We got off the bus from the plane to head into the area where they check your passport and stuff and everyone is running. Running like there's a bear chasing them. Running like maybe when it was a Soviet satellite, they would shoot at you when you got off the plane or something, just for fun.
We didn't run. It was like 11 pm it was our second flight and we were pretty tired. Jess is panicking a little but not bad - just wondering why the hell everyone is running - is there only one cab? Are the communists coming back?
We get to the cabbie and he wants 45 Lits - about, for the cab to the hostel. That's not a tremendous amount and we figure it's the night rate and he says he'll throw on the meter, so we're ok with it. We hop in and head on the most treacherous cab ride in the history of the world. This guy is flying on these roads - fast as hell. I'm like - holy shit - and this coming from someone who's puked out of cabs doing 80 on the LIE, commandered CBs on Poughkeepsie cabs and told Atlanta cabbies what they can do to themselves. He must have gotten his driving skills from Speed Racer - which judging from Lithuanian TV must have just hit the airwaves.
We're zipping through the streets and even at 60 and dark, this place is fucked up. There's some really shoddy buildings - stuff falling down and shit's crumbling. Jess said she thought Bratislava (Slovakia - which we went to last year) had the lowest quality of life of all the countries in the EU - I said no way, it had to have the lowest of western european nations and highest of eastern.
We've reached a new low.
It's pretty beat up - but I guess that's all you can expect after years of abuse by the communist regime - or any regime for that matter. I dare the people in Lisbon to elect the communists!
The buildings on our block are MAD bummy. Crazy shitty looking. We get in and our room is way small. Possibly smaller than Paris - we can barely keep our packs on the table. I imagine that this is what prison cells look like in Siberia. There are a bunch of annoying young Spaniards there. This one bitch keeps clapping and talking really loudly - like she thinks she's a flamenco dancer in training and needs a lot of attention. We finally shower - which wasn't bad. Well at least mine wasn't - Jess had one of the button pushing ones - mine was regular and nice and hot.
We get up in the morning and head to the kitchen and there's a ton of food everywhere. So Jess goes to ask how much for breakfast and one woman (with another behind her) tells Jess that it is for a group that is staying there. So she says ok - and we go and get our cereal from our room to eat it. We're sitting and eating and the other woman - who heard Jess talking to the lady says to us - "The breakfast is for the group" - so I make a face and hold up my cereal bag and Jess says "We brought our own". The lady was there when Jess was told the info - what are we thieves or something?
OK - maybe I am since I stole some of their milk but fuck them - no one cleaned up and there was no place to sit!
We finished and headed out to walk around the town and find some caches. Which we did and didn't do. We found a bunch but there were a bunch we couldn't find. Some appear to be missing - which sucks because we spent some time there. Turns out there are about a million churches and not a lot of people there. There used to be 105 synagogues but then the occupations and the Jews were driven out and now there is only one. There is another spot in the city that tried to break away from the rest - it's more bummy than regular Vilnius. We headed back after walking around all day. We didn't do much in the way of tourist stuff - because there wasn't anything. We hit a church - which had been destroyed every century - except the last two. There were a bunch of smelly Hungarian men there - the common room stank. I just don't get this aversion to deodorant. We ended up eating at some Baltic chain restaurant - it had ethnic food - it was pretty tasty.
We had to get up MAD early. Jess spoke to the girl at the desk and she told her to tell her about 1/2 an hour before we needed the cab. Jess woke up in the morning and woke the girl up (4:15) and told her we needed the cab. She calls and says "It will be here in 8 minutes" and Jess is like, uh, you said half an hour before we need it. And the girl says "No, half an hour before you need to be at the airport, it's impossible to get cabs now". (because Vilnius is super busy at 4:15 am?) Now Jess is pissed, the girls is pissed and I'm pissed because we're rushing and there's no way we are going to be outside for the cab. Jess thinks the girls didn't understand her. I think Jess' Lithuanian isn't that good and she should practice more.
We're outside waiting - 10 minutes later than we're supposed to be. I head back in and make the girl call again - she does - two cab companies. As I'm leaving she says, "Make sure you're out there." I say, we've been for 20 minutes already - the cab never came. It may have but who knows. Cab comes and we get there - quickly - not as quickly as we got to the hostel. It's like 16 Lits - nice and cheap! There's nothing in the airport - well at least nothing is open, not really anyway so we just sit and wait for the plane to come.
We didn't run. It was like 11 pm it was our second flight and we were pretty tired. Jess is panicking a little but not bad - just wondering why the hell everyone is running - is there only one cab? Are the communists coming back?
We get to the cabbie and he wants 45 Lits - about, for the cab to the hostel. That's not a tremendous amount and we figure it's the night rate and he says he'll throw on the meter, so we're ok with it. We hop in and head on the most treacherous cab ride in the history of the world. This guy is flying on these roads - fast as hell. I'm like - holy shit - and this coming from someone who's puked out of cabs doing 80 on the LIE, commandered CBs on Poughkeepsie cabs and told Atlanta cabbies what they can do to themselves. He must have gotten his driving skills from Speed Racer - which judging from Lithuanian TV must have just hit the airwaves.
We're zipping through the streets and even at 60 and dark, this place is fucked up. There's some really shoddy buildings - stuff falling down and shit's crumbling. Jess said she thought Bratislava (Slovakia - which we went to last year) had the lowest quality of life of all the countries in the EU - I said no way, it had to have the lowest of western european nations and highest of eastern.We've reached a new low.
It's pretty beat up - but I guess that's all you can expect after years of abuse by the communist regime - or any regime for that matter. I dare the people in Lisbon to elect the communists!
The buildings on our block are MAD bummy. Crazy shitty looking. We get in and our room is way small. Possibly smaller than Paris - we can barely keep our packs on the table. I imagine that this is what prison cells look like in Siberia. There are a bunch of annoying young Spaniards there. This one bitch keeps clapping and talking really loudly - like she thinks she's a flamenco dancer in training and needs a lot of attention. We finally shower - which wasn't bad. Well at least mine wasn't - Jess had one of the button pushing ones - mine was regular and nice and hot.
We get up in the morning and head to the kitchen and there's a ton of food everywhere. So Jess goes to ask how much for breakfast and one woman (with another behind her) tells Jess that it is for a group that is staying there. So she says ok - and we go and get our cereal from our room to eat it. We're sitting and eating and the other woman - who heard Jess talking to the lady says to us - "The breakfast is for the group" - so I make a face and hold up my cereal bag and Jess says "We brought our own". The lady was there when Jess was told the info - what are we thieves or something?
OK - maybe I am since I stole some of their milk but fuck them - no one cleaned up and there was no place to sit!
We finished and headed out to walk around the town and find some caches. Which we did and didn't do. We found a bunch but there were a bunch we couldn't find. Some appear to be missing - which sucks because we spent some time there. Turns out there are about a million churches and not a lot of people there. There used to be 105 synagogues but then the occupations and the Jews were driven out and now there is only one. There is another spot in the city that tried to break away from the rest - it's more bummy than regular Vilnius. We headed back after walking around all day. We didn't do much in the way of tourist stuff - because there wasn't anything. We hit a church - which had been destroyed every century - except the last two. There were a bunch of smelly Hungarian men there - the common room stank. I just don't get this aversion to deodorant. We ended up eating at some Baltic chain restaurant - it had ethnic food - it was pretty tasty.
We had to get up MAD early. Jess spoke to the girl at the desk and she told her to tell her about 1/2 an hour before we needed the cab. Jess woke up in the morning and woke the girl up (4:15) and told her we needed the cab. She calls and says "It will be here in 8 minutes" and Jess is like, uh, you said half an hour before we need it. And the girl says "No, half an hour before you need to be at the airport, it's impossible to get cabs now". (because Vilnius is super busy at 4:15 am?) Now Jess is pissed, the girls is pissed and I'm pissed because we're rushing and there's no way we are going to be outside for the cab. Jess thinks the girls didn't understand her. I think Jess' Lithuanian isn't that good and she should practice more.
We're outside waiting - 10 minutes later than we're supposed to be. I head back in and make the girl call again - she does - two cab companies. As I'm leaving she says, "Make sure you're out there." I say, we've been for 20 minutes already - the cab never came. It may have but who knows. Cab comes and we get there - quickly - not as quickly as we got to the hostel. It's like 16 Lits - nice and cheap! There's nothing in the airport - well at least nothing is open, not really anyway so we just sit and wait for the plane to come.
No comments:
Post a Comment