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After a long day of travel, we are finally in Munich. The most annoying thing about travelling is that I always get excited by "short flights", that are for example just one and a half hours long. However the issue is that if you add the time you need to be at the airport to check in your luggage (at least 1.5/2 hours before), plus the time it takes to travel to the airport (often around one hour), and then the time it takes to get from the destination airport to your next hostel (another hour), you've actually got like six hours of travel in the end -_-
Athens turned out to be really nice. It would have been amazing to spend more time in Greece and check out the islands, but I think we will save that for our Summer Euro trip sometime in the future - and save the money for Thai islands at the end of next week!
Yesterday we took it pretty slow. We decided to check out some more attractions in greater detail, such as a super old Olympic stadium, the National Library, the old University Buildings, the Parliament, and Syntagma Square. I think there was actually a protest going on since there were heaps of people outside the parliament building, plus police everywhere with riot shields and guns… But there didn't seem to be any manicness so they obviously kept it in order!
We also tried to put an end to our biggest challenge in Europe - TRYING TO BUY FLIP FLOPS. I know its winter, but seriously everyone here wears them as house shoes (and if you don't they think you're weird), so you would expect them to still be sold somewhere despite the odd season. But no, seriously, we haven't been able to find them anywhere in Europe - EVEN GREECE! Which is still really warm, by the seaside, etc. It's so frustrating because now we are going to arrive in Dubai in a few days where it's crazy hot and only have footwear appropriate for a European winter :(
Also something interesting that we noticed is that most shops have security guards wearing bullet jackets, and they keep saying on the speakers to watch out for your belongings. So it seems that doing clothes shopping is actually an incredibly risky affair!
The last part of our time in Athens was catching the train to the airport. This might seem like a simple task but before we arrived in Athens I did some research on the tourist scams and pickpocket hotspots to try minimise the chances of us getting ripped off or mugged. And one of the high risk areas to be pickpocketed is on the train heading back to the airport - because the pickpocketers know it'll be much more difficult for you to report it! And the train was soooo packed. Taxi wasn't really an option since the airport is about an hour away, and they said it would be around 70euros to get a taxi all the way there. So we continued using the safe packs that my nan got us to lock everything up, wore them under our jackets, locked up all our bags - even the little pockets of our backpacks, and hoped for the best. It probably sounds like we're being overly cautious but I really think it was necessary after reading people's stories online!
Now we are in Munich… First impressions is that it is super nice and we feel a lot safer and more in our comfort zone :) So it's now obvious to me that being in my comfort zone isn't about a language barrier, but I'm still trying to figure out what it is that makes me more uncomfortable in some places than others. I think so far the worst for me have been Nadi, Rome, Paris and Athens. So maybe I'm not particularly a fan of hyped up tourist places in general - probably because I'm always worried about being pickpocketed or targeted for obviously being a foreigner and find it harder to relax. Whereas in places like here (Munich), Warsaw, Tallinn or Budapest I didn't feel like I was such an obvious target. I can't explain why, it's just how I felt.
After arriving in to Munich, me and Matt decided to go for a little walk to get our bearings. I can already tell that it's a really beautiful city - lots of old buildings everywhere! Matt's brother had told us about a really yummy beer hall called Hofbrauhaus. This is a brewery about fifteen minutes walk from where we are stayign and is owned by the state government. It's also super old and has some kind of history to do with being a royal brewery for the Kingdom of Bavaria. So it's easy to justify why it's ok to drink lots of beer there. The hall is huuuuge and I think I read that it can seat up to 1500 people! There are tables everywhere that can seat at least eight people, and the waiters are running around like crazy - the waitdresses are also dressed up in those little dresses too! We treated ourselves to a delicious dinner with lots of beer :) We also bought a massive pretzel off one of the girls walking around the hall. Thank you for the recommendation James - it was deliciooooooooooous!
I was super full and needed to sleep after this :) We grabbed some like, hot cashews covered in a sugary coating. Then came home and chiiiiiiiiiilled!
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