(What I tried posting a few weeks ago)

Almost done. Well, kind of.

My time in Ghana is technically over, but, for the time being I'm stuck in Irún ("I-roon/ruin"), España.

At first I wanted to write a final blog, sort of a "wrap up" to my semester in Ghana. But, I also wanted to write a little about my time in Europe. And as that summary is likely going to end on a not-so-high note, at least for the time being, I wanted to keep this separate from my finale.

Anyways, my last day in Ghana was last Saturday, December 12th. That night I said goodbye to what was my home for the past four and a half months, and flew out of Accra with Levi, en route to London. From there we waited for a few hours the next morning, and eventually made it to our destination: Holland.

Having to drag around a backpack, and two other fifty pounds bags in a country I'd never been was, needless to say, an enormous struggle and source of frustration- especially when the train doors aren't wide enough to begin with. We navigated our way to our hostel without much complication, other than the luggage, and the freezing, sub-zero, pneumonia-begging, extremely chilly weather. Okay, it might have been slightly above freezing, but nothing close to the 90-degree sweaty mess I had been living for the last semester. In the end we did make it to our hostel, unharmed, hungry, and still very cold.

Amsterdam has by far been the highlight of my "Euro trip." We spent four days there, a lot of time which was spent either a.) doing nothing, b.) sleeping, or c.) eating frites and mayonnaise. All of the above were spectacular, especially the latter (I think I gained back any weight I might have lost in Africa). However, we did do things other than eat and sleep. One of the afternoons we spent at the Anne Frank House. It was interesting, to see and learn about. I guess I can't say it was great because of everything that comes with it, but I'm glad we made it.

Another afternoon we spent walking mindlessly through the Van Gogh Museum. I can't say that I've ever really loved art, creating it or looking at it, but this time was different. The pieces on display were absolutely incredible. It's difficult to explain, and I don't have pictures to share, but take my word for it. It was definitely something worth seeing, and I recommend it to anyone who travels to Amsterdam.

After four days of vacation, we began our way to the next location: Madrid, Spain. However, there was a slight problem: we (which I guess is my fault) missed our train from Amsterdam to Paris, where we were to connect to Madrid. Luckily there was another one leaving only two hours later. Or I guess it would have been lucky had some luck been on our side. Once we arrived in Paris, we were supposed to have about an hour to get to the next station to find our train from Paris to Madrid. This would have been okay, BUT, our train leaving Amsterdam was delayed by about 40 minutes. If you've done your math correctly, that leaves us 20 minutes to grab our luggage, find a train/subway to our next station, and hop aboard the train to Madrid. Too bad we had no idea where we were going, and eventually ended up missing that train too.

At first I did not want any part of France or its capital city. I left feeling the same way. That night, after eating some delicious Domino's, we eventually found a hotel that would accommodate the three of us. That morning we went out in search of the train station we should have been at the previous night. Luckily, for now, we found someone who spoke English, and helped us get tickets for the next train to Spain, first class, for free. Awesome! Right? Unfortunately this train would only get us to the border, Irún, where I sit writing this blog. But let's get back to the story.

After walking around in Paris for the day, hanging out in cafes and seeing Le Tour Eifel, we made our way back to the station, AFTER picking up our luggage at the hotel of course. Our train was supposed to leave that night at 11PM, but the system went down, and all trains were delayed. The screens that were supposed to tell us what gate to go to were also incapacitated. The train station in Paris was a madhouse. If you can picture the Titanic as it is beginning to sink, but without the water, then that is Austerlitz station in Paris, France- otherwise known as one of the deepest, darkest and most horrible places of Hell. The fact that all announcements were in French didn't help any. To make a long story short, or at least shorter than it could be, we ended up sprinting to catch our train, which ended up leaving over an hour later than the scheduled departure. So, we made it to Irún this morning at about 8:15- almost to Madrid, where we should have been yesterday. We did manage to get some sleep in our train "couchettes," so that's good.

The train for Madrid was supposed to leave at 8:30AM, and we should have had over an hour had this train, like the one in Amsterdam, not been late. So, like the last two days, we rushed off of the train to try and get our ticket situation fixed (as you remember, the original tickets we purchased were no longer valid, thanks to our ignorance, as well as the untimely delays in Amsterdam and Paris). The woman who helped us with our tickets in Paris was not able to book tickets from Irún to Madrid (since she works in France, and both of those cities are in Spain). So she wrote a note, in French, to the station in Irún that stated delays caused us to miss the train we should have been on yesterday, and we should be issued new tickets at no cost- since it was their fault. Minor problem- the French were in charge of our tickets, or at least the company that they were issued from, so the lone man at the station in Irún could not be of much help, since he spoke little English, and Levi's Spanish, while far better than mine, was a little rusty.

So, we had no real choice but to purchase tickets for the next train to Madrid, which isn't until 4:30 this afternoon. 8 hours sitting in a very boring and deserted train station on the border of France and Spain hasn't been too exciting, but it has given me a chance to watch a couple of movies, as well as write this blog, and the finale I know you've all been waiting for. Let's just hope the rest of Europe isn't as ruined as Irún.