germans have established a vast, confusing network of travel passes designed to save you money if you make 5 trips within one month not separated by a full moon falling on a Thursday or whatever, all of which require the same level of pre-planning anyway, with the result that any journey in Germany without some sort of transport card is the travel equivalent of unprotected sex: it might feel better, but it's going to cost you a lot more if you keep it up. So to speak.

Lest you think I am making fun of Germany, it was definitely one of my favourite countries so far. The beer is quality, the hospitality open and genuine, and it has one of the strongest economies in the world, giving Germans a sense of confidence which is quite appealing when combined with a casual attitude to nudity. To their eternal credit, Germany's role in both world wars and a large part of human history for the last hundred years, the history of Nazism etc, are not taboo subjects here. Virtually every city has some sort of museum documenting the holocaust or the rise of the nazi party, and it must be remembered that the unfairness of the Treaty of Versailles, in which Germany was declared solely responsible for World War I and forced to concede huge amounts of territory and make massive reparations, had virtually everything to do with sowing the seeds of discontent and creating the fertile ground which made national socialism (nazism) possible, and lead to World War II. I was talking to a German guy and asked whether questions about the past made him uncomfortable or whether he felt any implicit accusation in them, and he said not in the slightest - this all happened over 30 years before he was born and for him, and all Germans today, this is history, to be learned. I guess it would be the same if anybody asked me about Australia's past treatment of aborigines, or an American about slavery: something we can easily admit was wrong, but we don't feel in the slightest personally responsible. Nevertheless Germany does not shirk from it and in fact embraces it as a large part of the tourism market in the country. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak said that "No country wears its history on its sleeve with as much class as Germany", and I agree. And so would Jerry, so 'till next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #25 - San Fermin

The first rocket is fired on the stroke of 8am and your heart pounds. There is now officially no way out and the street, which seemed so wide and spacious only the day before, now seems impossibly narrow and crowds in on you from both sides. You are questioning whether you feel so lucky now to have made the cut, because the rocket indicates that the gates to the corral have been opened and you are about to take part in the ancient tradition of the festival of San Fermin in Pamplona, Spain: the encierro - The Running Of The Bulls.

Your carefully thought out strategy after watching yesterday's run from the comfortable balcony you had booked is immediately abandoned and replaced by one thought: RUN. A wave of people is surging past you with a look on their faces you have never seen before: more than fear, more than panic - it is pure terror. They are literally running for their lives and the hardest thing you have ever had to do in your life is fight the herd mentality that takes over and not run with them, as you wait, and wait, and wait for the bulls to reach you, because the idea is to run *with* the bulls, not 2 minutes in front of them or after they have passed. Then the throng of panicked runners becomes a flood and it becomes difficult to even stand your ground as suddenly the bulls are there, and you begin to run. For a while you are able to pace them, but eventually they begin to pull away and now you have to think: "Was that 4, or 5, or 6, or 12?". It was just a blur of black and tan. Released with the 6 fighting bulls that will be killed in that night's bullfight are 6 tame "herding" cattle who know the route and are there to provide a bigger pack to hopefully keep the fighting bulls on track and create a neat, tight group which will leave the corral, run pretty much a straight path right into the bullring at the other end of the run without getting distracted by any runners, and into the pens there with no incident. But the whole point is obviously that things don't always go to plan, and the herd can end up split, or one bull can become separated, or fall and get left behind, and this is when they are most dangerous. So now comes the hard part: you know there were less than 12 that just ran past (or you *think* there were less than 12, you were a little distracted), but there are way too many people still running behind you to see what's coming. How many was that? Are there any left? Where are they? Are they sticking to the middle of the road of have they found a line up the side right behind you, about to run you down? There are supposed to be a further series of rockets indicating when the last bull has reached the bullring, when they are all safely penned up etc, but in all the confusion and excitement the last thing you hear is a couple of fireworks. I still haven´t heard them. There is no way to know, so you just keep running.

You also run because you want to get inside the bullring at the end of the course. This is for 2 reasons: first, the idea is to run WITH the bulls - the doors to the bullring are not opened until the bulls are reasonably close, so anyone who has reached the end of the course long before the bulls even arrive is siphoned off amid much jeering, and the doors are closed as soon as the last bull is inside the ring (for obvious reasons), and so actually making it through the course and into the bullring is an indication that you have truly made your run with the bulls. And second, as a "reward" for getting into the bullring, once the bulls are safely penned, a series of young steers is released to create mayhem among the runners who made it inside (young steers, in this case, still representing roughly 200 kilos as opposed to the 500-600 kilos of the fighting bulls). This is your one chance to play matador with something that is a slightly lower chance of doing you some permanent damage, although further comedy is provided by the fact that you have to also negotiate a bunch of other jittery runners in the ring, and so someone is always the unlucky one to run out of space to dodge and become the newest horn ornament when you come face to face with the feisty future steak. Finally, after three minutes of intense fear and another half hour of comical evasion of the young steers, the event is over for another day and the runners start to pour out of the bullring, still pumped on adrenaline as they conduct their post mortems and talking REALLY REALLY FAST. You acquire your celebratory breakfast beer and, as you walk with great satisfaction back up the length of the course to reminisce on your successful run, it suddenly hits you: that was really, really stupid.

Of course, the festival of San Fermin is not all about trying to avoid being speared by some quality Spanish beef (indeed for some of the girls this appears to be the primary goal of attending the festival). There is also the Running Of The Nudes, a protest held each year by the animal rights group PETA the day before San Fermin starts, at which people appear nude to oppose the cruelty of bullfighting (not sure I understand the connection but who am I to question?). Not having anything else particularly to do the day before the festival started, myself and a few guys from the campsite had gone in to watch. As we were standing there, on a whim I turned to one of them and asked "Do you want to get involved?". He shrugged and said "Why not?" and so we approached one of the organisers. She immediately noticed our campsite wristbands (indicating "Festival Adventures San Fermin Running Of The Bulls 2009") and asked what they were for, and, in danger of having the entire plan fall over due to the hypocrisy of trying to join a protest about the very thing we were going to take part in ourselves the next day, I quickly answered with the first thing that came to mind: "Oh that's for breast cancer". Amazingly, this worked, and, our bona fides as passionate supporters of animal rights and womens' issues established, we were issued with the regulation black underwear and left to nude up with the rest of the group. I must say that I have never heard of a bright fluorescent orange wristband indicating support for breast cancer but I was hoping that the Australian accent would confuse, distract and charm her long enough from the fact that I was talking complete nonsense for me to see her boobs (this appears to be a pretty standard backpacker strategy anyway).

In previous years the Running Of The Nudes involved the protesters walking the entire length of the encierro course nude, and this is what I was expecting when we turned up, however it appears this year they had a new strategy, which was to lie out front of Pamplona town hall for an hour, with plenty of opportunity for media photos to promote their cause. Oh, and to have fake blood poured all over them and spears sticking out of their backs to indicate the cruelty of bullfighting. Have to say - was not expecting the fake blood. And as I had not even planned to participate, I had nothing to change back into after the protest, and so, late on the afternoon before the opening day of San Fermin I was to be seen walking back into the campsite in front of 2,000 festival attendees wearing only black underwear and completely red from thickly congealed fake blood. This red colour remained for the entire 5 days I was at San Fermin, especially the bits that, say, could not be scrubbed too hard, although it would have been interesting to see the reaction had I found company for the evening: "Oh no, that's just fake blood from when I lied my way onto an animal rights protest. Please - carry on".

All in all, San Fermin - especially the opening day - is the craziest thing I have ever seen. People are liberally doused with champagne, sangria, beer, water, a weird bright yellow concoction of egg and flour - for the entire day. 15 year olds are spraying middle aged couples and both laugh. The local Spanish absolutely *LOVE* it and it was good to see a festival not yet completely taken over by boorish drunk Australian Fanatics tour groups. The Spanish love it so much that, on the day after the festival ends, the locals, refusing to accept that it is over for another year, have started yet another tradition of the Running Of The Bus, in which they step out in front of the 8am bus up the street on which the encierro is run, and run up the road in front of THAT. The history of the encierro is equally crazy: before barricades were erected along the bullrun, the locals used to simply stand along the sides of the road holding up blankets - blankets - to define the course, hide themselves and stop the bulls running off into the wider city. Controversy remains about bullfighting due to the killing of the bulls at the end of the fight, and the general misery they suffer even without an organised bullfight: on the bus from France into Spain they played a video showing bulls being released into the centre of random Spanish towns to then be tormented by people running past, trying to pull their tail, zooming past with 5 guys piled onto a quad bike etc...all set to jaunty Spanish music. However, to their credit, the Spanish have also invented "fairer" methods of fighting a bull, including where a bunch of guys line up single file and try to stop the charging bull simply by having it run into enough of them that they all get accordioned together and it finally stops. This presents a much more amusing image on the video as the first guy in line stands there like a condemned man waiting to get absolutely drilled while his brave amigos hide behind him taking progressively smaller and smaller hits until the bull finally runs out steam. Crazy.

I'll leave you now with my favourite story from San Fermin 2009. When I watched the first bull run from the balcony, about half an hour before the bulls are released the police go through and thin out the majority of the crowd lined up to run, otherwise the street would literally be a solid wall of people from beginning to end and nobody would be running anywhere. So for safety reasons, almost three quarters of the potential runners are eliminated before the run starts. This happens in bulk with entire sections of the street simply sectioned off and tossed out at random, and it happened in the street right below our balcony. So, until 5 minutes before the bulls were released, the entire street below our balcony was completely empty in both directions. Then the police remove the barricades holding back the lucky (?) ones left, and they can take up their positions wherever they want along the course. So there we were, 5 minutes to 8, not a soul in sight on the street, all the shops barricaded up with corrugated iron roller doors in preparation for the encierro, when the shopkeeper on the street opposite our balcony opens his door and walks out. He is carrying a tray of paint and a long roller, and - this is just before the first bull run of the year is about to run right past his door, remember - proceeds to completely paint his roller door from top to bottom. After giving it a thorough coating, he picks up his paint and roller and, satisfied, goes back inside. About 30 seconds later the runners are released, the rocket is fired, and the run surges past. Crazy. 'Til next time: take care of yourselves (this means *NOT* running with bulls!).....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #24 - Spain

FLAMENCO - AN EXPLANATION


(2 men with guitars sit on stage with male & female dancer. Guitars begin, male dancer rises)

MAN: (Taps feet and whips hands, looks intensely at female dancer) "You will be my woman!"

(Sits down with satisfaction. Woman gets up, scornful look on face)

WOMAN: (More loud tapping of feet, elaborate arm movements) "I will not! You will never be good enough for me."

(Sits down looking pleased with self. Man taken slightly aback, steely look crosses face. Gets up again)

MAN: (Even more enthusiastic stomping of feet, whipping of hands) "I will have you! Do not defy me."

(Sits down again with greater satisfaction. Look of determination crosses woman's face. Gets up again)

WOMAN: "Do not kid yourself. Your beard is very feminine, and your pants too tight. Stop bothering me." (Punctuated by big stamp of feet, more hand gestures)

(Woman glares at man as she sits down. Man glares back, rises again)

MAN: "My beard is manly & strong as my complicated series of dance moves will show." Stomp, stomp, stomp, clap, clap, clap. Clap. STOMP!!

(Man circles challengingly around woman as he moves to sit. Woman stands and stares defiantly back as they circle each other)

WOMAN: "It is the beard of a young boy and you will never have me. There is no room in those pants for anything that would satisfy me. Take that!" Stamp stamp STAMP! Clap clap clap clap clap clap clap. Swing hips dismissively

(Man stands again) 

MAN: "I will because the power of the dance demands it! SUBMIT!" STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP!!! CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP!!! 

WOMAN: "I find my resistance strangely fading. It provokes my fiery Latin temperament. You will not succeed!!" CLAP WAVE STAMP WAVE CLAP WAVE STAMP WAVE CLAP STAMP STAMP CLAP CLAP CLAP WAVE STAMP CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP

MAN: "Resistance is futile. Save your energy for our lovemaking" STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP STAMP 

WOMAN: " I feel myself unavoidably drawn to you. We shall dance together while I contemplate this." WAVE CLAP WAVE STAMP CLAP WAVE CLAP WAVE WHIP WAVE CLAP CLAP WAVE WAVE WAVE WHIP CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP WAVE CLAP CLAP CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP WAVE WAVE WHIP CLAP CLAP WAVE CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP CLAP STAMP WAVE CLAP WAVE STAMP CLAP WAVE CLAP WAVE WHIP WAVE WHIP CLAP WAVE WAVE WAVE STAMP CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP WHIP CLAP CLAP CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP WAVE WAVE CLAP WHIP CLAP WAVE CLAP WAVE STAMP STAMP CLAP STAMP

MAN: (Slowing down) "You are now carrying my child. It is the power of the dance.

WOMAN: (Falls into him, panting) "I love you."


What's not to love? 'Til next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.

American Life In The Summertime #23 - Italy

You know the type. He walks into the dorm with cocky anticipation, dumps his gear on the bed and looks around. Noticing it's only you in the room as well, he looks slightly disappointed, looks around again to ensure he hasn't missed anything, and reluctantly says hi. Then, as soon as he can, he brings the conversation around to his true interest - "Have you met anyone else in the room?".

What he's really asking, of course, is "are there any girls staying in the room?" in the hope of bagging an English gap-year traveller or experiencing some efficient German sex. I informed him that there was a group of Swedish girls around earlier, but they looked a little drunk & went out to a bar about an hour ago. Almost before the words were out of my mouth he's asking if I know where they went, and, generously, I gave him the name of a bar I remembered from the guidebook as the preeminent gay-friendly establishment in the area. About an hour later he returned with quite a troubled look on his face. "How'd you go?", I ask.

With a voice heavy in defeat he replies "Nah man it was a sausage fest".

"Bummer".

Quite.


Buongiorno from Italy, home of pizza, pasta and prissy guys falling over dramatically on a soccer pitch when their opponent so much as breathes heavily in their direction (you may have won the World Cup, boys, but you'll get no respect from me until you get sandwiched by two 100kg second rowers and have to get straight back up pretending it DIDN'T hurt). You get lost in Italy, a lot, and directions are rarely helpful because every instruction to any point in the country always involves the words "at the church". There are, conservatively, around 900 churches on every developed block in Italy. The largest, of course, is St Peter's in the Vatican City in Rome, spiritual home of the Catholic Church, residence of the Pope, and smallest independent nation in the world. The Vatican is littered with priceless marble statues and monuments, most of which are in the "natural" style popular at the time, which means nude. A few hundred years ago the idea of so many exposed members in close proximity to so many priests caused the Catholic Church some distress (although the reverse is now the cause of distress) and so the Pope of the day chiseled all the penises off the hundreds of statues within the Vatican grounds. Their modesty was restored with fig leaves, to be reminiscent of the garden of Eden, but I like to think there is a secret room in the Vatican Museum in which these liberated organs are stored - a Peniseum, if you will - lined up in neat rows on a table for their sins like recalcitrant schoolboys on detention, where the Pope would come when fancy took him and play headmaster: "Stand up straight, Johnson!".

But by far the most absorbing, the most challenging, the most unique experience in Italy comes with the simple act of taking a train. On Italian trains, everyone gets to the appropriate platform and simply stops in place, creating a bottleneck at the entrance while the rest of the platform remains empty. They then proceed to abuse, with much flapping of hands and enthusiastic gesticulation, everyone else who is still piling onto the platform behind them as being complete idiots for doing exactly the same thing as they have just done. When the train arrives, there is no waiting for those already aboard to get off, everyone urgently pushes in as if they are concerned they may miss a meal if they don't get on before the train has even fully stopped. This of course only makes the entire process longer and Italians then stand around in genuine puzzlement and frustration as to why the train will not depart immediately now that THEY are on board, despite the fact that people are still pushing past them trying to get off. This is made worse by the fact that everyone has chosen to try to cram onto the one carriage that happened to stop right in front of the entire mob, rather than any of the other 9 carriages that are also connected to this train.

Then, when everyone has settled in and all those who have managed to snag a seat are looking smugly at those left squatting on their bags in the corridor, (who are, in turn, looking waiting for anyone foolish enough to get up and walk around or go to the bathroom or otherwise break contact with their seat, at which point they will swoop in like a seagull on a chip), the real sting in the tail of the Italian train system makes itself apparent. In Italy, it is possible, but not compulsory, to reserve a particular seat. However it is apparently not required, or even common, to sit in the seat you have reserved. So for the entire journey you have people pushing purposefully down the aisle, through & over those scattered on the ground, to arrive in front of a particular seat, which is always occupied by someone pretending to be asleep or deep in conversation with The Lord or otherwise studiously trying to avoid looking at the person who has just presented themselves in front of them. There follows more enthusiastic gesticulation, the gist of which is: I have reserved this seat, so get out; accompanied by animated pointing at the ticket and then the aisle. This immediately prompts the reply from the current occupant of the seat that what does it matter, as long as we all sit somewhere?, which seems a reasonable response except that the person trying to dislodge you was clearly not quick enough to get their own seat or they would not be here now trying to obtain yours. Guards are summoned, more tickets are pointed at and hands flapped in exasperation until finally the person without the ticket for that seat departs, with more animated arguments and questions relating to the legitimacy of the birth of everyone within shouting distance. You don't commonly see such behaviour from two nuns but train seats are at a premium over here.

The vanquished passenger must then take their place with the rest of the masses in the aisle, in the space left by the person who is now making themselves comfortable with great satisfaction in their former seat. Except this "space" has long since been greedily absorbed by the mob, meaning that the former occupant must now drag themselves and their gear through the crowded corridor all the way to the end where there is space. Unless, of course, they did reserve a seat but just took their chances & grabbed the first one they could get on entering the train in the hope that nobody else had specifically reserved *it* (a reasonable gamble at the time), in which case they will stride purposefully down the corridor to dislodge someone else, and so it continues for the entire journey like a giant, inconvenient game of musical chairs. Naturally, I loved it. Italy is beautiful, passionate, unordered, enthusiastic, easygoing, and easy to like. It has more ancient history and buildings existing side by side with modern life than anywhere else I have been, and it was the country where I spent the most time so far, before heading back through southern France and Monaco into Spain. And so, before some Italian nun comes and tries to push me off the computer seat, it is time to sign off and once again remind you of Jerry's wisdom - 'til next time: take care of yourselves.....and each other.