Overseas.

For those of you afraid that Ben is spending his overseas trip far too sober, you need not worry.  At 9am this morning it was 1am in Kraków, and Ben was making his way home from a night club.  He was drunk and being escorted by an American girl named Irene.  And for those now worried about his safety, drunk on Polish streets, Irene assured me she was taking good care of him.  I know all this, because I spoke to both of them on the phone at 9:15am.

I didn't gather much of the story, except that when Ben arrived at the hostel they were giving out free vodka shots.  He had three.  Then, at the nightclub, the owner of the hostel bought him beer.  I've never stayed in a hostel before, so I'm not sure if this is a regular hostel happening.  In fact, I have been off this big island only twice, and many years ago.  

The first time was to travel to Tasmania.  I know that this is still a part of Australia, though some would argue very differently.  I have a friend who grew up in Tasmania, and when I was introduced to him many years ago it was with the line "he's a Tasmanian, so excuse anything he does".  This friend is a lovely guy, though perhaps somewhat uncoordinated.  But no more than me, so who am I to judge people for their level of coordination?  We made an excellent pair on the social mixed indoor cricket team we were both members of in high school.  And by excellent I mean hilariously terrible.

Tasmania was our year 9 camp.

We caught the plane there, and spent five nights in five different locations, and five days in a bus being ferried to these different locations.  We stayed in cheap motels and caravan park cabins, and you tried to stay as close to the guy you had a crush on at possible.  Well, I did.  But so did my two best friends, and, unfortunately, we all liked the same guy.

There was one afternoon when the three of us were playing strip poker with him and his two best friends.  We were dressed very appropriately for strip poker, in that we could take off a shoe, then a sock, then an earring, then a necklace...  The boys were not so lucky.  Justin, the one we all liked, kept losing, and it was when he was sitting in just his boxer shorts that one of the teachers banged on the door to tell us that dinner was ready.  Justin lept like a gazelle and landed in the bathroom, closing the door just as the teacher walked in.  The rest of us were sitting innocently, only missing our socks, shoes and jewellery.

Sadly, it was not I who ended up winning Justin's heart that trip.  It was my best friend Michelle.  She had gone the whole trip denying she liked him, yet continued to flirt shamelessly.  Much to my and Lauren's dismay.  We even confronted her one night, saying if she didn't like him then to leave him to us.  That she wasn't being a good friend if she didn't.  She still denied liking him, and still continued flirting.

Less than a week after we returned to school, Michelle and Justin got together.  And were together for about two years.  This didn't stop me from still silently loving him, and staying up until 3am talking to him on ICQ.  Michelle wasn't allowed on the computer at night.  And the fact that he had a girlfriend didn't stop him from staying up until 3am talking to me.  Can you guess what he grew up to become?  I'm very glad I never ended up with him.

My other overseas trip was in year 10.  I went on exchange for four weeks to Germany, as a joint exchange between my school and another school.

The Germans came to stay with us in April.  This meant many parties, and many parties that involved boys from the other school.  At one such party, my friend Belinda fell in love with David.  He too fell in love with her, and they started going out.  They were still going out when we left for Germany in October, and my friends were quite good friends with him and his friends.

One of these friends was Gareth.  It was Gareth who I decided I really really liked, and we flirted shyly for the first week of the trip.  Gareth confessed to David who told Belinda who told me that he also liked me, and so Belinda set to getting us alone as much as possible.

Now this is when the story gets strange.

I had also been spending a lot of time with David, as he was telling me all about how much Gareth liked me.  And Belinda and Gareth were doing the same.  One afternoon in Belinda's bedroom, after I had given her the makeup tip to put masara on after eyeshadow, because if you do it the other way round the eyeshadow dust falls on your eyelashes and dulls them again, we both started talking about David and Gareth.  It was then, somehow, that we both confessed that we liked each others' boys.  We grabbed each others' hands, dancing and laughing and shrieking around her bedroom.  We were going to swap boys!

We decided this without consulting the boys.

However, when we did, they strangely agreed they felt the same.  David became my first boyfriend.  We went out for a week, until I decided I actually didn't like him that much, and he decided he was still in love with Belinda.  Gareth and Belinda went out for about the same amount of time, until Belinda broke up with Gareth because he was too strange.

The logical thing to happen next, would be for Belinda and David to get back together, except Belinda decided that she was instead going to hook up with a succession of German ratbags and drug dealers at various discos and parties.  David was distraught, and at one particular party locked himself in the second story bathroom, threatening to jump out the window if Belinda didn't take him back.  After much drama, he was eventually coaxed out of the bathroom by Belinda, who then told him they were not getting back together again.  She went off and resumed pashing the German drug dealer she'd met that night.  David was sat down, and kept under close watch.  The German hosting the party did not want someone jumping out of their bathroom window.  Their parents would be furious if they got home to find an injured Australian exchange student being taken away in an ambulance.

So those are my two overseas experiences.  I'm quite certain, when Ben wakes up and shakes off his hangover, that he will be able to give you an equally exciting account of his drunken night in Kraków.