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Sep 17 2009

The Montambo Incident – A travel story

I call this the Muntambo incident. The incident sometimes bubbles up to my conscious and out of subconscious. I am left with the question of where is Muntambo?

The event took place during the summer of 2004 on a train ride from Italy to Spain. The ride was horrible, there is no other word to describe it. Why on Earth would you take a 28 hour train ride from Italy to Spain when you can fly there in an hour for about the same cost? Well, that’s called an improper seat of your pants amateur backpacker mistake. There was no reason why, that’s the answer.

I don’t think it was until I got on the train that I understood how long the ride was going to be. I believe I said something like this to my traveling companion.

Me: “You’ve gotta be kidding me!”

Nick: “28 hours, we are so screwed!”

We got into our compartment, it was actually a sleeper car. Normal cars have two bench like seats facing each other. They aren’t the best for sleeping on but they will do in a pinch. In this compartment they actually converted into beds. Here was the strange thing, there were four beds.

At the ticket counter back in Italy we had to haggle and bard-er, hassle and beg to get the tickets, and we didn’t even speak Italian. People wonder why the rest of the world has a bad impression of Americans. The tickets were not actually part of our Eu-rail pass so we had to pay for them. We were fortunate to get the very last two tickets on the night train.

It soon dawned on us that we were going to have some travel mates. Basically roll the dice. I prayed for beautiful women. If only we were so lucky.

God does not play dice, that’s what Einstein said. I do. I like games of chance. Poker, black jack, dice, you name it. They make life more exciting. The stranger the better. I love a good wager.

I’ve played rock paper scissors and won over 100 dollars. I have also flipped a coins to see what life changing decision I would make: Stay at my Job or go to Australia, stay in Seattle or try out New York. Yes. I know what your saying, how can you change your life via a coin flip? Is this some stupid No Country for Old Men reference? No it’s not, I’ve actually done this, and followed through on it.

In the case of the train ride though, I was not nearly as lucky as I would have hoped. Instead of two gorgeous and voluptuous European women we were instead sharing a cabin with a Moroccan, who looked like had a serious chip on his shoulder, and a Spaniard who looked like a dead ringer for Danny Trejo from the movie Desperado.

I was always wary of pickpockets, thieves, and other unmentionable characters. Europe is not a place for violent crime, just petty theft. It seems to me crime via pickpocketing is much more common than anything really scary. It’s also annoying as hell.

Nick and I both claimed the top bunks. We decided without words it was probably good to get the top bunk and sleep with our backpacks, just in case. The lonely planet fills your heads with all kinds of scams, weird stories and things to watch out for. As a first time traveler it’s a bit daunting. All the things that could possibly be a scam. For all I knew this was a fake train and I was heading into a Serbian jail.

My sleep was interrupted constantly. The train would shake back and forth violently. Also I was having all kinds of paranoid delusions. Thinking up things the lonely planet writers would never have imagined.

The morning approached slowly. The rocking back and forth of the train, almost sickening me in my sleep. Strange dreams of some far off sand dune, I would one day go to.

In my semi consciousness I could see the sunlight stream through the trains curtains. It was almost morning. We were almost in Spain. I could almost taste the sangria.

The door burst open. Confusion. Utter confusion. Shouting in a language that I have a very limited knowledge of.

“Donde Esta Montambo?! Donde Esta Montambo!” The transit cop was yelling at me. His gun was drawn and pointed right at me.

Talk about a wake up call. Sweat was pouring down his face, he seemed as nervous as I was. He kept yelling the same thing.

“Montambo! Donde Esta Montabmo?” he screamed. What was he saying.. wait, Where is Montambo?

I couldn’t think, what I did, I did automatically. If I wasn’t Montambo, and my friend wasn’t Montambo. That can only leave a two people in the compartment who are possibly Montambo.

I pointed to the bunk below me at the Morracan with the chip on his shoulder. There sure enough, hiding under his covers like a child during a thunderstorm was Montambo.

The transit cop had his man. He pulled Montambo out of the sleeper car. As he was being pulled away, Montambo looked at me right in the eyes and glared.

You know how Bush said he looked into Putin’s eyes and saw his soul. Well it was something like that kind of a moment for me with Muntambo.

I’ve never seen Montambo again. Yet, somewhere, in some country, Montambo is plotting his revenge. If you ever see me looking over my shoulder now you know why it’s because I don’t know where Montambo is…

By Dermoney • Uncategorized • 0 • Tags: Travel Stories