Erm, well today I’ve updated the firmware on my iPhone, watched ‘Celebrity Come Dine With Me’ (that Christipher Biggins is a character eh) and ate some lovely pesto gnocchi with chorizo and melted cheese bread. Basically, it was all go again.

The photo is from Zaragoza.

Cannon at the Montjuic castle in Barcelona (Spain)

Canon EOS 450D + 18-55 IS

Flickr | Panoramio | Photoblogs | Cool Photoblogs

WASHINGTON, D.C (Press Release)–The following is the text of a joint Rewards For Justice – Federal Bureau of Investigation statement on a reward offer for information about terrorist suspect Husayn Muhammed al-Umari:

The U.S. Department of State has authorized a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of Husayn Muhammed al-Umari (also known as Abu Ibrahim).

Husayn Muhammed al-Umari is wanted by the FBI for his alleged participation in the August 11, 1982 bombing of Pan American World Airways flight 830, which resulted in the murder of one passenger, the wounding of 16 passengers, and the attempted murder of 267 passengers and the crew on board. Al-Umari was one of three people indicted for the terrorist act and is alleged to have designed and built the explosive device which detonated while the aircraft was in flight from Narita, Japan to Honolulu, Hawaii.

Al-Umari was charged in the District of Columbia’s U.S. District Court with: (1) Conspiracy to commit assault and damage to property; (2) conspiracy to commit murder, (3) murder; (4) aircraft sabotage; (5) damaging aircraft used in foreign commerce (6) placing bombs on aircraft; (7) assault; (8) attempted aircraft sabotage, and (9) aiding and abetting.

In 1998, a co-conspirator, Mohammad Rashed, who placed the bomb on the aircraft, was arrested and brought to the United States. He pleaded guilty to his role in the bombing and signed a cooperation agreement as part of his plea.

Believed to be a master bomb maker and one-time leader of the “15 May” terrorist group, al-Umari also has been indicted by the Government of France for his alleged role in the 1985 bombing of the Marks and Spencer Department store in Paris and the Leumi Bank.

Al-Umari was born in 1936 in Jaffa, in the former British mandate of Palestine. He is about 5 feet, 8 inches tall, with a medium to large build and light complexion. He is believed to have black or graying hair and may be balding. He has brown eyes and is believed to wear glasses. He has scars on both hands and his right forearm. He may possess a passport from Lebanon, where his wife reportedly lives. He is the father of two sons and two daughters. He lived for several years in Iraq. While his current whereabouts are unknown, it is possible that he is residing in Lebanon or Iraq.

He reportedly travels at all times with a firearm and should be considered armed and dangerous. He is reported to have received training from various terrorist and intelligence groups including the defunct Soviet KGB, German Red Army Faction, Irish Republican Army, Basque Fatherland and Liberty, and the Japanese Red Army.

More information about Husayn Muhammed al-Umari is located on the Rewards for Justice website (www.rewardsforjustice.net/umari). The FBI also has placed al-Umari on its Most Wanted Terrorists website (www.fbi.gov/wanted/terrorists/fugitives.htm).

We encourage anyone with information on Husayn Muhammed al-Umari’s location to contact the nearest U.S. embassy or consulate, any U.S. military commander, or the Rewards for Justice office via the website (www.rewardsforjustice.net), e-mail (RFJ@state.gov) or mail (Rewards for Justice, Washington, DC 20520-0303, USA).

All information will be kept strictly confidential.

Since its inception in 1984, the Rewards for Justice Program has paid more than $80 million to more than 50 persons who provided credible information that has resulted in the capture or death of terrorists or prevented acts of international terrorism.

The Pan Am Flight 830 investigation is being handled by the FBI’s Washington Field Office (WFO). Inquiries and information about this investigation should be directed to the FBI WFO’s public information office at 202-278-3519.
*
Preceding provided by the U.S. State Department

Madrid’s approach to Christmas is a breath of fresh air compared with Britain’s two-and-a-half month festive orgy.

Back home, the advertising starts in October, along with the special displays in stores.

But other aspects seem to be getting earlier. As a sub-editor, I was disgusted to edit a story about a village’s Christmas gathering – including mulled wine, mince pies and a silver band playing Christmas carols – taking place on November 14.

Here in Madrid there are admittedly lights and giant sculptures in the shape of Christmas trees waiting to be illuminated. But there is nothing like the same, nauseating sales-fuelled advertising drive.

Maybe it’s because in this Catholic country, Christmas means what it is supposed to mean. The Spanish know we are not here to worship good sales figures, but Jesus Christ’s birth.

I think a lot of people back home would actually be surprised to hear Christmas had something to do with Christ.

I love Albert Cano’s work. I hope he will want to do an exhibition in Galeria Kavel next year. Have a look at his blog amazing and clever collage.

Well here I am in Madrid and this great city has already lived up to expectations.

There’s a certain classiness about the place as soon as you step out of the aircraft that brought you here. There is the stunning architecture of the terminal buildings at Barajas airport and the sleek, modern blue and white Metro trains sweeping you into the city centre.

But co-existing with stylish Madrid is a deliciously gritty, down-to-earth back street world.

On my first night I was taken to a cramped little tapas bar whose walls were decorated with communist posters and one calling for the ‘Yanks’ to ‘go home’ – an interesting proposition considering one of our party hails from Hartford, Connecticut.

But whatever your politics, the bar captured the essence of Spain. Back home these days, it seems to be all about drinking as much as is physically possible before falling over into the gutter. Here it is about wonderful, varied food, great conversation, mixing with young and old… and having the odd drink.

That’s not to say Spain is without problems. On my way back from eating tonight I had to skirt around police officers trying to arrest a drunk, then I was propositioned by a prostitute, then I had to avoid someone after money in a badly lit back street plaza.

But the pluses easily outweigh the minuses – and they can be found in the unlikeliest of places.

For while the Retiro park is a delightful green oasis that more or less every visitor will enjoy at some stage, the Lavapes neighbourhood is a fascinating jumble of cultures most tourists will possibly never have even heard of.

My son lives here in flats that boast a grand wooden staircase and majestic front doors in the same deep brown, highly varnished wood with typically Spanish ironwork.

His neighbours hail from all over the world and consequently his choice of eating is not limited to Spanish fare, but includes Indian, African and even Lebanese.

But the cultural mix still has a distinctly Spanish flavour. The ground floor flat in my son’s block is used for Flamenco practice, for example, and a Catholic church towers over the neighbourhood protecting it’s diverse family

When my plane was approaching Barajas a magical scene was laid out before us – a magnificent light show on the ground below. Threads of orange dots were woven into the black night, sometimes drawing circles, sometimes cross-crossing.

Meanwhile tiny points of light made their way along unlit roads, like miniscule glowworms.

It suggested something special was on the way. Madrid is that something special.

Remember last August when my friend Manolo offered me the use of his lovely apartment in Málaga? Nog and I spent a fabulous week there and I really fell in love with the city. I’ve been wanting to go back ever since and was especially hoping to make it there during the Christmas season as I hear they really do it up nicely in Málaga  – I’m a total Christmas fool and lover of pretty fairy lights and all such festive sparkliness. But it turns out that Manolo, who lives in Seville, has been using his Málaga apartment a lot more of late and so it isn’t as available for friends as it once was. But then it turned out that there is another option …

For the past few years I’ve been helping Manolo rent out one of his family’s holiday apartments in Marbella. And a couple of weeks ago Manolo called me and said that, because of The Crisis, and that the place has been empty most of this season, that I should feel free to use it anytime I wanted. It’s a small one-bedroom place not far from the centre of Marbella, right on the beach … but you know, it’s in Marbella.

When Jessica was over for dinner the weekend before last we were talking about this chance of going away for the four-day long weekend (December 5-8th), since a free apartment was available. At the time I was saying how this would be difficult if not impossible because I couldn’t leave Sunny alone that long, even if Nieves from next door came over once a day to check up on him. And so Jessica offered to come and stay over here for those four days. She’s not very comfortable where she is living right now (with a very “couply” couple), so this would’ve also given her a bit of a holiday before she goes home to France … she could hang out here, watch dvd’s, cook to her heart’s content and have a cat to cuddle (weirdly her cat at home, Chloe, is almost the spitting image of Azar! but with smaller ears…). And even though Sunny is gone now, I’d feel much more comfortable knowing someone was staying with Azar.

And so … wondering what to do. Okay, if I had my druthers I’d be getting on a plane to Marrakesh or London. I’ve been to Marbella a couple of times before and didn’t really like it, though it does have a pretty old town centre. But hey, it’s a free holiday other than busfare and tapas, and I think it would be nice to get away for a few days, especially as I have someone who is happy to come and stay with Azar. Bonus points for Marbella are that a Marks & Spencer has recently opened there (mince pies!!!) and it’s just a short bus ride to Málaga, so I should also be able to spend at least one day there.

Given that my next PET scan is in January, and who knows what will turn up with that, I think I should go for it. I mean, isn’t that what credit cards are for?

What do you think?

I had always taken it for granted that if you sent and paid for a text message to be delivered that it would be, regardless of which mobile subscriber number it was sent to. At least that’s what I would expect at least 99.99% of the time, allowing for the occasional technical hiccup which would be fairly representative of a “best endeavours” clause.

So I was surprised to realise that sending a text message from an O2 to a Yoigo subscriber did not work at all; ever.

When I first started to look at the issue, I thought it might be a technical routing problem that perhaps had not yet been ironed-out, but it seems, from what various people have posted on the Internet, that this most likely is what can best be described as a deliberate act on the part of O2.

My surprise turned to irritation when I realised that O2 are happily charging for the cost of the SMS text message, irrespective that it doesn’t stand a bat’s chance in hell of ever getting to its recipient; moreso since sending a text message from a Yoigo number to an O2 number does indeed work as it should.

Hunting around the ‘net a little, reveals various posts suggesting that O2 does not guarantee delivery of SMS text messages to non-roaming partners. In the light of the additional experimental evidence that I have accrued, that would more properly seem to translate to “We only deliver to who we want, but we’ll take your money anyway if you are fool enough to give it to us”.

Victims of this policy, aside from the originators of such O2 text messages, include Yoigo and Hutchinson 3G (H3H), the latter who are Yoigo’s roaming partner in the UK and neither of which have a partnership with O2.

Some of my initial surprise subsided somewhat after I realised that O2 were nearly 70% owned by Telefonica (España), but this did little for my irritation. Telefonica (aka Movistar) may be forced to “play ball” with Yoigo in Spain itself (by having to participate in the appropriate virtual network sharing agreements), but there doesn’t seem to be an over-riding anxiety to do so from the UK – at least on the level of providing a decent two-way text messaging service.

Overall that’s a pretty shoddy state of affairs, especially considering that other networks do deliver SMS text messages between themselves even without roaming partnership agreements (for example Orange-Yoigo-Orange) – not to mention the fact that sending a text message from Yoigo to O2 also works without issues.

Unfortunately unless enough O2 customers complain directly to O2 (since they are the ones charging for, but not delivering a service), then I doubt that anything will get done about it anytime soon.

On the other hand all it may take is a single complaint to OFCOM.

Finally, whilst touching on the subjects of Yoigo and roaming, the current UK roaming partner for Yoigo appears to be “3” (H3H). A number of people have reported an inability to get any roaming service in the UK, with a Yoigo SIM handset. It is worth checking “3″s current coverage here. It looks like “3″ are in the process of upgrading their network and are stating that their coverage, in and around London, will be much improved by the summer of 2010. See here for details of this “regional” upgrade. Elsewhere, the coverage looks like it’s more than a tad spotty, with lots of “need to try outdoor” holes in it, so you might want to try that if you’re having trouble locking onto their network.

So all is not roses if you’re going to go roaming in the UK with a Yoigo SIM. On the bright side though, Yoigo tariffs are still pretty damn reasonable.

Additionally, it does seem that, prior to making the trip, you need to phone Yoigo on 622 each time you go to the UK to make sure that there is no restriction on roaming for your SIM. You can find the Yoigo FAQ on Roaming here (in Spanish) with links to countries, etc.

By Dian Hasan | November 24, 2009

The hallmark of any great city is its urban park! Commonly located at the center of its core, urban parks play a significant role in providing traffic-choked cities with much-needed green lungs. As well as recreation, sporting and cultural venues for residents and visitors alike. Here’s a look at some of the larger urban parks from across the world, as seen in through the lens of Google Earth.

BUEN RETIRO PARK, MADRID (350 ACRES)

Founded: 1632. Originally a retreat for the Spanish royal family, the park is adjacent to both the the Prado Museum and Atocha train station. The park’s gardens and artificial lake are both iconic in Spain. And there are chestnuts there — lots and lots of chestnuts.

Source: The Infrastructurist

Alright, so not a whole lot has occurred since my last post in Nice, France.

No… wait. That’s a complete lie.

One of the most important things that’s happened is I’ve learned I can not go to India on this little excursion around the globe. Why? Well, I got to Barcelona and was only going to stay for one day. When the hostel reception asked me why, I mentioned that I had to go to the Indian Embassy in Madrid and get my new Visa for the country sorted out ASAP. They told me there’s an embassy consulate in Barcelona and I was like, “Hey, might as well stay and get it done here since it’s such a fucking beautiful place.” Because it really was. Las Ramblas is really cool, the weather is beautiful year round, it has a gorgeous beach and harbor, and the people are pretty friendly. That’s about how I can sum it up. Nothing too crazy happened there outside of the usual pub crawls, getting drunk and making an ass out of myself on the dance floor.

So the next day I wake up and manage to make my way to the embassy consulate. I take in the sounds of groups of school children playing in the schoolyards during lunch time and enjoy the fact that I’m pretty much in the suburbs of what seems like a paradise city. Finally finding my way via small side streets and checking the almost non-existent street numbers on the houses, I see a small, handwritten sign beneath the buzzer for the embassy. Back in highschool, I took three years of Spanish, but I’m not going to lie and pretend like I’m fluent. The one thing I could make out was the word “cerrado”. Fuck, I thought. If I remember anything from those three years, besides how to say “I like to eat monkey head in a cage.”, it was that meant “closed”. Fuck, I thought. But I rang the buzzer anyway.

“Hello?”
“Hola”
“Open?”
“No open, closed.”

Yeah, so the fucking embassy was closed. I arrived there November 12th, and the last day it was open was November 11th. I missed it by a day.

So off to Madrid the next day.

But wait… it’s not that simple. It never is.

Not with me, anyway.

I set an alarm on my phone to go off at about 7 A.M. the next morning, It was a three hour train ride to Madrid and I wanted to get there early enough to get my business done and have enough time to see more of the city with some daylight. But there’s always a problem.

Somehow in my sleep, I managed to turn my phone off. I don’t know how, I don’t know why. But they say everything happens for a reason, right?

Right.

If I had woken up on time, I never would’ve seen Josh and Claire (two of the group of Aussies I had met in Nice, who happened to end up at the same hostel as me in Barcelona) at breakfast that morning and the following event never would’ve occurred.

“Oh, hey Ryan. Where’re ya’ off to?”
“Ah, I gotta get to Madrid and I’m in a bit of a rush, I turned my phone off last night in my sleep and missed my alarm.”
“Oh that’s right, you need to sort out getting your Visa for India. Where else are ya’ goin’ anyway?”

So I run down the list of countries to which I’m going. This includes Egypt.

“Ah, I’m trying to get my nan’s (grandmother’s) ashes to Egypt.”

You see where this is going now.

So in a very consise, five minute conversation I manage to agree with Josh that I’m going to take his grandmother’s ashes to Egypt, spread half of them around in the desert and bring the rest back with me to Melbourne when I arrive there. I’m not sure if he’ll be there or not, so we’ll work out the details when the time arrives.

Anyway, it wasn’t until I got to Madrid that I found out I wasn’t going to be able to go to India. I get to the hostel late, not realizing that the three hour express train from Barcelona to Madrid is an extremely popular route. Get to the train station at 1, and I don’t leave until 5:30. Kinda sucked. I did have time for a nice paella, coffee and some beer though. But I got to Madrid on a Friday night, and it’s difficult to keep track of days when you’re travelling. I was about to head to the embassy Saturday morning when one of the hostel staff members actually told me that it was Saturday morning. Shit.

So Monday rolls around and I head up to the embassy. Long ass line. One of the people waiting in line suggests I go to the consulate just a few streets away to save time and see if it’s possible to even get a new Visa before Thursday when I fly to Morocco. I do this and discover I simply don’t have enough time, even with a Visa in my name already. They’d have to cancel the old one and process the paperwork for a new one, which would take about a week and a half for a foreigner since the Spanish, American and Indian embassies all have to get in touch and talk about the situation or whatever the fuck has to go on when this sort of thing happens.

Farewell India.

I’m trying to lok at it in a more positive light and am thinking that I am just not meant to go this time. This gives me more time in some other areas, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I can plan a trip in the near future dedicated almost solely to India and give myself a few months there rather than a few weeks. Whatever whatever, I’ll sort it out.

There’s a nice English book store in Madrid I would suggest for any travellers in the area, by the way. It’s called J and J’s Book store (it’s actually an ampersand but I’m typing this on an Arabic keyboard and can’t find the damned key) off the Noviciadad metro stop. Great selection and very good prices. Many of the larger stores will be asking for 20-30 Euro for a new book, but you can get most used books there for around 4-6 Euro. Great coffee, friendly staff and they have weekly events like Intercambio night on Thursdays and Quiz night on Fridays. I spent a good day and a half there before I headed out to Morocco to recharge my batteries before I spend the next few months as far removed from Western civilization as I’ll probably be in my entire trip to come.

So… off to Morroco this past Thursday, the 19th of November, 2009.

I had no problems getting to the Madrid airport and getting on my plane. I was a bit nervous though, since when I was at the english book store, I brought up my story to some of the folks there. I asked if it would be immoral to open up the small tin of ashes I had been enstrusted with, and they said it would be only normal to want to see what I was actually carrying. There was no reason for me to disbelieve Josh, but I wanted to make sure the package actually contained ashes and not some kind of drug he simply wanted to get rid of. So the moment of truth came…

I managed to cut through the tape binding the two halves of the tin together and slowly pried it open. You would’ve thought I was opening Pandora’s Box or the Arc of the Covenant the way the entire bar had crowded around me during the last few millimeters of drawing off the top of the tin.

It was fairly anti-climactic. No ecstasy. No cocaine. No heroine. Just some hardened ashes to be spread around in the desert. There be Nan.

So yeah, I was a bit nervous checking my baggge in the Madrid airport since it technically is illegal to do what I am doing. I did a bit of research the morning I was flying out and I am indeed transporting a dead body, or more specifically, a biological agent across international boundaries. I had it buried deep in my checked baggage and just watched it off towards the X-ray machine. Out of sight, out of mind. If worse comes to worse, I can just let customs remove it from my possession. So long as I manage to get it to the Egyptian desert and fulfill my duty.

So… Marrakech.

It was definitely overwhelming as soon as I got out of the taxi to Jemaa el Fna square. THE Square of Marrakech in the old Medina. Neither pictures nor words can describe the madness that this place brings within the first ten seconds of stepping foot there. You simply have to experience it for yourself.

I manage to find my way to Cafe Argana like the directions to the hostel suggest after asking a few local souk owners who try to get me into their shop. I follow the directions from there and come to an impass. The street I need to walk down is closed off because they’re shooting a scene for the next Sex in the City movie. Fuck.

“You have to go around.” One of the security guards tells me.
“Can you tell me how?”
“No, it’s impossible. You will get lost, ask someone on the way.”

And he was absolutely right. Even if I had a map it would be completely useless. So I just kept walking, trying to stay on the main streets and using my internal navigation to get back to the street I had to take a detour off of. Shop owners keep trying to pull me in to look at their goods, but I keep telling them, “No… no… I need to find my hotel.”

“Oh, I know a hotel.” They would say.
“I already have a reservation.”

They would then let me on my way.

Finally a shop owner manages to get me in a small conversation and I tell him of my predicament. He tells me to wait a second and his friend pulls up on this bike that’s not quite a motor powered bicycle, and not quite a vespa. Some sort of medium between the two, very popular around Marrakech. The shop owner tells me that his friend knows the address and will take me there. I ask him how much and he just says I give his friend a tip at the end and come back to his shop to look at what he has to sell.

Fair enough, I figure. But I’m not coming back to go shopping.

So in a matter of only two minutes I go from complete distress in my wanting to find this fucking hostel buried somewhere in the snaking alleys of Marrakech to a euphoric motorbike ride (even if I was riding bitch), with a complete stranger through the same streets, zipping through the crowds, taking hairpin turns way too quickly to be considered safe with the amount of awkwardly weighted baggage I was carrying, and coming close to colliding head on with manned donkeys pulling oversized wheelbarrows full of what looked like fruits and nuts.

Intense.

I get to the hostel, give the man a tip and decline my trip back to his friend’s shop. I imagine he was fairly pissed, but honestly I just wanted to check in and have a quick nap before heading out into the souks again.

It was a completely different world at night when I walked into the main square. Open-aired barbeques perfumed the air with smells of snails, lambs head and tajine. Bumrushing waiters and stall owners vicegrip your biceps and wrists in an attempt to get you to sit at their restaurant. Vendors atop three foot tall platforms selling nuts and freshly squeezed juices (must haves!) wave you on and call out Hello in three or four different languages. These people, for as poor as they may come across, are very intelligent and know how to cater to tourists. I’ve met a fair number of men on the street who can speak conversational basics in English, Spanish and even sometimes German, along with their fluency in both Arabic and French.

But nothing really happens that first night. It was the day after when I got into the shopping mood and started trying to haggle.

I bought a couple of leather belts since the one I did have was starting to give way (it’s braided) and loosen up more than I would like. I thought I got a good price, but it wasn’t until a few days later when I realized exactly how I low I could manage to get souk owners to drop their prices with a few varied techniques.

But back at the hostel after my first full day in the medina, I book a tour (2 days, 1 night) to some Casbah’s, the Atlas Mountains, and the desert. It was quite the experience.

I wake up the next morning around 6 A.M. to catch the minibus for our tour at 7. We’re 12 in number and squeeze into this thing for a daunting 6 hour ride (with a few stop offs for lunch and shopping) to our final destination where an hour and a half camelback ride will take us out into the desert. I’m not going to go into any details about the people I met, since it was the general kind of talk that happens between backpackers. I will mention this one fellow though, Abdul, who was born in Yemen but lives in the U.K. currently and has for about half his life. He could speak Arabic and he was handy to have around when we needed information or wanted to converse with some of the people we came across.

I would love to describe the landscape we passed on our way to the “desert”, but it’s simply impossible. The tour driver took us on these winding (almost to a point of being terrifying) mountainside roads just barely wide enough for two vehicles, and in some instances with no guards to keep you from plummiting a good 500 feet straight down a cliffside should your tires catch some loose bit of dirt, or one of them pops, or an oncoming car forgets to turn and just decides to send both of you to what could only be described as hell after the vehicles’ gas tanks explode following the drop.

Scary, yet beautiful.

So the first casbah was cool, but really nothing intense and not nearly as authentic as I would’ve liked to imagine it could’ve been. It did have its old parts, but the people there weren’t too apt to let us just wander around their home without supervision, and we weren’t willing to dish out any money to hire a guide none of us understood.

So we move on after a good lunch (mint tea and a Berber omelette – definitely recommend) and buying a scarf for the desert sun. Eventually we get to where we pick up our camels and Berber guides, and head off into the “desert” after sunset. I keep using quotes to describe this for one simple reason. I thought I was heading out into the Sahara. I know it was only a two day, one night tour, but the photo was definitely misleading. There was sand, don’t get me wrong. There were sand dunes as well. But it just wasn’t the desert.

Oh well, I’ll get there when I arrive in Egypt.

Camels are rough to ride. You learn quickly to not be stiff, and that there’s a lot of gyrating going on in order to keep yourself minutely comfortable. Dirty jokes are mandatory.

We get to the camp site and sit down while our dinner is being prepared. It arrives (chicken tajine for 12 with some vegetarian side tajines) and we all chow down with strangers eating out of the same dish. Some more mint tea follows and we’re left to our own devices for about an hour. In this time we all go outside and lay down on the rock/sand mix and stare up at the sky.

There’s plenty of ways to describe the sky out in the desert using colorful adjectives and creative grammar, but I’m not going to try. I can only say this:

It was the first time I could actually see the edge of the Milky Way. A thick white band stretching across the sky just south of center and curving as it reached the horizon. Constellations became nearly impossible to pick out because of the sheer amount of stars covering the pitch black night sky. It became only more intense after the moon dropped beneath the horizon and allowed us a clear view into the world beyond the world. On our backs for a good thirty minutes, a group of twelve who’ve never experienced this before (mostly from Central Europe and the U.K., myself the only American as has become the usual case in my travels), we pick out a good two dozen shooting stars. About one every minute, yeah. Who the fuck needs meteor showers when you can see bits of space debris burning up in our atmosphere every sixty seconds?

I hope at least one of my wishes come true. It’s just playing the odds game, right?

I was the first to see the bonfire.

I stood up to go into our tent to grab a drink of water and see a bonfire being built behind us. The group gets called over and we get treated to traditional berber music played by our hosts on a set of old, plastic gasoline containers. It was great. Some of us danced and clapped along in rhythm and we were joined by another group on the same excursion as ourselves.

This comes to and end and then we sleep…

Or at least we try to.

It was excruciatingly cold. I had heard that the desert gets cold at night, but I wasn’t ready for this. The blankets did provide some shelter, but you really had to double up in order to get remotely comfortable. It takes me a good hour and a half or so in order to fall asleep the first time, but I was woken a few more during the night as some dogs, whether they were tame or wild I know not, near our campsite barked continually at only God-knows-what, and I wasn’t the only one struggling to find peace. The rustling of a dozen bodies coccooned in blankets atop sleeping mats was enough to assure me I wasn’t the only one awake. But I did manage a good four hours (I think) of sound sleep throughout the night.

We all wake up to a nice sunrise behind the nearby mountains and a simple breakfast of bread, jam and tea and head off back on our camels to our minibus to head back to Marrakech. The second ride was easier than the first, even if we were a bit sore. With some experience under our belts, I think a fair portion of the group was comfortable with riding the smelly, spitting beasts of burden. I can still feel it as I type this, but the biggest pain isn’t in your balls, you learn to put them in the right spot to avoid any painful slapping against the camel’s ridge-like spine, but at the inner joint of where your legs and hips meet. Having to straddle an animal that large for extended periods when you’re not accustomed to it simply does a job on you.

So off to another casbah, again I cannot recall its name. It was where the arena scene from Gladiator was shot, so I could easily google it and give you a more accurate idea of where I have been, but I simply can’t be bothered right now as I’m in a rush to catch a train up to Casablanca. This casbah was much older and more authentic than the one we had seen the day before. One of the men still living there gave us a tour (and didn’t even ask for a tip at the end, he was simply proud of his home and his heritage and wanted to tell us all about it), and took us up to the top (maybe 300 ft?) where we could see the groves of date and palm trees stretching for miles upon miles to nearby towns and villages. This place was nearly 3,000 years old and still had people living in it. So far removed from western civilization, and so dependant on the income from tourists who simply want to walk through a real piece of history, but simply cannot comprehend the level of depth which lies within the adobe walls. 10,000 people once living there had thinned to less than a thousand over the millenia, but it was still a civilization with language, crafts, religion and all the other minute variables which give culture to a people.

So we have lunch and head back off to Marrakech, but not before stopping at a small shop along the way.

It was definitely worth it as it was a shop where oils (both for eating and washing) and soaps were created using an old process (or at least we were led to believe it was so with the process being shown to us as soon as we entered the doors – they very well could’ve had machinery in a back room or some basement or factory down the road where the goods were made with a much higher rate of efficiency) of grinding the pulp of nuts into a sort of cake which was then squeezed by hands to produce the oil used to make the products.

I bought some rose scented soap and we all hopped back into the van to Marrakech. We get there and split off for an hour and a half for a shower and clothes change, but before I do that I sit down and have some snails. It wasn’t that exotic for me, as I have had escargot when I was in France, but these were honestly a bit of a let down. There were no spices and the snails were a bit bland; think of them as salty, boiled mushrooms that have a face staring right back at you in a state of despair, as I’d imagine that’s how a snail being cooked alive must feel.

Anyway, we regroup and head off for a bit of shisha (flavored tobacco smoked out of a hookah) at an off-the-beaten-path one of the guys with us had visited earlier in the week. It was a welcome smoke and then I head off to bed.

The next day was more of the same (window shopping and passing on), except I was walking around with these Sweedish girls and Australian boys who were sleeping in the same 8 bed dorm as myself. Some coffee on a terrace looking over the medina and another go at practicing my haggling skills.

Wait, I missed something.

I did entitle this blog “In Marrakech: Deaf people die an exotic cuisine for me!”, didn’t I? Right… so here’s why.

The overwhelming number of bicycle riders, whether they be motorized or push style, is just incredible. They use their horns, bells and whistles of all sorts to let you know when they’re coming by down a busy side street. Just stick to the side, walk in a straight line, and you will be fine even if they brush past you lightly. If you can’t hear this coming, you might just step out to the side at the wrong time and get clipped by a bike whizzing by, or a small truck, or a donkey pulling an oversized load – that’s really the last thing you want to happen here. So yeah, deaf people die if they’re not careful.

Exotic cuisine? Let’s just say that my last full day in Marrakech was accompanied the most awkward thing I’ve eaten thusfar in my life. I didn’t even know you could get this. Earlier that morning I was out on the top terrace of the riad I was staying at and was having conversation with some British guys on a short holiday taking off back home later that afternoon. What did they eat the night prior?

Sheep’s head.

Yes… and let me tell you, it was fucking delicious. Though it might not seem appetizing at first, it’s a must try if you can stomach the sight of a a man chopping the flesh off a freshly boiled head of an animal (and it still has the vague shape of a head after cooking, by the way) right in front of you, toss it into a bowl, and spice it with some flavored salt. The salt is delicious too.

So yeah, that’s pretty much my story in Marrakech and my short excursion out into what kind of was the desert but still wasn’t quite the desert, and the Atlas Mountains and its casbah’s. I have to go rush to the train station to catch one up to Casablanca, take a flight for a night’s stay back in Madrid tomorrow and then head on off to Cairo on the 26th. From there’s it’s overland travel through Egypt, Israel and Jordan for two and a half weeks and then flying out of Amman (spelling?) to….

Well, I’ll save that for when I get there.

Two days until Egypt!

Peace out and take care

-Ryan P.

I hope no one that works airport security reads this, or if they do, after I’ve already left their country! I’m only transporting ashes because I’m a nice person!

MERCADOS MEXICANOS-¿Qué dicen los analistas? 24 de noviembre

via MERCADOS MEXICANOS-¿Qué dicen los analistas? 24 de noviembre | Titulares | Reuters.

I’m 24hours away from the flight to Frankfurt and then to Barcelona! Wait for all my interesting updates of these three (Madrid as well!) places! Meanwhile I will have to try and finish my Concrete Task 2. And in case you missed my previous post about how dirt cheap the airticket is: the return ticket from Prague-Frankfurt is 0.02Kc and the return ticket from Frankfurt-Barcelona is 10EUR! HAHA

Kavel Rafferty has created 10 images of typical Barcelona bars and bodegas for her exhibition at Heliogàbal. The images mimic faded discarded Polaroid photos from the 70s using the instantly recognisable square format, muted colours and blurred textures . Kavel wants to celebrate these sometimes shabby hidden treasures of Barcelona, cañas, anchovies, formica tables, ashtrays, handwritten signs, tapas, tiled walls, vermouth, cafe con leche, barrels of red wine…
Kavel loves these bars, an integral part of the tapestry of Barcelona, Kavel records some of the details from these bars before they disappear from the city completely.

Date of Exhibition to be confirmed.
Framed signed cellulose prints are 100€ each.

With Argentina as the last team to qualify, all 12 participants for the Hero Honda FIH World Cup are known. The 12 top men’s hockey nations will play for the World Title in New Delhi, India from 28 February-13 March 2010. and they are:

India (Host)

Canada (Champion of the 3rd Men’s Pan American Cup)

Korea (Champion of the 8th Men’s Asia Cup)

South Africa (Champion of the Africa Cup of Nations, 2009)

Australia (Champion of the 6th Men’s Oceania Cup)

England (Champion of the 12th Men’s EuroHockey Nations Championship)

Germany (Silver medalist of the 12th Men’s EuroHockey Nations Championship)

Netherlands (Bronze medalist of the 12th Men’s EuroHockey Nations Championship)

Spain (Fourth ranked team of the 12th Men’s EuroHockey Nations Championship)

Pakistan (Winner of the Men’s World Cup Qualification Tournament – No. 1)

New Zealand (Winner of the Men’s World Cup Qualification Tournament – No. 2)

Argentina (Winner of the Men’s World Cup Qualification Tournament – No. 3)

Spanish, Mauritanian governments step up patrols along the coast to stop illegal immigration; Madrid helps Nouakchott with an annual budget of $750 million and a small plane to keep watch on immigration routes…. From VOA. Full story

This site may contain information about: flight information. The blog is also related to: cheap trip.

After many days in pursuit of the wild Detroitonian, I have finally caught up with the most sought after personality in Lavapiés, Miss Melissa. She was charming a group of Senegalese gentlemen when I stumbled upon her and happened to have a few minutes to douse the flame of curiosity that was burning inside me. Do you want to know what I was just dying to know?

Kelly: What famous person do other people tell you that you most resemble?

Meli: Jenna Elfman, emphasis on the ‘Elf’.

Kelly: If you could live in any home on a television series, what would it be?

Meli: Lucy and Desi’s second apartment.

Kelly: Who would you most like to be stuck in an elevator with?

Meli: Alberto. Hey baby, let’s share some O subscript 2, if you know what I mean….

Kelly: What’s the habit you’re proudest of breaking?  

Meli: Sister Mary Ann’s. Twenty-six Hail Marys.

Kelly: Where were you on September 11, 2001?

Meli: Mr. Rice’s class.

Kelly: Which of the four seasons do you most anticipate?

Meli: Dubai´s. Though I don’t know how the no-pork thing’s gonna fly.

Kelly: What’s your least favorite word?

Meli: Azberjain. It discouraged me from reading today’s whole entire paper .

Kelly: What do you think Victoria’s secret is?

Meli: Don’t care because the word ’secretion’ scares me too.

Kelly: What is one food you will never give up?

Meli: Blue Corn chips and Salsa.

Kelly: What’s your favorite tree?

Meli: Gotta love the dreaminess of the Sleeping Pillow, and the lingering smell of the Scotch Wine Tree you got for Christmas, long after it’s started to drop needles and get naked. But my fav-o is the one that provides me with feathery shade when I’m on the beach. Can’t think of the name at the mo. TOTAL calm.

Kelly:  If you could have personally witnessed one event in history, what would you want to have seen?

Meli: “The Rite of Spring” premiere in Paris. Who, after witnessing that night, could claim that music DOESN’T make us crazy? Manson ain’t got nada on Stravinsky.

Kelly: Do you feel that children should be sheltered from unhappiness?

Meli: Happiness is relative. Within the context of each culture, community, family, value set, recollection of personal experiences, peace, intrinsic motivation, human rights, the realization of one’s interdependency on his or her environment …. what was the exact question again? Liberal jargon’s got me jumbled.

Kelly:  If you found a $100 what would you do with the money?

Meli: Try to buy some scalpies for the Muse Show this week, and then realize that 100 dollars is only worth 66.8 euro. So then I’d go to the bar.

Pocas personas conocen la faceta humana de Guti tan bien como el presentador de En Juego de Onda Madrid, José Luis Poblador. Me encantó escuchar la entrevista que tuvo con el jugador del Real Madrid recientemente en su programa. Guti es como un boxeador, es sincero. Dice la verdad. No se muerde la lengua. Claro, eso tiene un doble filo. Por un lado, sus detractores se disponen a atacarle vorazmente, por otro, adhiere defensores a capa y espada a título de ‘Genio y Figura’.  A él le dedicaremos algunos capítulos en el inicio de este blog del que espero que disfrutéis.

Its that time of year again: the days are getting shorter, the weather is getting extreme and the cold become more frequent. As I look out of the window at rain soaked passers by I recall my summer holidays and the strange sensation of being warm. I think ahead to the summer and the possibility of getting away for a few weeks. The chances are that if I leave the country the weather will be glorious here and where ever I end up will have the worst summer in living memory.

Still, thinking about where to go is exciting after all the possibilities are many and varied. My girlfriend enjoys lounging around in the sun so Spain seems like a natural choice, I’ve never been and it’s not too far so flights aren’t too expensive. I get bored of sitting on the beach so I’ve been looking at what else we can do if I can convince her to get off the sun lounger. I’ve had a look at car hire in Marbella and it seems like a good option, lots to explore inland and away from the majority of the tourists.

I have also always wanted to go to Switzerland, particularly in the summer. I would like to go paragliding from the mountains although I might not have the guts for that. Apparently Geneva is worth a visit, judging by the photos I have seen it is very picturesque.

Hey everyone! This week we’ve got a new intro for our videos! Today we’re going to tell you about a place where you can go shopping: Calle Colón, and a place where you have have a cup of coffee: el Café Lisboa.

Calle Colón is the main street for shopping and Café Lisboa is a magical little place with a nice little terrace to sit and take the sun. We went there after grabbing abite at Orient Xpress.

Enjoy the video!

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There are thousands collections of Live internet TV hosting sites and video feeds. You can Watch Live streaming TV Stations or channels from many source. But to search and point your intended channels sometimes is very difficult since one site can offer thousand of free TV sport channel in just one day.  So Here, we provide summary of links that will provide free live streaming TV sports. In this site We focus on the  Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, soccer and other more spesific segment. Most watch free TV stations we cover for  Sport here are from, USA & Canada and some other popular sports in Europe and arround the world. Check out our featured free tv sport online live stream today 24 November 2009 (11/24) for Hull City Res vs Manchester United Res .  We will find the links from ustream, justin tv, p2p, sopcast, tvu, tvants, uusee, etc. So don’t need to worry about miss one of our favorite TV sport game match, we can now catch them online, usually just 24 hours later it will be stored in the hosting site, it depends on their policy. You can easily select and click to watch Hull City Res vs Manchester United Res  and others sport channel online stream here.

Pamplona, Sanfermines 2009, originalmente cargada por Rufino Lasaosa.

Una foto para un día. Llegando a los toros.

Más fotos de Sanfermines

Más retratos callejeros