My friend,
Tina's dad is Greek. He used to live in the US but then, for one reason or
another, he went back to the homeland. She wasn't too broken up about it
though. Because who in their right mind would be broken up about always having
a place to stay in Greece? And for always having this place to stay abroad, I
used to envy her. By the time we'd actually become friends, she'd already flown
over there to see him a couple of times and, never having traveled overseas
myself, I used to ask her tons of questions about what Europe was like.
“It's just a
more laid-back lifestyle.”
“Yeah. But
what do you mean by that?”
“It's
like... Okay. So imagine you have some letters that you have to mail. Or,
better yet, postcards. Like if you're on vacation or something.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
“And let's
say that you take them to the post office. And maybe there's even no line. No
line to stand in, I mean.”
“Alright.”
“And let's
say that there's a guy sitting behind the counter reading a newspaper.”
“Gotcha.”
“So what do
you do?”
“Easy. You
say, 'Hey, homes. I need to mail these here fucking postcards like snap. And
why don't ya gimmie some of your foreign stamps while you're at it.”
“Wrong.”
“Alright, alright.
'Please, sir, may I mail these here postcards.'”
“Still
wrong.”
“'Please,
may I mail them 'cause they're like for my family and shit.'”
“Still
wrong.”
“Alright.
Then why don't you tell me.”
“I'm going
to! The correct answer is; you don't do any of that. You just stand
there and leave the guy to his newspaper and his cappuccino or you can come
back later.”
“Oh yeah?
Well, what gives?”
“Well,
because he's obviously on his break.”
“Now, that's
fuckin' stupid. So you're trying to tell me that they don't have breakrooms in
Europe? Because that doesn't sound very laid-back.”
“I don't
know. They may not. But I do know one thing. If you so much as clear
your throat in attempts to get this post office guy's attention; you will
regret it.”
“He'll get
all pissed off?”
“Sooo pissed
off. He'll come right around the counter and point a finger at you and yell
right in your face.”
“Seriously?
You don't know that.”
“I do know.
Because that's exactly what happened to me.”
“Oh my God.
What a dick! What a high-strung dick! And this is your way of trying to
explain to me how chillax Europeans are?”
“It's just
their custom or whatever and, when you go over there, you're already expected
to know this stuff. And, if you really think about it, maybe we're the high-strung
ones. I mean, maybe we're the ones that have to have everything at the snap of
our fingers.”
“Yeah, but
can't they see... I mean, can't they easily tell the we have 'American' written
all over our face over there?”
“That
probably doesn't help matters.”
“That...is
true. Whelp, this has been fascinating.”
“Well, I'm
glad. But I hope it doesn't discourage you from going there someday.”
“Oh, no.
Don't even worry about that shit. I still wanna go. I just have to save up a
little bit of money first. Not all of us have parents over there we can stay
with, ya know.”
And I did go
to Europe...about a year later. And saving the money seemed sort of easy
even...I guess because I just wanted it that badly. My best friend and his girl
(Tim and Theresa) and I simply made a pact with each other. We said that we'd
each have enough money saved to buy a plane ticket come October and, sure
enough, each of us did. And so we planned a trip.
What we
planned wasn't anything that over the top; just a basic, 2 week introduction
to Western Europe type thing. It would be just the three of us and we'd be
pretty much winging it the whole way. And thanks to Tim and Theresa being the
chronic potheads that they were; our first few days were to be spent in
Amsterdam where they hoped to stock up on enough dope to send back home to
themselves...enough to last them through a nuclear winter. And I had no problem
with this, of course, despite the fact that I didn't really smoke that much pot
anymore. But, as the old proverb goes; when in Amsterdam, just fucking smoke
it. That, and I was just so thrilled to be out of the country that it didn't
really matter where we went first or where we went at all. So I just sort of
let those two lead the way which was actually a pretty good idea since, at the
age of 24, I was still really bad with both directions and planning
things.
Figuring
we'd be all distraught after landing, Tim booked a hotel for the first night.
And, shortly after arriving there and stopping in just long enough to deposit
our bags, we headed right back out the door again and caught a bus towards the
city center. It was around midmorning.
Amsterdam
was more amazing than I ever thought it could be. It was beautiful and cozy
feeling like a mountain town despite the gargantuan squares and cathedrals
scattered about everywhere. And everything about this experience was just so
new and weird to us right down to that strange sounding Dutch language
emanating from the overhead speakers right on the bus. Right down to the very names
of the streets themselves! And we were the typical tourists; I just didn't
realize it at the time. Like...at the first place we stopped in, a quaint
looking bar dubbed “The Pink Floyd”; I asked right away if I could take a
picture of all the different varieties of weed for sale right up there in the
front of this establishment in a glass display case. To which the guy behind
the counter respectfully and mild-manneredly replied, “We...prefer it if you
don't.”
“That's
cool, man. That's why I asked.” And I actually did feel like the gracious guest
assuming that the majority of foreigners who'd come before me had simply
snapped off a shot without first acquiring the proper permission.
And there we
sat ourselves in this bar for a while doing bong rip after bong rip and
listening to a live recording of Pearl Jam playing over a really hi-def sound
system. When it came time to get out of there, though, and we were walking down
the street again...good and baked out of our minds; a cop car sped up behind us
and, almost instinctively, I felt like we were about to get arrested. It just
passed us by though. Of course, it did. Fucked up as I was and in that tiny bit
of time since we'd left the bar, I'd somehow forgotten that weed was perfectly
legal here and we had nothing to worry about. And onward that cop car did go.
And even it emitted that siren so unlike ours. So alien and weird to
American ears...like something we only knew from the movies.
The three of
us spent the day wandering around like this. We did hit up the Rijksmuseum and
it was fun. But we also considered this to be enough culture for one day and
proceeded to hit the pubs again thereafter. And it was somewhere around dusk
when we finally made our way into...I believe it was The Bulldog. And this was
one of the more famous cafes around town; one that, upstairs, also functioned
as a hostel. Not that any of that mattered to us. It was simply another place
to get another beer and for Tim to roll up another joint for us to pass around
the table. The only problem with this plan, and he realized this shortly after
we sat down, was that he'd already used up all his rolling papers. But no big
deal. It's not like we weren't in a hash bar or anything. So Tim stands up and
makes his way over to the front counter where there's a guy behind a cash
register who happens to be eating a plate of food underneath the dim lighting
that seemed to be just the normal atmosphere of this place. And he says to the
guy...
“Hey, man.
Can I get a pack of rolling papers?”
And knowing
Tim, he probably even said, “Please.”
And Theresa
and I are watching this go down from our table about ten feet away...and we
have a perfect view.
So the guy
behind the counter looks up at him; fork still in hand and mouth half full of
what looked to be Swedish meatballs and egg noodles. And this guy is like this
skinhead looking dude with fierce, blue eyes and a stern, chiseled nose. And
then in the thickest Scottish accent that I'd ever heard in my life; an accent
so thick that my dad would have needed subtitles just to understand it...the
guy burst out with these words like a blast of hot air, “Can't you see?! I'm
eatin' me fuckin' dinner!”
And the guy,
after making such an eruption, continues to look exasperated that Tim had dared
to even talk to him.
And Tim,
after receiving the heat of this explosion, now wore an appealing look on his
face as if to say, “What? What the fuck did I do?”
And then we
left. Almost instinctively, Theresa and I each left some money on the table and
the three of us got the fuck out of there not wanting to cause any more of a
commotion than we somehow already had.
“What the
fuck did I do?!” Tim asked out loud this time once we got outside.
“I don't
know, man. I heard if they're eating or something then they're like on break or
some shit.”
“Seriously?!”
“That's what
I heard. Not that I really truly believed it until now.”
“But
like...does the whole place shut down just so that asshole can eat his
fucking dinner?!”
“I don't
know. Live and learn, I guess. For all of us. I mean, this has been a learning
experience for all of us. From now on, we know.”
“Yeah,
but...! Yeah,” and Tim's brain had become exhausted in a matter minutes. His
ability to want to even try to comprehend this was either defeated or
indifferent now (I couldn't tell which).
“It just is
what it is,” I said in a continued attempt to help smooth things over...not
that I had any sympathy for the Scottish fuck.
“Yeah, I
never really got that saying.”
“Neither did
I. It just sounded like it might fit. How about, 'Sometimes, a cigar is just a
cigar'? Can I use that one now? Are we close enough to Austria to where it
won't sound like such a meaningless cliché?”
“Yeah, I
guess. I guess, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. But sometimes a dick
is still just a dick.”
All in all
though (at least from what I perceived throughout the rest of our trip); I felt
like we were less obnoxious than most other Americans we came into close
contact with. If that situation at The Bulldog had even been our fault.
But who's to say? Needless to say though; we were all pretty much a
little intimidated by the rest of the food servers we encountered no matter
which country we happened to be in from there on out.
But there
was this one guy who stuck out in my mind. Not a European waiter, I mean. But
another American. The three of us were near the top of the Eiffel Tower and
this huge, fat dude exclaims in the thickest Texan accent I'd ever
heard, “Man, this thing sure is big!” And that's pretty dickish too...when ya
think about it.