Trip's Ending

I’m sitting on top of a building in Istanbul. I can see Asia, the Bosphorous River, and some clothes hanging on wires. Istanbul is huge. I pictured something like Morocco’s Murrakesh, but I’m looking at something more like Mexico City. The place goes on and on; up hills, around bends, and behind me. They say that there might be close to 20 million people who call this place home.

I was in Serbia for seven days. NATO bombed Serbia a bit more than a decade ago and there are still bombed buildings that haven’t been torn down. I heard a story from a local girl about bits of a blown bridge killing a baby in a stroller.  A Croastian family stayed at my home during the war. They told us stories of bombs falling too. Around a table with the Serbian girl, an Italian, an Aussie, a Dane, and a Japanese dude, we talked about peace and war. Everyone except the Serbian girl who has seen bridges bombed, thought that our generation won’t stand for violence between one another.  We acknowledged that “other places,” places like Africa and South America and what not, may see war. But as for the developed places, we think that there are too many of us travelling and knowing each other and commerce-ing together for there to be violent conflict. The Serbian girl who has seen bombs thought that war is “what people do,” and believe it or not, she was even able come up with some historical data to support her theory.

A German fellow that I met in the Balkans told me that there is a statistic, some probability or something, that says that when a German is travelling abroad, if he is to find himself in a conversation with a local, that it is far more than likely that the Nazis, Hitler, WWII, genocide, or something of the like will be mentioned. He says that he’s just a copywriter. When I was in Berlin I learned that in the 1920’s and 30’s, during a time sometimes referred to as “golden,” that the people in Germany were eating bark from the trees of the park because they were so hungry. Gangs roamed the streets killing and stealing and plundering. I learned that life was so full of fear that authority of any kind seemed safe.

In the same city, while I was in line for the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, I met a girl about my age, from Israel.  She described to me the honor with which she had already served her mandatory time with her nation’s military. She said that she had chosen to prolong her active service, and that she would be returning soon to continue her service. She attributed much of her nationalism to an awareness of the events chronicled within the monument that we were in line for.  I thought of her recently. There was fighting and Israel was involved and Hammas was involved and I was headed towards Turkey and then I thought of her for a second.

There’s one other guy on top of the roof with me. He’s a hostel fellow, a guy that I don’t know, and he’s singing songs out loud and talking in French to a cat that’s in his chair with him. It’s like he doesn’t even know that I’m here. He’s only one of three, (and I mean this), truly, certifiably crazy people who are currently in the hostel. There’s another guy who got kicked out of another hostel, and he does yoga like a severe narcoleptic falls asleep. Maybe I’m talking to him, and then he starts squatting. Maybe he’s making some pasta, and then he’s spreading his arms out and doing breathing exercises. Also, he speaks with himself. There are other crazy people too, though--outside of the hostel I mean. In fact, I know that the Yoga Guy is crazy because of another crazy person.  The other crazy person is a 40 something-year-old mom who got pregnant when she was 19 and is now “doing everything that she didn’t.” (Not crazy so far.) We met her when we first arrived in Istanbul. We got lost, walked for hours, grew frustrated, hailed a taxi, and then overpaid him to drive us the 100 meters to a block near our hostel. We went into a bar, asked directions, and of course, Mamma Party offered to show us the way. And then she asked if she could come up to our hostel’s terrace bar for a drink. (Starting to feel crazy). She did. And when we reached the terrace she was confronted by the Crazy Yoga Guy, because she happens to work at the hostel that kicked him out for being crazy. A few minutes later she made jokes about her redheaded son and told us that she likes younger men. (Crazy). I told her that my friend was younger than me. My friend said that he was going to sleep, I said the same, and we walked her to the bottom of the stairs.

There was a costume party in Oxford, darkness and rebirth in Germany, stories that will never be told from Amsterdam, expensive things in Denmark, talks of happiness in Krakow, parties in Budapest, romance in Cinque Terre, community at L’Abri, an Ausie with a smile and a voice in Belgrade, and now, in Budapest, there is the vastness of humanity. I can remember every single day from this trip. Really. I proved it to the friend travelling with me. I can go, chronologically, from day to day, and describe the day. No, not everything, but something from each day.  I know that I’m young, and I know that older people count that against me, but I’ve figured out what living is. Or I’m close. Either way, I know that it’s something like remembering everyday. It’s something like knowing the taste of homemade pumpkin soup in Poland, or something like watching the sunrise through a once cloudy Serbian sky, or something like missing your family, or something like knowing that my own problems really aren’t so big. Budapest is home to about 20million people and it’s only one place.