Criminal charges

A quick update. In Germany the police said we could either report the man to the police in Switzerland Or in Sweden. In Sweden the police said “you can make a report but nothing will happen, we won’t do anything about it.” So I sent an e-mail to the police in Switzerland, asking if I could report the whole thing to them via e-mail.

They replied:
“You must submit a criminal charges at the Swedish police (with the photo of the car and the number of the car). The Swedish police must then make a request for the ascertaining for the unknown car- driver to Switzerland (Interpol). Then comes the Inquiry to the police of Canton Solothurn and we answer back to the Swedish police. Then make the Swedish police a criminal charges against the car- driver. Finally, comes the lawsuit to Switzerland on our court.”

I will now print the e-mail and walk back to the Swedish police. Why must this be so difficult?

Fairytales

Going through southern Germany and France is like travelling in a fairytale. Everywhere are castles and churches looking like castles. It’s easy to travel back to times in your own head to an era of princesses and great dragons and heroes… If that ever was true.

Our host went to work early this morning as we stayed sleeping on the couch. I was dreaming that I moved into a castle. As I woke up I realised couch surfing is like a fairytale. While others spend tens of euro on accommodation we just go home to someone, have a nice meal together and sleep.

We will take some time checking out the town Flensburg today before we start hitchhiking to Nyborg.

Sharing cars

Random people were standing at the parking with their suitcases, we with our backpacks, waiting for someone to pick them up and drive them to where ever they’re going. A woman was on her way to Berlin, we to Hamburg. Another guy waited for the same car as us: a name found on the internet with a phone number and a short note saying “25 euro, to Hamburg at 8:00”. At eight the driver still hadn’t showed up and we were six people waiting for him. Yes, six. There must be something weird with this guy we said, and as a big blue van drove into the parking we were a bit sceptical. This was not a man who wanted to share his car, this was a man who wanted to make a profit as a cheap taxi.

We screwed the moral and went with him anyway. It was still a tenth of the price of the train, and the knowing that we would get to Flensburg the same day with ease was too appealing.

In Germany this car-sharing is pretty big and a common way of transport. I know some who try in Sweden but it never gets really big.
We shared a car from Bonn to Hamburg today, and another one from Hamburg to Flensburg.Suddenly we are so close to home, and while Emma can’t really wait to be back I am already thinking of moving to France for a while. From the first of October I don’t have anywhere to live anyway.

Now we’re about to have dinner with our host in Flensburg, and tomorrow we have a host in the Danish city Nyborg waiting for us. After that, we are going home. And to the police to report the man from Swiss the other day.

Bonn!

We just arrived in Bonn, an within an hour I will meet my long missed South African friend Katherine again. We haven’t seen each other for eight years, but used to study together at Parktown in Johannesburg.

We got here through car-sharing, for 20 euros each Michel brought us all the way from Freiburg. With us in the car was Wolfgang – a man in his fifties with dirty shorts, a big open shirt and bare feet. He had brought his homemade tea from herbs he picked himself and it was one of the best cups of tea I’ve had. Inspiring man that we had not met if it was not for car-sharing.

Michel is an artist and make his own music. When asked what kind he replied “strange music.” He’s working on an album that he wants to release digitally this year. I think I’ve changed my mind about this sharing cars, you Do meet interesting and exciting people that way, somehow I thought you had to hitchhike to reach the excentric ones. But no. We might just car-share tomorrow as well, we have a very long distance to move. Bonn to Flensburg. Wish us luck! The next day might just be home sweet home. If I ever find one.

Freiburg!

We walked up to an older couple and asked for a ride away from the tiny parking place where we had landed. They gave us a ride a few kilometres, to a petrol station outside Basel where we walked up to another couple and asked if they were going to Germany.

They brought us all the way to Freiburg, and although we’re still a bit shaken we are having a nice cup of tea at a nice café waiting for tonights cs-host. Finally, life is great again.

Off we go!

I’m living ahead of my time, I will have another week of work before I head to Milano to meet Emma. But our preparations has started. Emma has bought a new backpack to get a good feeling for it before our trip in Africa starting in January. We have made a plan for where and when to hitch-hike on our way back home from Chamonix, this is what it looks like (though it might change as we get there):

Sunday (19th august): flight Copenhagen – Milano then hitch-hike Milano – Chamonix
Saturday (25th of august): Chamonix – Lausanne.
Sunday: Lausanne – Luzern – Zurich (lunch and afternoon in Luzern)
Monday: Zurich
Tuesday: Zurich – Freiburg
Wednesday: Freiburg – Bonn (dinner with my long missed Southafrican friend before she smuggle us into her room)
Thursday: Bonn
Friday: Bonn – Flensburg (it’s gonna be a long day…)
Saturday: Flensburg – Copenhagen (almost home!!!)
Sunday: home sweet home, and the travel abstinence will have a new beginning.

Hitch-hiking, 5

A lot of things were said during the past days, we were talking almost constantly. Here are five of my favourite quotes:

“She has interviewed us all the time, sticking the microphone up our faces. Even when we stand on the street buying *****, she comes up with her microphone. The guy asked if we were policemen dammit!” said about me recording our whole trip.

“I have lost my swedish now hey, I can’t speak swedish anymore with all these other languages.” said in Germany, we speak both swedish and english since Jiaxin doesn’t understand so much swedish and with all german, dutch and french it got too much for Umud.

“Listen to them, he speaks swenglish and she chinglish, how do they understand each other?” said about Umud and Jiaxin while talking to each other, both using words from their own languages (Umud swedish, Jiaxin chinese) while speaking english.

“How can you live there? Du you understand what they say? Or do you speak english?” talking of me choosing to live in Skåne, a swedish province with a very distinct dialect that stands out a lot from the rest of the swedish dialects.

“I don’t get my brother hey, he refuses to lend me one of his shoes. I only had one shoe, had to stand only on my one leg dammit.” said at a halting-place in Germany after Farid came back from the toilets with only one shoe.

Unfortunately a big piece of the fun is removed when the sentences are ripped out and the whole scene isn’t displayed. But these are some of the topics of our road trip.

Hitch-hiking, 4

As I woke up this morning I had to realize that is should be time for a shower. My hair was crazy dirty and I am pretty sure that I have smelled a lot better in my days. So I filled two bottles with water and went into the shower rooms at the camping. The showers cost money, but to enter the rooms is for free. So I bend down and poured some water over my head. The shampoo smelled amazing and as I laid down in the grass to enjoy the sun (30 degrees in the air!) to let it dry, and maybe catch some more colour from those poisonous rays coming from the sun, I fell in love with the moment there and then.

As I was still asleep in the van someone from the camping had knocked on the door. He told Andreas that we had to move the van into the camping and check in, or else the police would give us a 200 euro fine.

While the rest of us were still asleep he moved the bus into the camping, and we got new neighbors. They were from Denmark and had a cat in a leash, miaowing to me as I lay in the sun. The grass and all leaves on the trees were bright green, the sky blue and the the sun made the whole world glitter. We checked out at noon and went back to Germany.

The boys wanted to go shopping (Jiaxin and myself are living for free, therefor nothing for us) so we entered a city called O something, eight letters. We drove around for an hour or so before we found a shopping mall. As we did, Jiaxin and I decided to spend a few euros on a cake, it is Farids 18th birthday tomorrow and we want to give him something.

I went into a grocery store and bought a tart case, chocolate and whipped cream.
So much for our free living, but it felt very good to give something back to the boys for all they had given us. As I went back to the van the others were gone and the van was locked. So I sat down on the pavement and started making the cake. I had a stanley knife in my bag so using that one I started spreading the chocolate on the tart case. The people walking by looked strangely at me, but no one asked why I was sitting there.

Eventually two of Idiåterna came back, and I was told to go inside to Andreas. We were supposed to get something vegetarian for the barbecue later that night. Andreas bought zucchini and vegetarian Falun sausage, and tomato.

We stopped for the night in-between Hamburg and the danish border. We lit two one-time grills and made skewers with vegetables. The meat-eaters had meat sausage. We said our cheers for the journey, company and Farid’s birthday with wine and a lot of laughing. Jiaxin tried to teach Umud how to speak chinese, and chii-waa-waaaaa will always stay in our memories. Idiåterna knows what I’m talking about.

After midnight, as Farids birthday finally arrived, I put 18 candles on the chocolate cake and Farid blew them all in one blow. Tonight was the last night we all spent together. The end of our first hitch-hiking experience were coming to an end.

Hitch-hiking, 2

We have entered Germany, but not decided where to go next. The choices are Berlin or Amsterdam. We are six people (yes, Jiaxin and myself actually get a say in this – we are part of the group already) and five of us wants to go to Amsterdam. Though it didn’t take very long to convince the last one of Amsterdam. We still have a long way to drive, but in the evening we should arrive in the capital of Holland.

Hitch-hiking, 1

Me and my friend Jiaxin are hitch-hiking to Paris – just to have a croissant for breakfast. This is our story.

We lost our way in Malmö while looking for the bridge. It’s the largest bridge in Sweden, so it shouldn’t be so hard to loose but we did. As we stopped and asked a woman for directions, she offered to drive us to the last exit of the high way to get onto the bridge, she said it’s too long to walk and we looked tired. Tired and crazy.

Her name was Margareta and she drove us to the last exit, and we didn’t walk more than 15 meters before Arne and Kate from Denmark stopped and asked us if we wanted to ride with them. We didn’t even have to stick our thumbs up!

They come from Faxe, a few kilometres south of Copenhagen. Arne told us that he picked up some hitch hikers from Finland and Sweden thirty years ago, they slept at their house and promised to keep in touch, but never did.

Now, seven years ago, a boy came up onto their lawn and said “I think I have been here before.” It was the hitch-hiker, he was travelling by and stopped to see if Arne still lived there.
Arne and Kate asked us where we were going. “Paris, to have breakfast. We want a croissant and a cup of coffee.” we said, and they told us that Paris is where they went for their honey moon twentyfive years ago. I find it so inspiring to hear about people sticking together for so long, and still look happy.

They took us to a halting-place south of Copenhagen where lots of cars stopped to fill for petrol and eat before heading to Germany, so it would be a good place for us to get a ride into the large country in the south. We met three other hitch hikers, going back to Germany from Christania. We talked for a while and decided to help each other to find a ride. After maybe one hour of eating carrots one of them came up to us and said they’d been talking to some people in the white minivan, they had space for two hitch hikers and were going to Berlin.

It turned out they were swedish. Four swedish boys going on a road trip with no real goal – either Berlin or Amsterdam. So now we’re on the road in Germany with four strangers in a minivan, and we already feel like one big family.