Back in 1999 I was eagerly listening to the Top 2000 on the Dutch Radio 2 with the best music of all time. It even inspired me to make such a list myself. I started off in December 1999 making a top 50 of my all-time favourite songs with, I had to look it up in a 12 years old notebook, "De Bestemming" by Marco Borsato on the number 1 spot. In the years after that I added 50 more songs every year to my list until I reached the magic number of 300. It took me 2 days to put together the list (not including the preparations, that usually started in August already), but it was worth it. It became a real tradition for me to make such a list in the period between Christmas and New Year.
The past few years however it got harder and harder for me to make such a list, as I like so many different kinds of music and it's almost impossible to compare and rank them. This year I was also lacking the time and will power to make the necessary preparations and therefore I had to decide, with a heavy heart, not to make a top 300 this year.
I realize that this is (obviously) a huge disappointment for many of you. I also realize that I must give a compensation to the people that were relying on me to help them find new music to start the new year with. So I retrieved a top 30 of the music that I listened to the most during the past year from last.fm. You can find the list below. I put links to YouTube for my top 10 favourite songs in 2011, for those that want to check out what kind of music I am listening to on a daily basis.
1. Sunrise Avenue – Hollywood Hills (Can't wait to see them live in Prague in 2012)
2. Ryan Star – Right Now
3. The Story So Far – I Didn't Slap You (Not suitable for parents; make sure your sound is not too loud when the video starts)
4. Sunrise Avenue – Fairytale Gone Bad
5. My Chemical Romance – Na Na Na (Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na) (Again: not suitable for parents...)
6. The Pretty Reckless – Just Tonight (Can you believe that the girl was just 17 when this video was made?)
7. Neon Trees – Animal
8. The Script – For The First Time
9. Bryan Rice – No Promises (The Danish original, much better than the cover version by Shayne Ward)
10. Every Avenue – Tell Me I'm A Wreck (My favourite song at the moment)
11. Handsome Poets – Dance (The War Is Over)
12. Weezer – Perfect Situation
13. Scouting For Girls – This Ain't A Love Song
14. Idool 2011 Finalisten – More To Me
15. Handsome Poets – Silence Is Sexy
16. Donkeyboy – Sometimes
17. Ryan Star – Start A Fire
18. The Bigger Lights – Hey Summer
19. Ryan Star – Breathe
20. The Downtown Fiction – I Just Wanna Run
21. Secondhand Serenade – Fall For You
22. Something Corporate – Watch the Sky
23. Two Door Cinema Club – What You Know
24. Sherwood – Ground Beneath My Feet
25. Carolina Liar – Last Night
26. Negative – Won't Let Go
27. Reamonn – Supergirl
28. The Moog – When I See You
29. Alexander Rybak – Funny Little World
30. Volumia! – Afscheid
Finally, I'd like to wish you all the best for 2012 and I hope to see you again next year!
zaterdag 31 december 2011
maandag 19 december 2011
The results of ISC #2...
Hi all,
Thanks a lot to those of you that were willing to vote in my song contest. It's really appreciated. So, as promised, below you can find a link to the results.
Click here to see the full voting process. (Recommended, as the voting was quite exciting)
Click here for a direct link to the full results.
I hope you enjoyed the contest as much as I did! Congratulatons to the winning country. :)
Thanks a lot to those of you that were willing to vote in my song contest. It's really appreciated. So, as promised, below you can find a link to the results.
Click here to see the full voting process. (Recommended, as the voting was quite exciting)
Click here for a direct link to the full results.
I hope you enjoyed the contest as much as I did! Congratulatons to the winning country. :)
zondag 4 december 2011
International Song Contest #2
It's December now and even though the weather is not as cold as one year ago, I reckon that most of you will now spend more time inside than 6 months ago. Such moments may be boring, but hey, with good music on the background those days will be a bit happier.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, most people stick to the same old (usually American) music all the time. Those people miss out on a lot of good music. I know that most people don't have the time to search new music themselves, and that's what this blog is for. Below you will find a video I made with 22 songs that I discovered in the past year either in one of the online song contests I participate in or by myself. Just click on "play" and listen to those wonderful songs.
And because I just love making lists and rankings out of everything, of course I made a contest out of this as well, just like I did in spring, in which you can vote for the best song. So if you feel like being a judge and/or want to make me a happy boy, please send in your top 10 in the form below. The deadline to do this is 20 December at 23:59 and this time there are no voting restrictions: you can also vote for your own country. Thank you very much if you participate in this!
And don't feel pressured to vote if you don't want to, of course it's also fine if you just listen to the songs and don't vote at all. I understand that not everybody is as enthousiastic about this kind of things as I am. :)
Recap video:
Playlist and links to YouTube:
VOTING DISABLED
Unfortunately, in my opinion, most people stick to the same old (usually American) music all the time. Those people miss out on a lot of good music. I know that most people don't have the time to search new music themselves, and that's what this blog is for. Below you will find a video I made with 22 songs that I discovered in the past year either in one of the online song contests I participate in or by myself. Just click on "play" and listen to those wonderful songs.
And because I just love making lists and rankings out of everything, of course I made a contest out of this as well, just like I did in spring, in which you can vote for the best song. So if you feel like being a judge and/or want to make me a happy boy, please send in your top 10 in the form below. The deadline to do this is 20 December at 23:59 and this time there are no voting restrictions: you can also vote for your own country. Thank you very much if you participate in this!
And don't feel pressured to vote if you don't want to, of course it's also fine if you just listen to the songs and don't vote at all. I understand that not everybody is as enthousiastic about this kind of things as I am. :)
Recap video:
Playlist and links to YouTube:
| 1. | Norway | Aleksander With | A Little Too Perfect | |
| 2. | Belgium | Yevgueni | Manzijn | |
| 3. | Estonia | Maarja | Shine It On | |
| 4. | Great Britain | Young Rebel Set | If I Was | |
| 5. | Poland | Sylwia Grzeszczak | Małe Rzeczy | |
| 6. | Italy | Modà | La Notte | |
| 7. | South Africa | Nádine |
| |
| 8. | Romania | Zero | Lay Me Down | |
| 9. | Iceland | Yohanna | Beautiful Silence | |
| 10. | France | Sofia Essaïdi | J'croque La Vie | |
| 11. | Switzerland | Lunatica | Who You Are | |
| 12. | Netherlands | Only Seven Left | Wake Up Call | |
| 13. | Austria | Christina Stürmer | Wir Leben Den Moment | |
| 14. | Finland | Negative | Won't Let Go | |
| 15. | Germany | Unheilig | Geboren Um Zu Leben | |
| 16. | Malta | Claudia Faniello | I Hate This Song | |
| 17. | Russia | Lena Katina | Never Forget | |
| 18. | South Korea | Song Ji Eun ft. Bang Yong Guk | Going Crazy | |
| 19. | Bosnia & Herzegovina | Hari Mata Hari & Ivana Banfic | Navodno | |
| 20. | Spain | La Oreja de Van Gogh | La Niña Que Llora En Tus Fiestas |
| 21. | Latvia | Lauris Reiniks | Banjo Laura |
| 22. | Czech Republic | Tomáš Klus | Marie |
VOTING DISABLED
woensdag 23 november 2011
Trip to Dubai and Oman
My apologies for the delay, but finally it is here: the report from my travel to the United Arab Emirates and Oman!
Ever since I saw an episode of a Dutch tv show called "3 op reis" about Oman a couple of years ago, I fell in love with the beauty of this country and it was very high on my to-go-list. This autumn I finally got a chance to go there. From Prague, I could book a relatively cheap ticket to Dubai. From there I would travel over land to Oman, a road trip through the desert, that turned out to be less empty than I expected. More about that will follow later.
First I will introduce Dubai, which is one of the craziest cities in the world. It is located in the United Arab Emirates, however, only 20% of its inhabitants is Emirati. 50% of the population is Indian or Pakistani. All of these people come to Dubai to earn money, which is quite there, because there is no income tax at all and the salaries are high. Due to the large amount of oil in the Emirates, the government just doesn't know what to do with all the money, which is why they started building crazy stuff, such as the highest tower in the world and or an artificial group of islands shaped like the world. Now let me tell you about my experiences.
I arrived in Dubai in the evening and quite unexpectedly I got through the passport control easily. When I got out of the airport, I got on a taxi to take me to Zulekha Hospital: the landmark near to the place where my Couchsurfing host Nicknack was living. The ride was however not a big success and it took me over 40 minutes to cross 11 kilometres. Nicknack, a 26 years old Thai guy, picked me up from the hospital with his own car and took me to his great apartment. It became clear to me that indeed it was easy to live a wealthy life here. In the evening we went to the famous Dubai mall. Just outside the mall, I bought my host a beer, that cost me 8 euros, but for that money we did have an amazing view on Burj Khalifa (that highest tower in the world). Even at night it was very impressive.
The next day was more or less a typical tourist day for me. I visited all famous places in Dubai, including Burj Al-Arab, the beach at Dubai Marina and Al-Ahmadiyah school. I could use 200 words to describe all this, but the pictures below speak for themselves:
I had to be home at a reasonable time though, as Nicknack told me he would cook a real Thai meal for me and his Lebanese friend who would also stay at his place that night. When I got home, at first I thought I was at the wrong address. The appartment was suddenly filled with Thai people, all speaking in their own language! It seemed like I arrived at a dinner party for the entire Thai community in Dubai. I did have a good time with all of them though, ate squid for the first time (like I expected in advance: I didn't like it), went out to a club in the basement of the Crowne Plaza Hotel with Nicknack, his Kenyan flatmate, his Lebanese friend Max and the last two remaining Thai girls Kim and Noyna and found out that parties in Dubai can be pretty good:
The next day I would go to Oman. However, at the bus station I suffered my first setback: even though I arrived 45 minutes in advance, the bus was already full and there were like 40 people waiting outside the bus. In a very chaotic situation I found out that there might be an extra bus, however, it was not sure when and if at all this bus would come. In the meantime, I had some tea with Ali, a Pakistani businessman in his late fifties on his way to meet a friend in Oman, and Tariq, an Indian student who was going to visit his parents in Muscat.
When we finished our tea and headed back to the bus station (which was not more than just some sand next to the road with a sign "bus" next to it), we got in touch with Farook, an Indian businessman who owned a car, but didn't want to drive to Muscat alone. After some time, the two businessman negotiated a deal: we would not wait for a bus to come, but go on a roadtrip to Oman with the four of us.
This road trip was one of the most special memories from my trip. Four men, that didn't know eachother when they got up that morning, spending 8 hours driving through the Arab desert, waiting for a visum for Oman at the Hatta-border and driving through typically Omani villages, sometimes stopping over for some Arab tea in a local teahouse. The tea was also one of the highlights of my trip by the way. I could get used to the quiet life of drinking tea in a tea house all day.
We arrived in the Muscat area shortly after midnight. This could have been a bit of a problem for me, as I didn't arrange a place to sleep in advance. Luckily Ali and his Omani friend Shabeer were willing to help me find accomodation. And even though it was late at night, Shabeer insisted on showing us around the area. He was clearly the kind of man that always expects to get what he wants, so we had no other choice than to go with him. After one crazy ride in the middle of the night we ended up at a fastfood chain, where my new Omani friend ordered enough food for the four of us (including his personal assistant/bodyguard Sohail from Bangladesh) to feed three local families. It was also at that moment that I was offered to stay at Shabeer's place during my stay in Oman. An offer that I gladly accepted.
The stay in Oman was hectic: it involved a lot of driving around, visiting sights in the area, drinking tea (at least three times per day), visits to the mosque (during which I had to enjoy myself for one hour, as non-muslims are not allowed to enter the mosque) and also a meetup with Mehdi: the only friend in the region that I made prior to my visit. The meetup took only two hours, during which we took a walk through the city and talked about everything, from general topics like the mindset of Omani people to really personal topics. It was a very interesting conversation that improved my understanding of what it's like to be young in a country like Oman and of the Arab culture in general. This is a photo of the two of us together, you can imagine that quite a lot of people were looking at us when we were walking the street together:
On Monday I was facing a difficult decision. Initially, I was planning to go back to Dubai on this day, however, Shabeer told me that if I would stay he would show me a beautiful beach and take me to the countryside. It was hard for me, but I decided to stay in Oman at the expense of visiting Abu Dhabi, as I had heard that there was not so much to do there. So on Tuesday I went back to Dubai, again by car, together with Ali and Farook.
For my last night in the Middle East, I arranged that I could stay at Nicknack's place again. The next morning, my flight left only in the evening so I had one full last day in Dubai, I went to visit the last remaining sights in Old Dubai and in the afternoon I met up with Noyna again. Together we went to some kind of park for kids near the Dubai creek, where we sat down for a while. I realized that this was going to be my last moment of warm weather for 2011.
So now I'm back in Prague, back in the normal world, where winter is starting already. Ah well, just 5 months left and then spring will start again...
Ever since I saw an episode of a Dutch tv show called "3 op reis" about Oman a couple of years ago, I fell in love with the beauty of this country and it was very high on my to-go-list. This autumn I finally got a chance to go there. From Prague, I could book a relatively cheap ticket to Dubai. From there I would travel over land to Oman, a road trip through the desert, that turned out to be less empty than I expected. More about that will follow later.
First I will introduce Dubai, which is one of the craziest cities in the world. It is located in the United Arab Emirates, however, only 20% of its inhabitants is Emirati. 50% of the population is Indian or Pakistani. All of these people come to Dubai to earn money, which is quite there, because there is no income tax at all and the salaries are high. Due to the large amount of oil in the Emirates, the government just doesn't know what to do with all the money, which is why they started building crazy stuff, such as the highest tower in the world and or an artificial group of islands shaped like the world. Now let me tell you about my experiences.
I arrived in Dubai in the evening and quite unexpectedly I got through the passport control easily. When I got out of the airport, I got on a taxi to take me to Zulekha Hospital: the landmark near to the place where my Couchsurfing host Nicknack was living. The ride was however not a big success and it took me over 40 minutes to cross 11 kilometres. Nicknack, a 26 years old Thai guy, picked me up from the hospital with his own car and took me to his great apartment. It became clear to me that indeed it was easy to live a wealthy life here. In the evening we went to the famous Dubai mall. Just outside the mall, I bought my host a beer, that cost me 8 euros, but for that money we did have an amazing view on Burj Khalifa (that highest tower in the world). Even at night it was very impressive.
The next day was more or less a typical tourist day for me. I visited all famous places in Dubai, including Burj Al-Arab, the beach at Dubai Marina and Al-Ahmadiyah school. I could use 200 words to describe all this, but the pictures below speak for themselves:
I had to be home at a reasonable time though, as Nicknack told me he would cook a real Thai meal for me and his Lebanese friend who would also stay at his place that night. When I got home, at first I thought I was at the wrong address. The appartment was suddenly filled with Thai people, all speaking in their own language! It seemed like I arrived at a dinner party for the entire Thai community in Dubai. I did have a good time with all of them though, ate squid for the first time (like I expected in advance: I didn't like it), went out to a club in the basement of the Crowne Plaza Hotel with Nicknack, his Kenyan flatmate, his Lebanese friend Max and the last two remaining Thai girls Kim and Noyna and found out that parties in Dubai can be pretty good:
The next day I would go to Oman. However, at the bus station I suffered my first setback: even though I arrived 45 minutes in advance, the bus was already full and there were like 40 people waiting outside the bus. In a very chaotic situation I found out that there might be an extra bus, however, it was not sure when and if at all this bus would come. In the meantime, I had some tea with Ali, a Pakistani businessman in his late fifties on his way to meet a friend in Oman, and Tariq, an Indian student who was going to visit his parents in Muscat.When we finished our tea and headed back to the bus station (which was not more than just some sand next to the road with a sign "bus" next to it), we got in touch with Farook, an Indian businessman who owned a car, but didn't want to drive to Muscat alone. After some time, the two businessman negotiated a deal: we would not wait for a bus to come, but go on a roadtrip to Oman with the four of us.
This road trip was one of the most special memories from my trip. Four men, that didn't know eachother when they got up that morning, spending 8 hours driving through the Arab desert, waiting for a visum for Oman at the Hatta-border and driving through typically Omani villages, sometimes stopping over for some Arab tea in a local teahouse. The tea was also one of the highlights of my trip by the way. I could get used to the quiet life of drinking tea in a tea house all day.
We arrived in the Muscat area shortly after midnight. This could have been a bit of a problem for me, as I didn't arrange a place to sleep in advance. Luckily Ali and his Omani friend Shabeer were willing to help me find accomodation. And even though it was late at night, Shabeer insisted on showing us around the area. He was clearly the kind of man that always expects to get what he wants, so we had no other choice than to go with him. After one crazy ride in the middle of the night we ended up at a fastfood chain, where my new Omani friend ordered enough food for the four of us (including his personal assistant/bodyguard Sohail from Bangladesh) to feed three local families. It was also at that moment that I was offered to stay at Shabeer's place during my stay in Oman. An offer that I gladly accepted.
The stay in Oman was hectic: it involved a lot of driving around, visiting sights in the area, drinking tea (at least three times per day), visits to the mosque (during which I had to enjoy myself for one hour, as non-muslims are not allowed to enter the mosque) and also a meetup with Mehdi: the only friend in the region that I made prior to my visit. The meetup took only two hours, during which we took a walk through the city and talked about everything, from general topics like the mindset of Omani people to really personal topics. It was a very interesting conversation that improved my understanding of what it's like to be young in a country like Oman and of the Arab culture in general. This is a photo of the two of us together, you can imagine that quite a lot of people were looking at us when we were walking the street together:
On Monday I was facing a difficult decision. Initially, I was planning to go back to Dubai on this day, however, Shabeer told me that if I would stay he would show me a beautiful beach and take me to the countryside. It was hard for me, but I decided to stay in Oman at the expense of visiting Abu Dhabi, as I had heard that there was not so much to do there. So on Tuesday I went back to Dubai, again by car, together with Ali and Farook.For my last night in the Middle East, I arranged that I could stay at Nicknack's place again. The next morning, my flight left only in the evening so I had one full last day in Dubai, I went to visit the last remaining sights in Old Dubai and in the afternoon I met up with Noyna again. Together we went to some kind of park for kids near the Dubai creek, where we sat down for a while. I realized that this was going to be my last moment of warm weather for 2011.
So now I'm back in Prague, back in the normal world, where winter is starting already. Ah well, just 5 months left and then spring will start again...
zaterdag 8 oktober 2011
About my addiction
It's been a while since I last wrote here, but now I feel it's time to tell you in all honesty that I have become an addict. Not the bad kind of addict though, no, I realized that I am addicted to traveling, meeting new people and exploring new places.
The addiction started in spring of this year, when I had the best 1.5 weeks of my life during my trip through the Baltics and Poland. In the past few months, I have been on holiday in Ukraine for 2 weeks and went on several weekend trips within Czech Republic, and sometimes even to Poland or Slovakia. Now, my addiction has reached a new "high". From 2 to 9 November I will travel outside of Europe for the second time in my life, as I will visit United Arab Emirates and Oman in that week. I will travel alone and have no real friends yet in those countries, so to be honest I'm a bit frightened about this trip, but as Eleanor Roosevelt once said:
You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
A very inspiring quote, that fits in my current mindset perfectly. So at the moment I am still planning everything, so I can't say much about my schedule yet, but for sure I will visit Dubai (the home of the famous Burj Al Arab Hotel), Masqat and make a daytrip to the Omani countryside, which has been my dream ever since I saw a report on tv about Oman a couple of years ago. Not many people may think of Oman as a tourist destination, but believe me: it's an amazing place.
And if you decide not to believe me, that's fine as well. I'm confident that I will convince you in one month from now with the most beautiful pictures. :)
The addiction started in spring of this year, when I had the best 1.5 weeks of my life during my trip through the Baltics and Poland. In the past few months, I have been on holiday in Ukraine for 2 weeks and went on several weekend trips within Czech Republic, and sometimes even to Poland or Slovakia. Now, my addiction has reached a new "high". From 2 to 9 November I will travel outside of Europe for the second time in my life, as I will visit United Arab Emirates and Oman in that week. I will travel alone and have no real friends yet in those countries, so to be honest I'm a bit frightened about this trip, but as Eleanor Roosevelt once said:
You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
A very inspiring quote, that fits in my current mindset perfectly. So at the moment I am still planning everything, so I can't say much about my schedule yet, but for sure I will visit Dubai (the home of the famous Burj Al Arab Hotel), Masqat and make a daytrip to the Omani countryside, which has been my dream ever since I saw a report on tv about Oman a couple of years ago. Not many people may think of Oman as a tourist destination, but believe me: it's an amazing place.
And if you decide not to believe me, that's fine as well. I'm confident that I will convince you in one month from now with the most beautiful pictures. :)
zondag 7 augustus 2011
Pidkamin 2011
The past two summers I have been enjoying volunteer work camps in Serbia and Estonia. Even though I have a full-time job now, I wanted to participate in such a project again. This year I went to the village of Pidkamin, in Western Ukraine, to help renovate an old monastery with a long an interesting history.
I went by bus to Ukraine and to prevent an 18 hour bus ride I stayed in Kraków for one day and one night. Kraków is a great city, I had a very nice time there and can recommend it to anyone. And if you are going there, be sure to ask me where to eat: I know a place in the Jewish area where you can eat really good zapiekanka (thanks Alex for reminding me of this name) and another place called "King Kebab", that really honours its name. There was a fat guy with a beard behind the counter, who kept on asking me "yes?" with every ingredient he wanted to use. I just let him have his way, because instinctively I knew that this guy was going to make me the best kebab I had ever had. And my instinct was right. Just take a look at this wonderful picture:
In the evening I got on the night bus to Lviv. It became a trip to remember. We arrived at the border with Ukraine at around 1:15. So far the trip had gone very smoothly. At the border we encountered a huge traffic jam, that we were allowed to pass at first with our bus, but we were kept waiting at the front of the line for a long time, with no information on how long it was going to take. In the end it took us 4 hours to even be allowed to enter the border area. After a lot of inefficiency and bossy customs we were finally allowed to enter Ukraine at 7:15, which was 1 hour after the bus should have arrived in Lviv.
Our bus felt at home on the bumpy Ukrainian roads immediately. Just like a working person stops pretending to be better than he actually is and gets rid of his fancy outfit as soon as he gets home, our bus let go of a light socket above one of the seats:
At the same time, drops of water started falling from the ceiling at several places in the bus. Yup, that's Ukraine: never fix anything until it's really, really broken.
In the afternoon I met the other volunteers with who I would be living and working the coming two weeks. Together we took the train to Brody. The train ride was quite uncomfortable for a person that wanted to rest a bit, but still that was nothing compared to the bus ride from Brody to Pidkamin. At first we wanted to get on the bus of 16:15, so we bought tickets for that bus. When the bus arrived however, it was so full that it looked impossible to fit in even one extra person without a backpack. So in the end we bought tickets for the next bus, which was (slightly) less crowded. I needed to get used to that for the coming weeks, as pretty much all buses were old and too crowded.
At the monastery in Pidkamin we were welcomed by Father Andrei, the priest who was in charge of the whole complex and our boss during the camp. The priest told us that he expected us to work really hard the coming two weeks. Maintenance man Igor, a thin bald man who looks like he walked straight out of a ghost story, thought different about that. The first working day the priest was away and we were working well, until Igor showed up, told us not to work too hard and gave us some instructions that were wrong, probably because otherwise we would made him look lazy. However, the priest already knew that Igor was a lazy worker and when he got back he instructed us to friendly nod when Igor was talking to us but ignore all of his instructions.
So now about the work. Our goal of the camp was to make the area near the big wall of the monastery complex, which was more or less a hill with a lot of weed and stones, look flat again. This was quite a hard job, because of all the rocks and the ground that needed to be taken down the hill to the dumping ground. We started off with a good mood and full of energy, as you can see here:
However, after two weeks, we looked like this:
Luckily there were also plenty of fun activities. As we were with a group of 8 foreigners and 2 Ukrainians who came from a different part of the country, we went sightseeing as well and visited a castle in Oleskiv and a huge monastery complex in Pochajiv. This complex was absolutely amazing. I could use 100 words to describe its beauty, but one photo says it all:
Moreover, in the first weekend of the camp there was an ethno-folk-rock festival on a field near the monastery. The first Friday night was alright, we met the monks, dressed in a traditional Ukrainian outfit, and took a photo with them:
Saturday was supposed to be the best day of the festival. During the day I had already met some people that were attending the festival and I met them again in the evening. It took quite some time to find them, and the rest of the group didn't want to wait for them, so I ended up alone, partying with my new Ukrainian friends. And I had a great time with them, as the picture below proves:
The next day I would meet up again with Olya, a girl I met the day before (the left one on the picture). Together we walked around the festival area a bit and after that we went to a nice and quiet place near a lake in the forest:
Finally we met some guys from the camp there as well and together we walked back to the festival area, where we said goodbye to Olya, who had to go home with her friends, and went back to the monastery for some Ukrainian lunch. Unfortunately the weather was not so good in the afternoon (the picture above was taken later), so the group didn't feel like going back to the festival after that lunch.
After two weeks I had to leave Pidkamin again. In Western Europe a travel of about 100 kms (to Lviv, in this case) would not be special enough to mention in a travel report. However, in Ukraine travelling is still a real adventure. First I had to take a bus from Pidkamin to Brody. It's normal that such a bus is crowded, but this bus was really surrealistic. More and more people kept getting on the bus and it became incredibly hot inside: after 15 minutes I could not see through the windows any more because of all the steam and my whole body was wet from all the sweat. After 40 minutes on the bus, it felt like heaven to get on the train again with the uncomfortable wooden benches. Also the train ride was an adventure, as the soon-to-be babushka (=grandmother) with two golden teeth that was sitting next to me started asking me questions in Russian. My answer that I didn't understand was not sufficient for her, this lady wanted answers. So I did my best to guess what each question meant and tried to answer them in a mixture of Ukrainian, Czech and English until she seemed to understand.
After we had more or less finished our conversation I put on some music and closed my eyes for a while. However, after a few minutes some really young gypsy kids entered the compartment. One of them started playing a song on his guitar, while his younger brother enthusiastically started dancing to the music. Another thing you would not often see in Western Europe.
In Lviv I met up with Olya again, who would show me her home town in the coming days. We visited some very nice places, including an underground bar where Ukrainian nationalists used to gather. In order to get in, you would have to know the password, in order to prevent Russians from coming in. Right now it's mostly a cool place to hang out, but the atmosphere of the Ukrainian nationalists is still there, which makes it a great place for a tourist to visit. If you're interested, just ask me for the password. :)
After two days in Lviv I moved on to Kosice: a city in Slovakia that was on my way home. I took the train there, which was a train ride of almost 12 hours in total. In my compartment I met Luda, a 52-years old nurse from Odessa, with who I set up a conversation. In the end, she must have felt like we became real friends, because just when I was out to stretch my legs a bit and look out of the windows on the hallway she called my name. I looked behind me and saw that she made lunch for the two of us. Luda smiled at me and said: "eat". I said that I was not that hungry and thanked her for the offer, but now the smile on her face was gone and she said to me:
"eat!". So I had lunch with her, and afterwards she even showed me lots of pictures of her son and the rest of her family.
When we arrived at the border we got into trouble again. The train was broken and it was being repaired with us inside of it. So for in total two hours I could do nothing but watch those mechanics, who most of the time were doing nothing but looking at the train like this:
Right. And then one of them pointed somewhere, saying "maybe we should try this button", another would walk towards the train, push that button, and walk back to his old position and watch the train again for one more minute only to find out that the train was still broken. After two hours, it looked like they had fixed the problem (something with electricity in the train), but before the night fell the electricity was gone again, so when we arrived in Kosice at around 21:30 I had to find my way to the exit of the train in the dark.
In Kosice I met my friend Gabika, who would lead me to my hostel and be my guide for the next 24 hours. Kosice is a city with a very nice atmosphere (like all cities in Slovakia I think) and a beautiful fountain that actually plays music and moves to that music. Moreover, there are some very nice parks in the city, where we spent a lot of time, because Kosice is not so big and it was too hot to walk around all the time anyway. Also, the best moment of my travel was in Kosice, as I found a Pizza Hut there:
You really can't imagine how happy I was to eat pizza there again. As a kid I used to go there quite often and I totally loved the pizza's there, but then the Pizza Hut in Utrecht closed and I never went to the Pizza Hut in the past 5 years for sure... So seeing this place in Kosice made me feel like a little kid again and... Ok, this is probably not a story you guys are interested in.
So after only 23 hours in Kosice it was time to go back to Prague again, because it was already the 2nd of August and I had to be back in the office the next day. Now, 4 days later, I have moved back to my old routines again, but I certainly feel like a different person after this travel, it has really opened my eyes in multiple ways.
I went by bus to Ukraine and to prevent an 18 hour bus ride I stayed in Kraków for one day and one night. Kraków is a great city, I had a very nice time there and can recommend it to anyone. And if you are going there, be sure to ask me where to eat: I know a place in the Jewish area where you can eat really good zapiekanka (thanks Alex for reminding me of this name) and another place called "King Kebab", that really honours its name. There was a fat guy with a beard behind the counter, who kept on asking me "yes?" with every ingredient he wanted to use. I just let him have his way, because instinctively I knew that this guy was going to make me the best kebab I had ever had. And my instinct was right. Just take a look at this wonderful picture:
In the evening I got on the night bus to Lviv. It became a trip to remember. We arrived at the border with Ukraine at around 1:15. So far the trip had gone very smoothly. At the border we encountered a huge traffic jam, that we were allowed to pass at first with our bus, but we were kept waiting at the front of the line for a long time, with no information on how long it was going to take. In the end it took us 4 hours to even be allowed to enter the border area. After a lot of inefficiency and bossy customs we were finally allowed to enter Ukraine at 7:15, which was 1 hour after the bus should have arrived in Lviv.
Our bus felt at home on the bumpy Ukrainian roads immediately. Just like a working person stops pretending to be better than he actually is and gets rid of his fancy outfit as soon as he gets home, our bus let go of a light socket above one of the seats:
At the same time, drops of water started falling from the ceiling at several places in the bus. Yup, that's Ukraine: never fix anything until it's really, really broken.
In the afternoon I met the other volunteers with who I would be living and working the coming two weeks. Together we took the train to Brody. The train ride was quite uncomfortable for a person that wanted to rest a bit, but still that was nothing compared to the bus ride from Brody to Pidkamin. At first we wanted to get on the bus of 16:15, so we bought tickets for that bus. When the bus arrived however, it was so full that it looked impossible to fit in even one extra person without a backpack. So in the end we bought tickets for the next bus, which was (slightly) less crowded. I needed to get used to that for the coming weeks, as pretty much all buses were old and too crowded.
At the monastery in Pidkamin we were welcomed by Father Andrei, the priest who was in charge of the whole complex and our boss during the camp. The priest told us that he expected us to work really hard the coming two weeks. Maintenance man Igor, a thin bald man who looks like he walked straight out of a ghost story, thought different about that. The first working day the priest was away and we were working well, until Igor showed up, told us not to work too hard and gave us some instructions that were wrong, probably because otherwise we would made him look lazy. However, the priest already knew that Igor was a lazy worker and when he got back he instructed us to friendly nod when Igor was talking to us but ignore all of his instructions.
So now about the work. Our goal of the camp was to make the area near the big wall of the monastery complex, which was more or less a hill with a lot of weed and stones, look flat again. This was quite a hard job, because of all the rocks and the ground that needed to be taken down the hill to the dumping ground. We started off with a good mood and full of energy, as you can see here:
However, after two weeks, we looked like this:
Luckily there were also plenty of fun activities. As we were with a group of 8 foreigners and 2 Ukrainians who came from a different part of the country, we went sightseeing as well and visited a castle in Oleskiv and a huge monastery complex in Pochajiv. This complex was absolutely amazing. I could use 100 words to describe its beauty, but one photo says it all:
Moreover, in the first weekend of the camp there was an ethno-folk-rock festival on a field near the monastery. The first Friday night was alright, we met the monks, dressed in a traditional Ukrainian outfit, and took a photo with them:
Saturday was supposed to be the best day of the festival. During the day I had already met some people that were attending the festival and I met them again in the evening. It took quite some time to find them, and the rest of the group didn't want to wait for them, so I ended up alone, partying with my new Ukrainian friends. And I had a great time with them, as the picture below proves:
The next day I would meet up again with Olya, a girl I met the day before (the left one on the picture). Together we walked around the festival area a bit and after that we went to a nice and quiet place near a lake in the forest:
Finally we met some guys from the camp there as well and together we walked back to the festival area, where we said goodbye to Olya, who had to go home with her friends, and went back to the monastery for some Ukrainian lunch. Unfortunately the weather was not so good in the afternoon (the picture above was taken later), so the group didn't feel like going back to the festival after that lunch.
After two weeks I had to leave Pidkamin again. In Western Europe a travel of about 100 kms (to Lviv, in this case) would not be special enough to mention in a travel report. However, in Ukraine travelling is still a real adventure. First I had to take a bus from Pidkamin to Brody. It's normal that such a bus is crowded, but this bus was really surrealistic. More and more people kept getting on the bus and it became incredibly hot inside: after 15 minutes I could not see through the windows any more because of all the steam and my whole body was wet from all the sweat. After 40 minutes on the bus, it felt like heaven to get on the train again with the uncomfortable wooden benches. Also the train ride was an adventure, as the soon-to-be babushka (=grandmother) with two golden teeth that was sitting next to me started asking me questions in Russian. My answer that I didn't understand was not sufficient for her, this lady wanted answers. So I did my best to guess what each question meant and tried to answer them in a mixture of Ukrainian, Czech and English until she seemed to understand.
After we had more or less finished our conversation I put on some music and closed my eyes for a while. However, after a few minutes some really young gypsy kids entered the compartment. One of them started playing a song on his guitar, while his younger brother enthusiastically started dancing to the music. Another thing you would not often see in Western Europe.
In Lviv I met up with Olya again, who would show me her home town in the coming days. We visited some very nice places, including an underground bar where Ukrainian nationalists used to gather. In order to get in, you would have to know the password, in order to prevent Russians from coming in. Right now it's mostly a cool place to hang out, but the atmosphere of the Ukrainian nationalists is still there, which makes it a great place for a tourist to visit. If you're interested, just ask me for the password. :)
After two days in Lviv I moved on to Kosice: a city in Slovakia that was on my way home. I took the train there, which was a train ride of almost 12 hours in total. In my compartment I met Luda, a 52-years old nurse from Odessa, with who I set up a conversation. In the end, she must have felt like we became real friends, because just when I was out to stretch my legs a bit and look out of the windows on the hallway she called my name. I looked behind me and saw that she made lunch for the two of us. Luda smiled at me and said: "eat". I said that I was not that hungry and thanked her for the offer, but now the smile on her face was gone and she said to me:
"eat!". So I had lunch with her, and afterwards she even showed me lots of pictures of her son and the rest of her family.
When we arrived at the border we got into trouble again. The train was broken and it was being repaired with us inside of it. So for in total two hours I could do nothing but watch those mechanics, who most of the time were doing nothing but looking at the train like this:
Right. And then one of them pointed somewhere, saying "maybe we should try this button", another would walk towards the train, push that button, and walk back to his old position and watch the train again for one more minute only to find out that the train was still broken. After two hours, it looked like they had fixed the problem (something with electricity in the train), but before the night fell the electricity was gone again, so when we arrived in Kosice at around 21:30 I had to find my way to the exit of the train in the dark.
In Kosice I met my friend Gabika, who would lead me to my hostel and be my guide for the next 24 hours. Kosice is a city with a very nice atmosphere (like all cities in Slovakia I think) and a beautiful fountain that actually plays music and moves to that music. Moreover, there are some very nice parks in the city, where we spent a lot of time, because Kosice is not so big and it was too hot to walk around all the time anyway. Also, the best moment of my travel was in Kosice, as I found a Pizza Hut there:
You really can't imagine how happy I was to eat pizza there again. As a kid I used to go there quite often and I totally loved the pizza's there, but then the Pizza Hut in Utrecht closed and I never went to the Pizza Hut in the past 5 years for sure... So seeing this place in Kosice made me feel like a little kid again and... Ok, this is probably not a story you guys are interested in.
So after only 23 hours in Kosice it was time to go back to Prague again, because it was already the 2nd of August and I had to be back in the office the next day. Now, 4 days later, I have moved back to my old routines again, but I certainly feel like a different person after this travel, it has really opened my eyes in multiple ways.
zaterdag 6 augustus 2011
Some of my favourite music
Today I discovered a tool that makes it very easy for me to share my favourite music via this blog. Since it has been a long time already since I posted my last recommendations, I made a list of 10 relatively unknown songs for you to listen to.
The list is a mixture between rock, pop and easy-listening (near the end), so I'm confident that everyone will enjoy at least part of this list. I wish you lots of "wow"- or "hey, this is nice!"-moments while listening to these songs. :)
The list is a mixture between rock, pop and easy-listening (near the end), so I'm confident that everyone will enjoy at least part of this list. I wish you lots of "wow"- or "hey, this is nice!"-moments while listening to these songs. :)
donderdag 23 juni 2011
Summer break
Sorry guys, summer is not the time to keep a weblog up to date. You will have to wait for winter to come and then I may post more here.
Quick update on what my life is going to look like in the coming weeks:
- City trip to Bratislava next weekend
- Helping to renovate an old monastery in Ukraine at the end of July
- Sister + some friends coming over in August
- Teambuilding weekend from work in August
- Lots of Couchsurfers coming over in the time between those things
It's going to be one awesome summer. :)
Quick update on what my life is going to look like in the coming weeks:
- City trip to Bratislava next weekend
- Helping to renovate an old monastery in Ukraine at the end of July
- Sister + some friends coming over in August
- Teambuilding weekend from work in August
- Lots of Couchsurfers coming over in the time between those things
It's going to be one awesome summer. :)
dinsdag 7 juni 2011
Trip to the Baltics & Poland - The summary
Dear reader,
Below you will find the travel diary I wrote during my travel to Lithuania, Latvia and Poland. I realise that I wrote quite a lot and not all of you may have the time to read all of it, so I will just write a short summary of the travel here.
The whole idea behind my travel was to meet as much locals as possible, to get an impression of what a country is really like instead of just exploring the country using a travel guide and map. I travelled alone, but in total I met up with 9 people (plus their friends sometimes) in 5 different cities: Vilnius, Riga, Kaunas (my favourite), Warsaw and Ostrava. This concept was a big success: I got to do and see a lot of things the average tourist would never get to do or see and made a lot of new friends.
I'm already considering doing a second trip like this, to the Southeastern part of Europe next year, because this last trip has certainly been the best trip I have ever made. But that's for later, first I have to start planning my travel to Ukraine in July. This is going to be my best summer ever. :)
A selection of my photos are available on Facebook. And if you can't see them because of that, just do something about that. :)
Below you will find the travel diary I wrote during my travel to Lithuania, Latvia and Poland. I realise that I wrote quite a lot and not all of you may have the time to read all of it, so I will just write a short summary of the travel here.
The whole idea behind my travel was to meet as much locals as possible, to get an impression of what a country is really like instead of just exploring the country using a travel guide and map. I travelled alone, but in total I met up with 9 people (plus their friends sometimes) in 5 different cities: Vilnius, Riga, Kaunas (my favourite), Warsaw and Ostrava. This concept was a big success: I got to do and see a lot of things the average tourist would never get to do or see and made a lot of new friends.
I'm already considering doing a second trip like this, to the Southeastern part of Europe next year, because this last trip has certainly been the best trip I have ever made. But that's for later, first I have to start planning my travel to Ukraine in July. This is going to be my best summer ever. :)
A selection of my photos are available on Facebook. And if you can't see them because of that, just do something about that. :)
Trip to the Baltics & Poland - Part 3&4: Kaunas, Warsaw & Ostrava
Part 3: Kaunas
The 2.5 days that I spent in Kaunas can be summarized by two words: absolutely amazing. I was busy all the time with meeting new people and really got to see the best side of the city.
When I arrived in Kaunas after a 5.5 hour bus ride from Riga (which is really not something I would recommend on the hottest day of the year) I would meet up with a girl named Eglė and one of her friends straight away. I had just enough time to drop off my backpack at the hostel and freshen up a little bit before they would pick me up to visit a sports event by the medical university. After watching some of the games, we went to a nearby lake with some more friends for a swim and some mosquito bites and we ended the night on a viewing point over the whole city, where we could watch a storm above Kaunas.
The next day I met up with my good friend Rima, who I already know for almost 2 years. Together, we visited pretty much all places in Kaunas that are worth visiting, ate some Lithuanian food (but no cold soup) and had some fun taking pictures of eachother together with some very friendly statues. Even though she had an exam the next day, we stayed together till 5 in the afternoon, which was highly appreciated by me. :)
The next morning I met up with Agnė, who has not been my penpal for so long yet, but I certainly had a very enjoyable time with her. We had some Lithuanian food at the same place I was the day before (still no cold soup for me), went to a church where I burnt my thumb trying to light a candle and visited some musea. I was a bit sad when she had to leave in the afternoon, but luckily I was able to arrange another meetup in the evening, with someone I met on CouchSurfing. After that, it was time to go clubbing in Kaunas with the owners of the hostel and two other guests from the hostel: a girl from China and a man from Alaska. It was a very nice way to end my short stay in Kaunas.
Right now, I think Kaunas is a city full of amazing people and my days there were definitely the best days of my trip, and maybe even of my life. I really hope I can go back there soon.
Part 4: Warsaw
The day that I had to leave Kaunas and Lithuania had arrived. I had a weird feeling, because I would have liked to stay there for a longer time. So I took the train to Warsaw. I had to change trains in a small Lithuanian village, which I, with my passion for small villages abroad, really liked. After a train ride that lasted in total for 8 hours I arrived in Warsaw, totally exhausted from the boring trip and still feeling the lack of sleep from the night before. Despite of that, I still went out that evening with my CS-host Mateusz and some of his friends, but this time it didn't get so late.
During my stay in Warsaw we did some traditional sightseeing, visited an impressive museum about the second world war in Poland and in the evening we chilled in a park, violating the Polish law that forbids to drink beer in public places. I still believe that such a law is ridiculous, but who am I to judge that..
The final stop of my travel would not be Katowice, as just before my travel started the friend I would meet there had to cancel our meetup. Luckily I was able to find a very good alternative: I could meet my friend Petra from Ostrava instead, for the first time. After a funny situation when I texted her where I was while she was standing right behind me, we went sightseeing in the city and afterwards she took me to a very nice tearoom/loungebar where we had a drink together. After that, we went to a park where I pretty much forced her to be on a picture with me, so I would have a photo with everyone that I met up with during my travel.
At 8 o'clock it was time for me to take the last train home and around midnight I got back to Prague safely, with a lot of great memories on my mind and an extremely satisfied feeling. I had done it. I had finished my first journey alone with just a backpack and a list of people I would meet up with. I can't wait to do such a trip again next year!
The 2.5 days that I spent in Kaunas can be summarized by two words: absolutely amazing. I was busy all the time with meeting new people and really got to see the best side of the city.
When I arrived in Kaunas after a 5.5 hour bus ride from Riga (which is really not something I would recommend on the hottest day of the year) I would meet up with a girl named Eglė and one of her friends straight away. I had just enough time to drop off my backpack at the hostel and freshen up a little bit before they would pick me up to visit a sports event by the medical university. After watching some of the games, we went to a nearby lake with some more friends for a swim and some mosquito bites and we ended the night on a viewing point over the whole city, where we could watch a storm above Kaunas.
The next day I met up with my good friend Rima, who I already know for almost 2 years. Together, we visited pretty much all places in Kaunas that are worth visiting, ate some Lithuanian food (but no cold soup) and had some fun taking pictures of eachother together with some very friendly statues. Even though she had an exam the next day, we stayed together till 5 in the afternoon, which was highly appreciated by me. :)
The next morning I met up with Agnė, who has not been my penpal for so long yet, but I certainly had a very enjoyable time with her. We had some Lithuanian food at the same place I was the day before (still no cold soup for me), went to a church where I burnt my thumb trying to light a candle and visited some musea. I was a bit sad when she had to leave in the afternoon, but luckily I was able to arrange another meetup in the evening, with someone I met on CouchSurfing. After that, it was time to go clubbing in Kaunas with the owners of the hostel and two other guests from the hostel: a girl from China and a man from Alaska. It was a very nice way to end my short stay in Kaunas.
Right now, I think Kaunas is a city full of amazing people and my days there were definitely the best days of my trip, and maybe even of my life. I really hope I can go back there soon.
Part 4: Warsaw
The day that I had to leave Kaunas and Lithuania had arrived. I had a weird feeling, because I would have liked to stay there for a longer time. So I took the train to Warsaw. I had to change trains in a small Lithuanian village, which I, with my passion for small villages abroad, really liked. After a train ride that lasted in total for 8 hours I arrived in Warsaw, totally exhausted from the boring trip and still feeling the lack of sleep from the night before. Despite of that, I still went out that evening with my CS-host Mateusz and some of his friends, but this time it didn't get so late.
During my stay in Warsaw we did some traditional sightseeing, visited an impressive museum about the second world war in Poland and in the evening we chilled in a park, violating the Polish law that forbids to drink beer in public places. I still believe that such a law is ridiculous, but who am I to judge that..
The final stop of my travel would not be Katowice, as just before my travel started the friend I would meet there had to cancel our meetup. Luckily I was able to find a very good alternative: I could meet my friend Petra from Ostrava instead, for the first time. After a funny situation when I texted her where I was while she was standing right behind me, we went sightseeing in the city and afterwards she took me to a very nice tearoom/loungebar where we had a drink together. After that, we went to a park where I pretty much forced her to be on a picture with me, so I would have a photo with everyone that I met up with during my travel.
At 8 o'clock it was time for me to take the last train home and around midnight I got back to Prague safely, with a lot of great memories on my mind and an extremely satisfied feeling. I had done it. I had finished my first journey alone with just a backpack and a list of people I would meet up with. I can't wait to do such a trip again next year!
donderdag 2 juni 2011
Trip to the Baltics & Poland - Part 1&2: Vilnius and Riga
Part 1: Vilnius
My trip to the Baltics and Poland started on 27 May. On that day I would fly to Vilnius, where I would stay with Andrius, who I met via CouchSurfing. On the bus from the airport I already met the first new people. First I was talking with a middle-aged woman who was travelling alone with her (obviously single) 35-year old son. Then the guy sitting next to me overheard us speaking Dutch and started talking to me about the political situation in the Netherlands. However, I will mostly remember this guy for the quote he told me before I had to transfer the bus. He literally said to me: "You know, girls are actually just like buses. You get on them, you ride them for a while and then you get off again to transfer to another." And the worst thing is that he was actually not even joking. Luckily this guy was not my first impression of Lithuanian people.
So after riding the second bus for a while I arrived at the bus stop where I would meet Andrius. He welcomed me to his home with a smile and made me feel like at home immediately. After having dropped off my backpack we went out for dinner in a traditional Lithuanian restaurant. I really enjoyed the food there, much better than what I'm used to in Czech Republic. :)
On Saturday we walked around in Vilnius (and the unofficial republic Uzupis) for a while, before going to a CouchSurfing-meeting in a park on the riverside. I met some very nice people there and when the evening arrived most of us went to a bar to watch the Champions League final. It was kinda funny, because some people had never really watched a soccer game before, as basketball is the national sport (or as some people say: religion) in Lithuania. All of us enjoyed the good game though.
At the end of the evening, Andrius and I shared a taxi with Paul: a 50 years old American who is currently travelling through the Baltics using Couchsurfing and Interpals; the same websites as I used to get in touch with the people I will meet on my trip. His host was living in a brand new house just outside of Vilnius. In that area, the roads were not paved yet. It was a real experience to be in a taxi on a dirtroad in the middle of nowhere at around 1:30 am. Once again an experience that a typical tourist would never get during a trip to a European capital!
The next morning I experienced why Lithuania is called Lietuva (literally: "rain country") in Lithuanian. It was raining as if the clouds had just burst open and it looked like the rain would not end soon. Therefore we played pool in a nearby shopping center in the morning and went to Trakai, a national park in Lithuania, in the afternoon. When we arrived there the rain had miraculously stopped. Near the castle of Trakai we met Paul again, who was visiting the place together with the two teenage sons of his host. Together we enjoyed the traditional food Kibininė in a restaurant with a great view over the lake. Even though the castle itself was a bit disappointing to me, I can really recommend people to go to Trakai, because it is a very quiet, relaxing place.
Part 2: Riga
On Monday I had to leave Andrius, who had actually become like a real friend during the 3 days that I spent with him, again and made my way to Riga. In this city I would also be Couchsurfing. My host would be Lelde, a very experienced CS-er. She had to work until 6, so I had to enjoy myself in Riga for a few hours, but that was no problem, as I got a map with all the highlights of the city at the bus station. In the evening I was kinda tired (had to get up at 6:30 in the morning), so I just stayed in and had a nice conversation with Lelde while enjoying a good glass of wine.
The next day I would finally meet my first penpal: Kristine. We would meet only in the afternoon, so I had all morning for myself, but that was still not a problem, as I could just visit all highlights that I hadn't seen the day before and because the weather was just perfect I could spend the rest of my free time in beautiful Kronvalda park. In the afternoon I met Kristine and her friend Lolita. Together we went to the roof of a shopping center to get a view on the skyline of Riga. After that we had some drinks in a bar and we went for a walk in the old city, but it was just too hot for that, so we ended up sitting in a park most of the time, which is not really a punishment when the weather is like that, I can tell you.
After just one day in Riga I left Latvia again for Kaunas, where I am now. I will already share with you that I'm having the time of my life here, but you will read more about that later.
I will post my photos online as soon as I get back to Prague.
My trip to the Baltics and Poland started on 27 May. On that day I would fly to Vilnius, where I would stay with Andrius, who I met via CouchSurfing. On the bus from the airport I already met the first new people. First I was talking with a middle-aged woman who was travelling alone with her (obviously single) 35-year old son. Then the guy sitting next to me overheard us speaking Dutch and started talking to me about the political situation in the Netherlands. However, I will mostly remember this guy for the quote he told me before I had to transfer the bus. He literally said to me: "You know, girls are actually just like buses. You get on them, you ride them for a while and then you get off again to transfer to another." And the worst thing is that he was actually not even joking. Luckily this guy was not my first impression of Lithuanian people.
So after riding the second bus for a while I arrived at the bus stop where I would meet Andrius. He welcomed me to his home with a smile and made me feel like at home immediately. After having dropped off my backpack we went out for dinner in a traditional Lithuanian restaurant. I really enjoyed the food there, much better than what I'm used to in Czech Republic. :)
On Saturday we walked around in Vilnius (and the unofficial republic Uzupis) for a while, before going to a CouchSurfing-meeting in a park on the riverside. I met some very nice people there and when the evening arrived most of us went to a bar to watch the Champions League final. It was kinda funny, because some people had never really watched a soccer game before, as basketball is the national sport (or as some people say: religion) in Lithuania. All of us enjoyed the good game though.
At the end of the evening, Andrius and I shared a taxi with Paul: a 50 years old American who is currently travelling through the Baltics using Couchsurfing and Interpals; the same websites as I used to get in touch with the people I will meet on my trip. His host was living in a brand new house just outside of Vilnius. In that area, the roads were not paved yet. It was a real experience to be in a taxi on a dirtroad in the middle of nowhere at around 1:30 am. Once again an experience that a typical tourist would never get during a trip to a European capital!
The next morning I experienced why Lithuania is called Lietuva (literally: "rain country") in Lithuanian. It was raining as if the clouds had just burst open and it looked like the rain would not end soon. Therefore we played pool in a nearby shopping center in the morning and went to Trakai, a national park in Lithuania, in the afternoon. When we arrived there the rain had miraculously stopped. Near the castle of Trakai we met Paul again, who was visiting the place together with the two teenage sons of his host. Together we enjoyed the traditional food Kibininė in a restaurant with a great view over the lake. Even though the castle itself was a bit disappointing to me, I can really recommend people to go to Trakai, because it is a very quiet, relaxing place.
Part 2: Riga
On Monday I had to leave Andrius, who had actually become like a real friend during the 3 days that I spent with him, again and made my way to Riga. In this city I would also be Couchsurfing. My host would be Lelde, a very experienced CS-er. She had to work until 6, so I had to enjoy myself in Riga for a few hours, but that was no problem, as I got a map with all the highlights of the city at the bus station. In the evening I was kinda tired (had to get up at 6:30 in the morning), so I just stayed in and had a nice conversation with Lelde while enjoying a good glass of wine.
The next day I would finally meet my first penpal: Kristine. We would meet only in the afternoon, so I had all morning for myself, but that was still not a problem, as I could just visit all highlights that I hadn't seen the day before and because the weather was just perfect I could spend the rest of my free time in beautiful Kronvalda park. In the afternoon I met Kristine and her friend Lolita. Together we went to the roof of a shopping center to get a view on the skyline of Riga. After that we had some drinks in a bar and we went for a walk in the old city, but it was just too hot for that, so we ended up sitting in a park most of the time, which is not really a punishment when the weather is like that, I can tell you.
After just one day in Riga I left Latvia again for Kaunas, where I am now. I will already share with you that I'm having the time of my life here, but you will read more about that later.
I will post my photos online as soon as I get back to Prague.
dinsdag 17 mei 2011
Travelling plans
Hi all,
This summer I will (hopefully) be the best summer of my life. Not only am I living in a vibrant city called Prague, but also I will do a lot of travelling. Two weeks from now, I will already start my first travel. I will fly to Vilnius and go back to Prague using public transportation. I will not book any ho(s)tels in advance, so I will have as much flexibility as possible. Here is the (preliminary) schedule of my travel:
27.05 Prague --> Vilnius
28.05 Vilnius
29.05 Day trip to Trakai and Kibininė
30.05 Vilnius --> Riga
31.05 Riga
01.06 Riga --> Kaunas
02.06 Kaunas
03.06 Kaunas (or something else?)
04.06 Kaunas --> Warsaw
05.06 Warsaw
06.06 Warsaw --> Katowice
07.06 Katowice --> Prague
This means that I will reach my new year's resolution of visiting at least 3 countries I have never been to before in just 10 days. In total, this will be around 2000 km of travelling, which is a lot, but it should be an awesome experience, as I will try to hang out with locals as much as possible. This way I will see not only the touristic places in the cities I will visit, but also the areas where you can really feel what a country is like.
My second travel of this summer will be my annual trip to Eastern Europe to do volunteer work. This year, I have decided to go to Ukraine, where I will help renovating the old monastery of Pidkamin. This monastery has a long and somewhat tragic history (just google it if you want to know more) and it is important for the local people that it stays in a good state. The renovation work will take place between 17 and 31 July and during that period I will also get to stay at the monastery, which should be a very special experience.
During the rest of the summer I will probably do some more city trips within Czech Republic and maybe to Bratislava or Kraków.
Of course you, as a reader of my blog, will be among the first to hear about all my adventures on all of these travels. :)
This summer I will (hopefully) be the best summer of my life. Not only am I living in a vibrant city called Prague, but also I will do a lot of travelling. Two weeks from now, I will already start my first travel. I will fly to Vilnius and go back to Prague using public transportation. I will not book any ho(s)tels in advance, so I will have as much flexibility as possible. Here is the (preliminary) schedule of my travel:
27.05 Prague --> Vilnius
28.05 Vilnius
29.05 Day trip to Trakai and Kibininė
30.05 Vilnius --> Riga
31.05 Riga
01.06 Riga --> Kaunas
02.06 Kaunas
03.06 Kaunas (or something else?)
04.06 Kaunas --> Warsaw
05.06 Warsaw
06.06 Warsaw --> Katowice
07.06 Katowice --> Prague
This means that I will reach my new year's resolution of visiting at least 3 countries I have never been to before in just 10 days. In total, this will be around 2000 km of travelling, which is a lot, but it should be an awesome experience, as I will try to hang out with locals as much as possible. This way I will see not only the touristic places in the cities I will visit, but also the areas where you can really feel what a country is like.
My second travel of this summer will be my annual trip to Eastern Europe to do volunteer work. This year, I have decided to go to Ukraine, where I will help renovating the old monastery of Pidkamin. This monastery has a long and somewhat tragic history (just google it if you want to know more) and it is important for the local people that it stays in a good state. The renovation work will take place between 17 and 31 July and during that period I will also get to stay at the monastery, which should be a very special experience.
During the rest of the summer I will probably do some more city trips within Czech Republic and maybe to Bratislava or Kraków.
Of course you, as a reader of my blog, will be among the first to hear about all my adventures on all of these travels. :)
maandag 9 mei 2011
A different approach to life
Last weekend I got acquainted with a relatively unknown, yet often practised, form of art: I went out with a couple of pick up artists. Now what is a pick up artist? According to Wikipedia, a pick up artist is a man who is considered to be skilled, or who tries to be skilled at meeting, attracting, and seducing women.
After the first meetup (a short one in the afternoon, to make plans for the evening), I looked into the phenomenon a bit more. I found an interesting forum, on which guys that are new to "The Game" could learn more about what being a pick up artist is all about. The distinction between guys that are skilled and the guys that want to be skilled is clear immediately. On the forum you find a lot of lonely guys, trying to become more skilled at meeting good-looking females, or as they like to call it: HB's, which probably stands for something like Hot Babes.
The administrator of the forum challenged those poor guys to go on a "newbie mission" that required them to say "hi" to every HB they would meet. The saddest cases came back the next day crying that they were too afraid to do it, or just ignored by all those beautiful women. The slightly more intelligent cases understood that just saying "hi" and would not help them get over their anxiety to approach women and they actually said a few lines to their victims, before running away, being scared by the thought that they might actually receive a reply.
Of course there are also some very skilled PUA's, like the ones I met up with. They know that a woman is not impressed by some random guy buying her a drink or just a simple "hey, how are you?". They know how to win the interest of a girl, by doing those small things that they won't even notice. After receiving some advice from Ryan, an experienced PUA who could make any girl interested in him by just saying one or two lines, it was time for me to practice a bit. I was going to do my first "approach" as a PUA. The target was to have a one minute conversation with a random girl that was standing close to us. I passed the test with flying colours: the two of us had a very nice conversation and after 5 minutes I had to excuse myself, to get back to Ryan, who was waiting for me.
The rest of the evening I talked to a couple more girls, just for fun, with no other intentions than just to have a nice conversation. And, even though I had some varying success with my opening lines, I really enjoyed myself.
So will I become a pick up artist now? No, that's not what I have in mind. But I did have a great time last weekend. This new, more outwards oriented, approach can actually do good. I think I will try it out some more on my travel through Eastern Europe at the end of this month. More about that subject will follow in my next post. :)
After the first meetup (a short one in the afternoon, to make plans for the evening), I looked into the phenomenon a bit more. I found an interesting forum, on which guys that are new to "The Game" could learn more about what being a pick up artist is all about. The distinction between guys that are skilled and the guys that want to be skilled is clear immediately. On the forum you find a lot of lonely guys, trying to become more skilled at meeting good-looking females, or as they like to call it: HB's, which probably stands for something like Hot Babes.
The administrator of the forum challenged those poor guys to go on a "newbie mission" that required them to say "hi" to every HB they would meet. The saddest cases came back the next day crying that they were too afraid to do it, or just ignored by all those beautiful women. The slightly more intelligent cases understood that just saying "hi" and would not help them get over their anxiety to approach women and they actually said a few lines to their victims, before running away, being scared by the thought that they might actually receive a reply.
Of course there are also some very skilled PUA's, like the ones I met up with. They know that a woman is not impressed by some random guy buying her a drink or just a simple "hey, how are you?". They know how to win the interest of a girl, by doing those small things that they won't even notice. After receiving some advice from Ryan, an experienced PUA who could make any girl interested in him by just saying one or two lines, it was time for me to practice a bit. I was going to do my first "approach" as a PUA. The target was to have a one minute conversation with a random girl that was standing close to us. I passed the test with flying colours: the two of us had a very nice conversation and after 5 minutes I had to excuse myself, to get back to Ryan, who was waiting for me.
The rest of the evening I talked to a couple more girls, just for fun, with no other intentions than just to have a nice conversation. And, even though I had some varying success with my opening lines, I really enjoyed myself.
So will I become a pick up artist now? No, that's not what I have in mind. But I did have a great time last weekend. This new, more outwards oriented, approach can actually do good. I think I will try it out some more on my travel through Eastern Europe at the end of this month. More about that subject will follow in my next post. :)
zondag 24 april 2011
A Czech rollercoaster
This week I heard about the fact that there was a fair in Prague with Dutch attractions on it. It was even said that they would have "kroketten" and "frikandellen", which was a reason for me to go there with a couple of colleagues. Unfortunately the Dutch snacks-salesman had already left, but I did get a ride in both a Dutch and a Czech rollercoaster at that fair.
The difference was noticeable. The Dutch attraction was beautifully made, with lots of accessoires, safe and gave me an exciting ride. Just the kind of rollercoaster I am used to. The Czech rollercoaster however was ugly, but looking spectacular. The ride itself was quite ok, but the most exciting part was the fact that you never knew for sure if you were going to survive the next descent. The control room of the rollercoaster looked like it had not changed for the past 40 years, there was some rust on the tracks and when you looked down you would see a table with some very old and basic tools to do maintenance. Luckily all of the people who dared to go on this ride survived it, but it was certainly an experience we will never forget. :)
Easter
So today is the first day of Easter. And since my girlfriend is not coming this weekend and my flatmates are out of town, I had to hide my own Easter eggs this morning. That was still quite fun to do, but it was not so much fun to search them afterwards. I was done in about 1 minute. They tasted very good though. :)
So next week there is another holiday for me as a Dutchman: Queen's Day. And I will get to celebrate it in Prague maybe even better than I would have done in the Netherlands. On Thursday, I will go to the embassy to eat Dutch food and drink Heineken-beer. On Friday I will go to a special Queen's Day-party at a nice club here in Prague. Should be a good week for me. :)
The difference was noticeable. The Dutch attraction was beautifully made, with lots of accessoires, safe and gave me an exciting ride. Just the kind of rollercoaster I am used to. The Czech rollercoaster however was ugly, but looking spectacular. The ride itself was quite ok, but the most exciting part was the fact that you never knew for sure if you were going to survive the next descent. The control room of the rollercoaster looked like it had not changed for the past 40 years, there was some rust on the tracks and when you looked down you would see a table with some very old and basic tools to do maintenance. Luckily all of the people who dared to go on this ride survived it, but it was certainly an experience we will never forget. :)
Easter
So today is the first day of Easter. And since my girlfriend is not coming this weekend and my flatmates are out of town, I had to hide my own Easter eggs this morning. That was still quite fun to do, but it was not so much fun to search them afterwards. I was done in about 1 minute. They tasted very good though. :)
So next week there is another holiday for me as a Dutchman: Queen's Day. And I will get to celebrate it in Prague maybe even better than I would have done in the Netherlands. On Thursday, I will go to the embassy to eat Dutch food and drink Heineken-beer. On Friday I will go to a special Queen's Day-party at a nice club here in Prague. Should be a good week for me. :)
maandag 18 april 2011
And the winner is...
(...)
I hope you all enjoyed listening to the songs in the contest, but now it is time for the moment of truth. Who will win the International Song Contest 2011? Which country collected the most points during the past 1.5 week? Who will have the honour of being victorious in the first edition of this contest? We will find out soon.
I can tell you that in total 15 people voted in this contest, from 7 different countries. I would have loved to share a link with you guys where the votes would appear just like in the traditional Eurovision way, but unfortunately this was not possible due to technical problems. So you should believe me when I say that it was an exciting contest in the beginning, even though the final result is very clear. In total, 14 out of all 15 people gave points to the winning country (the only person who didn't, was not allowed to, because she submitted it) and 8 people put this particular country in first place. In the end, the winning country had more than twice as many points as the runner-up. So it was a very convincing victory for...
FINLAND!!!
Congratulations to Samu, Raul, Sami, Riku and Osmo from Sunrise Avenue and of course to my friend Essi from Finland, who submitted the winning song! I already knew that your music taste was great, but now we both know that the rest of the world thinks the same! Please do keep on sending me some more songs from your home country.
Now, for the ones that are interested to see how their country did in this contest, here are the final results:
Finally I would like to thank all those wonderful people that voted in this contest, it really made me happy every time I received a new list. Especially, I would like to thank my close friend Laura from Estonia, who actively helped me in encouraging people to vote and even posted a link to the contest on her blog! Thanks a lot, I really appreciated your effort.
So I hope you all enjoyed this contest and all those interesting songs as much as I did and maybe I will do such a contest again in April 2012. :)
Take care!
I hope you all enjoyed listening to the songs in the contest, but now it is time for the moment of truth. Who will win the International Song Contest 2011? Which country collected the most points during the past 1.5 week? Who will have the honour of being victorious in the first edition of this contest? We will find out soon.
I can tell you that in total 15 people voted in this contest, from 7 different countries. I would have loved to share a link with you guys where the votes would appear just like in the traditional Eurovision way, but unfortunately this was not possible due to technical problems. So you should believe me when I say that it was an exciting contest in the beginning, even though the final result is very clear. In total, 14 out of all 15 people gave points to the winning country (the only person who didn't, was not allowed to, because she submitted it) and 8 people put this particular country in first place. In the end, the winning country had more than twice as many points as the runner-up. So it was a very convincing victory for...
FINLAND!!!
Congratulations to Samu, Raul, Sami, Riku and Osmo from Sunrise Avenue and of course to my friend Essi from Finland, who submitted the winning song! I already knew that your music taste was great, but now we both know that the rest of the world thinks the same! Please do keep on sending me some more songs from your home country.
Now, for the ones that are interested to see how their country did in this contest, here are the final results:
| 1. Finland | 100 |
| 2. Belarus | 45 |
| 3. Netherlands | 44 |
| 4. Latvia | 44 |
| 5. Philippines | 37 |
| 6. Mexico | 28 |
| 7. Croatia | 24 |
| 8. Czech Republic | 22 |
| 9. Estonia | 21 |
| 10. Chile | 15 |
| 11. Saint Lucia | 10 |
Finally I would like to thank all those wonderful people that voted in this contest, it really made me happy every time I received a new list. Especially, I would like to thank my close friend Laura from Estonia, who actively helped me in encouraging people to vote and even posted a link to the contest on her blog! Thanks a lot, I really appreciated your effort.
So I hope you all enjoyed this contest and all those interesting songs as much as I did and maybe I will do such a contest again in April 2012. :)
Take care!
donderdag 7 april 2011
International song contest
The moment has arrived. My dream about doing my own song contest is finally coming true. During the past week, some selected friends had the opportunity to send in a song from their home country for this contest. And because of all the wonderful people who submitted a song, it has become a very multinational contest with participants from 4 continents!
Below you can find the videos corresponding to all songs that were submitted. Listening to all of them should take about 15-45 minutes, depending on how fast you listen. :) And please do make notes while listening to remember which songs you liked best, as you have to vote for your favourites as well. The voting process is explained below. For now, just sit back and enjoy the music.
1. Latvia: Instrumenti - Born To Die
2. Saint Lucia: Lisa J. Weekes ft. Leebo - Hold Me Close
3. Belarus: J-Mors - Ne Umirai
4. Finland: Sunrise Avenue - Hollywood Hills
5. Croatia: Jinx - Na Plazi
6. Netherlands: Handsome Poets - Dance (The War Is Over)
7. Chile: Chico Trujillo - La medallita
8. Philippines: Sandwich - Two Trick Pony
9. Estonia: Antonina - Pakike
10. Mexico: Mana - Clavado en un bar
11. Czech Republic: Čechomor - Proměny
So now about the voting process. I kindly ask everyone who has listened to all these songs to submit a top 5 of their favourite songs. If you submitted one song yourself, you may not to vote for that song, however, if you did not submit a song, you are allowed to vote for the song from your own country, as long as you promise to vote honestly. :) Your number 1 will get 10 points, and the other countries in your top 5 will get 7, 5, 3 and 1 points. If two countries have an equal amount of points at the end of the voting process, the country that was chosen as number 1 more often will be ranked higher.
You can vote by filling in the form below. The deadline for submitting your votes is 17 April 2011 at 23:59.
VOTING HAS BEEN MADE INACTIVE.
I am looking forward to receiving all of your votes. :)
Below you can find the videos corresponding to all songs that were submitted. Listening to all of them should take about 15-45 minutes, depending on how fast you listen. :) And please do make notes while listening to remember which songs you liked best, as you have to vote for your favourites as well. The voting process is explained below. For now, just sit back and enjoy the music.
1. Latvia: Instrumenti - Born To Die
2. Saint Lucia: Lisa J. Weekes ft. Leebo - Hold Me Close
3. Belarus: J-Mors - Ne Umirai
4. Finland: Sunrise Avenue - Hollywood Hills
5. Croatia: Jinx - Na Plazi
6. Netherlands: Handsome Poets - Dance (The War Is Over)
7. Chile: Chico Trujillo - La medallita
8. Philippines: Sandwich - Two Trick Pony
9. Estonia: Antonina - Pakike
10. Mexico: Mana - Clavado en un bar
11. Czech Republic: Čechomor - Proměny
So now about the voting process. I kindly ask everyone who has listened to all these songs to submit a top 5 of their favourite songs. If you submitted one song yourself, you may not to vote for that song, however, if you did not submit a song, you are allowed to vote for the song from your own country, as long as you promise to vote honestly. :) Your number 1 will get 10 points, and the other countries in your top 5 will get 7, 5, 3 and 1 points. If two countries have an equal amount of points at the end of the voting process, the country that was chosen as number 1 more often will be ranked higher.
You can vote by filling in the form below. The deadline for submitting your votes is 17 April 2011 at 23:59.
VOTING HAS BEEN MADE INACTIVE.
I am looking forward to receiving all of your votes. :)
woensdag 30 maart 2011
An idea to bring this blog back to life!
So... It's been a while since I last wrote a blog post here. The main reason for that is that I was occupied the past few weekends and didn't really have the time nor the inspiration to write anything here. I won't share every little detail with you now, but to summarize: I had three great weekends. :)
Soon I will bring new life to this blog. As you may know, I have three passions in life: music, making lists and other countries/cultures. That's why I'm going to do my own version of the Eurovision song contest. It has always been a dream of me to do such a thing and this blog finally enables me to do so. So in the coming week I will approach some of my foreign friends and ask them to submit a song from their home country. Next week I will post them here and you, as the reader of my blog, will get to vote for your favourite songs. One week later the winner of this contest will be announced. I hope you all like this idea as much as I do and am looking forward to receiving all those interesting songs!
Soon I will bring new life to this blog. As you may know, I have three passions in life: music, making lists and other countries/cultures. That's why I'm going to do my own version of the Eurovision song contest. It has always been a dream of me to do such a thing and this blog finally enables me to do so. So in the coming week I will approach some of my foreign friends and ask them to submit a song from their home country. Next week I will post them here and you, as the reader of my blog, will get to vote for your favourite songs. One week later the winner of this contest will be announced. I hope you all like this idea as much as I do and am looking forward to receiving all those interesting songs!
zondag 6 maart 2011
Weekend trip
I can feel it. Spring is coming! Which means that the days are getting longer, the sun is shining and Laurens is going on weekend trips again. This weekend I decided to go to Tábor: a town that is about 100 km south of Prague and has a long history. And since I like to see small villages, I took the slowest train possible on my way there, that took me through the strangest places, with mysterious names such as Čtyřkoly or Mrač. But I was enjoying myself during that train ride!
After one hour I arrived in Benešov, the end station of my train. Since I knew that my final destination was not such a big town and I had plenty of time, I decided to explore Benešov for a while. This town was not mentioned in my travel guide however, and pretty soon I found out why. There is absolutely nothing special to see there. In fact, there was only building that was worth taking a photo of. I would have loved to share that photo with you, but since the battery of my camera was dead once again, I took the picture with my phone and it seems like my laptop and my phone are not the greatest friends in the world, as they kinda ignore eachother. But believe me when I say it was one amazing house.
Police!
So after walking around for about 1.5 hours I got back on the train and was quietly enjoying the landscape when suddenly three policemen entered my compartment. The first one, a chubby bald guy who looked like the retarded brother of my all time hero Arnoldas Lukošius, shouted something at me in Czech.
Of course none of the three men replied positively when I asked if any of them spoke English, but I could understand the words "pazport kontrol". I knew it was useless, because I had left my passport at home in my other bag, but as a sign of good will I went searching in my bag. After ten seconds (my bag is not that big) I told those guys that I didn't have it with me and gave them my drivers license instead. The first guy was confused now and turned his head to the left a bit, like a child that didn't get what he wanted, but wasn't sure if his mother would get mad at him if he asked for it one more time, and kindly asked: "pasport?". I said to him: "No, drivers license." He looked at me even more confused now. Then the second policeman, that acted like an older brother of the first one, intervened and took my license out of the first guy's hands and started talking to the third guy a. In the meantime, the first guy proudly showed me the badge on his uniform. I nodded and smiled at him and he seemed happy.
One minute later, everything was ok. The policemen thanked me in Czech and they left. Upon leaving my compartment, the bald guy waved at me and said "good-bai", before being pulled away by his older brother. Travelling by train through the Czech countryside can be such an adventure.
Tábor
So in the middle of the afternoon I arrived in Tábor, a town I had never heard of before last Friday, but it was certainly worth the visit. There were quite a few buildings from the Middle Ages, that were nicely decorated over the years. And after having walked the entire route that was in my travel guide, I sat down on the main square. The sun was shining and I had some ice cream: it was a great moment that really felt like a holiday.
As you can read, I had a great time yesterday, and I'm happy that my next trip is already planned: one week from now I will be in Chrudim, a small town in the center of Czech Republic. I hope that will be an even better day, but it should be, because then I will be shown around by a very nice local girl. Can't wait for it to be next weekend. :)
After one hour I arrived in Benešov, the end station of my train. Since I knew that my final destination was not such a big town and I had plenty of time, I decided to explore Benešov for a while. This town was not mentioned in my travel guide however, and pretty soon I found out why. There is absolutely nothing special to see there. In fact, there was only building that was worth taking a photo of. I would have loved to share that photo with you, but since the battery of my camera was dead once again, I took the picture with my phone and it seems like my laptop and my phone are not the greatest friends in the world, as they kinda ignore eachother. But believe me when I say it was one amazing house.
Police!
So after walking around for about 1.5 hours I got back on the train and was quietly enjoying the landscape when suddenly three policemen entered my compartment. The first one, a chubby bald guy who looked like the retarded brother of my all time hero Arnoldas Lukošius, shouted something at me in Czech.
Of course none of the three men replied positively when I asked if any of them spoke English, but I could understand the words "pazport kontrol". I knew it was useless, because I had left my passport at home in my other bag, but as a sign of good will I went searching in my bag. After ten seconds (my bag is not that big) I told those guys that I didn't have it with me and gave them my drivers license instead. The first guy was confused now and turned his head to the left a bit, like a child that didn't get what he wanted, but wasn't sure if his mother would get mad at him if he asked for it one more time, and kindly asked: "pasport?". I said to him: "No, drivers license." He looked at me even more confused now. Then the second policeman, that acted like an older brother of the first one, intervened and took my license out of the first guy's hands and started talking to the third guy a. In the meantime, the first guy proudly showed me the badge on his uniform. I nodded and smiled at him and he seemed happy.
One minute later, everything was ok. The policemen thanked me in Czech and they left. Upon leaving my compartment, the bald guy waved at me and said "good-bai", before being pulled away by his older brother. Travelling by train through the Czech countryside can be such an adventure.
Tábor
So in the middle of the afternoon I arrived in Tábor, a town I had never heard of before last Friday, but it was certainly worth the visit. There were quite a few buildings from the Middle Ages, that were nicely decorated over the years. And after having walked the entire route that was in my travel guide, I sat down on the main square. The sun was shining and I had some ice cream: it was a great moment that really felt like a holiday.
As you can read, I had a great time yesterday, and I'm happy that my next trip is already planned: one week from now I will be in Chrudim, a small town in the center of Czech Republic. I hope that will be an even better day, but it should be, because then I will be shown around by a very nice local girl. Can't wait for it to be next weekend. :)
zondag 27 februari 2011
Some observations about the Czechs
After two weeks of radio silence, it is now time for a new blog. Again, I don't really feel like talking about what I have been up to (ok, a quick summary then: I have survived a fire in my flat, ate oysters for the first time of my life, played soccer outside in -5 degrees Celsius in just a t-shirt and been to some pretty awesome parties), no, I will write about Czech people once more.
This time I will not only talk about my own experiences, but I will use the Xenophobe's guide to the Czechs, that I bought this weekend, because lately I am really trying to understand Czech people, as a foundation. To me, the things that were mentioned in that little book were very recognizable. So here's a list of observations from my guide to the Czechs. My comments will be in brackets. :)
1) Czech Republic has the highest beer consumption per person in the world (ok, no surprise there, with all the cheap and good beer that is available here)
2) When asked "If you had to choose another country to live in, what would it be?", most Czechs would answer Slovakia. (very adventurous people, those Czechs)
3) Czechs consider themselves to have a good cuisine (muahahaha!)
4) Pets, unlike the elderly, are regarded as a full member of the family (probably this is not true for farm animals, considering the fact that they usually end up in goulash and are being eaten with dumplings; I can't imagine any worse way to end up)
5) Czech men are not afraid to wear socks in sandals and some are even proud of wearing their sandals this way (yup, I've seen it happen, even young people do it here...)
6) A girl would respond better to a guy saying something nice about her dog than to a compliment about her looks (interesting, I'm gonna try that out)
7) Czechs have over 30 words for "making love (just a pity I can't pronounce any of them...)
So I hope these facts have given you more insight in what kind of people I am surrounded with. The book also said that Czech people are always prepared to argue about anything, so I'm looking forward to some nice discussions about this post. :)
Have a good week!
This time I will not only talk about my own experiences, but I will use the Xenophobe's guide to the Czechs, that I bought this weekend, because lately I am really trying to understand Czech people, as a foundation. To me, the things that were mentioned in that little book were very recognizable. So here's a list of observations from my guide to the Czechs. My comments will be in brackets. :)
1) Czech Republic has the highest beer consumption per person in the world (ok, no surprise there, with all the cheap and good beer that is available here)
2) When asked "If you had to choose another country to live in, what would it be?", most Czechs would answer Slovakia. (very adventurous people, those Czechs)
3) Czechs consider themselves to have a good cuisine (muahahaha!)
4) Pets, unlike the elderly, are regarded as a full member of the family (probably this is not true for farm animals, considering the fact that they usually end up in goulash and are being eaten with dumplings; I can't imagine any worse way to end up)
5) Czech men are not afraid to wear socks in sandals and some are even proud of wearing their sandals this way (yup, I've seen it happen, even young people do it here...)
6) A girl would respond better to a guy saying something nice about her dog than to a compliment about her looks (interesting, I'm gonna try that out)
7) Czechs have over 30 words for "making love (just a pity I can't pronounce any of them...)
So I hope these facts have given you more insight in what kind of people I am surrounded with. The book also said that Czech people are always prepared to argue about anything, so I'm looking forward to some nice discussions about this post. :)
Have a good week!
dinsdag 8 februari 2011
Czech bands in concert!
Lately I received the comment that my blog posts were way too much about funny stuff and too little about the things I do here in Prague. Well, that is mostly because I didn't do so much interesting things the past few weeks (although playing paintball for the first time in my life would be worth mentioning of course). But yesterday, I "did" something again.
On Sunday I decided to look at the concert agenda for Prague for the coming month, because I felt like I needed some new music in my life. On that website, I found out that the next day there was a concert at a place called Palác Akropolis by two bands that I did not know, but that did have a name that sounded interesting. So I checked them out on YouTube and decided they were quite good, so yesterday I went to Palác Akropolis to see them perform.
The support-act was called No Heroes. Those guys honoured to their name, as they entered the stage in simple white or black t-shirts and jeans. Their music was exactly the kind of music I like though. I could try to describe their style, but maybe it's easier to just show you guys a video:
So now for the main act, called Poslední výstřel. I was kind of looking forward to them, because they would sing in Czech and based on their YouTube-videos they were a bit.. unusual. Well, that impression was right. The lead singer, who looked a bit like Mick Jagger, was an over-aged, highly energetic, semi-drunk rocker/hippie/drug addict, and there was also this bald maniac who was quietly playing the accordion at first, but suddenly started to make crazy sounds in his microphone half-way the concert, and during the last song he even started to rap in a weird-sounding language that was probably Czech.
I must say, that last song was pretty good actually, but I will show you the best song of the evening: Rozhodně nečekejte sex. Actually, I caught myself singing along this one line at the end of the song. So thanks to these guys I now know one more line in Czech! was such an educational night yesterday. :)
I must say though that the live-version was a lot better than this video: it had a lot more guitar in it. The Czech crowd really went wild during this song! Which means: people started to move their legs a bit to the rhythm instead of just watching them with their hands in their pockets or their arms crossed. Yes, Czech people still have a lot to learn about enjoying themselves at concerts...
On Sunday I decided to look at the concert agenda for Prague for the coming month, because I felt like I needed some new music in my life. On that website, I found out that the next day there was a concert at a place called Palác Akropolis by two bands that I did not know, but that did have a name that sounded interesting. So I checked them out on YouTube and decided they were quite good, so yesterday I went to Palác Akropolis to see them perform.
The support-act was called No Heroes. Those guys honoured to their name, as they entered the stage in simple white or black t-shirts and jeans. Their music was exactly the kind of music I like though. I could try to describe their style, but maybe it's easier to just show you guys a video:
So now for the main act, called Poslední výstřel. I was kind of looking forward to them, because they would sing in Czech and based on their YouTube-videos they were a bit.. unusual. Well, that impression was right. The lead singer, who looked a bit like Mick Jagger, was an over-aged, highly energetic, semi-drunk rocker/hippie/drug addict, and there was also this bald maniac who was quietly playing the accordion at first, but suddenly started to make crazy sounds in his microphone half-way the concert, and during the last song he even started to rap in a weird-sounding language that was probably Czech.
I must say, that last song was pretty good actually, but I will show you the best song of the evening: Rozhodně nečekejte sex. Actually, I caught myself singing along this one line at the end of the song. So thanks to these guys I now know one more line in Czech! was such an educational night yesterday. :)
I must say though that the live-version was a lot better than this video: it had a lot more guitar in it. The Czech crowd really went wild during this song! Which means: people started to move their legs a bit to the rhythm instead of just watching them with their hands in their pockets or their arms crossed. Yes, Czech people still have a lot to learn about enjoying themselves at concerts...
maandag 31 januari 2011
Love at first sight
Two weeks ago, I walked into a toy store and I fell in love. Not with a beautiful girl behind the counter, no, I fell in love with one of the stuffed animals that was looking at me, with a look in his eyes that said: "please, Laurens, take me home with you". This weekend, I couldn't resist the temptation any more, so I went back to the toy store, found my friend back (I really believe I saw a smile on his face when he saw me again) and this time I took him home with me. We were both so happy when we got home and played with eachother all afternoon! :)
So now there is only one problem: my little friend doesn't have a name yet. And that's where I need your help. So please get inspired by the following photo and send me your suggestion about how I should name this naughty little creature:
I hear you thinking: what's in it for me? Well, it's mainly about the honour of course, but I discussed it with my new friend and he told me that he will do a chat session of 30 minutes with the winner, like this:
So send your suggestions to me now, and my cute little friend hopes to speak to you soon. :)
So now there is only one problem: my little friend doesn't have a name yet. And that's where I need your help. So please get inspired by the following photo and send me your suggestion about how I should name this naughty little creature:
I hear you thinking: what's in it for me? Well, it's mainly about the honour of course, but I discussed it with my new friend and he told me that he will do a chat session of 30 minutes with the winner, like this:
So send your suggestions to me now, and my cute little friend hopes to speak to you soon. :)
zondag 16 januari 2011
International cooking
Ok, so I got another interesting idea this weekend, that I need to share with you.
On Friday night I was without inspiration about what to cook for myself this weekend, so I asked my new Turkish penpal who I was talking to at that moment if she had any suggestions. Straight away she suggested a traditional Turkish dish, called tavuk sote (chicken saute). So I googled a recipe, made my own interpretation of it and went to the supermarket on Saturday afternoon to buy all the ingredients. It took quite some time to prepare it, since I worked with mostly fresh ingredients, but the result looked very good and the food tasted delicious as well!
So my idea is to cook a traditional recipe from a different country that was suggested by one of my penpals every weekend for the coming weeks. It will be just like a culinary travel around the world! Sounds very good, doesn't it? So if you have any suggestions about a traditional dish from your country that I should make, please let me know. I will send you a picture of the result, so you can tell me whether I did everything alright or not.
And if I don't receive any response, like the time when I suggested you all to close your eyes and stare into a bright light to become a happier person (see one of my previous blog posts), I will send you a friendly reminder on msn or through mail in the coming weeks. :)
On Friday night I was without inspiration about what to cook for myself this weekend, so I asked my new Turkish penpal who I was talking to at that moment if she had any suggestions. Straight away she suggested a traditional Turkish dish, called tavuk sote (chicken saute). So I googled a recipe, made my own interpretation of it and went to the supermarket on Saturday afternoon to buy all the ingredients. It took quite some time to prepare it, since I worked with mostly fresh ingredients, but the result looked very good and the food tasted delicious as well!
So my idea is to cook a traditional recipe from a different country that was suggested by one of my penpals every weekend for the coming weeks. It will be just like a culinary travel around the world! Sounds very good, doesn't it? So if you have any suggestions about a traditional dish from your country that I should make, please let me know. I will send you a picture of the result, so you can tell me whether I did everything alright or not.
And if I don't receive any response, like the time when I suggested you all to close your eyes and stare into a bright light to become a happier person (see one of my previous blog posts), I will send you a friendly reminder on msn or through mail in the coming weeks. :)
dinsdag 11 januari 2011
My first guest in Prague
Hi all!
I am pleased to announce that from Wednesday till Friday last week I hosted my first guest at my new place. My penpal Kate from Ukraine went on a trip to France, and on the way there she decided to make a stop in Prague to meet me. She had already done a city tour with the group she was with, but I still showed her around a bit in my neighborhood and the city center. Although it was hard to communicate at times, as she didn't speak English that well, we managed to set up quite a few nice conversations, thanks to her Russian-English dictionary and Google Translate, and had a very nice time together. :)
So I hope I will be able to welcome more friends to Prague soon, now that the worst part of the winter seems to be over. The city is just amazing, and I live in a great area, so this really is a great opportunity for you. :) And for the friends who are students with a corresponding tight budget: my guest-bed seems to be very comfy, so you don't have to spend a lot of money on a good hotel here; Hotel Laurens will take very good care of you as well. For free. :)
I am pleased to announce that from Wednesday till Friday last week I hosted my first guest at my new place. My penpal Kate from Ukraine went on a trip to France, and on the way there she decided to make a stop in Prague to meet me. She had already done a city tour with the group she was with, but I still showed her around a bit in my neighborhood and the city center. Although it was hard to communicate at times, as she didn't speak English that well, we managed to set up quite a few nice conversations, thanks to her Russian-English dictionary and Google Translate, and had a very nice time together. :)
So I hope I will be able to welcome more friends to Prague soon, now that the worst part of the winter seems to be over. The city is just amazing, and I live in a great area, so this really is a great opportunity for you. :) And for the friends who are students with a corresponding tight budget: my guest-bed seems to be very comfy, so you don't have to spend a lot of money on a good hotel here; Hotel Laurens will take very good care of you as well. For free. :)
dinsdag 4 januari 2011
New place, new experiences
So, as I moved into my new room last weekend, I think it's time to give you all an update about it.
At first glance it all looked so perfect. The room is big, looks cosy and is situated in the center of Prague. However, on my first day and night here, I was a bit disappointed. Indeed, the room looks nice, and so does the kitchen. However, what pictures do not mention is the amount of noise you hear. My room looks out over one of the busiest streets in Prague. Even in the middle of the night not a minute goes by without several cars passing. I'm just a small town guy, so the first day and night I really had to get used to it, and I coudln't relax or sleep very well. However, today I already got used to it a bit and don't even hear all the sounds any more. So I'm turning into a big city boy now. :)
Moreover, the appartment is quite cold. In my room it's no problem, because the heating system works very well. In the hall and kitchen however, it can be very cold in my opinion. I say "in my opinion". As I spent a lot of time outside in the first night of this year, I may have a bit of a cold. That could be a reason why I'm so cold here all of the time (even in my heated room), so let's not judge the flat yet about that.
Today I'm starting to feel a bit better again, and I am cautiously optimistic now about my future here. When I'm in Vinohrady, the area that I live in now, I always get lost, so I'm sure that I will soon have some funny stories to tell you guys. :)
Photos of my new place will appear here soon!
At first glance it all looked so perfect. The room is big, looks cosy and is situated in the center of Prague. However, on my first day and night here, I was a bit disappointed. Indeed, the room looks nice, and so does the kitchen. However, what pictures do not mention is the amount of noise you hear. My room looks out over one of the busiest streets in Prague. Even in the middle of the night not a minute goes by without several cars passing. I'm just a small town guy, so the first day and night I really had to get used to it, and I coudln't relax or sleep very well. However, today I already got used to it a bit and don't even hear all the sounds any more. So I'm turning into a big city boy now. :)
Moreover, the appartment is quite cold. In my room it's no problem, because the heating system works very well. In the hall and kitchen however, it can be very cold in my opinion. I say "in my opinion". As I spent a lot of time outside in the first night of this year, I may have a bit of a cold. That could be a reason why I'm so cold here all of the time (even in my heated room), so let's not judge the flat yet about that.
Today I'm starting to feel a bit better again, and I am cautiously optimistic now about my future here. When I'm in Vinohrady, the area that I live in now, I always get lost, so I'm sure that I will soon have some funny stories to tell you guys. :)
Photos of my new place will appear here soon!
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