ko no yo no kagiri ni wa aru no? Written: Sunday, Jan. 21, 2007 - 2:01 p.m. Eating/Drinking: Britain Watching: Hearing: Shiina Ringo - Ko no Yo no Kagiri looong story about my attempt to take a train home with the storm. Big pic too. So yeah.. some of you may have been affected by the great storm last thursday... mainly western europe. I know I was! I consider it an adventure now but didn't quite like it then ^^; Here is a map of the netherlands to sort of show the routes I usually take/ routes taken when I go home to mom o_o; It all started when i got out of school and took a train in Maastricht at 1:30 pm... I figured I'd be in The Hague at around 4:30 - 5 pm ^^ something like that.. but when I got to my transfer point (namely Eindhoven) I heard my train I usually take did not go further than Breda... so I decided to stay in my train which goes past Utrecht (from where I could take a train to The Hague too... with only a slight difference in time..) BUT, that train only went to 's hertogenbosch (den bosch) ...and there we were told no trains went to utrecht at that time.. so I decided to try my luck and take a train to Nijmegen, when I got there, the train to The Hague from there was canceled too. So I decided to take a train to Arnhem, where surely, some train must've gone to Utrecht, from where I could try to get to The Hague!! (meanwhile getting further away from my destination) When I got to Arnhem... the train stopped and we were told the train did not go any further!! then we were all told that ALL trains in the netherlands were in fact... CANCELED!!! -sigh- yeah, so I was stuck waiting in Arnhem for HOURS. then FINALLY they announced a train was going to Utrecht! that train took a very long time because it stopped at all the smaller stations along the way... but when we finally got to Utrecht I was relieved... I figured 'hey, a train must at least go from here to The Hague right? ' ....WRONG! at that time.. they decided that ALL TRAINS WERE CANCELED again... so no trains at all, with thousands of travelers stuck at that station since it's a big station!! I walked around for a bit hoping... then checked out the taxi area... nope, no chance of leaving it seemed. Meanwhile, my mobile phone had no reach whatsoever since early in that day... so I asked some random rescue worker if I could borrow his phone.. phoned mom who basically said.. 'eh, too dangerous in the roads o-o just sleep there.' me: T^T wah?!! you're leaving me here?!?... So I decided to go to the place they had arranged for all the travelers who were stuck there to sleep... but I had no intention to stay there and I had all hope that trains would start going again before midnight at least.. I sat in the cold hall for hours on the floor.. until some guy mentioned that SOME trains may be going again (this was around 11 pm...) so I went to the front of the hall, where every one was going to the hall with beds already.. but I decided to stay there and hope for trains to go again... but was losing all hope.. (ok, it may have been the Red Bull from the food package they were handing out... Red Bull in a food package in a place where we're meant to sleep!?... whatever.) Right then and there I decided to give it until midnight or so... with a NOTE! saying 'wanted: taxi to The Hague' I was really willing to pay just about anything to just get home after not having been there for 2 weeks.. and I really did not want to sleep in a cold place with 1000 beds for 1500 people o-o; well at least I would get mom to pay.... since she practically abandoned me =_= so I stood around with that note... at one point some guy came up to me and said he needed to go there too!! and he said he know another person who needed to go to The Hague, so he went to find her! When they came back the woman said she had a guy she could phone to pick her up... but then... a guy came up to us and said 'I'm going to that area! I could give you a ride!!' we asked how much it cost (we heard some pretty high prices going around for taxis to amsterdam and whatnot.) and he said... 10 euros!!! ....CHEAP! that guy was so nice for that =3 he could have made a lot more. So we went with the guy who first had to drop off a girl in rotterdam... then dropped all of us off in front of our door in The Hague~~~ -love- I was home at 1 am!!!! good enough for me =3 all in all it was quite the experience, I talked to many many people during that day.. and undertook something and got where I wanted to go... so I felt really lucky =3 and here is my lucky note! xP praise it! So that was quite the almost 12-hour traveling (normally it takes me 3..) adventure!! =3 Mood: First entry ~~ Previous ~~ Next ~~ Latest Entry