Credit Crunch Travel: Are We the Only Victims?
Maria Christina Marchi spots a celebrity in an unlikely place.
Students have been known to travel to the most bizarre places often using exceedingly intricate routes to get there – and this all for a number of very good reasons.
First of all being a student entails one fundamental thing: a constant lack of money to finance anything which could be vaguely unnecessary. Meaning that our meagre budget is of course spent on coffee, an occasional snack… and travelling.
Second of all travelling has to be an experience to boast about. Just think of all those students who embark upon missions of hitchhiking in order to reach a hostel in some forgotten European city and successfully (or semi-successfully) manage to return with heroic recounts of how they got picked up by a hairy, southern-European truck driver who tried to take them out for a sketchy dinner and whom they skilfully escaped from. Or something along those lines anyway.
But the point is that students have a knack for getting great travelling deals. So, when I found out that I could get to Milan and back for only forty pounds, I was very, very excited. I believed it to be a great investment. And I was not the only one.
In fact, queuing in Milan Malpensaheld big surprises in store for me and my fellow travellers.
We all sat there smugly, holding our cheap tickets – some satisfied with our short break from the real world, others excited for the wonders awaiting them in Edinburgh. And then the man standing next to me in the crowd of strangers (do not question the way Italian queues are formed – even we do not know how they come about) seemed to have a familiar face.
Whilst being so blatantly Italian, wearing his huge cream-white D&G shades, big glossy red coat and tight-but-not-too-tight designer jeans, he also looked like a foreigner, hiding from the crowd of loud natives. It was only when I got close enough to him and saw through his shades that it hit me – a world-cup winning footballer was dragging his luggage alongside me.
On a low-cost, money-saving, very cheap airline no less.
Ringhio Gattuso was standing next to me. One of the most venerated men in the country. I was literally lost for words. Apparently even the stars are learning to live the student way.
Except, they do it whilst wearing D&G.
Students have been known to travel to the most bizarre places often using exceedingly intricate routes to get there – and this all for a number of very good reasons.
First of all being a student entails one fundamental thing: a constant lack of money to finance anything which could be vaguely unnecessary. Meaning that our meagre budget is of course spent on coffee, an occasional snack… and travelling.
Second of all travelling has to be an experience to boast about. Just think of all those students who embark upon missions of hitchhiking in order to reach a hostel in some forgotten European city and successfully (or semi-successfully) manage to return with heroic recounts of how they got picked up by a hairy, southern-European truck driver who tried to take them out for a sketchy dinner and whom they skilfully escaped from. Or something along those lines anyway.
But the point is that students have a knack for getting great travelling deals. So, when I found out that I could get to Milan and back for only forty pounds, I was very, very excited. I believed it to be a great investment. And I was not the only one.
In fact, queuing in Milan Malpensaheld big surprises in store for me and my fellow travellers.
We all sat there smugly, holding our cheap tickets – some satisfied with our short break from the real world, others excited for the wonders awaiting them in Edinburgh. And then the man standing next to me in the crowd of strangers (do not question the way Italian queues are formed – even we do not know how they come about) seemed to have a familiar face.
Whilst being so blatantly Italian, wearing his huge cream-white D&G shades, big glossy red coat and tight-but-not-too-tight designer jeans, he also looked like a foreigner, hiding from the crowd of loud natives. It was only when I got close enough to him and saw through his shades that it hit me – a world-cup winning footballer was dragging his luggage alongside me.
On a low-cost, money-saving, very cheap airline no less.
Ringhio Gattuso was standing next to me. One of the most venerated men in the country. I was literally lost for words. Apparently even the stars are learning to live the student way.
Except, they do it whilst wearing D&G.