day five - reggio, here we come!

we had our usual breakfast on the main floor of our hotel room again this morning. This time, we took our time since we didn't need to be at the train station until just after noon. A decision was made the night before that we would be commuting to the train station by taxi. 15 euros later, we were there waiting to board. The signs were so confusing. There were two trains leaving for Reggio at around the same time as stated on our tickets. Luckily or unluckily a lady wearing a blue blazer, with no red stripe, no name card and with her fly down and a piece of her shirt sticking through the hole, helped us. After being rejected by two other train information workers, we were desperate and really didn't want to miss our train to Reggio - the purpose of our trip. So this lady came up to us and asked if we needed help. Since no one else was helping us, we leeched onto her. As travel savvy as Nat and I are, we quickly realized that there was something fishy. Like I said, she had no red stripe on her jacket and no name card was the first give away but the really big one was that she was actually helping us! She's the one who seeked us and not the other way around! She was even helping Nat carry her suitcase. As much as her shoulder appreciated the help, Nat decided that it would be much safer to carry her own. She helped us lug our suitcases up onto the train, directed us to our seats and even waited till we caught our breathe before hitting us up for 5 euros each! Yes, she was nice and really helpful but really? 5 euros? I think she deserved something but not 5 euros each. I saw Nat reaching for a 5 and made an excutive decision just to split the lost of the 5 euros instead of 10.

The train ride this time wasn't too bad for me. No gravel needed! So, what did i do for 6 hours on this train? I ate some chips, had a Fanta, ate a quarter of Nat's sandwich, listened to my ipod, took a power nap...but the most entertaining and time consuming event was catching Natacha sleeping on the train! On the plane ride here, she had taken a picture of my sleeping habits on the plane - awkward position with a black toque. So i thought we had the same type of humour and that she would appreciate me recording such events as these. I took many good ones! My favourite one (and again i will post visuals once i figure out how!) was when she had her mouth wide open and the passenger next to her looked identical. They were both busy catching flies! Pay back is going to be a bitch but luckily Nat forgot her camera charger so no pay back this time!

Finally we made it to Reggio and am happy to report that we skipped taking a taxi to our hotel from the train station as it was only about a 10 minute walk... so tomorrow begins the first day of this infamous Reggio Emilia study group. I'll report back soon!