joining the dots

Day 2 (Part 1)

I woke up hearing someone knocking the door. It was a conductor telling me the arriving time to Berlin. Then he brought me a small breakfast. Right before getting off the train, I felt like I'm going to through up. It's probably because of not sleeping enough and having a long journey. Finally, I've arrived at Berlin. I have been many times to This city, although it looked like totally different when I came out the station at 5am.

Now I have to kill about 3 hours. Everything was closed at this time, so I decided to get some sleep. I've found some space upstairs just in front of a shop. Once I laid on the hard floor, I started to realize different view. I don't know why but everything looked so different from lower view. I could not get any proper sleep, but I had a good rest laying on the floor for two hours and half. Eventually I got on the train to the first destination Warsaw.

I thought it's not gonna be easy journey.... It was long way and every single seat had someone sitting. Fortunately, a young guy came into the compartment. He spoke good English and we started talk about everything. Time started pass double speed after meeting him, since people were speaking only in Polish. He got off on half way to Warsaw... I did some drawing, writing some lines that will probably gonna stay only in my diary and never read back. After nearly 6 hours of long journey, I have reached the first destination Warsaw. Train station looked quite old and dark, some how I found this very exciting.

The first thing I had to do is to find out where the hotel is. After asking people and a bit of walk, I found the hotel. What is the first thing you would do in the hotel if you were me? Shower!! After nealy two days of long journy in hot summer weather made me smelly and dirty. After coming out of shower, I went out to explore the city. I like finding out things without having any guide book, just by asking people and a map. It makes me walk a lot but I like it. I didn't go to essential touristic places as my friend is arriving tomorrow. The first impression of this city is dark, although you see loads of new skyscrapers which were still building. By the time I got back the hotel, my energy run out...


車掌のノックの音で目が覚める、後１時間で到着らしい。朝ご飯も持って来てくれた。列車がベルリンに着く直前突然の吐き気に襲われた、何とかこらえる。多分丸三日ちゃんと寝ていないのと長旅の疲れだと思う。やっとベルリンに到着。時間は朝の５時駅の外に出てしばらく新鮮な空気を楽しむ、この街はもう何度も訪れているが、今回は何か違って見える。

次の列車まで３時間ある。駅の中の店などは全て閉まっていたので、少し寝る事にした。駅は吹き抜けの２階建てで、２階のまだ閉まっている店の前に陣取り横になる事にした。角度が変わるだけで周りの世界が全く違って見える。結局ちゃんとした睡眠を得られぬまま時間が過ぎる。列車に乗る時間がやって来た。

やっと最初の目的地ワルシャワに着けると思ったが、長かった。途中、英語の話せる青年が乗って来て、しばらく話した。彼以外はポーランド語しか話せないので彼が来てから時間が過ぎるのが２倍になったような気がした。彼の名前は忘れてしまった、僕と同い年なのとトランペットを結構真剣にやっているのが記憶にある。彼が途中で下車してから、３時間後やっとワルシャワに到着。ホステルの勧誘がしつこい、駅はみずぼらしく薄暗いが不思議な事に僕の好奇心をくすぐった。

とりあえずホテルに行こうという事で、人に聞きながら何とか徒歩でたどり着く。夏の暑い中、２日間の旅で汗まみれになっていたのでシャワーを浴びる事に。さっぱりした所で、街を探索に出かける。僕はガイドブックなしで人に聞いたり地図を手がかりに色々な発見をするのが昔から好きで、初めてパリに行った時も１日中歩き回った記憶がある。明日、友人が合流するので重要な観光スポットは避ける事にした。この街の印象は社会主義の名残か少し暗い、駅前に建ちかけている高層ビルを見れば、経済的に発展していっているのは分かる。ホテルに戻る頃には体力も限界に達していた。

足


朝焼け


朝食


ベルリン駅