Backlog

Whenever I travel, I keep a travelogue. I first started this, oh, I dunno maybe four or five years ago, and it wasn´t until just recently that I filled up my old one. I also use my travelogue as a stash for my postcard collection. I am pleased to say that I have already started a new one, whose admirable contents are a photo of a Marc Chagall stained-glass window in Zürich, and a woman, on a pogo stick, in her Sunday best, walking a greyhound. Nothing quite compares to my postcard of Vladimir Lenin thrusting his fist in the air with a McDonald´s style logo saying McShit. I´ve never understood it, but it makes me laugh.

Well, I have a considerable backlog of reporting to do. Last I wrote, I was in Chicago, so let´s pick up the pieces. Oh, and it´s currently about 9AM here. I couldn´t sleep much past 730AM because I was a bit too hot in our hostel bedroom.

After going to the Art Institute, I went back to the Architecture Foundation for my tour. The subject of the tour, of which they have dozens of varieties, was Modern Skyscrapers. Our tour guide, Jim, pointed out that since the 1950s there have really only been two major architectural styles in skyscraping - Midcentury Modern and Postmodern. If I was working on my laptop instead of the computer at the Madrid hostel, I could upload pictures detailing the differences, but alas I cannot at this time. Maybe later. (My laptop is out of juice and I haven´t asked Martha where the adapter is yet). In lieu of photographic aides, I´ll just leave you with the unsatisfying ´it was very cool´. Also, I´m using a Spanish-language keyboard and it´s nearly impossible to get quotation marks.

After the tour, which ended around 3PM, I was finally in time to check in to my hostel. Bear in mind, I had arrived in Chicago at around 630AM and had been on my feet - save for brief breaks - since that time. When I had first arrived at the hostel, I approached the reception desk to be confronted by a very unhelpful Chinese woman who couldn´t comprehend why I was there (to check in) and told me to come back in nine hours. At that time of day, still being fresh, I didn´t feel a need to argue. At 3PM though, I would have broken down the door to get to my bed, I was so exhausted. Luckily, everything went through and I quickly crashed for an hour and a half.

My biggest fear about travelling to Chicago by myself, other than killer bees, was that I would not have anything to do in the evening once most of the public venues shut down for the day. I was really scrambling to figure out what to do. Fortuitously, I was walking to the elevator lobby and there on a bulletin board was a notice saying that the hostel staff was taking a group of people to something called the Improv Olympics, and that it would be free. One must never pass up the opportunity for free things, whether they be pencils, or improv shows, or musty chairs left on the side of the road. (Okay, maybe not that last one).

The group of people was about 20 or so, mostly foreigners. As I described it to Helen, most were either by themselves or with someone, to which she pointed out there aren´t many other options. They are opposite statements that kind of fill up the range of ´am I travelling solo or not?´. Nevermind that. What counts is that I met, much to my surprise and gratitude, two Australians around my age named Ewan and Alex. I did meet a few other people, including a British girl named Alice - who sounded shockingly like my friend Yui but was not Japanese (is it weird that my image of a British female accent is based on a 6-foot Japanese woman?) - and a Frenchman named Tomas. There was also another Aussie who joined us later named Rio. We talked about many of the things people who do not know each other talk about - the weather, novel differences in our cultures, where we live, and what is drinking like in your country. These tend to be universal constants that can be shared by strangers anywhere.

It is especially novel being from Minnesota. There is no end of questions like ´Where is Minnesota?´ or ´What is there to do in Minnesota?´ or ´How far is Minnesota from Montana?´ or my favorite, ´So Minnesota is in Wisconsin, right?´ I am a perpetual cheat in that I am a geography major who reads the BBC daily, so I was able to wow the Australians by knowing the name of their prime minister and knowing what state they were from (Newcastle, New South Wales). The Improv show was great. There were three different groups who came on, each getting a little bigger, and they had a guitarist and a pianist off-stage, so the comedians would sometimes burst into song or be forced to sing when the musicians started playing something. My favorite moment was in the last sketch with a large number of people waiting in a hospital room - presumably someone was fatally ill - and one of the comedians, and older, heavy-set man comes on-stage and in a deadpan, deep voice asks ´Can you direct me to the maternity ward? I must go to where humans are spawning,´ and then goes off to eat babies like a troll. All around funny.

Afterwards, many of us were hungry, and since we were right by Wrigley Field where there are lots of bars, we went in one and I got a tasty burger (non-Big Kahoona style) and we talked at length until about midnight. At this point, the Australians went off to more bars that I couldn´t get in to - they had fakes, I did not. I got back to the hostel and pretty much fell straight asleep.

Speaking of hostels, it´s about 10AM, so I think I shall either wake Martha up or go in search of the supposed free breakfast she promised they have. Almost finished with Chicago! Yay!