The one where I get stuck in an ruined city

On August 24, 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius, an active volcano in the vicinity of modern Naples in Italy, erupted and buried the surrounding settlements of Pompeii and Herculaneum under a mile of rock and ash, killing up to 25,000 people.

Pompeii remained buried until the 16th Century, Herculaneum until the 18th. In 1804, the first real excavations of Pompeii began to uncover the city. Large scale excavations of the ruined city continue to this day making Pompeii one of the largest and most famous archaeological sites in the world.

The plan was to get to Pompeii from Rome and back again in one day. Pompeii is closest to Naples, about 2.5 hours from Rome. We arrived at Termini, the central Roman train station, at about 9am on Monday. We struggled through buying our tickets, and spent about 20 minutes with a dictionary trying to read the Italian tickets and figure out where were supposed to be waiting for the train and where we would sit once it arrived.

We boarded the train and found our seats, only to be almost immediately yelled at in Italian that we were in the wrong seats. We tried to show the two ladies our tickets and prove that we were in the right place, but they just kept saying “No, no!” And so, assuming we must be wrong, we left the seats and went up the carriage to ask an employee and another man who spoke English. Both pointed us back to where we had come from. Finally, we squeezed our way through small, crowded hallways to the seats we had started with. The ladies were gone and our seats were now vacant. We sat down and I watched the Italian countryside through the rain on my window for most of the journey (punctuated by naps, of course, because it was quite early still.)

With the train and a transfer to the Metro in Naples, we got to Pompeii at about 1pm. The site is open until 5pm, so we had enough time to see most of it (not all, though, because it really is an entire ancient city.)

It was pouring rain by the time we arrived, and though it was frustrating to have to hold up my umbrella and my camera at the same time, it also made the site a lot more interesting to me. Pompeii is a major tourist location, and I’ve heard that in the summer it’s packed beyond belief. Since it was the off season, and since it was raining, Pompeii really did look like an abandoned, ruined city. A city of the dead. You could walk several streets before running into another person. It gave a very surreal, ghostly aspect to the site.

The streets of Pompeii are still paved with cobblestones and still have the stones in place for the pedestrians to cross without stepping in puddles or debris. In the rain, they were more rivers than streets and we were glad for the raised sidewalks on either side. We wandered the streets of Pompeii, walking around a city that was frozen in time in 79AD. It was amazing to see the way a town looked in the Roman Empire. With wall paintings, mosaics and graffiti still in tact, it was easy to imagine yourself a Pompeian in the houses and courtyards.

When they excavated Pompeii, they didn’t find dead bodies. They were incinerated in the heat. But the way the ash and rock had fallen created pockets of air in the shape of where the bodies had been. Therefore, archaeologists were able to make plaster casts of the people who had died in Pompeii. In the summer I understand that many of these are left in situ, among the buildings of the city so that you can see where they died. In the off season, however, the casts are kept in an open storage area.

As someone studying archaeology, Pompeii was a wonder to see. I have been reading in textbooks for years of all the things we’ve found out from Pompeii. Because it was frozen in time, it alloys us to see how a Roman city would have looked in the 1st Century AD. Graffiti, wall paintings, amphorae and shops can tells us countless things about the Roman way of life.

Needless to say, we spent as much time as possible at Pompeii.

At around 4:25 we made our way back to the main gate to buy the guidebook. The last admission was at 4:30, so we ran out quickly to get the book and then nipped back in. An employee told us not to go too far, since they were closing in half an hour. We told him that we were going to go see the Villa of the Mysteries and exit that way.

And so, we walked across the city to the Villa. We got there at about 4:50, just in time to see the Villa and exit on time. But when we were done looking around the Villa, we realized that we couldn’t find the way out the book had described. There was a fence that kept us from going any further past the Villa.

We decided to go back up the hill to see if we had missed the exit on our way in. A man told us that we had to go back towards the main entrance. We were confused, but we continued up the hill anyway.

After walking for a while, we realized that the path we were on wasn’t going to lead us to an exit. By now it was 5:20 and dark, and there was no one else in Pompeii. Everyone had left for the day. We still had no idea how to get out.

We had two options, either to go back down into the city and keep walking to the main entrance and hope we could still get out that way, or go back to the Villa of the Mysteries and continue to search for that exit. Standing on top of the hill, we could see Vesuvius, the city of Naples and the intense dark of the dead city below. The only house nearby had dogs that were barking loudly and, in my anxious mind, angrily. I was worried we would have to stay in Pompeii all night.

We decided to go back to the Villa and try our chances there.

When we got back to the Villa it was about 5:40. We jumped two fences to get past it, trying to follow the signs that said “Uscita” (Italian for exit.) Finally, walking around with only the flashlight on my keychain for light, we found the exit. A woman in the building at the exit saw our flashlight and opened her window. She started yelling in a mix of Italian and English that they were closed, we had to leave. I yelled back “I know! We’re trying! Uscita! Uscita!”

Finally, we got out of Pompeii and didn’t have to spend the night with only two toblerones and a package of Fruit Joys, possibly ending up food for the famous Pompeii stray dogs.

Of course, on the way down the hill in the dark I tripped and went over on my ankle and I ended up having to buy a Tensor (/Ace) bandage to keep me walking all over Rome for the week.

S as in… snail?

I like to pretend I’ve got it all together. New country? Sure! I’m a pro! England can’t be that different, can it? Because after all, it’s our Motherland and we both spell the right way (colour, cheque). Easy.

Not so much.

The following is a list of the things in the last few days that have had people glaring at me and thinking “Ugh. American.” (I don’t expect many people to realize that I am, in fact, Canadian.)

1. Dollars?

Sunday I went on one of those hop-on-hop-off city tours of Newcastle. In typical fashion, I arrived at the bus stop just as the bus was pulling away and had to wait the full 30 minutes for the next one. Sigh.

When the bus finally arrived, I hopped on and smiled at the bus driver. There was a silence.

“Uh, so it’s what, 8 dollars?” I say, finally. He laughs. I try to correct myself as quickly as possible. “I mean.. pounds.. not dollars…”

“8 dollars wouldn’t get you very far, love.” You’re telling me.

2. Can you repeat that please?

I hadn’t eaten anything all day Sunday. My stomach is not happy, so I didn’t push it. After thoroughly exploring the city, I came home briefly to put away my camera and pick a place to eat from the city guide I had. I finally chose one and headed off in that direction.

I walked nearly across the city, only to discover that this place was not open on Sundays. I then proceeded to walk the streets and realize that most places weren’t open on Sundays. I wanted a real meal, something that someone brought out to me. But the only places I could find that were open were McDonald’s and Subway. A lot of the places I passed had been serving food until 5pm, but were now only serving drinks.

I finally found a place to eat. Apparently a vodka bar? But it had food. I went in and sat down. The waitress finally came to ask what I wanted to order. I ordered the veggie burger and then asked her what was on tap. Do people not ask that in England? Is there a different saying for it?

“Like, lagers?” she asked.

“Uh, yeah.” I’m so articulate. Keep in mind that this was only the second conversation I’d had outside of my head all day. She listed them all really fast. I blinked.

“Um… can you repeat that please?” I asked, timidly. I was really hoping that one of the beers she listed was Newcastle Brown, because, well, I’m in Newcastle and it’s a great beer.

“Something, something, Carlsberg, something else,” she said.

“Um, I’ll have a pint of Carlsberg…”

3. Um, which one again?

This happened to me twice. I’m okay with bills (do they call them notes here?) but as soon as I get to the change part, I can’t tell a penny from a… 20p?

When I went to pay admission for Castle Keep, it took me a good two minutes of riffling through my wallet. I knew they had a 50 cent (p?) piece. But I could not remember what it looked like.

Then I paid for my dinner. The waitress who already didn’t like me much.

“That’ll be 10 pounds and 5 p,” she said. I handed her a 20 pound note.

“Uh, I have… 5 cents.” Cursing myself in my head, I know it’s not cents. She waited. I riffled through my wallet. Finally, I gave up and pulled out a 10p and handed it to her. She gave me a look.

“It’s 5p.”

“Um, yeah, which one is that again?” I asked.

“The small silver one.”

“Oh.” I handed her the 5p.

4. S or F?

People never think of their own accents as hard to understand. I certainly never thought anyone would have any trouble understanding me. I guess it’s one of those culture-centric things we do.

Yesterday morning I called the electricity, water and broadband companies to get my accounts set up. That required stating my address. Easy enough, right?

Wrong. My postcode ends in the letters S and G.

Everytime I gave my postcode, they thought I had said F rather than S. And then when they said it back to me, I thought they were saying S rather than F. This was worst with the lady at BT Broadband. She was desperately trying to find my address in the system.

“I think I must have your postcode wrong,” she said. She spelt it out. “…And F as in foxtrot, G as in golf?”

“Oh. No. It’s S.. as in snail.” I tried to think of a better s word. It failed me. S as in snail?! Sigh.

Hipster film

Dear Urban Outfitters,

Until I walked into your store this week, I had no idea that film was now cool. Here I was, stuck in the past, thinking that digital cameras were everywhere and paying $16 to get my film developed. Little did I know that I could walk into your store and buy a camera that was new in 60s. But I guess that’s vintage now, right?

I looked down and saw a Blackbird, and I was surprised. Cute, sure, made of plastic with a top view finder. At least it shoots 35mm film, which despite the failing film market can still be processed at your local Loblaws or drug store. For all the old fogies out there who never learned how to use digital or kept trying to throw away their memory cards after one use.

But then I turned around and I saw it. The little package I used to dread in my years of loading film. The 110 film. The film that required loading into a special canister in a darkroom. You have to actually break the plastic into pieces and pry out the film. The film that I always left for last when printing, because it required changing the mask and recalibrating our printer.

Now you have all these hipsters out there shooting 110 film on plastic toy cameras. But let me ask you one question: How are they going to get this film developed? At the time my dad’s photo store closed, we were the only people in the city who could print 110 film. Now there’s no one. Maybe in a bigger city you’d be lucky to run into someone who actually knows what 110 film is. I bet most of those kids who work at the Loblaws photo counter would have no idea.

I’m all for going back to our roots - I still love shooting the occasional roll of film. But everyone abandoned the film processors of the world years ago. And because of that, the industry is almost dead. Because people were all too happy to shoot a million digital pictures and never print a single one. Because now the average suburban family has as many dSLRs as children.

So you’re too late, Urban Outfitters. Even your loyal hipster following can’t revive film.

I still love your dresses though,

Hez

Dear Facebook,

Every time I open you up, a little blue box tells me that I should get a username. I don’t need a username. Usernames are for MySpace, and aren’t you the anti-MySpace? I remember when the point of Facebook was to be a “virtual yearbook.” You had to have a real e-mail address and a real name and you were meant to connect to real people, and far less creepy stalkers. So no, I will not be available at http://facebook.com/heather.c.montgomery or any other Facebook.com slash addresses. (By the way, it’s weird that you searched my profile for my email address to suggest that, since my middle initial isn’t listed anywhere else in my information.)

Next, I find it really creepy how you use our personal information to market things to us. I get it, you’re a multi-billion dollar corporation, and awesome - it’s free for us, but personal information is personal, right? Also, did you know that when I post photos on you (even though it’s super convenient and everyone can see them) I essentially lose my rights to them? Copyright fail.

Right now, I can’t figure out why the hell you insist on bringing me back to my home page every time I click on a post in one of my groups. Wtf, Facebook?

Lastly and definitely most importantly, I do not want to be friends with So-and-So McGee who I went to high school/middle school/soccer camp with. Just because they’re friends of friends doesn’t mean they’re interesting. Also, even if I do remember them from high school doesn’t mean I ever want to talk to them again. I also do not want to become a fan of Some Band, Chicken, Not Dying or Stepping On Spiders. I don’t want an app that tells me some random date in the future that I will a) die b) marry c) reproduce or d) finally get a Facebook username.

Thinking of leaving you forever,

Hez

Planning Committee undertakes location scout for Retreat

*For immediate release from the Department of Corporate Planning and Infrastructure*

On Friday July 10, the Planning Committee of the 2009 Corporate Retreat successfully undertook a preliminary strategic operation. The team effectively scouted the first location of the Retreat, and through such investigation was able to identify areas for further planning and research.

Although the Corporate Retreat was originally scheduled for this date, the shift to a later date was thought to be best for all parties involved, allowing for proper preparation and organization by all. Most importantly, this will provide an occasion to further pursue options for corporate attire and a more thorough planning of proper locations and the best possible routes.

The Planning Committee attended a serving of refreshments at a predetermined location in Kemptville, Ontario. The lovely locale of Frank’s Diner was able to cater to all of the Committee’s needs. Preliminary examinations of the area proved fruitful and it was chosen as one of the most important locations for the real Corporate Retreat, now re-scheduled for August 7, 2009.

First impressions of the chosen media for the Retreat were very positive. All parties involved were highly optimistic for the outcome of the August 7th event, and have now commenced planning with more zeal and determination than ever before. Events have been well documented and will be shared as part of the media kit for the Corporate Retreat.

Please direct all media enquiries to the Communications Assistant. Any and all comments will be directly responded to in order to encourage an attitude of openness and clarity involving the events of the upcoming Corporate Retreat and Friday’s location scouting.

-30-

Ah, the wonders of spin. I didn’t spend 4 years in journalism for nothing!

In short, Kaitlyn got food poisoning (not from Frank’s though!) and we had to cut it short and reschedule. But it gives us time to buy cowboy hats and find me some plaid, since I was the only one not wearing any on Friday.