The Time I Almost Got Frostbite

Innsbruck, Austria, 2017.

  Last week this time, I had boarded a train which would whisk me off from the hum-drum and into the throes of something magical. At least, that is what I'd hoped; you see, the weather had been terrible. So I ate my doughnut and drank my coffee, all before I reached Jenbach. And no, I did not expect Jenbach to provide me with my dose of 'something magical'.

  After a somewhat brief thirty-three minutes, the train glided into the train station and me, bundled in a multitude of layers of clothing, which I hoped would shield me from the biting frost, my camera bag, and my now empty cup of coffee, stepped out on to the assuring concrete. As I found my way to the bus stop, I thought, almost euphorically, I'm finally going to Achensee. After months of procrastination and shitty situations, I am finally going.

  Either if you personally know me or if you have been reading this blog long enough, you know that my luck is the most rotten thing you will ever come across - worse-than-bread-that-has-mould-growing-on-it-contaminating-everything-else-in-the-fridge rotten. So, there is no way that my moment of jubilation could have lasted. Now that we have that out of the way, allow me to narrate exactly what happened.

  As I mentioned, my brain was experiencing a simmering elation at finally having gotten my lazy ass out of bed and en route Achensee. Having found the right bus stop, I gratefully plonked myself down on an empty wooden bench, right next to a pair of lovesick teens, who giggled like there was no tomorrow. My glove clad hands - my body was finally au fait with the cold - scour my bag for the book I had brought along. Having found it, I open it to the dog-eared page. The book was alright; it was about a psychiatry resident and his various encounters, many of which were amusing enough.

  After reading a few pages, I look up at the digital screen which would tell me when my bus would come. I was not pleased by what I saw. There was a sadistic 54 next to 83328.

  Fifty four fucking minutes! 
  Why did I have to wake up at 6 a.m. again? 
  Oh, that's right, I picked the one place in all of Austria with bad public transport.

  I had already lost most of the feeling in my hands and the tittering next to me seemed to have gotten louder in the past - I looked at my watch - only five minutes had passed? I contemplated drinking another cup of coffee but, in the end, my snobbishness about coffee obviated this urge. So I sat there for the next  forty nine minutes, hoping - no, almost praying - that the bus would arrive before I got frostbite, which it obviously did. 

  NOT!

  The bus came a looooong time after I had lost all feeling in my hands, the cold had even become sort of pleasant. That is when you know you're in trouble. Although, gratefully, after a long ten minutes enshrouded in the warmth of the heated bus, I did regain some feeling in my hands, all the while being subjected to the unaffected giggling of teenagers, who for some fucking reason were immune to the cold. 

  That's it for now. This blogpost was my attempt at conserving my ever-positive outlook on life. Until next time. 

Love,
Teenagers are blood-sucking monsters.

Hues Of Blue

Amalfi, Italy, 2017.

  I just stumbled upon a few pictures of the magnificent Amalfi on my Instagram feed and they transported me back to my ephemeral visit there this summer. I am not quite sure when Amalfi made it to the list of places I absolutely wanted to go, but it did and I am glad it did. The funny thing is I did not even want to visit it - too many tourists milling about. Instead I wanted to go to Capri. Fortunately, we - Kevin and I - were running short on money in the last leg of our trip and the trip to Capri happened to be a "little" out of our budget. This is where the humble/gruelling six hour journey and eight euro tickets to Amalfi come save the day because there was no way that I was leaving southern Italy without lying on a warm beach with water the colour of sapphire.

  The beach was as amazing as I had pictured it to be with the exception of pebbles in place of sand, which scorched your feet the moment you stepped on them. Idiotically enough, we forgot to carry sunscreen with us. My excuse was that I expected Kevin to bring it since he was always uber prepared. Needless to say, my tan was epic! Or as the aunties back home would say, 'What happened to you? You've become a little dark.' I had to exercise major self-restraint every time one of them said this by not rolling my eyes. It was just a tan, for God's sake; it was temporary!

  Coming back to the point. The first thing we did upon our arrival in Amalfi was hop on over to the first public bathing spot we could find and strip down to our bathing suits. We spent many an hour there, me in the water and Kevin on the beach. Since the summer days are so gloriously long and warm, I seriously contemplated skipping visiting the actual town. In the end, the Indian guilt won and after much procrastination on my part, we wrapped up our things, donned on our regular clothes - me, my dress and him, his shirt and shorts - and we marched into the town. I am so glad that we did because the town was every bit as splendid as the beach. It possessed a certain charm that Naples lacked. It's streets and it's square with the church, which reflected in the late afternoon sun, and it's hidden passageways, which remained unchartered by the tourists appealed to a part of my conscious/unconscious mind; I'm not sure which it was.

  Their was a band playing at the foot of the grand staircase which led to the gleaming church. Or was it a parade? My memory fails me. Whichever it was, there was music. Music which was as sweet as the sea water, I had previously gulped, was salty. We strolled the streets with the music caressing our senses; every shop we passed was either showcasing Amalfi's plump citrous yield or its proud glasswork.

  When we were finally cramped in the one bus which was going back to Sorrento with an entire class of American college students and everyone else in Amalfi, I was lucky enough to find a seat; thus, avoiding sitting on the hard ground or, as the somewhat young boy did, lie under a seat for the one and a half hour ride. The sunset was beyond splendid; I watched it its entirety as our bus traversed the narrow road on the edge of many cliffs. I saw the soft but bright orange differentiate itself from the dark sea, I also saw it gradually transform into something softer - almost, tender - until it turned into a hue of blue and I could no longer tell where the sea ended and the sky began. There was something almost magical and  utterly hypnotising about it.