Travels with GG

Firenze, the girl from the sky, and fire

Part two: The girl from the sky

After the awe-struck, sleep deprived day in Firenze, we finally arrived at the Florence Youth Hostel, ate a package meal (asparagus risotto - it was terrible) and slept. The sandman worked overtime that night.

At about 2:30 am, I found myself awake, screaming, my hand covering my mouth to stop me from doing so, and eyes staring at a girl sprawled on the floor next to my bed. I had been woken up by a massive crash involving the girl falling off the top bunk of the bed GG was sleeping in, and hitting her head against the bedside table. I thought she had died.

Soon enough, another girl appeared on the top bunk. Hearts palpitating, we managed to throw the two apologising, drunk English girls out of the room. I shut and locked the door, made sure I had the key with me, pushed the luggage against the door, and then GG and I sat and stared at each other.

What had just happened?

On closer inspection, we realised that they had been in the room for a bit, for the bathroom had been used. We were so dead to the world, we had no clue. How could we take care of ourselves if we were incapable of realising there were noisy intruders in the room. We couldn't sleep. The main worry - what if we slept too soundly again?

Well, there wasn't much that could be done so we tried to go back to bed. As we drifted into unconsciousness, we were alerted by a key rattling in the door again! What audacity. I got up, opened the door and told the girl off. Her excuse for the behaviour was that since her key didn't fit in the room she was assigned to, she simply tried other rooms and decided that she had the right to sleep in there. What cheek!

After having thrown them out for a second time, we found that turning the key halfway in the door would stop it from being pushed out the other side and that would prevent the room from being broken in a third time.

In the light of day, we saw the whole incident from a lighter perspective, but the crash had destroyed my ballpoint pen that lay on that bedside table. I therefore continue my chronicles in pencil.