ISC #10

Hello and welcome to edition 10 of the International Song Contest. A jubilee edition! I started this tradition in 2011 by asking 11 friends to select a song from their country and have people vote for their favorites.The contest was quickly expanded 22 songs per edition when I started enjoying it to find great music by myself. And now I can't believe that this is already the 10th edition! A big thanks goes out to all of my friends and family who have made this possible by selecting songs and/or voting for their favorites. It's you guys who kept me going all this time!

I honestly believe that this 10th edition of ISC has the highest average quality of music so far. Because I worked hard for it. Really, you won't believe how many songs I have judged before coming to the list with the 22 songs below. The preliminary list of participants contained music from countries like Tuvalu, Paraguay, Trinidad and Tobago and Bahrain, but in the end they were deemed not good enough to share with you. Now there are only two countries making their debut in this edition: Kazakhstan and Myanmar. This makes a total of 67 countries that has participated in ISC.

Let's hope you will enjoy listening to these songs. As always there is a voting section below where I kindly ask you to vote for your favorites in Eurovision-style. Any vote is extremely appreciated. :) 

Voting rules:
- Voting goes via the traditional Eurovision-system, see below. You may also vote in a personal message to me, via e-mail or via Facebook.
- You can vote for your own country and/or your own entry, as long as you promise to vote honestly. You can also ask one of your friends to vote, as long as this friend votes based on his/her own taste and not on your advice. :)
- You can vote until 18 October 6:00pm CET.
- Voting tip: personally I find it easy to rate the songs I like 1-5* while listening to the recap video and rank them afterwards based on this rating. After the voting has ended I will publish the results on my blog and make a fancy animation of the voting process, to give the viewer the feeling that he or she is watching the results of the real Eurovision song contest. If you include your e-mailaddress, I will send you an e-mail when the final result is published.

Recap video:



Playlist:
I also made a YouTube playlist of all the songs, to make it easier for you to listen to the full version of your favorites! You can access it via this link.

Voting section:
 Sorry, voting is closed!

List of participants:

No.	Country	Artist	Title
1.	Hungary	Tamás Horváth	Sour Cherry Tree
2.	Germany	Namika feat. Black M	Je Ne Parle Pas Français
3.	New Zealand	Mitch James	Move On
4.	Croatia	Klapa Cambi	Jidra Mog Vapora
5.	Iceland	Steindi Jr.	Hardest Karaoke Song In The World
6.	Netherlands	Haevn	Finding Out More
7.	Kazakhstan	Alem Band	Qalawim
8.	Ukraine	Boba K	What She's Like
9.	Myanmar	Ni Ni Khin Zaw	A La Kar Pae
10.	France	Arcadian	Ton Combat
11.	Latvia	Masha	Mr. Presley
12.	Tunisia	Myrath	Endure The Silence
13.	United Kingdom	Lewis Capaldi	Fade
14.	Finland	Kaija Koo feat. Cheek	Nää Yöt Ei Anna Armoo
15.	Malta	I.Am.Willow	Satellite
16.	Estonia	Stig Rästa	Home
17.	Russia	Ocean Jet	Breaking The Stones
18.	Armenia	Sirusho	Huh-Hah
19.	Mexico	Danna Paola ft. Noel Schajris	No Es Cierto
20.	Greece	RadioAct	Me N Myself
21.	Romania	Carla's Dreams	Unde
22.	Sweden	H.e.a.t.	Living On The Run

My personal top 30 of ISC 1-9

We're slowly getting ready for the 10th edition of the International Song Contest. A jubilee edition, which has a very strong line-up. To get ready for that, I decided to make a top 30 of my personal favorites from the past 9 editions of ISC. Also, I made a recap video of the top 13 favorite songs. Why a top 13? Because 30 is too much for people to still enjoy, the number 14 has no official video and a top 10 would be too few songs. :) But for the people who want to watch all songs, I did make a playlist on YouTube. For the link, see below.

So here is the recap video:

Here is the link to the playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-GSipfiWJo&index=2&t=0s&list=PL2msETN888OE0tQQc1fOHfGx1qx1jYtta

And here is the list itself, including the country and the final position in the contest the song achieved:

1. Sturm und Drang - Molly The Murderer (Finland; finished 10th in ISC#6)
2. Sunrise Avenue - Hollywood Hills (Finland; finished 1st in ISC#1)
3. Red Electrick ft. MPO - Young Again (Malta; finished 2nd in ISC#7)
4. Lunatica - Who You Are (Switzerland; finished 2nd in ISC#2)
5. Michael Schulte - Carry Me Home (Germany; finished 2nd in ISC#5)
6. Haloo Helsinki! - Beibi (Finland; finished 7th in ISC#9)
7. Nik & Jay feat. Søren Huss - Ocean Of You (Denmark; finished 16th in ISC#7)
8. Paddy & The Rats - Pilgrim On The Road (Hungary; finished 5th in ISC#6)
9. Luminize - Get It Back (Croatia; finished 5th in ISC#7)
10. Eivør - Undo Your Mind (Faroe Islands; finished 8th in ISC#4)
11. Softengine - Yellow House (Finland; finished 3rd in ISC#8)
12. Kaleo - Way Down We Go (Iceland; finished 1st in ISC#8)
13. Morat - Yo Más Te Adoro (Colombia; finished 2nd in ISC#9)
14. Bobby Andonov - War Is Love (Australia; finished 7th in ISC#6)
15. Blackbyrd ft. Craig Hinds - From The Bottom Of My Heart (South Africa; finished 1st in ISC#7)
16. Sekai No Owari - Dragon Night (Japan; finished 12th in ISC#8)
17. 77 Bombay Street - Long Way (Switzerland; finished 3rd in ISC#3)
18. Mejaši - Zorica (Croatia; finished 4th in ISC#6)
19. Bryan Rice ft. Julie - Curtain Call (Denmark; finished 1st in ISC#3)
20. NRG - Mayday (South Africa; finished 5th in ISC#5)
21. Modà - La Notte (Italy; finished 15th in ISC#2)
22. Vunk ft. Antonia - Pleacă (Romania; finished 14th in ISC#5)
23. Cats On Trees, Calogero - Jimmy (France; finished 4th in ISC#7)
24. Sanna Nielsen - Empty Room (Sweden; finished 4th in ISC#3)
25. J-Mors - Ne Umirai (Belarus; finished 2nd in ISC#1)
26. Pegasus - Last Night On Earth (Switzerland; finished 6th in ISC#8)
27. Airport Impressions - Berlin (Malta; finished 3rd in ISC#6)
28. Autumn Hill - Return Policy (Canada; finished 5th in ISC#8)
29. Revolverheld - Keine Liebeslieder (Germany; finished 4th in ISC#4)
30. Negative - Won't Let Go (Finland; finished 4th in ISC#2)

Trip to Georgia and Armenia

Again, it had been too long since my last trip. This time I went to Georgia and Armenia: two small countries on the Caucasus. I started and ended the trip in Tbilisi. Upon arrival at the airport I met a Turkish-Iranian guy, who went to Tbilisi on a day trip without a clear plan. Since I knew what I wanted to see in the city, he was happy to spend the day with me and visit all the sights together in one day. It was fun to share memories together, such as ordering two meals per person because they were so cheap that we thought they must be small, but in fact they were super filling and we really struggled to finish everything (and failed miserably).
After one day I moved on to Yerevan in Armenia to meet my friend Maddie. I had to go so soon, because we made a deal to watch Eurovision together. We also explored the country. Below you can find the highlights.

Unreliable Armenians and a bumpy ride into Georgia

My initial plan was to go to the Georgian town of Akhaltsikhe after Armenia. According to Wikitravel there should be one minibus going there, but I couldn't find it. That would be the start of a memorable story. The night before I had made a reservation for the direct minibus to Batumi. However, when i arrived at the place there was first a misunderstanding about the price and then the bus was suddenly full. I showed the (unreliable looking) man my reservation and then he said the only English words I would hear him say all day: "5 minutes, Mercedes car". So I waited there for 40 minutes and finally the Mercedes car showed up. The man took the money I was supposed to pay to get to Batumi. I asked him if this car was going to Batumi and he seemed to say yes. But as expected, the car was only going to Tbilisi and from there I had to find my own way. A not-super-friendly and no-English-speaking other passenger showed me where to find the minibus to Batumi. After 40 minutes of waiting for it to fill up the minibus left at 3pm for the 6-hour ride to "Bhathumi", as the driver called it with his distinct Turkish accent.
The ride was bumpy. Partly due to the poor condition of Georgian roads, but also due to te fact that we got a flat tyre. That has happened to me before, but this time it was not so easy to replace the wheel: we just couldn't remove the old wheel. Our driver stopped other minibuses to try with their equipment, but nothing helped. In the end we got help from a local farmer who was passing by on his tractor. He suggested to pump up the tyre with his pump and drive to the nearest garage to get the wheel replaced. So there I was, at a garage in a small village close to the (unofficial) border with South Ossetia (Doghlauri, to be precise), waiting for some unshaved old local mechanics to fix our minibus. My way of traveling certainly takes me to extraordinary places.

Batumi: the perfect city

At 22:30 we finally arrived in Batumi. Actually it was quite good to arrive in Batumi so late, because the city is the casino city of the country and certainly has a vibrant nightlife. Which I couldn't try out unfortunately, because for some reason there were only older people staying in my hostel. But I certainly enjoyed this seaside city with its long boulevard. Batumi really is a perfect city with its coast and its nightlife.

Up next was Kutaisi, where within the hour I met several nice young people in the hostel with whom I agreed to hire a taxi the next day to visit all the highlights in the region. Much cheaper than booking a daytour! We visited two canyons, a cave and a huge abandoned hotel in a nearby village. The owner of the hostel told us that in the Soviet times workers would earn vouchers for holidays, but could not decide themselves where they wanted to go. The government decided everything and since for some reason they wanted everybody to go on holiday to this village they built 24 hotels there. After the Soviet Union collapsed, nobody wanted to go here any more and most of the hotels closed and were abandoned. As you may know, I love to explore abandoned buildings and it’s even more interesting to hear the story about why these buildings were abandoned.

The mole is active!

One of the most popular tv shows in the Netherlands is called “Wie is de mol?” (Who is the mole?), in which 10 (semi-) famous people have to complete missions to earn money for the team. However, one of them is trying to sabotage everything and it’s up to the others to find out who this is. This show always takes place in an exotic country and this year it took place in Georgia, so I could visit some of the places in which a mission took place. One of the missions was for example to re-paint the White Bridge of Kutaisi within one hour, with the help of local people who were passing by. The mission was completed and it was fun for me to see that even now on the floor of the bridge you could still see the paint drops and even a white spot where clearly a jar of paint fell over. After Kutaisi I also visited Rabati fortress in Akhaltsikhe. I wasn’t aware of this in advance, but when I was there I recognized places from tv and it turned out that this actually was the location of the final of Wie is de mol?. And as any traveler may know: it’s always nice if you visit places you have seen before on tv.

Two final day trips

After Akhaltsikhe I took the minibus back to Tbilisi. From there I had planned two daytrips: to the old towns of Mtskheta and Sighnaghi. Usually I stick to my plan, but since many people who I met in hostels and also some friends who have been to Georgia recommended me to visit Kazbegi mountain, I changed my plan for the final day and made a daytrip to Kazbegi. Even though it was a bit of a cloudy day, it was indeed a beautiful place.

Overall, it was a good trip. Let's see where I will travel next! :D

Eurovision 2018: my top 5

As a song contest-fanatic, of course I have listened to all the Eurovision entries and ranked them already by now. Here's my top 5 of this year.

1. Hungary (AWS - Viszlát Nyár)
A surprise number 1 this year perhaps. It has been since 2006 since I last had a song in a foreign language in my top 3, but I guess for this song you don't need to understand the lyrics to appreciate it. I have been told that the title means "goodbye summer" and that this "summer" refers to the father of the singer who passed away. The lyrics are about how you should take care of and spend time with your loved ones, before it's too late. I bet you wouldn't have expected such nice lyrics from a metal-song, right? But as said, this song is not so much about the lyrics, it's mostly about the music. And I loved this song already since the moment I heard the awesome intro. Enjoy it, if you can enjoy this kind of music. :P

2. Belarus (Alekseev - Forever)
The national final from Belarus was the worst of all national finals. There was only one song that could win it: Forever, by the Ukrainian singer Alekseev. His live performance is "not that great" usually, but the video clip of his song is awesome. The song is a perfect combination of an Eastern European pop song from the 1990s and a modern day pop song, sung in English with a very distinct accent. This song has something special and therefore it is in second place.

3. Denmark (Rasmussen - Higher Ground)
Denmark is in my top 5 pretty much every year. After a one year break, they are back in 2018. Rasmussen is a true Scandinavian viking with a powerful voice. I hope that at Eurovision the song will be performed with a true viking ship on the background, that could give the whole performance something extra and would guarantee Rasmussen a place in the final.

4. Latvia (Laura Rizzotto - Funny Girl)
Laura Rizzotto doesn't have a truly Latvian name. She was born in Rio de Janeiro and has roots in both Brazil and Latvia. She lived in the USA for a while as well, so this funny girl has a truly international background. I can't describe what I like about the song so much, it's just a quality song from a good singer. She has to perform in the strong semi-final 2 though, so I will have to wish her good luck to qualify for the final.

5. Italy (Ermal Meta e Fabrizio Moro - Non Mi Avete Fatto Niente)
For the second year in a row Italy reaches my top 5 with a song in Italian. And this year's entry couldn't be more different than the one from last year. While last year we had the "catchy" singer with a dancing monkey on the background, this year's entry is a serious song about terrorism. The title litterally means "you did nothing to me", which implies that people in the west will continue to live the way they want, despite the "inutile guerre" (useless wars) that are currently being fought. A song with a message. If the song were in English, it would have a big chance to win, but now I think it will just reach top 10 and not more.

My favorites to win the contest
Realistically speaking, none of the songs in my top 5 have a chance to win the contest. The top favorite among bookmakers is Israel: a very creative singer called Netta. She has awesome live performances without a music tape on the background, but her Eurovision song was very disappointing to me. It is creative from her to imitate a chicken on stage, but somehow I don't believe that this song will win. Just like Norwegian Alexander Rybak: he won the contest 9 years ago, made many excellent songs in the years after that, but returns to Eurovision with an average song. For sure he will get many votes from his fans, but the song is just not good enough to win. The Estonian opera singer is also standing out, so she could win it (even though I strongly dislike the song). Czech Republic may be a dangerous outsider, with an excellent modern pop song by Mikolas Josef, who already has the attitude of an international superstar. Or maybe the Netherlands has a chance, with Waylon's good country-rock song. Or perhaps it will be the Swedish Ingrosso who takes victory with his modern pop-song. There are any candidates for the win this year in my opinion. Let's see who gets it in the end!

The wonders of Southern Africa

It had been 6 months since my last big trip, so it was about time I'd go somewhere again. In this blog post I'll take you with me on my journey through Southern Africa: from Cape Town to Pretoria, plus Kruger Park and Victoria Falls.

A table for the clouds

I started with a few days in Cape Town, where I met my good friend Georgie again, more than 5 years after I last saw her in her home country Czech Republic. She was in Cape Town for a church conference and of course we wanted to spend some time together. On the first day we hiked up Table Mountain together with her friend who is a flight attendant for Emirates. It was very cloudy though and I wonder if Table Mountain is called this way because it's like a table for the clouds. In the evening we went out with some people we met during the hike. Despite the cloudy weather, it was a great day!

The following day the flight attendant had already left (crazy life, hiking up Table Mountain after a flight of 10 hours, going out in the evening and then flying back the next morning), but some people from the church conference had arrived and together with some of them we made a daytrip to see African penguins at Boulders beach and to visit Cape of Good Hope. So my first few days in Cape Town were quite action packed and full of meeting new people.

The biologist and the two hippies

South Africa is not really a country to travel through with public transport. You just won't get to the most beautiful places. Since it's a bit boring to rent a car and drive 2000 km on my own, I bought a Baz Bus ticket. The Baz Bus is basically a hop on hop off bus for backpackers. It picks you up at your hostel and drops you off at the next hostel. The Baz Bus route runs between Cape Town and Johannesburg and has stops at all the beautiful spots. My first stop was in Knysna: a small town with a beautiful lagoon next to it, separated from the sea by some magnificient cliffs. I stayed there two nights and wanted to do paragliding on one day. The paragliding was taking place in Wilderness, so I went there by shared taxi. The paragliding was however cancelled last-minute due to too much wind, so I had to find something else to do. So I explored the beach and the town. I also met the Belgian biologist and his two hippie friends, who I had talked to a lot on the bus the day before. I would meet them on 4 different occasions in total. That's the fun part of going with Baz Bus: you make new friends on the bus and you never know if and when you will see them again. Below some pictures of Knysna.

A mountainbike ride in Storms River

Up next was the relatively unknown Tsitsikamma National Park. I was staying in a village called Storms River in a bit of a hippie hostel with a goat walking in the garden who was sometimes pooping on guests' flipflops. In the hostel I met another Belgian (South Africa is full of Dutch, Belgian and German backpackers!) and we decided to go mountainbiking in the park the next day. We were rewarded with some awesome views:

Lesuuthuu

After a short stop in Port Elizabeth I went to the Drakensberg mountains. One of the most beautiful parts of these mountains is the Sani Pass which connects South Africa with Lesotho, so that's where I went. Lesotho is a country of roughly the size of Belgium and it's the country with the highest lowest point in the world. I wanted to spend 2 or 3 days there but the only possibility to stay more than 1 day was to join a 2 day pony trek. I really really don't see myself riding a pony for 2 days, so I joined a day tour to Lesotho in a 4x4. The views from Sani Pass were indeed stunning. We drove into Lesotho at the most relaxed border crossing ever: they gave us all an entry and exit stamp at the same time, so we wouldn't have to come back in the afternoon. Something I didn't know: Lesotho is actually pronounced as Lesuuthuu. The first time I heard it was while talking to a British girl at the hostel. I remember thinking "oh boy, she has the worst British accent ever" but the next day I found out she just pronounced it correctly. :) So in Lesuuthuu we visited a traditional village that was way too touristic (it reminded me of the floating village at Lake Titicaca in that sense), went to see some sheep shearers (sadly they were on lunch break), had a beer in the self-proclaimed highest pub in the Africa (hard to believe that this is true, but still, Lesothian beer tasted very good) and made a short hike during which we met two young shepherds.

In exchange for some apples we could take some pictures with them and I gladly took advantage of

this opportunity:

Onwards to the Kruger Park...

In the mountains the weather can change quickly. The next day it was rainy and foggy so I had to change my plans to go hiking and get some nice views. I got a ride to a nearby city from a friendly British couple and spent a day there. After that, I continued towards Pretoria. For time purposes I will not write about that and skip to the Kruger Park. I booked a package tour to go there. It was supposed to be a camping trip, but the tents had real beds and electricity and there was even a working fridge on the campsite to keep our beers cold. There was no wifi, which forced us to sit around the campfire sharing stories. Such a horrible way to spend our 3 evenings there. :)

The first day in Kruger Park didn't go as planned. Angry villagers had set up a roadblock and were throwing stones at cars so that nobody could enter the gate to Kruger Park. We had to take a detour of 2 hours to get to the next gate. We were rewarded afterwards however with lots of animals. We even saw 2 cheetahs chilling in the grass after just having eaten an impala. Some baboons were having some casual sex nearby, when the impalas asked them to take revenge on the cheetahs for killing their friend. So then the baboons attacked the cheetahs! It was not the most violent attack, but it did make the cheetahs stand up and cross the road right in front of us.

In the meantime we were also trying to spot the Big Five. We found the rhino, elephant and buffalo already. Just the leopard and the lion were still missing...

So the next morning we got up at 4am to beat the villagers (no, not beat them up, just to be ahead of them) and got to Kruger Park before any riots could start. We didn't see the leopard, but did see lions. At one point we were waiting at a crossroad because another safari vehicle was rapidly approaching. The driver shouted "ngala ngala" before making a right turn with squeeking tyres. So we followed them, racing with 50 km/h on a very bad dirtroad. We saw a lioness chilling in the grass in the distance. We waited for a long time and got rewarded: the lioness stood up and out of the bushes at least 4 other lionesses appeared afterwards. It was a nice moment.

Swimming in the Devil's pool

Victoria Falls has been on my bucketlist for a long time already. Since I was in the area anyways, I made a quick stop in Zambia to see the falls. I knew that December is a bad time to visit them because it is the end of the dry season. So the falls themselves were not super impressive due to a lack of water. But: when life gives you lemons, you just make lemonade. Since the water is low, it is possible to swim in Devil's Pool: a part of the falls where tourists can swim right next to a waterfall of 100 meters high. And then I don't mean at the bottom, no, at the top. So one wrong move could make you fall down the falls. It was a very cool experience and a great way to end my journey!

The results are in!

The results are in! International Song Contest #9 is officially over and all points have been added up. And we have a winner! Quick, check out who it is via the link below:


http://tummiweb.com/scorewiz/scoreboard/view/192163/isc-9


It was interesting for me to see how music tastes among people can differ. Also it was interesting that for the first time there were voters from 5 different continents (the Chilean flag doesn't work in the tool I used). That was also very nice for me.


Most voters were already thanked by me individually, but also via this post I want to thank everyone who voted. Without you this edition wouldn't have been possible and as you can see all votes had their impact on the final result. See you next year!

International Song Contest #9

Hello and welcome to edition 9 of the International Song Contest. A special edition. Not only because every edition of this song contest is special, but also because this is a themed edition. The theme is "languages". All songs in this contest are in (one of) the official language(s) that is spoken in the country. So today I - together with some friends who helped me selected the songs - am sharing 22 new songs from all over the world in 20 different languages.



This edition will therefore be different from all previous editions, but I hope you still enjoy listening to these songs. As always there is a voting section below where I kindly ask you to vote for your favorites in Eurovision-style. Any vote is extremely appreciated. :)



Voting rules:
- Voting goes via the traditional Eurovision-system, see below. You may also vote in a personal message to me, if you have me as a friend on Facebook. :)
- You can vote for your own country and/or your own entry, as long as you promise to vote honestly. You can also ask one of your friends to vote, as long as this friend votes based on his/her own taste and not on your advice. :)
- You can vote until 9 October 6:00pm CET.
- Voting tip: personally I find it easy to rate the songs I like 1-5* while listening to the recap video and rank them afterwards based on this rating.



After the voting has ended I will publish the results on my blog and make a fancy animation of the voting process, to give the viewer the feeling that he or she is watching the results of the real Eurovision song contest. If you include your e-mailaddress, I will send you an e-mail when the final result is published.

Recap video:






This year for the first time I made a YouTube playlist of all the songs, to make it easier for you to listen to the full version of your favorites! You can find it via this link.



If you are old-fashioned and still want to have the links to the songs one by one, you can still find them below:

1.	Slovakia	Zuzana Smatanová	Horou
2.	Norway	Morgan Sulele	Bare Min
3.	Colombia	Morat	Yo Más Te Adoro
4.	Estonia	SHANON	Jäätunud Jäljed
5.	Kyrgyzstan	Kyrgyz Kyzdary	Ak Sedep
6.	Germany	Adel Tawil	Ist Da Jemand?
7.	Croatia	Mejaši	Zavela Me Ana
8.	Malta	The Travellers	Xemx U Xita
9.	Brazil	Gisele De Santi	E Eu
10.	Czech Republic	Sebastian	Toulavá
11.	Netherlands	Racoon	Oceaan
12.	Romania	Vunk ft. Fly Project	Fa-mi Cu Mana
13.	Albania	Vedat Ademi ft. Yllka Kuqi	Ne Zemer Te Mbaj
14.	France	Claudio Capéo	Ça Va Ça Va
15.	Italy	Emanuele Corvaglia	Una Nuova Dimenzione
16.	Cambodia	Preap Sovath ft. Kanha	Rom Anh Jek
17.	Ethiopia	Teddy Afro	Marakiye
18.	Mexico	Natalia Lafourcade	Tú Sí Sabes Quererme
19.	Finland	Haloo Helsinki!	Beibi
20.	Montenegro	Andrea Demirović	Odlazim
21.	Armenia	Sofi Mkheyan	Hamadzayn Em
22.	Switzerland	Beatrice Egli	Wo Sind All Die Romeos

Voting section:


Voting is over!