Diary of Writing Italy’s Sorrow

Freiburg, Germany, April 23, 2006
German archives week.  Am now in a hotel just outside Freiburg in the Black Forest of Southern Germany and am feeling extremely relieved to be here.  The flight to Basel was fine, although delayed by over an hour, so I was late picking up the car.  First of all I ended up on the Swiss rather than the French side, so had to cross the back over the border within the airport.  Then when I eventually reached Freiburg, I realised that the maps I’d printed off the internet were completely inadequate and I soon became horrendously lost.  To make matters worse, my German is almost non-existent and the night porter at the hotel didn’t speak any English.  I’m not quite sure how I got here – fluke, really.