Day 8. Mile 1300. Nashville, TN

I woke up in Kenova, and it took me a few minutes to recall how that happened. Then I checked out from my room. Did you know that more than half of the motels in the US are owned by Indians? The ones from India, not the other ones.

I started driving into Kentucky. The landscape changed as soon as I crossed the border. I was now driving through farms, endless green fields and many, many cows. They were walking around freely and happily, just waiting for their day to partake in Wendy’s glorious enterprise.

Then I saw a sign on a fence of one farm that said “used cows”. This made me quite upset. I mean, that’s not very specific, is it? If it says “used car” or “used toothbrush”, I have a very good sense of what that means. A cow, on the other hand, can be used in a variety of ways - was it milked? maybe they harnessed a plow to it?  I don’t think I should be forced to stop the car, back into the driveway, look for the farm owner and start asking questions that make me look like a maniac just to find out that the cow has been used in fashions that prevent me from making use of it in the future.

But it’s really pretty, and green, and wide open. 

Then I found myself in Paris, KY. It’s a cute little town. I stopped for lunch at the Grey Goose. The manager told me that the whole area is home to cattle and horse breeding businesses, and many important horse races are taking place, one of the biggest ones at that very moment. 

I left Paris, again (ha ha) and drove on to Nashville. I got a room at the Savoy Motel and left to the city, to get food and beer and music.

Parking my truck was not easy, but then came Walter. tall, black, very nicely dressed young man who jumped in front of the truck and spent long, long minutes helping me to get the truck parked right. When I got out of the truck came the story - he’s a veteran, his wife is giving birth as we speak in the next town, he can’t get there since his car is in the parking and he’s eleven dollars and 72 cents short. And he was crying.

You know those times when you know you’re being fucked but you feel like it’s just your destiny?

Oh, you don’t. Well, I do. I gave him the money. Well, he did help me with parking, and if he made that story up - he was a very good writer, actor and producer. They should start giving awards to hustlers. I nominate Walter.

Then I saw five middle-aged women holding their out-of-control friend to the ground. a few feet from there, another one smashed her own head into the streetlight pole. Ah, America, I missed you

Then I went to Broadway street, which as I later discovered is also referred to as “Honky Tonk Row”. This is where the best shows are in Nashville.

All the bars have free music shows. At some point one of the band member will come down to the audience with a bucket and ask for tips. Taking the word of one of the performers, this is how they actually make their living.

I spent the rest of the night hopping around five or six clubs, getting beer and listening to some really good bands. I might have even slipped a “amen” or a “yeehaw” every now and then.

Day 20: We made it!

What do you know - it worked. We live in Paris.

We landed in Paris at about 6AM. We got our luggage by 7AM. Our landlord is away for a vacation, but he gave his friend the keys and emailed us his phone number. We called the friend from the airport with Skype. Unfortunately, the guy doesn’t speak English very well, but I managed to communicate to him that we’re on the way to the apartment. He, on the other hand, said he’ll be there at 10, which meant we’d be stuck outside the apartment for a while, and all my attempts to convince him to come earlier were blocked - I’m not sure whether by the language barrier or his laziness.

We got to the apartment at about 8, and even though we were exhausted we had to wait for him for two hours, with our luggage, in the middle of the street. Eventually, he arrived, and little earlier than expected.

So here we are. We don’t have air conditioning, we don’t have an oven, but if you stick your head out the window, you can see the Eiffel tower. I really can’t believe we made it. Julia starts working on Monday, and I’m supposed to start in the beginning of the month. No more “Person on the Road” for a while. I might post updated in the future, maybe on a different blog. I really don’t know -  so thanks for following so far, and stay tuned.

Day 18: Passports!

We woke up for the day of our flight, still no passports in our hands. The tracking showed that my passport has left Ellicott City’s post office, and Julia’s passport has left the post office in Baltimore.

Julia drove to her sister’s house in Baltimore to wait for hers, while I stayed in her parents’ house waiting for mine.

Express mail is guaranteed to arrive by noon. At half past twelve I was already engaged in a pointless conversation with the post office (me: “where is the envelope that I was supposed to get by noon?!”. Lady: “sir, we just got it today!”).

I called Julia, to see how she was doing, and as we were both sighing on both sides of the line, she started yelling “somebody just knocked on the door!”. A minute later she called me and reported live the opening of the envelope and the revealing of the visa page in the passport.

She came back to her parents’ house and we had lunch with her parents who were working from home in order to take us to the airport, but it was already two o’clock, and my passport’s location was still a mystery. In an act that I interpret as “I can handle my daughter leaving, but not leaving her terrible boyfriend in my house”, Julia’s mother called the post office and started yelling at them. Turns out that the envelope was left in their mail box. Julia and I ran outside and obtained my passport. Let me say this one last time: we had the two passports six and a half hours before we were moving to another continent.

So I’m writing this from the airport in Washington DC, and we fly in one hour. We stop in Iceland for an 18 hours layover. The plan is to rent a car and drive a little bit, and then continue to France. We can’t believe we made it. Really, we can’t.

There are, however, two more days of adventures until we finally settle down in our new home in Paris. Stay tuned.

I will leave you with something to think about – take a look at the sign for the chapel house in the airport. Is it just me, or does this sign portrays a child preparing to give a blow-job?