Dateline: 18.20 31 Aug 1996
Location: Divac^a-Venezia, IC 242 Kras
Of
all the passport checks I've endured in the past few weeks - trust me,
I'm a veteran by now - none have been as excruciatingly long, boring, or
stupid as ths one here at the Italian-Slovene border, Italy's side. We're
up to half an hour now (and counting), during which every passport and
visa in the train was checked twice, first by frontier guards, then
by carabinieri. This might be only to be expected on a train carrying a
large number of Romanians, Hungarians and similar undesirables (from the
state's point of view), but not only are these aliens examined under a
microscope, but authentic Italianos are interrogated at length as well.
Oddly enough, my Finnish passport was handed back after a very cursory
glance, in much less time than the interrogation of the Italian sitting
opposite me. Go figure. What they hope to achieve with this process is
beyond me, since anyone with a valid tourist visa will get in the country
whether they harbor nefarious intentions or not. Neither does it make a
very good impression on tourists like me, never mind the timetable; before
this stop the train was already a whopping hour and a half late. (Poor
me almost ran back from the caves to the station, because I thought I was
going to miss the station. Well, at least I had time for an extraordinary
bowl of goulash at Divac^a's only restaurant.) And I thought IC trains
prided themselves on their punctuality... not to mentio efficiency, Mr.
Conductor has walked past me twice now and has yet to ask for my ticket.
I'm not sure if there's a supplement on this train; if yes, the current
situation suits me just fine.
Trieste Centrale... although that probably should be
spelled "triste". This place looks like an iron-smelting town in Romania,
but they've managed it without Czech chic communism. OK, perhaps I exaggerate
a little, but I would still not be surprised to find that Slovenia's standard
of living is higher than Italy's. I hope Venezia is a bit better than this.
The day's budget
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