Serki's Blogism

Quiz

2008-09-30T12:03:00.004+02:00

Following scenario:

A woman with a baby strapped to her back is crossing a small street with about 5 meters width. There is no traffic except a bicycle on which an older grandfather, mid 70s, is riding. The man insults and curses at the young lady because he had to brake and advises her to use the zebra which is about 50 meters ahead.
And now the one million $ question: In which country are we?

Athens

2008-06-01T00:30:00.012+02:00

After a very quick and spontaneous decision dating back to the beginning of April, I landed in Athens last week. I spent lovely days and nights there thanks to my two friends I visited!
I like to listen to the Greek language, but there is just something wrong with the combination of sounds and accents, so that my brain is unable to keep the words... I had almost 3 days to learn how to say "Thank you", which is something like "Ephgaristo", if I didn't mistake it for another thingy... again. But there is a word I remember for sure and that is: Acropolis!

I didn't take that picture, can you notice? :)
The theater in front of it:
Panoramic view:
They have some strange habits though... (yeah, I contributed to the tree's final design)

...but this is not one of them... the food is delicious! I think the name of this is "yalanci dolma", which is interestingly also the Turkish name for it! That is usually eaten with a lot of yogurt!

All time favorite sports: bird scaring followed by ignoring of agitated bird-loving older people. It's fun. Try it.

Soldiers in front of the memorial for the "nameless" soldiers. Looked like a hard job... they are not allowed to speak or move, after they go back to the little shelter which you can see on the right.
The evil eye...The mandatory day at the beach...

The port: xyz limani :)
I think that's the place where the gay dudes used to do naked sports, right? or was that back in the 450's B.C? :)
Shopping at night

Traditional colorful shoesand restaurants... mhmmmmm

Thanks for showing me around and being so generous and welcoming, my friends!

"If you love something set it free, if it comes back then it's yours, if it doesn't then it was never meant to be" - apparently a Chinese proverb.

Flash of inspiration

2008-05-16T18:29:00.002+02:00

"I guess the art in life is kinda to find sources of motivation in all situations." - some dude.

Paris

2008-05-08T00:01:00.011+02:00

Spending a long weekend in Paris definitely tires you, especially if you walk from site to site. I think everybody is familiar with Paris' face (haha, what a pun), so I'll just post some cool pictures. The most impressive thing we saw, was the Louvre for me. It is just so amazingly large and I liked the architecture and all. The pyramids and the feeling of being in "The DaVinci Code"'s world... thrilling. Sadly there is no tomb down there... just ticket teller machines and information desks..

Lost his head:
Inside Notre Dame:
Everyone knows that thing, right?

World's best fish burger:

I guess you have seen enough pictures of DaVinci's Mona Lisa... but have you ever seen the crowd in front of it? here they are:

another famous one:

The Louvre, from inside to outside view:
Night shots:

Leaving Napoleon's tomb (how do you pronounce this word? is it more like "tom", like something heavy falling on the floor and doing that sound 'tomb' or is it more like "tuuuum", like when something cool happens and you were to say "uuuhhh"?)
and now we're looking back to Napoleon's tomb:
Sacre Coeur... kazillons of people:
Moulin Rouge... wasn't what I expected, although I don't really know what I expected :P
"Aux Champs-Elysées, aux Champs-Elysées, Au soleil, sous la pluie, à midi ou à minuit..."

Yep, exactly... italian food in France :) But we were quite lucky with the restaurants, most of them turned out a pretty good choice afterwards...
"Die Welt ist ein Buch. Wer nie reist, sieht nur eine Seite davon." - "The world is a book. The ones which never travel, only see one page of it."
Aurelius Augustinus (354 - 430)

Brazil (IV) - Porto Seguro

2008-03-25T00:01:00.014+01:00

I've also spent five short days in Porto Seguro - the place where the Portuguese met the mainland for the first time (probably run aground :P).
But first of all, the first thing we do is.... we relax, hehehe:
Then we look around:
One of the famous things in this state - Bahia- is Capoeira. For most it looks like some kind of a dance-fight thing... well... it is :D

I can't get enough of beaches, waves, sand and blue skies... By the way Bahia is closer to the equator than Rio and São Paulo, so it looks more tropical and more like you are dreaming.
So here we go once more:
A place called "Toa Toa" where people are dancing altogether to Axé music and doing movements and sounds which might remind you of the physical act of love... it's kinda fun for a while...
another one...
OK, now something very different: Mud. Filthy, brown mud. And loads of it... They lured us with "it's healthy for your skin, bla bla bla". And of course, all the women and older people went crazy. For the record: it's not worth it, it's really, really disgusting and the fricking mud makes your bathing clothing (favorably a tiny G-string for girls :D) exceptionally dirty.
Back to nice things: See this guy? Why does he look so happy? Any guesses?
There may be lots of reasons, but in that very moment the menina in the following picture was one of the main reasons... Guys, may I present you... yes... I know... say it... a w e s o m e :P

Crabs in pitú (I guess):
A real Baiana (O Que É Que A Baiana Tem?):
A fake Baiana:
Another day, another beach :) We were heading towards "Praia do Espelho".
Huge parrot, can't really recognize that in the picture though...
Wanna see what the parrot is look at... this:
The advantage of having your own private photographer with you:) You get these kind of pictures for free:

Like a dream:
This one is my creation... I mean the picture:

"What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies." - Aristotle

Brazil (III) - Rio de Janeiro

2008-03-24T13:31:00.024+01:00

The beach side of life... Rio. I think this city is one of the nicest places I've been to. Well, I've only been 5 days there, so my view might be a very, very touristic one, but hey... I am a tourist :D

During the 6 hours ride from São Paulo you see a beautiful country side:
... but once you arrive there, hehe, the beach is calling already: Ipanema Beach, if I remember right...
And the beach gives you what you need: Cangas, Brazilian beach towels...

It is quite crowded... weekday on the picture, imagine the weekends...the favela Rocinha (I think...), they probably have the nicest view onto Ipanema beach

it's so easy to take nice pictures in Rio...
Another day, another beach: Prainha at nine o'clock in the morning...

Some pictures from down town, close to the area Santa Teresa:
On an old tram on a viaduct through the center:
Rio summarized in a painting...

You can see clearly the line between the favela and the non-favela:
The mosaic stairs... they told me that it is kinda "alive", since the artist is always working on it and he exchanges pieces of the stairs:
Another day, another... you know... beach hehehe. This time it's some part of Barra Beach. This beach is something about 20 km in length:

Canga seller...beach fruits:

The view from Morro da Urca, haven't been on the Pão de Açúcar [Sugar Loaf] though (2nd pic), it was too cloudy as you can see...
View to the Crist statue, he is literally watching over the city:

Back on the streets:
Well, the part of the trip which I HAD to do... visiting the Crist on the Corcovado... wasn't so lucky with the weather though. On the first picture you can see a hint of the Maracanã stadium, the forth largest stadium in the world (around 100'000 spectators max):

Best picture I got of him...
But at least I wasn't the only one who was unlucky that day... hehehe... my fellow 32R$-for-a-crappy-view-spenders as well :D
At last some pictures from the famous Copacabana beach:

Sort of liked this quote, because it seems to me that it fits although it's formulated quite harshly:

"A life lived unexplored is a life not worth living." - Kirk Hammet

Brazil (II) - Sao Paulo

2008-03-10T18:37:00.020+01:00

It's already been ten-ish days since I returned from my short trip (some might not agree, hehe) to Brazil and I feel like uploading some pictures.

Some impressions from Sao Paulo City:
traffic...

delicious food (but not the one in the front in both of the pots [and why the hell is it turning the picture???]):
chocolate pizza...

and awesome "real" pizza:loads of fruits:
and my first coconut juice:
carnival in Caragua and people getting crazy:

more to come...

Brazil (I)

2008-02-15T00:55:00.006+01:00

Oi gente!
Yep, I still exists :)
So I arrived in Rio two days ago and unfortunately I'll have to leave this beautiful place in two days. But until now I've seen the beautiful beaches of Barra, Ipanema, Copacabana, Prainha and others of which I cannot remember their unpronouncable names.

But first things first: I dont have any pictures in this post to prove my words, but they will follow later :) I bet some guys are waiting for pictures of Brazilian girls, I would, hehehe.

Where was I? Ah yes, the beaches... the girls, ahhh. Imagine to live here! Also, here, I am an outstanding person... why?... because I look like a white sheep within brown and black sheeps hehe, yes my skin is still very swiss-cheese like, but I hope that changes after my trip to Bahia next Sunday. Tomorrow I'll see the Christ himself at Corcovado and today I climbed the 'Sugar Loaf', well that's not quite true, it was it's brother the 'Dog Face' (I hope that's right). Hm, writing this is not as much fun as I imagined, because I'd need some pics to show since not everyone is familiar with faces of dogs :)
Before Rio I had a short stay in Sao Paulo, but soon after my arrival me and the family of my half avocado went to the beach in the state of SP. Caraguatatuba, if I remember right. Followed by a short visit to Ubatuba and an intended visit to Parati, which unfortunately miserably failed. We tried it three times and each time something happened, like forgetting the purse of someone etc. I guess it wasn't meant to be :(
After the beach trip, which was quite rainy but still lots of fun, we returned to Sao Paulo, where I stayed for a couple of days. They have the most amazing Pizzas here! I guess better than in Italy (sorry Carloi :)) and the best thing is, they are open until 3 am or even later! We went there at 12 and stayed until 2 am... impossible in Switzerland. Why we went at 12 o'clock? well remember, I am in Brazil, so people are late and slow. And some of them very slow. But I don't mind... I met the nicest people here and I have to admit, the idea of giving 'the living' here a try has crossed my mind (Strange sentence...). Although communication is not always very easy, my acquired Spanish at CERN is enough to understand the basic written Portuguese - speaking is another thing :D

This must be enough for now, gotta go. Boa noite.

Circle of Secret Friends

2008-02-02T00:11:00.000+01:00

The Secret Friends had a gathering in a Korean restaurant... and I got my first Christmas present ever! A bit late, but still... cool-e-o! Thanks Marcelo!

A little note: Don't take that "strong, fierce, blabla" soup menu, it doesn't really taste like anything... well it did, after I threw pieces of every other dish I had on my tray, but I don't think that was the idea of it.

Cheers!

London

2008-01-20T00:52:00.000+01:00

- "London?"
- "London."
- "London?"
- "Yes, London. You know: fish, chips, cup 'o tea, bad food, worse weather, Mary fu*king Poppins... LONDON." (from "Snatch")

So wow, almost forgot to write about this little trip. Here comes a short version of the story: very crowded, cold and overwhelmed first night, until my sweet Chilean companion joined me. The following days were really nice and we saw a lot, and I mean a lot! Look at this route, we made it in one day and estimated its length to about 50 Pia-Serkan-kilometers! Probably even more, really!
See the map...

And now some impressions:

wondering if they are doing the Brazilian waxing as well... not that I want one, but... :)

View from the London Eye, quite expensive by the way:

Finally a sunny day!

In the science museum! Many touchy touchy things, it's awesome!

My favorite picture of London...

Many other pictures on my picasa album

Note to self:

Think twice about booking a flight to London Luton airport, because it's quite far from the center, and you might be better off taking another airport even if it's more expensive - at first sight. It takes more or less two hours from the airport to Piccadilly Circus and it costs about 15£, one way.
Simply planing to see central London? Check out the Piccadilly Backpacker.
If you're using the underground more than once, buy a day ticket

"I am the highway"

2007-12-29T17:50:00.000+01:00

Check out this song, loved it. Kinda sad, but can't stop listing to it...
"Audioslave - I Am The Highway":

Und so fängt's an...

2007-12-25T01:37:00.000+01:00

Da ich kürzlich herausgefunden habe, dass ich gerne reise und zudem noch Spass daran finde Fotos zu schiessen, habe ich mir gedacht, dass ich das ganze mal ins Netz stellen und so vielleicht mit ein paar interessierten Menschen meine Fotos, Berichte und was weiss ich noch teilen könnte.
Super... der erste Satz beinhaltet schon eine Lüge, das fängt ja gut an. Also naja, streicht einfach das dritte Wort "kürzlich", sonst hab ich noch ein schlechtes Gewissen.
Ok, ich schweife ab... und genau, das bringt mich auf den Punkt: ich habe gelesen, dass solch ein Blog einem helfen soll seine Gedanken zu ordnen, was nebenbei meinem geschätzten Gymi-Deutschlehrer schon aufgefallen war. Mal sehen, vielleicht bringt's ja was.
Ich weiss zwar nicht welche Formen dieser Blog annehmen wird, aber primär soll er (der/die/das Blog??) mir als Notizpapier und Gedächtnisstütze dienen. Wenn es etwas gibt, das ich nicht ausstehen kann, dann ist es etwas (für mich wichtiges) zu vergessen.
Und um es vorweg zu nehmen, ich bin nicht der eloquenteste, was wahrscheinlich schon einigen aufgefallen ist, aber dies soll mich nicht daran hinder meine 2 Rappen ins Netz zu stellen.
So, und in diesem Sinne hier noch ein passendes Zitat (zuerst aber noch was für meine englisch sprechenden Fans).

Howdie to the English speaking readers.
Basically I'm too lazy to translate everything that I've written in German above and I guess I'll probably be switching between languages in the future... none of them is near to a writer's level, but that's not the purpose of this blog. I'm planing to put some traveling pictures and reports in this blog, but I guess I'll also share some other things that might be of interest to somebody out there...

So that being said, I'll finish with an adequate quote that I found some time ago in the net, unfortunately I don't know who the originator is:

"Just because the message may never be received does not mean it is not worth sending."