Pop Quiz

For all you music buffs: what road am I crossing here?

Mike - I expect you or Irene to know this one.
Previous pop quiz winner is Munkee - good call bro it is Cherub Rock!

30.8.07: a day in London

First the Ferrari broke down.
So I figured I'd take the Bentley out on the town. Rolled up at Harrods.

Bought some truffles. They were only like 950 pounds ($1800) per kilogram or something. Thats a drop in the bucket.

Whilst eating them truffles I splurged for some 8.99 per kilogram grapes. They look just like grapes in the US - kinda brown and shit. But these are Harrods grapes. There's only one Harrods. Taking the Egyptian elevators to the other floors I found a hot tie for 89 pounds ($180). So im like well now I need a suit to match it. We gota roll in style ya know. Hired a Harrods personal shopping assistant to pick out the right Armani attire. I have no idea how much that cost because there was no price tag. Its probably free (unlikely) or infinity. I was afraid to touch it because everything was so pristinely laid out and exquisite. The suit went nice with my gold pants too.

Mad props to the personal assistant. Tipped him with some fine 80 pound ($160) caviar. It was only 80lb a kilogram so we got several. Drop in the bucket. Wish I didnt buy so many, they didnt taste as good as the truffles. Decided to feed them to the life size moving T-Rex in the Natural History Museum down the street. He liked them.











Throwing away 80 pounds is nothing - thats how much it cost to Fedex a box of crap back home. Freakin UK-US border customs crappy tarrifs.

But wait, hold your horses...
Thats not all I did. The caviar made me projectile vomit.

So got a bite of Londons best falafel. This would rival Mamouns in the west Village.

Hit up Green Park and watched a group of Brits try to play baseball. It was probably the worst game I'd ever seen. They were calling home plate "4!" and safe "not out" and if you were out they'd make a safe sign. That along with not tagging runners but bases and I couldnt take it anymore. Head across the way to Buckingham Palace for the guard changing and ran into the Queen of England. On a solemn note it was 10 years ago today the Princess Diana tragedy occured. Everyone was out remembering her life. I gave the Queen my Bentley.

She traded it in for this Rolls. She "rolls" in style now.

29.8.07: Nottingham

Took a day trip out there. Not what I expected. A massive shopping town. But I did see Robin Hood. Buses to Sherwood Forest werent frequent enough so had to skip on that oh well.

Salisbury

I took a day trip to Salisbury. Really it was another London Walk. The main attraction besides the sheep is a nice town and Salisbury Cathedral. Built from 1220 and 1258 its a gothic cathedral boasting the second tallest spire in Europe at 404 feet. Some say its held up by the Virgin Mary.





















The cathedral is built on a 4 foot foundation. If you were in Mr. Cicero's strength and materials class you know this is proposterous. How it's still standing today is an engineering marvel. You can see the marble colums inside actually bending, and the spire has a 29" lean to the left.

There's a number of shot outs to dead people with engravings on floor blocks. What do you do in the 14th century when there's no white out?

A neat surprise found here is the oldest working clock on Earth from 1386. The medival clock that boasts only an hour hand because back in da day they only needed to know the hour for mass, thats all.

Lots of people are buried inside, including the first resident: William Longspere. He's got a whack story. Was a royal figure and went on a trip overseas. Ship sank. Wife was heavily touted by the Baron of Devon (I think) to marry his nephew so their family would take on the royalty. She declined - a lot. Until one day William showed up, apparently survived like Tom Hanks. Baron dude was happy to see them reunited he invited them over for dinner. A while later William mysteriously dies. More macking on the Barons part and now widow for real declines marriage until she dies. Years later when they moved Williams remains to Salisbury Cathedral they found a rat in his brain. Rat (obviously deceased) had eaten Williams brain while 6 feet under. They ran tests on the rat. What did the rat die of? Arsenic poisoning. What happened to William? Well now you know.

But that wasnt the most amazing thing here. THE MAGNA CARTA. One of the four originals. Yes, it was here and I didnt know until I saw it. Being a history buff I found it cool. No pictures of course but it was neat to see the original 1215 document. And if you dont know what the Magna Carta is I aint talkin to you no mo.

Ever see Sense and Sensibility? Then you may notice where Alan Rickman walked:


Oh and 8 miles outside Salisbury are a bunch of random rocks in the countryside.

I checked out the astronomical, UFO, energy source, Druid (not true) site, whatever you think they are rocks. Pretty amazing someone 4000 years ago (yes 2000 B.C.) moved 4 ton rocks 240 miles and 40 ton rocks 20 miles. They even had utilized a ball and socket system to create the U shapes - pretty advanced for over 2000 years ago I'd say.

I AM STAYING

In London. For good. Nice knowing you. Im'a have to get used to walking, driving and descending steps on the left hand side. But I am reminded when crossing to:

I have already mastered the Tube system. The cushioned seats are so comfortable.

I didnt know the first underground station was Baker Street right here.

I'll have to start speaking like a Brit. cheers. bullocks. coach. lift. futbol. the loo. chips. Man all i've been eating is indian food and fish and chips.

The buses are all double deckered. I find that cool for some reason. Me and another travelling Australian I met, Brenda, on the top level:

The museums here are all great. Free admission too. I got to see one of my favorites by Dali:

Unfortunately they didnt allow pictures taken so this isnt it, but surprizingly its a small painting. Very cool Dali exhibit at the Tate Modern. Comparable to MoMa.

The British Museum apparently gets all the good stuff. Like the Rosetta Stone.
For those who dont know its the key to understanding Egyptian hyroglyphics.



Some chick named Cleopatra is also here.

Yup, thats really her. Lots of Egyptian stuff here. And - two facades, really the statues on their sides, off the Parthenon are displayed here. Unbelieveable.

This museum beats any of the ones on Museum Mile in New York.

If ya want to know more about London you can take a walk. I did the Jack the Ripper tour and yea it was interesting following his footsteps. Never knew he left the intestines of his victims on their right shoulder. As well as carving off their skin, slicing their necks to the vertebrae...ya get the idea.

Did you know all these years I thought the London Bridge was the London Bridge? Ya know, London Bridge is falling down, yada yada yada that song. Well this is the London Bridge:

You may be able to decipher the engraved words.

And this is the Tower Bridge:

Yea I didnt realize the famous looking one is called the Tower Bridge. I associated that childhood song with the wrong bridge. Havent we all?

I'll always know what time it is

Except when the sun begins to set...

So I've been calling some of ya back in them states from these funny red things; so far you're all afraid of an uknown caller ID. Pick up its me!

I'll have to start calling around for London apartments. I'll send everyone the address when I get it. Cheers.

Roughing it

I hadnt showered in 3 days. There was no way I was going all weekend in the festival portashits as I called them. Worst smelling things ever. Giant vats of shit and piss with metal cages.

That entire bottom portion is the biggest tub of shit I'd ever seen, smelt and ever had to endure in all my scouting and camping years. Each campsite had their own but imagine 1000's of kids using one for 4 days. You lucky I didnt take a picture of the bottom.

READING: Day 3

Caught some lesser known acts today; just wating for the Pumpkins really. But in order to get up front I had to sit thru Lostprophets. Dont like their music but they put on a good show - literally made everyone within the square mile jump. Plus the bottle tossing before the set was funny. gota pass the time somehow. If you can kinda see them here:

I moved up for Nine Inch Nails. Incredible show. Crazy mosh pit. There was some huge fat chick who pushed her way in front of me - she had to have been under some Trent Reznor trance. I was tossing everyone else aside but shit man she was something I had to avoid haha. When NIN got to head like a hole the guitar dude was going wild - enough to slip and fall on his ass. He got up and guitar broke. So he throws it across the stage haha. Insane. At the end of the song Trent threw his guitar at the drums and the same guitar dude clipped the mic stand with his. As he walked off he decided to literally toss a 100lb speaker off the stage. He was definitely under a Trent Reznor trance haha.

Between NIN and the final act for Reading it was a battle for position. Rediculously squashed in front with every Pumpkins fan in Britain. But man was it worth it - I take back what I said about them before. The Pumpkins are back, and sound sooo much better with 30 foot speakers haha. Sound was awesome, and they played a different set than the one I saw in Colmar. Plus they ended it with my favorite song! For those of you who really know me what do you think it is? This is a test...

Inspiration...

How do you get to the front of the crowd? Simple, when the mosh pit starts in the back you end up in the front. Bloc Party was huge. Everyone turned out to see the local band.

It was actually a fun time tossing the leftover tennie bopper remnants from the previous Panic! at the Disco set. They decided to crowd surf because ya know

So I decided to toss them 4 rows up like The Ultimate Warrior would have.

For real though, it was a good moment for Bloc Party. Lead singer met the guitarist at Reading a while ago and now to actually play the main stage there - I could see the emotion in them over it. I noticed people sporting previous festival shirts listing Bloc Party at the smaller stages so the progression over the years to bigtime is evident. It was the best set I had seen them play - I think the 30 foot speakers in front of me helped. Somehow I didnt have my ears drowned out deaf - maybe new speaker technology or i'm already on another hearing level.

As for the other bands: Angels and Airwaves sucked. Literally everyone was tossing bottles at them the entire time - a few hit them it was hilarious. I dont know what they were doing at Reading - they totally sucked and their songs suck. Its not Blink182 anymore dude.

Who else was awesome on day 2? The Arcade Fire. For all of you who frequent the philharmonics and orchestras - you know who you are - dont bother going anymore. Just go to an Arcade Fire concert. They got a dude who plays clarinet, bass, french horn and trumbone - not all at the same time tho. Oh, and RHCP were good too.

READING

Day 1.

One of my more expensive weekends here but it was worth it. Arrived in Reading for the rediculously huge yearly music festival.

They predicted rain and mud but we got dry and sun. First time I saw the sun near London too. As i'm walking to find the event some nice lady asked if I wanted a map - sure i'll take one. Until I open it and its one of those Christian pamplets haha.

Thats a good marketing strategy if anything, promoting Jesus with a side of map.

As for the bands one of the better sets was Kings of Leon. I think they were stunned by the huge crowd stretching about 5 football fields across and wide. I wish I had seen them in a small venue in Charlotte when they were there cause their set was awesome.

Interpol opened for them but I think their gig I saw in Rochester sounded better. Razorlight headlined day 1; apparently popular here tho some booed with the mention of their name. At least the performance was a good lightshow.

On the train from Colmar to Paris

this is who I sat across:

LONDON = awesome

So here I am now...London, UK. I want to stay longer ;) Yea thats right, I would live here. Although i'm getting raped by the pound exchange rates its all worth it. Cant post images yet cause its technically impossible at the hostel PC. But let me tell you...if you got an IT job making 50,000 pounds a year...that converts to 100,000 dollars. That has to be illegal or some sort of tax evasion - does anyone know? I'm about to seriously consider it haha.

But London is like New York - almost. I've run into a few more travellers from yea you guessed it - Melbourne, Australia. Like i'm convinced no one lives in Melbourne, they all just travel. I even ran into someone from Park Slope, go figure. I'll elaborate more on this awesome town in due time.

For now I gota get ready to join the mudfest at Reading. The Thames flooded which means the weekend concert is stocked with mud. The last time I rolled in a mudfest was Atlantas Music Midtown Festival. I cant wait. And the Pumpkins are playing!

Cheers...

Improvising...

So I woke up late last Sunday morning. Which means I missed the am train to Paris. Which inherently meant I missed any chance of getting from Paris to London as all the Eurostars were sold out. I seriously was going to sleep in the Paris Nord terminal that night - but they close at 1am! So ya know I dont freak out...I step outside and its a little shady by them train terminals...lots of odd looking pickpocketers staring at me and my lucrative backpack. Found a semi cheap hotel and made it out ok.

Until I got to immigration on the "British" side of the train station. They pulled me into the interview room, yes I was flagged because I had no kids and no job. Apparently there's an immigration problem in the UK with lots of people overstaying their visas to work here. I wasnt intimidated at all just told them yo check this itinerary out theres no way Im staying in London more than 6 months. I got no job, no kids and whatever else you want me to say...just let me in dammit! haha. The lady was nice and said she'd keep my interview on file just in case I'm a good lier ;)

the Pumpkins

Excellent concert but it felt like the 'new' pumpkins...well it was the new pumpkins. They played a lot of old crap but I felt like it just wasnt the same anymore. Still rocked the amphitheater full of French and Germans and me. I'd show some pics but its weird on this PC so maybe later i'll elaborate visually. They closed with Muzzle, one of my favorites so that was a good way to go out.

Colmar, France: a pleasant surprise

The eastern part of France is actually quite nice. I just went to see the pumpkins there, but the town turned out to be a cool touristy kinda spot. This is the old church in the center of town, inside is cool as well. The people there were all nice, and I ended up killing lots of time walking around the joint. I cant explain it, just show it :)

It was kind of like Its a Small World - ya know the little ride in Disneyworld. Only people actually live in these colorful thingys. I had some french fries at the corner cafe watching the people go by. I asked for water and the waitress asked "do you want gas or no gas?" I'm like what? gas or no gas? Well lets try the "no gas" version of water haha. I guess its the difference between seltzer and regualr h2o. As I ate them fries (which taste just like McDonalds only better) weird people like this dude dressed in a rabbit suit hitting on some hot chicks.

And at some points he strips. Weird French people. French guys can be jerks tho..at one time these dudes yelled at some woman "yada yada yada sacleblu letramp!" Must have been bad cause she gave them the finger haha.

Oh, and did you know...that Liberty Enlightening the World, better known to us as the Statue of Liberty...was devised by Auguste Bartholdi - who happens to be from Colmar? I checked out his museum and it was pretty neat...did you know he also did the statue in Lafayette Statue in Union Square? I can go on and on...but I feel like a ball of knowledge about lady libertys creator now. I'll spare you the details but show you this - and let you wonder - what if:

Ever see the Price is Right?

That Swiss hiker game. Ya know, where you have to guess the price along the mountainside before the hiker falls off and Bob Barker says don't worry you still get to spin for the showcase showdown? Well I kinda felt like that the other day. The one perk of choosing the Harder Kulm hike was a 45 degree tram ride down (picture the Roosevelt Island tram but at 45 degrees).

hmmmmmmmmm........

Going down?

So because of a landslide - only a week before - the 99 year old railway was temporarily defunct. We decided to save time we'll take the railway anyways. Believe me it was exhilarating, even with my legs shaking the whole way down. I felt like the hiker in Bobs little price game. This is an adventure Bilbo would like.

INTERLAKEN 20.8.07

This place is THE adventure city of Switzerland. Rediculous scenery. I was here for half a day; not enough time to go rafting, canyoning or parasailing - but to hike the Swiss Alps. I choose the path leading to Harder Kulm, 4337 ft to the top. It sounds like hard as hell when you say it in German and it looked as imposing as Helm's Gate. The most arduous trek I've done so far; not technically difficult but just taxing enough to make me drip sweat like Patrick Ewing. It was worth it though. Atop Harder Kulm you may see Jungfrau on a clear day I think - not today unfortunately. Also met some cool folks from Melbourne on the trail - Jace and Angie. We chilled at the hostel later on too.yo vinny, what'd you do today?

Home. 19.8.07

I think we take the idea of home for granted. The homeless guy in my room has a home - it's just been at the hostel for 14 years. So he's not really homeless; his 'home' is just different. The second morning this Korean traveller farted - three times - in the bed next to his. Now I see why every morning he returns with two bottles of alcohol. I left him all my US quarters.

Swiss way of life

Zurich is rediculously clean. Always top 10 in the world for living standards, I discovered the city used to be cleaner? Everyone follows the rules; no one jaywalks. I didn't want to step into oncoming air so stood patiently with the throng of Swiss who will literally wait for the green person to cross an empty street. Crazy. Adn the trains are always on time - right to the minute. The transit system is so precise I dont even know what to say. The Nestea iced tea is awesome. Somewhere between southern sweet tea and the stuff in NY. I must have dropped 80 bucks on iced tea alone - especially at 4 dollars a pop until I found it for 2CHF at the store the second day in Zurich. I drank so much, I needed the public pissoir. Usually the Swiss sit back and watch their Swiss bank accounts grow so for them to proclaim 'I'm at werk' is unreal.

They'd rather make their way to the hoe promenade where it's an exotic mess.
Doing this makes them thirsty so they drink spring water out of R2D2 contraptions. But not everyone is into porn here - even though its shown on most channels all the time.






No, the women like to sun bathe (at this ladies only bath joint seen here) while the men drive their Ferrari's to the always enticing chess game. Before they know it time is gone. But the Swiss always know what time it is - clocks are everywhere (naturally) - including the biggest clock face in Europe atop St Peters Church on the right here.

Expectations

Lesson one: dont buy a map. I did that right off the train to find my hostel. I knew where it was but just didnt have my orientation straight. Apparently if you walk far enough there's maps on the street. And you can't return maps in Zurich unless the crazy lady who sold it to you is there to take it back?

Lesson two: expectations that you'll meet backpackers at a hostel are false. The first guy I meet? A homeless dude. I put my stuff on his bed. He's lived at City Backpacker Hostel for 14 years apparently. Thats dedication.

Lesson three: expect to meet someone everywhere you go. I ran into Emily from cheese pasture land Wisconsin and Raphael - a French chemist who was interning here for college. Pretty cool people.
Ladies I got his email if you want it.

ZURICH 15.8.07

I walked off the plane and into the unknown. Everything in the airport was in German or French. But it was an impressive first impression of Europe. I'll tell you why: there are commercials that pop out along the monorail walls as its moving. Almost like Back to the Future II. Their baggage carts are capable of traversing escalators. Imagine that efficiency at Newark. Good thing most signs had pictures for the likes of me. I learned real quick 'Bitte night einchstein' meant 'Do not enter'. Willkommen: hello and Danke: thanks.

Zoorich is mad expensive. A big banking city where McChicken meals set you back 9 dollas yo. Everyone drives a Porsche, BMW, Mercedes or Ferrari. Apparently I missed the biggest techno rave in the world here last week. But thats ok, I heard lots of Kanye West and Daft Punk coming from the little Euro cars. Also heard the police sirens similar to what was in the Bourne movies - wasnt one of them filmed here?

I Still Remember

I recall a song by Bloc Party always resonated in my head over the last few months. I Still Remember. While sitting in London Gatwick airport (en route to Kathmandu earlier this year) they played it. Bloc Party hails from London. The whole London scene seemed intruguing to me. They speak in funny tones, but its cool. Also at that time I was into BBC music. whatever it was, the idea of seeing what life is like across the Atlantic was becoming more appealing. The idea of the song is kind of about having an attraction thats unspeakable. I became attracted to the idea of travelling to London. After tomorrow, it will be more realistic and some. Not just London, but ya know why not the entire planet? You only live once right? We'll reconvene at UCT+1.

the jumpoff

August 11, 2007. Tashi/Cuomo going away party. Top 10 nights of 2007. I was having so much fun I didnt take any pictures. Good luck in Baltimore Cuomo.

but it really isnt done

Until you have the fund-age to do it. That was a perplexing quandrum. I had some savings, but not enough to sustain a proposed round the world trip. Especially after handing in my two month notice at work. So the house that tashi built in Charlotte was the missing link. I took a chance and hoped it would close before I decided to leave. I set a deadline to depart based on when the Smashing Pumpkins would play in Europe. What a fan right? Fucking crazy. House closed a week before the first flight. Freakin lucky as hell.

the idea

originated from a Ukranian dude I used to work with. We'll call him V. He said "tashi if I were your age I would see the world and have lots of stories to tell"...well I pondered that point for a while until I said why not go? A few trips to nepal and belize and I caught the double (inside joke) - I mean travel bug. at times, when I get an idea I usually let it marinate for a while before acting on it. But I do act, because of my conviction as Vinny says. I tend to follow thru on everything from my jump shot to life changing decisions. Wanna buy a house? Sure just do it. Wanna move back to NYC? Why not, lets go. Quit your job? No problem. Travel the world. In my mind, it's already been done.