Making friends

by seon ferguson (Australia)

I didn't expect to find Italy

This travel story is going to be a little different. Instead of focusing on the places it is going to focus on the people I meet in my journey. I booked a bus tour of Italy with a company called globus and it was the best decision I have ever made. I didn't expect to find people who would become life long friends on this tour but I did. The first night we had an introduction where we all stated our names and where we were from. Everyone was from America except for two women from Canada. I had already meet an elderly couple in the hotel lobby before and we seemed to hit it off so we sat at the same table. It turned out their niece was Jessica Alba and they went to her secret Italian wedding. As the trip continued I made more friends, a family from California who I sadly lost touch with (I spent a bus ride back to the hotel talking science with their kid), a family from Texas who actually lived in the next town over from where True Blood was set, two sisters who took pictures of me at all the landmarks and one of them kindly lent me their charger (which I forgot at a hotel) I did have some bad times, I once sat on a fountain to get a picture taken (like what everyone else was doing) and this female Italian cop came up to me and told me to get off. I said I didn’t realize it was illegal as everyone else was sitting on it and she told me I better not come back. I would have if we didn’t have to go the next day but it’s probably a good thing I left when I did. I had another bad experience with an Italian cop last time, I had to get out of the way of their horse which did a number 2 next to me. I realized that’s what they thought of tourists. I could have gone to all those places by myself but because of the people I shared my experiences with the trip it was more special. For example, when I was in the Sistine Chapel which I’ve been to before I could share my experiences with my travel friends and that made it more especial then before when I just went alone. Venice was very special as well. I have fond memories of that. When I was in the water the realization that I was finally in Venice, a city I have been looking forward to seeing for years, finally hit me. I still remember how amazing it was to see buildings and the only way you could get to them was through a boat, or swim if you were a really good swimmer. Speaking of Venice another memory pops up. I was with another travel friend and we heard some commotion and we saw a man grab a woman and me wanting to be a hero yelled out you can’t grab women that way but then we saw police and army come up and we realized she was a thief he was chasing (the second thief I saw in Venice that day). We watched from a Venice bar but realized we probably should stop taking pictures. Also getting lost in Venice with my science friend was a good experience as well, we saw Mozart’s house which was something I wouldn’t have gotten to see which was good because all the galleries were closed. I do miss going off to pubs with her in every city we visited. Without sharing my experience with other people I don’t think I would have gotten as much out of Italy as I did. And to this day I miss them, I even added some of them to facebook and we keep in touch there but sadly haven’t seen each other in person yet. And while travel is all about finding things you didn't expect (good and bad) the life long friendships I made which I didn't expect to find was a very present surprise.