Last entry on Dresden and I promised more words so here goes.
I walked around a lot. The historic town wasn't that big so I managed to finish it in a few hours, and returned to the hostel a little past noon. Went to the SPAR in the railway station, bought some frozen fish and vegetables, and microwaved the whole lot. It was surprisingly tasty and very affordable. No pictures of my frozen lunch though - even I'm not that hardcore. Damn Asian tourists. As it turned out, the weather took a turn for the worse after lunchtime, really clouded over. Good thing I finished all my sightseeing during the morning.
The railway station, just so that you get an idea of what the skies looked like.
In comparison to THIS.
I hung out in the hostel some more, made no friends whatsoever and acted like a social pariah, and went off to the Hbf for my bus to Prague, one of the highlights of this trip. I'd be lying through my teeth if I didn't say that I was really excited for it. The only thing that bothered me a bit was that I'd be arriving fairly late, and I'd actually heard stories about Prague being kind of unsafe, but there didn't seem to be anything I could do about it.
Took the tram to the main train station, and waited for my bus. Waited, and waited, and waited. It didn't come. More and more people began to congregate at the bus stop. I was travelling with orangeways, but there were people waiting for Flixbus, Student agency and Berlin Linien as well, and going to all sorts of places. I learnt that my Prague bus terminated at Budapest, and a bunch of Hungarians who were waiting for our extremely late bus moped about, smoked a bunch of cigs and got very agitated. I started to freak out again, and commiserated at length with a Korean girl who was also going to Prague. She told me in rueful, broken English, that she was used to German buses being late. I'm certainly not saying that I have a PhD in travelling, but I think I've done my fair share of backpacking and I've never EVER encountered any form of transportation that was delayed for more than 10 minutes. This goes especially for the less developed countries such as Romania - heck, Romanian buses and trains are the most punctual I've seen, for that matter. As for my beloved England - ha! English buses depart earlier than they're supposed to, which I find very funny, and right up my street, since I always arrive there at least half an hour in advance anyway.
Anyway, half an hour ticked by. 45 minutes. This was Germany, for chrissakes, the country that runs by the stereotypical millisecond. I spent most of the latter half of my trip in Germany and I have to say that this is one stereotype that is completely bollocks. The buses weren't punctual, fine. But neither were the TRAINS. Every single damn train I took was delayed by at least half an hour. Someone really needs to rewrite the book on stereotypes.
Other stereotypes however are pretty much spot on. I'm the East Asian who takes pictures of her food and blogs about it. (The Europeans probably just refer to me as "the Asian.") Feen was the Australian girl who came to Europe for one reason and one reason only: for the cheap(er) booze and wild party scene. Same for Carly and Raina and Jep and all the hundred other Aussies I met in the latter half of my trip. Will was the non-party version of Aussie, the type who look like they can climb mountains and hike all day. Then you get those inevitable groups of Americans that do lots of sightseeing for sure, talk really loudly and make general and obvious statements. Klaus was the lone German traveller in his late twenties who was unsurprisingly good looking with chiselled Saxon features and deep blue eyes, was generally quiet but very friendly once someone broke the ice and, if you let him, could talk away whole books on Angela Merkel and austerity. Rafe and Hannah were the Kiwi lovebirds who wore tank tops and carried huge backpacks, were ridiculously fit, and had been travelling for over two years already. Jake was the smug English lad who wore a properly pressed shirt and belt despite not having had a proper wash in days, and talked like a hybrid cross between Rupert Grint and a ghetto version of Daniel Cleaver.
The bus finally arrived after more than an hour of delay, we all got on the bus and rolled to Prague. Prague's next on the list. Till then, adieu and here are my pictures.
A statue of Martin Luther, the man credited with the Reformation in the 16th century.
A close up..
And then, just lots and lots of walking around.
