Back in good old Blighty

I'm home! Well, I have been since the wee hours of Wednesday morning, but I've finally recovered and unpacked and resumed my life of watching mysteries and Tribe on the telly. One day, I'll make the incredibly treacherous journey to the nearest Boots to give in my films for processing, so I'll soon be able to complete my very impressive summer photo album! Can't wait! Especially as it will be a welcome distraction from the reading I'm doing at the moment. All very complex stuff about folding DNA to create nanoscale shapes...origami basically, but with strands of DNA instead of bits of paper. It's all very exciting, but as soon as I move away from the abstract of a paper, and into the nitty-gritty, I get a tad confused and need to refer to Wikipedia. Oh, the shame! University doesn't start until October I believe, and I'm in the process of sorting out where I'm going to be living. Until then, I shall be in London, so if anyone wishes to meet up for a drinkie or two, then let me know. Do beware that I have now got about £10 in my bank account, and a few Euro cents somewhere, so it'll have to be a traditional studenty event!! I can't wait to get paid!

So, Barcelona, how did that turn out? Pretty nicely. The weather was good for most of the holiday, though I found evenings a little chilly. The food was yummy, especially for someone who loves chips with ketchup (the Spanish version is patatas bravas)! I am a little sad that I didn't eat any manchego y membrillo (cheese and quince jelly), because it's one of my favourite tapas. Oh well, maybe I can find some in the Harvey Nichols food hall! Oscar had researched some cool and funky places to get food in the city, and we found some of them but they were often a little pricey. Still, there were wacky places in the gothic part of the centre, and we gave them a whirl. We found this amazing ice-cream/waffle parlour, where they claimed to have "50 unusual flavours of ice-cream", and it was true!! They even had acai flavour, which of course I had to have as I have been craving the pots of acai I used to eat in Brazil. It was soooo good! We visited a strange sweet shop where they had sweets in every fruity flavour you could expect, packaged in space-food type plastic bags. One street was basically a chocolate-lover's paradise, and I wanted to buy some samples, but I was penniless :-( There was a funky cookie shop too that caught our eye, but if the cookies weren't filled with chocolate, then they were filled with weird cheese or herbs. I didn't like that - I just wanted a Ben's Cookies cookie! Gosh, I've gone on about food for ages...



The trip was a very cultured one. We must have visited at least a dozen, if not more, art galleries/museums. One of my favourites was the Picasso gallery, because it was very thorough in explaining the various phases the artist went through to get to being one of the most celebrated modern artists in the world. It also explained how he was influenced by other artists while he stayed in Paris, and it was great to actually be able to see that admiration in his work. A lot of the big and famous paintings from the cubist period were missing from the gallery, as they are dotted all over the world, but I preferred it that way. He's not just about the Weeping Woman after all. Another thing I enjoyed was the temporary exhibition at MNAC called El Cartell Modern, which included a selection of modern posters by European anc American artists such as Cheret, Mucha and Steinlen. I really hope a collection like this is exhibited in London soon, because it was fascinating.

I've come back filled with good food, ice-cream and art. I couldn't have dreamed of a better short European holiday. Thanks to Oscar for planning it all :-)

Five days later, and still no Manchego :-(

Hola! Oscar and I have been in Barcelona for 5 days now, and it has been a pretty packed holiday so far (as is our way!). Of course, there has been much walking up hills, and rides on funiculars, and eating of ice-creams, and we´re both having fun. So far, we´ve seen a couple of Gaudí buildings, walked around the Gothic part of the city A LOT and tried to avoid the grotty La Rambla as much as possible. Yesterday we took a trip to Monserrat, which is a mountain 60km away from the centre of Barcelona where apparently, many moons ago some man saw a vision of the Virgin Mary, and so now has become quite a popular destination for pilgrims and tourists alike. We ventured up to the top of the mountain, and it felt like we we´re on top of the world! The food in Monserrat was, however, largely disappointing :-(

Today we had a deserved lie-in and then decided to go to the Miró art gallery, but after a little trek uphill, we discovered it had just closed for the day. So we went for a walk up Montjuïc, where we had great views of the city, and found a funky place for a refreshing drink. We wanted to go on a cable-car ride too, but it was too expensive :-( But when we got back to town, we had a nice cake, so that made it better. Sundays are pretty dull days here because everything is pretty much closed, so unless you really like window-shopping or sitting around, there isn´t all that much to do.

Oh my gosh! Today, there was a naked man on La Rambla. And I mean naked. He had tattoo'd shorts on, and his willy was hanging out for everyone to see. It´s so bizarre. We also saw a food establishment called "Punjabi Bar". Enough said.

Senhor! Uma sangria, por favor! Pronto!

Weeeeeee! It's time for the third holiday! Yup, tomorrow I'm jetting off to Barcelona (British Airways this time, praise the Lord), for a week of sunshine, sangria and Sagrada Familia! Woo! Being at home for the last two weeks has been strange. I've developed a terrible routine of watching certain television programmes every weekday, and very occasionally venturing away from the sofa to do some learning. It will be nice to go out and about and not worry about how much each journey on the public transport is draining my funds! Also, today, I saw a woman who challenged a 15 year-old bus-fare avoider be spat in the face. That kind of behaviour, along with the random shootings and stabbing at the otherwise peaceful (and very enjoyable!) Notting Hill Carnival yesterday, make you wish you were one of the 196,000 Britons leaving the country for good. As I can't afford to emigrate just yet, a holiday will have to suffice. I'm quite looking forward to being able to comprehend Spanish at last too, as Portuguese and Spanish are not too dissimilar.

I will be meeting Oscar over there, as he's already holidaying in Marbella, and since Spain is his territory he has been assigned all planning duties. Hence, I'm not sure what to expect. Some people tell me that Barcelona is lovely, others say beware of the freshies (i.e. people, usually men, fresh off the boat from a lesser country) and prostitutes around Las Ramblas. Hmmmmm. As long as it isn't a Spanish version of the Pelourinho, I think I'll have a good time. Now all I need to do is pack...

Istanbul: the highs and the lows

Okay, I've been a little lazy and not updated this here blog in a while. Apologies to all my fans. I returned from Istanbul a few days ago, and since then have been...ahem....extremely busy. Oh ok, I've just been bumming around my house, but relaxing is a full time job! The last time I wrote here I was half way through my holiday in Istanbul, and the second half was equally as fun and bizarre. Instead of detailing everything we did over there, I thought I would summarise what I thought were the best and worst bits. Overall, I really enjoyed the holiday, but unlike many of the places in the world I have visited and become besotted with, Turkey is certainly one place I would never want to live in and possibly never visit again. Although very pretty and historically rich, it is a somewhat confused land, filled with inequality, racism, identity-crisis (are they European or Asian?) and way too much meat.

The highs:

The Blue Mosque. I don't care what people say, but I think this mosque is much more pretty and grand than the Aya Sofya over the road. I know that architecturally the Aya Sofya was a ground-breaker, but I think the Blue Mosque has a sort of tranquility and sereneness about it, while it's rival felt colder and hostile. Maybe it's because the Blue Mosque is still used by hundreds of people to pray in, whereas the Aya Sofya is nothing more than a cash-hungry tourist attraction. A little fact for you: the mosque acquired its informal name due to the tens of thousands of handmade blue tiles that decorate the interior. Amazing.

The Grand Bazaar. There are over 4000 shops and several kilometres of lanes in the covered market, and it felt like we visited them all. We certainly got lost in the maze of shops a few times. Bargaining is pretty easy, as most of the shopkeepers speak English/Spanish, and so you can purchase wares at reasonable prices. We picked up a few things for our future house :-) Interesting discovery: you get lower prices if you speak Spanish than if you speak English.

Karadeniz Aile Pide Ve Kebap Salonu. So good we frequented it twice, this was the place to go to get a tasty pide and some "poofy bread" to dip into your houmous. The waiters were also very keen to promote how romantic it was to eat at the restaurant (i.e. they lit a tea-light on the table).

Dolmabahce Palace. An imperial pleasure palace with neo-classical exterior and tremendously over-the-top interior. Inside the highlights include chandeliers weighing 2000kg, and a crystal staircase.

Kariye Muzesi. Once the Church of the Holy Saviour Outside the Walls, it served as a mosque for four centuries and is now a museum. It is filled with amazing frescoes and mosaics depicting various biblical stories. It's over 1000 years old and in really good condition, and if you ever visit Istanbul, make sure you go here. Although, you might want to take a taxi to the museum as it is on the top of a rather steep hill...which, ahem....we climbed. At least we earned the pine-mastic pudding we had afterwards! (Anyone who can tell me what "pine-mastic" means wins a piece of Turkish Delight.)

The lows:

Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts. Okay, the museum was packed full of various artefacts from various ages, and there were English labels for a change. But it was about 1000 degrees in the museum and there were more carpets and kilims than I can stand to look at in one go. They didn't really explain why each carpet was noteworthy, and so it basically felt like we were in a carpet warehouse. The calligraphy exhibits were really good though.

Airport and museum security. Pretty much at every museum/palace we visited we had to pass through security, which involved my bag being x-rayed and having to walk through metal-detectors. At the airport, before we even got to check-in we had to lug our suitcases into an x-ray machine and take off shoes and belts etc. And then we had to do it again before we got on the plane. And there are so many people who insist on checking your passport. WHY???!

Turkish Airlines & Stansted Airport. All I can say is, never again to both of them. Gatwick and easyjet now seem like paradise.

Sun, sea and sheep's brains.

Hey folks. Oscar and I have been in the hot and sweaty Istanbul for four days now, and we've been rushed off our feet seeing the sights and familiarising ourselves with this historical old city. We're staying in an interesting hotel on a fairly quiet street in Sultanahmet, the old part of the city. The big tourist attractions Aya Sofya and the Blue Mosque are a short walk away from here, so obviously we've been to see those already. In fact, we've done quite a bit already. My favourite of all the religious buildings has to be the impressive Blue Mosque, which is covered in tens of thousands of blue isnik tiles, and is just huge and breathtaking inside. I experienced a similar feeling of astonishment in the Taj Mahal. One of the other weird and wonderful places we've been to is the Basilica Cistern, which is an underground structure designed to hold over 80,000 cubic metres of water. It was so lovely and cool in the cave like place, and quite relaxing despite the number of tourists busy snapping pictures of the famous upside down Medusa heads.


Tomorrow, we are going to the Grand Bazaar, which we have wandered through already, but tomorrow we are set to do some serious shopping! Needless to say, I am rather excited, though Oscar might hide his credit card in advance :-( At some point we are also going to cross over to the Asian side of Turkey, so we can say proudly that we were in two continents during one holiday!

The food is nice, once we manage to find something we can eat. At lunchtime, we tend to feast on dips and pides (which is like the Turkish version of a pizza), but it can be pretty tricky to find vegetarian/fish dishes for dinner. There are some fancy restaurants, specialising in Ottoman cuisine, but sadly, this means kebaps or some other meaty feast usually involving the innards of a sheep. Tonight hopefully, I will have some room left in my belly to eat some baklava, which shockingly, we have not sampled yet! Don't worry, I will get my fill of it before we leave, especially when tomorrow, we go to a restaurant built above a pretty good baklava shop :-D

Mint tea and baklava

Amigos! How are you all? I have been back in England for about 6 days now, and its been a funny time. Firstly, I caught a cold on the flight back home, so I have been nursing that a bit. Then, I haven't really been at home much, as I have been wandering all over the place to meet up with friends and have a good natter. It's nice to be back in London, but I haven't fully got into the fast-pace of life here yet. I still want to walk slowly, sit about in the sunshine for hours and generally do very little. So, the fact that it has become much warmer over the last few days is just making me feel even more Brazilian! Also, my misplaced bag finally arrived on Thursday, so I have finally got clean, summer clothes again! It was getting a bit gross wandering around in winter trousers!

On Monday, I shall be making my way over to the airport once more, to fly to Istanbul! I can't believe how quickly the second holiday has come around, and I am once more feeling excited and impatient about immersing myself in a different culture. Mint tea and baklava, here we come! It's going to be nice to go away with Oscar too, as we haven't been on holiday together since last September. My experience in Brazil taught me that although it is really fun to travel by yourself, its much more fun to experience things with someone else. I think I might go over-the-top with my souvenir shopping in Istanbul too, to make up for the disappointing purchasing in Brazil. Plus, now that I can envisage myself getting my own chic little apartment, I might start buying interesting objects to decorate it with. I shall try to keep you informed with what we're up to over in Stamboul, but rest assured, we'll be having a great time ;-)

Holiday #1 is complete

I'm back in England! It is cold and cloudy and not particularly summery feeling. But, at least I managed to get back safe and sound. The adventure on the bus was actually worthwhile. So if anyone else is wondering how best to get to the airport from anywhere in Salvador, jump on the executivo bus, and for a mere R$4, you will end up at the airport in about 40 minutes or so. Plus the bus is air-conditioned, spacious and comfortable, and drops you right outside the departures terminal. So, don't take a taxi!!

Sadly though, although I made it to London, my suitcase did not. Everyone on my flight from Salvador to London via Lisbon has lost their bags, so we figure that the problem probably occurred at Lisbon airport. Luckily, flights from London to Lisbon are frequent, so the airline has promised the bags should be returned to us in 2 days. It is super annoying though - particularly for the people who were arriving in London for a holiday. That cannot be a good way to start a vacation.

Right, well, I won't be writing here for a while, not until holiday #2 to Istanbul is underway. I hope you are all enjoying your summers, and if you are around in London at any time and want to meet up, let me know! I shall post pictures here and on facebook.com as soon as I get them developed. Anyone from Dialogo who has photos (preferably of me with my eyes open!), please email me them.