Guest Blog

I did a guest blog for the University of Utah Study Abroad office. If you want, check out my blog post about my crazy transportation experiences here. Also, stay tuned to hear about some amazing experiences I had this weekend. I'll give you a little teaser- I went back to Ukraine, where I served my mission, and had some funny make you laugh, make you cry experiences.

You know you're in Europe...

...when you take public transportation everywhere, which is what I do. I find it interesting that after being in Belgium for a short 3 weeks, I already know the public transit far better than the public transit in Salt Lake where I've lived my whole life.

Riding around on buses and the metro, you meet all sorts. After coming home from Luxembourg (we rode the train of course to and from Luxembourg) we got on the metro to head home and this was the site that awaited us:

(yes that girl definitely had a wedgie!)

So they had a little bit to drink. I think the fact that I was recording them made them want to show off even more. I also think that the fact they were so drunk will make it so they don't remember that I have this little recording of their night.

There was a middle-aged lady standing by us who thought it was the most hilarious thing that I was recording them. It became even more hilarious when a Samarai-looking old man pulled out a camera and took a picture.

Fortunately for you, I did not take a picture of what happened to me the night before all of this metro fun happened.

*Warning, those who are queasy, stop reading here- you've been warned so I don't want any comments about how gross this is; just stating the facts people!*

I had just got on a tram (think light rail) to head to Matt's house (he makes a cameo appearance in one of the videos above) to watch the England vs. Wales Rugby match with his British host family.

(side note- I am pretty sure Matt's host dad speaks English and I am also pretty sure I don't understand him at all when he speaks)

So I'm on the tram and I sit down and before we even get to the next stop, the lady sitting in front of me turns her head, and pukes all over the aisle of the tram. The smell of throw-up is bad enough but when you're in a closed-in area it is just magnified.

My first thought was to take a picture. My second thought was to get as far away from the puke as I could. Luckily reason (the second thought) won out and I moved to the back of the tram and most of the others followed suit, except for one old man.

The puke-lady got off on the next stop but left her remains behind. The old man who stayed by the puke started yelling at the world in every language he knew, including English. I'm still not quite sure who he was yelling at, but if I had to guess it was the puke. In English he said, "You Puke on the ground!? Why you puke on the ground!!? We sit here and you get off!"Then he cycles through several languages but I imagine it was more of the same.

Finally the old man hurdles the puke (pretty spry for an old guy) and starts yelling at the driver. The driver stops the tram, gets out of his little booth, and starts opening up all these compartments but apparently doesn't find what he was looking for (Firstly-I was hoping for a muzzle for the old man- that would have been fun to watch, Secondly- something for the puke; but alas neither of my wants were fulfilled) and gets back into the driver's seat and takes off. The puke remained.

So everyone is in the back half of the tram except for the old man and the puke. They make nice seat mates I've decided. But as we stop to pick more people up, they don't know about the puke, or the old man for that matter, and go to the front only to find a pleasant surprise. One guy completely stepped in it and didn't seem to care. That about made me puke.

A small group of teenagers decided to tough it out and opened some windows while sitting next to the puke. Luckily, I soon was off the tram and watching Rugby.

Now, every time I get on a tram, I can't help but look to see if there are some remains of that night. I have decided that the 10 second rule does NOT apply to trams in Belgium...or really any public transportation.