Disposable Europe

We take pictures to supplement our visual memories. Aside from sheer artistic and aesthetic merit, no one needs convincing that pictures we take remind us of people, places, and things. I’ve heard that when we take pictures, it limits and focuses our memories, but it’s easy to give that up for the joy of fondly remembering something from a snapshot. Anyone who has ever had a camera stolen knows what a terrible feeling that can be. More after the jump.

Madrid, Capital of Spain and Cool

I thought I published this back in Barcelona, after staying in Madrid for about a week and a half. Now I’m in Nice, and heading to Paris tomorrow, where the internet is 4 euros an hour, but stay tuned. For most of the time in Madrid, I stayed with my friend Molly in a quiet but convenient neighborhood called Embajadores. It was relaxing. I spent a lot of time in nearby Lavapies, a ethnically diverse and architecturally barrio. For the first couple of days, I couldn’t help comparing Rome, where no one would dream of there being an openly gay neighborhood like Madrid’s Cuerca, to the modern bustle of Spain’s capital. Indeed, I once again found myself in a “stand on the right, walk on the left” escalator city. Madrid has a better Metro system, more interesting fashion, and much more interesting nightlife. However, they have far more Starbucks, McDonalds, and Burger King. Still, the two countries have many of the same social problems. They are both plagued by high real estate prices, unemployment, and incapable governments. More after the jump.

Chump-less Checklist to Doing Rome: Generalities

Personally, I’m sick of travel guides. I love Let’s Go, but their accommodation advice is useless to me and restaurants can be hit or miss sometimes. I have a guide of Rome that seems to have been written in the mid-fifties and that might be my favorite because of its tone. There are so many things that guide books are not going to be able to tell you, and that’s understandable, but as my semester here draws to a close I thought I’d put together my own brief guide for those coming to Rome for a few days. Of course do the touristy stuff, but keep my sentiments in mind (after the jump).

Keep on Moroccan in the Free World

The weekend before last I went to Rabat, the capital of Morocco, to visit Mia. Traveling took literally all of Thursday to get there and all of Sunday to get home, but I feel like I saw a lot for two days. It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before, and I’m going to avoid making my trademark generalizations about a place I’m definitely no expert on. However, I’ll do my best to describe my stay, as a lot of people seem to be dying to hear about it. It was disorienting to be in a country where I can speak neither of it’s main languages (French and Moroccan Arabic). Above is the Hassan Tower. Across from it is the Mausoleum where the two previous kings of Morocco are buried. The current King, Mohammed VI, has ruled since his father died in 1999. The Tower still does the call to prayer, which Mia can hear from her nearby house. More pictures and stories, after the jump.

Napoli, Capitale del Sud

Not this last weekend, but the weekend before, I went to Naples with my friend Mike. It is a beautiful city, although I will say that Naples has more spark and character and imagination in one fingernail than any hill town has in its entire body, to paraphrase a favorite movie of mine. I think of the lemon I brought home as a metaphor for the city. Bigger than most, ruddy, more flavorful, more colorful, bumpy, a bit dirty, etc. The task of writing about it is daunting, and I have made a simple list.

Berlin! Schiesse!

In the middle of our spring break trip, David and I traveled by train from Prague to Berlin. After crossing the border, the train came under the care of the incredibly organized Deutsche Bahn, our first experience with hyper modern Berlin. With more money than it knows what to do with, the city is now constantly rebuilding. Cranes are always up, and fellow travelers exclaimed that things looked different from even a year earlier.

We took one of the extremely popular free four hour tours of the city. As it was March, the tour was small and fast moving, and our guide was really good. I loved all the history, because it is almost entirely based in the 20th Century. It can be easily and logically divided into five periods: the German Empire (1871-1918), the Weimar Republic (1919-1933), the Third Reich (1933-1945), shared occupation (1945-1990), and the present era.

And in the present era, we found Berlin to be a nutz city with an insatiable party libido. It’s a younger city than New York with a lot of places that open at four in the morning. We spent most of our time in Mitte, an über-hip area with a lot of stores selling only one thing. Our hostel, based on Douglas Adam’s “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” was also in Mitte. We also walked along the longest stretch of the Berlin Wall still standing. As I mentioned before, Berlin is one of the most internationally famous locations of graffiti and street art, and we were not disappointed.

Walking this way lead us to Kreuzberg, a traditionally alternative section of town now home to hipsters priced out of Mitte. Both have an American Apparel however. It was a fun place to be, with a lot of interesting locales, and surprisingly great and inexpensive sushi.

Most interesting to me was the remnants of conflict between East and West Berlin. I didn’t realize it, but that wall was actually the last in series of protections aimed at keeping East Germans in. And once the wall, and its accompanying death strips, finally came down, there was still a strong mental barrier. It’s kind of unfathomable to Americans, but many did not support reunification. Now, the only physical indication of the barrier in many places are the stylized pedestrian crossing signals. I wish I had more time there, but for now, it’s an adequate introduction. As always, there’s a lot more detail in my pictures, dutifully uploaded to flickr.

“East Berlin can’t buy a thing, there’s nothing they can sell me/ walk through the wall no pain at all” — The Mekons