Portugal, Spain, Serbia

A few years back I decided to do sort of a test run of what I am doing now and flew to Lisbon, Portugal with not having any plans or anything lined up. Once I hopped off the plane, I roamed the streets until I found a hostile, I believe by using the helpful app called Hostile world. This is what helped get me through my travels most of my time in Europe. It was honestly one of the scariest experiences for me just to get on the plane, because I had no clue what in the world I was doing. I was so nervous about the whole situation I puked like 5 times before I even left for the airport. Portugal ended up being so much fun and had so much for me to try and see. The first thing I did was try a Portuguese cuisine which was a Big Ole plate of sardines, body, eyes, and all. Boy oh boy have I never been soooooo disgusted in my life haha. One of the fun things about the situation was I had no idea how to eat them, so I had the server show me how to cut and debone the fish. It actually wasn't too bad, definitely not the most appealing thing that I've ever eaten, but I still tried to finish them all for the heck of it. There was an Argentinian lady at another table who had a hoot watching me. We ended up bonding over the meal, speaking with our hands and a little bit of Google translator which was my first successful interaction when it came to language barriers. These interactions happened a few times, such as when I was sitting at a local restaurant, I became best friends with these gentlemen who were impressed with the size of the beer that I was drinking. So, I invited them over and they dug their hands in my Paella which I wasn't expecting to happen, but thought it was hilarious. We even shared a little bit of the food with a local bird that we found, but same situation, we spoke completely different languages and became best friends by the end of it. Which shows that even if you can't communicate through voice, you can still find ways to get the point across.

I ended up staying in Lisbon for a while because I wound up finding so many fun things to do there. I became friends with a ton a people from the hostiles. I also ended up learning how to use the trains so that I could head to the beach where I'd either try to play beach volleyball or relax. One of my highlights being in Portugal was meeting a crazy bastard named Ryan from Ireland. This man could drink until the break of dawn which is what we did some nights swapping stories between one another and the hostile bartender who was also fricken amazing. Home boy aka (the hostile worker) gave us free beers the whole night the one time we all hung out because he admired our stories and our lives which was a pretty cool moment. Becoming friends with the locals is definitely the way to go which is why I am pleased I did this adventure alone because it made me have to get out of my shell and talk to people. One of the fun locals I met was named Claire and she would take me to all the fun local bars. There was a bar ran by these crazy huge bartenders who thought that I was hilarious, probably because they would call me over and pour bottles of liquor straight into my mouth... It was cuckoo bananas. If you go to Lisbon, Pink Street is where you want to party at night, it gets SOOO lively there. Pink Street also had one of Lisbon's most interesting clubs with a bunch of sex toys all over it which was totally wild to me, and I was very fascinated by everything. It wasn't a successful club night if I didn't find a stripper pole to try to jump and swing around which is totally what I did.

After a couple weeks in Lisbon, it was finally time to meet up with a familiar face of mine, my friend Tony who grew up in the same city as me. Tony is a kickass world traveler who has been all over, and he decided he wanted to find and meet up with me which was pretty sweet if you ask me. It was really fun having Tony with me, we ended up traveling out of Portugal together and went to one of the most beautiful beaches I've ever seen in the world which was in Lagos. We were only there for a few days; it was really cool walking around the town because all of the artwork graffitied around the city was memorizing. However, the beach was also one of the best parts of Lagos with its sapphire blue water. After a decent amount of exploring the edges off the ocean we came across a nude beach. Now you may call me old fashion but looking back at it that situation, I regret not letting it all hang for just a little bit. I feel like that would have been such a free feeling moment to have so next time I come across a nude beach I am going to face my fear and let my Willy Wonka free. Also, another thing we ended up doing when we were out and about was, we got more sardines (So Round 2 for me... yay) and other crazy big whole fish for lunch. I was extremely excited to show Tony my skills that I learned when I first got into Lisbon from that server who taught me to debone at my first restaurant in Europe. Now, one of the wild things that Tony had me do is eat one of the fisheyes because it's supposed to mean good luck. This is the sort of stuff I live for because I am the kind of person that's into fear factor opportunities.

Once Tony and I were done with Lagos, we made our way to Seville which let me tell you was a wild ride all the way up until the end, almost getting robbed twice. So, things were going great in the beginning, it was the back end of the trip that I got to have with Tony, so we wanted to do something that was integrated into their culture which was going to a bull fight arena. Now, at first, I was intrigued with the whole idea because I thought it was going to be a man vs. bull event. However. I realized sadly that wasn't the case and it turned out to be like 10 matadors vs. 1 bull and they would take turns going around stabbing the bull. Now I know Bull Fighting is big in their culture, but I just couldn't stomach it and had to leave halfway through. Things got a little dicey in Spain, the first incident happened after I met this beautiful woman from Croatia at one of the local bars. She took me to this elegant bridge that changed different colors and patterns. It was actually a really nice moment, as we lay on the ground surrounded by people watching the lights, my phone was playing music right by us. Next thing I know this random guy came up to us to say hi, then as he started walking away, I noticed my music stopped playing. I realized home boy stole my phone and I went to go stop him which turned into a whole scene. He didn't speak any English, so I asked my Croation friend help translate which was a nightmare because they started going back and forth aggressively about the situation. The guy kept on saying he didn't have the phone, and we were so close to just giving up and letting him go because it's not like we can just search him. Then, an idea popped up in my head, what if we called the phone. All of a sudden, I noticed worry in his eyes as I heard the phone ring in his pocket. He gave me back the phone and I told the thief that I better not ever see him again, then tried giving him one of those "'or else" looks which I probably totally botched.

The next incident happened like a week after and this time it was somewhat my fault because I put myself in the sketchy situation. So, there was this grocery store that I went to one day to get a rotisserie chicken for diner. While I was munching that bad boy down, I noticed some street kids playing this crazy game on a cardboard box with people surrounding them. Money is being thrown around every which way having me realize this was some form of gambling for them. Eventually, I got done watching them and went about my day. Later on in the day I decided to go back to that area because I wanted some "Bugles" which I knew were at that local grocery store. I decided to find the sketchiest bench out that night so I could sit down and eat my snack and drink a beer, oh I forgot to mention this was at around 2am. While I was sitting there, I felt a presence behind me, so I got up and turned around really quick in pure panic. Two men were trying to go into my bag on my back, so I stood up and threw my beer at one of them. I recognized them, it was 2 of the gamblers from earlier that were sitting around the cardboard box. All of a sudden, I started booking it when out of the corner of my eye, I see 2-3 more hoodlums chasing me from different directions. Now I don't think I have ever sprinted so fast in my entire life, because this was probably in the top 5 for scariest moments ever. I ran, and ran, and ran, for about 30 minutes until I realized that I got away, it was a good thing I did track in high school for moments like these. Well, everything would have been a fine and dandy if my phone didn't completely die on me, which was even more of a nightmare because now I am lost. After wondering the streets for hours and hours I finally recognized a clock tower which led me back to the hostile I was staying at.

Just when I thought I couldn't have any more fun in Spain, my very last night I went to the train station around 1 am to make my way back to Portugal. The only problem was that I accidently bought the wrong date for the train ticket, and it was actually for tomorrow. Well, what does one person do so late at night with no room booked to stay? The answer ended up being, finding a park to camp out in for the night. I was so sketched out that the people who tried robbing me would pop back up, so I wanted to try to find somewhere safe. A few nights back I helped this couple stuck in this private park over this tall, spiked fence, by finding a certain area to get over it. I went back to that exact spot so I could easily get over with no stress. I felt like James Bond rolling around and hiding in bushes from park patrol. Finally, after a long search for a spot that couldn't be seen by patrol, I set up camp and rested there for the night. It was honestly hilarious because when I woke up there were a ton of people walking around me venturing through the park.

After Spain, I continued my travels returning back to Portugal and went to check out the capital of Port wine, "Porto, Portugal". Now this place may very well be one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen in my entire life. It looked like everything came straight out of a fairy tale there. After coming back from one of my jogs I met this Australian named Sam. First thing he asked was my name and if I wanted to jump off of a bridge today. I said, "Heck yes" and followed him and his other friend Charlie to this extremely high bridge. Now I am a daring guy, but this was kind of extreme with boats driving underneath and the fact that I had no idea what was underneath. I saw these locals doing it for money from everyone which meant that this is kind of a thing that people do. So, I said screw it, faced my fear of heights, climbed up and not only jumped once with Sam, but did it again with Charlie so she had someone to go with as well.

Eventually, I made my way back to Lisbon so that I could make my flight to go to Serbia to see my long-lost relatives. A few weeks prior when I first got to Europe, I messaged my family in google translator and made plans to try and find them. So here we are back at the airport that I flew in on to set off on a new side quest of mine. When I was waiting in the airport to leave, I noticed a liquor store and proceeded to buy myself a ginormous bottle of grey goose and some freshly squeeze sunny D from the vending machine. Let me tell ya, I got completely tanked on this plane from this and it turned out to be such a bad idea! Next thing I know after another swig of the Goose cruising on the plane, I hear over the announcement, "now landing in Budapest Hungry" when I'm supposed to be flying into Belgrade Serbia! Now I don't know if I have ever had such a ridiculous "oh shit" look on my face in my entire life than I did at that moment. The worst part was its like 3am and my long-lost family was supposed to be picking me up from the airport! Now I'm stuck try to google translate and explain that they flew me to the completely wrong country. At first, the airline I took was just going to leave us screwed there with no flight or any transportation to take us to our destination. So, me and the Serbians rallied up and made a huge scene until they gave us a bus to Belgrade, meanwhile... I am still completely sloshed for all of this. 2 border stops, 1 bottle of Grey Goose, and 5 hours later we finally made it to my destination to meet my family.

Serbia was such a beautiful place to visit, and it was such a humbling experience being able to meet everyone. My translator was this kick ass relative of mine named Valentine who loved Rocky!! He was around 11 I believe and had so many different crazy skills between fencing, dancing, and playing piano, it was so impressive. He was able to speak such better English than most of the people I met there. Alot of the kids knew English because they teach it in schools now, which they didn't use to back in the day. They tried to feed me like 5 meals a day which was crazy to me because I usually only eat like once a day. I kept on trying to explain to them that I kept thinking my stomach would explode if I kept eating more. I don't know if they ever understood what I meant because they would just keep handing me more food! So far things were a success but in traditional Dakota fashion I knew I would somehow accidently get myself in a ridiculous situation, then the water park happened. All the Serbian kids thought I was so cool that I could do flips off the water slide, so I went to do it again with one of their video recorders. Unfortunately, this time I smacked my face at the edge of the water slide and cut my forehead open making all the Serbian kids think they killed the American. I tried telling them that I played football and could take a hit ha-ha, and that I've definitely had worse injuries in the past. I had such a wonderful time in Serbia, I even went to one of their Serbian plays that my family performed in. The coolest part of Serbia was definitely climbing the mountain with remnants of a castle at the top when I was there, the view in general was just insane and so beautiful to take in.

With very little time I had left, I flew back to Portugal and spent the remainder of my days until I had to leave Europe. One of my last friends that I made on my travels was a man who I met at a local restaurant, who turned out to be one of the most gnarly people that I have ever met. We talked about how he took a lot of risks to get where he was then and how he traveled the world. It turned out he lived right across the street from the restaurant and invited me over. Now I've seen all sorts of scary movies, and I know this is usually a bad idea, but I decided screw it, let's see what this is all about. It turned out to be the best idea ever!!!! He grew his own weed which I was able to smoke, then he pulled out like 5 different bottles of liquor for us to swig on. However, the wildest part was that he had a play station for us to play games on. This was so amazing for me because I usually play video games a few times a week at home, so I did miss my pew pewing. After a few hours had gone by with my new friend I said goodbye and took myself back to whatever hostile I was staying in. The rest of my time was filled with Kebab munching and site seeing. The day finally came for me to fly back to the United States, and I was actually really excited to see my dog Roo, and all my friends and family again. I ended up getting a super late flight which I almost missed in pure Dakota fashion because I passed out and woke up 1 hour before my flight took off. It was like those kids were chasing me again in Spain and I was off to the races. Luckily enough I made it to my flight somehow with minutes to spare.