Athens

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.

Brazil (III) - Rio de Janeiro

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