Ever since the day I went to Europe, six weeks ago, I have been tired. It started out with the initial jetlag. But during the past three blurred-together weeks, my exhaustion has evolved ever closer to a constant state of dementia. Since June 14, I’ve rarely gotten more than three hours of sleep per night, smoked at least a pack of cigarettes a day, and done immeasurable amounts of damage to my brain, liver and lungs. My mind is numb and I am unable to socialize effectively. The only cure I have is the thought that now I’m 36,000 feet high, flying back to Tucson, merely a drunken pilot and a nosedive away from an icy fate in the North Atlantic Ocean. All of this doesn’t even mention that in just three weeks time, I have come as close as the hair on my chin to getting arrested three times.
My first police encounter occurred in Berlin, a city with more history and more demons than any other in the world. Late on a Thursday night, I was returning from some bars in East Berlin, an eerie place that teems with evidence of the German Democratic Republic (the Soviets) who occupied the east side just 16 years ago. On the east side, all of the buildings are designed in the same completely uncreative style that evokes every notion of communist egalitarianism I have ever envisioned.
Four of us were walking, drunk on whiskey and German beer, on a street where Hitler and Stalin once rallied their forces en masse. This must have evoked a rash of alcohol-induced hallucinatory paranoia into one of my friends. What ensued could best be described as an extreme act of vandalism carried out on a large scale with severe implications for all involved.
In five minutes we met the German Police for the first time. They had reports that four men were walking, smashing in headlights on cars, screaming and yelling, and vandalizing everything in sight. We were definitely caught. In my astute state of mind, I saw two options. I could rat out the perpetrator, and get off clean, but let him sit in jail. German jail all alone for a night. Then who knows what would happen. Criminal charges, deportation, extradition. No, I thought, this is not the time to be a sissy and point fingers. Cops can sense weakness.
My other idea was to lie about it. If they tried to arrest us I decided I would run. A true criminal never admits guilt, never gets caught, and is always cool under pressure. So we summoned our skeleton German skills, and repeated the word “nein” over and over again. The tactic paid off, and eventually they let us go. After becoming frustrated with speaking English, the two Berlin cops ended up fighting each other more than us.
The second close call involved the purchase of an illicit substance, and the third near-arrest involved the use of it. It was the summer solstice party, known in Denmark as “Saint Hans Day,” and I stayed up all night on a beach overlooking the Baltic Sea. At two in the morning, amidst a small crowd of boozers, stoners, campfire guitarists, skinny dippers and other weird people, I got caught red-handed rolling a joint by a couple of Danish police. When I saw them approaching, I threw my hashish up into the air and onto the sand. They tried to find it with flashlights for twenty minutes to no avail. But that was a tense moment for me, one that has yet to really wear off.
Five days later I was still in a daze. After summer school finals, I immediately left for Amsterdam, with no break and going on no sleep. I should have expected that Amsterdam would aid my further collapse. Our hostel was situated in the middle of the red-light district, where on every alley and street corner, women dance in red-lit windows beckoning their next customers, and homeless drug dealers offer an endless supply of cocaine and ecstasy. Coffee shops line the streets, and the smell of marijuana is everywhere. Homeless guys shake you down constantly and manipulate you into a cigarette and some change. Everyone is always messed up.
Despite all of this, which may seem either bad or good depending on which side of the political spectrum you gravitate toward, the city is really amazing. And that’s sort of how I feel about Europe in general. Crazy and potentially life-threatening things happen that make for good stories and interesting experiences.
My plane is nearing the airport now, and a small piece of relief has crept into my brain. I made it home safely, somehow. Now I’ll have a chance to sleep and get back to normal – if it weren’t for that damned jetlag, which has me completely confused and desperate.
Dan Post is an anthropology and ecology senior. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu.