Doing a little homework...

Like the diligent student I hope to be, I spent last week in Eastern Europe preparing for my forthcoming Russian linguistics and social science test.

Step 1: Form a study group.

(with big al and the beef in Prague)

With Alan wrapping up the final leg of European tour with me in Eastern Europe, we were able to get the Beef on board for one wild night in Praha.

Beef hit the road back to Germany first thing on Sunday, leaving us to a little independent study of Czech culture.

Step 2: Get to know the locals

After a night train from Prague to Krakow, I was pretty excited to enjoy a little polish sunshine. As you may recall my last trip to Krakow in Januaryish left me seriously frostbitten. The nightlife was as interesting as I remembered it. I had the pleasure of exchanging tales of loneliness with a nice young lady who shared the pain of trying to meet nice eastern european ladies... no pics, just one interesting story.

While Alan took a trip to Auschwitz, I decided to visit a few alternative sites I missed on the last trip. After a long walk out of the center, I ended up in the old factory district where Oscar Schindler's' factory has become a memorial to the Holocaust.

Step 3: Take in a little history...

Budapest style. We spent an afternoon at the House of Terror, and got a taste of what six plus decades of Nazi and Soviet rule must have felt like- not fun. We spent the rest of our time in Budapest getting a feel for the city and witnessing a bit of history in the making- say hello to the Hungarian boy-band craze sweeping the, um, really small city square outside our apartment...

Step 4: Take the test. Next stop- Mother Russia!

Howdy

Okay so it's been awhile- more of a summer to be exact. Long story short- things got busy, people came/ people left, took a few flights and moved flats. The highlights in chronological order as far as I can remember...

A Sort of Homecoming (June, Seattle)

A great weekend in Seattle on the front end of a not so great week in Texas...

(That's right- the Kennedy Bros baby!)

Grenouille Rapide (June, Luxembourg)


Liverpool Footy Tournament (June/July, Liverpool)
This year we almost won one!

Smoke Free London (July)
Okay no pictures here, but man is it awesome- London went smoke free on July 1st and my dry cleaning bill has been cut in half...

CJB & CrazyM (July)

(Okay, not a recent picture, but you get the point- it was a awesome weekend!)

Tour de France (July)
The tour kicked off in London this year and I was front row for the action...

Mom and Dad (July)
That's right, Bob and Marcia took on Europe for Round II - The Greek Odyssey.
And after they were finished with the cruise, I took them to sunny Scotland...


Spear Mews (July)
A new flat in a new part of town (16 Spear Mews, London SW5 9NA- if anybody wants to send cookies or milk duds)...

(Who's up for game three?)

Harmonie Granger (July/August)

Ireland with CJB (August)
Same story, different island...

A visit from the future Mr and Mrs Mambelton (August)

Stay tuned for 'Scenes from a Hungarian Goulash Cellar'...

Obrigado very much!

I don’t really know what else to say about my 4 days in Portugal…

the water was blue,

Dave and the boys were on top of their game,

and at lease two of the three monkeys managed to stay out of trouble…

(I'll give you one guess which little monkey was allegedly run over by a motor vehicle while crossing the road - such a rumor is of course unsubstantiated)

In a word- perfect!

Sometimes they get the best of you and sometimes you the best of them...

Yah, so I visited all of the famous mosques, toured the palace, bartered in the grand bizarre, and took a boat across the Bosporus to Asia, but I don't think anybody wants to hear the play-by-play of my weekend. So what I will tell you about is the top two highlights on my two-day turbo tour of Istanbul.

1. Sometimes they get the best of you...

It's true that you don't have to work very hard to get ripped off in Turkey. But I like to think of myself as somewhat of a wise, seasoned traveller who's paid his dues and learned a lesson or two- I mean, shit, I've got a whole drawer full of broken Rolax watches and Ray Brand sunglasses. So, I was walking along the Golden Horn (Istanbul's harbour) minding my own business and rocking out to a little crazy poker when the shoe-shine man walking in front of me drops his shoe-shoe brush. Being a good lad, I picked it up and jogged up to him with a little, "here you go my friend." (everybody is "my friend" in Turkey). To show his sincere gratitude, the man offers to shine my worn-out, soon-to-be-trash New Balance sneakers. While he went to town with his little toothbrush he asked if I had kids. "Not that I'm aware of" I responded (he didn't think that was funny). He did however proceed to tell me of this wife, step-mother, and eighteen blind children. How could I possibly accept a free shoe-shine after hearing that... ahh there's the rub! I offered him all of the change I had pocket- about 10 lira or 6 bucks. "No, paper he insisted." The man was looking for bills. Keep in mind he could have bought Kebabs for his wife, step-mother, and seven of his eighteen blind children for 10 lira. I quickly realised that while accepting my "free shoe-shine" I had been surrounded by 4 other members of the shoe-shine mafia and my New Balance sneakers were quickly about to double in value...

2. Sometimes you get the best of them...

On a wise man's recommendation, I spent an afternoon at Cemberlitas Hamam. With no idea what to expect- I stripped down, threw on my loin cloth, and joined the 30 other sweaty naked dudes in the 400 year old steam chamber. Let me stress that I had no idea what to do, so I followed the lead from a few other guys and laid out on the massive marble slab in the middle of the room. As I was about to fall asleep, a gigantic hairy man grabbed my ankle and pulled me over to edge of the platform where he proceeded to scrub my skin off with soap and steal-woolish pad. Ten minutes later- after having 3 layers of skin removed (head to toe) and feeling exfoliated as hell- I used a bucket to rinse the soap off and followed my new friend in the adjacent chamber... Had it not been for the constant pain, I might have felt slightly awkward about the semi-erotic beat-down I received there. When it was over I returned to my private dressing chamber to decompress and reflect... I left the bath house a new man and feeling like a million lira.

Such are the Turks... honest folk trying to make a living (some more honest than others). A would-have-been travel companion declined the opportunity to accompany me on this weekend adventure believing that Turkey is too dangerous- I found this to be ridiculous before and even more so after. I found the people to be delightfully friendly and I left Istanbul with a affirmed love of the Turks and a acute case of Cholera.

I have a dream...

... that one day I will ride in a bad-ass moped gang.

And last weekend I got one step closer towards realising that dream on the island of Sardinia with Ryan, Willie, and my hog Trigger.


To be continued...

Winner [win-er]
1. A person who wins; victor.

"In life, there are winners and losers." Well that's what I've always heard and so believed. Although this weekend I learned that's not always true. Life- maybe, but in Football- No!After 90+ minutes of what can only be described as a stalemate, the Fulham/Blackburn football match ended in a draw. Lame. Yet, on the way out the underdog Blackburn fans cheered and sang as though it had been a victory.

Winner [whin-erz]
1. A man who picks up a French speaking Senegalese woman in a pub by asking, "are you looking for the guy selling nachos?"; A man who yells on a crowded street without provocation, "French chicks are hot if they're not fat!"