I’m going to talk about the act of leaving Strasbourg- that is, attempting to leave Strasbourg, in order to meet up with my German cousin Kathleen in Magdeburg, Germany. The plan was to leave Strasbourg on Friday afternoon (12/18), get to Magdeburg at night, and then leave for Copenhagen, Denmark the next morning super early. Remember, I was leaving Strasbourg after 4 months, so I was schlepping my life around with me. The plan was: Strasbourg to Offenburg, Offenburg to Braunschweig, Braunschweig to Magdeburg, arrival time a little before 9pm. Let me break it down for you. PS: Sorry this is long but read it thanks.

Parting is such sweet sorrow

After a teary goodbye with Kathryn, I am sitting with all my bags and backpacks (1 huge suitcase, 1 medium suitcase, 2 backpacks and 1 shopping bag) in this stupid little train to Offenburg, Germany, just about 30 minutes away at 4:52pm. The train turns out to be late, and I start worrying about making my connecting train. We pull up to Offenburg, doors open, and I’m one of the first poised to exit. There are hordes of people behind me and in front of me; for the first time, I am faced with the insane amount of bags that I have. It takes me two trips to get everything off, and in the mean time, everyone is just LOOKING at me like I’m an alien or something. Not a single person offered to help. It was so irritating. I got everything off, and then tried to get my stuff together to find my track. I couldn’t even move. The suitcases just keep falling over sideways and my backpacks keep falling off my body. This feeling, knowing that I am missing my train because I am physically unable to get there quick enough, made me so frustrated and angry and honestly on the verge of tears. So yes, I miss the train, and I am so unmotivated, (considering giving up and going back to Strasbourg), but I went to figure out what other trains I could take.

In the bottom of the train station, I print out a receipt of a new itinerary, with 3 transfers, one of them leaving me only 6 minutes to shove my bags out of the train, find my new track, and get on board. My new arrival time was late; Magdeburg at 12:30am. Really close to giving up, I see a teenage girl walking past me and I spontaneously yell out to her (in German… everything said from now on is in German) “hey look I have so much crap here can you please help me get to the track?” Turns out she pwns and I regain my confidence and wait for my train to go on to Baden-Baden, Germany.

Pwn woman

I lug my bags into the train, and prepare myself to sit on the floor near the door. I don’t want people stealing my life in those bags. This woman sees me and is like “oh there’s a place over here!” and I point nervously at my bags, but she insists I come and says she can “keep an eye on it.” Turns out she pwns, and we talk the whole time, and since she is getting off at Baden-Baden, she says she will help me getting to my next train.

Train Friends

The woman and I get off at Baden-Baden, and the next thing I know, my HUGE blue suitcase, aptly named Beluga, is in the hands of some 20-something year old guy. I think, “hmm, does he know the pwn lady??” but then I hear her say “oh well this young lady needs some help getting to her train, maybe you can be of assistance.” This poor guy doesn’t even know what he’s getting himself into. He ends up LUGGING my suitcase across the most crowded train I have ever seen; huffing and puffing, dragging, lifting when necessary, this damn suitcase through a train that has people literally just standing in the aisles. Lucky for me, he was taking the same train. I had no seat reservation, and I told him “it’s ok thank you so much, you can just leave me here at the door…” but instead he finds a place for me next to him (unbelievable… everyone in the aisles was like “there are no seats”) and we sit down and continue on. If not for this guy, I have NO IDEA WHAT I would’ve done. Cried obviously
Everyone in this crowded train gets off in Frankfurt, and I continue on my way to Hannover. Along the way, another young guy gets on and sits across from me, and we start talking, me in hopes that he is getting off in Hannover and that I can convince him to help me with my bags. JUST MY LUCK he is, and OMG he is going on my train too!! PERFECt! Except this train is late.

Late trains and the problems they cause

Young guy #2 helps me with my stuff as we run to our next train, which will take me to Wolfsburg, where I will finally transfer to Magdeburg. Only problem is, since the last train was delayed, and this train waited for us, our arrival in Wolfsburg was definitely going to be delayed. It is about 11pm, and the train to Magdeburg from Wolfsburg is supposed to leave 8 minutes or so after we SHOULD HAVE gotten there. So I’m freaking out. I tell the conductor “look man I have an insane amount of bags and I NEED TO make this train to Magdeburg.” He reassures me that I will… he even shows me his freaking conductor device that says the train will wait. It damn well better- this is the last train to Magdeburg for the night.

I am an idiot

Waiting at the door of the train with young guy #2, and we’ve moved onto the subject of New York, and I am telling him the best hostels to stay in. I am sweating and more nervous than I’ve been all night, because this train to Magdeburg is the last one. Really. The last. I get off the train and start running, I don’t even know where. I didn’t hear the conductor announcing on what track my train would be, so I’m frantically yelling to people “which track?? Magdeburg train?!!” … remember that I am slow with all my bags.

My favorite part

I see the train in the distance, “Magdeburg Hbf” on the top, and now I’m running to the elevator. I take it down, and with my idiot sense of direction, of course I don’t remember in which direction the track is, so I don’t know which elevator to take up. I yell at people but they don’t answer. I think it’s this elevator… I take it. I come up, and I step out. The sign that says which train is coming is making the clicking noise when the letters change. My train is gone. I missed it. By seconds. I scream at the top of my lungs.

I hate my life

Going down to the train station, I learn there is no one working here and there really are no more trains. It’s past 11:30pm. I tell myself not to panic and to stay calm. I have never heard of this Wolfsburg place. I am talking back and forth with Kathleen, and she is talking with her brother Torsten, who works for the Deutsche Bahn, trying to see if there is anything he can do. Of course my phone battery is low, and I have no idea how much money I have on my pay as you go German cell phone, so I am scared we could be cut off any second. I go upstairs to the train station, where there is a McDonalds, a half a dozen 30-40 year old men drinking, each looking sketchy and dangerous, and a ridiculously drunk teenage boy accompanied with a girl.

Can this get worse?

Basically Kathleen and Torsten can’t do anything for me. I approach an older couple who has just arrived in the station, and I try to look completely hopeless and ask them what I can do. The woman basically told me to go to a hotel, because it would be too dangerous to stay here here. Luckily, there is a hotel around the corner. I gather up my confidence, bundle up my jacket, and drag all my bags outside in the snow (it’s snowing) and start walking on the road to where I think she told me this damn hotel was. I see a sign, “Tryp Hotel” and I start to feel more at ease. I see the building up ahead. “Ok Becky… mom and dad would’ve just told you to bite the bullet and get the room, look it’s for your safety and you should just think of this as getting to spend a night in a hotel after an unfortunate day.”

So much for positive thinking

I get into the hotel and there I am thinking to myself, “haha! A hotel in Wolfsburg! Who has even heard of this place?!” I walk up to the desk and say to the woman “OMG so you’re never gonna believe this, but I missed all my trains and I NEED a room for tonight.” “Oh,” she says, “you need a room?” She looks at her computer, “well we are all booked for tonight.” I start FREAKING OUT AND PANICING. “But, but, I don’t know anyone here and I have nowhere to go, and I have all my stuff with me. I will give you money just to stay in the lobby! I have nowhere to go!” After explaining to me that the lobby is only open to GUESTS after 1:30am, I put my head down on the desk in submission. Another guy comes up to me and says “don’t worry we will call you another hotel.”
Turns out these people pwn, they arrange to get me a room at another hotel and call a cab for me to get there. God I was so lucky for them. Taxi driver shows up later and takes me to a Holiday Inn, concierge lady pwns, and I get in my room at about 1:20am. Kathleen and I have decided to meet in Hamburg in the morning, and my train leaves Wolfsburg at 5:15am. Meeting in Hamburg means I could have just taken a night train from Strasbourg and gone directly there. The reason I left early was to get rid of the bags in Magdeburg. I love how nothing I plans works out. I arrange to get a taxi at 4:45am. Awesome. Do you like my room?

A new day

I drag my sorry self out of bed 3 hours later to catch my taxi. Today’s itinerary only had 1 transfer before I met with Kathleen, and there were 20 something minutes in between, so I was feeling pretty confident that everything was going to work out. I am sitting on my 5:15am train, going to Hannover (yes, I was there a couple hours ago). Everything is going fine, aside from the fact that I am freezing and falling in and out of sleep and its pitch black. But then things stop being even remotely fine. The train stops. Everyone is sitting there, equally as confused as me. Announcement comes on saying we’ll be 5-10 minutes late. Ok, I can deal with that. Even with 10 minutes I am confident I can make my connection. But then 10 minutes go by, and we haven’t moved. I look nervously to the people next to me, and they are getting nervous too. Then we here it over the loudspeaker- “due to technical difficulties with the engine, this train will not be able to continue. We are going to slowly move back to the last station and we’ll see what happens when we get there.” At this point I figured I was just destined to fail; but I was kind of used to it by now. OF COURSE this train has technical difficulties…. It just HAD TO, it is my destiny. So I just sat in the train and tried not to fall asleep and awaited to see what would happen next.

I get a text from Kathleen- looks like she is ALSO having technical problems with her train from Magdeburg to Hannover. HER train is not moving either.

After we finished going backwards, it turns out we were going to be able to continue to Hannover. Incredible! I didn’t have to get out with all my crap and change trains! Only problem now was that I was certainly going to miss my train to Hamburg. I looked in my Eurorail Timebook (Eurorail is my rail pass, and they give you a time book of trains between major cities), and I took a picture with my phone of the schedule of trains to Hannover to Hamburg for quick reference. Seemed like there were 2 per hour. I started to feel better. Even if I missed whatever the next train was, I would get to Hamburg today. But would Kathleen?

Vienna saves my life

I shove my suitcases out of the train onto the Hannover platform. It is almost light outside! You know it’s so depressing traveling in the pitch black cold? I took the elevator downstairs into the station, and up on the departure board, just about every single train is late. The next train to Hamburg was supposed to leave 50 minutes ago, but it still hasn’t left, despite a message next saying the train would be “30 minutes delayed.” I took the elevator up to the platform, and found myself with tons of pissed off cold people. They had been waiting outside for this damn train for 50 minutes! But then, we here over the announcements that a night train from VIENNA would be arriving on this track, and its next stop was Hamburg. Everyone rejoiced.

Train shows up, and I am clutching my bags, ready for the rush to shove my bags into the train in two trips heaving and puffing. The damn Eurocity night trains are a step higher than the other trains, so this means one more heave than normal per trip. Regardless, I am now standing inside the train, at the end of a train wagon, right at the door to enter the next wagon with all my bags around me. I take a look for a seat, but since this is a night train, everyone is in a cabin and the lights are all off and they are sleeping; aka its impossible to tell if there is a seat or not. No problem, I will just sit on my luggage in the cold hallway for 2 hours and watch the sunrise out the train window and try not to fall asleep by listening to Michael Jackson and Beyonce.

In Hamburg

I made friends with the conductor on the Eurocity train since she kept passing me by going in and out of the train wagons. I learned from her that this train would arrive in Hamburg BEFORE my originally schedule train would, even if my original train followed its schedule. I have no idea why that was happening- maybe the Eurocity was faster?- but whatever, everything was finally falling into place. Maybe we would even make our train to Copenhagen, which was scheduled to leave at 9:28am. I should be getting into Hamburg about 9:00am, and Kathleen at 9:05am.

At 9:00am, I am pushing my bags off of the train from the high step, and I take a deep breath. I’m in Hamburg!! I start looking for an elevator to get up to the train station and off the track, and after going back and forth, I notice that the elevators are broken. But then I look to the staircase, and I see that the escalators next to the staircases are also broken. There is no way up but the stairs. I am now standing in front of the staircase, looking pathetic at people walking by, thinking to myself that I will just have to wait for Kathleen to get here before I can go up. This blue suitcase weighs more than I do. A nice German couple takes pity on me, and they help me get my stuff up. TWO men needed to carry my bag up the stairs… that is how heavy this thing is. But whatever, I am in Hamburg, and I am now in the train station itself! I go to call Kathleen to let her know where I am standing. I can’t. Phone is out of credit.

Really? Really????? Are you just getting sick of this?? Me too. It’s hard to write about trust me. But anyway I trudged off with my suitcase parade in hopes of finding a payphone. I see one and put my euro in, give Kathleen a call; no answer. I try again, and I GET HER!!! I think just knowing she was on the phone and the fact that the money I put in would expire in about a minute put me in some irrational phrenzy, and instead of having a short conversation, I just repeated about 10 times, “Kathleen I am on the second floor facing track 5a waiting for you, I am not moving.” She did manage to get out that she just got to Hamburg.

I go back to my position next to track 5a, waiting to see her any minute. It is 9:06, and we could still even make our train to Copenhagen! At this point, I really don’t even care if we go to Copenhagen. I will freaking stay in Hamburg for five days, I just can’t be alone anymore, I can’t be dragging this s*** anymore and yes, I am just done done done.

Ten minutes go by, and there is no Kathleen. What could she be doing?!! I assume her phone is out of credit as well, meaning we have no way of reaching EACH OTHER. I look at this woman standing next to me, and I say to her “Look I am all alone, about to miss my train, I can’t move with my bags, and my friend is looking for me, she can’t find me, and my phone is out of credit so I can’t call her. CAN I PLEASE USE YOUR PHONE??” thank god this woman took pity on me, and soon I am connected to Kathleen. Kathleen confirms her phone is out of credit, and I am being irrational again and just screaming that I am next to track 5a on the second floor and she better get her ass over here. I look at the wall across me, and it says “Phillips” in blue. I tell her I am directly across the Phillips sign. “What Phillips sign Becky?!!” Pause. “Wait don’t move I’ll be there soon.”

LAST PART

Of course there are staircases on either sides of the track in Hamburg, and of COURSE Kathleen is waiting for me directly opposite to where I am standing, on the other side of the station. As she finally comes up the elevator, I feel as if a part of my body just peeled off of me and is disintegrating before my eyes; I shriek from deep down in my core, and my entire being is at rest knowing that I am not alone.

When we made it down to the track, we did get on the wrong train (OF COURSE, GET USED TO IT BY NOW BECKY). Luckily someone told us it was not the train to Copenhagen before it started moving, and then we hauled it running to get on our train which was farther up the track. And yes we sat in the wrong wagon, but you know, I was used to it.

I slept for the 6 hours or whatever it was to Copenhagen, and when we got to our hotel, I just kept sleeping. My body hurt for 3 days after. And I mean HURT, like I was waking up in the night unable to move my back and stretch my arms out. I can’t think of a concluding sentence… but you know, that is the same feeling I had after this entire mess was through; no words, no thoughts, no strength… I will never forget how happy I was to see Kathleen at that moment. Now there’s a memory for ya