Ok, I survived
Never made it to Prague, primarily because I spent too much time in Antwerp, plus made a point of visiting some friends in Germany that I hadn't seen in years
So:
Train from London to Brussels. Never left the Brussels airport; it was the first day of the EU Summit so I just hopped the first train to Antwerp on the advice of my man Big Josh, who pointed me to a tattoo shop and punk bar that are a couple doors apart. I strolled up and was immediately one of the gang, drank til late, invited to a gig the next night, which I went to, followed by a backyard barbecue party. That was Friday and Saturday. Sunday I hung out at the bar all afternoon sippin' Belgian brew with the locals. Good times.
Monday caught a train to Cologne. Cologne was good for some things, like being a tourist, not so good for other things, like just chilling in a cool rock bar. It wasn't until my second (and final) night there that I finally found some cool bars, and it was already midnight by then, and I had to catch a fairly early train to Berlin the next day. Positives about Cologne: good beer (koelsch, local stuff), beautiful churches (not just the big main cathedral, there's loads of them).
Wednesday, off to Berlin and, of course, drinking at White Trash. I must have showed 'em who was boss last time I was there, because one of the owners and most of the bar staff remembered me from March. I wandered in there around 6, planning on just having a couple beers and getting out, but I stayed for about 9 hours instead. Got a few free drinks, of course, and a job offer. Eh, yep ... but I'm not into flipping burgers for a living, even in Berlin. Later on, System of a Down came in. The owners gave them a couple bottles of Champagne and a bottle of single-malt Scotch, which I thought was silly, and then the guys were just complete dicks to everyone there, including the bar staff, who were completely unimpressed by the guys. Ah, well.
Thursday, still in Berlin, after sleeping off my hangover, I went out to the East Side to see a friend of mine from Texas that I hadn't seen in a solid 10 years. He's been married for 8 years, and I'd never met his wife. We ate pizza and drank beer and caught up on 10 years of life. It was cool -- he's stayed in touch with some of our old friends, and I've stayed in touch with others, so we swapped tales and reflected on old stories, and it was good.
Friday I hopped a train to Giessen, which is basically in the middle of nowhere, from what I could gather. Fairly small town. I chucked my luggage in a rail station locker and sat in an old-man pub for most of the afternoon waiting on a friend of mine to come pick me up.
It was great, about 6 old men, me, and the barmaid. A couple of the old guys were shooting dice with the barmaid. I never quite figured out the rules to the game.
Once Anja showed up, she took me out to this hippy festival in the woods about 15 minutes outside town. She's in this sort of world-music band. They were actually really good, but I'm not generally comfortable around that many hippies. Ah, well, cheap beer, and it was good catching up with her, as I hadn't seen her in over 2 years. I ended up sleeping in her van, parked on the street in some nearby village, windows open and no one bothered me. Hippies.
Saturday, she drove me back to the Giessen train station, I grabbed my stuff and spent 7 hours on trains back to Antwerp. I figured it wasn't worth going elsewhere and having one night to try to learn a new town, since I had a Monday morning train out of Brussels back to London, it just seemed easiest.
So I went back to the punk bar (T' Hemeltje or something like that, means 'Little Heaven' in Flemish), got there around midnight. They closed at 3, and I wandered off to another bar with 4 Mohican squatter punk types. 2 of them were father and son. Around 7.30am I'd had enough, and left them to carry on while I wandered back to a bed. Sunday was much the same, slept through the early part of the day, then back to the bar to chill with the crew all afternoon / evening.
Monday, up and on a train to Brussels, then on a train to London.
Someone wonderful met me at the train station when I got back.
And now I'm busy getting ready to go to Portugal / Spain on Sunday, not to mention getting ready to head back to the States.
Oh yeah ... Slunt played Tuesday night here in London. It way rocked! We all went to the Crobar afterwards, of course, and I was hung over all day yesterday.
They're playing again tomorrow (Friday) night at the Mean Fiddler -- I highly recommend this one, gang, it's a helluva good time.
Never made it to Prague, primarily because I spent too much time in Antwerp, plus made a point of visiting some friends in Germany that I hadn't seen in years
So:
Train from London to Brussels. Never left the Brussels airport; it was the first day of the EU Summit so I just hopped the first train to Antwerp on the advice of my man Big Josh, who pointed me to a tattoo shop and punk bar that are a couple doors apart. I strolled up and was immediately one of the gang, drank til late, invited to a gig the next night, which I went to, followed by a backyard barbecue party. That was Friday and Saturday. Sunday I hung out at the bar all afternoon sippin' Belgian brew with the locals. Good times.
Monday caught a train to Cologne. Cologne was good for some things, like being a tourist, not so good for other things, like just chilling in a cool rock bar. It wasn't until my second (and final) night there that I finally found some cool bars, and it was already midnight by then, and I had to catch a fairly early train to Berlin the next day. Positives about Cologne: good beer (koelsch, local stuff), beautiful churches (not just the big main cathedral, there's loads of them).
Wednesday, off to Berlin and, of course, drinking at White Trash. I must have showed 'em who was boss last time I was there, because one of the owners and most of the bar staff remembered me from March. I wandered in there around 6, planning on just having a couple beers and getting out, but I stayed for about 9 hours instead. Got a few free drinks, of course, and a job offer. Eh, yep ... but I'm not into flipping burgers for a living, even in Berlin. Later on, System of a Down came in. The owners gave them a couple bottles of Champagne and a bottle of single-malt Scotch, which I thought was silly, and then the guys were just complete dicks to everyone there, including the bar staff, who were completely unimpressed by the guys. Ah, well.
Thursday, still in Berlin, after sleeping off my hangover, I went out to the East Side to see a friend of mine from Texas that I hadn't seen in a solid 10 years. He's been married for 8 years, and I'd never met his wife. We ate pizza and drank beer and caught up on 10 years of life. It was cool -- he's stayed in touch with some of our old friends, and I've stayed in touch with others, so we swapped tales and reflected on old stories, and it was good.
Friday I hopped a train to Giessen, which is basically in the middle of nowhere, from what I could gather. Fairly small town. I chucked my luggage in a rail station locker and sat in an old-man pub for most of the afternoon waiting on a friend of mine to come pick me up.
It was great, about 6 old men, me, and the barmaid. A couple of the old guys were shooting dice with the barmaid. I never quite figured out the rules to the game.
Once Anja showed up, she took me out to this hippy festival in the woods about 15 minutes outside town. She's in this sort of world-music band. They were actually really good, but I'm not generally comfortable around that many hippies. Ah, well, cheap beer, and it was good catching up with her, as I hadn't seen her in over 2 years. I ended up sleeping in her van, parked on the street in some nearby village, windows open and no one bothered me. Hippies.
Saturday, she drove me back to the Giessen train station, I grabbed my stuff and spent 7 hours on trains back to Antwerp. I figured it wasn't worth going elsewhere and having one night to try to learn a new town, since I had a Monday morning train out of Brussels back to London, it just seemed easiest.
So I went back to the punk bar (T' Hemeltje or something like that, means 'Little Heaven' in Flemish), got there around midnight. They closed at 3, and I wandered off to another bar with 4 Mohican squatter punk types. 2 of them were father and son. Around 7.30am I'd had enough, and left them to carry on while I wandered back to a bed. Sunday was much the same, slept through the early part of the day, then back to the bar to chill with the crew all afternoon / evening.
Monday, up and on a train to Brussels, then on a train to London.
Someone wonderful met me at the train station when I got back.
And now I'm busy getting ready to go to Portugal / Spain on Sunday, not to mention getting ready to head back to the States.
Oh yeah ... Slunt played Tuesday night here in London. It way rocked! We all went to the Crobar afterwards, of course, and I was hung over all day yesterday.
They're playing again tomorrow (Friday) night at the Mean Fiddler -- I highly recommend this one, gang, it's a helluva good time.
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I hope you are OK.