chapter 8 : côte d’azur.

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it’s december already?! time for the mother of all clichés: time really flies. this time of the year is always exciting for me, holidays, christmas, new year, my birthday! 3 punch-jabs of festivities. but this time round might be more special, since it will mark a year since i have been living in switzerland, and more significantly, living a brand new lifestyle. without realising it myself, my life has changed a great deal, learning one of the most difficult languages in the world from scratch up to the level i am in now (it’s not perfect, but i try), having no school, having to find friends and acquaintances in ways that i have never done before, new weekly routines, and getting my first job. kaapoow! (–>is that an appropriate sound effect?!) well, it’s not the time for reflection yet, gotta get this series done. in the meantime, enjoy the christmas trees creeping up all over the place and the snow flakes gliding down in your screen as you’re reading this. (do you know you can change its direction with your mouse pointer?! –>easily impressed)

after a long two-legged train ride on the speedy train à grande vitesse, we arrived in nice. and i tell you what, it was fucking hot out there! feels like i am back in jakarta, just more beautiful. (side note: i love jakarta’s ugliness!) it was not simple to get up to our hostel, we needed to take a tram to get to a shuttle pick up point, where we then needed to wait quite a while for the shuttle bus to come. a lot of planing was then required to get in and out of the city centre, and being back for the last shuttle bus became a necessity. but once we arrived at the place, it was actually quite nice.

i then went on a lone walk. this is one thing that i realised about myself, my curiosity of a new place borders being a mental disorder. it appears that i don’t like not knowing the way and direction, and every corner of the road just intrigues me. that might be the reason why i spent long hours in many cities that i visited just walking around without any destination or purpose. i seldom get lost, but i like it when i do, cos then i get a better feel of the place, and it improves my sense of direction. and while we are in the topic, i like the europeans old towns, cos they do not have a dead-end, despite looking all jumbled up and unorganised. back to the walk: i just picked a direction and kept walking forward. it was quite easy to orientate cos the hostel is on a hill, and nice is a very hilly place, and you can always catch a glimpse of the beach. i saw on my walk, a monastery, a big garden, some ruins of the historical types, and lots of big expensive villas. however, there are also stretches of areas that are quite run down. the main source of entertainment for people here seems to be a nice expensive dinner, drinks, and partys, there are no decent cinemas or any other mainstream entertainment centres to be found. but i was on the square in the centre, and there were actually a lot of spectacles to be seen, apparently street artists thrive in nice, and their skills were well above mediocre. then, a turn to a corner of the road brought me to the best part of that evening, it led me to the pier. it was at that moment in time and space, that i decided, that my definition of rich would be having a kick ass yacht. i actually spent some time hanging around the pier, thinking about the kind of yacht that i would get, if a billionaire would give me a lot of money for no particular reason. and you can only realise it once you are up close, yachts are fucking huge. they can fit the whole of my extended family both in indonesia and switzerland, and we would still have ample places. at the end i got distracted by one thing though, just as a huge wooden sailing ship actually docked at the pier. then i decided, i would rather build myself a ship and name it black pearl, like a boss.

the next morning we went to tour the city centre of nice with some other hostel guests led by the manager of our hostel. the sea is gorgeous by the way, if you have not figured yet. blue as far as you can see to the horizon. however, the beach in nice is not sandy, but instead stony, and that’s the reason why people go to other beaches if they wanna spent a lot of time on the beach. the fruit market in the city centre should really be checked out, it was just too colourful to miss. then we took a bus up to eze, where a mini village is situated on top of a hill that oversee the beach, the old buildings on the peak of the hill is a wonder if you ask me, just imagine how the people in the middle ages brought all the materials up there to build all those, that’s what you call a shitty job. and there was also this perfume shop, where you can ask for a tour around the mini museum and factory, the informations were in french though, could not understand a thing.

then the trip went further, this time, a bus ride brought us from eze to monte carlo. talk about high life man. first destination: no other than the casino! sadly though, the old casino building has been modified to be an opera of some kind, and we could only enter if we would sell ourselves to pay for the entrance fee. maybe they have some high stakes gambling going on inside. in front of the entrance to the building though, luxury cars line up like shoes on a rack. i try to stay metres away, knowing that a scratch on that mc-laren f1 would cost me much more than all the money i’ve seen in the whole of my life. but then there is a casino for the laymen, in a building adjacent to the old casino. unlike the ones in singapore, i could already go in and gamble, woohoo. at first i didn’t want to though, i was just looking around, but then some gleaming lights in front of my face gave me no other choice, they have and-i-am-not-shitting-you star wars slot machines!! i took out a 5 euro note out of my wallet (see how stingy i was), put it into the machine, it gave me some credit to start playing, and i just pressed a button that sends the imaginary barrel on the screen spin around. i could not understand a thing, at the end of the turn, there were just pictures of the millennium falcon, jar-jar binks, r2-d2, wookies and darth vader scattered around. the lack of any conceivable pattern meant that i lost money on that turn, which repeated itself in the 2nd and the 3rd and the 4th turn. i almost lost all of my money, but then i thought, what the hell, losing 5 euro in a casino would already be a cool enough story. however, just after i used my last spin, the machine found a strange-looking pattern that gave me 5.6 euro! what the crap, i am actually winning money in a casino! who the hell bloody cares if it’s 60 cents. i then cashed out from that machine, which meant that the machine printed me a coupon from which i could get my winnings on the counter. however, just as i was walking towards the counter, i saw this old-school looking slot machine with a lever, and i was really tempted to try, just pulling the lever. so i thought, i was content with losing 5 euro in the star-wars machine seconds ago, i might as well lose the 5.6 euro in this slot machine. then i inserted the coupon to this machine and it then also gave me some credit to play, and i was just pulling the lever like a kid in a toy store. this time around, it actually took a lot more turns for me to actually almost lose all of my money. and then on the last pull, i shit you not, i fucking got 10 euro from that one turn. as the prophet charlie sheen said: i am winning! then the same thing happened, i ask the machine to print out the coupon, walked in the direction of the counter, but then there it stood, a f-ing blackjack table. i was scared as shit to join the table that i almost peed in my pants, the people there look so composed, cool and professional. i called for back-up. dee then came to stand beside me at the table. the minimum to join the table was 10 euro and that was all that i got. the first turn was really make it or break it, win or go home. the dealer then dealt the cards, instantly it became clear to me that i suck balls in addition and blackjack, i was taking so long to think about my cards and the next step. however, out of some miracle, i won the first round, and with that doubled my money. i was such a wuss, and that’s why i only put in another 10 in the next turn, and in this turn i was still very slow at making decisions, until dee was shouting instructions beside me, telling me what to do, but it bloody paid off, i won again on the 2nd turn. after that, i was just following dee’s instructions for the subsequent turns, and i won the 3rd, and again the 4th, and again the 5th. megakill! then i made a pact, the first time that i lose, i would leave the table. i still won the 6th turn, but lost the 7th, and i really did went away, with some playing chips on my hand worth 60 euro. crap. from almost losing 5 euro to winning 60, i ended up winning and going home at the same time. literally, like a boss!

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then we also went to see the palace of the furst of monaco, but it was closed for the wedding preparation. but it wasn’t for naught, cos we actually found a yellow submarine in the area, just in front of the monaco’s version of the seaworld, and took one of the few pictures in which i am featured in on the trip. côte d’azur is a very beautiful place, adjectives fail to describe. and really suitable for people wanting to taste the thrill of a jet set life. i will definitely go again to check out other beaches such as cannes and st. tropez. one of the highlight of my trip.

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