In August 2019, I traveled to Europe for Business-cum-Pleasure trip. I am an Indian PhD student doing research on social insects in US and got an opportunity to go present my research in France. I extended my business trip to a total of 14 days so I could visit around Europe. I am writing my journey to Europe less in words but more in pictures here This trip was special and memorable to me as it was also my first solo trip to a far destination. As a local guide, I have been using Maps for a few years and I knew pretty good use of it. I loaded my phone with a few offline maps of the places I had decided to go and decided to download more maps as I go. Although my phone carrier also assured me of network and free (slow) data throughout Europe. I added list of places I wanted to visit on my Google maps and left from Charlotte airport in North Carolina.
So my trip began as I landed to Brussels airport. I was a bit nervous as some of my friends warned me about the languages in Europe. I was still hoping that English would be useful (wasn’t so hopeful about my mothertounge, Hindi ) and I was not too wrong. I saw the signs in English and people talk to me in English and was bit relaxed then.
So it was a good start and I was so excited. I reached my Airbnb which was pretty cheap and I realized after reaching there that why it was so cheap but let’s not talk about that I went out to see beautiful city of Brussels. I realized music and street performers were everywhere. One of the band near town hall caught my attention which was all-women band. This was so interesting not just because I heard a nice melody but also glad to see all-women performers on street, something that I had never seen.
I spent a good amount of time around Town Hall and surrounding areas. I made several friends too because the city was full of tourists, with one of them I headed to Atomium.
Although, I was most excited about the food. I believed on random Google articles and decided to try fries and waffle around city. I actually tried waffle at 4 different places but one street shop’s waffle were too good. Unfortunately, I don’t remember the name of the shop but I have a picture of it:
After visiting to couple more places next evening I had a $22 RyanAir flight to Rome. The flights in Europe are cheap if you don’t carry a lot of luggage. I tried to overpack my cabin bag and laptop bag (with no laptop) with my clothes.
When I reached to my hostel, I was surprised to see how well it was maintained and actually it is worth to choose hostel over an Airbnb if you are alone. The host did not know English but another Korean traveler helped me (yes, he knew Italian!). Well not only that I left with the same person 5 minutes after my arrival for night sightseeing of Rome city. I went to Colosseum and Trevi Fountain that night. Although, I liked the walking tour of the city more than seeing the monuments. This handmade Pinocchio had something in it that I wanted to take picture with it:
I wanted to visit this small country (so small that actually it is within the boundary of Rome city) after reading Da Vinci Code book. I still have not seen the movie because I do not want to ruin my imagination The place is filled with tourists in St Peter’s Basilica although I spent more time near the calm river right outside it:
My next destination and in fact one of my most liked places in Europe was Budapest. I reached there on another cheap EasyJet flight and after arrival on airport, I bought the City pass for public transportation and took the train to City center towards my Hostel. The hostel was really clean with welcoming staff. First thing I wanted to see was Hungarian parliament and I headed over there. This is such a beautiful piece of architecture that it made me go to this place again in morning to see the daylight view:
The city is a perfect mixture of historic monuments to vibrant nightlife - one can never get enough of it. And suddenly I stopped thinking about the city when I checked my phone network was not working and I did not download the offline map of Budapest (ouch!). Well more ouch moment: I did not know the address of my hostel as it was in my Airbnb app. Wait for the part that I did not have enough cash either. I remembered some train station near hostel so started asking around but fml not many people spoke english or they had no idea. Long story short, I somehow got back to my hostel after walking for 1.5 hours before connecting to a public wifi and reached back to my hostel right before my phone died. That was a good little adventure and I was smiling on this day when I slept.
So here comes the business part of the trip. I reached this cute little town on West coast of France. I was weirdly excited to take Seabus for next four days to conference venue which was on a beach of the town kinda connected through waterway. On first morning right before the conference, I reached to the venue earlier and decided to look around for some french food I saw a small restaurant by the beach which was selling Crepes and I ordered 2 crepes with the help of one random person who spoke English. I did realize in France that why learning french is important and the sentences my Algerian friend gave me did not work either lol. Well coming back to Crepes, I have had those in US which were too small and that is why I ordered two here. I was excited to eat crepes in france but it’s size was much bigger than I excpected:
I ended up eating both of those and I don’t remember completely but I might have just slept through first session of conference. Extra thanks to fancy french cuisine (i.e., very less quantity) that during lunch I could eat while socializing with other researchers:
I made some friends, went around the town (by missing some sessions) and discovered the historic value of this little french town. I ate some street food, walked around the downtown and joined a architecture walking tour.
I recorded reaction of a little kid to a street magician which I found very funny:
My next stop was the capital of the spies (well I did not know that until I see this sign in downtown):
Apart from the city, I wanted to try some food in Germany. I did not like Bratwurst at the place I tried but liked the pasta and Doner (My Turkish friend suggested me to get here) here:
I was joined by my old college friend who flew from Switzerland to accompany me on my road trip which I had planned to do from Berlin to Prague. Although, I saw the sights a tourist supposed to see in Berlin city, I liked the palaces and castle located in suburb of Potsdam and Moritzburg.
One of my dream was to drive on German Autobahn (and that was kinda whole purpose of renting car which was way too expensive than flight/trains). I enjoyed driving a lot on Autobahn, did not go crazy but at least drove fast as I wanted. Finally, we reached Czech and I like how European countries have no border between countries. They just have a basic sign which say the name of country and that’s all!
We reached to the Airbnb at night and slept while planning next day’s visit to Prague. I was so happy about my smooth trip to Europe. There, yeah right there, I jinxed it. The next morning, we started from Airbnb and not even 5 minutes, I saw a car following me and I saw what no body like to see - the flashing blue lights! Damn. I was thinking they stopped because the Germany’s car plate but I got my first ever traffic citation - in Czech Republic! The reason was I got on to a highway for that I had to obtain a permit. Well I tried to explain the police that car rental company told me I can take my car anywhere in EU and no restriction was there. Also, if I made a mistake, I just drove like 1- 2 km of that highway and I can go back in small roads. But well, they don’t speak English and did not quite understand what I was trying to say. They did not gave me back my Passport, car registration, driver’s license and Insurance until I paid 1000 CHK (about 40 USD) through my debit card. I hope no one else see this car when they visit Czech:
I was a bit disappointed until I reached Prague. And I now I was happy again, this was another best part of my Europe trip apart from Budapest. A lot of places to see, very lively city and really delicious food.
Paris, France
My last stop was Paris and my flight back from there. Guess where did I go in Paris when I did not have much time. Yes, you guessed it right:
By now, I was pretty tired and was ready to come back to small little town of Greensboro, North Carolina.