I like France. Americans may view it as laziness, but from a French perspective it is time well-deserved off. Since Oct. 15, I have been off of school and will not be in school until Nov. 1. (This is with the exception of 2 days that I had a final on).
FYI, for anyone who is following the French Government raising the retirement age to 62, it isn't a war over here like the American Media is portraying it. I can stream some American news over here and they have only highlighted the one or two small incidents in Paris with rioters. Granted, about 1-2 million people over France are striking, and it is quite annoying, but it is highly peaceful. And the gas shortage, well it wasn't like the gas shortage in the 70's, and it is all fixed now. If you haven't heard, the French Parliament voted 170-something to 150-something to approve the raise in the retirement age to 62.
Currently, I am uploading all of my photos from this trip to my Facebook account. If you would like to see them, add me as a friend so you can. Since other people are pictured in these photos, I do not feel comfortable making them public. Granted they are not in any way indecent photos, I just don't like it when others see photos of me in my private life without my permission. Therefore, this is I haven't made the photos public. Also, it may be hard to find me searching on Facebook. I have made extra sure that it is difficult to find me, so if you do what to add me as a friend, just comment on this post and I will find you. But Brother Google might be able to search me down.
So about the trip. It was a 5 day excursion form Western Euro to Eastern Euro. I went from some of the richest Euro countries to the less poor ones, and was it quite and experience. We left Strasbourg and headed to Wien (Vienna), Austria, on the first day. We stopped in Nuremburg, Germany, for lunch. I have decided that Bavaria, the region that Nuremburg and Munich are in, is the second best place to live on this earth besides the U.S. The food is amazing and the beer is by far second best to my homebrew, which means it is pretty darned good beer. I have already started planning a Bavaria/Bohmeia beer tour in the spring. I drove the first way to Nuremburg, so I could buy the beloved Bavarian beer and drink all the way to Wien.
We arrived in Wien at night, got in our hostel and slept. The whole trip was overcast and rained on and off, so that wasn't fun, but all the sight-seeing outweighed this fact. In the morning we went to the Schönbrunn Palace and then to Wien city center. The Palace was cool, we only look outside at the gardens. We were on a tight time schedule so we couldn't do the inside tour. The city center was cool, got to see a lot of architecture. Let me tell you a secret, no matter where in Europe you are, it all looks the same to some degree. There are a lot of churches, that look the same on the inside and out, and the buildings look the same also, and there are castles EVERYWHERE. I found this quite disappointing, but it is still awesome to see them anyways. We also saw a Picasso and Michelangelo exhibit at the Albertina Art museum. The Michelangelo's were the practice drawings for the Sistine Chapel. I didn't take any pictures, but I got 1080p video of some of them. I wasn't supposed to be doing it, and they caught me...oh well!
After our day in Wein, we headed to Bratislava, Slovakia, for the night. Three of the girls were supposed to sleep with a friend, that is the only reason we actually stopped there. The funny part was after got home for the bar, they attempted to find their friends place with the GPS and couldn't. So instead of coming back to the hostel and sleeping in the room, they slept in the car. I am still trying to understand this one, but I'm pretty sure it was a pride thing.
This was a Sunday night, and when we arrived the girls wanted to grab a beer. I wasn't quite in the mood, I was still feeling the Bavarians from the night before. But I wasn't going to let 6 girls walk around Eastern Europe in the wee hours of the morning by themselves, so I joined. We walked into the only bar open and...well it was a Communist bar. The girls, of course, were quite unaware of this but I had an idea when I saw parts of the USSR flag as their logo. When you walked in, you saw Cuba's flag hanging and pictures of Lenin, Castro and Castro's son. The guys in there looked like neo-nazis also, but they were very very hospitable. I waited an hour to see if the girls would notice anything, and they didn't. So I brought it up, and of course they shrugged it off. Now i'm not a risk adverse person, but you always need to understand your environment and this one screamed that finding another place could have been a good idea. And this is why I felt it was a good idea to escort them in Bratislava.
The next morning we work up and headed to Budapest. If you didn't know, Budapest is actually two cities. They are separated by the Danub and Buda is the older part while Pest is the new part. It isn't the richest city in the world and that is what was neat about it. The further East you went, the more depressed the cities became and looked. The Hungarian currency is in thousands. I have a 1000 ft. (Florentine) bill that is worth about 5 U.S. dollars. I had a 5000 also and wanted to keep it, but it needed that money for dinner. Budapest is under construction, and so was a lot of the places we visited. Highways, cities, and historical renovations galore. While in Budapest, we saw some Palaces, Parliament, and Churches. Also, if you didn't know, paprika comes from Hungary. But the highlight of the Budapest story was quite annoying for me.
When we got to Budapest, parking was a nightmare. We finally found a spot, but it was 3 hour parking only. We dropped our stuff off at the hostel and then came back. Five of the girls were belly aching about moving the car while me and one other warned that if we keep it here, it will get booted or towed. You have to remember I was with 6 girls (ages 19-21 except for on who was later 20's). First off, there reasoning was "because I don't understand how they can keep track of how long we are here, therefore they won't do anything to our car." Well, needles to say, this became a "I told you so situation." We came back and low-and-behold our car was booted! Well, I was pissed to say the least. I went from happy tourist to terrorist in a matter of milliseconds. It all ended well, we went to the hostel owner and he spoke to the Police. We met them at the car, paid our 11,500 ft. ($65) fine and they removed the boot. To all guys, no matter where a woman comes from, they are all the same. Not that I'm saying it negativity, but yes they all reason and act the same, THE EXACT SAME.
After our night in Budapest, we went to Bled, Slovenia. Slovenia, Austria and Germany are amazing countries. It is a mix of Augusta, MO, with some mountains from North Carolina and throw in a Rocky Mountain or two. It is just plain amazing, I took a lot of video and I will let you know when it is all edit.
Bled was very nice. It was quite different because the other destinations were populous cities, and Bled was country. Words can't describe it, but the pictures I have can. We visited a castle where they had medieval dancing and actual sword fighting. They hit the swords, sparks flew and one sword broke. In the morning we work up and visited a national park and saw a cool river and water falls, then headed home.
The trip home was long and we stopped in Munich for dinner, and of course for beer. This is when I found out more bad news and started to think that next time I will play a bigger role in managing the trip. Well, it started when I was calculating the distance we had driven. We drove 2600 km, 1600 miles, (but we knew this beforehand because on Google Maps it put us at roughly 2500km on our road maps). Then all of a sudden I hear a voice, "Bill, we had a limit of 1750 km." I about soiled myself. After I read the contract, I realized that we had to pay an extra 380 euro for the mile overage, which doubled the car expense, and we had driven in countries in which it was forbidden to be in (Slovakia, Slovenia, and Hungary).
This was quite an experience in cross-cultural communication and patience. Although the good far outweighed the bad, I had one hell of a learning experience. I learned a new level of leadership and human management. By the time I had found out about the distance limit, I was too tired to be upset, therefore I reached into my leadership tools and dealt with it in a more appropriate manner. I have come to learn that you should never leave leadership to the side, be a leader in and outside of the business world. Once I figured this out, it made life easier for those next 12 hours.
Cross-cultural communication. I found myself having to be the translator for all the girls. First off, none of them had English as there native language. I had 3 Spanish, 1 Polish, 1 Brazilian, and 1 Greek. When they spoke to each other with the same words, they ultimately had different meanings. Because of my natural grasp of the English language, I found myself re-wording a lot of what they had to say. I found it an interesting challenge and realized this is one I will face in the future when I become the World's Entrepreneur.
In the end, we all made it back safe and happy. I saw a part of the world that many won't get to see, I experienced life in ways most will never and I took away lessons that are difficult, if near impossible, to find in any school except The University of Life.
This coming Wednesday I am off with a different group of people to visit Normandy and Paris for 5 more days. Get this, it will be a trip with Americans, Germans, and Russians but this time we won't be shooting at each other. Not that it is totally ironic, but if you think in historical terms it can be viewed as a unique experience.
I need to get back to my French wine and Brie.
Cheers, Prost, Santé, Salud (Whichever language you may speak),
Bill
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