I had a VERY interesting night. It finished
at 06:40 AM. :)
So I go on the train, right, to Ede-W. I
nod off between Driebergen and Veenendaal; whooh, that was close. "Should
maybe stay awake for the next stop," I think to myself. Yeah, about that.
As it's only 5 minutes, I should've just
... got up, walk around a bit, stand by the door.
Well, I didn't.
Instead, I wake up in Arnhem. On the last train of the night.
Whoops. I get out, too sleepy to even remember to ask the conductors, when the
next train is leaving or what the taxi number is or if, by chance, one of them
lives in Ede..
So I go out and think a bit - with a slight drizzle, I go to stand below a nice
tree. I put on some extra clothes (thank god for layers! (I had a nice shirt
with me, and additional thin sweater, so good on me:)) and I see a naked man,
walking down the street.
I mean, either he was naked or he had a
see-through everything. I was pretty sure I could see some
"bouncy-action" happening down THERE. Anyway, I can only see him for 10
seconds or so, as he goes into this alley and vanishes. This wakes me up
completely and puts a huge smile on my face: life is crazy indeed! I will never
say "I've seen it all," because life just keeps bringing up surprises
for me:)
Anyways, I decided to check the train
station again, for train schedule (why I went to a nearby park was .. well, I
needed to get some of the tea we had, out), but it was closed. Euuh, OK.
So I put on some music and as that didn't work for me, I put on a really nice
podcast (Stuff to blow your mind) - just geeky and serious enough for me.
So I walk around, right, Arnhem - phuh, what's there to see at 2 AM? I
check some store fronts, see three shops selling wedding dresses (apparently
they are a huge thing in Arnhem
- not the dresses, they're normal, the weddings, I mean), a games shop, etc. A
guy on a motorcycle passes me twice. I mark him down as a potential threat to
look out for. (Or just a local dude with nothing to do.)
So I walk down the street and a guy with
two white bags in his hand looks like he's just closing up for the night. By
the look of the bags, he's got Chinese or some food shop. We pass each-other, I
say "hi!" and as he almost goes into his car, he turns around and
asks: "hhfas fsahlkjfasldj". Mhm? I took my earphones out and ask
him: "I'm sorry, what?"
"Are you hungry?" he asks.
I'm like: "Well, yes, a bit."
"Here, take this." He gives me a
bag of fries! "It's not so warm anymore," he adds after a fashion.
"Wow, thanks! Thank you!" I reply
and start eating it, as I continue my walk. I wave to him as he drives off and
give him the (hopefully) international sign of 'dude, this is great!': OK sign.
I hope he saw it, and didn't think I was giving him the thumb due to the fries
indeed being warm and not hot.
As I walk further, I meet two cats, second
one of which I hopefully fed 3 fries (or else, they're just there on the
pavement still). I find a bench and sit, then lie down. It's 3:15 now. Jeez,
"this is going to be a long night," I think to myself.
Lonely cars and trucks keep waking me up,
but I manage to nod off in between. I'm nervous about the cops. Just in
general, you know, nodding off in the street is frowned upon and I just want to
get back home, no trouble and no questions asked.
"HEEEEE HEEEEEE HAAAAEEEEE
HAAAEEEE!" two cars rolling down from the side street, just behind me.
Just two retards, having fun and either trying to wake me or trying to wake
people in the alley. Dicks. (I'm sorry, but they probably were.)
3:45. Ok, time to start back to the station.
(I was kind of hoping the first trains would be there at 4:30, but a tiny voice
kept saying: yeah, you wish. It's probably more like after 5 or so.)
So I start back, with another podcast and
as I near the centre of Arnhem,
I see this guy, in flippy-floppies, a shirt, two Amstel beers and a woolen
sweater on his shoulder. He’s drunk, obviously. I sort of try to avoid him (not
because I would be afraid, but because I too easily get into lengthy
discussions with drunken people, preachers and elders), but he goes like: “Hey,
you want a beer?”
(Man,
Arnhem at night
is like, get-stuff-for-free heaven.)
I say that sure, the closed one. He goes: “What?
Closed one! Are you Dutch!?”
After we establish, that no, but some of it might have rubbed off on me in the
past year and a half, I say I’m from Slovenia.
He says his
father, when separated from his mum, is now living for 10 years in Slovenia.
OK, what does he do, I ask, as we are walking along the street.
He’s a circus
man, the guy replies.
It turns out that
the guy, Josma, is also a clown and a performer. And he goes: “Wow, the stars
maan, they tell stuff, you know?”
I think: well,
this is going to be interesting.
“Let’s go and
make a fire!”
I’m slightly dubious, as I don’t want
to be the lead character of a front-cover matter in national newspapers, you
know, just trying to find my way back home. But then he mentions “fire-pit”,
which sounds more controlled, and “outside the town, in the fields”, which
totally sounds more scary (than it actually was at the time).
As he said before
that the first train leaves at 5:31, and it’s now about 4 AM, and as he looks
harmless, I sort of go along. We end up walking next to the Arnhem’s park (Sonsbeek)
and I ask him about the house on the hill. He says it’s now a restaurant, but
that a young, 19 year-old lieutenant lived there and went to India and she
hanged herself when he didn’t come back.
Sorry, what? … After some explaining, I
piece together a story of a lieutenant who apparently went missing and his
young wife waiting for him, and hanging herself in her white dress (what’s with
Arnhem and wedding dresses!?) from that top ledge – you see, just there?
And we go to the mill, and he explains
about it and how he slept on the ridge in the roof, and we jump a fence and
walk along; he tells me of animals that live in the ponds and how kids get
assignments from the mill/centrum and go and find animals and plants and write
down what they see. Aaw, that’s nice. Cool.
Then we come to this larger pond, where
some ducks are sitting, and some are standing in the water. I dismissed it, as
they were probably standing on some ledge in the water.
Then he tells me: “There’s this path here,
you can walk onto the island! You can walk on the water!! … I just have to find
it!”
And I see the
place where the ducks were: “I think it’s here, but …”
And before I can
stop him, he’s already on it, ankle-deep.
Sigh. Ok, get
ready, I say to myself, might be you’ll be rescuing the guy at some point. But
hey, I still got 45 mins to kill and why notJ?
So he starts edging further into the water,
now it’s slightly deeper, he’s all happy about it (who wouldn’t be, walking on
water, like that, albeit slightly drunk) and he turns back to me and shouts:
“I can’t swim!”
Euh, what? “Sorry, did you say that you CAN or that you CAN NOT swim?”
The answer is even more doubtful:
“I can…(t), the DUCKS told me!”
Sigh. Ok, I’m getting mentally ready, might
be some rescu-
and he’s gone. Flipped into the water. Of
course.
I wait a second or two, before I start taking
clothes off, but he’s back up, scrambling onto the treacherous pathway. He’s
coming back towards me, all dripping and like a water-zombie. Huffing and
puffing like one, as well.
It’s a comical sight, and I can’t suppress some
laughter, but it’s all good natured.
On the way home now – I decide to accompany
him, especially, after he mentions that he should not get hypothermia, and that
he’s got minutes. (I’m thinking, well, it’s not that cold, and he should be fine, if we keep moving, but who knows,
maybe he’s more experienced in this?)
And I find out about
his wife (and that she won’t be too happy about this, oh, no) and daughter, and
what he does and how he once put on a tall pair of stilts and went on a
skateboard, downhill. I’m like, Jesus, really? “Yeah,” he says, “it was winter!”
Larks.
At the end, we
part at his house and we shake hands again, and he starts telling me of his
company (Verder Nog Iets) and half
out of interest, half out of courtesy, and half out of already thinking I should
have some proof of this night’s adventure (hey, back off about the halves, eh,
it was late – now 5 AM) I want to write down his name.
“Nooo, wait, I’ll get you my card!”
“No, really, it’s fine, I’ll just write it here-“ And I realise I can’t, cause
I don’t know how to spell it. And neither does he, so he – despite my insisting
that nooo, you’ll wake up your wife, it’s fine – goes in to get his card.
So now I’ve got this 3 postcards (which are
also business cards) of him and his girlfriend/wife at home. Want some? Write
to me, I’ll send itJ.
I believe redonkulous is the word we are
searching for, to describe this night in Arnhem.
PS – Got home safely, caught the first
train and nearly fell asleep again. Had my bike at Ede station, and even though the first bus
was 13 minutes away, I still cycled home, quite content with this night’s
adventure … and the niceness of the evening before – but that’s another story.
"Here, take this." He gives me a
bag of fries! "It's not so warm anymore," he adds after a fashion.
I say that sure, the closed one. He goes: “What?
Closed one! Are you Dutch!?” 
And this is why I love international (life) experiences. Where else do you get a chance to meet people like that? :)
It a printed and online edition of the university newspaper and to be honest, I am not sure if it is run only by students or also by paid professionals. The diversity of articles is enormous.
What do you see?
