I escape from Greece (with something less than dignity)

I decided to stay at a "party hostel" on the Greek island of Corfu. It's called the Pink Palace and it's completely insane. It has its own bay. Apparently it's the biggest hostel in the world, it has its own private beach and three bars. The point of the Pink Palace is to get you as drunk as they possibly can and stay that way so you miss your check-out time and have to pay for another night. No one I met there had only stayed for one night, and everyone says they're leaving tomorrow. The shots are 1€. There's wasted cliff diving (this is an actual activity) and I can't imagine how no one has died there. They made me take a shot before they gave my my room number and it pretty much went downhill from there.

The Pink Palace is an interesting place. Initially I thought it was great but I began to realize it exists to take as much money from you as possible. They offer a free shuttle from the port to the hostel, but the shuttle back to the port costs money. They give you free drinks... if you buy more alcohol after that. They have lots of pretty people working there who seem to exist to make everyone incredibly drunk. And the check out time is 9am, earlier than any hostel I had ever stayed in. If you miss your check out time you stay another night.
 
Of that night at the hostel the less said the better. I made some wonderful new friends and lots of questionable decisions. It started with a game called Power Hour (60 shots of beer in 60 minutes- actually a LOT of beer I found out). After that it's kind of a blur. I cut off a guys dreadlocks and cut open my foot while breaking into someones house and actually tried to give myself stitches. And lost half of my clothes. I made a pact with Jason, my Canadian partner in crime, to leave the next day at all costs so we dragged ourselves out of bed at 8 am, about 45 minutes after going to sleep and checked out of the hostel. We were still drunk, bruised and sore but we escaped the Pink Palace. Then I hopped on the next ferrie to Italy, a night boat where I slept on the floor.


I spend a exhausted and hungover day in Bari, Italy. It's beautiful city on the sea, filled with Italian men who want to marry me apparently.



After that I took a train to Milan in the hopes of getting a connecting train to Lyon, France but there were no more trains that night. I slept on a pile of sheet rock in a construction site and woke up with an Italian police nightstick in my face. I asked the officer in question if I was in trouble and he yelled (gesturing emphatically with his arms) "no no you bellissima, you want coffee bella?" He went on to let me know in Italian that he was my knight in shining armor and he would fend off all Italian rapists from me until I caught my train for Lyon. I told him I appreciated his chivalry and he took right up to the door of the train before kissing me on the hand like I was a princess  instead of a filthy worn out hippy chick.


My mother was thrilled to see me, she burst into tears and gave me food, which is totally the way to my heart. I will be helping them work on their house and do battle with the evil neighbor. Also I get to hang a rope from the  ceiling of the barn and get back into shape for aerials when I go back to the states. My mother and father fight like an old married couple, (by some miracle of tolerance they still ARE an old married couple),  and this is the first time I will be staying with both of them since I was about 15. Hopefully Burble shows up soon to cook because while my mother has lots of wonderful talents, her cooking is terrifying. It's really nice to see her though and I'm making a valiant effort to get along with my father for the first time in years. There is some stuff he and I should probably get talk about but for the meantime we have forged a sort of truce. Also I got him a fez in Istanbul as a peace offering.

I am out of money, hung over (still) and there is a massive bruise on the small of my back (I think I might have gotten in a fight at the hostel and I didn't even know it was possibly to bruise there.) I would like to see Italy but I was pretty sure I just needed to get to France so I took six trains to Geneva and hitched to my parents house in Cluny. The hospital job I lined up here (and one of the reasons I was traveling in the first place) has totally fallen through. I have no idea what I should do now and I have almost no money and I needed to talk my Italian police friend into buying me food on the way to France. (Not difficult actually). However I have a great tan for the first time ever and I regret nothing, I climbed a mountain and visited 11 countries (Holland, Germany, Czech, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Turkey, Greece, Italy, Switzerland, France). I can do as well alone as with a travel buddy and I have a LOT of interesting photos. I need a rest so I'm going to chill at my parents' house for a month until my friend Natalee comes to visit at which point we will resume the adventures in Spain and Portugal. So this blog is going to take a little break for a few weeks while I recuperate from three months of insanity.  Thanks everyone who has become attached to this blog. I'll post about the insanity that is the Mcalpine farm in a couple of weeks. By then I'll probably be ready for the next adventure.