Roll with it

Note: This is my third attempt at posting. The first try took me 45 minutes to type and ended up coming out with an A with an accent over it between every letter. I tried erasing them but they kept reappearing. The second was quite witty, but the computer ate it. One more try...

I'm at home in Ottawa briefly. A cheap flight was found online, and I decided to hop on it. (Having said that, I'm determined to be a real traveller and for some reason understood only to me that equaites to no less than 6 months on the road. So I've extended my trip an extra 2 weeks, and my new arrival date home is December 13 or 14 2006.) No idea what I'll do with those extra 2 weeks yet. Maybe Spain or the south of France?

The fact that I'm home isn't that big of a deal (even though my mom kind of freaked out about it - "But whyyyy? Is everything okay? Are you okay?").

The trip home, on the other hand, is a fun story. I booked it the night of Sunday the 28th of May. The flight left Tuesday the 30th of May at 1 pm from Madrid, which was easy enough to catch as long as I caught all my trains. One missed connection would have led to a domino effect which would have led to me missing my flight. Keeping that in mind...

I hopped on the train at 5 pm on Monday the 29th in Lagos. It was about 20 minutes late (apparently Portugese public transportation isn't exactly known for punctuality), but the ticket checker told me that they'd hold the onward train to Lisbon until we got there. So, I transferred in Tunes, and was on my way to Lisbon. We were cutting it really close, it looked like I'd get there right before the overnight to Madrid was due to leave. The train pulled in to Lisbon an I transferred with about a minute to spare.

There were 2 girls from my hostel on the train. The conversation went like this:
Them: Wow, hey. How'd you manage to get on this train?
Me: Well, it was pretty close, but the train just got in and --
Them: No, how'd you get a ticket?
Me: Well, I have my rail pass so it wasn't a big problem.
Them: No, a reservation ticket.
Me: What do you mean?
Them: This is a weird train, but you need to reserve in addition to having a pass
**the doors to the train close and it starts to pull out of the station**
Me: What?
Them: Yeah, we came yesterday afternoon but the train was full so we had to stay here an extra night.
Me: Um....oh....

The ticket checker came by and, in Spanish, told me to produce another ticket. I said I didn't have one. He said I'd have to get off the train at the next stop. I begged. I said I'd sit on the floor, pay extra for a sleeper bunk, stand in the spot between the cars, anything. I just needed to stay on the train. The guy said no go, the train was sold out and I'd have to get off at the next stop.

I started to freak out, but tried to pull myself together. If there's ever been a time to stay calm, this was it. The train guy told me the town the train was stopping in had no hostel or hotel. The people in my train cart started trying to help. Taxi company names, suggestions about taking the bus to Madrid, ways to change my flight. Someone even started making me a sandwitch so I wouldn't be hungry in case I did wind up sitting up all night at a train station somewhere in Portugal or Spain.

The train started to slow down. The ticket-taker came towards me. I started to gather up my stuff, wondering what I was going to do. He said (still in Spanish) I could stay. About 10 people burst into applause. I had to stop myself from flinging my arms around the stodgy Spanish ticket taker. Turns out some Canadian guy left his passport to the last minute and couldn't travel with the rest of his friends. I gave his buddies some money to buy him some beers. Whoever he is, I owe him huge.

I went to the food car and had some tea with the 2 girls from my hostel, dozed a bit and woke up in Madrid. After getting lost in the metro a few times (their system is sadly lacking in directional signs) I wound up at the airport.

And this is where the fun begins. This has been a novel so far, so I'll keep it brief. In essence, I'm pretty sure I was flagged as a terrorist. I think it was because I carry 2 passports. In the Spanish airport I was patted up and down, questionned for half an hour about my motives for going home, had all my stuff inspected, was made to play my ipod, show them that there was no bomb in my camera, and was almost kept off my flight.

Better yet, they electroncally flagged me so when my ID was swiped in Philly it all happened again. The plus side was at least this time they spoke English. The bad thing was they were a lot more thourough. They inspected my shoes, read my journal (and just who is this Mathieu? Did he ask you to bring anything home for him?), made me take my hair down so they could make sure there wasn't a bomb in there. Finally, they finally let me go to Canada.

Montreal, to be specific. Only a 2 hour bus ride from home. The guy in the bus booth told me that the Greyhound takes all kinds of cards, so "just sit back and relax". I hopped on the bus, and was informed that they only took cash. I gave the bus driver my cash card and a sincere promise that I'd pay on arrival. Great, except on arrical my cash card didn't work. Good thing Matt's mom was there to bail me out.

And my reward for all this was a Big Mac - cold, of course, because the bus was 25 minutes late.