I got a good jump on the day today and left at 630. My muscles were sore but I was happy to be on the bike again. Emmanuelle and I parted at the station this morning and it was already getting hot outside.

I stopped after about 25 km to go to the bathroom at a local restaurant. The restaurant was closed so I thought I could actually use the bathrooms without paying the toilet lady. To my surprise there was no one in the diner or on the street but when I opened the door to the bathrooms the bathroom lady was there. So I paid her 2 polish monies and she gave me my 3 squares of toilet paper. The rest I'll leave unsaid.

By noon I had stopped about a hundred times to ask for directions from the local people. Not like I was lost but I just wanted to meet some locals of Poland. These attempts were unsuccessful until one time when I was crossing a stoplight, I noticed a man who took no notice of me but as I passed, out of the corner of my eye I saw him glance at me. This was a breakthrough because I had thought that the locals jut ignored me but they were actually just pretending.

Totally excited with this new information I had entered the next town and looked for the first local I could find. There was a man standing on a corner waiting for a light. Perfect, I thought to myself. I went as close to him as I could and instead of talking I just stood there and pretended to ignore him. He was already ignoring me by this time so I turned my head and ignored him more. He replied by looking right through me, somewhere off in the distance. I had finally made contact with the locals and I didn’t feel like I was an outsider anymore. The light turned green and he continued to ignore me for the next three blocks then turned right. I was so excited to finally blend in I could hardly ignore him anymore so I left. But it gives me a warm feeling to know that somewhere out there tonight there is someone ignoring me.

Seriously, aside from the subtle differences in mannerisms I don’t think that the Poles are much more different than the Swiss people.

Sometimes I forget that I am on a trip and the others around me are either on their way to work or on their way home from work at the end of the day. Caught in the deadly cycle of what we like to call life. Wants become necessities and the little man gets trampled. Then if all goes well after 50 years of work we can get that little cottage by the lake and die.

I guess in essence this trip is about this.

My whole life I have rebelled against the normal, fighting to the death with the reduced world with all of its white picket fences and 2.3 kids and a dog named butch who sometimes pees on the carpet. I think that in the last couple of years I have come to the conclusion that this is just the human drama and is necessary day to day survival. It’s warm and safe when you don’t carry the world with you everywhere and it’s quiet when you don’t have to see the people screaming from the inside.

Aside from the subtle differences in mannerisms between the people that I have met in the world, I think we are very much alike.