A rapidfire update!

After Berlin:

Cologne, Germany--what a stressful train ride. It was absolutely packed, and since I didn't make reservations, I was wandering around with my luggage and coat on, very sweaty, while the train had already left, trying to find a place to sit. I had to sit in an aisle and get up many, many times every time someone needed to pass by. I think this situation was made extra stressful because it was hard to understand what was going on and how I can tell whether I am allowed to sit in a given seat because everything was in German. Most Germans are taught English, but not all of them are proficient or willing to use it. And then the hostel I ended up in was gross and there were snoring boys in my room again...

Brussels, Belgium--I hated my stop here. First off, I got off at the wrong train station without realizing it. After wearily wandering around with my suitcase in the streets of Brussels, I stopped a very nice and trustworthy-looking couple and asked for help. Good thing one of them spoke English... he took one look at my map and started laughing at me saying I was extremely lost and that I had better come with him. He then drove me, through 15 minutes of rush hour traffic, to the front door of my hotel. He even apologized during the ride because the traffic was so bad--baffling, as he wouldn't even let me pay him for his trouble. The hotel was a nice change of pace (ie, the privacy) but the lady at reception was very non-helpful and it was difficult to finally find some grub to eat. Oh, and then I caught a cold while I was there. In the morning, I dragged my suitcase through this immense Turkish street market which was conveniently blocking the walking paths to the train station. I was literally crawling behind shoppers while they browsed at the different booths, while peddling men shouted back and forth. And the train station was a completely separate haven of frustration on top of that...

London, United Kingdom--I flew in from Brussels. I managed to find my hostel all right and get there without too much trouble. It was here where for the second time in my life, I saw the triple-tiered bunk bed. The first time I ever saw triple bunk beds was when I was at the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Hmmm.... To make things even more interesting, I was in the middle bunk. When I got there, the guy at reception gave me a card that had the code for the front door written on it, and the code for my room written on it. I lumbered on upstairs and tried my code. I went down, and he pointed out to me that I was hitting a '4' instead of a 'y'. I went back upstairs and tried a few more times. I came down and told him the code wasn't working. He checked and realized that he had given me the code to the wrong room (how's that for a sense of security?). I went upstairs and tried the new code a few times, but to no avail. I went back down the 2 flights of narrow, steep stairs, quite exhausted at this point because I had been running around with a suitcase all day and I was sick, and told him that the code wasn't working. He looked again and it turns out that he wrote down the second code wrong. Unbelievable. Eventually I made it to my bunk, only to have a grunting, hacking, heavily breathing Italian guy amble on up to the bunk above me. How uncomfortable. hahaha.

Mexborough, United Kingdom--I took a train up from London to stay with family whom I haven't met before. I LOVE this family. Any kids who speak with a British accent are going to be 10x cuter than normal, but these kids are just sooooo terrific. By now, however, my 'cold' has worsened into what I suspect is bronchitis. I woke up at 3am today coughing. I something that I coughed up ended up obstructing my airway, and I quickly jolted into sitting position, gasping for air. Eventually the obstruction was dislodged and I was breathing again, but that was a scary 2 seconds... I thought I was going to die. Okay I know you're laughing and thinking I'm being dramatic, but it was like I was choking. I decided against seeing a doctor for now, seeing as how there is only a 10% chance that bacteria is causing this, and if it is indeed bacterial, they will need to do a lab test to confirm this before they will prescribe me antibiotics. I am going to try and just hang tight.

Okay this might not look rapidfire but I had to trick myself into thinking that catching my blog up was going to be easy and fast. Stay tuned, my dear family and friends. Thank you for checking up on me.