Klaus, The Motorbike Dork

My last night in the youth hostel in Darmstadt, I came back from a long walk to find a motorcycle helmet on my desk where there was no motorcycle helmet before. The bathroom door was shut. My armpit hairs stood on end. I sat down on my bed and listened. I could hear the sounds of a man taking a crap where there were no sounds of a man taking a crap before. A few grunts and a decisive flush later, the door opened and out walked a babyfaced, bespectacled man wearing a black IBM t-shirt tucked into the front of his black highwater jeans. He dried his hand off on his crotch and extended it. My name is Klaus, he said.

This was my new roommate. Klaus was a 35 year-old motorbike dork from Essen with an internet job and a Maltese internet wife. He asked me if I wanted to go see The DaVinci Code and I said sure. He adjusted his tube socks, pulled on his royal blue synthetic biker jacket, and we walked downtown.

As we passed through the main square, we were swept up by a relentless current of fauxhawks and soon found ourselves watching some crummy Europop concert along with a couple thousand German tech school students. Neither of us really wanted to see that damned movie anyway. Klaus offered me a concession stand cocktail. And so it came to pass that Klaus The Motorbike Dork and I sat for several hours with our knees touching ever-so-slightly beneath a small plastic table, drinking mai tais in the shade of a plastic palm tree. For one night (and one night only), I was a traditional German homosexual. That I do not have any pictures is my only regret.

Colon City

Lody, lody - am I glad I got out of there.

Now I'm in Darmstadt. I have spent the past 24 hours on trains or in train stations. All the while I have been lugging around my body weight in dirty underwear. I feel a bit like Sisyphus except I'm beginning to think that I am Sisyphus, I am the rock, and I am the hill.

The day before I left the States, I got a coffee in the Old Market. I read this quote on the wall while I was taking a crap on the coffee shop crapper:

"From a certain point onward there is no longer any turning back. That is the point that must be reached."
-Franz Kafka

They even want my chitterlings!

Provided I don't snap in my next lesson and start bellowing "Deutschland Über Alles" as I goosestep up and down the aisles, I will pass my CELTA course tomorrow and leave Krakow the day after. I'm anxious to get out of here. Krakow has been kind to me, but I am ready to step onto a train and go someplace else, to drink coffee and brood on my own for a few days without the company of a stumbling gaggle of British lechers.

Thursday morning, I am taking the train to Berlin. I might stay the night there. Over the weekend, I have a job interview in Darmstadt. It is possible that I will be living there. Then again, a lot of things are possible now that were just a daydream yesterday.