Some stories

Nice moments, bad luck, X files...unforgettable stories!

Time to start the section of stories! I will put a title to them and for sure a picture will make company to the text. The topic... spontaneous! I hope you enjoy this part of my blog and make you think/imagine/wonder about something nice and productive ^^

A talisman for a non-religious person? (28th March 2009)

First trip as a backpacker by myself. Me and my best friend, we were starting in Milan (Italy) our way towards Balkans. At that time thirsty of adventures and impatience to see the world (or better to say Europe :P) we spent some hours in Milan, one of the airport-city connexion in Europe. Waiting for our train to Belgrade we walked through the city taking the advantage of getting some small gifts for free (we are specialist on it! hahaha). This time a bag from something related to the church and a T-shirt from Easyjet, when our airline was the old-cheap Ryanair at that time...

The story is short and simple but I want to incite people to reflect a bit. Looking at our free map an old lady approached us to help us. Unluckily she did not talk in English but body language is a powerful tool in many situations, not only when you do not speak the language ;P We pointed her out where we wanted to go and she drives us to the metro, indicated us where to buy the tickets and with gestures explained to us how to reach our destination.

Internal pocket of my most used bag,
full of talismans.

And why this picture? When she was saying goodbye to us she took the Virgin you can see in the picture, one to each of us. At the same time she  did some sings of protection over us and she left. Since then, I have this talisman with me together with other I will mention another time. What you see it is the inside pocket of my most used bag which travel with me everywhere since then! Nothing really bad happened to me travelling. I do not now if this have something of influence over it but the good wishes of people are always welcome! :)

What I would like to discuss with this story is the fact of trust somebody you do not know or being trusted by someone on the other hand. As humans I believe this is supposed to be like this. The fear of being hurt/stolen has made us distrustful missing innumerable experiences and stories to tell later on. There are good people and bad people everywhere but not trusting (even with precaution) we just have things to miss... I have been surfed within Couch Surfing community approximate 43 times and I do not have a really bad story to tell about that. Maybe some funny, weird or even disappointed moments but nothing which make me stop trusting people by the simple fact that we are human sharing the same place to live: The world.

Driving a Polish train (5th June 2010)

Sitting next to the driver in the cabin.

The friendly driver of the train

I was running as hell to catch a train in the first city of Poland coming from Ukraine's border: Przemyśl. After my miracle arrival I found myself in the first carriage and with no tickets. However, I was told I could buy on the train. The man who was checking the tickets seemed very friendly and I bought my ticket from him, with no problems while no English language was involved in the "conversation" and he smiled at me. I sit and I observed the driver's door open and I was curious to see the cabin since when I was a kid I had the chance to visit a plane cabin and it was amazing! I pointed to the door telling to the ticket inspector I wanted to go there and from his reaction I understood "no problem!". There I found the "fashion" driver you can see in the pictures. What I could not image is that he invited me to sit next to him, he let me charge my mobile phone there (since there was no more plugs along the train) and he allow me to change a gear in a straight piece of the railway!!! At the same time the ticket inspector came to offer me tobacco and it was really nice to try to understand each other! hahaha I was trying my very limited slavic knowledge and well sometimes it worked! ahahah.

Nice view!

I was the driver for some minutes!!!

Together. What a friends! :P

The driver even insisted on the pictures and so on! So friendly! So nice Polish people! :) Although, not a really safe idea to let me being there while we were in movement! ahhaha. I remember they were (the driver, the ticket inspector and another guy, friend of them who joined in a station) kind of telling me why I do not know speak Polish! Maybe it was my imagination... all of us in the cabin and with a great view just opposite me. Nothing I could imagine! But, I need to recognize that being a solo traveller and a girl you find many opportunities which are not presented travelling with company.
In this regard, travelling in eastern countries in Europe is still more adventurous than in the west, of course! You cannot plan everything: transport can suprise you, the timetables are not available... and most important, people! They are that wonderful that maybe you stay some more days than originally you thought.