I’m in my hotel room at the Weisses Kruez in Bregenz, Austria, after a hard day snowboarding in the Austrian Alps. Right now I have the window cracked open to let some fresh air into the 100 year old hotel, and from time to time over the constant pitter-patter of the rain I hear thunder roll across the valley. Today I was jet lagged, hung over, and sleep deprived while playing in some of the best snow I’ve experienced in years. It all began the night before, after a long day at work and a nice meal and a fine beer at a brewery in Boblingen outside Stuttgart.

From there, I left my co-workers at the Sindelfingen hotel and hopped in the Mercedes ML400 diesel rental 4x4 and headed south. I had planned this weekend out in detail the week before, so I knew exactly where to go. The drive on the Autobahn was really enjoyable despite the rain. I found some techno radio station and enjoyed one particular song which they said was “Detroit” inspired – although I don’t know who the artist was or where he was from. There’s nothing quite like cruising at 150 km/hr in the rain at night while listening to good tunes and anticipating a fun filled weekend.

Once I checked in around midnight, I went to a club and bar called Cuba a few blocks over that supposedly had a good mixed crowd. It turned out to be a hip-hop club with a second floor balcony overlooking the ground floor and the dee-jay spinning from a corner dance floor up on the balcony. It was loud and I was annoyed at the stand-offish crowd, but I must say some of the young Austrians are beautiful people. After sitting at the bar in vain hoping someone would sit next to me so I could strike up a conversation, finally I managed to have an interesting discussion about travel and what life’s like in Austria with a fellow by the name of Martin who spoke about as good English as I speak Japanese. So it was a struggle, but he seemed to at least understand most of what I was saying. I ended up drinking far too many excellent beers and getting drunk, and then magically my German language skills reappeared after a 5 year absence. I am not sure where the skills went now or where they came from, but for a while there I was pulling out all kinds of grammar and vocab that I can’t begin to remember today. I do not understand how my mind processes language.

So anyway, this guy (who was straight, just for the record) and I talked for several hours it seems, because soon it was 4AM and they were shutting down the place. We parted ways and I promised to return tonight, although frankly if I go back I’m not sure I really want to talk to him for another 3 hours. So I’m thinking I might just forget it and crash for the evening. On the other hand, I could meet someone that’s actually interesting to me, although the club was so noisy and stand-offish that I am seriously questioning why I should go back. My original plan was to only go to this club tonight, Saturday, and go to bed early yesterday so I could get up early and go snowboarding. But I screwed that up by going Friday night.

Instead, I woke up with a start at 9:20 AM and realized somehow I improperly set the alarm the night before after getting home drunk. I guess things like this are expected, and honestly I don’t think I would have wanted to get up any earlier. It was actually painful to contemplate getting out of bed and go snowboarding, but damn it I didn’t travel half way around the world to stay in my hotel room and sleep in. Although it was tempting. So instead I roused myself, showered, and ate some yummy eggs and yoghurt downstairs in the breakfast room provided by the hotel. I hit the road at 10:00 and was sort of disappointed in myself for wasting hours and hours the night before getting drunk and talking to someone I suppose I’ll not see again. The drive up was uneventful, although I was really wanting to just pull over and take a nap rather than go snowboarding. But, damn it! I was going snowboarding.

Once there I was surprised by how few cars were in the parking lot and I proceeded directly to the rental place where I got a snowboard for 24 euro. I then picked up the lift ticket for 40 euro and went straight to the cable car to the top. I haven’t been in too many cable cars, but this one had all the trappings of a traditional Alps cable car. It was old, crowded, and went on little cables taking you ridiculously high in the air over almost vertical terrain.

My first run was a bit disconcerting because I wasn’t sure what I was getting myself into. For one thing, I’ve only snowboarded once before this year, and that was at Pine Knob in Michigan and that almost doesn’t count as snowboarding (take no offense, please)! For another, I had no idea how the rental board would respond or if it was set up for me properly. I’m also out of shape for snowboarding and particularly for snowboarding at one of the best resorts in the Austrian Alps. And lastly and most importantly, the trail maps are not the same as in the States. On the trail maps back home, you have green for easy, blue for intermediate, and black for designating the most difficult. In Europe, they have blue and black runs, but there’s no green and there’s red instead. I was afraid they had shifted the whole scale to get rid of green and introduce a new category, red, to indicate the really most difficult. Red like the color of blood.

As it turned out, red just meant a designated easier groomed and marked way down the open slope. Since there are no trees at all, there aren’t trails to designate the right way down the mountain. I quickly discovered that there was some excellent power just off the side of the marked route. But it also is very difficult to turn or keep moving in deep powder when it’s a gentle slope, so I found myself shying away from the designated area in search of the good stuff in the steeper areas. But I was snowboarding in the clouds, and the visibility was near fifty feet if my goggles weren’t fogged up, which they usually were, so it was more like 5 feet and you could barely see outlines of what’s coming up ahead.

I was more than a little worried about accidentally ending up in an run ending in a cliff, which nearly happened more than a few times throughout the day. It was very disconcerting at times, because I really didn’t want to accidentally go over a cliff. But all the best snow was there to be had if only one didn’t mind being the first person to explore. Usually tracks are a good sign that there’s a way out, but where I wanted to go there were no tracks, not that I could really see anyway if there were or not. As it was, on one particular occasion I was somewhat blindly turning in beautiful untracked powder when I completely had a weightless feeling and had ridden off a 5 foot high outcropping only to land face first in 2 feet of powder. It didn’t hurt in the slightest, but it was enough to wake me up to the very real possibility that I could very easily end up snowboarding off a real cliff and I might not be so lucky then. This was the kind of skiing in the clouds on powder feeling where you can’t tell if you’re actually moving or not until you suddenly find yourself landing on your hands, butt, or occasionally face. You turn and think you’ve come to a complete stop, only to have the rude realization that you’re still moving and that the snow beneath you isn’t shaped like you thought it was. On a few occasions I had to jump rocky drops to get myself out of some messes I’d gotten myself into, but they weren’t of the “stick this landing or face the consequences” (ie, a cliff) variety so I was okay.

I also freaked myself out when I accidentally snowboarded into a narrow gulley of rock that was obviously a stream or something in the summer and an avalanche chute in the winter. There were no tracks into this thing and there was a reason for it. When you ski a lot, you learn to recognize geographical features that create avalanche chutes. These are the very rare perfect pathways that snow takes when it decides to slide off a mountain in one particular narrow area. However, I had committed myself to going there already and was having a tough enough time just staying standing on the flat approach to the entrance. It turned out to be really fun and sort of like a natural half-pipe, and when it narrowed down to the smallest area which was barely two snowboard lengths laid end-to-end, sure enough I started a mini-avalanche and pushed all the fresh fluffy powder down through the chute and I surfed it down. So that was pretty stupid, but in Europe they don’t mark these things. I would have taken pictures but I wanted to get the hell out of there as quick as possible.

On the other hand, whenever I got below the clouds it was like heaven. You could see everything and see where to turn and where to go to get the best terrain. If not for being jet lagged, hung over, and exhausted, I would have ridden all day. Instead, I took an early lunch at the top of the mountain on the other side from the cable car, and enjoyed a nice goulash soup and salad. After eating, I felt a thousand percent better and rode hard for the rest of the day until my legs no longer would respond to my commands and I spent half of each run sitting in the snow resting. By 4:00 I’d had enough and packed it up to go home after taking a little walking tour through the village of Zurs. It was cute, but I think I like staying down here in Bregenz more because there are actually people here. Zurs seemed like a sleepy little hamlet with lots of quaint hotel lodges, but not much of a vibrant nightlife.

Once back at the hotel in Bregenz, I napped from 6 – 7:45 and finally got myself up to find a restaurant for dinner. I picked a crazy Chinese owned fish restaurant and ate all kinds of weird sea creatures. I was having flashbacks of Japan and remembered why I no longer am adventurous in eating everything from the sea. I asked for recommendations and it was suggested to choose the fish and sea creature on a stick entrée over salad. I didn’t realize that was what I’d ordered, but it was the recommended dish. I recognized the shrimp, which still had it’s head and tail and shell on, but the rest could have been mystery meat from the sea. I think some of it was squid and it was actually good. But my mind plays tricks on me when eating weird animals and I always regret not just being a vegetarian to save myself the anguish. But it’s expanding my mind and palate, if nothing else.

So now here I am in the hotel, and it’s quarter past midnight and I haven’t decided whether or not to go to the club, although I don’t think I’m up for it. On the other hand, I napped at entirely the wrong time of day and I’m not tired now. Plus I have jet lag and it feels like 6PM so I really have no excuse. Well it closes at 4am so I have time to decide later. Ciao.

- SAN
- posted by freestyle @ 12:27 AM

 
It's 4:20 AM Japan time and I've been awake for 2 hours because I crashed early last night -- 9PM and now I'm doomed to jet lag hell. I thought I was doing well with the jet lag, but apparently it got the better of me last night. As a result, I missed the Saturday party I was expecting to attend and now tomorrow I can expect to be dead tired by the evening again. Oh well, I go home in 2 days anyhow.

Later today I'm going to attempt to visit Baird-Miller-san from JCMU at his house about an hour outside Nagoya. He's teaching English there to Japanese people in the JET program, and he's staying in a little town in the countryside. I'm looking forward to getting out of this crowded city and away from the insane crowds at Expo.

I am slightly concerned that I won't be able to find an ATM that's open, because I mistakenly spent my last 100,000 yen bill ($100) on clothes when I thought I had another in my wallet. I basically have $25 in Japanese currency on me now to last till Monday, worst case. If I can't get more cash, I won't be able to take the day trip and I'll have to stay in Nagoya once more. That would suck because I've done about everything touristy that's possible to do here, and then some.
- posted by freestyle @ 12:20 PM

 
8/31/05 – Wednesday 7:47 AM

Well I need to catch up on my writing. I just woke up, and I’m fairly proud of myself because getting up after 5AM when you just land in Japan is somewhat rare because of the complete upside down time zone that’s either 13 or 14 hours ahead. Day becomes night and night becomes day. I attribute my ability to sleep last night to the fact that I’ve been completely wearing my system down since I got here.

I spent a total of 11 hours yesterday at Expo waiting in lines and looking at pavilions. Then, after being completely exhausted, I went out to Karaoke with Nicole and met some of her friends. We had a blast. Karen and Dave were there who I met Monday night after arriving and John had taken me over to meet up with Nicole at Karen’s house, where we proceeded to drink cheap sake out of a four liter plastic jug with Asahi beer chasers. Sake looks like vodka, but it’s really only rice wine and it’s entirely possible to sip a large amount out of a cup. This resulted in me getting nice and tipsy and afflicted with a throat burned raw from all the harshness of the cheap sake. All day yesterday it hurt every time I drank a water or anything else. I’m seriously worried that I might be developing a cold, because it’s now the 2nd day and my throat still bothers me.

Ok, so back to karaoke. John and James had to go to a party for their group of pavilion workers only, so after some difficult miscommunications (I have no cell phone – very difficult to coordinate meeting up with friends without one), I managed to make it to the subway station outside the karaoke bar. There I met Nicole’s friend Rob, an interesting guy in his early 20’s about the same build and height as me and that apparently likes to drink whisky. Nicole and Rob proceeded to drink an entire bottle of 953 yen whisky while we sat on the steps outside to the station waiting for the rest of the group to show up. I bought a bottle of café latte to shake off the jet lag and spiked it with a shot of whisky. This was about all I could manage as far as alcohol was concerned. When it hurts to swallow, the last thing you want is pure 40 proof alcohol on your throat. Plus if I’m getting a cold I don’t want to share a community bottle of anything.

While waiting and drinking outside the station, a whole bunch of people ended up dropping by. Alex Scharf from my time at JCMU showed up randomly on his way home from actually climbing Mt. Fuji. He was with some Japanese girl I didn’t know and didn’t get introduced to. Not surprisingly, after just climbing Mt. Fuji he wasn’t up for a night of karaoke. I’ll have to catch up with him later.

We also met up with Nicole’s roommate Cindy (“Sin” for short) after Rob drunkenly called her and convinced her to drag herself out of bed to come join us. Apparently she had done what I wanted to do yesterday afternoon – nap for three hours. Well anyway I’m getting tired of writing about this, so let’s just skip right to the end. We ended up taking over the karaoke bar with about 12 people and it ended with lots of drinking cheap whisky and coke. Some of the highlight songs: bing crosby’s White Christmas sung by Nathanial (whom I embarassingly and mistakenly called Jeremiah earlier in the night – hey, it’s some kind of really long formal Biblical name with lots of syllables), and I sang renditions of Simple Minds’ Don’t you forget about me and Puddle of Mudd’s Blurry. A bunch of Japanese songs were put on by the Japanese girls who were with us whom I don’t actually know, so that was not fun for me but at least I got to practice my reading comprehension and sing in Japanese a little. We also sang wham’s “last christmas”. Christmas songs were real popular last night, as were slow Japanese love songs (in Japanese).

We ended the night singing Coldplay “yellow” and being drowned out by Rob, who was thoroughly drunk at that point. He was getting real friendly with everyone, I’m sure having to do with the half liter of whisky, and had taken to sing duets real loudly with everyone he could for the last hour of the night. All in all it was a blast. I felt bad for Karen who had to front a bunch of money for people when they left early because they were too drunk and for various other reasons, like they were tired. It seems to always be the case that people show up for Karaoke and don’t pay. I never figured that out, but I think it has to do with the student poverty mentality that a lot of people living I Japan seem to have. I don’t know why, because they get a $60 per day per diem, which should be more than enough to live on.

So that was yesterday. Today I wanted to sleep in and go to Expo late. It rained all day yesterday, so this time I’m bringing an umbrella. Then I won’t have to steal/ borrow one from the American Pavilion again. Now that I’m all rested, I think I’ll lesiurly get up and shower. I need to be nicer on my body so this developing cold goes away. Plus my back is still killing me from walking and standing for 11 hours yesterday. I had my new orthotics in my shoes that’s supposed to fix the pain that developed in my foot last fall when I played football with the Sunday football league. Anyway, my feet didn’t hurt too much except for my heels, but man I must be doing something wrong because my lower back is in excruciating pain whenever I use those muscles. It’s probably from slouching so much and leaning against walls. You try standing for 11 hours. The human body is not meant for it.
- posted by freestyle @ 7:47 AM

 
8/28/05 – 1:12 PM PST

So I’m sitting in the Portland airport nearing the end of my 5 hour layover here after leaving Seattle this morning. I left the house at 5:15 and said goodbye to my dog for probably the last time. She turns 15 in a week or so, but is in pretty bad shape now. She is basically deaf and mostly blind, but the spirit seems to have gone out of her except for just a few minutes each day where she obviously steels herself against pain and shows some of her former vigor. It’s sad for me because she seemed to ignore me as much as possible on the brief 3 days I spent in Seattle with her and my family.

My parents were still in bed at 5:15 in the morning, and I whispered goodbye and my Dad whispered bye. My mom apparently was still asleep despite all the ruckus of me getting ready to leave, and she continued snoring.

So that was my morning. Now it’s time to board.
- posted by freestyle @ 1:12 PM

 
I'm going back to Japan tomorrow to visit with people I know and see World Expo 2005. I'll try and post a bit...
- posted by freestyle @ 10:48 AM

 
7:44 AM EST, Thursday, May 05, 2005. 14:45 Athens time

So it’s been a long journey, but shortly I’ll be catching the last plane to Mitiline. I’ve slept a little at this 4 hour layover, mostly because of a large beer I had with lunch. I feel very jet lagged right now. I guess it’s because I’d normally just now be rolling into work, and the reality is that I haven’t slept all that much. I think I got about 3 hours on the first plane, if that. Then the ½ hour or so here at the Athens airport. So yeah, my brain is a little foggy right now.

I am ready to be done hauling all this crap around and just settle into the hotel. It should be a nice hotel, so I’m going to appreciate that. I wish I had packed lighter, as I always do. But for some reason I thought that a week trip would generate so many snapshots that I’d need to take along this laptop to store them all. So the laptop came along.
- posted by freestyle @ 2:45 PM

 
Wednesday, May 04, 2005. 4:37 PM

I’m sitting in JFK airport in New York right now, waiting for my flight on Olympic Airlines to Greece to begin boarding. I’m going to a wedding, so I’ve been lugging around a cheap plastic garment bag containing a suit. I already finished the single magazine I brought along, “Automotive Engineering”, and as thrilling as that is for me, I still felt compelled to pick up a novel to read. I ended up getting “The Princes of Ireland” by Edward Rutherfurd, which is a kind of historical fiction account of the history of Ireland from antiquity to the present, I think. At 776 pages long, I expect this book will be a travelling companion of mine on many trips in the future as well. Or, if it’s really good, I might read the whole thing. I haven’t read a whole fiction book in over a year.

So that’s the mundane detail for now. The adventure is just beginning. Moving backwards from now chronologically, I flew here on a little puddle jumper airplane from Detroit. I had some fun on the way to the airport in the form of a flat tire. I couldn’t believe that I actually got a flat tire on the very day I needed to catch a flight. Fortunately, I’ve traveled enough to despise hurriedly driving to airports, so I left plenty early and other than 15 wasted minutes, I had no major additional stress because of the mishap. I drove over a strap of metal that was like a giant staple. My Jeep was oscillating back and forth in a strange way, so I pulled over to check. It looked a little flat, and sure enough, I heard the telltale hiss of a leak. I’m pretty amazingly sensitive to how my cars drive, I guess, because it hadn’t even come close to getting completely flat yet. But it was on it’s way – about half flat. Anyway, after some cursing and idle threats to hunt down the Jeep engineers responsible for the tire changing tools and rhetorical questions about what cheap low-wage 3rd world nation produced them and how they were going to get an earful from me, I was able to successfully exchange the wheel and get back on my way.

I saved a little time by loaning out my Jeep for a week to my roommate Darren, who hopefully won’t crash it or smoke in it. But at least I didn’t need additional time hunting for a parking spot. I’m actually thankful that he’s able to use it.

So anyway, I’ve been really stressed lately because I bought a duplex last week. It came with one almost-deadbeat tenant, so I’m in the process of giving him the boot. But he still has rights, and I won’t get to move into the downstairs flat until mid July. So that’s one source of stress, and the other is work. Work is very consuming right now, and it’s mostly because the project I’m working on is understaffed. We’re eventually going to be a department of 20, and right now there’s only 2 of us. So there’s a lot of pressure and here I am, going on vacation. Oh well, they’ll get by. I just need to relax. A lot.

Right now I’m wishing that I was travelling with at least one of my friends. Travelling alone was very fun for me once, but after having done it so much both with and without friends, I’ve decided it’s better to go with someone. You can talk casually about random stuff, and when you want to be social you don’t have to strike up conversations with strangers. Oh well, I’ll be meeting friends in Greece at the wedding, and will at least have a few days to hang out with them. I’m looking forward to it.
- posted by freestyle @ 4:37 PM