Roma

I arrived in Rome feeling horrible. I was feverish, sweating, chilled and exhausted all at once. I had to find my way from Termini station all the way to some camping site on the other side of Rome, which I was kicking myself for.

I had to get off the train, get on to the metro, get off the metro, walk to the bus stop and wait for the right bus to come. The bus did come, and it was packed. More packed than you would think is possible. I pushed my way on there and stood, feverish and dizzy, crammed against other hot, sweaty, bothered bodies for a half an hour on the bus. It was terrible.

I arrived at the camp site and sat down to eat at the first restuarant I see. I'm shivering in the heat and I order a meat and cheese calzone. The calzone was gross, filled with only cheese and speckles of meat. It was overpriced and nasty and I was pissed. So I left to find my tent to sleep for the rest of the night.

My poor roomate, who was sleeping less than six inches from me, must have hated the fact that he was laying next to a very ill person who wouldn't stop blowing his nose every two minutes and leaving his nasty tissues all over the ground. I went to bed early that night, but not before I ran into Adam from Indiana.

Adam is a guy I roomed with in Paris, stayed at the same hotel with in Nice (without knowing beforehand), and then ran into again here. I couldn't believe this was the third time we ran into eachother over an entire continent. I spent the entire day at the pool with him and a guy I met named Tom from the UK. I just wanted to relax and read my book to get well, so that's what I did.

The next day I did the same thing. I never left the campsite. I met some nice Canadian guys and some girls from the UK and we had a cookout. We had heard about a free Genesis concert downton in Rome, so I convinced everyone to go (this was going to be my first time leaving the campsite in Rome). What a mistake that was going to be.

I'm very particular about my concerts. I like to be there early, see the opening act, be there for hte opening, get a good seat, prepare myself, etc. The other people I was with didn't have this same attitude. In fact, I couldn't get them to leave until 45 minutes before the concert started. That may sound like decent time, but not with Rome's public transportation. So we wait 20 minutes to get the bus, and then get off at the metro, but find the metro closes at 9 (when the concert started) so we had to take a bus. Two buses, and then walk. For every minute that passed, I was getting more and more angry. Genesis, in Rome, for free, and I'm missing it. Everyone else is having a jolly old time walking around two hours after it started...

We finally get there and it's so packed you can't even see the stage. Luckily they had video screens so I just sat down and watched the last few songs. I pretty much missed it and I was pretty much as pissed off as you can get about a concert.

It takes us even longer to get back, so the whole trip was a complete waste. I get back and go straight to bed, regretting I ever attempted to be sociable.

Later that night, I am awoken. Adam tells me that he checked out the day before, and that he needs to sleep on my floor. I told him it was OK, as long as my roomate didn't freak out. So he crawls on the 6 inch space between the beds and falls asleep. I thought that after that I would at least have a good nights sleep...

I am awoken at 3 AM by a loud noise. I listen for a few minutes and determine that it's a group of people making noise. I lay there for a while listening to see if it is going to way and I realize that it's about thirty feet behind me and not going anywhere. I sit up in bed and look out my tent window and see a group of British guys horsing around a picnic table, drunk, being unbelievable obnoxiously loud for three in the morning. I keep watching for a while, waiting for security to show up. It didn't show, so I started to feel like I needed to do something. Just then I hear some girls telling them to stop, and I look again to see guys throwing sheets up on top of a tent. This is bad, I thought. I keep watching and I see a girl walk from down the row past their tents. As she walks by, all the guys start harassing her, calling her some of the worst things you can call a woman. By now, I'm starting to get really bothered by this. They keep getting louder and I keep hearing girls scream at them to stop. Then I see a girl run from a tent, wrapped in a sheet, past all the guys down the road as the guys called her names and taunted her. After she runs down the street, they all start chanting "USA, USA, USA" just to be funny, even though they are from England. That was it. All the anger from the concert comes flooding back and in a rage I grab a sandal and tell Adam "We've got to do something. Now." So I run out of my tent, barefooted, and start yelling at these guys while Adam stands behind me a few feet back, still drowsy. I won't repeat what I said here, but it was about as rough language as you can get. I went on for about thirty seconds before I stopped and waited for them to do something. Half of them stood there, almost dazed by what had just happened, and the other half start laughing. It's one on eight, and I'm obviously not going to physically force them to go to bed. So I just stand there, with my shoe in my hand, ready for action. As I stand there, they all join in taunting me, but at the same time they are all slowly retreating to their tents. I continue just to stand in the road staring at them until the girl in the sheet returns.

"Did you find security?"
"No, I cannot find them." (She has a heavy Dutch accent)
"What happened?"
"Well, they are drunk and our zipper is broken so when we told them to be quiet the came over, threw porn in our tent and peed all over and inside our tent."
"They what? OK. Let's go. We're getting security."

We both walk past the remaining few as they call her a c*** and laugh hysterically. We walk all the way down to the entrance of the camp and I find a security guard and fill him in on what's happening.

"I suppose you're not aware of this, or of what is going on in the camp in general, but some drunken Englishmen decided to urinate all over this girls tent in a drunken stupor"

So he calls for backup and me, the girl, and four security gaurds go up to the tents. Funny thing is, when we get there, they're all quiet in bed. The tents are locked and silent.

"What tent was it?"

The girls says she doesn't know.

"Well, you need to know"
"It's a little tough, you know, when you're getting peed on" I say.
"We cannot do anything unless we have a tent number"

I point to about five tents and say, "all of these".

"Are you sure?"
"Well, it wasn't like I, being one person, could approach eight drunk idiots and ask them what exact tent they are staying in - Perhaps the tents that are locked shut with people in them are it? We all know the coward aren't going to come out now..."

So they tell me they cannot do anything tonight, but that in the morning it will all be resolved. I made sure that the two girls in the tent got a new place to stay for the night, and I helped them pack up all of their things (some soaked in urine) so they could move to a new place.

I gave them my tent number and told them that in the morning they should come get me so we can go to talk to the management. They thanked me and I went back to bed, too pumped full of adrenaline and anger to sleep.

The next morning the two girls that were in the tent, along with the manager, knocked on my tent and told me to follow them. They led me to the tents, and I saw all my old friends from the night before, standing in a line, looking pissed, hungover and confused. The manager turns to me and asks,

"What it these boys"
"Yes"
"You are sure?"
"No doubt"

At this point the coach comes up to me and says,

"I don't mean to call you a liar, but my boys said they didn't do it. They said that they were being loud and someone came out and yelled at them to go to bed and they did."
"Was that before or after these boys decided to take a piss all over their tent?"
"Well, they said it wasn't them."

Can you believe that? Blatant liars. Ugh. What is worse? So I replied,

"So you mean while these boys were horsing around drunk, some stranger just happened to come by and take a pee all over the tent for a good laugh and no one noticed? Do you really believe that?"

"Well, they said they didn't do it."

The manager intervenes and now asks the girls if they are sure if it was the same boys in front of them that peed on their tent and harassed them. They say yes without missing a beat and the manager instantly declares,

"You're out. You're all out. Get out."

The look on all their faces was priceless. A mixture of shock and anger and disbelief all melted together to form an expression that will be forever burned in my mind. Victory.

"All of us? Even those who didn't pee on the tents?" (Now she admits it)
"Yes."

So later that day, the girls bring me a gift for helping them out (some cookies and fizzy water - a backpackers gift for sure) and thank me. They tell me that management upgraded them to a bungalo (that's a house with AC) for free for the rest of their stay (Two weeks!). I told them that it was nothing and that I hoped they enjoyed the rest of their stay.

As I left that day for the train station (to go to Switzerland), I saw them all loading solemnly into the team bus, carrying all their junk.

I couldn't help but grin.