It has been far too long since I have posted, this is largely due to a dark few days spent in the city of Frankfurt.
Frankfurt seems an underwhelming place to mark the halfway point of such a grand trip. I can't really find a whole lot to appreciate about a city where the main train station seems to forcefully spit you out into the red-light district. As if by giving you the worst possible first impression of the city, it can only possibly get better from there. Perhaps this is a necessary maneuver, as the remainder of Frankfurt is composed of banks, and I'm told, an airport. Indeed, when I informed a resident of Wolfenbuttel (a town we had the pleasure of recently visiting) that I would be going to Frankfurt, he screwed up his nose in disgust and in delightfully accented English, asked 'but why, is nothing but airport!' Of course, it is the airport that draws us to the city, to greet our reinforcements. As soon as they're here, we can get the hell out on our way to Switzerland.
My arrival in Frankfurt was by train, and I was alone. James remained with a friend of ours (Crispy!) in the north, whilst I moved on ahead to meet my dear cousin Alison. On my arrival, we tried the only two advertised hostels in Frankfurt, both of which were inexplicably booked out. I had missed the last bed by moments. Thus, I'm directed to the Last Resort Hostel. Not its trading name, but most definitely a fitting one. This is the hostel that you get sent to when there's absolutely nothing else in town. The best that can be said about it by the counter staff at the second hostel is 'Once you get inside, it's not so bad...it's just that the entrance is shared with a sex shop'. Classy.
Some words in the English language fall into disuse, particularly when you're living in a nice city. When you get to Frankfurt, some of these words are granted something of a revival. In particular, the word 'Junkie' was destined to fall into consistent use whilst in this fine town. The junkies were everywhere. And by everywhere, I mean that they were all outside of my hostel. They congregated in front of a derelict building, fighting, swaying, flailing or lying comatose in the gutter. They're like abnormally social zombies. Needless to say I spend as little time on the streets as possible.
At night the place comes to life, and by that I mean they turn on enough red lights to make Frankfurt visible from the moon, a rose colored speck of iniquity. As I walk home from an evening spent in Alison's hostel common room, I'm accosted by a series of aggressive promoters, who strut outside the (numerous) strip clubs on my street. One goes so far as to literally attempt to drag me inside, it takes at least fifteen refusals and a good deal of physical resistance to convince him that I am indeed not interested in his seedy establishment.
All in all, I was thoroughly relieved when James and Crispy arrived, and we headed to new accommodations. We were to stay a night at the Elbe Hotel (not a hostel!) which would most definitely be an enormous improvement. Filled with optimism, I approach our new lodgings, only to see that there's something in the gutter, right outside the front door. It's a junkie. With a blissful expression on his sleeping face, he rolls so that his legs disappear under a parked car, and his arms, bloody and punctured, splay out on the sidewalk.
It's going to be another long day in Frankfurt.
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