Germany, Poland and Ukraine: Friendships Renewed

Sometimes you must take a chance on friendship, even when it is expensive or a little untimely. When my friend from Germany, who I met in 2008 in Washington, D.C. through the Washington Semester Program, invited me to come to Germany for a wedding celebration for her recent marriage, I knew I could not pass up the invitation. Although quite impractical considering I had just returned from a 13-week-around-the-world excursion, I knew something special awaited me.

While planning the three-week trip, I was working as a nursing assistant, returning to the job that had kept me financially stable throughout college. Even though the job market is volatile at best, even for part-time jobs, I was confident in procuring a job. Not only did I get hired for one job in the home-health field, but also I was hired as a nursing assistant at the local nursing home, which is one of the nicest I have ever seen. These two jobs were keeping me busy and helping me to fund the trip, so much so that when I left for Frankfurt, Germany, I had made just enough to pay back the ticket and give me some spending money.

Since this trip was so close to the last voyage abroad, I had a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that I was going abroad for three weeks, an amount most people consider a substantial vacation. Here I was leaving almost cavalierly, knowing it was but a drop in the bucket of the adventures I have planned for this year. I did not really tell my parents much about what I planned to do because a lot of the trip was up in the air in terms of what I would see and how I would get places. I knew who I was meeting and when, but that was the extent of how much planning and research I had done before I left. Before I chronicle the connections I made on my trip, I will discuss the variability of travel on this surprising and perfect trip.

Hitchhiking

Arriving in Frankfurt, Germany, I set out to find a ride. I wanted to try hitchhiking, which had been on my mind since my last time in Europe. I met several people who inspired me to take on the challenge of putting yourself at the mercy of the kindness of strangers. Fortunately, I met some expats, who were actually on my same flight from Atlanta and who were absolutely wonderful. They took me about an hour outside of the airport, not exactly in the direction I sought, but out of the airport, which was the essential part. Not able to find a gas station right off the autobahn, they dropped me off at a basic gas station a couple miles from the highway.

This was my first time hitchhiking, so I really did not know how it would go or how long I should wait for someone. I do not think I ever waited longer than one hour, which I am told is quite good, but there were some moments where I questioned what I was doing. It took me longer to get from Frankfurt to Bonn than it did from Dresden, Germany to Krakow, Poland, which is roughly three times as long in distance, because I was such a novice and had no idea that there are certain strategies that help you to have a more successful hitchhiking experience. For instance, the closer you stay to the interstate or autobahn the better your chance of getting a ride that is going in your direction. Another tip, it really is more effective to get a ride from a gas station than from an on-ramp because it allows you to meet the person and probably reassures them. It is a lot more awkward, though, to go up to people and ask them for a ride. This is part of the humbling experience that I enjoyed as a hitchhiker.

You really get to know yourself and have to take a leap of faith that there are some good people left out there who will treat you well. I met many of these people, who reminded me that God created people to be good and honest and loving but greed and fear have turned many people into creatures that are but vapors of the intended. I was blessed to see some of the possible beauty inside all of us.

One woman in particular was quite memorable. It was dark, around 9 pm, and I was in an off-beaten-track town where the prospects looked pretty grim. My almost-final destination (a town called Koblenz where I planned to catch the train to Bonn) was about 13 miles away. I would have walked, but at night that would not have been the most advisable and would have taken me forever. Wandering kind of listlessly from one gas station to the next, I thought I would try my hand once more and see if the woman at the pump was by some chance going my way. Well, this lovely 20’s something woman did not speak much English, but she offered me a ride in the direction I was going although her destination was about 6 miles from where I needed to go. I learned that you take a ride when offered. Well, she ended up taking me directly to the train station out of the magnanimity of her heart. What a blessing to be picked up from the middle of Podunk and plopped right into the ideal spot. What a way to end that coarse travel day! Moments like those made hitchhiking abundantly worthwhile.

Unlike my experience from Frankfurt to Bonn, my trip from West Germany to Krakow, Poland, was practically flawless. I had resided at the home of a delightful couchsurfer in Dresden for the night, which was a good halfway point between Bonn and Krakow. I started early in the morning and walked quite far until I stopped at the on-ramp for the highway I wanted. Almost losing hope after nearly an hour of thumb-jutting, a drama-director picked me up and dropped me off at a large filling station right off the highway where I got another ride with a 20’s something guy driving a new Mercedes. He said “You can ride with me, but if someone calls me on the phone, don’t talk.” Hmm, maybe I should not have gotten in the car with him, but I had a pretty good sense of his integrity. He was pretty cool—the driver for the owner of the new car! We drove 130 miles down the autobahn listening to techno music: memorable to say the least. He dropped me off at a rest stop outside of Gorlitz, the last German city before Poland.

And this is where I got a huge break, the kind that all hitchhikers hope for: I approached a young woman, late 20’s, and asked her where she was going. She was traveling to a city two hours past Krakow, but she was planning on taking the highway that led to Krakow all the way home. I asked her if I could ride with her and she seemed hesitant because she tried to explain in broken English and gesticulations that she was a bad driver. Well, I figured she could not be any worse than me, and I drive with myself all the time ☺ I ended up staying with her the entire way from Germany to Poland, roughly four hours. Now, that is incredible! You see, that is the adventure with hitchhiking: your journey begins the moment you set foot out the door and you never know when it is going to end, when you are going to arrive. This was a perfect method for me to try on my fluidly planned and tensionless trip.

Germany: The Whole Reason for the trip (and much more)

My German friend, Anna, and I studied together at American University, and we reconnected in both Bavaria and Paris later that year in the fall of 2008 on two different trips we took to see one another and another one of our friends, who is also German and who I saw this summer in Berlin. So, we are the three musketeers you might say of our foreign policy group, and I was pleased to be able to make the effort to see her on this special occasion in her life. I was hoping that we three would be able to reconnect, but our other friend was in the throes of writing her masters thesis and was unable to make it to the party in Cologne.

Surprisingly, however, the party ended up only being a small part of my time in Germany. In the world of coincidences, I would rate my time in Bonn at the top of the list. My friend from college, who I had managed to see in Berlin in the summer, and Anna—the reason for which I planned this trip—both live in the same city! My college friend is a teacher at the international school in Bonn, which used to be the capital of West Germany during the Soviet Iron Curtain, and Anna has been living there for a few months. I stayed with my college friend for a couple days while Anna was getting all the details finalized for the party, so I was able to make one visit into two meaningful encounters.

My goal was to reach Bonn in the late evening on the day I arrived in Germany but because my hitchhiking efforts were a bit weak that day, I did not knock on my friend’s door until after 11 pm when she received me right before going to bed. It was not the meeting for which I had hoped, but we ended up enjoying our two days together, including the wedding party that she attended with me. What a joy, the whole affair! I was blessed with two friends who welcomed me into their homes and lives with such love and made me feel so special.

Together, my college friend and I met up with Anna and her husband at a flea market where we made plans for the evening. They picked us up on their way to Cologne, where we helped them get the final accoutrements in order at the adorable café they rented for the intimate party to celebrate their recent marriage. (The reason I am not calling it a reception is that they had three “weddings” essentially: one with the actually ceremony, which took place on an island in the North Sea, two with their relatives and three with their friends and colleagues.) The food was amazing and the meeting of some of their other friends and colleagues was a joy, especially since I had my other friend with me. There is nothing more awkward than going to a party where the only person you know is the host and cannot personally entertain you. It was a tremendous event, wrapping up nicely their wedding proceedings.

Both Anna and her husband are busy journalists with full schedules, so I was happy to have one day with Anna all to myself, which was coupled with an unexpected visit from another friend from the Washington Semester, who drove all the way from Paris to meet her in Cologne. The shrinking of the globe astounds me and how when one person puts forth some effort, many others are more inclined to also make the effort. Our friend from Paris is also the one who is connecting me with a project in Senegal and he had just gotten back from a US conference the day before. The day was exceptionally filled with noteworthy moments.

Cologne is home to one of the largest cathedrals in the world that more than 30,000 people visit each day. Anna works for a media station whose building offers an unparalleled view of the cathedral in all its glory. Our time together started and ended there, even leading to a climb up the 500 plus steps of the massive towers that flank the front of the cathedral. We met our friend in the cathedral square and we meandered through the small old part of the city (because of the bombing during WWII, which obliterated the city, only a small portion of the old city was rebuilt) until we reached a really nice pastry café for a traditionally German afternoon pause for cake and coffee. It was the perfect way to spend a couple hours together.

Upon leaving our friend, she and I continued our exploration of the vibrant city and wandered around the city, traversing the lock bridge across the Rhine River, which has become the home to hundreds of locks since 2003. Couples will engrave, scratch, or write their names onto the lock then throw away the key into the Rhine to symbolize true and lasting love. The weather smiled upon us, permitting us with the chance to savor the rhythm and sights of Cologne.

What a diverting day, especially since our last day together, she had to work. While she was at work, I took the most sublime bike ride along the Rhine then made jam for Anna and her husband from the fruit she had left over from her party. (This made her really happy because she loves preserves and does not know how to make them. I was thrilled that she liked the result of something I love to do. I am always content when I can be domestic in other people’s homes since I do not really have a place of my own apart from the occasional times I sleep in my parents’ home in between work shifts ☺)
Anna worked the morning program at her studio and was done by the time I needed to move on from Bonn to Dresden. She and I met for a coffee and hot chocolate before I caught my ride that I arranged on-line on a ride-sharing website where drivers post their available room to take on fellow travelers for a small sum. It is organized hitchhiking and is also a very good method for getting somewhere cheaply in Germany. It was sad to leave Anna, but we already started dreaming of the next time when we shall meet: hopefully in Wisconsin this spring ☺

My driver spoke very good English and was very kind to me. The ride was quite interesting. I was one of many other travelers in this large, empty van that was going back home after having moved their son with a full load across the country. They picked up people along the way who had also arranged this service with them earlier in the week and dropped each person off at the pre-determined place close to the highway. The best part was stopping in the small village where the driver’s mother lives, who served us coffee in pretty little coffee cups. I think we were there for an hour and a half while he and his wife loaded veggies, mowed the lawn and chatted with his mother. This ride was one of those random occurrences that is certainly more indelible in the ol’ travel logs than taking the more convenient and expensive route, and thankfully near the end, we picked up a girl who helped me find the correct tram to get to my lodging for the night.

My final night in Germany was as good as the first, which is the key to a good trip: enjoy yourself from the very first note to the very last drumbeat. My couchsurfing host was charming and invited me warmly into her apartment with a homemade dinner that she was making with a friend. They were the type of people with whom you can connect so quickly that in a couple of hours, you feel as if you have been friends for quite some time. We shared in making the dinner then passed the evening conversing and reveling in a winsome evening of new friendship.