The Rain in Spain Falls Mainly on the Plains

the world past time. here played in rome.

the roman palintino. this is the old game field.

the vatican.

this is the fake that is in the plaza where the real one used to be. The real one is pretty amazing but i think that i like the "prisoners" even better. florence.
crazy statue in florence
gardens in florence.
gardens in florence.the collosseum.

the duomo in milan. the largest gothic cathedral in italy.
over looking torino.
little red bicycle. pisa.
the leaning tower.

over athens.
kalymnos sunset.
greek island.
oh the climbing. kalymnos.

*if you are trying to figure out a time frame for the pictures, the top ones are the most recent and the bottom are the oldest. the list of locations that i have visited is posted in order in the message below.*

time continues to move as i sit back and watch it pass. i now find myself with 9 days remaining in my trip across the ocean and it is a bit surreal to think about coming back to the states. i am very excited to see everyone, but . . . i know that within about two weeks i will be ready to move around again. well, i am sure i will have the opportunity. i am headed back to w.v. for the summer to work at the new and will try to stay there (work permitting) throught the end of september. from there i don´t really know; there is talk about heading up to stay with keith and sarah for a while or i might try to go out west and see adam and leanna (i have not asked them yet).

for now though we will live in the present. i find myself in madrid at the moment staying with a bunch of my friends from greece. though it is late spring in an area where the temperature should be scorching it has been pretty cool (15-17º) with quite a bit of rain; however, i have been having a wonderful time just relaxing; traveling is hard work. i have officially been to athens, kalymnos, patras, brindisi, milan, torino, pisa, florence, rome, civitavecchia, barcelona, toledo, and madrid since leaving thessaloniki. i head back to barcelona on friday morning and will stay until saturday evening when my ferry leaves. i am going to see a flogging molly concert while i am there so it should be a wonderful stay (not to mention barcelona is sick). then i head back to italy to stay two night in torino and one in milan; my plane leaves at around 9 in the morning on the 28.

i am trying to think of a good story to tell . . . let´s see . . .

in rome i was waiting in line to see the palatino (the roman forums) as i had decided to splurge on the ticket that cost 11 euro (it included the palatino, forums, and collosseum) when from in front of me i heard the distinct sound or american english. now here we must stop for a second. it is not unusual to hear english in tourist areas however, the number of american tourists is way down and most of them are obnoxious college students looking to party or older individuals in guided tours. the rest of the tourists are other europeans, chinese, japanese, or aussie´s. all of this coupled with the fact that italians do not speak much english it was a rare occurance. so . . . i looked around and sure enough there was a couple standing in front of me, about mom and dad´s age, waiting in line for the same attraction. i don´t remember now how the conversation started but we were soon into the wirl-wind of conversation that occurs when you meet someone familiar in an unfamiliar place. they were a couple from florida on a last minute vacation to see some of the sites in italy. i am not sure how it came about, perhaps i was looking especially pitiful that day, but they invited me to join them to walk through the the ruins. as i had been on my own for 4 or 5 days i graciously accepted and we began to chat further. there are 3 or 4 different subject areas that you talk about with strangers and these include things like family, the weather, work, polotics (only comfortable strangers) and food. we of course covered all of these on our walk and found many things in common. ellen is a teacher and bill is a computer guy, they are the parents of boys, and very kind. upon leaving the palantino they offered to buy lunch and i of course issued what has become my standard line, "i will not ask for anything, but i am in no position to refuse your generosity." they took me to an italian restaurant (the first time i had eaten out since kalymnos) and proceded to buy me a wonderful lunch of bruschetta, ravioli, and beer. we split company upon leaving the restaurant and i have been in touch with them since. i have found numerous cases of sincere generocity as i have been traveling, and though i still believe that the human race is mainly a large, violent, distructive force, at least there are a few bright spots left.

i suppose that that is all for now i have to buy a ticket for the concert, the ferry, and reserve a place to stay in barcelona so i have to warm up the credit card. talk to you all very soon and i will see everyone before too long.

peace love and happiness
ian