København. What a wad of flavor...


København. You can see it in my smile...


København. Do yourself a favor...go.
København. Drives them pretty girls wild (err, actually, those pretty girls drive you wild).

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About 95 percent of y'all didn't get that intro at all. I can see your eyebrows scrunching up all the way from Scandinavia.

"What the hell is København, how do you even pronounce it, and why in Jesus' name is that 'o' wearing a Miss America sash?"

Good questions.

København = Copenhagen, Denmark, which is not "the capital of Sweden," as people who "didn't invent the deep bowl" often think; it's pronounced koob'n-HOWN; and I have no clue as to why the Danes have to have 29 letters in their alphabet, so don't ask me.

...Your forehead is still creased, and now your eyelids are getting into the act, aren't they? I can tell you still don't get the allusions (most of you, that is).

"Okay, great...but what is the flavor of the wad that we can see in your smile? And what is it a wad of? And why can we see it in your smile?"

You are obviously not from Texas.

Go to iTunes, download "Copenhagen" by Robert Earl Keen, Jr., and always remember: If you dip Copenhagen long cut tobacco, and especially if you dip Copenhagen snuff, you gotta spit. And I mean really spit. Spit often, and spit hard. Because if you don't, trust me: You won't be able to see much of anything in your smile, for two reasons. 1) You won't be smiling. 2) Anything that had been visible in that grin of yours will be floating in a toilet somewhere, awaiting the flush that will take it away from Regurgitation Station.

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"So, Bailey's, how do you and Josefine know each other?" Ana, a roomate of Josefine's friend Sofia asked me at dinner Friday night.

I looked over at the girl I supposedly "knew" and tried to decipher how to answer, based on the facial expressions she made back at me.

"Uhhhh, we know each other from Spain."

Which was true ... technically. But the honest answer would have been, "Uhhh, we really don't."

Strangers? Then how was it that I found myself in a hip Copenhagen apartment at that very moment, eating a homemade dinner and drinking Carlsbergs and bottles of Golden Ladies like I was an old friend in town for the weekend?

E-mail: The most powerful tool since the opposable thumb. From a chance run-in with three blonde Danish lookers in a Barcelona hostel back in Sept. 2004 to me inviting myself to their hometown nearly two years later ... it was all due to the miracle of email that I was able to land on Josefine's couch for the past five nights, free of charge.

None of it would have happened were it not for the ultimate "stay in touch" machine that Al Gore helped invent.

I met Josefine, along with two of her friends, Laura and Malou while traveling through Spain for my first time, during the fall break of my semester abroad in Geneva. Alongside two other American dudes, I, too, did a double fist-pump upon realizing who our new next-door neighbors were. On the balcony of that Barcelona hostel, all the way down on the end of Las Ramblas were three good-looking blonde Danish girls, all of whom spoke English, and spoke it well.

They took us out to a club that night, and we chilled a bit the night after that, but then, the whole thing vanished into the creases of my brain's memory, kept alive only by the descriptions in my travel journal and their contact information scribbled in the margins.

When I began to gear up for a return to Europe, I went back to that journal to see if my old friends remembered the Texan who said "y'all" without an accent. Only one of the three responded to my email.

We may have not remembered what each other looked like as recently as last Wednesday, but we sure won't forget it now. Even if I never see her again, Josefine and I will be friends for life. That's what a Thursday-Friday-Saturday-Sunday-Monday self-invite will do to your relationship with a total stranger.

Even if she does steal people's bikes without a trace of guilt, the girl with eyes the color of the North Carolina road jerseys is probably the nicest human being on the planet. And one of the most knowledgeable, too -- did you know that deodorant only works if you cleanse your skin of the old layers of sweat and previous deodorant stick rolls before re-applying? I do now.

And to think I will smell better for the rest of my life only because we happened to choose the perfect Barcelona hostel two years ago ... and because of how easy it is to regain contact with fleeting acquaintances through the power of email.

It's why you gotta love traveling: You never know what taking a right instead of a left will do for the outcome of your journey -- both on a Eurail trip and in life.

For now, let it suffice to say that a trip is only a trip because of the people you meet along the way. Can't you see it in my smile?

 

I don't think you can really make it out, but this crossing light is a throwback to the old Communist days of East Berlin. The Commies wanted even the stick figure meaning "Go" to identify with the proletariat, so they gave the common man a hat -- legend has it, the only crossing light man in the world to wear one.


In the early days following the fall of the Wall, people instinctively tried to purge East Berlin of anything and everything Communist. So of course, that meant bye-bye to their beloved Green Man-Red Man figures. The problem was, this was about the only exciting and sexy thing the Communist world ever thought up. Look at these guys, then go outside and look at one of ours. Ours suck. Theirs are awesome. So by popular demand, scattered throughout Berlin at random intersections are the Communist crossing signals, hats on, ready to guide you across the street. There is apparently even a store in Berlin that sells nothing but stuff with these guys' images plastered on it -- I never saw it.


Even though the Danes are better at sarcasm than ANY other European country (it really is not even close, and I think it's because all of their channels are in English with Danish subtitles, rather than going with the dub), Marie, a Dane on my bike tour, wasn't quick enough to understand why I had to take a picture of this place.

Me: "Hey, Marie. Wanna go get some Balzac coffee?"
Marie: "Why?"
Me: (sheepish giggling)


You have to love American soldiers and their potty humor during war. This magnificent statue in the heart of the Tiergarten, erected in triumph after a defeat of the French in the 19th century, was affectionately titled "Chick on a Stick" by our G.I.s.

 

I just liked the Buddy Bears so much, I had to show you some more.


Yeah, I'd be feelin' a little blue if I was from Lebanon, too.


In France, everything but their hearts are made of gold.



Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. And people think HOUSTON has an inferiority complex? (I just learned that the Rice website has a link that says, "Houston: It's Cooler Than You Think"). I doubt we would have to tell people where we sit geographically if Kofi asked us to make a Buddy Bear.

Serbia. Those dots you see are bullet holes. I can't tell if that was the artistic vision, or if the bear was ambushed along the way to Berlin.
 

You know the Cow Parade? This is a UN project called the Buddy Bears. Every nation represented. It is wild.


Just take one guess.


Apparently, in China, Winnie the Pooh lives in an opium den.


Miguel? Miguel San Juan? Why didn't you TELL me you were gonna be in Germany??


Once again, take one guess.
 

BÍLLY = TORTUGA

 

You know a city has a rich history when there can be a building like this and I don't have any recollection of what it is, why it's there, or whether or not it is even that significant in the grand scheme of things. But Berlin is like that, kind of like Houston in a way (ever heard of the Eighth Wonder of the World, folks?).

But Randall, the dread from Australia who splits his year between Berlin, where he gives bike tours all summer, and Guatemala, where he works in a program which supports impoverished urban youth, is the real reason I chose this shot. Basically, Randall is hilarious. And I wish I could remember all of his one-liners, which he has undoubtedly perfected after a billion tours given (it seriously is like a stand-up comedy routine with these people...they have an act, they have material, they have audiences that make or break the show, and very few, if any, have much money).

Here are the two that stand out.

1) In front of a remnant of the Berlin Wall, which was subject to a lot of vandalism in the immediate wake of reunification, mostly because everyone wanted a souvenir from the legendary David Hasselhoff concert on the Brandenburg Gate: "And as you can see, this former part of the Wall is now itself protected from the public by a wall -- kind of ironic, don't ya think?"

Maybe you had to be there.

2) During his intro speech about Berlin: "Now, Berlin is no longer the Germany of the Reich by any means. In fact, it's one of the most diverse cities in the world. Berlin has the third-largest gay population in the world, as well as the world's third-largest Turkish population. I haven't seen the figures just yet, but by my calculations, that would give Berlin the most gay Turks in the world."

Huh, huh? That one is funny no matter where you hear/read it.

 

I caved and did a tour when I got to Berlin, only because it's a city over eight (EIGHT) times the physical size of Paris, and there is no center to move outward from. But I did a bike tour, not a regular one, which meant that for four hours, I rode around on a beach cruiser in one of the coolest cities I've seen on my trip. AND I got a turtle squeaky toy on my bike, which is fitting for the man who himself looks like a turtle.

Our Aussie-Aussie-Aussie, Oy-Oy-Oy guide, Randall, is taking a photo of Marie and Rebecca, two girls who came to Berlin from Denmark just to see Robbie Williams play.

Apparently, he has more than just one song ... which means that milleniuuuuuuum is not the first word that pops into their heads when they hear the name Robbie. (His lyrics are much deeper than that, according to Marie: "He has one song where he says, 'I put the Brit in celebrity!'") And they wonder why I wouldn't stay two extra nights to go to the show with them...for only 50 euros.

Oh, and Marie and Rebecca are posing with Uncle Marx.
 

Man, no WONDER Chuck Knoblauch began to stink so much! Bahahah. (For those of you who don't "habla Deutsch," Knoblauch is German for... the niño!)

Just kidding, it means garlic. 

IT'S BOOTY TIME.

Like always, you people are on a little bit of delay as to where exactly I am. At the moment, it's Copenhagen. The few days before that, it was Berlin. This little story comes from my time in Den Haag, a.k.a. The Hague. (You know the reason the UN chose this city for the International Criminal Court has to be the intimidation factor that goes hand-in-hand with definite article place names. If you're Charles Taylor, used to running the show in Monrovia, and you roll into THE Hague, all shackled and humiliated, you'd be feeling a little scared, no?)

Anyway, I went to THE beach in THE Hague. Trying to avoid the crush of people that flock to the center of activity, I took a right and started walking, and walking, and walking.....

....until I realized, by the sights all around me, that I had walked so far, I was now on the nude portion of the playa.

"I'm alone, I'm in Europe, I've never done the whole nude beach thing....." I thought, checking both ways before I crossed the street into Adam and Eve Land. "What the hell."

And down came the trousers.

Step two was digging out a little chair for myself in the beach, which must have been a really attractive sight for the nudistas behind me: A full rear view of Billy bent over, my scoof-maloof saying hello, both my hands digging and digging and digging, until the underground seat was deep enough.

That's where I am in this picture.


Then, a lightbulb went off.

"Oh man, it would be great to set up the self-timer on my camera and get a picture of my bare ass on the blog."

Clearly.

So out came the scoofy show, once again, as I crawled out of my beach hole and started setting up the view finder to rest on the coast line. It took a while with the sun making everything hard to see, and I assumed the risk of people seeing me with a camera on a nude beach -- a no no, I figured, even in Holland.

Well....it's only a no no if the people who think they're being photographed don't want to be photographed, as I learned thirty seconds later.

"I saw you take a peek-chah! I saw you take a peek-chah!" Great. Another Dutch cartoon character on acid type, coming my way in the water. I had just walked into the ocean, not knowing whether the self timer trick had worked, and here was this dude, also naked, trying to make small talk. And the worst thing was, he thought I had taken a picture of HIM.

"You take a peek-chah! Yes! Haha, you take a peek-chah!"

Where's the Dutch word for "self-timer" when you need it???? It was lost in translation, as this dude now thought I was into him.

"Do you want me to take a peek-chah of you?"

"No."

"I take a peek-chah, it's okay!"

"Naw, man, I'm cool."

When he started talking about his boyfriend in America, that is when I began to walk back to my beach hole.

And just to let you know, shrinkage definitely exists, and is very apparent on the nude beaches.

 

The two things I have lost and miss the most: my Nalgene bottle and my Gold Bond powder.

Gold Bond, WHERE ARE YOU????? My scoofy is beginning to be rash in its decision-making and I need your help to calm down the region. Please don't pull a Condi on me.

And the Nalgene...I guess it was finally time. I had almost lost it on four other occasions -- on this trip alone. But the worst thing is that I can't replace it here. They don't know about the water bottle trend. And I can't replace my Chaco's, which I didn't lose, but whose soles are beginning to crack like the San Andreas. Ironically, both the water bottle and the sandals were given to me by the same person in the same year -- one of my original Little Leaguers from the Dixie Pawns is the heir to the Blue Ridge Mountain Sports empire. Mr. Smith, if you read this somehow, it'd be great if you could send me another pair of those green ones with my new water bottle as well. Size 12.

But today, it was really annoying, because I had to pay for water. This is what chump travelers do -- rookies pay for water, folks. Rookies. You don't pay for the one thing that is free universally...and while I'm still in the West, where I'm able to drink this stuff, I'm pinching every penny I can.

And of course, what happens the first time I pay for water? I accidentally get the freaking mineral water...the one with gas.

"How could this have happened?" I began to fret once I heard the unmistakable fizz explosion sound coming from the mondo bottle. "In Den Haag the guy told me that ALL blue labels were REGULAR!!"

Well, that was Holland. This is Germany. Blue labels do not necessarily mean good water.

Can't we get a committee together from across the EU and Switzerland to come up with some commong ground regarding this issue? Everywhere you go in the world, the big, red octagon with the word "STOP" on it means stop. Everywhere. So I don't see it as impossible to bring about a N.W.O. where "blue" means "no gas," and "red" means "gas."

I've never actually tasted pee, but red can't be far off.

(happy ending -- I was able to use the gas water bottle as a pillow while I read in the park)

I know someone named Rambo. Do you?

I have now spent four days in Den Haag, which is a cool city because it's not that touristy, people are nice as hell, the beach is really cool with nice temperature water, there are parks, etc. But I have been chilling full time at this place called Cremer's, after the hostel girl recommended it and I found out I could pick up Internet for free.

I have been here like six times now. I'm here right now, actually -- for two hours before I take a train to Berlin, and then on to Copenhagen Thursday.

In my many hours spent at Cremer's, I have met some interesting people. But the pattern has pretty much been crazy Dutch acid cartoon character guy, cool person not born in Holland, crazy Dutch acid cartoon character guy, cool people not born in Holland, and so on.

Geop (pronounced Joop!) and the other guy whose name I can't remember were the cartoon character people -- these types of crazies have one main sentence that they will tell you, and continue telling you in 30-second intervals until they finally depart from your presence. Geop's was, "I plan on studying in WisCONsin, I heard there's a uniVERsity there" (8 times). Where he picked Wisconsin, I have no idea. My money is he saw some MTV Spring Break special on some chicks from Madison. The other guy's was, "Everyone in Holland speaks ENGlish! We learn it in SCHOO-ule!" He seriously went through this for five minutes with me, and then capped off this brilliant oral dissertation with, "Soo....I guess that's why we speak ENGlish in HOLLand!"

But Rambo was one of the cool folks. He's from Turkey, but came to Holland in 1976.

He rolled up next to where I am sitting right now, in his wheelchair, and asked if he could sit with me. Soon, we began talking. Then, Lebanon came up.

"Too much killing, too much fighting. I do not support this."

Rambo sure wasn't living up to his namesake.

"I am Islamista," he said. But his form is Islamism did not sound too familiar. "Do you know why they fight us? They are scared of this..." Rambo searched for a pen before even trying to find the words, his English not refined enough to express the dream.

On the back of a coaster, he wrote one word.

ISLAM.

Then, a downward arrow. From that point, five arrows all pointing downwards, separated by about fifteen degrees each to give them their own, distinct directions.

Rambo took another coaster.

1.

It was an alpha & omega story, and only one word had to be written. Coaster No. 1 was today's Muslim world, divided by ethnicity, geography, language, culture and some pretty violent arguments between the Shia, who think Ali, Islam's fourth caliph, was all that and a bag of chips, and the Sunnis, who think he was just one big-timer in a list of many.

"They are scared that we will form this," he said once it became clear that I understood Coaster No. 1. Rambo was pointing at Coaster No. 2.

Islamists have a simple goal: the reunification of the ummah, the worldwide Islamic population. But Rambo didn't sound like he was too anxious to harken the reign of sharia in Holland. And he sure didn't sound like someone who wanted to see infidels die en masse. Rambo, who could probably still put a beat down on me despite having lost the use of his legs due to polio, was not your typical Islamista.

"You know what Quran say?" I couldn't say that I did. "It say you must respect the Bible. You no know that, see. Ahh," he waved me away, acting disgusted by my ignorance.

But his message intrigued me.

It was almost like a "We Are the World, We Are the Children" form of uniting all Muslims to live as brothers, just like Muhammad wanted it to be like. But not to be attained through violent means. A Muslim...Islamist...hippie?

Far out.

As he continued to pontificate, I got that feeling. You know the one. Like you've met this person before. In another life?

It was the way he spoke -- the way he said his words, the types of ideas he had...he sounded like Bob Marley would have had he grown up in Trenchtown, Saudi Arabia.

"Excuse me, Rambo, do you know who Bob Marley is?" I had to ask.

Rambo started to chuckle, as if to say, "What kind of question is that?"

"I learned English from listening to Bob Marley."

Holy God. I cannot describe the amount of restraint it took to not scream -- loudly.

"More, more," I said, wanting to hear the story.

"I started listening to him in 1982..."

"...One year too late!" I interjected. Rambo shook his head in dismay -- Bob Marley died in 1981.

"I learned one word at a time. I listen, and I ask my friend, I say, 'What is this? What is this?' And I learn that way.

"The beat really," he struggled for words, and just patted his heart with his fist, "...for me."

We talked about this for obviously another 30 minutes, exchanging favorite songs, phone numbers and the like. And when it was time to go, he insisted that I photograph him with something "very special to him."

Rambo was easy-going and very non-threatening the entire conversation, but it wasn't until he got on his scooter that I saw a real smile.





 

This is George. George is dangerous.

Our friendship began my second day at the hostel in Den Haag, Holland (The Hague). Paranoid to the max about my laptop, my baby, getting stolen, even a quick dash inside for a refill on coffee made me think twice. So I see this short, bald, ROUND man sitting next to me, smoking a cig, drinking his joe black, looking extremely Middle Eastern.

I didn't know if he knew English, but I knew he would understand the universal sign for "I'm watching you, buddy." Two fingers, pointed at my eyes, looking straight at him.

"I'll remember what you look like," I said as I walked by, assuming he would not understand the sarcasm, thereby making the situation humorous for me.

When I came back 15 seconds later, the computer was still there, next to big, grinning George.

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"Seven thousand years ago!" he said, arms raised above his head to form what I found out 30 seconds later was a pyramid. All I had asked was where the man was from, and he was all about letting me know how old school his Egyptian society was.

"I am NOT Arab!" he warned. "There are some Egyptians with Arab blood, but we are not Arabs." To distinguish himself even more, George made sure to let me know that he was a Coptic Christian, as well.

"The Islam, he say 'Oh, yes, Allah, Islam, pray,' you know? But then he go with the women! He say (thrusting motions). The Chreestian is good, the Islam is no good!"

This was ten minutes before a group of semi-attractive, buns of steel French girls walked by.

"Wow," he said to himself, but definitely a little louder than is normal for saying something "to yourself."

His attention caught completely by the tall one in the white pants, George's eyes zoned out, staring without seeing.

"This is George." Now facing me, he spoke with pride.

"George is dangerous," he said with a sly-like-a-fox grin, boasting about his libido in the way that construction workers patented. "I have 57 years, but I am dangerous."

A few laughs, the periodical wiping of the forehead to collect beads of perspiration, and George began laying out the scene of his dangerzone.

"Nice whiskey" was the first step in the process. "Nice wine, nice bed..." George was still looking at me, his daily-shaven pate burning holes in my retinas, a pleasant smile on his face. He paused before the fourth and fifth steps.

"Clean woman...and then, after," his eyebrows raised to finish the thought. "This is George."

 

Isi was the only one that EMBRACED the "penis buttah." And the apple? I'd say it's even better than the banana, personally.
 

These guys have got the right idea. RAFTS are what you should bring, every time. It's a must.

I'm a Pisces, so I'm supposed to swim like a fish, right? I love the water, and all, but I really would say that I'm more like a seal. The climax of swimming is the drying off part.

That pier was my sunning rock.


 

It's my experience that hip hop is now officially the music of our generation. Let's just make it official.

And whenever you're at a festival with a bunch of heady white kids, and the music is all either reggae or all jam bands, etc., the one hip hop group gets people going crazy. It's like people have just been waiting to act like badasses, which is what white people feel like when they're cruising down the street in their Saturns, sunglasses on and a ferocious head nod going, cuz murda was the case dat they gave you.

I was at Saian Supa Crew (FR) with Zizou and Nawiee. They had already been complaining earlier in the weekend about the montony of reggae (not the first time I've heard the complaint), and they were overtly "hip hop guys," so I was happy to be there with them.

The way I was grooving in Abenberg to Gentleman...well, these two Frankfurters weren't going that crazy, but they were jamming.

And it was halfway through the show, when Zizou had been getting into it pretty hard, that he turns to me in his German accent and says, "Zie people, have been longing, for hip hop."

Yes they have, Fabian.

HOW GREAT IS THAT QUOTE?


 

Mascha -- and everyone in Germany -- says "hallo" when she answers the phone.
And as for Officer Hanaa...I mean, seriously, hottest cop of all time?

Johannes used to have a pet named Max Peter. It was named after his uncle. The pet was a retarded chicken. Johannes is a country boy -- a hunter and fisherman, which is pretty rare in Germany because it costs like two BMWs to get a license. So he has some chickens, and some sort of heating machine that takes care of the hens' maternal responsibilities by warming all the eggs. Well...one time, Johannes messed up and cracked one of the eggs towards the time they were going to hatch. Clearly, scotch tape is the solution, right? That's what this kid thought. Somehow, the thing survived, despite having a litany of birth defects that included it being a freak in all aspects. And Hans Peter became a pet..until it died a few months later.

Isi is down with peanut butter after living in the U.S. for a year, so I'm down with her.

And poor Mascha, who left the night before the final day -- her three favorite bands that she missed, Joy Denalane, Patrice and Saian Supa Crew, ended up being my favorite three shows.
This is what you do whenever Rene says, "Let's have a chill out, mon" in the deepest German accent I've ever heard.

Okay, anyone who went to Strake with me, Laeo is Jeremy Yeglin. Same body structure, same facial expressions, it is unbelievable. Just not as hyper.

And Max is like the opposite of TK -- tall, but not like TK.
 

Good? That's what I thought.

 

They all cave. Everytime.

 

Only like fifteen people, total, might get this, but you know the random song on Gentleman's live CD called "Stranded in Babylon"? This is Matthias the Dread, the Cologne native who probably has the coolest white guy dreads of all time. He has a friend in Austin named Buffalo Soldier, he told me. Can't say that I've met Buffalo Soldier. (And you've got to love that, yes, Germans also know about the rabbit ears. And just the other day, I saw these two 7-year-old Dutch kids having a grand ole' time on the metro, playing their Dutch-acid-cartoon version of Rock, Paper, Scissors. Some games and tomfoolery simply transcend borders of geography, language, culture and religion).

But this photo serves a dual purpose of analyzation.
It's called the "What is '80s'?" Debate

*Note: '80s', in this story, denotes a negative connotation.

This story has nothing to do with Matthias the Dread.

Look at my shirt. It's tie-dyed. That is not a very unusual sight on American college campuses. But here, in the land of mullets, Michael Irvin temples, Ridgemont High Vans slip-ons and tight jeans, I "look like I'm from the 80s."

That's what a bunch of those German kids told me, at least. And it was confirmed by pretty much everyone else I asked about it after the festival.

This got me thinking. When I walk past some European dude -- wreaking of cologne, torso plastered by a tight Puma cutoff shirt, eyes shielded by astronaut sunglasses, Euro-mullet glaring back at his inquisitive eyes from the subway car's darkened window, reflecting the glow of lots of hair gel and hot pink-highlights, does HE think to himself, "Man, that dude in the tie-dyed shirt dresses like David Hasselhoff." ??

It's like rain on your wedding day, eh? (Mr. Kerman, my eighth grade teacher, told me that nothing in that Alanis Morisette song is actual irony -- if that's true, then I don't know what the hell they are).

If my son's generation of Americans ends up dressing like today's Euro-mullet kids, I will more frustrated than a traffic jam when you're already late.

 

The View from SummerJam Platz

The building just below the Jamaican flag is where the stage was tucked behind. The Green Stage, the one I will watch a concert from while sitting in my raft the next time I make it to SummerJam.

Patrick, René, Johannes, from left to right, with the freshwater ocean view. Patrick admits that the German flag chair is because of the World Cup.

I swam three times a day. Wouldn't you have, too?

 

Zidane or Fabian? (Hint: One is actually Zizou. Seriously.)

 

Zidane or Fabian?

 

THROWBACK JERSEYS

What is the deal here?

I saw a treasure chest of amazing throwback jerseys -- that's real throwbacks. Not thowbacks, as in Mitchell & Ness's jazz. Like my Dream Team II Shawn Kemp jersey, or the skin tight Larry Bird jersey Wes The Original Beach Kid rocks.

This was the only time I felt absolutely compelled to snap a photo. My Shawn Kemp compadre has the most sick nasty jersey of all. But the reason I took a picture was because I had a plan in mind, which failed, to snap a frame of the guy standing about 5 meters in front of him...also clothed in a real old-school Shawn Kemp jersey. But this one was also different! A shout out to his years of sharp peak and even sharper decline -- the dark green and what's-it-called-dark-red with sand-colored lining.

MAN I WISH I HAD ACTUALLY BROUGHT THAT DREAM TEAM KEMP JERSEY WITH ME! Can you picture how funny that would have been? Anyone who knows me knows what would have happened.

Me: "Hey, vass-up man!" (I turn around and point to the fading word still barely visible above the number on my back) "We both got Shawn Kemp old school jerseys! Quick, come over here with me real quick." (I lead the startled, confused German Shawn Kemp jersey wearer over to soon-to-be startled, confused German Shawn Kemp jersey wearer No. 2)

Me: "Yo! Look!" (I turn around, once again, to show No.2 the world "KEMP" plastered on the faded, Value Village mesh shirt, as if the pen used to write it dropped out random pellets of salt. Then I make No. 1 turn around and show off his jersey, too).

No. 2: (really confused...most likely does not even know who Shawn Kemp is)

But, alas. I figured I would look too American. That's very ironic -- I will explain later in my "What is '80's'? Debate".

Here is the list of all the jerseys I can remember (despite writing down almost all of the memorable moments on my little reporter's notepad that has all of my weird thoughts and ideas scribbled in it, I stupidly did not copy down any player jersey names -- memory will have to suffice).
NICK VAN EXEL (Lakers, 3-D style, amazing)
MICHAEL JORDAN (3x)
DENNIS RODMAN (both Bulls; 2x)
DIRK NOWITZKI (only twice?!?!?! Come on, guys. Show some support.)
TRACY McGRADY (Orlando, Houston; 2x total)
KOBE BRYANT (2x; one was old school 3-D)
SHAQUILLE O'NEAL (1x; Lakers)
GARY PAYTON (1x; Finals jersey)
TIM DUNCAN (1x)
VINCE CARTER (1x; Toronto)
DWAYNE WADE (1x)
LEBRON JAMES (a few times...one was St. Vincent-St. Mary's)

And that's all I can remember at the moment, but I'm sure more will come to me. Maybe I just got the wrong impression during the World Cup, but did I hear of more than ten people who cared about the NBA when their boy Dirk Nowitzki was choking in the finals? No. Good thing for him, too. Nice free throw shooting down the stretch with the chance to turn the fire hose loose against the Heat by taking a 3-0 lead, Dirk. Football mania saved you from scrutiny in your homeland.

Billy is a happy boy.

www.summerjam.de

 

SummerJam.

Only 359 days till next year.

One adjective to describe a wanderer’s existence: Ephemeral. Here today, gone tomorrow. Gutentag. Je suis Bayless. Nice to meet you. Adios.

Rinse, wash and repeat.

This is not a problem for those who travel solely to find themselves. It is a problem for those who want to find other people, too. For a son of The Bob like me, genetics play a role even bigger than the oak trees the old man calls calves. Like my father always says, “I just love people.”

Making friends on this trip has been like smoking crack. No matter how many hits, I can’t get enough. Just one more score, one more score, one more to get me through these next few hours. A fleeting high, because you never know where you will be the next day, your newest buddy exiting stage right forever. Some of these hit-and-run relationships last only a few hours, on a train from Bordeaux to Paris; some last a single night, chatting through language barriers over a beer in a Dutch hostel; but some last just a little longer, enough to really leave a mark.

Those are the friendships that nourish you like a well-balanced diet, rather than just giving you the quick, fleeting jolt of that rock.

(I swear, I have never done crack, but we’ve all taken D.A.R.E., so we know what it does).

I now have a slew of friends – real friends – from Cologne, with a pair of Frankfurters thrown in for some demographic balance. None of them would have made cameos in my life’s movie had it not been for a late breakfast on the Downtown Mall last April in Charlottesville.

Jamison, my old roommate, was moving slowly that day, and ventured down to Café Cubano for some early afternoon eggs and coffee – breakfast time for a long haired, guitar-playing, free spirit college kid. He made eyes with a cute waitress, used his rock star good looks to snag her digits, and called her up. Her name was Laura. Jamison and Laura began dating. Turns out she’s German, from Cologne, the hometown of Gentleman, my favorite reggae artist. Turns out she loves Gentleman, in addition to some other German reggae bands on my iPod. Turns out she has a bunch of friends going to a three-day reggae festival in her hometown in July.

It’s called SummerJam. I had been dying to go for over two years, ever since I saw a clip of the madness on a Gentleman DVD.

Turns out she was able to hook me up phat.

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If I’ve learned anything so far, it’s that national stereotypes are constantly being shattered. They may be true to an extent: Spaniards seem kind of lazy, Aussies (pronounced Aw-zeez, not Aw-ssees) are really just Americans who say “weed” instead of “weird,” Italians seem extremely vain, the French speak French, the Dutch are more like cartoon characters on acid, Germans are completely anti-war, and the Swiss are, well, neutral -- a quintessential Swiss characteristic. But here is how I now view these different tags of nationality: If every country is a Baskin Robbins, with 31 flavors of people living there, the stereotype is simply the ice cream of the month.

The most prominent flavor out of the masses, but by no means the only one. Not by a long shot.

They say that Germans are cold and unfriendly. I disagree.

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“I brought some food with me, just so I wouldn’t come empty-handed,” I said to Laeo, my right side being pulled down to earth by the weight of the bread, cheese, apples and bananas in my shopping bag. Laura, out of the country for the month, had set me up with a bunch of her old high school friends to camp out for three nights, and the last thing I wanted to do was come off as a mooch.

“Yes, but it is okay if you do come … empty … han-ded,” he said with his mouth, his eyebrows betraying the fact that he had just picked up a new English phrase via context clues. “It’s no problem.” A very popular phrase among Laeo and his friends for the duration of the festival.

The kid barely knew me, having made my acquaintance at a bar two nights earlier for a few minutes, but Laeo was already making me feel welcome. It was a sign of things to come.

This group had it all. Laeo, the quintessential nice guy. His blonde older sister Hanaa, a cop that you wouldn’t mind being cuffed by, her gun replaced by a bikini top for her 72 hours of holiday. Mascha, the cute hippie chick who shuns drugs and alcohol, but loses no cool points in the process. Patrick, the ringleader, organizer and axis of the clique. Sarah, the girl who thinks she speaks no English until she realizes that I can understand everything she says. Johannes, the country boy who exudes the vibes of someone used to a slower pace of life. René, the gentle giant who beams with astonished pride that an American finds his English presentable … and then wants to do nothing else but talk. Isi (pronounced "easy"), Laura’s best friend, completely fluent in English, who could easily ditch her medical career plans for a modeling job any day. Max, the unassuming tall guy who puts on no airs, completely content with himself and those around him. Fabian (or “Zizou”), a Zenedine Zidane clone from Frankfurt who happened to be camping next to the group of Cologners, and Nawiee (pronounced nah-vee), Zizou’s Odd Couple, Iranian-born sidekick who let me use his tent as a personal storage locker.
*Note: Some of these names are probably spelled wrong..just a word to the rest of you out there, when you write down your email address for me, please write down the correct spelling of your name. I'm in unchartered territory in this continent of many languages and many spellings.

In a sea of two and three-person tents, most separated by the width of a single human foot, these kids had corralled their wagons to form a huge living room in the middle of their temporary abodes. It may as well have been known as SummerJam Platz, because with enough room for all of us to max and relax outside, protected from the sun thanks to the two jumbo open air tents propped above, I doubt we could have scored a spot any sweeter. Even if it was still “96 degreeeeees in the shaaaaade,” as Third World sang on the last day, SummerJam Platz will probably never be topped on my list of all-time great camping spots (front country camping spots only, of course).

That’s because of the X factor that SummerJam brings to the table -- something that few, if any festivals are able to compete with. It’s located at a place called Cologne Bay – all of the music is on an island planted in the middle of this man-made body of freshwater.

That means that separating us from the island is a lake. A clean lake. A lake you can swim in.

Chill German kids making me feel at home, a shaded, outdoor living room for a camping spot and an amazingly refreshing schwimmin hole less than 15 meters away.

“It’s like this every day in Germany, right?”

“Oh, but of course,” someone from the peanut gallery responded.

Who says Europeans don’t understand American sarcasm?

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By the way, there was some pretty good music, too.

Three days: Friday through Sunday. Two stages: Red and Green. (How they decided upon those names, I have no idea, because there were no signs, no color themes, no nothing to indicate which was which). Thirty-eight shows, divided evenly between the stages. Forty-thousand people, three times the size of UVa’s student body. For 80€, I’ll take it any day.

Morgan Heritage, Damian “Jr. Gong” Marley, Luciano, Patrice, Ziggy Marley, Saian Supa Crew, Tiken Jah Fakoly, Junior Kelly, Joy Denalane, Culcha Candela, Third World, Jimmy Cliff, The Gladiators, Caramelo/Criminal, Toots & the Maytals….I could go on, but most of you have only heard of one, maybe two of those groups. Let me translate for you, then: The lineup was freaking amazing.

It was like green eggs and ham music. I watched in the middle of the crowd, I watched from the back of the crowd. From the outskirts, and from the sides. When good songs injected my weary body with sudden bursts of energy, I danced, shuffled and skanked with gusto. But when my legs could take no more, I sat down to watch, or I lied down to listen. From the pier in the middle of the lake, and from the shallow water on its banks, I bobbed to the music. From SummerJam Platz, I could hear the thud of the bass beat. And on the island, I could feel the vibrations of 80,000 dancing feet.

If only life was a video iPod, and I could just keep hitting repeat.

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So while I’ve got some juice left in my battery, and while I can still pick up this illicit free WiFi signal from a little spot in Den Haag, Holland, I’m going to post this little intro credits story, and try to tell as much as possible of the good stuff with pictures and short stories.

(By the way. Dutch people, when they speak their language, seriously sound like they are spouting out a shuffled Webster’s English Dictionary playlist from an mp3 player lodged in their esophagi – “Hour eggshells de fout ijk hammer den Jordan.” It is so weird and extremely amusing).

Cologne, Germany.

"Soooooo much TROUUUUble in the worrrrrld!"

I never once thought when I was hearing Damian Jr. Gong Marley sing these lyrics to one of his father's most powerful songs this past weekend that I would return to civilization and read about the buildup to war in Lebanon.

At SummerJam, a three-day reggae festival on a man-made island in Cologne, newspaper headlines arent able to bring you down to the reality of the world we live in. You live in a tent, D.A.R.E.ing one another to Just Say No (to showers), all the while faced with incredibly tough decisions on a daily basis: which band is better, the one playing on the Green Stage, or the one jamming out on the Red Stage? You're surrounded by clouds of ganja smoke, conscious lyrics and hopeful messages: diatribes against the Babylon system; warnings of war in the east, war in the west, war up north, war down south; exhortations to peace and exhortations to the deliverance of justice that must precede peace.

But you never for one second stop to think that maybe those abstract ideas are going to morph into the concrete, so close to "Zion"... not while you're away for three short days, at least. Then, you see the first newspaper headline staring you in the eyes from the kiosk rack at Amsteradamer Strauße station. It's in Turkish, but it says everything with pictures and cognates -- there's a little bit of a situation in south Lebanon.

So my post-festival high has been pretty much stamped out, as I have spent the last 6 hours of my waking moments reading the litany of Stratfor pieces my dad mailed to me during the past three days, a 72-hour period that I was fortunate enough to remain in blissful ignorance.

SummerJam was amazing. But now it's back to Babylon. Let's all pray this thing doesn't spread into Syria. And if it does, let's just pray that those two kidnapped Israeli soldiers don't become answers to a trivia question about what sparked WW3.

This is why I love to travel.

I'm walking down a sidewalk a few weeks back in Paris, and I see this guy approaching from the oncoming direction.

"Dude," I said to myself. "That guy looks JUST like Trey Wingo.

"That IS Trey Wingo!"

Not realizing that Trey Wingo doesn't know me as well as I know him, I just yelled, point blank, "WHAT'S UP DUDE!!"

"Hey...and you are?"

"Oh, sorry, my name's Bayless Parsley! What are you doing here, man?"

"Just vacationing, I don't know," he said, as if he had less of a right to be in Paris than me.

Turns out this Sportscenter anchor went to Baylor, and is really tall.

I snapped the photo, and let him go on his way, but before he left, I peeked into my crystal ball and let him in on the secret.

"I'll probably be working with you some day!"

"I hope so, man, take it easy!"

YEAH TREY WINGO, I WILL TAKE IT EASY, JUST FOR YOU!

So, I decided to go to this gorgeous Spanish beach town called San Sebastian after my initial attempt to run with the bulls in Pamplona failed after I slept in too late. (Don't worry, Uncle Kenny. I ended up running with them three days later, which will be written about soon...maybe). Anyway, it was a bad idea considering the entire freaking mundo goes to San Sebastian during the eight days of the Festival de San Fermin, which is the excuse the Pamplonans have for getting trashed and running with those torros.

After two hours of walking the streets of San Seb, backpacks strapped front and back, I was giving up hope. "Better start looking for a nice, soft bench," I thought to myself as I hung up the pay phone in defeat, the only youth hostel remaining on the list telling me they were booked for all of July.

And then, I met Ana.

Ana is an old woman, and she lives alone. Except for the revolving door of company she keeps in the form of wayward travelers like myself. Ana's apartment is a "hostel," or a pension, en espanol.

Riiiight.

It's just an old woman's apartment, and she charges between 25 and 30 euros a night during San Fermin. Supply and demand, baby. Supply and demand.

Anyway, it wasn't so bad -- I had my own room the first night, after all. And then, the next morning, she came into my room and handed me a piece of candy!

"How nice," I thought. "Even though it really has no other trappings of being a place for travelers to stay, Ana goes and gets us the proverbial mint on the pillow."

She must have said something else when she handed it to me, because with my struggling Spanish, I assumed it was, "This is for you" or something.

Looking back, I think it was, "Is this yours?"

So I opened it, ready to pop it in my mouth.



Well then. That is definitely NOT a piece of candy. I guess Ana wasn't so nice, after all.

CLASSIC AMERICAN-EUROPEAN ENCOUNTERS....Type A, Type B.

So I will continue now with the Italy semifinal post game story, even though it is extremely untimely at this point, following their (cheap) victory over France in the final.

The streets in Pisa were CRAZY, you guys. I know I already said it, but I’ll say it again. Crazy.

My face was on perma-smile, as in a George W. Bush smirk – the kind that just doesn’t come off, no matter what you hear through the grapevines that the headlines are saying. Even though, when compared to Germany and Germans, or France and the French, I don’t particularly like Italy or Italians all that much, it was impossible to not be happy for these people. An Ethiopian who had been cryogenically frozen in 1935 and de-thawed right before kickoff would have still been excited for the nation of Italy. Aeroplanes and chemical weapons be damned … this was the spirit of a nation, rejoicing in the flesh.

Crazy.

After about ten minutes of simply trying to soak it all up, I remembered how heavy my bags were, and Micah and I headed over to post up on the wall overlooking the river that runs through Pisa. From there, more soaking-in occurred. I saw one fight unfold a few feet away, most likely due to someone spilling a drink on someone else’s girlfriend, but other than that, it was all love, all night, all the time.

They say Europe is in for a shock in about fifty years, when their declining population puts them at a disadvantaged position in a world breeding like one really big rabbit. Well, Italy solved the entire continent’s problem that night, in the final two minutes of injury time against Germany.

In nine months, the surge in birth rates in Pisa alone will make up for years of damage wreaked by birth control, (especially now that they went all the way…what a pun!). From what I could tell from my perch atop that riverside wall in Pisa, any Italian dude who wasn’t getting some that night was either blackout/fall-down drunk, or he was a priest.

Everyone else got laid, no doubt.

“Dude, the first two places I went were OUT of BEER,” I heard all of the sudden, jolted out of the mind drift I had floated into amidst the bedlam. It was Micah, who had been gone for over ten minutes in search of replacements for those free tall boys we got from our favorite Italian bar hop.

Out of beer, at two places, in a college town, in Italy. Now do you believe me when I say the streets were alive?

Good thing the third time was a charm, because Micah and I proceeded to just sit there, drinking beers, watching, talking and observing, for about two hours. And all was well in my world.

Eventually, we decided to make a move, not because the party was dying down – it wasn’t – but because we just did. And it was then, sitting on a bench across the river from our original spot, that we had the type of run-in that I have dubbed Classic American-European Encounter: Type A.

Classic American-European Encounter: Type A:

A dude who looked like John Belushi -- had he styled his hair like a native of the Samoan Islands -- rolled by us, two girls by his side, and could tell that we were new in town thanks to the heap of packs on the ground. Samoan Belushi then asked us in Italian where we were from. We said America. He didn’t exactly react in a positive fashion.

“Bad place. NO USA! Bad!”

I tried to shake it off and shake his hand, but he was intransigent, pulling his body away from mine like I had HN-51.

That’s when I started to really get irritated.

I figured if I stood up and informed him in words other than English that I am not George Bush anymore than he is Romano Prodi, it would make him realize that not everyone in my country was synonymous with our government, and the dab of irony that such a statement could be delivered in the tongue of the perfidious French would prove that we Americans aren’t as dumb and provincial as everyone thinks.

It worked – John Belushi from Samoa bristled at the notion that HE could somehow be associated with the mess that is the Italian government. What do ya know???? Citizens of a country may not have control over their leaders!

“But Al Gore got more votes,” he then said in broken English, fighting furiously to keep his head above water in his insistence that I was nothing but an SUV-driving, human rights-scoffing, Ugly American.

Great, so now the guy won’t shake my hand because the anachronistic electoral college system put a popularly unelected man in the White House nearly six years ago? Real profound, buddy. All you’ve proven is that you, too, have seen a Michael Moore film, and that you aren’t aware of how our presidents are elected.

But just wait. Don’t throw your spaghetti noodles against the wall in anger until you’ve finished reading.

Through talking to me via his French-speaking ladies, Samoan Belushi realized that this Texan wasn’t all that different from him, at least not in what we liked to do for recreation. And after about two minutes of trying to win him over, I succeeded. I changed his mindset. You know how I can be so sure?

He gave both of us man kisses.

Man kisses! Two of ‘em, one on each cheek. A far cry from his “I’m not gonna even shake your hands” days. MAN KISSES from Samoan Belushi.

I really think a small part of him learned -- even if he forgot it five minutes later -- that you can’t throw the baby out with the bath water when it comes to encountering Americans. That’s why it was a Classic American-European Encounter Type A, because the ‘A’ stands for Asshole. It’s what Europeans assume we Americans are; and it’s what they become in trying to pigeonhole us.

CA Double E Type A’s don’t always end positively, unfortunately -- but in this case, I chalked one up for the good guys, the Americans who don’t embody the stereotypes. No need for thanks -- I do it for you peeps back home who actually care what the world thinks of us. I am the ambassador of all who can say with a straight face, “Je n’aime pas notre gouvernement.”

You won’t believe it, but Micah and I had another memorable encounter with a group of Italians that night, less than 20 minutes later. But this one was different. It goes under a different category -- one I have coined Classic American-European Encounter: Type B.

Classic American-European Encounter: Type B:

You’ll see, if you scroll down, a picture of Micah playing guitar on the balcony of our hotel room in Florence. He is the lead guitarist for Jamison’s band back at UVa, and is hands down the best guitar player I can call a friend. That skill came in handy shortly before we were to jet out of Pisa, homeless for three more hours.

No place to stay? Nothing to do? Why not just cruise up and down the streets, slowly thinning out after a four-hour rager, and try to make my life seem like a music video? It sounded like a great idea at the time. And it was, mos def.

After going for about five minutes with Micah behind me, playing a Bob Dylan song I had never heard which described a night spent in Rome, we got to the train station and decided to turn around and keep going – up and down, up and down.

I always say that life is nothing but a reaaaaally long movie, with an ending that not even Roger Ebert has access to until it’s over. With Micah’s invisible shadow strumming his guitar and singing the mystery tune, making me feel as if I was all alone, stepping in tune to the perfectly-dubbed soundtrack, this was a scene from my movie that will definitely survive the editing process for the final showing at the Pearly Gates.

It was just as I was contemplating this fact that we ran into a group of nine Italian crazies who seemed just as excited about the 2-0 win at 3 a.m. as they had been at 11.

I had seriously JUST finished a feeble attempt at convincing Micah to put out a collection plate to fill his nearly-empty coffers when we crossed paths with the baseball team full of football fans. Had he listened to me, no doubt he would have come away at least 10 euros richer.

Naturally, the bulk of the group flocked to the music man, Micah, the Peace Prophet Part Deux, while two of them came over to the mysterious scraggle-beard strapped to a small house, known as an REI backpack in the States.

“Where are you from?” David and Simone asked me in broken English, knowing the answer wasn’t going to start with the letter “I.”

“America,” I said in an Italian accent, as if that would help make up for my lack of foreign language ability (we all do it…but it is really dumb, if you think about it. It’s still another language, and saying it with a twist isn't changing the taste of English THAT much).

I was expecting another CA Double E: Type A, having bid adieu to Samoan Belushi moments earlier. But these guys were different; less skeptical; less Michael Moore-ons.

“U-S-A!” the pair simultaneously exclaimed, causing me to brace myself for a Type A explosion. But these guys were Type B, not some assholes who think owning a tacky Ché Guevara shirt makes them revolutionaries who don’t shake hands with imperialist Yankees.

“How are you!!” each immediately screamed in succession, not realizing that their question came across as more of a statement. It was a statement, not an interrogative, because they really did not care at all how I was feeling, how I was doing, what my day had been like. That question really meant, “I think it’s really cool that I’m partying in my own city at 3 in the morning and we are meeting some cool Americans that are walking down the streets of Pisa, one with a guitar in hand, the other just chillin with a huge ass backpack.”

Prego.

And that’s when the fun started to happen.

Apparently, moments before the singing and dancing began, one of Micah’s “Don’t Feed the Bears” onlookers couldn’t resist himself, and blurted out, “Can you play dee A minor?”

The answer was yes. And judging by the reaction, I think they liked it.

“Duh-duh duh-duh duh-duh duh-DUH EE-TALEE-AHHHHH!!! Bum-bum-bum, bum-bum, bum-bum buh buhhhh...”

And it went on like this for over a minute, in a language I won’t even attempt to replicate on paper. When I took out my camera, it really did become a music video, because ALL of them were posing and flexing for the lens like they were at one of Jay-Z’s pool parties. All of them wanted in. Smiles, chest bumps, outstretched digits to let me know their prediction for Italy’s final game, flag-waving … and then there was the kid who outdid Samoan Belushi’s man kisses.

I never caught his name, but when you watch the silent video I took of it on my camera, it’s obvious when he takes my arm and starts leading me in circles, dancing about like his team had just advanced to the World Cup final or something. The shot just goes straight down to the ground for over five seconds, turning round and round like a carousel. Elbows locked, feet hitting the ground in a piston-like rhythm, the two of us did our little jig as the song continued for all those who knew Italian – which was everyone but me and Micah.

Now that was a trip.

But it was the manner in which our groups parted ways that made me feel even better about myself than the Samoan Belushi man kisses to the cheeks, or dancing with a tall, dark and handsome Italian mystery man. Without any prompting whatsoever, in a kind of ritualistic, group “Thank You” card to these two random Americans giving them a concert and snapping photos of them on their turf, the chant of “U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!” took control of the quiet night air.

I’m getting goose bumps as I write this, because it was one of the nicest gestures I’ve ever received in my life's many travels.

“Grazie! Grazie!” we yelled. “Buona fortuna, Italia!”

(p.s. Just because we had a great experience with that one group of Italians does not mean that I feel that way about the entire country. I was rooting for Zidane and co. hardcore in the final. I hate the Italian team; I’m sorry. Not only the cheap shot to McBride’s face, but the “dirty terrorist” remark in the final to Zizou? I’m glad he head butted that little xenophobic bia-bia).

Sorry, this is going to seem like a bit of a departure from the Italy adventure, but I've just got to publish these thoughts. Stay tuned for the night in Pisa after Italy took out the Germans, but here is some funny stuff to keep you happy for the moment.

Quick thoughts to bring a smile to your day:

1) I saw the greatest t-shirt when I was cruising alone down the streets of Paris last week. It was clearly made by some fashion guido, rather than the Spring Break wholesaler one would assume without having actually seen the quality of these threads, and the frog wearing it may or may not have understood the meaning of the message being broadcasting to one and all: “I Need Good Head.” Ce n’est pas très subtile, mon ami, but I speak for all mankind when I say, I feel ya buddy. We all feel ya.

No wonder the French loved Bill Clinton so much – they were on the same page vis-à-vis the difference between wants and needs.

2) Without a doubt, the hottest girl I got to know during my semester abroad en Suisse in the fall of 2004 was a Turkish bombshell with Greek, Persian and German blood running through her veins as well. Her name is Rüya, pronounced Ree-yuh, if I remember correctly -- which may not be the case, as I wasn’t focused on proper pronunciation so much as on how to diplomatically announce, “I can provide the green card.”

The only reason I bring this up now is because I recently received a reply email from Rüya after I informed her of my plans to visit Turkey on some later leg of this trip. To rendez-vous in such a far off place with a 5’11” beauty who speaks the language and has a lay of the Anatolian homeland could only be a good thing, and I crossed my fingers at the thought when I saw her name glaring at me, in all caps, in my UVa email inbox the other day.

“Hi Bayless!” it began. Exclamation point, good sign, good sign…

“It’s kind of funny, I actually don’t live in Turkey anymore.” Funny, I don’t really see the humor in that, Rüya. Keep the faith, Billy. Maybe she still lives in the area...

“I had the opportunity to do so, so I moved to New York!” Motherf****.

“Yeah, I’m not doing much, just some modeling.” ‘Not doing much, just some modeling in New York,’ you say? Should I take a number, or just quit while I’ve still got some of my dignity intact?

Coincidentally, Turkey dropped a few points on my To Do List this week.

But even without a person to meet up with in Ankara, I heard the capital is nothing but a concrete jungle/Ataturk shrine anyway. With no ability to converse in a place so dull, a solo traveler like myself wouldn’t have too much fun. Istanbul, though, is as attractive as ever in my mind, especially after I met a French journalist on my train to Pamplona that said I would need two to three weeks, minimum, to properly do Byzanti…um, I mean Constanti…no? Oh yeah, Istan…bullsh** is Turkey too dangerous to visit. Watch me.

Besides, I can’t wait to make the hajj to the Mecca of döner kebabs. I’ll be there, ready to stuff my face, armed with Immodium to confront the inevitable case of dia-RÜYA that I will get from the rack “lamb” roasting behind the counter in a part of the world not known for inventing sanitation.

3) This is where the comments aspect of the blog is useful. I am conducting a poll after my trip to Florence with Laura and Micah, Jamison’s lead guitarist. Two things: One, DO GIRLS KNOW ABOUT SHRINKAGE, yes or no? Seriously, this may seem like an issue of common sense, but you’d be surprised. Two, is the whole shoe size = correlation myth true, yes or no?

Like Diddy would say, “Vote or Die.” (Notice I wrote ‘would say,’ rather than ‘would do.’ It’s a lucky thing for him that we don’t always get what we wish for).

4) Back to Micah, a name his Baptist missionary parents chose because of the famous reference to the “Peace Prophet” in the Bible, (which is badass if you ask me).

He is a celebrity, and not just because he plays every Wednesday night at The Virginian in Charlottesville. Micah’s 15 minutes came back in the day, during the Reagan era, when he was just a little guy who wasn’t potty-trained. (Michah is 24 at the moment, and can hold his bladder for over 24 hours, an amazing feat which I witnessed in Florence).

Not only was Micah-tito the Huggies baby, but also, he was the freaking MICHELIN baby! He thinks the former is more impressive than the latter, a statement which I personally disagree with. But irrespective of how one ranks those two accolades, it doesn’t matter – Micah was the HUGGIES and MICHELIN baby!

I mean, why wouldn’t you exploit your child like that if you were a parent? If your kid’s cute, milk it! Hell, it’s not like that little mooch ain’t doing the exact same thing to his mommy! What goes around comes around.

I remember when my 15-year-old sister, Garland, was but a wee lad as well. She was one of the cutest kids ever, and not just because she looked like a boy with her afro curl job she had going on until her pre-teens. She just was. And I always said, “Mom, I’ve got two words for you and for Garland, two words that will pay for her college if you listen to me on this one: GAP. KIDS.”

And what do ya know, they didn’t listen, and now Garland is working three jobs with a kid and another on the way. Such a sad story...I’ve seen it a thousand times.

But back to Micah and parents milking it. His mother apparently has an idea that is on point like Fife and Tip. Get all the Michelin/Huggies baby together in present day, strap some diapers on ‘em, and film them drinking beers and just chillin’ like villains. I love it. Of course, I had to add my creative vision to it:

“Why don’t you do that, but also convince them once you are all AARP cardholders to do a third commercial with y’all, this one talking about the new line of diapers Huggies has released for seniors who can no longer keep their business in their bodies? Michelin … that may be a little more complicated, I guess.”

5) All right, Europe, it’s time to make a decision. You can keep holding out on deodorant, or you can keep holding out on A/C, but you can’t do both. You’ve got to pick one.

Do people in France and Italy just not smell the same thing that I smell? Walk into a train station, B.O. Sit on a subway, B.O. Definitely on the trains, B.O.

It’s because it’s summer, it’s because it’s hot, it’s because people sweat, true…

But it’s compounded by the fact that there’s no relief from the heat when indoors, and by the fact that no one over here has yet grasped the enormous power a stick of Mitchum deodorant possesses (does anyone else besides myself not absolutely love Mitchum’s slogan? So effective you can even skip a day. Perfect for a backpacker).

I don’t complain because I care about the stench of body odor – I actually think my own smells kinda good, just like how everyone finds the aroma of their own farts rather pleasant, whether they admit it publicly or not (but just your own, no one else’s…what is the reason for this phenomenon?). Simply put, I just feel bad for those in Europe who do care about body odor, and who are disgusted by it…because after I lost my dop kit in Paris over a week ago, I have put on deodorant exactly two times.

When I get older, I’m going to be a rich, rich man, because I’m going to open a slew of internet cafes across the street from every train station in Europe, and in them, I’m going to sell deodorant by the bushels. It’s a buyer’s market out there, folks.

Wait ... I am “older” now. All that meant in the dialect of adolescence was “out of college,” a.k.a. “get a job time.” Should that be a sign to me that I am wasting my life?

6) “Où est la gare?”

It’s a simple enough question. In French, it means, “Where is the train station?”

Say it to yourself: ooo-ay lah gair…

Alors, vous parlez un peu de français aussi maintenant, comme moi!

Except for one thing: You didn’t pronounce “gare” correctly.

Rule No. 1 when learning French: Don’t take any of my advice on how to pronounce things, because I will probably be wrong.

The way that I was saying it the night of the Italy-Ukraine game in Vevey, CH drew a lot of blank stares and uneasy silences, because instead of asking how to get to the train station, I was simply inquiring as to where the war was.

“Où est la guerre?” That is ooo-ay lah gair.

Picture if Peppy Le Peux came up to you when you were watching an Astros playoff game and blurted out in a French accent, “Excuse me sir, where is the war?”

I bet the directions you’d give him would be a little more extensive than “straight ahead two blocks and then take your first right,” which is what I finally discovered from the Swiss kid who understood my gaffe and started cracking up.

“La gare?” he repeated quizzically, not sure if it was a trick question, or if I had been living in a cave somewhere other than Afghanistan since 9/10/01.

I could see in his eyes that he wanted to hesitantly say “Irak...?” But then, eureka.

“Ahhhhhhh, où est la GARE?” he said in sudden realization that I was just a stupid tourist, rhyming it with “car” the second time around. “Alors…”

And he proceeded to direct me there. I found the train, albeit after a little embarrassment, and I will be sure to never make that same mistake again. But this was but one example in a litany of French moments which make me cringe. I love French, but French doesn’t love me. C’est très difficile.

And people wonder why I’m too bashful to really practice my French with native speakers.

GOOOOOOAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!! ITALIAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!! 

Just remember when you read my Italy story that this is what I looked like the entire night, going nuts with the Italians. Not only the mondo-pack, but also the mini one clinging to my front side, marsupial-style.

This is the bar owner's hot Italian chica. She wants me, I know.

The beer in my hand is the free one, the one "FOR AFTER!!!" 

Sometimes, it's good to walk around in circles for over thirty minutes and end up not finding a place to stay, because you happen to find the sweet spot across the street from the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and you get free drinks when the home team wins. 

This is what I call hopsitality. 

Italian bar owner and his really hot Italian bar owner girlfriend pouring free champagne for everyone after the Azzurri advance to the final for the first time since 1994. 

The bar proprietor in front.

SO Italian.
 

The spot we found to watch Italy's thriller over Germany. Sure, the beer was a little pricy, but we ended up each getting a free tall boy, and Micah's 10.50 tab was "ONLY TEN!!!!" thanks to the win.

But guys, come on, just check out what's right in the middle of the background, through the window. It's amazing the thing doesn't fall over -- I just can't wrap my mind around it. 

Get it? The Tower is falling over, but I'm the only one holding it up.

It's an optical illusion, don't worry. 

I thought leaning over for a picture of the Leaning Tower of Pisa was pretty clever, until I nearly fell over from the shift in weight in my mondo-pack right as this shot was being captured. 

Micah brought the travel book, Italy for Dummies.

This is such a classic photo for the cover of the next updated edition.

"Okay, we're heeeeere.....and we're really smaaaaart.....I have no idea what we're doing." 

I guess this must be the fourth Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, the one whose statue was nowhere to be found alongside Donatello, Michaelangelo and Leonardo.

I knew Rafael had a thing for April O'Neill, but he must obviously swing both ways. That, or he's just telling The Shredder that he can get down and you-know-what. 

Stream of consciousness game: Orange, nunchucks (spelling?) 

Stream of consciousness game: Blue, sword 

Stream of consciousness game: purple, bowstaff 

This guy I saw in Florence was who I wanted to be that day. The last time I suggested taking a Segway tour of a city, my traveling compadre made fun of me mercilessly.

Say what you want, but this dude had the right idea. 

Since the place Micah, Laura and I got in Florence had a 12:30 curfew (what is this, ninth grade?), we didn't do much that night. Just sat on our room's balcony porch, drank semi-cold to warm Italian beers, and ate bread and feta. That, and had a free concert from Micah, whose name was chosen by his Baptist missionary parents because of the passage from Micah 4:3, the "peace prophet's" description of what is to come after the End of Days: And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

All really religious parents should be hippies, too, I think. Micah's dad, for example, has a pony tail longer than Rapunzel's and doesn't support the Iraq War, yet he is still more devoted to following Jesus' example than George Bush will ever be .... because that example was to not wage war. Make sense? Religious-hippies are a great case study in raising your kids with the best of both worlds. You can teach them to be upright and differentiate between right and wong, but you can do it in a way that won't force them to rebel. After all, why do kids rebel against their upbringings? Because they see their parents as being "out of touch," as being squares.

This is the stark truth. Micah probably informed me of how much he loved his dad once an hour, and he wasn't embarassed by it. The Peace Prophet Part Deux is also just a straight up good dude, and it's due largely in part to the environment in which he was raised. Yet, he's an amazing musician who plays guitar and drums, and sings. That is not very square-like. Nor is it rebellious, because his folks are all about that whole "free spirit" thing.

Me? I'm thinking about naming my son David, because he got allll the ladies.Okay, if anyone likes my idea, PLEASE help me in convincing the man. You all agree that the way he got his name is cool as hell, right? (If not, you've got issues, and I bet you kick puppies when they poop on the rug). Well, I'm trying to get as many people as possible to email Micah at micahberrymusic@gmail.com, and tell him that if he ever starts up a band of his own that goes on tour or gets a record deal, a real band with a serious name essentially, that it has to be something along the lines of The Peace Prophets, or Peace Prophet Part Deux, or something utilizing that line of thinking. It's a gold mine.

If Micah ever becomes famous (he is a sick nasty guitar player, singer/songwriter), this bottle cap could end up knocking the Aaron Burr bullet off its pedestal. 

Notice the red crescent on the tip of Micah's nose. That ain't there because he prefers an Islamic alternative to the Red Cross. It's there because too many European 7-11 equivalents decide that cold bottled water is more important than cold beer, and stock their mini-fridges with the former rather than the latter. Beware, anyone who ever tries to pop open a piping hot bottle of beer using the back of a lighter. Beware. 

Okay, so we´ve got a lot of stuff to cover, and not a lot of time. I'm in Spain right now, and have had a lot of other stuff go down in the past few weeks that has not been written about, but the trip to Italy has got to be publicized at the moment. It was only two nights, but it was full of anecdotes. Prego.

ITALY.

Before we start, someone inform me why their soccer team always wears blue. I see no blue in the flag.

I went for two nights, one in Florence, the other in Pisa.

Florence, you suck. I´m sorry, you just do.

It´s like, can we please have more English-speakers ruining my attempt to experience some Italian culture? They are EVERYWHERE in that city. Taking pictures, making fun of Italian fashion, being annoying, being American tourists.

Kind of like what ... I ... was ... doing.

I hate myself.

But it wasn´t my fault that I added to the degradation of a city that would be absolutely beautiful if the entire tourism industry imploded. I didn´t even want to go there in the first place, because I hated it the first time I went, in the summer of 2003. And it hasn´t gotten much cooler since. At least it's predictable though...you can always count on the streets being so full of garbage that the smell of a big trip to the toilet seems like a pine tree cab air freshener in comparison to a romantic stroll around the city.

It was Micah, Jamison´s lead guitarrist from back home, who hoodwinked me into heading south from Switzerland, dangling promises of going to Cinque Terra in my general direction.

We never quite made it there, needless to say.

But Florence wasn´t that bad, really. I did get to witness Micah nearly putting an eye out with a hot bottle of Italian beer, when he opened it right outside of the store, using a lighter as the catalyst.

BOOOOOM! I thought a gun had gone off, it scared me so much. But it wasn´t a bullet, it was just the bottle cap, and Micah´s nose was the target. For a good three seconds, all I could do was stare at him, mouth agape, eyelids glued to my eyebrows.

It was one of the craziest things I´ve seen on the trip. Just hammered the dude, right in the schnoz. Left a crescent shaped cut which immediately filled with that 'Is it blood?' material that isn´t quite puss, but isn´t quite blood either.

I´ve never seen it happen before, and I can guarantee you I will either get struck by lightning or get pooped on by a bird for the fourth time before I see it again.

(Pictures to come, don´t have them on me right now).

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Has anyone ever been friends with a buddy´s chica, and had to answer the question of whether or not the guy you´re buddies with is 'so hot'? I have, many times, especially after this trip.

I mean, what do I say to that? 'No, he´s actually pretty average,' or 'O. M. G. I am, like, totally jealous of you for getting to see his butt. When he wears those jeans without boxers like he does, I just can´t contain myself.'

Girls out there...we don´t know how to answer that question. Just throwing that out there for ya.

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Oh man, I wish I could have gotten a snapshot of this Senegalese dude´s face when we passed by his makeshift stall of fake Louis Vuitton bags.

How many people on this earth above the age of 11 would EVER think those things are real? Seriously. Senegalese man, how could you have fallen for my question?

(GAAAASP by Billy, followed by excited face and the following words): 'Louis Vuitton!! Woooow, are those REAL??'

The guy was like a pig in cheet. Have you ever seen a dog whose owners neglect him full time, and how the puppy reacts when some family friends come over who absolutely LOVE to play with him? It´s like he´s been waiting for that moment all his life, and absolutely cannot believe that it has finally come. His eyes widen, his tail wags so hard that liftoff is clearly the next step, and he nearly has a heart attack from the surge of shock and adrenaline pumping through his veins.

The Senegalese fake Louis Vuitton guy was that dog, and I was the family friend.

'YES!' he said after a half-second pause of disbelief, subconsciously hoping that he could make up for such a crucial delay in reaction time with an extra oomph of enthusiasm, not realizing that it would lead to the neglected dog analogy.

What happened next was probably the best part. Instead of engaging him, which would be like petting him behind the ears, I just started cracking up and kept walking, which is the equivalent of yelling 'BAD DOG!' at him after he scrambles to his feet for some attention.

Ahh, to scam a scam artist. You just feel like a vessel of karma when you do it right.

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Italians lead the league in beggars who also want to be choosers. I've never seen a class of people living in abject poverty who have the airs of Thorstein Veblen's leisure class ... until I went to Italy and was cursed to hell by three different gypsies on various trains I took during the two days there.

The one guy who knew English was the best.

'Change,' he demanded. 'Change,' as he stook out his hand, full of 1 and 2€ coins.

The man with the right to my money had about 6 or 7€ on him. Me? I had less than AH euro. Instead of allowing the guy to make the meanest face e-ver at me and curse me under his breath in Gypsy-talk, I should have said 'Gratzie!' and taken a few coins for myself.

'Change. Change.' Get the hell out of my face, dude. Or at least go do something for my change, like try and convince me that Louis Vuitton sells wholesale to sketch Senegalese immigrants for resale on the bridges in Florence.

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And also, Italian homeless people, just because you have a right to all this money for being absolute jerks, doesn´t also mean you have the right to cut people in line at the information desk. It just doesn´t mean that, not at all. But they know no one is going to do anything about it, except for saying 'm'excuse' and hoping they give a crap.

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So we went to Pisa the second day, to see the Leaning Tower, and later decided to just stay and watch Italy-Germany in the World Cup semfinal.

GOOD. DECISION.

It was just Micah and me at this point, as Laura flew home confident in the notion that Jamison is, in fact, sooo hot.

We began our trek from Pisa Centrale to the tower, looking for cheap one-star hotels along the way.

The Italian government is great about starting you along the rabbit hunt, then abandoning you once you´re lost in the woods without a compass and no idea how to get back. We must have seen signs pointing in the direction of at least 5 different one-star hotels, and then nada. Poof, thin air, good luck finding them. Not even a mention of how many meters we had to travel to make it there. Just nothing at all.

The tower had been awesome, better than anticipated. After years of marveling at the ad wizardry employed by the people hired by Cici´s Pizza, I had finally seen the actual source of inspiration for the poster displaying a leaning stack of white pizza boxes and the cheesy block-lettered phrase, 'The Leaning Tower of Pizza!' OH MAN OH MAN, what a bunch of Mensa they've got running that media blitz.

But we had to get a move on at 8:30, because the game was thirty minutes away and we had some one-star hotels to find, not to mention a bar as well.

We walked for 30 minutes in a big circle, found no hotels, and wandered into a bar to catch the start of the game, sweaty as all get out, packs still on our backs...and guess what is peeking over the wall across the street from the bar, visible from my seat, through the window?

The Leaning Tower of Pizza.

Man, I felt like a horse´s patute.

The game, for those of you who didn´t watch, was an Instant Classic. Zero goals through the first 118 minutes, and then, with two minutes to go before a second straight PK game for Germany....the Italians pour it on, scoring twice in the final two minutes of extra time.

Grosso, Del Peiro, goalo.

Duo.

What a night, the one that was to follow.

Micah predicted what the VERY Italian bar owner would do with about fifteen minutes remaining: 'Dude, I guarantee you this guy gives us free beers after the game if Italy wins....Nahhhhhh' he said with a laugh, knowing that it couldn´t be true.

Well, it was.

There were only about 8 people in the place, total, and the owner and his girlfriend had no qualms about giving all of them free glasses of champagne in the wake of the celebration. When Micah, post-champagne, tried to settle up his 10.50€ tab, the man's generosity was overwhelming.

'ONLY TEN!!!!' he exclaimed, not knowing that his words would be repeated by the two of us in delighted memory at least 244 times the rest of the night. He then gave Micah a free tall boy, 'FOR AFTER!!' he said. Of course, this caused me to want a free one, too, which I got, courtesy of those two late goals.

We immediately hit the streets, now full of life after being near ghost town status just three hours before. Cars honking, Italian flags waving, people yelling, people stopping in the middle of the road to hug perfect strangers....people LIVING, REJOICING, the spirit of a nation pulsating with complete and utter satisfaction.

I can't even begin to imagine the scene if Italy wins the damn thing.

Here's one question, though. For people at mass celebrations like that one who stand in a crowd waving a flag for hours....when do they stop? It appeared from a distance that the answer was, 'Never,' because, well, the flags didn't ever stop waving. But they've got to get tired, if not bored, no matter how exciting the win was. Do they trade off with friends, kind of like a chores chart at summer camp? Or do they simply hand off their flags to random people, forgetting about it in the wake of the celebration? It´s gotta depend on the price of the flag, or more importantly, the sentimental value of the flag in question. Thought-provoking, I know.

Micah and I had to have been the only Americans in the entire city of Pisa, and we sure stood out, with our giant packs on our backs and our lack of Italian language abilities. But it was crazy, and if I didn´t HAVE to go to bed right now, I would finish the story.

But I guess I´ll just leave you wanting more. To be continued. Out.

FINALLY, someone else said it.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=373291&cc=5739

This is the one reason why I will never be able to say that soccer is my favorite sport. The experience I've had over the past month has definitely catapulted it to big time status, and I have vowed to many people that I will be at every World Cup for the rest of my life, in sickness and in health, till death do us part.

But it's like, soccer, quit being a sport for little whiny babies. We don't need everyone to act like Vlade Divac.

Portugal, unquestionably, is the worst about this. Ghana, next. Argentina, as well. Italy, si. But Portugal....God I hope they go down in flames.

Unfortunately, the computer in Morges, Switzerland, my home base for my European travels, has been hijacked by its own anti-virus defense software, and I can't upload pictures at the moment. Booooo.

The following is a verbatim excerpt from le journal du Billy. You guys are LUCKY that I'm doing this for you.

I REALLY NEED TO CLEAN OUT THE FILTER BETWEEN MY MOUTH AND MY BRAIN

If I ever become famous, I really could foresee some huge scandal in which I am overwhelmingly condemned as a racist bigot in the court of public opinion, all because of one slip of the tongue on live TV, or in the presence of the member of the media.

On the train from Nuremberg --> Amsterdam, we (Hunter, Jamison and I...this is the day after the Burg Open Air Festival, about a week ago) sat across from a pleasant German couple: early 30's, study abroad experience at UNC, impeccable English. We talked about anything and everything, for maybe 30 minutes, an hour, when suddenly, the topic of German flags was broached. Laura (Jamison's chica) had confessed her surprise when I saw her in Cologne over the abundance of red, yellow and black she had seen since touching down in her homeland a few weeks ago. To her and the entire generation of Germans disillusioned with their nation's history, flags = nationalism = another world war.

All I did was express the humor of the situation in joke form (to this incredibly nice couple who never said anything remotely offensive to me).

"Yeah, I mean, maybe it's not such a good thing that the World Cup is stoking the flames of German nationalism...we all remember what happened the last two times you guys got all riled up."

No good?

Call me oblivious, but I seriously did not detect any semblance of an adverse reaction from the two Germans.

It was only after they got off, and both Hunter and Jamison expressed their temporary desires to disavow any connection with me about 30 minutes beforehand, that I realized my gaffe.

But seriously...it was a pretty funny joke, no?

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Not included in that journal passage was the discussion we three had after having arrived in Amsterdam, while chilling at The Grasshopper, about five minutes before Jamison left me for good (tear).

It's especially funny now, seeing that there's a very real possibility France will face Germany in the World Cup Final next Sunday.

(Hunter and Jamison have both just discussed the fact that 'T-A-C-T' is a four-letter word to me)

Billy: "Oh dude, if Germany won, that would be CRAZY. But I would seriously be a little scared, too. What if they took it ... a little too far? Ya know, like 'WE ARE EXTREMELY CONFIDENT RIGHT NOW! WHAT DO WE ALWAYS DO WHEN WE HAVE CONFIDENCE?? LET'S INVADE FRANCE!! AHHHHH!"

Obviously, I kid.

But.... ya never know.