Posts by Jonah

So I walk into Plato and Aristotle (the class, not the two guys walking out of the Academy of Athens) this afternoon and notice a new guy sitting in the back. I take my seat, chit chat with the lady who sits in front of me, and wait for Dr. Wood to come in. He enters through the door at the front of the classroom, goes over to the board, and starts writing numbers on it. He’s always writing all over the board, drawing diagrams and pictures and writing Greek words in a mixture of Greek and Roman letters, which annoys the heck out of me. Usually we furiously copy down everything he puts up there, but I had a feeling I’d be better off waiting this time. So I sat and watched.

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“What I have,” he said, “are two tickets to an opera thing…” he read what they had printed on them. “I’ll give them away using this lottery. Is there anyone who can’t make it?” He read off the dates. Several people raised their hands, and he erased numbers from the chalkboard accordingly. I thought about raising mine, since I’m not really into opera, but didn’t, figuring I’d just pick an unlikely number.

Paul was first on the way around the room. Numbers 1 through 17 were left up there. “Nine,” he said, picking the one in the middle. On we went around the room, each person selecting one number left on the board, as Dr. Wood crossed them out. The lady next to me picked “one,” which is what I wanted to choose. So I picked the next best, the last one. “Seventeen.” There were only a few left to pick from. Only two other people chose after me.

Dr. Wood looked at the paper he had written a number down. “Seventeen,” he read.

Class went well, at least the first part. Aristotle isn’t terribly hard to talk about, especially once I’m used to Dr. Wood’s vocabulary.

At the break, I went straight back to where the new guy was sitting. I’d heard him whisper to Dr. Wood right before class that he was a perspective student and asked to sit in. “So you’re a perspective IPS student?” I asked. Kathleen and Jay and Paul all came over to talk to him as well. His name is Jonathan, he said, and he was working on a teaching certificate at Montevallo near Birmingham, Alabama, though he’s originally from Seattle and went to college at Wheaten (however you spell it).

“I don’t think I could pass a test on this today,” he said, indicating the chalkboard with wide eyes.

“Oh, neither could we,” Kathleen assured him.

Then break was over, and class started back up. Dr. Wood started drawing furiously on the board, so I didn’t even bother to try to copy it all down, especially when I wasn’t sure what he was getting at. He handed out our journals at the end of class. I turned immediately to the back for his comments overall.

“Honest, intelligent, sustained. A”

Jay, Kathleen, Paul, and I went to CiCi’s Pizza with Jonathan and tried to talk over the big screen TV. That makes three meals in a row that have been pizza, since I made one last night for Paul and Berck. Jonathan asked if we were familiar with the writings of some neo-luddite, so I had to explain what a luddite was to Kathleen. I tried to get Jay to explain the last bit of class to me, but he just said, “You don’t know what Act and Potency are?” then sucked in his breath and shook his head. Jonathan ran off a curb in his VW Jetta, narrowly missing a sign in the CiCi’s parking lot, so we all had to get out and lift the car back over the curb. He took us home, and Paul and I showed him our apartment, so he could see what Tower Village is like. He’s gonna come to Father David’s class tomorrow, even though Jay and Kathleen tried to talk him out of it. They’re afraid the class will give a bad impression of the school because of how boring it is.

Father David may not even still be alive by the time Jonathan comes to UD, if ever. He said it probably won’t be before fall of 2000.

Lost my pencil. Haven’t really needed it except to keep accounts because I’ve been too busy having fun. I wanted to get a nicer one, but I’m about out of money. Have to change some travelers cheques.

Yesterday was so wonderful. I hadn’t been planning to stay in Assisi more than one night but got talked into it. I’m now on the way to Roma with an American chick, a Mexican guy, and a fellow from Chile.

I got into Assisi when it was dark. The hostel book said to take the bus (didn’t give a line number, just a picture of a bus), so I waited at the bus stop with several other people. A bus came by, but the driver said he wasn’t going to the hostel. You’re going to have to watch out for me, I told God. After many minutes later, another bus drove up. “Ostello della pace?” I asked.

“Si!” he said slowly, smiling. I got on and took a seat. In Italy, you’re supposed to buy tickets for buses ahead of time, but at that time of night no place was open. A couple of Japanese girls stood near the driver, holding money and looking confused. At the next stop, they got off, but the driver motioned for me to come up to the front with him. He said a bunch slowly in Italian, drove a few meters, and then made an unscheduled stop. He pointed straight ahead and then to the right. I nodded and thanked him. I could have kissed him.

But once the bus left, I wasn’t sure where to go. I tried heading straight down the road, but it didn’t have sidewalks and did have a lot of traffic. After a bit, it curved off to the right, but that just appeared to go back down the hill. I turned around and headed back, turning into the open gate of what looked like a huge church complex. No hostel signs, but I walked around the building anyway in partial hope I’d find someone to tell me which direction to go.

I heard someone running behind me. It was one of the Japanese girls. The other one followed close behind. They asked me where I was going. “Oh! The hostel is this way!” they giggled. They led me back to the main road and straight through the curve to a small side road. They’d run couple hundred meters to come find me, but it’s a good thing they did. I never would have found the place by myself, and the hostel closed for the night at 11:30. We walked down a completely dark, narrow, winding road with fireflies blinking on either side. The stars were beautiful, the night was beautiful, and I had two Japanese guardian angels on either side of me to guide my way.

I am amazed by the kindness of strangers. It makes me rethink my whole concept of humanity.

I took a risk and lost. Those of you who’ve played cards with me know I love to bluff and am horrible at it (which explains why you know it). I thought it was a sure bet, but I was wrong. I was positive a train would be leaving the Madrid station sometime after I got there. But there wasn’t. There weren’t any trains leaving until the next morning. Worse yet, the station was closing. And the hostels listed in my book shut their doors at ten. It was approaching midnight.

I must look really helpless when I don’t know what to do because that’s when someone always asks if I need help. This time it was a man leaning against a railing, calmly smoking a cigarette. He didn’t speak much English but communicated enough for me to confirm what the train time board blandly stated and that all the hotels in this area were expensive. Still, I didn’t seem to have much choice. Over to the side I noticed a group of Oriental women (one of their bags appeared to have Chinese or Japanese characters on it) preparing to go…somewhere. Their rucksacks gave me hope, and I determined to follow them–that is until they gathered outside a closed room of lockers and stared inside. Abandoning the group that appeared to be as clueless as I was, I walked over to the nearby hotel, gulping at the four stars on its side.

To get to the door, however, I had to pass through four blokes, one of whom welcomed my approach with open arms, one hand holding a half empty glass. I smiled good naturedly as I walked by shaking my head. The three other blokes laughed at him.

The doorman at the hotel spoke English, something I desperately needed to hear, even though what he was saying was the hotel was full. He kindly gave me directions on the metro to the center of town, where he assured me I would be able to find a hostel or pension willing to put me up for the night.

To get to the metro, I had to pass through the gauntlet of guys again. The tall, built, good-looking one in nice clothes opened his arms again, evidently willing to give me another chance. But they let me pass by once more, laughing as my bloke shouted, “Where are you going? “WHERE ARE YOU GOING?”” in an inebriated voiced after me.

The truth was I didn’t know where I was going at all. But the Oriental chicks were descending on the escalator ahead of me, and that gave me hope. Safety in numbers, and if we were all headed the same direction, it must be all right.

I began to wonder about that when the metro pulled up, one car full of ecstatic young people. I elected to get on a less crowded car with the group of Oriental girls. At the next stop, however, we were inundated with celebrating youths. I turned to the man in a suit the next seat over and asked, “Football?” He seemed to roll his eyes and nodded, answering me in Spanish. I nodded even though I didn’t understand a word.

A young man with curly hair and the thinnest line of a vertical goatee plopped down between us. He seemed less manic than the rest, who by now were rocking the whole car by jumping up and down, singing. I decided to ask him where the stop I was to get off at was. “Donde?” I asked, showing him what the doorman had written down for me. Fortunately, he spoke English, a rare occurrence in Spain. He informed me that one of the soccer teams in Madrid had just beaten Italy.

“You picked the worst time to come to Madrid,” he said.

“It’s like the Super Bowl,” his friend, a built guy with short hair added, shouting over the noise of everyone else on board. Some of the others, waving purple and white scarves, taunted Curly and his friend. They explained, “There are two teams in Madrid; we like the other one.” The others handed Short Hair a two litre of Orange Fanta, which he offered me. I declined. Curly invited me to join them in their celebration party, but I said I needed to find a place to stay. “You could stay with me–I have a flat,” offered Short Hair, “No, really, it would be no problem…” I told them I wouldn’t feel completely comfortable with that. They laughed. Then the whole group got off at the next stop. “Two more!” they shouted, “Two more stops!”

But the Oriental girls got off at the next station. I figured I could always spend another buck and get back on the metro, but for now I’d follow them. “Are you looking for a hostel?” one asked, turning around on the escalator up. “We missed our train. You come with us?”

The one that seemed to be the leader studied a metro map and then led the way onto another metro line. “Are you sure you know where you’re going?” I asked, but they were. Soon we were on another escalator. A bunch of young people were descending on the other side shouting and waving their scarves at us. “Madrid!” I shouted back at them. They shouted back something in suspicious tones of voices.

Then we were out on the street walking uphill. Cars all around honked their horns happily. The girls came to a certain door and started ringing the buzzer. After ringing for perhaps a minute, someone answered on the intercom. “Do you have any vacancy?” the leaders shouted into the speaker. The door opened, and we started climbing a center flight of stairs.

A young woman met us at a door several fights up and retreated as we advanced in on her. Then an older man with a bald head and potbelly came in. The girls started all talking at once, “Remember me?” “Do you have room?” “There are six of us. Seven of us!” The proprietor and his daughter didn’t seem to speak any English, the Oriental girls spoke limited English and no Spanish, and I stood there trying to figure out if they had room or not. The girls even offered to let me room with them.

But they didn’t need to. The daughter led me to a single room and gave me a towel. “Two thousand,” she said –about fifteen dollars. I gladly handed it over.

“You okay?” several of the Oriental girls asked me as they prepared for bed.

Yeah, I was okay. Just amazed.