Home is where the heart is...

I met up with some friends to go to a flamenco show? yup, I avoided flamenco my entire stay in Granada (Andalusia is its birthplace) and I ended up going to a show in my native country... oh well. I was impressed one bit, I don't like this kind of music but then he sang about Albayzín... my old neighborhood when I lived in Graná. Hearing the words about Albayzín brought a smile to my ugly face. Happy days.

Since the "lovely" people at the Mexican embassy didn't want to give me the stupid visa to fly from Cancún and since I was not going to book another connecting flight I had to come up with a plan B. Come up because like most plan Bs, they don't exist until you need them. 

I left JH more than a month before and had been working three times a week in a super nice and cozy pub that goes by the name of Whiskey Den. But the time had come. I had to leave. I needed to leave. It was not all fun and games in these 5 months in Guatemala. Had ups and downs but overall was nice. Met nice people. Met not so nice people, unfortunately.

My aim for the day was to get to either El Tunco or San Salvador. I was leaning towards the beach as it would be easier to leave from there than from the city. 

I probably wrote about this before but I cannot remember 100%. Even if I did, it was most likely in 2012. Hitchhiking in Latin America is super different to HHing in Europe. In LatAm you just need to look like a foreigner and put your stuff in front of you and that's it. My level or paranoia grew quite a bit during my times in Guatemala to the point that I was refusing many rides because I didn't feel confident enough to get inside the car. Surprisingly enough, I felt very confident in Nicaragua but I'll get to that soon.

I had to routes to choose from: the Panamarican Highway that would get me to San Salvador but I would have to cross Guate City with all my shit so... no.  The other route was to leave Antigua towards Escuintla and take highway CA2 towards El Salvador. It was a bit longer but nicer views and it would take me through El Tunco where a friend of mine was waiting for me. 

I chose the latter route.

It was 8 in the morning. I stopped at McRubbish for a coffee to go. By 8:30 I was already on my way. First and second rides came easy. By noon I was about 50 Km from the border. Unlike other times that I don't have a time frame I wanted to be in Nicaragua for the weekend meaning that I had to sleep that night in El Salvador. I was quite in a hurry given I had to take a stupid flight that would take me from Costa Rica to El Salvador to Colombia to the Dominican Republic. Success! By early afternoon I was in El Tunco. Next day's destination: León, Nicaragua.

León was not that far away, less than 500Km but that included two borders. Hitchhiking in El Salvador was a breeze. While I was in the queue for the passport check in the Honduras side of the border, someone offered me a shuttle bus, straight to the Nicaraguan border for 6$. "What time are we leaving?". "Now". That guy had a different concept of time than me. That now was almost two hours later. He was waiting for the bus to fill up. All the passengers agreed to paid 8$ so we could leave straight away. Yay, I was on the way to Nicaragua. The van was overheating so we stopped in some town in the middle to fix it. Yay, we lost almost another hour.

I knew that my tattoos would get me questions asked. Everything was fine until I said I was from Guatemala. Before: "gringo", "traveler", "welcome to Nicaragua". But everything changed the second after I said where I was coming from: "do you have more tattoos?", "what do they mean?", "are you in a gang?".

Finally I was in lovely Nicaragua. I stayed in a nice little hotel owned by an Andalusian guy, the name: Hostal Flamenco's...! León was nice. It was not like I remembered it but nice still. Nicaragua is quite cheap. I was craving for Gallo Pinto. I wanted to spend the most time in Nicaragua and the least in Costa Rica. There is a nice beach close to León, Las Peñitas. Then it was Granada. Not quite my Graná but still as nice as I remembered it. León was exactly the middle point between El Tunco and San José, Costa Rica. 

All good things have to come to an end. I needed to leave Nicaragua and somehow get to Costa Rica to take the flight to the DR. The flight was in the afternoon but I wanted to make it to San José the day before so I could check, double check and triple check everything.

A friend of mine arrived to Costa Rica the day before me. I wanted to meet with him so I went to the hostel that he was staying only to find out that he checked out in the morning. The hostel was overpriced (like everything in Costa Rica), not the nicest. It offered free coffee but it was only free if you ordered the, you guessed it: overpriced breakfast! The staff was far from being friendly: I was not shown the room, bathrooms, bar, anything! I found out what time was check out time through another guest. Horrible and expensive experience. I would've slept at the airport if only my flight was in the morning. 

Ahead of me were 18 hours of traveling, between flights and layovers.  I had to spend my last Colones in some overpriced coffee (3$!) because I couldn't change them into Dollars because they "don't have 1$ notes". First stop: El Salvador... where I was just a few days before! Two hour layover and a flight to Bogotá where I would spend the night at the airport. No point in going outside. Flight arrived at midnight and the flight to Santo Domingo was at 8 something.

 I had never been to the Caribbean. I didn't know what to expect. I had no idea about anything on the island. I knew it had amazing beaches and expensive all inclusives on those beaches. I arrived to Santo Domingo but the flight to Madrid was from Punta Cana, some 200 Km from the Capital of the Domincan Republic.

I had to no idea where to stay in DR. I completely forgot that it was Semana Santa so CS was a no no. Everybody was on holidays or already hosting other people. My older brother used to travel quite often to Santo Domingo a few years back so I asked him if he had contacts.

The DR has a lot of tourism, tourism made for rich people. There is no public transport to and from the airport. The taxi is about 30$ I've read somewhere that you could jump in inside a guagua (Dominican bus) and pay 1-2$ but lucky me, my brother still had some contacts in SD. That's how I had a driver waiting for me at the airport. The guy even held a sign with my name written in it! Never had that before happened in my life. I think it was the first time in the history of human kind that a driver was waiting for a sweaty and smelly backpacker. These people who I'm super grateful not only paid for the taxi but also for a small hotel in the old town part of the city. The hotel was really nice. Fancy, at least for me. I mean, for now. I've stayed in fancier hotels when I was younger and I was traveling with my parents but that was ages ago. I don't even remember when was this. I think I was still in high school...

I only had one night in DR. Or so I thought. I went out for dinner to a fancy restaurant and had a massive meal consisting in pasta. The restaurant was overlooking a very pretty square, everything was colonial, inside and out. DR was expensive, at least for me. Not for the flock of tourists that were drinking and eating everywhere.

The time to leave had arrived. I needed to take a bus to Punta Cana Airport. One thing caught my attention: From Santo Domingo to Punta Cana/Bávaro the bus stopped only at the Punta Cana airport, not the Santo Domingo. The same, coming back from Punta Cana, the bus would stop at the SD airport but not PC airport. What if you needed to get from one airport to the other? You either pay a taxi of you're fucked. I would've been fucked.

At this point I was not impressed at all about the DR. Well, at least not in good way. In Santo Domingo most of the people were rude and not nice. If I was standing in a queue someone would try to cut in the queue. When I was about to board the bus and was waiting for the driver to take my backpack someone try do cut the line!? for fuck's sake man, wait for your fucking turn, the bus won't leave without you stupid motherfucker...

I made to Punta Cana airport with plenty of time to spare. I had everything in order: I had the printed ticket to Madrid. I had a printer ticket out of Europe. I had my passport. I had everything... at leat I thought I had everything in order.

Dominicans are super racists: they had a queue for Latin Americans and one for non-Latin Americans. Finally I made it to the check-in counter:
- Where is your visa?
- I don't need a visa.
- Dominicans need a visa to get to Europe.
- I'm not Dominican.
- You will have to wait until the supervisor (decides to) comes here.
Ok, no worries. I don't need a visa, this will be solved quickly. Flight was at 21:15 and it was still not even 17:00. I still have time.

Well, supervisor showed up more than an hour later and confirmed what I was telling the ground personnel for the past hour: Guatemalans DON'T need a visa! Ok, with that out of the way she began the check-in. I have to say that I had already paid the 20$ in exit tax. "This is a one way ticket, where is your return ticket?". I showed a ticket from Belgium to Turkey. Let me talk to the supervisor (again). I talked to the arrogant and ignorant supervisor and she ignores me. She instead, take many people at a time to some room to ask them question because they suspected that their passports were fake! It was humiliating, I was sitting by a column while all the people were getting their boarding passes. I have to say that were a shitload of Spaniards on holidays taking that stupid plane. After about three hours and just before the plane was about to take off, that bitch tells me that they cannot let board the plane because the ticket is not valid. I try to reason with her that Schengen rules states that one need a return or onward ticket out of the Schengen area, not a particular country, that I could fly into Spain and fly out of Estonia if I wanted to. She doesn't know what Estonia is. Her ignorance is amazing. I mean, the level of ignorance she possesses is just unbelievable. She thought (and probably still thinks) that if a person flies to Spain, the return/onward ticket has to be from Spain because "Spain won't let out to go to another country to take another flight". I missed the flight. I tried one last time to reason with those idiots but there was another woman that was super upset. She was partially checked in but was not let board the plane. Her luggage was on the way to Madrid, she wasn't. FUCK YOU EVELOP. YOU SUCK! YOUR GROUND PERSONNEL SUCK! YOU ARE THE WORST AIRLINE! FUCK YOU AND GO TO HELL STUPID CUNTS!

I had to spend the night at the airport, obviously. I was too upset to even think about what I was going to do. I was stuck in the stupid Dominican Republic. I tried to get some sleep. I'll think of something tomorrow.

Morning came. I asked where I could eat something as there was only ONE restaurant in the fucking international airport! There is a shopping center about 10 minute walk from the terminal. I found a café to sit a loiter the internet. I ended up staying there until closing time. The ladies that work there were super nice. Specially one, Chavela. She gave me water without asking.  I was supposed to be in Spain Sunday morning, instead I was having a coffee still in the DR. Yeah, yeah I know. Why are you complaining, you're in the Caribbean, you're in paradise. Paradise? yeah, for rich people! I sent some couch requests to people near by but it was Semana Santa: every body was out or hosting someone already.

That whole Sunday I thought about what do do. I even thought to go back to Guatemala and send Europe to fuck itself. I was worn out. I was tired. I needed a shower. I changed tshirt because the other one probably (most likely) stunk. Went to the café again. Found another ticket, leaving Monday evening. I booked the ticket with the help of a good friend of mine. Fuck the ticket from Belgium, this time I had a return ticket to Guatemala. I was to leave the stupid island Monday evening at 22:10.

The time came. I showed up at the counter. Again, a queue for Latin Americans and a queue for non-Latin Americans... da fuq DR!? What's wrong with you? I gave my passport. The guy scanned it with some X-Ray/UV/IR device but that is not enough so he asks me for my ID. According to international law, the ONLY valid form of ID for a person in a foreign country is their passport. But I agree and gave my ID.  He scans it with the X-Ray/UV/IR device and finally give the OK. All's good. I've flown Wamos Air before and have no complaints of any kind before, why would I start now. Gave my passport and then I'm not in the fucking system!!! What the hell is going on for fuck's sake!!!??? Come on Wamos, don't let me down. I have high hopes for you, don't let me down.  Supervisor goes to two different terminal but this one is not a bitch, like the Evelop one. Everything's good. False alarm. I'm given the boarding pass. Everything is alright. I'm headed to the X-Ray machines and then to passport control. See you later suckers!!!

Not quite.

The police guy passport control man askes me were I was before. I'm confused and don't know the exact dates. He's testing me, he's looking at the stamps in the passport. He asks me where is my visa. For the millionth fucking time: I DON'T NEED A VISA!!! He then takes my passport to his supervisor. All this is happening when I'm trying to board out of the country, not getting in. The uniformed cunt says out loud, in front of me and other people: "I've always thought of Guatemalan passport as fake, I mean, look at them! they seem very fake to me". I said to myself: idiot. Then he asked me for my ID, which he liked more. While all this is happening the police guy passport control man is always looking angry and serious. Then another guy joins and ask where is the visa to what the uniformed guy says that Guatemalan don't need a visa. I'm nervous. He says that everything is OK. When we're about 1 meter from the control booth he called us back. "How much money do you need to get into Europe?". How the fuck should I know, a shitload that I don't have? I said 500€ minimum between cash and card, while showing my debit card. "OK, cool. I was just asking because not long ago there was a Colombian guy that wanted to go to Europe and didn't have any cash or card with him. I sent him back to Colombia". Hmm, I thought that at least I would get a free flight back to Guatemala instead of getting stuck on the island. Now, the police guy passport control man changed completely his attitude. Now he was smiling and even apologized for all that shit! I made it. Now I only needed to wait for a couple of hours more to board the plane and then 8 hours later I would landing in Madrid.

8 hours later I was landing in Spain but there was something that kept bothering me. I was in plane where half of the seats were occupied by Dominicans. There was probably a valid (and annoying) reason why DR is super tough in letting people board planes. Got to Spanish passport control. I gave my passport. Woman asked me if I had a return ticket to which I showed the ticket I was not asked to show leaving DR. Asked me where I was going to stay. I said hostels but the booking were in my mobile and the battery died. Stamped in. FUCK YEAH! I WAS IN!!

I didn't want to book the bus ticket to Lisboa just in case. I had to rush to the bus station. When I got there I bought the last ticket to Lisboa! It wasn't because during the whole ride no one sat beside me. More space for me.

I celebrated going to a café and bough tostada de tomate y café con leche. It was not the best that I had but I couldn't care less. I was back in Spain and by that time the next day I would be in Portugal, but that's for a different post.

That was the story of how I got back to Europe.

Stupid visas

I thought that last week was the worst. Little did I know what was coming... The worst day(s) of my life my Sunday 27th September. And to a lesser lever, the following Monday, although it turned out to be way better than I expected. And I was expecting the worst!

Saturday night. I barely slept due to the fact that I was really nervous and I had to print the boarding pass for the flight to Guatemala. The boarding pass was only available 24hr before the flight. The flight was at 19:15 Mexican time. Sunday's 2:15. Finally managed to download the stupid PDF. I tried to sleep a bit longer with little to no success.

Now I have to find a locutorio (internet café) to print the stupid piece of paper. Note that I had to be at airport no later than 11, which is the time that most locutorios open on Sundays. I began to panic. I bitchslapped myself (mentally)  and went to have breakfast. There, while drinking coffee I remembered that there is a hostel not far from where I was. I used to send them guests when I was working at Makuto. I decided to go and ask if I could print the boarding passes there. The receptionist, a cool Colombian guy agreed to it. One thing was out of the way.

Boarding passes out of the way, onto the next worry: leave Spain. With that out of the way I only had a 10 hr. flight, 2 hr. layover, 1,5 hr. flight and I would be hugging my mum. Everything would have been over by 20:30 Guatemalan time.

But Mexican immigration had other plans for me...

Rewind a couple of weeks. I'm in Madrid. Applying for the Mexican visa. They told me that I had to go to the Mexican embassy in Portugal because my passport was stolen in Portugal. They could not accept the police document in Portuguese. They told me about another option: if you only take a connecting flight and spend less than 24 hr. inside the airport, you don't need a visa because it's only transit.

Now fast forward to Sunday's flight. After 10 hr. inside a Boeing 747 I finally landed in cloudy Cancún. Two hours later I had a plane that would take me home. As I said before, Mexican immigration had other plans for me. The immigration officer looked at my passport. I told him that the embassy said that I don't need a visa if it's only transit. The look on his face was telling me that things were going from bad to worse. I went to an office. I told the embassy story. They said that they couldn't take me to the terminal. Exactly the opposite of what the embassy people told me a few weeks prior. I start to get nervous. I start breathing heavily. I control myself to not have break down and have a panic attack. Success. Policeman took me to an office, maybe 3x3 meters, no windows, just a desk and two chairs, a light on the ceiling. Very sketchy. He asked me again the same questions. The he asked me how much money I had. Later I realized that if I've had enough money, I could've bought my way out of the airport. But I realized this hours later. He left the office and I stayed there for what it feels like 3 hours. I was a nervous wreck. I don't know really, maybe 15 minutes later he came back to the room and said "there is no point of you being here, let's go back to the office outside". I don't know, they saw that I was not well and changed they're approach, began to treat me like a person and not like a common criminal. They talked to some people from the airline but they didn't want to "risk" taking me to the other terminal as the ticket could be fake and it would be their responsibility if they don't let me board the plane.

I was told at the embassy that a policeman would escort me all the time. I don't care I said to myself, as long as make it to the plane. Even if this means being treated like a criminal and maybe even humiliated as this would happen in front of the entire terminal. My goal is to get on that fucking plane.

Boarding time was 19:45. A few minutes before, the policeman told me "I got bad new for you, we are sending you back to Spain". My legs couldn't support me anymore, my world collapsed... "When is the next flight" I asked, "who will feed me?". He told me that airline will "take care" of me as I was their responsibility, after all, it was their fault to let me board the plane without the "appropriate" visas. "When is the next flight leaving?". By this time I've already lost the flight to Guatemala City. "You leave in 20 minutes, airline people will pick you up and take you to the plane". My world collapsed once more.

It has been a dream or fantasy of mine to fly for free. I finally managed to do it but I was going to wrong direction. What is going on? I was being deported from a Latin American country back to Europe? Am I in some kind of parallel universe? I mean, I've heard or read on the news of people being deported from the States back to Latin America. People being deported from Europe back to Latin America, Africa, the Middle East. But for fuck's sake, I was being flown back to Europe!!!???

Third time on board a B747. This time instead of Economy Class I flew Business Class. At least I was coming back in style. I was utterly exhausted. I barely slept the night before not say during the flight to Mexico. The seats in Business Class had more space. It took one hour less to fly back to Madrid.

The anxiety kicked in again. What was I going to tell border police. I left Spain the day before and less than 24hr. I was back? "I forgot my laptop" was not going to work. My mind started to fuck me up once more. I began to think that I was not going to be let into Spain again. That they were going to send me back to Mexico. Mexico won't let me in again and they were going to send me back to Spain. And so on. And so on. I would be stuck in international travel limbo. Or, I would be thrown in jail without the possibility to tell anyone about my well being. I was supposed to be in Guatemala but I was back in Spain.

Finally my turn to go to passport control came up. Gave my passport. "Motive of the visit, holidays?", I answered that yes, it was holidays. I was not thinking clearly. He noted the stamp of the day's before date. I explained the situation. The policeman looked at me and said what it would translated into "what a chore" but colloquially would mean something like "tough shit" while he was stamping my passport. I was in! They fucking let me back into Spain!

It was rough. It's something that I would like to never repeat. Ever. It's actually the fourth time that I was held in a sketchy room for questioning: first time was leaving, yes, leaving Bulgaria. But after an hour I made into Turkey. The second time was in Slovenia. I even felt that my life was in danger as the policeman had his hand on his pistol, yet I made into Slovenia after two hours. The third time is utterly ridiculous and stupid. I almost never made it into Nicaragua... yes, you read it right: Nicaragua!!! Their argument? I could stay there indefinitely. Yeah, right. I'm going to stay in a country with a shittier economy than my own. Sorry if any Nicaraguan is reading this but that how things are. And now at Cancun Airport.

While staying at my friend's flat here in Madrid, I learnt that a good friend of ours had it much rougher than I did. He was deported back to Asia after spending 6+ weeks in an Eastern European jail. Compared to that my experience was a walk in the park, and it was still tough. I am grateful that none of that happened to me.

Maybe some of you will never understand this kind of incident because you were lucky enough to have been born in a country with a good passport. I'm not complaining. Maybe a little. It's just how things are.

I know that someday I will laugh about this. It's not today.

But to put the cherry on top. I still need to apply for the stupid Mexican Visa. Why? Because I will come back to Europe and where is the cheapest place to fly from? You guessed it right: Cancún. FML.

A lot going on lately

As some of may know, I'm about to go back home. It's been a while therefore I have a lot of things going on my head. A lot. 

I don't think I have been this nervous or anxious or stressed before. I had to take care of a lot of shit. I was supposed to fly on the 10th of this month but I had to change the flight. Twice. I was supposed to be in Mexico with someone I love. I told her I would take care of her, specially when she needed me and I my stupid job got in the way. I let her down. I tried my best to be with her in the distance, I swear I tried.

A couple of years ago I made the promise to keep out personal stuff from the blog. I tried but I was going through some rough time at the time. Writing help me vent what I'm feeling at the moment, which is a log. While writing the blog back in 2012 I was listening to Vodka Juniors (some of you might know that it's my favourite band). Now I'm listening to their new triple album.

I still can't believe that I'm going home. I will be able to hug my mum for the first time in three years. I don't know how things are back home. I'm not the kind of person that look at the news online. Although this year I made an exception as I was following the election process and... well, no comments. I didn't vote, I get no opinion.

There is so much stuff I would like to write inside my head that I don't know what else to write. 

At the moment I'm in Granada where is still warm and sunny. I'm going to rainy season in Guatemala. Luckily one month left of that. Most of my friends that used to live here are gone. But I'm staying with one of my best friends and that is nice. This past few weeks I was also lucky to meet new people, the sad part is that I met just before I'm leaving.

I already started the job hunt in Guatemala, Mexico and Panama. 

Holy fuck, I feel the same pressure on my chest I felt exactly three fucking years ago. Breath in. Breath out. Hahahaha. I am actually behaving exactly like I did three years ago. And there were also a few time zones in between. Not hahaha. But is changing. Right fucking now! I'm going out for a walk.

I'm going to see my mum, my brothers, my nieces, my nephews, my family, my friends.  I'm actually already invited to my high school class reunion, a stag party and a bottle of Argentinian wine. Last time I was back I only met a handful of my friends. I hope this will be different. I really hope so.

Sorry that from now there will be no photos. My phone was robbed in Portugal along with my SLR camera and I gave away the small digital. Eventually I will get either a smarthphone o camera although it's not my priority. My priority is to be with that someone I love. Not sorry if this sounds cheesy. But what the hell. It's what I'm feeling, It's what I'm writing. It's like my fingers are possessed. I can't stop writing! Words are coming out quite fast. Unlike in other occasions. I remember that once I wrote one line in two days. I did eventually write something on the third day.

I got to say "see you later" to many of my friends hitchhiking back from Lithuania as I have already set the goal to go back home before the end of the year. I still have a few days left, perhaps I get the chance to say it to a few more. The thing is that summer just finished so people is barely coming back from holidays.

Holidays. Some people have told me that my life is like a big holiday. Maybe it is. On holidays you are always happy. There has been times that I was definitely not.

I watch The Motorcycle Diaries last night. There was a quote from the scene in the mine that caught my attention:

- Buscan trabajo?

- No, no buscamos trabajo.

- Entonces, por qué viajan?

- Viajamos por viajar.

- Benditos sean

It's something like this:

- Are you looking for work?

- No, we are not looking for work.

- Then, why are you traveling?

- We travel just because.

- Bless you.

PS. I am looking for a job.

Alive and kicking (part 1): Leaving Granada - BXL

That’s right, I’m alive. My life has been intense since the last crap I wrote. Met some wonderful new people that I wanted to take with me. I met someone very special the last weekend I was in Granada. I am indeed the King of Bad Timing. I spent more time in my second home (or first?), oh yeah, that place is Hamelin. That pub became a very special place for me. The barmen became my friends, I did some crazy shit there. I slept at the bar more time than I would like to accept. I would be in a position to deny that but unfortunately there are a few photos of me sleeping. Since I started traveling I don’t listen to radio and I don’t what to look for on youtube, I mean new music. My music library has grown very, very slowly. But despite that fact along the years I managed to came to know some really great bands. I’m not sure if I knew them before but in Granada I became a fan of The Black Keys; and I specially like one song: Lonely Boy. I’m not sure who was it that changed the name of the song to Lonely Ron but I liked it. From then on I sang that song, let’s say a lot.  I even managed to get a shot named after me… yup, you guessed it right, the name of MY  shot is Lonely Ron. The last beer I had there, the Sunday before I left was very, very emotional.

 (photos courtesy of Syrmo Kyrstopoulo)

photo by Cristina

I needed to be in Paris fast and given the fact that hitchhiking in Spain is utterly unpredictable, I decided not to hitchhike whilst still in the country. I found myself in Bilbao 12 hours after leaving Granada. I had been there before, 4 years prior. In Bilbao I met with my friend Cristina. She spent 5 years in Australia. I haven’t seen her in the same amount of time. We talked about of love stories, about traveling, about traveling and love stories. We had a lot to catch up… a lot! Although, 3 days was not enough to get up to date for the last 5 years, but we have an idea of what we did in that time. Sometimes some people tell me “life has taken us different ways, you are traveling the world. Distance tends to drive people off". Not in this case, I felt like the last time I saw Cristina was a month ago (a 5 year 30 days ago, if that makes any sense. It does in my head).

The route that lorry drivers take from Portugal/Spain to Northern Europe “goes through” San Sebastián. So there I was, at 6 in the morning looking for a way out. I decided to share a ride to the first petrol station on French soil. The driver didn't charge me... it ended being sort of hitchhiking. Once there, 5 minutes later I was inside a Portuguese lorry on my way to Bordeaux. I think that Granada turned me uglier. I spent 7 hours stuck in that damn petrol station! Nothing was working. I was asking people near the pumps. No one was going to Paris. In December I was on the other side of the road, going to Madrid and I found an straight ride after less than 30 minutes (we had breakfast in those 30 minutes of waiting). Why on this side was different? Dafuq should I know! I just knew that no one was picking me up. I was desperate. I was anxious. I was hungry. I only had one apple, one peach and one pear in my stomach. Finally, by 17:00, a Belgian car drove me to Paris… super fast! I was very scared but I didn’t care, I was finally going to Paris, for the third time.

Paris, the City of Light. Twice before I had been there and twice before was nothing special. In fact, I’m not a big fan of Paris but I was supposed to meet someone there, someone that never came. Therefore, third time was not the charm.  I met some nice people there so it was alright. I met with my good friend Lempi and everything was alright.

Leaving Paris is always a major pain in the ass; this time was not the exception. The distance between Paris and Lille is not that much so I decided not to start as early as I normally would. After four hours of sharing the spot with four other people, I finally left and was having a beer with my friend Chloé by 17:00. The first thing I noticed when I saw the beers on the table was, where the fuck is the food? Oh yeah, I was not in Spain anymore. Summer of 2013 I met a nice Moroccan in Tallinn. A year later I was meeting Abde in Lille for a coffee.

I was standing in the entrance of the motorway. A place I had been standing twice before. The first time I was there I was going back to Belgium and I found a ride straight to BXL. The second time I was going South, I was going to Saint-Loubès and found a ride to the first petrol station on the motorway. Both times it took like maybe an hour or two. Both times I was with a girl. This time though, I was alone. This time it took me I think more than four hours. Not one single car even stopped to ask me where I was going. I didn’t remember that hitchhiking in France was that hard. I saw a lorry with Belgian number plates and immediately showed him the “BXL” sign I had been using. Suddenly, the unexpected happened: the driver agreed to take me! After introducing myself and talking for a bit he told me that he was not going to BXL but to Antwerpen through Gent… Fuck it, I was on my way to Belgium, I didn’t care. As long as Belgium was still as easy to hitch as it has been in the past, I could be anywhere and still make it before dinnertime to my destination. He offered me to take me to Antwerpen (it would’ve been as easy to go there and hitchhike down to BXL but why bother to add an extra 100ish Km) but I asked to be dropped off before Gent, right before the crossroads on the motorway leading to BXL. 10 minutes went by and I was offered a cigar whilst being driven the petrol station on the motorway. There I asked a few drivers but they were going not quite to Brussel (by the way, for those of you who do not know: BXL = Brussel = Brussels). Finding a ride in 10 minutes is super cool, especially after being stuck for 4 hours in the same place. Belgium is the country where I had the most rides in luxury cars. I saw a fancy MercedesBenz S-Class, the driver looked (and was) a businessman. He changed his name to Dries when he converted to Islam, over 20 years ago. He used to hitchhike and told me that Spain was once easy to hitchhike and that Guardia Civil had always been assholes. Oh yeah, he told me this while driving me to BXL.

what's next?

Exactly! And I don't know.

I have three weeks left in Spain and I have no idea what to do and where to go. I don't think I have been this confused about this. 

It all started one day when I was having dinner with my friend Julia back in the hostel. A week later I received the news that I had to leave. It felt like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge... or even worse. Yeah, maybe worse than that.

That was over a month ago. At the moment I felt that the world was crushing me. I didn't want to leave. I almost cried. As much as I love Granada and actually, almost became my new black hole, Estonia is still very deep in my thoughts. I started again with the "when I was Estonia" stories.

Days went by and not only I started to accept the fact that I couldn't stay but I started to embrace the idea that I had to leave. The more I thought about it the more I wanted to leave. Maybe it was a sign from a superior being that I needed to move somewhere. That I needed to pack my stuff. That I needed to get going. That I needed to start using my thumb again because it's getting rusted because of the lack of hitchhiking. But where to, Germany? Poland? Lithuania? Russia? Back to Estonia? Finally leave Europe and go East? Pavel is already in Iran and Matthieu is hitchhiking to India very soon...

Some of my good friends left. I don't know if I'm ever going to see them again. I sure hope so! I still have good friends here but we don't hang out as often as before. There was a very special group of volunteers working at the hostel but they are all gone. Then two more came but they soon will be gone. I, soon, will be gone too. The hostel way of life: people coming in and out of your life. But some, well, they a leave a mark on you. Really looking forward to meet with the little one, the curly hair one, the skinny one and the Swedish looking Aussie guy really soon.

I'm starting to think and to "plan". That is not good. Never works out. I have my life "planned" for the next month. I mean I do like how this plan looks like. No, I love how this plan looks like but what if doesn't work out? You see, I'm thinking too much. I don't like to think this much. I even thought about going back home. Home as in Guatemala. Stop traveling for good. Or go to the forest and live a naked life. The naked part seems interesting but I need internet to keep writing crap, crap like the one you are reading right now.

My room is a mess. I need to clean it up. I'm leaving this flat at the end of this week and I have no idea where I'm going to move in! I will be literally homeless for two weeks. Maybe I could camp in Sacromonte?

Anyways,  I'm back to where I started, asking myself what's next? I guess the answer is that I'll see what happens next...

Note to self

I always tell myself NOT to plan. Most of the times I listen to myself. But it has happen that in a few particular occasions, well... I don't.

Most of the times I listen to myself and just go with the flow, no plan. It has worked for almost 5 years, except in four occasions. The latest one was a couple of days ago. I planned to stay in Granada for an indefinite period of time. I came to like and the love this city. For the first time I found a place I could stay for long. Well, second time. Tallinn was the first one. And then, after the planning, the shit came in! YAY FOR ME!

"Here I am. Life has taken an interesting turn". I found this quote last year. Now, I think that life is playing its "funny" tricks on me once again. Life indeed has taken a quite interesting and specially unpleasant turn. Shit happened and now my days in Granada might be very limited if I don't come up with a solution. My mum always said that things happen for a reason.

"My past known". I have been living in Granada for the past six months. And I love it here, I don't want to leave but...

"My future unknown...". Should I swim against the tide? Should I hit the road once more? I have no idea what to do. I wish my dad was still alive, I could really use his wisdom right now.

"The present is up to me". But he's not here. No one is going to help me solve the crap I'm in but me. "I took a shot to the chin" by some motherfucking cunt. But I managed before. I know I will now. I know me. Time to pick myself up off the floor, shake the dust from my trousers and find a solution, regardless of what that may be. I still have more than a month. Anything can/will happen in this time.

As I was finishing this post, I was about to click "publish" when this song came on iTunes:

Hang Tough by 80s glam metal band Tesla

Took a shot to the chin.

Looks like you just can't win

In this do or die situation.

And it's harder than it seems

To survive, keep alive and make your dreams,

Make your dreams all come true.

You gotta, you gotta give it your best shot.

Give it everything you got.

Oh, you gotta hang tough.

Hang tough. Hang tough.

Sometimes love can make you blue.

A heartache made just for you.

But you can't let it bring ya down.

If you should stumble, if you should fall,

Pick yourself up off the floor.

Fight for what's right and stand your ground.

You gotta give it your best shot.

Give it everything you got.

Oh, you gotta hang tough.

Hang tough. Hang tough.

When the goin' gets rough.

Hang tough. You got to give it all you've got.

Hang tough. Keep your head above the ground.

Don't you let it get you down.

Oh, you gotta hang tough.

Hey! Oh! Hey! Oh!

You stay locked away inside your room

'Cause you don't know what this world is comin' to.

Hummingbird hums 'cause he don't know the words

And the piper will play 'cause he don't know what to say.

He's alot like you, yeah. Oh, he's alot like you, yeah.

He tries hard ev'ry day to be free and fly away. Yeah!

Hang tough, oh, when the goin' gets rough.

Hang tough. You've got to give it all you got.

Hang tough. Keep your head above the ground.

Don't you let it get you down.

Oh, you gotta hang tough.

Hang tough. Oh, you got to give it all you got. You gotta

Hang tough. Don't you let it get you down.

Hang tough. No! Oh, you gotta hang tough.

Hang tough.

Hang tough!

One thing is sure: I'm not ready to go back to Guatemala...

Granadian? Granadese? Granadino facts!

These are some of my facts I came up with and some of the things I think about Granada.

- People with dreadlocks in Granada are as common as people with noserings: you can see them everywhere! I'm no longer crazy about girls with dreads. Pity.

- I loooooove girls in tights/leggins. Never seen so many like in the South of Spain. You looked so good in them!

- Guys with beards are also quite common but I'm not going to shave tho. I shaved not long ago. I'm starting to think that I do it once a year.

- Awesome free tapas is a Granada thing. In Cádiz they were not free nor awesome, they were actually quite expensive. In Madrid there was only one place that had great tapas but the drinks were quite expensive.

- Most things are more expensive than Estonia but the few "important" things (if you know what I mean) is way cheaper!

- I don't think I will ever go to Alhambra, at least to the paid areas. The Spaniards spent 800 years trying to get rid of the Arabs and now they are making a (huge) profit with what they left behind? This is not to open a debate. If you don't like this, keep it to yourself.

- It's painful to walk on the cobble stone street with shitty jandals. Even with Chuck Taylor's is painful.

- I will NEVER get used to going up and down Albacín. NEVER!

- Who the hell had the idea of putting slippery stones on the sidewalks, even if it's drizzling it's super slippery! Don't even think about going out wearing jandals... or be prepared to spend most of the time either on the floor or walking funny. 

- The weather is as crazy as all the women in my life. During the day can be really warm and at night can get chilly. Then it was warm throughout the day. Now it's chilly throughout the entire day! WTF! Granada., you're drunk!

- Did I mention the tapas... Oh my God. They're great! The other day me and my friend went to this restaurant and for only 1€ we had a 3-piece (?) tapa!

- It's a hikers paradise. There are many hikes to choose from. Too bad that's not my strong.

- With the exceptions of Poland and Estonia, where I had a bunch of local friends, in Spain all of my friends are not Spaniards and I'm the only whose native language is Spanish. But I ask ask them quite regularly how to say some things in Spanish...

- Outside sitting is called "terraza" (terrace) but a "terraza" is also a real "terraza".
- There are many things that are quite similar to Latin America, for example: you can buy movies on the street. Or sunglasses. And while you drunk a beer in some pub you can see a guy selling roses inside!

Granadadada

Just like nothing 3 months had gone by. Three months I have been living in Granada. It took me a while to finally get used to it or actually to adjust to this new country. As weird as it may sound, one of the reasons why I couldn't quite adjust was the language. If you know me, you know that I'm weird so this shouldn't come as a surprise. Nevertheless, it took me about a month to accomplish what it took me more than 6 months in Estonia (even tho is no secret my love for Estonia).

I no longer live in the hostel, which is good. My flatmates are cool. I live with 3 girls. I have a super cool group of friends in which I'm the only native Spanish speaker.

Another interesting fact is that in these three months I had more friends visiting than for an entire year in The Black Hole. And a couple of more are coming in the next few weeks. I guess Spain is more "central" than Estonia.

All in all, life is almost good here. I mean there are a couple of things are not quite alright but I guess I can live with them. At least for the time being.

I wish that 9gag didn't exist. I need to spend less time browsing through all the crap people post there. But it's funny. That, and the fact that for some strange reason I cannot get online at home make very difficult for me to write new stuff. But there has to be a solution no? Maybe I could write a word document and then copy and paste it onto the blog? I could try that. This post won't have pictures in it. I don't know where my memory card reader is.

I went to Nerja again. This time I camped on the beach. There is a hippie beach 5 seconds away from what I think it's  the guiriest beach in Nerja. Just walk around a big rock and you are in Playa Chica. I didn't feel welcome there. I felt a bit of aggression while being there. The same kind I felt when I went to the Dragon festival, a free hippie rave in the nearby town of Santa Fé. I wanted to take shitloads of photos of people but nope, I didn't. I didn't want to get my ass kicked. It was a very interesting festival. I'm not an expert when it comes to festivals but I thought there was going to be a central stage where DJs where going to play their (strange for me) music but no. Anyone could just set up a tent with a sound system and voilá! I was having a lovely time when suddenly a generator was started followed with horrible music. Killed the mood. There was a tent that was playing good music but I only stayed for one night. My parents raised me as a responsible boy, didn't even go out that night. I tried to hitch back to town but no one picked me, bastards. The police were checking for drugs, they were checking people going in and coming out:
- policeman: "where are you going?"
- Ron: "home?"
- policeman: "do you have any illegal drugs on you?"
- Ron: "no. I don't do drugs" (?)
- policeman: "where are you from?", while holding me by the arm
- Ron: "Guatemala"
- policeman: "do you have hash in Guatemala?"
- Ron: "eeer, I don't know". I actually don't know,
- policeman: "and coke?"
- Ron: thought about telling him that we also have Pepsi and a few other colas but decided not to, he seemed that he didn't have a sense of humor. "coke is from Colombia. Besides, coke is everywhere"
- policeman: "alright. good-bye"
- Ron: ?. "ciao"

Spring should here. During the day it's warm and sunny, except when it's raining. The other day it was and I went to the shop wearing shorts and jandals... some people even looked at me angry! It was not that cold, nothing I couldn't bear. I probably looked very guiri.

I think Granada is drunk: warm days and chilly evenings. Oh well, beer and drugs are cheap around here... probably that's the reason.

still roaming around Andalucía

It's been over a month since I wrote something. I had so many friends visiting me that I haven't found the time to write.

One thing that maybe some of you might already know is that Granada is growing on me and it's doing it fast! The moment that I immediately started to really like it here was one sunny saturday afternoon a few weeks ago. I was cooking in the hostel when my friends Marie and Felix showed up. The weather was superb, they literally dragged me out to catch some sun in one of the many parks in Albayzín. There we met with other people and in the end we were a small group of about 8 people drinking, chatting and listening to music. From that moment onwards I started to really, really like Granada.

I had a few days off in a row and my friend was flying into Málaga so I decided to go. Málaga is a nice city, not sure if I would go back, maybe yes, but it was nice. Weather was awesome, it was more than awesome! Tshirt weather. There is some kind of fortress on top a hill overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, going up there was not fun at all but the views from up there made all worth it.

After sending a few unsuccessful CS requests we decided to drink the night away, going from pub to pub until well, a new would arrive. Probably this plan would've worked out on the weekend but it didn't work on a monday. Málaga doesn't have as many chinos (Asian owned open till late convenient stores) as Granada. To find one it took us about an hour but we found it and bought the precious wine to celebrate Justyna's graduation. We drank it by the boardwalk. Then we started our plan: first pub told us they close at 23:00, we only had time for one beer. We found another one, the bartender told us that he was going to close at 3:00. It was 2:00 when he kicked us out alleging that his boss called and told him to close due to the lack of patrons... we were the only two customers. The bartender told about a bar that was open until very late so we decided to give it a try. We even took a power nap there! We were kicked out at 4:00. What now? We found an open underground parking garage and decide to go 4 floors below ground level where there were almost no cars parked and was dark. Amazingly I slept quite good, the floor was hard but it wasn't very cold.

Maybe I need to see more of Málaga. Maybe I need to go back. Maybe.. it was a good decision to go to Nerja. It took me several days to finally be able to say the same correctly but I finally stopped calling Renja.

Without a place to stay we explored the town, which is a guiri town but still very nice. The last time I saw (didn't even touched) the Mediterranean Sea was when I was in Barcelona in 2010, almost four years ago! Wow, how time flies! After wondering around town I saw someone that reassembled the CS  guy but he wasn't. His name is Aleksi and is from... Estonia! After talking to him for a while he invited us to sleep in his cave. The caves in Nerja, unlike the ones in Granada which are man made, are natural. Perhaps in summer is super cool to sleep in caves but in February when it's pouring outside it's not fun. It was an interesting experience though. Oh! and the cave wasn't his, it was his friends' cave! Aleski just left us there after sharing some boxed wine with him. The cave was very damp and very cold. Around 5 the real tenants of the cave woke up, well two of them, German and Dutch guy (the other two a Latvian and a Czech). They were really friendly.

The idea was to skinny dip in the sea but due to "safety reasons" (the water was super cold!) the idea was abandoned. Tried to hitch back but was impossible, not one single car stopped. Ended up taking the bus back to Granada.

photo by Justyna

photo by Justyna

photo by Justyna

photo by Justyna

I don't know why I wrote Andalucía in English (Andalusia) in the first post of the "roaming" series...

dreadlock city

I don't think I've been to a place and seen so many people with dreads. In the 50s or 60s the ad campaign for VW in North America was something like "not a minute go by without you seeing a VW Beetle". Well the same happens in Granada: not a minute goes by or you cannot walk more than one street without running into someone with dreads. Some look and I have to be honest, bad! Some others look good while some girls look abso-fucking-lutely  HOT! Twice I tried to let my hair grow in order to have dreads and twice end up a complete failure. The last time I ended up with a off-centre greenish mowhawk.

The other day, a friend of mine wrote to me: "go out, make friends... Tallinn is in the past". Later that day he sent an email telling that he was joking. Maybe he was but I couldn't stop thinking about it. Is it really time to move on and "explore the world"? I like Tallinn and Estonia in general, that's no secret but at the same time there are so many places left to go. After traveling Latin America with my SO of the time and ended up completely worn out, I decided to change my mindset about traveling: no more hurrying to place to place. For the time being, I'm going to stay here for a while. Fuck knows what I'm going to end up doing. We'll see. I'm not going to worry about things that are not happening yet but can't get them out of my head. I'm starting to meet new people, at least I have that part covered.

I always like to meet other hitchhikers. I met Vine in Sevilla where we hung out. Then he came to Granada and we hung out more! He's hitchhiking round the world. He told me he's going to do it for about 4 years. I say he's going to take more. I have been on the road more than 4 years and still haven't even been to half of the world! 

It's very easy to get lost in the narrow winding (and steep) streets of Albayzín (or Albaicín). All street look the same! I think it's going to take me a while to remember the shortcuts to some places. I'm going to stick to the streets I know so I won't be late to wherever I'm going.

The days are getting chillier. I think february is the coldest month of the year. The good think is that days are getting longer. Spring will be here soon. I wish I'd brought another pair of shorts.

roaming around Andalusia

I'm in Spain for fuck knows how long. I want to explore the region I'm in: Andalusia. In the month I've been here I have only been to two places: Úbeda and Sevilla.

Spain is alright. Maybe is just that I'm used to Northern/Eastern European countries for so long that I feel like I don't belong here. I even feel more comfortable speaking English than Spanish.

There are three things I will never get used to it while I'm living here. The first one are cañas: who the fuck drinks a beer so small? In what kind of parallel universe I ended up that they don't know what a proper beer is? The second thing being the fucking siesta. Sometimes I have a few things to do and go to some place but by the time I got there is past 14:00... and they stay closed until 17:00. I don't have the mood to stay walking around for three hours waiting for the damn store to open! And last but definitely not least, they don't know about the existence of proper heating and insulation. It's not as cold as other places I had been but it feels like it's even colder. In those other places they do have proper heating and insulation. You could walk naked inside if you want to!

Alright, enough complaining. Like I said, Spain is alright. I went to Úbeda the other day. It's a small town about 150kms North of Granada. It's a small cute little town of about 40000 people. One of the notable Ubetense people is famous singer songwriter Joaquín Sabina. Famous at least in Spain and Latin America.

Didn't know what to expect from Sevilla except that I was going to meet with some people there. I was told that it was bigger than Granada, that it was warmer, that it was this, that it was that. It was alright. I like Granada more but I like the fact that it's flat and not hilly like Granada! Also no dogshit but in some part they have horse shit! 

I said it before and I'll say it again: it's not about the pretty sights (although the flat part I loved it!) it's about the people. In the hitchgathering FB group I agree to meet with a guy named Vine. It's always nice to meet other hitchhikers and we both met with a Croatian hitchhiker living in Sevilla, Alica. 

And while still in Granada I met Natallia, Viktoryia and Stephen. I met with them again in Sevilla. It was brilliant! I just wished we had more time together over there. I know we'll meet again, I'll make sure of that. They're not still not that far away, not just yet at least. Until next time I ask qué hora es?

Coming back, Granada welcomed me back with rain and cold. It's still cold but at least it's sunny.