Geneva

There really isn't much here. I got here early in the afternoon yesterday, checked into the hostel, and went sight seeing. I went to the UN European headquarters for a tour, but a huge labor conference inhibited what we were able to see. It was still interesting. I walked around town and found a few places dedicated to Jean Jacques Rousseau, who I admire. I also found the church where John Calvin preached. So I found some of the roots for both my philosophical and religious beliefs in one city. Impressive. That was pretty much it all the city had, though.

I headed back to the hostel to finally check into my room. I met a girl in the reception room who I'll refer as A and who was "looking for something to do [yesterday night]." That should have been my first clue. I went up to my room and met one of my roommates, let's call him M, who seemed pretty cool. I wasn't sure what he was doing just sitting around in the room, though. I put my pack away, and headed back down to the lounge where I found a free wireless hotspot. So I camped there for awhile and uploaded my Interlaken pics. A little later, both M and A showed up on their own. Having heard that there's supposed to be some decent bars in the area, I was hoping to head out and find some of them later, the idea of which I tossed around with these two, who both seemed interested. So we watched The Green Mile, which the hostel was showing at 8. After which, though, they both were "tired" and headed to bed... but not before agreeing to meet at 9:30 this morning. I probably should have just gone out on my own...

I woke up this morning at like 7, got a shower, and headed out to the grocery store for breakfast. M tagged along. I spent the rest of the morning surfing the internet waiting for A to get up. When she finally came down, we checked out and spent like an hour trying to figure something out to do. They had told me that they already saw everything, but I learned didn't visit the UN or see any of the landmarks in town. I don't know what they did all day yesterday, then. After finally locking our luggage up, we finally started wandering aimlessly towards the city center. We walked by the Jet d'Eau, which is a fountain that shoots water 140m into the air. It wasn't on when I came through yesterday. It's kind of cool to watch the water shoot that high. As we kept walking, I felt more and more like I was babysitting and I was ready to move on to a different city. I had to get away from them. So we finally walked back to the hostel and then to the train station, where I got on the train to Bern.

Don't get me wrong, A and M were nice and cool people but neither made for any interesting conversation. And the clingy indecisiveness tended to pull me down to their level, which I kind of resented. I'm sure they couldn't have enjoyed hanging out with me much either. I probably should have just gone off and done what I had wanted more than just be polite and accomodate their (lack of) desires. Oh well, we'll see what Bern has to offer.