Journeys

watching: some shit on TV
mood: depressed

Well, normally I start at the beginning of my short trips, but this time the Ending was way more interesting. So I'll start with our Journey back.
Since we have been walking every day for several hours to "admire" (I'l explain that later) a lot of things in St. Petersburg, we decided to go to the airport a little earlier than we had to. Means like an hour early, BUT in St. Petersburg, you are not allowed to check in 3 hours before a flight, only two ours before! I'm not kidding. Since the check in counter are in a different room they actually make you wait in a stinky, tiny lobby with a crappy cafe. Finally at 15 past 5 p.m. (five minutes too late) we were allowed to proceed to the check in counters. Lucky us my dad has a gold card and 2 of our 5 party travel group have frequent travellers cards (^_^) why is that important....because you don't have to check in at economy class counters (^_^) anyhow, being the privileged fuckers we are, we checked in for emergency row, at least we thought, but we ended up sitting in the first row after the middle sky waitress bar (^_~) which ended up being the best place ever. Well, after spending hours in passport control we did some duty free shopping and slowly made our way to the plain. Well of course there was delay, how could there not have been delay? Righty, the problem was, because of the delay we got into a thunderstorm and ended up in a turning loop above Frankfurt. When we began to land I felt like spontaneously ruining the plain by puking all over it. Gosh, I was sick to my stomach like I've never been. But the other guests were in luck and I didn't. After going through what a Martini Cocktail goes through, I realized that the plain was rising again and a short while after that an announcement that we were starting through again was given. Well, I was like...okay, whatever I'm simply going to take the next train to Cologne, but everything ended up in big chaos. We were redirected to Nurnberg, refueled and waited...and waited....and waited. It took ages till we were allowed to start again. And waiting sucks when you left leg is a pain in the ass and the sky waitresses are incapable suckers. Not kidding the stewardesses didn't even feel the need to walk around and give people something to drink. We had to ask for it and we fought a war about the sweets, because there were too little, of course. That is the reason why it was better that we ended up having the seats we had and not the real emergency row seats. Well anyways, after those HOURS and HOURS of waiting and funny comments form the pilot like:" If you stick with us, you are stuck with us" (he was commenting on the fact that those whose final destination Nurnberg was, were allowed to leave the plain) we tried reaching Frankfurt again. Landed without any further complications, but when we arrived there was no ground crew to let us out of the plain, so we were waiting again. The Airport seemed to be deserted, until we came to the counters where we had to handle when we were able to leave Frankfrut for our final destinations. Being Cologne and Bremen. Of course there were no connecting flights anymore, it was already 1 a.m. by now. So they checked us into an hotel and gave us connecting flight for the next day. Now the odyssey was not over yet. the cab driver brought us to the wrong hotel, because they put down the wrong address. When we arrived at the right hotel there, of course, was a big queue for check in. At fucking 2 a.m. we were not exactly in the mood to wait any longer, but there was no other opportunity. We ended up in the bar drinking Gin Tonic till 3 a.m. and I had a rather nice conversation with a young man my age, being German and working in Singapore. Which makes me now feel like an even bigger loser, because Keio did not accept me. Bye bye future dream. The next morning I fell out of bed, drenched at 9:30 a.m. had breakfast and made my way with my parents to the airport again. Of course my flight to Cologne had a delay of about half an hour......the flight takes only 20 minutes, thinking about that. Well, here I am, back in Germany.....no desire to fly to St. Petersburg any time soon.

Pictures and a full report on my trip to Russia will follow soon.

listening to: Dream Theater | Images and Words
mood: scared

Well it's been already a week since I'm back in Germany, but due to some organizational stuff and studying AND being totally out of order due to that darn flue, I haven't had the time yet, to write a report on my stay in Barcelona. But here we go.
We stayed at hotel OMM, which is a neat designer hotel. I loved it there. The staff is friendly and always happy to help you out with things, especially the guys at the bar..whooohooot. All very nice and some of them not only nice, but also hot (O_O)
The Spa is very good and the Masseuses are all very skilled. I had a Thai massage and two Aryuveda massages. They rocked (^_^)
The rooms have a very cool design, but are also practical. One big plus is the fact that they have stereo's in the rooms (which meant I connected my iPod to the stereo and tortured my neighbors with Aikaryu and stuff like that hehehe). There is also a safe in the room, which I always prefer.

in the hotel lobby

Of course we were walking around a lot (^_^) And my feet are now even flatter. I had sore legs due to so much walking, even though I usually walk a lot to. Shopping and sightseeing is a fatal combination *GGG* You can see some of the stuff I shopped in the fashion statements area. The rest is not at all spectacular, therefore no need to take a picture and show you.
It was freezing cold in Barcelona which sucked, but hey, you can't have everything, right (^_^)

Of course we saw the most important things, like the Skrada Familia and stuff like that, but to be honest. Don't pay the entry to the Sakrada Familia, it sucks, cuz they are working on it, trying to finish it. But they obviously suck at doing so. I don't think that you should finish a piece of art when it was left unfinished, even if it is a building. It's prettier from the outside anyways (^_^)

Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia from further away

Gaudi's front of the Sakrada Familia

The new front. Does it not remind you of Lord of The Rings, too?

This hospital rocked. I forgot the name of the architect, but I will look it up later and tell you, its something with an M at the beginning, I think. You have to admit that this hospital is so cute, you would totally go there if you had to go to a hospital at all. the only a little bit scary things are the

Angels Of Death as I named them (^_^)

Besides that the same guy built the Ofera Catalan, which is a music house in the heart of the gothic part of the town. It is built very beautifully and with a lot of phantasy. We had a guided tour, which I hate, but they don't let people in without it. It rocked to see it though, even though you have a pattern overdose after that and need something calm to the eye!

We of course also went to the Miro museum, which is a must when you go to Barcelona. Don't forget to bring you cam, cuz pictures whithout flash are allowed. I took only a few pictures, here they are:

and here some random pictures of Barcelona (^_^)

Some more Gaudi

Restaurants I would totally recommend is MOO, for it's really innovative cuisine. I'm not kidding. I had a desert named after some Dior perfume..something something poison. After I ate it they gave me a tester to smell the perfume and I swear it tasted just the same as it smelled. AMAZING! But I wouldn't buy the perfume, way to sweet for my taste, but I'd eat it any time again. My dad had some stuff and it said with a cigar. And they actually made a cigar of ice cream and chocolate and imitated the ash with some stuff. That thing really tasted like the some of the cigar it was supposed to imitate. That was so cool and surprising. So go there, it's worth it, but you have to make a reservation in advance, especially on Thursday nights, cuz the hotel lobby is packed with young folks partying that day.
Another really good restaurant is NEGRO ROJO. At Negro they serve Nouvelle Cuisine and at ROJO they serve Japanese food. It's a two story restaurant. Pretty good food, too.