It is 10:42 am. We – including our train – are on a ferry between somewhere in Denmark and somewhere in Germany. The train we are on (or, more specifically, above, at the moment) is about an hour late.
I am drinking a beer. At 10:42 am. The beer is also about an hour late. Maybe two or three.
I do not drink beer in the morning. Seriously. Ever.
However…
After a totally uneventful trip from Stockholm to Copenhagen last night, I was pretty well convinced we’d have a smooth start to the morning.
HAH HAH BLOODY HAH.
So.
We stayed last night at the Danhostel Copenhagen Downtown, a newish hostel (in that it is new in its incarnation as a hostel) in an oldish building (in that the faded and scratched up signs in the elevator betray it as a former university building used to house the faculty of archeology) in a rather scenic part of town very close to Tivoli (home of Reptilicus!!!) and the main train station (home, as I understand it, to pickpockets and drug dealers behind the station).
Not all of these parenthetical facts are important, but some of them are.
The hostel advertised itself as some sort of weird art-and-culture hostel,
hosting artists-in-residence and having its own cafe and bar where people from all different backgrounds could meet or whatever. I didn’t really care except that I thought it might be noisy, because what we really needed was a cheap(ish – this is Scandinavia) place to stay where we could catch our 7:42 am train to Hamburg. The “art” aspect, outside of some strange figures painted on the walls of the stairs, seemed mostly absent. We think we found it this morning, but cannot be sure (more on that later).
The hostel’s elevator was old and scary, the rooms were mostly clean, and the bathrooms were very, very poorly designed. Check-in was at the bar next door, though this was not clearly labelled, and our window looked out over a scenic courtyard filled with dumpsters and bicycles (situational “art”? we still couldn’t tell…), and it was a good six steps up to get into the scary elevator box of doom, a typical old elevator with a push door to the outside, and inner door that closes behind it. (Note: I don’t mind these elevators at all, but I do mind them when they have a sort of Alfred Hitchcock quality to them…)
To be honest, our night there was uneventful. We were able to find some baby formula which seemed a lot more pleasant for Torsten, we went for a short walk in the neighborhood in the (yay!) rain, and we got to sleep at a reasonable hour after some ice cream. (As an aside, it’s sort of fortunate that we never bothered to get Danish kroner, because it kept me from sitting downstairs drinking beer and writing instead of getting some sleep, etc.)
The morning wasn’t all that eventful, either – we got up at the buttcrack of dawn to shower, pack up, and get Torsten ready, and had intended to be out by around 6:15 am until we discovered that our train for Hamburg left the train station at 7:42 instead of 7:16 as I may or may not have told Christian (I vote for “not” 
), so we probably got out of the room closer to 6:50, which was way more time than we needed to walk to the station, even with all our stuff.
You totally know where this is going, but you totally still won’t believe it.
Christian went into management mode when we were carrying bedding/baby/baggage out, which is generally fine with me, since I usually push Torsten and carry some of the lighter baggage, and he pulls the heavy diaper bag and the RED SUITCASE OF DOOM™ along with his laptop and backpack. He sent Torsten and I down with a few light bags to await his trips down the elevator and watch over our stuff.
<BEGIN PERFORMANCE ART PIECE>
Torsten and I arrived downstairs without incident, rolling out of Ye Verye Verye Olde Elevatore Thingie and down the stairs to await husband and stuff.
Time: 7:06 – Progress: Excellent.
Noise, from above, echoing down the stairs…
Krista???
Shout, up the stairs
Yup?
From above…
I’m stuck…
From below…
Um… what do you mean, stuck?
No answer… no answer…
…
I went next door to the bar, having figured out the elevator was stuck, and not, you know, Christian in a doorway or something. I’ve been stuck in elevators before – usually there’s just a key and the thing gets unlocked and someone lets you out (and you step up or down, depending on where it’s stuck), so I figured… well, crap, we’ll have to run a little, but we’ll make it still without too much stress.
(Note to former UNO students: when I speak lightly of being stuck in elevators, I am NOT SPEAKING OF BIENVILLE HALL. Thank you for your patience.)
Anyhow, I thought… eh, we’ll be on our way soon.
HAH. BLOODY. HAH.
Apparently, Danish law requires that a trained specialist come unlock the
elevator. So the staff call the guy, have no idea when he’ll get there, and the waiting begins.
Time: 7:15 – Progress: Suckfest.
Elevator guy has been contacted, but no answer on when he’ll get there. Staff member comes to offer me coffee in building with elevator and asks where we are going so she can look up train times for subsequent trains. I let her know we are travelling on a specific ticket for a specific train, and can’t just hop the next one. She looks worried and offers me coffee again next door if I want it.
Meanwhile, Christian is trapped in the elevator enjoying the high pitched whining of a motor spinning and going berzerk, which may or may not be better than being stuck listening to Barry Manilow in an elevator.
Time: 7:20 – Progress: AAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaargh.
Christian asks me (from above, echoing down the stairwell) to take his laptop next door and look up the next train. Initially I refuse, but I’m nervous standing there with the baby, so I go over to do it and then realize I need the root password for his machine, so I can’t do it anyway. And I’m not going back to ask, because the “entrance” to the “cafe” is really just a slab of rock they sort of half-assed stuck in front of the doorway to make a step, and pulling a stroller up it isn’t very easy.
Staff member calls again to tell dude to hurry and informs me he’ll be there in five minutes. She then offers to call us a cab to be paid for on their tab so that we can make our train. I let her know we have no car seat with us, so this might be a problem. She says she’ll call to find out.
Meanwhile, I begin to internally freak out that something will happen to
husband next door stuck in Ancient Elevator of Deathly Delights™. I also worry both about that and the fact that we’ll have no kroner to pay the driver if he doesn’t take credit cards.
There is a lot of worry to go around.
And during all of this, Christian is trapped in the elevator enjoying the high pitched whining of a motor spinning and going berzerk, which is probably not better than being stuck listening to Barry Manilow in an elevator.
Time: 7:25 – Progress:
AAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAArgh.
Torsten is being awesome, in spite of Mama’s fear about the Pleistocene Elevator which has swallowed Papa whole. I become resigned to the fact that we’re probably going to have to buy new train tickets, since we now officially have 17 minutes to be on board our train, and as far as I know, neither the technician nor the cab are there.
The frown comes out in spades, and I play with the baby, because I love him and don’t want him scared too.
Apparently, baby without car seat in cab is fine, which should scare me, but I know it’s a five minute drive. I will feel guilty about this later even though everyone is fine.
Christian, however, is not so fine, being trapped in the elevator enjoying the high pitched whining of a motor spinning and going berzerk, which is starting to sound a lot like being stuck listening to Barry Manilow in an elevator, if Barry Manilow’s naughty bits were caught in a vice.
Time: 7:30 – Progress: Freedom! Also
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Husband appears downstairs in front of the door with bags just as cab arrives.
Great relief. Also huge stress and major doubt that we can catch the train.
Time: 7:35 – Progress: Und los geht’s!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA… ah, you get the idea…
Bags are piled into cab, and husband insists stroller will not fit in trunk even though driver insists. Finally driver tells us he’ll get fined if we have it in the car, we put it in the trunk, and we are on our way with driver driving carefully, baby on my lap held tightly in back, and Christian in front seat. Driver says it only takes five minutes to get to train station (he says this at 7:33), so we’ll be fine.
Yeah, um, fine, except Copenhagen is a big train station, we don’t know what track the train is on, and we have a Torsten, so I can’t really use stairs and escalators.
Time: 7:41 – Progress: OHHHHHHH
SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITTTTT!!!!!!!!!
Inside the train station with all bags and the baby. First, we find our track on the TV monitor. Then we are RUNNING, and of course go the wrong way to our track. Correcting course, Christian screams “OUT OF THE WAY!’ as he barrels down the escalator to our track with the RED SUITCASE OF DOOM™. Woman moves out of the way and waits for crazy woman running behind him with baby carriage. I decide to say screw it and take Torsten down on the escalator.
Christian wedges RED SUITCASE OF DOOM™ into train car doorway so train cannot leave without wife and child (though Danish train personnel will later be discovered to be child-friendly), and at 7:42, Torsten and I are on the train.
*****************
Now, as to this ferry ride, about 3 hours in, where I am drinking beer – it has now been discovered that the train is broken and we are accruing delay because this ICE is now only running on one engine (and passengers have been freaking out thinking the train is on fire, which it is not), but nevertheless, we have made our train.
Unfortunately, this new technical difficuty means we will miss the 15-minute-window we had to meet up with Christian’s other cousin in Hamburg, but we are on our damned train.
***********************
Later…
Fast forward to our next train in Hamburg. Said broken train, which has stopped many times, is ending its journey in Hamburg because it is so messed up. It was supposed to arrive at 12:16. It eventually gets into the station at 13:40.
Our connecting ICE to Wuppertal leaves at 13:46.
Run, run, run.
Because, you know, we arrive on track 6 or something, and we’re leaving on track 14.
Why?
Because that’s life.
Run, run, run.
Pant, pant, pant.
Pant, pant, pant.
We made this train too, and got to endure some woman giving us nasty looks every time we talked to/played with Torsten for the whole trip. I really wanted to stare her down, but, eh… she was scary.
Fortunately, the last leg of our trip was uneventful, and we got in to Wuppertal without incident, but holy crap.
<END PERFORMANCE ART PIECE>
Torsten was fine during the whole thing, mind you. Not to say the few completely-unfriendly-to-children Germans on our trains were fine, but Torsten didn’t care, and the Danish train dude came and yelled at people who were trying to tell us it was a quiet area when it was not (many of whom were complete dicks and are the reason Germany is known as the least child-friendly country in Europe.). Thank you, train people of Denmark.)
Anyhow, we’re in Wuppertal, everyone is safe, I am tired and packing and doing laundry for my trip tomorrow, and Christian is not allowed to go near anything mechanical again ever. (Btw, the thing that was broken? Just a belt that allowed the inner door to open and close. Stupid belt.)
As an aside, I can totally recommend the staff of the hostel we stayed in – they worked really hard to get us to the airport – but seriously?
Stay away from the damned hostel itself.
Professional computer geek and linguist living in Germany, doing infosec stuff and being the freakiest mother ever.
