Truckstop #1: Bathrooms and bugs

Thursday, May 28

Lunch ended at around 1:20 (after it started at 1:00--man Americans eat fast!) and I hurried to my room where I threw my personal items for 4 days with no shower in a backpack. A little before 3 p.m., myself and a group from my Pensione ("hotel") left promptly for the train station where we met the remainder of our group and boarded two "Gioto" buses headed to France. Antonio, our driver, faithfully and safely drove until around 10 p.m. when we stopped at a truck stop thinking it was a much needed relief for our bladders, but finding out to our dismay that it was our sleeping quarters for the night. Yes, you read correctly, a truck stop! It was quite a sight to be seen let me tell you: 108 Gonzaga students pulling out their sleeping pags and bags from their brightly colored backpacks, laying them down in the weeds and cuddling up to our pillows to make an attempt to fall asleep. As predicted, we encountered a few difficulties :)

First off, the toilets at the rest stops here are far from the porcelin thrones we have in the U.S. Rather, they are holes in the ground, literally. And the flush button you push with your foot triggers 4 sprinklers to go off, cleaning not only the hole in the ground but also the back of your legs as you make an attempt to exit the all-too-small stall without getting splashed with sprinkler liquid and who knows what else.

Secondly, as soon as we layed down our sleeping mats, bags, and arranged ourselves with bungee cords and other sorts of contraptions connecting our bags to ourselves for thief protection, someone got out a flashlight to look for something he dropped only to discover we had all layed our treasured (bugless) items down in a highly developed earwig civilization! I freaked out, of course, and searched the premises for a bugless spot where I could sleep. I found a spot a few feet away in the weeds.

The third problem is a logical one: attempting to sleep at a truckstop presents certain noise complications...the freeway, for example! In the States, most rest stops have off ramps, so the freeway/highways aren't so close to the buildings. Not the case here! The cars were flying by at extremely high speeds all hours of the night, with the only separation between us and them being a thin barbed wire fence :)

All in all, however, it was a cultural experience...one that I would prefer to not experience again. (little did I know what was in store for me the next night)