venice is now officially my favorite place on the planet. this is not a whim. the whole of portugal had held the top spot for some six or seven years. but all that changed when i set eyes on venice. i can't adequately explain it. it must be seen firsthand. i felt like i was walking around in some fantasy land, like a set of a movie, where all the façades are cardboard creations that will just fall forward if touched the wrong way. i was elated there, spring in my step and all. a true lightness of being, despite the scorching heat and exorbinant prices. it's the most remarkable city in the world. i had heard as much before, but never truely believed it, especially about there being no cars there. but it was true, it was just canals and boat buses, not a single vehicle made an appearance all weekend. people have garages for their boats. venice is really over 100 little islands and about 400 bridges, many of them leading to peoples' front doors. we walked all over the place, and once passed the emergency room of a hospital, its receiving door opening onto a dock. i saw firefighters whiz by on boats, sirens blaring, lights flashing. it was completely surreal. i only regret that we couldn't enjoy a gondola ride, where i had planned to perform my rendition of madonna's "like a virgin," but the gondalier was charging about 100 euros a ride, so nope. but everything else was incredible. i am still reeling from the experience.

now i'm in barcelona for the last stop of the european tour. i still have to record some thoughts of budapest and vienna, but i don't believe the time i have left in this internet cafe will allow me to do so. but in a nutshell, nothing compared to venice. and i already see that my three favorite places visited during this trip were venice (of course), prague and paris. all three of those cities gave me these little unmistakable chills that let me know i was somewhere very special. all else was great as well, but those were the standouts.

budapest had its moments. it had castles that reminded of disneyland's magic castle, and the parliament building looked like superman's fortress of solitude. the city was similar to prague in many ways, with its fancy bridges and castles on a hill, but it lacked the unassuming beauty of prague. i had always heard that prague was a noir city, but i didn't find that at all. budapest was far more noir, much more dilapidated, certainly poorer -- its people dour. the hungarians were not a friendly lot, which probably tainted the way i received the city. we also didn't have a chance to see much, seeing that the museums were closed on sundays and mondays, the only two days we were there, but i'd love to go back and explore it properly. as it was we took a boat ride on the danube river and got a history lesson from the accompanying audio tour.

vienna seemed like a cross between paris and prague, very western, and just a bit too gaudy for my taste. shit, internet time running out. will try to update later on.