Club Portugal

I said it on Facebook, and I will say it again here: I am officially a card-carrying member of Club Portugal.  This means that I have a card.  Also, a T-Shirt, as soon as some overachieving pork chop decides to put one up on Zazzle.

I got up at 5 AM to train it to Hannover, and from there hitched a ride to Hamburg with some guy I found on the internet, because you can do these things in Europe.  I got there at 10.30 in the morning, expecting to wait for three hours like I did last time. Naturally, I was the only person there, and at 10.40, I was right back out on the street, +1 on membership cards, -1 on Things To Occupy My Time Until 8 PM When My Ride Leaves.

So, I called up a Turkish friend from way back when in Konstanz.  He had seen my Hamburg pictures on Facebook, and messaged me saying that he was living there, and next time I was in the city to call him.  So I did.  By 10.55 we were hunting each other down in the train station, and by 11.00, there were hugs involved.  We ran around the city for a couple hours, got lunch, and then took a leisurely stroll through the red light district, for some reason which I'm still not clear on.  I saw lots of naked people, lots of naked people holding bad things, and a sign that said "Funky Snazzy Pussy," which did not intrigue me enough to find out what it was.  And then we went back to his dormitory to hang out and drink tea.

The good news is, if I was still on the fence about studying here, I'm not now.  I met a couple of his flatmates, and we sat and talked until it was time for me to almost miss my train.  The one guy was from Berlin, but his parents were from Afghanistan, which meant I had to attempt to explain American foreign policy while avoiding looking him in the eye for shame.  Also, I wanted to ask him if he spoke Farsi, but I was afraid he would ask me how I knew Farsi was spoken in Afghanistan, to which I would have had to answer "I read The Kite Runner."  Awkward.  Best to keep silent and listen to him tell me about a high school project he did where he analyzed the speaking habits of Obama and Adolf Hitler and found them remarkably similar.  Best to nod and say, "Interessant."

Then I called up my ride and was like, "Dude, I'm peacing out early," before hopping a train back to Celle.  All in all, a successful day.  Tomorrow it's off to the town hall to try and get this shit sorted out, because my visa expires in like, four days.

In other news, after a long, dreary, and generally miserably winter, fall has finally come to Celle.  Unfortunately, my beautiful purple pea-coat is what's known as a "fall jacket" around here, which means it's useless after the end of the week.  I've got my mom and my sister hunting down the sexiest arctic parka they can find, my only requirements being a) a hood, and b) pink.  I figure my body will at least be easy for the rescue guys to find when I freeze my ass off.

EDIT:  The pork chops have been hard at work on Zazzle.  Should I get the shirt with the Portuguese flag, or the shirt with the Portuguese flag, do you think?  There's also a nice blue one with the Portuguese flag.