International Me (& DPO) vs DANGER

Grade 12 Eurotrip. Amazing! Crazy 10 day tour! Madness. Awesome except for one scary night, although it was quite funny. We were a big group of St. Matt’s Tigers, combined with many other school’s big groups. One night, some of the hotel reservations didn’t go through. Being that we were St. Matt’s Tigers, we were the ones that had to find another hotel. We toured the town, I think it was Cannes, all through the day. At night we dropped the others off at their hotel. It was stunning. It was beautiful, the nicest hotel I’ve ever seen. We rallied to stay there. No no said the teachers. Sad. We left. Our tour guide Fabritzio started walking us to our ‘hotel’. It was far. We walked through all of these dark little alleys that he called ‘shortcuts’. There was drug paraphernalia lying on the ground. We walked around all these sad people. One kid had a panic attack (it was unrelated), so we had to slow down. Then, we arrived. It was horrible. It was no better than the alleys. It was what Mister Giggles once called a ‘helltel’. Ew. I feel icky just thinking about it. The teachers got us checked in and ‘settled’. Then, they told us to not open the door at all. Way to spread the scared. I’m so thankful that it was always 4 to a room. Easier to laugh. Everything was dirty. Sheets were ew. Floor under the bed had things and creatures. We stood in a huddle in the middle of the room. Then, we noticed the window. It was open and led out to an area that had old mattresses and further drug things. The creepiest part… there was stuff piled on top of more stuff, building a staircase to our window. Ew. We freaked. We weren’t allowed to get a teacher, no opening the door for us. Finally, I decided to go out the window and destroy the stairs. I was held and hanging out, throwing stuff to further corners of the ‘courtyard’. Finally, it was done. We cheered in victory. Then, logic slapped me in the face. Just because we couldn’t reach the stuff anymore didn’t mean a person on the ground couldn’t rebuild. Sad and useless non-victory for us all. We didn’t sleep, but still, Europe!