The story from the eye of a traveler; dancer; diver; photographer

Happy New Year

2012-01-01T00:00:00.000Z

Been a very fun and meaningful year. I’m sure this one will be even more. Graduating this year, starting my first real job. Another new phase of my life is about to begin. But for now, I shall enjoy my final semester in university. New Year Resolution: Go Diving, Go Travelling! Now this epic road trip is not as epic as this Europe Trip Part 1 from Ethan Ow on Vimeo. Can't believe it was

27th July 2011: City of Dreams

2011-07-27T22:04:00.000+01:00

Dubai is a place where dreams come true. You want something that they don’t have (yet), they’ll make it happen. Everything(almost) in Dubai is artificial. They have the best of everything, the biggest, the tallest, the longest, the insert-whatever-here-est. We always believed temperature dips in the desert. Wrong! When we landed, the pilot announced “Welcome to Dubai, the temperature outside is

26th July 2011: Goodbye Europe

2011-07-26T16:03:00.000+01:00

Writing this onboard of Emirates EK098. Although with all these travelling, this is my first time flying on a full carrier. It’s been budget flight since as long as I can remember. 4 more hours to go but I’m going to enjoy every bit of it. The feeling is just weird. Part of me doesn’t want to leave but I kinda miss home after all. I’m kinda tired of waking up in a different city (although there

25th July 2011: Happy Birthday to me

2011-07-25T22:09:00.000+01:00

Every year, I’ll celebrate my birthday in a different country. That’s a promise to myself. This year, Citta Del Vaticano. I know, weirdest choice, but it’s the only day I could visit the holy land. It’s closed on Sunday and when I reached on Saturday, it was late. Tomorrow I’m flying to Dubai so today it is. We took a paid tour for the Vatican Museum, very impressive work of in the Sistine

24th July 2011: Glory of Roma

2011-07-24T22:20:00.000+01:00

Gladiators battling each other, crowds cheering of what used to be slaves, prisoners of wars. That’s the Roman’s past time. And on some other day, we have people marching to St Paul’s Basilica through Via de Corso. Here lived great civilization, each greater than the previous. Though eventually swallowed by corruption, lands taken by barbarian, Roma still remain as one of the best cities today.

23rd July 2011: Eternal City

2011-07-23T22:56:00.000+01:00

Roma is city where ancient monument stands. Ancient engineering that withstand even the force of time. Although some of it were destroyed but it’s mostly done by human or mother nature itself. Pantheon stood for thousand over years, built to worship every single god and today still in use as a functional church. That’s how amazing it is. In piazzale stands architecture from different era, where

22nd July 2011: Gelato Galore

2011-07-22T23:53:00.000+01:00

It’s amazing how many gelataria you can find around Italy. They are literally everywhere. So many good ones, so many exciting flavours to taste. Just can’t get sick of it. I’m sure the gelato is making me feel better. The strike ended, we managed to catch a train to Pisa, spend an hour and catch the last train back to Firenze. Managed to see the leaning tower after all. And wow, it’s really

21st July 2011: Strike!

2011-07-21T22:52:00.000+01:00

It’s been kind of a smooth sailing for us for the past 5 weeks. But it seems like it’s going to end. We will have to cancel our plan to Pisa and Cinque Terre. Trenitalia is having a strike and we are not leaving Firenze any time soon. And blister starts popping up all over my feet. Think I’m failing a little sick, my body is giving in to fatigue. I hope it’s not going to ruin the last few days

20th July 2011: Where Renaissance begun

2011-07-20T21:39:00.000+01:00

This is where it all started. Where curiosity didn’t kill the cat. Place where many great painters/sculpture/architects/engineers bloomed and prospered. Walking through the town is truly amazing. Looking at churches built by only some of the greatest men mankind ever knew, men who defined history, men who brought us out of the dark age.Michelangelo’s David is has a bigger head than it’s suppose

19th July 2011: Colour to the eye is like music to the ear

2011-07-19T21:38:00.000+01:00

Thanks to our day pass, we could take as many vaporetto as we want. Island hopping is one of the must do in Venice. Went around Lido, Murano, Burano and Torcello. Took us a whole day and ended our day with a nice dinner in Lido. It wasn’t really cheap but the place was crowded with locals. We even got to have a taste of what squid ink pasta tastes like. All the islands are so different from each

18th July 2011: Bella Venezia

2011-07-18T21:31:00.000+01:00

We were really amazed with our camping accommodation. It’s on the mainland, half an hour to the island, an amazing one. We paid a quarter of what otherwise we would need to if we stayed on the island, gotten a 3-days transport pass and added them up we still saved a huge chunk of money. And according to sources, the accommodation in the island is mediocre. We’re in real luck as Eurail is giving

17th July 2011: Border of Switzerland

2011-07-17T22:59:00.000+01:00

TGV didn’t have seats for Eurail pass holder thus I’d had to give up the plan of staying a day there. Headed to Milano straight instead. We were 40 minutes of bus ride from Lugano from where we were, small town near Milano, Como. We did cross the Swiss border overnight, but that will be as close as we’ll get to Switzerland, for now. Last 10 days in Europe, Italy our last European country.

16th July 2011: Au revoir Paris

2011-07-16T21:18:00.000+01:00

Raining since the morning, as if it’s weeping because we are leaving. There is just so much to do in the city but everything requires queuing. So much things to do yet so less time. La Tour Eiffel, Cathedrale de Notre Dame and Musee Du Louvre, respectively deserves a day each. Well Mona Lisa has been waiting there for hundred of years, they can wait a few more. I don’t suppose it’s going anywhere

15th July 2011: Tainted Sacred Heart

2011-07-15T21:11:00.000+01:00

J’adore Paris, it’s no wonder everyone falls in love with the city so easily. Sights, sounds and scents excites all senses. But, every city in the world has it’s flaw. Such beautiful city polluted by flocks of scammers. From the train station to the Louvre, from the streets to the top of Montmatre, filled with scammers trying to make a living out of people’s money. Sacre Couer is such a nice

14th July 2011: Glimpse of Happily Ever After

2011-07-14T22:40:00.000+01:00

Paris Disneyland, it really have some magic with it. Although it didn’t came by easily. In order to save money (we found out we only paid half of the published rate), we had to make sure we get the tickets a week earlier. But the problem is with a mailing address, the only way we could purchase the ticket is via the disneylandparis.fr website and get the tickets mailed to a local address.

13th July 2011: Bastille Day Celebration

2011-07-13T22:20:00.000+01:00

Bastille Day is on the 14th actually. Today we met with our new host in Paris, jolly man in his mid 40s. He has like the most awesome apartment, ever. Invited us for dinner with his friends and the celebration. It was a nice dinner at the balcony, overlooking the river. Treated with a nice 20 minutes le feu d’artifice. Went around few places in Paris, but there is just so much to see and so

12th July 2011: SNCF is screwing with me

2011-07-12T22:29:00.001+01:00

All train from Paris to anywhere is full. Not full if you are willing to pay 100+ euro, but full if you are holding a Eurail pass ticket. Eurail is almost useless if you are using it with TGV. All TGV trains ran by SCNF requires compulsory booking, unlike DB, where we really managed to save tons of money and now everything goes to TGV reservation, tres grande vitesse indeed, with the money of

11th July 2011: –20 to +4000 metres

2011-07-11T22:31:00.000+01:00

It’s amazing how far people can go for thrill seeking. I’m no fan of height but I’ve did it anyway. The final moments before the drop, the sensation was amazing. For a while I thought it will never end, accelerating under the gravitational pull. It’s weird how I can’t tell how fast I was going while looking down on Earth. But it became so obvious how fast I’m travelling away from the clouds. The

10th July 2011: Rabbit Garden

2011-07-10T22:29:00.000+01:00

Our couch surfer host live in an area where a lot of Berliner consider dodgy. It’s a really nice area other than the occasional crazy drunk dudes that starts shouting. There is also this garden, Rabbit Garden, where it was built for the Duke to hunt rabbits but now a park where marijuana is distributed. A walk in the garden was interesting and it’s not really like what we expect

9th July 2011: Falling of something marks the beginning of others

2011-07-09T22:28:00.000+01:00

“Ich bin ein Berliner” JFK 1963. The history of Germany is an intense one. World War I, Third Reich, DDR, Red Army, concentration camp, it’s almost amazing how all the Europeans history is so related to one another.

8th July 2011: Prism in the sky

2011-07-08T22:28:00.000+01:00

Another day spent in the train, leaving for the former East Germany. Weather is turning bad in Munchen but good thing we are already leaving.

7th July 2011: Bavarian Alps

2011-07-07T22:29:00.000+01:00

We’d hiked a lot today. 2 different see and a monastery. All giving us great view of the Alps. The monastery, being a Bavarian one, of course brew really good Bavarian beer. In fact it was my first Bavarian beer when I reached Munich two days ago. Started drizzling awhile ago, hopefully weather will be great in Berlin. And we finally found someone to host us in Berlin, only a few hours before

6th July 2011: Munchen, Candidate City

2011-07-06T22:44:00.000+01:00

Unfortunately it will remain as the candidate city and not the city for 2018 Winter Olympics. Bavarian beers are awesome. So is the current Pope, since he is Bavarian and his favourite beer, Augustiner. Beats any global brand that spends tons of money on marketing. Augustiner is so good, they never spent anything on advertising since they started brewing 200 years ago. They are not even called

5th July 2011: Salzburg, birthplace of Sound of Music

2011-07-05T22:22:00.000+01:00

Bad day today, half of my photos taken today was loss because the memory card was corrupted for no reason. Austria will be missing from my Mac Index collection! We left Lucas’ place early in the morning to head for the Wien Westbahnhof, train station where we could catch a train to Salzburg. We were lucky to be there early as our Eurail timetable was outdated and the train departure time was 15

4th July 2011: Hidden Gem

2011-07-04T22:28:00.000+01:00

Wikitravel can only tell you that much about a city. Couch surfing is really awesome since not only you save money for accommodation (which is probably the biggest expense), you get to meet real people and the best of all, you get the local insights of the city. I’ve always find it more enjoyable to travel in a city if you have friends to show you around or at least tell their favourite for