There And Back Again - A Traveller's Tale

I'm home. Been so for almost 12 days now.

What I never fail to start off with is to explain why I ended earlier. The story of the evil fren and the unforeseen abandonment.

But what I remember is:

- The wonderful breakfast we had on the 1st day at Frankfurt
- The magic mushrooms from Amsterdam flower market
- The hailstones near the Eiffel Tower, and the indian touts that swarmed all around it
- The shifty backpacker place, the pickpocket, and the maze of streets at Florence
- The Colosseum, Circus Maximus, and the homely Bed & Breakfast at Rome
- The surprisingly comfortable (super) ferry rides to and fro the Adriatic Sea
- The disgusting incident at Athens
- The gloomy beach & friendly people at Schinias, and the frighteningly deep "hot" spring outside Athens
- The brownish-green waters of crumbling Venice
- The wild rugged scenery at Slovenia and Croatia
- The perplexed border guards at Slovenia and Croatia, thanx to a never-before-seen red passport
- The stripping of a CPU in Zagreb, and the unfinishable carbonara
- The beautiful studio apartment and old city centre at Split, and my 1st fish in weeks.
- The clear blue waters off Hvar, an eyeful
- Feeling lost and helpless on the way to Munich
- Feeling free and relieved on the way to Innsbruck
- Being shocked that I'm staying at the 4star hotel
- Feeling very lonely in my 4star room
- The totally unprepared hike up the 1st mountain I saw from the road, and the lovely couple who brought me down
- Cowmine!
- The sterile, characterless hostel at Vienna, and the unhelpful staff
- The rickety, cramped, dirty but fun caravan at Innsbruck
- The guided hike round the valley, thru flower-strewn meadows, gravel slopes, conifer forests
- My first touch of snow
- My hesitancy bunking in with a friend at Frankfurt
- My sadness when I was about to leave
- The children I played with
- Making up Chinese characters and hoping I wldn't get found out
- Getting immensely bored of cities
- Feeling horrified to know I was cooking the ENTIRE dinner for my friend's family, and not 1 or 2 dishes as I earlier thought
- My relief when they loved my cooking

Paiseh, all these must be very boring to read. Especially when there's so much, and all in point form. But be relieved that I'm not going to sit you down and talk about everything that's happened - it is definitely more than this list of highlights.

I leave it here for me, so i don't have to strain my eyes to read the infinite scribbles in my journal.

I come back, hopefully, a better person. more thankful, more appreciative, more kind, i hope.

Amazing what good 5 weeks, and some money, can do. Compared to 5 years, and a whole lot more money. hahah.

I'm glad I've gone away, coz it makes things back here seem so much better.

Its like an enlightening dream. It doesn't really change anything, but you see everything with new eyes, and hopefully better equiped to deal with a new day.

Time to wake up.