I'm shaved & showered and I'm walking through the village at dawn.
BUT WHY?
At 5:30 I'm sitting on the floor tiles outside the entrance of the Chinese Restaurant.
The WiFi in the hotel is still out. And I was hoping that the Chinese restaurant wouldn't turn off its WiFi router outside of business hours.
And I was correct. The connection is atrocious, but at least I can check my e-mail and look for another hotel available within cycling distance that might have working WiFi ....
6:30
It's early. So it is excusable that I only NOW realize that my outside-China WiFi connection earlier also delivered some more translation work for me. Now the demand to have a room with functioning WiFi has changed from a wishful thing to a NEED.
8:00
Over breakfast I mull over the difference between NEED and WANT. I just fell into the same trap as everyone else, though to a smaller degree (there are many things that I do NOT need ...). And constant WiFi access is one of them. I realize this after I'm informed that the earliest they MIGHT fix their WiFi would be Monday (It's Saturday morning now).
Being off-line should be good for me....
Where is the nearest book store????
11:00
I have reached Mother's old-age home.
The staff doesn't know yet that we're leaving in three days. WTF? Nice job Mme Caretaker ! It's going to be an organizational NIGHTMARE on Monday. See a doctor, learn how to measure & inject insulin, buy a suitcase for mother, talk to officials so they actually let us go..... would they evict Mother if I just abducted her?.... Where in the world will I get the insulin from ?
But this time she actually orders something she likes. And after she finishes it, she orders the same thing AGAIN ! LOL. Better on her hips than on mine!
I consume nothing aside from the sugar calories contained in my white wine. And since mother re-orders her dish, so do I ;-)
The GREAT WiFi connection of the ice-cream parlour lets me catch up with adding images to three blog posts, reveals the location of 2 book stores in MomTown, the weather for the next 3 days, as well as available trains for Tuesday's departure. HOW did people travel in the BEFORE-internet days? I DID travel THEN, but definitely not as well as today ;-)
Tomorrow is SUNDAY, which means that all the supermarkets in Germany will be CLOSED. Better stock up on wine TODAY ! Come home with me, you 2 bottles of Tempranillo ;-)
Next stop: The book store. It's NOT really a book store, more like a book boutique, LOL. Selection is ABYSMAL, but it must be my lucky day because their VERY limited selection is centred on Sci-Fi, which I was looking for in the first place. NOT a chance in HELL to find anything by my favourite authors (Did I mention, the place is TINY?), but I walk out with two voluminous softcovers, one by a German author, the other one by a Chinese one. ONE of them should do the trick of bridging those 2 am jet-lag hours, I hope !
Just after leaving the book store, I see something appalling. A very attractive Turk or Arab in his mid-30s is kneeling on the sidewalk in the middle of a VERY busy pedestrian street in central MomTown. Germans are SHOPPING today and they're spending their Euros on the most worthless CRAP. The Turk or Arab is holding up a picture of a young girl and looking down at the pavement, hopeful that someone will recognize his position as one of subjugation and despair.
NOPE, that is NOT happening today, there is no-one even looking at him and I too walk right by him with my bicycle. I stop 20 meters on to get my wallet out and take out all the coins I have. They weigh a lot ..... (double entendre ;-)
Yes, he's gorgeous but what makes him even more beautiful is his gesture of touching his heart as a way of thanks.
I'm barely back in my hotel and I've dipped into the wine already. On the way back I've seen two men in what looked like formal police uniforms. NOW I hear Um-pah-pah music. WTF? I grab my camera and storm downstairs.
I open the hotel door from the inside and the nice old lady standing OUTSIDE the door smiles at me and says Bonjour !. WTF? They think I'm the hotel manager, LOL. Time to recall any French left in my neural pathways. I tell them how to call the ACTUAL hotel manager, which arrives two minutes later. The old lady's German is excellent, but I'm surprised how much French I remember, even after I spew out my usual "Je ne parle pas de francais". A magic moment.
But what happened to the Um-pah-pah music? I grab the bike battery and ride off to find the marching people.....
I discover them around a small square in the middle of no-where.
All that comes out of the commanding officer's mouth (accompanied by um-pah-pah) are martial sounds like AAAA-ten-tion, EEEEEyes LEFT, RRRIIIGHT TURN, MARCH, etc etc.
Germans and military shouting? I always thought that the world had MORE than enough of that combination in the past.....
So forgive me for not staying to observe what other kind of crap they're up to .... At some point in life one either separates from shit or one becomes shit oneself !
I head back to my room and start browsing through my newly acquired books.
18:00 and I'm STILL SO TIRED ....
19:00
What a day.
1. I'm sitting in the Chinese Restaurant wolfing down a roasted duck, but I still feel comatose .... Duck poisoning from yesterday's dinner? Or just bored stiff in this town? Or maybe it's the Grim Reaper .... I know A LOT of people who are dead at my age ..... or is it just WiFi withdrawal ????
2. One of my 3 remaining clients MUST have had a 'senior day'. He sent me a file early this morning; I spent my waking hours translating it, now I get an e-mail in which he tells me to wait with translating until changes have been made to that file. Ah well, I'll be reaching that stage of life soon, so there is no point in getting all huffy-puffy, LOL.
3. The restaurant's WiFi is even worse than my that of my hotel in Vancouver. As I work my way through the duck, it gets worse and worse and stops working before I even finish the plate. Dark Ages 2.0 in North America & Europe seem to be approaching even faster than I had feared. No wonder everyone is always in a bad mood. For Fucks's Sake: The Dial-up Internet connections of the late 80s worked better than THIS. I can't wait to return to the land of smiles and functioning everything ;-)
4. It's RAINING when I leave the restaurant. NO, according to the hourly weather forecast, it is supposed to be SUNNY under CLEAR skies right now !
I'm getting that Vancouver feeling again. I just want to go to bed and fall asleep.
Good thing it's already 20:00, LOL
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