written down as it happens, posted days later...
01. breaking my streak of getting through security unscathed, i don't exactly get stopped for extra screening at logan, but functionally speaking, that's what it it amounted to, seeing as how the screener waited until i was successfully through the metal detector and on my way to collect my bags, he's handing me back my passport when here tells me i have to go back and do it again with my shoes off. now, of course i start to sound like a broken record here, right? but if you are going to make the smelly sock parade mandatory, make it mandatory, but as of now, the tsa's website does not say it is so. so instead, i go back to the end of the line, per his instructions, while he waits for my passport. five minutes pass while the line moves slowly. during that time he misplaces my passport. i know this, because i've watched him like a hawk. "id please," he says twice. "you just put it over there, dude," i respond impatiently. twice. idiot.
02. zurich has a lovely airport, although it's empty. the only flights arriving seemed to be from the us, given the time of day, and the place seemed deserted. all the same, they were in too big a rush to stamp my passport, dammit. isn't that the point of having them, anyway? i should have paid the extra $350 to fly to frankfurt.
03. getting the eurailpass set up was blindingly easy, as was catching a train. people do the 'i-understood-your-german-but-i'm-going-to-reply-in-english' thing pretty quickly, which is fine, because my german is as incomplete as it is awful; but it gets the job done.
04. as luck would have it, the lack of lines and ease of transfers meant that i was able to catch an early train to stuttgart. i spent all of 10 minutes in zurich, confined entirely to the hauptbahnhof. but i've been there before. i probably should have thought of that before withdrawing chf50. i reckon my parents can probably use it.
05. needing to walk around, i decided to miss my train to nurnberg and catch a later one, so i spent two hours walking around stuttgart. i had two beers during that time, one at a real nice dive-y bar called the 'zum zum'. but it did have dinkel acker on tap for 2.6 euro which is cheap by any standard. stuttgart is pretty nice. they took over the plaza in front of an old schloss to set up the world cup mini-festival thing with what look to be beer tents and other refreshments, and a giant tv screen. i know what i'm doing when i get to frankfurt.
06. the ice trains are very nice with one exception--no power outlets. the first class cabins are furnished with big, widely spaced, comfy seats and huge tables that put the acela to shame, but there's no power outlet. it didn't matter 'cause i was mostly looking out the window anyway, but the irony of it is that the much older first class car i'm in now does have a power socket. weird. not a bad way to travel in the least, though. and tough to stay awake now.
07. there's a surfeit of small corrugated-metal office buildings and stores in the german and swiss suburbs. they look like lego sets. it's not fair to call them big-box stores, 'cause they're actually rather little boxes, but they appear to serve the same function.
08. erlangen is a smallish town not far from nurnberg that has a famous beer festival called the bergkirchweih. picture a tree-lined hillside dotted with stone 'kellers' from which issue forth one-liter mugs (actually, they tend to be filled well past the one-liter mark) of strong beer. felt it the next morning, i did.
09. frankfurt is a very modern-looking city, with a striking skyline quite atypical for europe. after getting here and checking in, i went immediately to the river area, where the first game between germany and costa rica was kicking off. they had giant video screens moored in the middle of the river, and people lined the shores and nearby bridges, taking it all in. there was much singing and shouting, but it was actually very mellow.
10. since germany won, there was much rejoicing about town. at one end of the zeil, a shopping area for pedestrians, people were forming a gauntlet of black, yellow, and red and demanding cars honk before allowing them to pass.
11. they have open-air grills in the street, a giant grate hanging over coals, covered with sausages. it smells amazing. beer is everywhere, also sold on the street. there are people wandering around with both beer and sausage, dressed in all the colors of the world. even paraguay was represented. oddly enough, the toughest jersey to find is the us jersey; i decided that i need one, since the standby tickets came through for monday's game in gelsenkirchen.
12. the english team is staying at my hotel. they're being rather cautious about letting people in, as you might imagine. it took me an hour to get back into my hotel room after going for a run, because they blocked off the entrance so that becks and crew could get onto the bus without much hassle. there was a large crowd watching.
13. the train ride to the waldstadion was actually as fun as the match. on a lark, i got in the first-class compartment with the loudest, singingest bunch of drunk englishmen i could find. they had fun and cheered on mexico, too on behalf of a few mexican interlopers. pretty much every one of their songs says the word 'england' er, 'eng-er-land' as many times as possible. they are also adept at changing the lyrics of the songs to suit the situation, such as 'nice trou-sers' to salute a german still on the platform who had a truly reprehensible pair of pants. it was sweaty, cramped, loud, and smelly (someone farted) and spectacularly fun. i wish i'd had my camera, which reminds me:
14. whatever i'd read about not being allowed to bring cameras was clearly false. d'oh.
15. the match was actually relatively calm. the singing continued for most of it, but the fans were fairly calm up in the nosebleed seats. they even did 'the wave' which shocked me. everything was extremely well organized, and the stadium was so clean that i felt bad for leaving peanut shells on the floor. the match was entertaining, but had its rough edges. england scored a goal early, and was making paraguay look bad, but as the game went on, they had trouble finishing plays, and seemed to always make one pass too many. in the second half, paraguay came out strong and played a better half, and the refereeing was decidedly one-sided against the english, making them have to hang on for that 1-nil win.
16. i wore my charlton athletic jersey today. i have an england jersey somewhere, but i couldn't find it before i left. at any rate, more than a few charlton supporters stopped me to shake hands. even after i explained that i'm an american who adopted them 'cause they were the first premiership match i went to, they were still happy to have met. nice folk indeed.
17. i'm typing this in my room while cooling off (it's hot!) and watching a bit of trinidad-sweden (probably heading to the river to watch the rest soon), hoping to get it and a picture or two out via my thumbdrive. if you're reading this, it worked.
18. they have the daily show on cnn international! kinda. it's the 'global edition', which appears to be weekly.
19. the english fans are still at it. they've totally taken over the romer, the old-fashioned-looking, half-timbered house-lined city square. they're mostly singing, dancing, but also occasionally throwing bottles, or kicking the ball around. lots of shirtless guys jumping around. it looks like the night the red sox won the world series, and all they did was win their first game. i am thoroughly impressed. either way, they've been at it there pretty much ever since the game let out; i walked by and gawked no fewer than three times. the polizei have been mostly good sports; they've got nasty-looking dogs, and riot gear, but they're mostly letting the english run amok. even though they're kicking balls around and windows are occasionally being broken, the police have more than once thrown the ball back to the fans, to great cheering. some of them seem kinda bemused by the rest, but the singing, the singing is unanimous, and it continues.
20. there's a good crowd on the river tonight, too, watching argentina and cote d'ivoire, but it's clearly not where the, uh, action is.
21. things are really cheap here. a coke costs 1.50 euro pretty much anywhere, even from vending machines, and less in grocery stores, which isn't bad. bratwursts are ubiquitous, and only 2 euro. that's a cheap dinner indeed. i think i've eaten 3 out of 4 meals from street vendors at this point. let's ignore the fact that this is my third full day here, okay, mom?
22. off to gelsenkirchen for the us-czech match tomorrow. lots of time on the trains coming.
23. some pictures are uploading to flickr now hopefully.
That is super cool! Mark will be so jealous about England in your hotel...
wish I was with you to have a beer. Too bad the U.S. lost today...hope you had fun though.
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at juin 12, 2006 9:44 PMHey Rob
great stories - I've been hitting as many blogs as I can to get a real flavor of what's going on over there. Just incredibly bloody jealous. But keep on writing. Yours is the best blog so far!! Too bad for the US. They looked low-key against the Czechs. Much like the Brits who looked awful. Can't wait to see Holland take on Argentina and Ivory Coast. Take care mate and have many beers for us over here!! Mark
at juin 13, 2006 9:23 AM