along with some extra underwear and T-shirts. We changed
trains in Paris in some dark, damp, underground station, and
we kept going south. Somewhere outside of Paris people began
exiting and cattle began coming on. There was no food, no
potable water; as the train covered the terrain downhill we’d
get more cows accompanied by a peasant or a peasant family.
I hadn’t anticipated this at al - I, too, had read about the
elegant and mysterious Orient Express. A sweet boy offered
to share his canned Spam with me, but I foolishly declined. It
was a four-day trip from London to Athens, each hour after
Paris more sordid than the one before. I did love the train ride
through Yugoslavia because the country was so very beautiful,
and I promised myself I would go back there someday, a bad
promise nullified by war. I had never been in a communist
country; there were more police than I had ever seen in my
life, and each one wanted to see everyone’s passport and go
through everyone’s luggage. I was easy on that score. I had
one small piece of luggage and nothing more.
While still in Yugoslavia, I began talking with an American
named Mildred. She was wrinkled as if her skin had been
white bread, squooshed and rolled and then left to dry. She
had smudges of lipstick here and there and was very kind to
me. I needed water desperately by the time we reached
Yugoslavia, but I was afraid to run out to the station when the
train stopped because I didn’t know when it would start up
again. I’ve always found traveling by train exhausting and anx-
iety-making. Mildred gave me water or pop or something I
could drink. The cows were in touching distance now, and so
were the peasants, though there were many more cows than
peasants.
Mildred was going to Athens. Someone had stolen al of her
money. She wondered if she could borrow some from me -
what I had would be exactly enough for her to liberate her
things, being held by an irate landlord, and then later that
same day she would have the money wired to her by her son
so she would be able to pay me back. We made a date to meet
in a town square in Athens for the day following our ar ival.
I gave Mildred pretty much al of my money. I had enough for
the YWCA that first night. The next day at the appointed
hour I waited in the square. She never came. The direct consequence was that as it started turning dark I had to find a man to take me to dinner and get me a room. And I would
have to do the same the next day and the day after that. I
