blog.starwreck.com

Greetings from the Nice airport, where I’m waiting to board on a plain back to Finland. Finally…

DISCLAIMER:
At the beginning, I’d like to start by apologizing that I haven’t been able to update the diary as I had promised. My dear, beloved Acer – who I also address by the name of “not only a piece of shit, but also a *heavy* piece of shit” decided, that it’s better for me not to be able to use the WLAN during the week. So I was pretty much in the darkness. I could’ve used the Internet café, but the lady was so impolite and the place was so small and the keyboards were French ones, so I decided to write a more comprehensive report as soon as I head back to Finland.

KÄNNI PÄÄLLE - TURN ON THE CANNES

I arrived to Cannes after 14 hours of travelling. First I took a bus from Tampere to Helsinki Airport. Then a flight to Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. From there I travelled through the butt-ugly city outskirts of Paris to most surprisingly obviously named airport in the world – Paris Orly. Oh boy, the fun I had!

As a very bad, easilly annoyed and almost all the time lost, confused and tired traveller, what more could I ask than a protest march of the airport personnel. I was just about to pick my luggages when a raging mob of aggressive stuerts and clerks suddenly flooded in from all the corners of the building. Yarly!

Finally, I got to the mysterious city of Cannes. The only imperssion I had about Cannes was men in suits and a red carpet, but first thing new to me there was a palm tree. I had never been to so south, and wasn’t really prepared for the vegetation to look like something from a… well, a film.

City itself is actually somewhat part of the much bigger city of Nice. It’s a smaller, a bit richer city nearby it, with a one big street, various others, outer parts and the harbor with small mediterranean-style streets and tiny shops. All very nice – no pun intended.

At the first day, there weren’t that many people, but as the festivals grew, more and more people started swarming on the street, even so that it was at some times impossible to go anywhere. And the weather was great all the time. Surprisingly, I really loved the city and even some of the people there.

French are a problematic folk only when doing business with them. At first, they refuse to speak English – although most of them know how to. They also expect to be tipped – which is fine, but for us Finns something we are not used to… And they fail to pay you back the right amount of money. There seem to be easy ways around that, like saying bonjour (they like that, those nationalistic bastards!), checking the receipt (if you get one), and by tipping. Not too hard, but confusing at first.

(Continued in Cannes - Part II)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007 at 10:26 and is filed under English posts, General, Travels. You're welcome to comment below, or link to this post. The comments are not moderated, but behave or Santa will smack you with a shovel.