I started my trip around the world in the city of dreams: New York. Camping out at my friend Diana’s for a week, we were a happy little family, just me, her, and Larry and Lulu, her two cats.

After a couple of days of constant meowing I packed up my things, my two friends from Austria who had arrived shortly after me, and we (more or less) fearlessly rented a car.

And walked off to look for America.

Or drove off, more like. Our first stop was Sleepy Hollow, New York State. The drive through the American countryside was nice, even though it did feel like driving through the middle of nowhere. We passed towns like Poughkeepsie and Albany and admired garden fences and front porches.

The image of the USA was fully formed, in my head. It was – obviously – very much influenced by the American film industry. Everything looked familiar and felt familiar too, I had seen it all in movies and TV shows. Yet everything was different.

So I looked at the scenery
She read her magazine
And the moon rose over an open field

One thing was just like the movies promised though: motels. My very first night at a motel was somewhere on the road in the state of New York. It was fall and even though we had enjoyed a nice, sunny day, the sun set early. It so happened that we didn’t find a motel before dark. We had decided to go for a Motel 6 because my friend said they had a fairly “good” reputation and were cheap. Only problem was, we had in our naiveté not thought to look up the address of a Motel 6 on our route. So we ended up at a random motel off the highway. I guess that’s the way you’re supposed to do it, just look for a vacancy.

We got the keys at the reception, then parked the car in front of our room, which was on the first floor. A couple of guys were sitting on the porch of the room beneath ours. To tell the truth, they looked like they had stepped straight out of a Quentin Tarantino movie. One of the guys – a young man wearing a hoodie and drooling out of the corner of his mouth – came to us and slurred, “Just tell me if you need anything!” I looked at him, aghast. “Like meth?” I could barely contain myself from asking. “Yeah if you need extra towels or soap or anything! I know the owner!” Nice guy. Very polite!

I have to admit it: I was scared! I was so glad that I wasn’t alone! It was probably nothing, maybe the guy was really just being friendly. Still. Very weird first night.

We drove on the next day, unharmed, unmurdered, but decidedly looking a little worse for wear. Whoever thought motels are a great place to relax, because look at how Thelma and Louise were always able to get a good night’s rest and/or shag Brad Pitt there – well, you are sadly mistaken! Motels really ARE shitholes, at least the cheap ones. And you are much more likely to encounter a Tarantinoesque character, bed bug or Norman Bates than Brad Pitt or anybody remotely resembling him.

But it didn’t matter! We were on the road and we weren’t going to stop!