And the beat goes on

WARNING - THIS POST CONTAINS SOME RANDOM PICTURES JUST TO REMIND YOU (and maybe me) THAT LIFE ISN'T ONLY TRANSPORTATION MISHAPS.

I would like to report that our struggles with conveyances has reached an end.  I would like to, but, in all truth, I can't. I write this in the compartment of the night train from Prague to Krakow.  It is no longer night; it is morning.  For the past four hours or so we have been sitting in the station of a place called Bohumin - where that is, I do not know.  Why we are here, I do not know.  When we are leaving...one of the women in our compartment is trying to find something out.

Our companions are an interesting lot: three children, the oldest, a girl going into seventh grade, is the only one who speaks English; their mother, who just got the info we needed about what the heck is happening; their Grandmother, who is (gulp) about my age; and an unidentified woman of the same age who may be a great aunt or that determinate "auntie" and who functions as the court jester.

They brought a lot of food and beverages.  We each brought a small water and I have a candy given to me after a meal sometime in the last week and a half.

I don't want to resort to hyperbole; accuracy is my goal.  That said, the seats in this car look like they are built for humans to sit on, I have no reason to think they were designed for goats, iguanas or dolphins.  But they are the most uncomfortable things to sit on that I have ever experienced.  Sleeping is damned near impossible.  Honestly, my ass has been hurting for hours.

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So, we're finally moving.  They added another car for us and I believe to outward appearances we look like a train.  My explorations reveal that we only have access to two cars.  No cafe car, doggone it.  That bit of candy is looking mighty tasty right about now.  I kinda dragged Na down to the other car, which is modern.  We got a compartment to ourselves and I slept for a couple of welcome hours.  Na is still asleep.  (That's "now" in writing time, not reading time.  I really must write that metaphysical treatise on travel and the space-time continuum.)

O! The seats in the new compartment are exquisite.  I sing the praises of whomever designed them.  He or she should be declared a knight or be given the Medal of Freedom or be declared a National Treasure or something.  There's power in here, too, so I'm writing and charging...and my ass doesn't hurt.  Life is looking up.

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One more needle from the fickle finger of fate.  When we finally got to the tram station in Krakow...the ticket machine was broken.  We got on anyway.

(Sigh)

We were ensconced in the Elephant on the Moon Hostel and asleep by noon thirty.  Now, off to see something of this town.