Day 7

Susi drops me off at the Gottingen train station in the morning. I look at her and cry. It had been so long and she had been so good to me.  I walk into the train station find my platform and wait. I am standing there for awhile when I realize that this lady is having a fit waiting. She throws her bags down and she is screaming at her husband. I didn't know what was going on. I know my train is late, but I don't know how late. Oh lets say the train was maybe 90 minutes late. So, I go downstairs to the not so nice ticket office and ask what I am supposed to do. He of course is really cranky. What I found when traveling by train....there is never anyone to help. So, he gives me an entirely different train schedule with one additional transfer. This means I have to walk through second class and find places to sit when the seats are not reserved.

I am now realizing the benefits of flying and not being on a train. So, I take the train to from Gottingen to Hamburg and Hamburg to Koln. I get on the train in Koln and it is a Belgium/French  train. The company is called Thalys and its colors were like purple and pink.  I get into the last cab on the train and see that there are no seats there. So, I ask a man who had first looks like maybe he was mean if I could sit there. It turns out that he was a very pleasant man to speak to. I explained to him my situation and he said he could relate. That all of his trains were late as well. It was apparently a bad day to travel by train. So we sat together until we were asked to move. I was sitting in the back and a young lady sat next to me who had just been to San Francisco camping. I told her how scared I was to be on the train because I didn't know if my new train schedule would be okay. She told me to show my original ticket because the French/Belgium do not like the Germans. I felt like I was in fear of being arrested. The train ticket guy looked not so nice.

The mean French Ticket Conductor was a dead ringer  Michael Sheen....

There were more people who joined our cabin. There was one lady from Germany who had trouble with her ticket because she had used an IC ticket and not an ICE ticket. Yes, another advantage for flying. She ended up having to pay extra money. She was really upset and I can't blame her. She was going to be late for her meeting and then she had to fork out more money. She was very angry with the ticket man, and I was impressed. I just would have shut my mouth and not made a scene. I did make a friend on the train. Her name is Dr. Z. It turned out that she had been in Gottingen as well, but ended up going to Frankfurt and not Hamburg.  She was taking the Eurostar to St. Pancras as well and then on to Slough. Which I thought was pretty crazy since Slough and Gerrards Cross are pretty close to each other.

We decided to sit next to each other on the Eurostar. Our train was quite late and we ended up staying in Belgium for maybe 2 hours. It was okay and for ONCE the Border Authorities were NICE. We did a little bit of shopping and sat down for coffee and a treat. We talked about family, marriage, arranged marriages, etc. I was quite happy to be drinking a Chai tea when my nose started bleeding. My nose had not bled in a long time. In fact, I could not remember the last time it had happened. I think it might have been the weather being colder and being on trains all day long. So, we went to the bathroom and fixed it. I was really embarrassed. Here I was a stranger and my nose was bleeding. I don't know was I was emotional about it, but I was. She was very kind and helped me out. We found seats together and talked. I was so afraid the ticket people were going to make me sit in my seat 15 cars ahead, but it turned out to be okay. They didn't care. I realize that I am always being paranoid about getting into trouble. I worry way way too much. I should not sweat the small stuff.

I arrived, had my passport checked once again, got a cab back to Marylebone and back to Gerrards Cross. Um, next time I travel in Europe I am going to fly as much as possible. Planes are cheaper and faster.