Being back in Paris feels like that moment when you walk in the door of your house/apartment and you smell that smell of familiarity – you feel safe and home. It’s like when you can make it from your bed to the bathroom in the dark without bumping into anything. There are some things that are engrained so deeply in my memory, and being back here is… good. I think that when you use the word good to really mean that something gives you pleasure, makes you happy, or fulfills you, there is no other way to describe it beyond it being just that: good. 

Paris was good to me for the 4 months I studied here in 2012. Paris is good to me now, with the sun shining, the smell of stale cigarettes in the air, and the city alive with summertime.

I lust for a life here. I lust for the ultimate comfort I have in San Francisco with so many people I love near me. Creating a new life here would be a challenge, but I think I’ll regret it if I don’t try one day.

4 days back is not enough time for me to eat all the food I want to try, to see all the streets I used to love and to explore new ones, or to meet make good new friends. I could probably use all the time in the world. But I can’t have my crêpes and eat them too.

A bientôt Paris, my chérie. I will be back soon. 

Taylor and I spent two amazing weeks in what I would now say are some of my new favorite cities in the world. We definitely embraced the “adventure is out there” motto since there were some times when we weren’t sure what would happen next, or where we’d end up. That’s the best thing about not having a plan – it means some of the best stories are about to unfold, and living them may be a bit frightening, but laughing about it after makes it all worth it in the end.

Here’s a overview of our 2 weeks in numbers:

• 2 countries, 5 cities visited
• 1 shoe casualty
• 1 toenail casualty
• 1 maß (beer stein) casualty
• 1 foot (some blisters) casualty
• 2 encounters with the police
• 15 (give or take) liters of beer drank
• 4 pretzels eaten
• 4 bratwurst eaten
• 12 scoops of ice cream consumed
• 6 total hamburgers eaten in 3 different cities
• 2 planes, 3 trains, 3 long bus rides taken
• 6 different beds/couches slept in

We started out in Berlin, staying at Johannes’ apartment, although he was not actually there. When we showed up for his girlfriend to let us in on Wednesday morning, our first day there, he didn’t tell us which apartment to ring so we ended up waiting outside for a solid 15 minutes and asking a stranger to use their phone to call him. Eventually it all worked out and we had a great stay in Berlin.

In Hamburg, things went a little more smoothly, minus Taylor breaking her shoe one day while walking around, and a house party getting broken up by the German police. They’re not super warm, those guys. Martin and I had just left the party to put our shoes on in the hallway when Taylor was still inside saying her goodbyes and the police showed up, demanding the hosts to hand over their IDs due to a noise complaint. Taylor was trapped inside as Martin and I were free on the outside. It was quite hilarious, he even asked the police if Taylor could come out and leave with us and they said no. Of course Tay and I understood none of what they were saying but she got out 10 minutes later.

Our next police encounter happened when we were going from Munich to Poing, a small suburb where Julius’s family lives. After spending the evening out with Julius in Munich, he left us and went to his friends apartment and Taylor and I began our adventure to Poing. While we waited on the train platform, all of a sudden Taylor remembered we didn’t have the keys from Julius to get in the house. I took off running to get to Julius’s platform and like a scene from a movie I was screaming his name as the doors of his train closed and he threw the keys out to me. When Taylor and I got on our train, so did the police controllers, asking everyone for their tickets. Now, until Munich, we hadn’t exactly paid for pub trans – it’s sort of on the honor system in Germany, unless of course there’s controllers. When the police asked us for our tickets, Taylor remembered Julius had them. of course. they told us we had to pay 40 euro and when we said we didn’t have it they said, “That’s a problem.” Playing sweet American tourist doesn’t work so well in Germany. They told us we could get off at the next stop, buy tickets, then wait for the next train. Unfortunately for us it was close to 11:30, we were a 20 minute train ride away from our stop, the last bus left Poing at 12:04, and we had to wait at the station for 20 more minutes for our next train. We got off at Poing at 12:02, ran like hell to catch the bus, and I ended up running after it waving my arms like an idiot screaming, “BUS!” as it drove away into the night.

We walked around poing for 15 minutes looking for ANYONE, but that town is in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, and we were lucky to come across a hotel that was closing its doors and called us a taxi to take us to home sweet home. I wouldn’t highly recommend staying in Poing in the future.

I loved Germany a lot. Everyone is attractive. They put ketchup on any/everything. German doesn’t always sound angry. They don’t like vegetables. And so many other great generalizations I came to find during my two weeks there.

I already miss all my friends there and I’m looking forward to the next time I’m back.

Taylor and I finally made it on the train from Hamburg to Nuremburg (we think). We left my friend Martin’s apartment at 11:15 to take the 25 minute bus to the city’s main train station, but ended up on the wrong bus and got out shortly after and opted for a taxi. Oops. It only cost €10 and since we never paid for transportation in Hamburg we justified our splurge. We got to the train station, found our platform, and got on the train. When we lugged our heavy suitcases on board through the maze of bags already on the tiny ass train car, we asked someone if it was going to our stop and they said no. Back off the train. We asked a couple more people on the platform and they told us it was the next one, but we were weary since none of the signs read Nürnberg. We got on the next one and found what we thought was our reserved seats, but no go. We went through the train and found 2 empty seats to sit our sweaty asses in while we figured our shit out. I was a little stressed. Taylor decided to walk all the way through the train to find out what was going on, and came back to tell me she found our spots and we were on the right train. Hallelujah! Let’s hope we make it in one piece. 

Now I’m sitting in our Harry Potter-like compartment as we train through the German countryside. 

So far we’ve spent two and a half days in Berlin at my friend Johannes’s apartment, then bused to Hamburg and spent four nights at my friend Martin’s, and now we’re making an unexpected stop in Nuremburg to see my friend Julius before we go to Munich. All of these people I met very randomly and have only spent a short amount of time with before coming here. My life continues with a theme of making friends with strangers, and I know there are many more adventures to come!

 

 
All these adventures began with The first Crazysash World Adventure: 17-year-old Sash, traveled to France alone to stay with a strange French family. I remember being so nervous flying so far all by myself. I got off the airplane and waited for a girl and her father to appear and hopefully recognize me. They took me home, and I’m sure all I said for the first 24 hours was, “Okay!” I used their phone to call my parents and cry – I couldn’t understand what anyone was saying and I wanted to come home.

Slowly, it got better. And of course, soon I didn’t want to come home at all. Roxane and I became like sisters, staying up late giggling on each other’s beds. She got me drunk for the first time (pretty sure all I had was two shots of tequila) and I felt silly and free and fully happy in this different world.

Roxane was my first real foreign friend, one I’m seeing again for the fourth time when I visit her this trip. I met Martin through my uncle Jeremy who hosted Martin as a couch surfer in San Francisco more than two years ago. I met Julius through Jeremy as well, and I thank god my uncle loved to introduce me to cute foreign boys!

Leaving Hamburg, I feel like my travels here have helped me come full circle with Jeremy’s death in a way. While visiting the orphanages in Laos last year was life-changing, staying with these people I would never have known if not for Jeremy is very special to me. There are so many people around the world who only know Jeremy like I do, people who may have met him in a customs line in an airport once and been invited over for a meal. Or people who stayed at his house once then traveled with him to Mexico and had mayonnaise making contests. I love to laugh about the crazy shit Jeremy would do with people who understood him best, and I’m forever thankful for these friends I’ve made because of him. 

I got my sense of adventure from my grandma and Jeremy – two people who are no longer here but whom I admire so greatly. I’m going to continue to have Crazysash World Adventures as long as I can, and I promise to send you a postcard one day.