Travel Tuesday-The Crazy Roommate

I've been slightly MIA from the blogging world lately because I have been super busy, but I'm going to do my best to continue posting three times a week. The rest of November is still pretty busy, and then I"m heading to NYC at the beginning of December for a couple of days (yayyyyyy!!)

Anyway, enjoy today's Travel Tuesday!! This story took place during my first trip to Europe (different trip than Paul).


“Excusez-moi monsieur, mon ami, ummmmm, she needs to know her ummm how do you say, her exit, no, no, no her, departure gate! Oui, oui.” Jess started off in French and eventually trailed into speaking with a fake French accent.
The employee behind the desk gave us both a weird look, and said in a flat voice,
“It’ll be up on the screen shortly”.
We laughed, said “thanks” and went on our way. Jess had decided earlier in the day she really enjoyed French Canadian accents, and therefore was going to talk in one for the rest of the day. This didn’t shock me; nothing shocked me with this girl.

We were in London, England, getting ready to fly home to our respective Canadian cities of Toronto and Edmonton. My departure gate number finally flashed on the screen, and we slowly made our way to the waiting area. Our gates happened to be right next to each other, so we stalled and talked for a little bit longer. When it was finally time to board, my eyes welled up, and I pulled her into a hug.
“I am going to miss you so much!!!”
“I’m going to miss you too!!” We broke apart, gave each other a weak little wave, and tried to stop crying. I settled into my seat for the 8 hour flight back to Toronto. What a trip.

Three weeks earlier…

“I told you!” the girl shouted, “I wanted a private room in the hostel, not a fucking room with 8 fucking other people!!” I glanced over from where I was seated in the internet café. The girl was a tiny bit of a thing, and she had on a black hoodie with cat ears on top. She continued yelling. Whoa, was all I remember thinking. I left the café, stepping as far away from the girl as I could, then wandered back to my hotel and got ready for bed. I had to be up at 4am the next day to meet up with the tour group. We would be leaving at 5am sharp, and for the next three weeks would be making our way around Europe.

I got up in time, and although I wasn’t looking so hot (it was 4am, what do you want?), I was beyond excited to get the adventure started. I got to the meeting spot with the group after dragging my luggage down the street, and boarded the bus. As I got on, I recognized her, the girl in the cat hoodie, which she was incidentally still wearing. Yeah, friggin, right, was all I remember thinking. I sat far away from her, in a seat by myself, and shortly after that, the bus was en route to Dover, where we took a lengthy ferry ride across the English Channel. After that, we were back on the bus, and would be arriving in Brussels within a couple of hours. The girl in the cat hoodie had become a mere blip on my radar; there were so many people on the tour, I could likely avoid her the entire trip.

We made it to our first hotel and the tour manager gathered us all in the hotel lobby, where she would call out our roommate situation for the rest of the trip. Numbers dwindled until it was only Cat Hoodie Girl and I.

“Megan and Jess, you’re together!” Lou smiled brightly at the both of us. You have got to be kidding me, I thought.

We made our way up to our room making awkward conversation. She talked all about her boyfriend, and then she told me about all the boys she intended to sleep with on this trip. Her speech concluded with “What happens in Europe, stays in Europe.”

I was less than thrilled to be stuck with this girl as my roommate; I couldn’t imagine spending the next three weeks with her. It soon became apparent though, that I would be the one that was going to have to adjust, because she clearly wasn’t going to.

We had a break through in Amsterdam; up until that point we hadn’t really hung out. We saw each other at night obviously, but during the day we went our separate ways.

“What are you going to do today?” she inquired the first morning we were in Amsterdam, as we were getting ready.

“I’m going to go check out the Anne Frank House for sure”, I said, my inner nerd jumping with complete joy and excitement.

“Anne who?” she said, “Mind if I tag along?”

I was kind of floored she had never heard of Anne Frank, but I said of course I didn’t mind. Four hours later we were making our way out of the Anne Frank House and she was bawling.

“That was fucking amazing. Thank you!” she said.

That night our tour group was taking a group outing to a sex show (Hey, what’s more awkward then watching live porn with people you just met two days prior? Not much!) This place seemed pretty sketchy, but looking back, I’m pretty sure it was tame considering what could have been. At one point, some of the performers wanted members of the audience to get up on stage. Who was the first and only person to volunteer from our group? Jess. The audience volunteer portion of the show started with people eating a banana out of a ladies vagina and ended with a masturbating gorilla. The lights went on, and we all got up with the same sort of shell shocked look on our face. Except Jess, she was ecstatic.

That night I was slumbering away peacefully when Jess came into the room, stumbled on my bed and drunkenly slurred, “hey, do you have a condom??” I did have one, but I was pissed she woke me up so I pretended to be asleep. Eventually she went away. Then she came back an hour later, shout-whispering, “I totally just had sex with a random guy on a park bench!” The pretend sleep continued. My brain was saying, lalalala, so don’t want to hear this!

By the time we had made it to France, I was used to Jess’s antics. I loved the girl to death when she was sober, but when she was drunk, look the hell out. She was hilarious, she was always up for anything and she was just as excited to be travelling as I was. But she woke me up every single night of the trip; inevitably I was always in bed before her, no matter how late I was out. Sometimes when she got back to the room, she would grab the phone and proceed to have the longest, loudest conversations with her boyfriend in Alberta. She fell drunkenly onto my bed more than once. She fell down and smashed her head on more than one occasion, and I heard about way more rendezvous in random European parks then I ever cared too. She danced naked on our balcony in Nice, waving and screaming at cars while touching herself (I shit you not). I made a fast exit from our room and went and found my other friends.

“Jess is dancing naked on our balcony!!!” I told them. They just nodded and laughed, and told me I could totally sleep on the floor of their room if I wanted.

I could handle all this though, I mean, she really wasn’t hurting anybody. She was annoying the shit out of me, but it made for some pretty amusing phone calls home. There was only one time I wanted to throttle her. We were in Italy, just outside of Venice, and by some miracle we both ended up back in the room at the same approximate time. We were just going to sleep when we heard the door open. She was drunk and sleeping topless, and was completely out of it. I shot straight up in bed, and called out weakly, “who’s there?” I could hear people approaching the beds. I flicked on the lights, and standing before us were two Italian men in their underwear. One in boxers, one in briefs.

“Ummmm”, I stuttered, fearing slightly for my life. This is not how I want to die!! I was inwardly freaking right out.

“Did you want something??” I continued. They came closer still, and one of them bent down and picked something up off the floor. Jess’s bra. Around his chest it went, and he fastened it shut. He proceeded to dance around the room with her bra on. I think this was the one point of the trip where both Jess and I were equally shocked at something that was happening. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry (I laugh now, because that shit is hysterical!! But while it was actually happening? A little bit scary!)

“Who the hell are these guys??” I hissed at Jess out of the corner of my mouth.

“I think I met them in the bar…maybe they followed me up??”

“You think?? Jesus...” I trailed off and turned back to the men.

“Could you leave now? Please? Please leave!!” my voice became higher and more desperate with every word I spoke.

Naturally they spoke little to no English. The word they did know? Kiss.

“First, we must have a kiss”, one of them said, the other one nodding in happy agreement.

I folded my arms across my chest and glared at Jess. Go for it. She wrapped the blanket around her chest, and jumped out of bed, pecking them each quickly on the cheek. Then they left. I barricaded our unlockable door with my suitcase. Jess was snoring away by the time I got back in my bed.

The trip ended shortly thereafter, and somehow, Jess and I had become friends. We soon found ourselves at the airport saying a tearful goodbye. I wouldn’t miss sharing a room with her, but I would miss her. Sober her. Despite all the sketchy situations, I am glad we ended up roommates, and I can honestly say, I haven’t come across anyone quite like her since, and I highly doubt I ever will again.