U2fan

WELCOME Arbiter!!!!!

As far as guidebooks, my personal favorite is Eyewitness. I always get one about the country I'm going to, but it is seriously a beautiful book (I know, I'm a dork) with glossy pages and pictures about historical places to see (not too much info about backpacking/traveling on a budget, etc.) It's also a nice souvenir in a sense; a book to keep and look back on. That being said, clearly you probably want some of the other books people have mentioned that would help you in other areas. The Eyewitness books are so nice that I wouldn't want to tear out any pages! I also agree with jw1313 about rick steves; I manuevered my way through London on my own, using a "self-guided" tour of the Thames River, and found it to be very useful and informative.

PS. If you can do it, awesome, but honestly, I think your itinerary for 2 weeks looks virtually impossible unless you want to be traveling the entire time and have literally a day in each places. The cities you mention are just all over the place....

PPS....I went to Egypt and want to learn Arabic! That's awesome you might get to! I know it's so hard, but if you could be fluent you would be in SUCH high demand; you could name your price and the govt. would probably pay it!

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Flight to Tokyo: 92,000 yen

Metro to Ginza shopping district: 160 yen

Watching middle-aged Japanese woman dance to U2: priceless

arbiter13

"The first plan of battle never survives initial contact with the enemy."

And thus, my intinerary has already been mixed up. Since my former companion had to drop out, I've completely eliminated London and Amsterdam. I'll just fly into Frankfurt. I'll be in Berlin and Prague for 4 days, Caen for 2, and Dresden for 2...may venture to Munich or Paris...who the hell knows.

Maybe, one of these days, I can earn up enough vacation time to hit Europe hardcore for one summer. Air fare will be a lot cheaper (any military ppl know about Space Available airfare??? Hooah SA!)

I have a friend (read: love of my life who broke my heart and destroyed my world) who is from Bulgaria, speaks 7 languages fluently and is starting on Arabic. The CIA is DESPERATE to recruit her, but only if they can help her become a citizen quicker will she do it...and she's too much of a damn commy.

Hell, I wish the CIA wanted ME that bad.

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The word "good" has many meanings. For example, if a man were to shoot his grandmother at a range of five hundred yards, I should call him a good shot, but not necessarily a good man.
-G.K. Chesterton

"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography."
- Ambrose Bierce</color>

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