Day 14 Goodbye Amsterdam!

Once we had finally got onto our train we all found a seat, and almost immediately all fell asleep; we were on the train for about two hours before the real trouble hit. The train comes to a station and stays there, it doesn’t just stop for a quick 10-15 minutes like usual. Then an announcement comes on the intercom and says that due to the sever storm yesterday the route from Amsterdam to Berlin is now closed and that there are no trains going to Berlin at this time. The announcement suggests getting off this train and getting on the train on the other side of the platform and riding local trains the rest of the way into the city. As the majority of people were doing what the announcement had suggested Dr.

V decided he didn’t want to do that while leading 50 students, it would have just been way to hectic getting on and off multiple trains with 50 students all while carrying our luggage.  So TnCIS decides that it would be a longer yet safer and less chaotic route to stay on the train, ride it back to Amsterdam and then get a charter bus from there and go to Berlin by bus.Literally so soon as we plan an alternate route and a different way to get to Berlin another announcement comes on the intercom. This one says that there is another train that is going to Berlin and that it is just taking a longer route to avoid the problem area. We are all relaxed thinking “Great now we don’t have to ride the two hours back to Amsterdam before getting on a bus and riding it back for about a 10 hour ride.” Then the announcement says, “This train will be departing in one minute.” One minute! All of our suitcases all of a sudden became empty as we were jerking them off the luggage racks and trampling one another trying to get the train as fast as possible. Thinking that was enough chaos for one day I was relieved until Dr. V comes up to us to tell us the situation of this new train we are about to climb abroad. He informs us that on this train we no longer have our own seats, and advises us to just find a seat and sit down for the time being, but if at any point someone approaches us and tells us we are in their seat that we must get up and move for them. Not expecting what was about to happen I thought, “Okay no big deal we can do that.” No, it kind of was a big deal, only because there actually weren’t that many seats available, and the only space available was in the cargo cart where all the bikes are stored. So yea, I laid underneath a rack of bicycles for about six hours, constantly in someone’s way but with nowhere else to go. We finally arrived in Berlin and to the hostel at around 9 P.M. and we immediately found our rooms and were asleep before our heads could hit the pillow!