Hostal Doña Lupe - luxury!

So, having already paid for two nights, I got up early and spent the morning looking for somewhere else to live. While I hadn't actually bought a guide to the city, I had at least had the wit to do a bit of research in the library. I checked out a couple of the other hostales nearby before looking up the address I had brought with me - the cheapest (but highly recommended) hostel in the Let's Go guide. It was about as far away as you could get and still be in the same city. Up a very big hill.

I gathered up my kit (I had FAR too much stuff - learned that lesson the hard way!) and trudged across town. Don't think I even said goodbye. Nor did it occour to me to get a bus or taxi; not so much out of the heat affecting my brain as just being overcome with the strangeness of it all.

And this is where I ended up:

a bad night

So, I had decided I was too poor to invest in a Let´s Go! of my very own, but had the good sense to copy out the details of the most likely looking cheap accommodation in Granada. What I hadn´t rekoned with, however, was that the bus might arrive at about 3am. Nor had I yet learnt that the bus station in european cities is always in the dodgiest part of town.

Naturally then, when a complete stranger offered to take me to his "hostel," I chose to ignore that he was a rather shifty-looking and dirty old man and went home with him. I´ve since found out that those who tout accommodation around bus and train stations are usually doing so illegally and are not properly registered or whatever; to be honest, though, I´m not really likely to be tempted again anyway - I think I learnt my lesson! Memory suggests, in a rather non-specific way, that both the stranger and his establishment were somewhat unpleasant and frightening. The six dirty bunk beds crammed into the tiny room, the heat and the noise - dogs barking, glass breaking and couples copulating - well, it was all just a bit much after three days on a bus.

Granada

Looking back, I was terribly innocent and overburdened. I had persuaded myself that I would look for work and stay indefinitely, not considering that Granada already had a student population of about 50,000 and certainly didn't need any more seasonal unskilled labour. Oh, and I don't really like working that much anyway, so when an opportunity didn't just fall into my lap, I kinda gave up on the work idea.

I busked a bit, without much success. So carrying the guitar all that way was a bit of a waste of time then...

Dale limosna mujer...

... que no hay en la vida pena como la de ser ciego en Granada.

So, I was 18 years old. I was meant to be doing a six-month placement teaching English to schoolkids in Spain, and it didn´t work out because the guy in Spain had taken a sabbatical without telling anyone else in the organisation. Typical.

So, what to do? Sit around moping? Instead, I sold my possessions and got on a bus (no easyJet then!) to Granada. That´s a long way on a bus...