Joe's Travel Blog

Just an update with planned trips...

2011-06-27T04:31:00.000-07:00

Barcelona (Spain) for a quick 2 dayer tomorrow
Bochum (Germany) for 3 days next week
Wellington (New Zealand) for a week a week or so after that

Will do my best to update this blog accordingly hoping for some interesting trips to write about. although most of it will be... on a plane again...

Bangkok - Day 6 - Boats and pictures

2011-06-05T05:03:00.000-07:00

So this was saturday. I woke up at about 10.45 so missed breakfast, I woke up determined to do some more of the tourist type stuff and went downstairs to speak to guest services to see what they recommended. I mentioned I'd quite like to see bangkok from a boat and they told me about the company just at the end of the road the hotel was on that did the boat tours. It turns out there are many of these companies doing the same or similar tour up the river, around the canal systems and back down the river.

I walked down the road to the pier where I got harassed by tuk tuk drivers shouting '20 baht 20 baht' 'anywhere 20 baht' - which is about 40 pence. I swear some of them seemed so desperate for business they'd drive me back to Guildford for 20 baht.

You had a choice between speed boat or slow boat (same route)

Speed boat

Slow boat

Now being a petrol head and the fact that the speed boats were powered by what looked like big turbo charged V8's you'd think it would be an easy choice. But just as I was going to say speed boat I realised I didn't stand a cat in hells chance of getting any good pictures being thrown around in one of them. So I opted for the slow boat hoping i'd be able to get some piccies.

So here are a few pics from when we were heading up the river, note (covering my arse a bit) Ive not had a chance to crop or edit any of these so hopefully they look ok...

So some amazing sites and varied types and looks of buildings. We then peeled off to into the back waters where the sites got even more interesting!

About half way around the backwaters we pulled up into a bit of a floating market where dudes and dudettes in boats full of tat, i mean quality goods, tried to barter with you and sell you stuff. Now I have a collection of hats so I wasn't going to miss out on a thai hat, so I bought one off this dude and he gave me a free beer.

Then we continued around the back waters for a bit before joining back onto the main river...

This is not the greatest picture but it was an Alligator! didn't even know they were here!

So got back to the hotel after the boat trip confident I'd seen at least some of the real thailand, had to try the hat on!

That afternoon I just chilled out by the pool and read a book.

That evening I went to the top class Thai restaurant on our complex called Salathip. They had an 8 course Thai set menu...couldnt resist! The food was amazing, by far the best asian food I have ever eaten, made even better by the surroundings over the river and the traditional thai entertainment!

At one point I wondered why everyone was staring at me, then i realised they were doing this stuff right behind my head!!!

Then I had a quick drink at the bar and headed back to bed

Bangkok - Day 5 - Work over, let's see what this is all about

2011-06-05T03:15:00.001-07:00

The next day I woke up with a hangover. I'm not going to lie, I crawled out of bed and if you could have seen me it was not a pretty site...Just be thankful I'm not one of those people that take photos of everything.

scraped myself down to get breakfast, can't remember what I had, but I'm thinking it was mainly fruit juice and coffee based...

Today was the first day to myself and I had plenty of choice as to what to do. One of the guys on the workshop had marked out the different places on a map for me and recommended different stuff what the kind of thing I was after. He also recommended the places not to go to!

Today I didn't feel up to full on sight seeing so being the technogeek consumer I am I thought I'd go to one of these technology mall places. I chose a place called Panthip Plaza. It's basically a couple of thousand computer and phone shop's / stalls rammed into a big 6 floor mall. Imagine Bluewater for geeks.

I got a cab over there (no I didn't go on a tuk tuk and have no plans to) and he dropped me somewhere near, I went for a stroll over the bridge and found the entrance to Panthip Plaza.

As you walk in it is quite a shock to the system, relatively organised chaos. People with every type of mobile phone you can imagine, I almost bought a Ferrari 599 shaped mobile phone but they wanted too much even after some extreme haggling so I left it. Now you don't come to a place like this unless you actually want to buy something, I had a bit of a shopping list planned out. I was looking for some kind of tablet, i'd seen reviews of what people call the fake ipads (epads or other variants) that although cheap chinese made things were running android 2.2 and not actually that bad. I also was looking for a few sony camera attachments.

I spent the next 3 hours wandering the mall, It flew by all of a sudden i realised it was lunch time and I'd not bought anything. I had already spotted a small stall on the 4th floor that had these epads. It's quite amusing really they make out like they are as good or better than ipads and give you the hard sell. I did well, about 20 minutes negotiating and some back and forth typing numbers into a calculator, stripping out of all the crappy accessories i didnt want and showing them that I had a dell streak in my pocket so I'm quite aware this is a chinese knockoff I managed to get them to sell me the 10" version for less than the 7" version, something like 2300 baht ie about £47. She didnt look particularly happy when we shook on it so can't imagine she made much money but they didn't look like they'd had a single customer today (and that's why I chose them)

I did go into a number of camera shops that stocked sony stuff but none of them had the specific stuff I needed so in the end I headed back to the hotel.

In the afternoon I just chilled out a bit, by the pool etc, to be honest I was still a bit knackered so I probably didn't make the best use of the day but then again I had a new tablet to play with.

Now it's not going to convert any ipad fans any time soon but for the money you can't complain, once I'd stripped off all the crappy stuff on it I didnt want (most of it chinese) and installed stuff i did want from marketplace it started to actually become quite a good little device.

That evening I was meeting up with another colleague from the uk who had been on holiday not far from here and was now back in BK for the night. He was meeting a couple of his mates who live here so I tagged along.

I hopped in a cab outside the hotel and as soon as we started moving the cab driver (who spoke perfect english) turned around and said "why didnt you take the sky train, traffic very bad between here and there"
Now seeing I had no idea how far apart here and there were it was a bit of unknown risk but I said I wasn't in a massive hurry and then spent 45 mins in the cab having a nice chat with the man. (it still only cost me £2)

He was right of course, the traffic was pretty bad, but to be honest i've seen worse, at least people werent driving into each other like Jakarta!

Got to Sukhumvit Soi 7 where I'd been told to head...and those who know BK well probably know where this is heading...

I get out the taxi and he told me to walk left so I did...as I did...I saw the 'other side' of bangkok. I mean metaphorically not geographically.

Some of you have probably heard of Pat Pong, well this street was one of its poorer cousins. Bar after Bar after Bar with Girl after Girl after Girl. 'oh my' I thought to myself where have I been taken. Pretty soon I realised I was actually in the right place and there was a bar half way down the street with the guys I was meeting.

We had a beer and then a couple of us hadn't eaten so we walked around the corner to a kind of open thai canteen restaurant that was serving mostly locals real thai food. I had a seafood in sauce with seaweed and was really really nice.

After then we met back up with the guys and it was decided due to my never having really seen the bangkok night life before that we would head to soi cowboy. A short cab ride later and we were there. It was similar to the first place only bigger, brighter and even more places of that ilk. A man with lower morals would have been in disneyland! However as they say I'm a good boy and know where my bread is buttered!

Although the sites were obvious and unsubtle the evening consisted of a couple of beers and some good chat in 2 different bars, their names escape me but I think one was like Barracca or something.

Part of me felt a little uneasy most of the evening as I was told that most of the girls were poor farmers daughters who came here to make money the only way they knew how and I found that a little sad. But on the other hand I'm glad I truly saw that side of BK.

After that it was a much shorter ride back to the hotel (the traffic had gone) and I headed into the lobby bar for one more drink with my bar tender friend Pick, he gave me some free thai whiskey to try which was really good!

It was late and the jet lag was laughing in my face now so I crashed.

Bangkok - Day 4 - The finer side of living

2011-06-05T02:36:00.000-07:00

Woke up this morning feeling fine...got something spe... sorry

Got up had breakfast but this time opting for some more local cuisine including some raw salmon sushi and a few other delicacies.

Work went really well apart from a few technical shenanigans but we got over that pretty quickly. After the course had finished one of our colleagues who lives just outside Bangkok had invited us over for dinner at their house. I was completely knackered as the jet lag and work had been hanging on my eyelids for the last few hours so at bare minimum I needed a shower to wake me up.

After the shower I met up with the guys and we hopped in his car. It was about a 45 min drive to his place but was nice because it gave me a chance to see some more of bangkok other than the central part.

I had a lovely evening at their place, met his english wife and their thai children of 11 and 5, who were adorable, What was really amusing to me was that she had cooked a traditional english chicken roast! This was brilliant and delicious and made a really surreal counterbalance to where we were. Their home is amazing, it's like one of those places you see in hollywood. Beautiful white stone house in security gated complex with amazing pool and bbq area. If I ever end up living in a place half that nice I will be happy (I probably won't).

I didn't take any photos as 1.didn't take my camera and 2.just didn't seem appropriate!

but had a great evening with wonderful company topped of by Kem (the 11 yr old) announcing he had an electric guitar! well, that's like telling me they had a ferrari in the garage, I had to have a play. Ended up giving an ad hoc guitar lesson to boot.

Was a lovely evening and again I got real insight into what life is like for many ex pats living over here. It's not exactly a bad life!

After this I got a cab back, here is the other thing about thailand, the taxi's are so cheap! I got a 45 min journey and is cost about £2.20. I tell you if I lived in Bangkok I don't think I'd bother owning a car. Actually what am I saying, petrol is so cheap I'd probably have a V12 monster...

When I got back I didn't quite feel ready for bed and in the lobby bar they had a singer and band doing various western covers. They were really bloody good!

although the introduction into Bieber into their set was uncalled for.

Another discovery here was a bar man called (i think he said) 'Pick' who spoke pretty good english and made amazing cocktails! Ive had a few in my time but this guy really knew what he was doing, tasting / adjusting I had a couple and all were a 'taste sensation' (imagine peter kay)

At about 1am I thought enough was enough and headed up to my room to sleep.

Bangkok - Day 3 - Bonjour and Skyscrapers

2011-06-05T02:17:00.000-07:00

So the alarm wakes me up at 6.30am...which to me of course feels like 12.30am...the last thing I want to do is go and do 12 hours work but alas that's why I'm here of course so being a good little boy I don't complain and the days workshop all went swimmingly, but before I got there we had breakfast to contend with...

Now the buffet in this hotel is extravagant to say the least, you can literally have anything you want. you want fry up? of course. you want 200 types of fruit, no problem! you want sushi followed by sweet and sour pork balls in a fiery chilli sauce, knock yourself out! As I was nursing last nights psycho pizza fire from hell I went for some simple bacon and eggs, but what I realised as I looked round the place was just how different people's breakfast culture are.

I spotted one little (guessing chinese) guy eating a fish salad with fruit

Another eating what looked like pad thai or some other similar dish

Another having noodle soup

Another with piled high waffles covered in syrup

and I could go on...It made me think about just how different peoples palettes must be at 7.30 in the morning. but anyway I digress...

Work went well... I'll not bore you with that...

That evening I had a choice to go with all the delegates on the organised restaurant boat by the hotel for my evening meal or join my colleagues somewhere else... I went for the colleagues option.

Before meeting up with them I went for a quick swim in the pool as the temperature at around 6.30pm was like bath water both in or out.

Was very pleasant and helped relieve some tension from quite a stressful first day.

One of my colleagues bailed due to being knackered so I met up with the other one who is a great french guy now living in singapore. We went to a place called something cafe, can't remember the first word, which his wife said did good thai food. unfortunately that was over 3 years ago and they had changed ownership, the food was purely european and although the service was very bad, eg wrong dishes appearing, the food when it did arrive was very nice. They had no idea how to make a good Mojito though!

After the meal we got a cab over to the Banyan Tree. This hotel is a tourist hot spot as it has the open top restaurant / bar on the roof...Vertigo / Moon Bar. I had always been planning to go here as many people had recommended it, but even more so as Helen and Tom (V's sis+hubby) had only just gone there a few weeks back.

Had some great Banter around the differences between england and france (well more the english and the french) but also got some real insights into what life is like as an ex pat in asia. The return on your money and quality of life seem to be right up there. We also had some very good realisations about how as England we think that we are right up there in terms of best places to live in the world / well off country / public services and in some respects its true, but in many respects we are kidding ourselves I think.

While up at the Moon Bar I took a few photos of the view:

As you can see the view is something pretty special and no better place in my view to sit with a cocktail chatting about the world...

After this we hopped back in a taxi to the hotel and I went to sleep as the jet lag was creeping up on me like some kind of creepy sleepy thing.

Bangkok - Day 2 - Arriving in Bangkok

2011-06-05T01:46:00.000-07:00

So as I sit here thinking about packing up my things and maybe having a last visit into town before I go I realised that my plan to do 'small and often' entries has failed. So instead Ill try to do an overall summary of my trip to bangkok.

The flight over was good, no drama, only managed to get about 4 hours sleep but actually this served a purpose, as I was awake for the second half of the flight so when I landed at 3.30pm BK time I and my body could kind of believe it was the afternoon. The highlight of the flight over was the descent into BK. It's rainy season here at the moment which basically means every day they see random scatterings of the most amazing thunderstorms. The descent through the clouds where the pilot was obviously given leeway to fly around the thunderheads was an amazing sight, never seen weather quite like it!

Got off the plane thinking about where I needed to go and the possibility of whether I was supposed to or not have a visa (which I didn't) and with my head full of journey logistics I totally forgot about one obvious difference between England and Thailand...the temperature! It smacked me in the face like a microwaved kipper covered in chilli sauce!

After a stroll through arrivals and what seemed like a 4 mile hike to immigrations I remembered my trip to Jakarta last year where to get into the country I effectively had to bribe the official due to a mix up in visas so off course not having any kind of visa this time I was thinking it could be tricky. Turns out Thailand is much more relaxed, straight through no issue.

So i picked up my driver at arrivals (well he picked up me) and after getting some cash out (which just looked like asian monopoly money to me) hopped in the BMW 7 series and enjoyed the blast or air con, complimentary cold water and wifi connection! dammit they know how to do service in this town!

On the drive to the hotel the driver who spoke some english was pointing out various buildings and parts of town to me. I never realised BK was so damn big! one thing I did spot was this...

It seems our recent hammering by barca hasn't affected the branding out here, sponsored buildings no less!

As anyone who follows me on these little jaunts knows for me the interesting bits and highlights are all the querky little differences between where I'm from and where I'm going, it's always the little things for example spotted this sign on route to the hotel...

Not sure why but I really like this sign.

So anyway we arrive at the hotel, I am staying at the Shangri La hotel in the south of the city...and as soon as we pull up I can tell 'I've done well' with this one, the staff are incredibly attentive and friendly, everyone of them says hello and smiles, can't do enough for you etc etc that kind of 5* service that someone like myself who stays in a lot of 3* middle of the road not quite a truck stop but nothing like the ritz kind of places, could get accustomed to! Plus the client has apparently negotiated a good rate so it works out at less than £70 a night! my first insight into money going much further in Thailand.

Check in was also an experience, Im greeted at the car by 2 people, 1 to take my stuff and 1 takes me straight to my room where they check you in there, talk about streamlined service!

My room was only on 6th floor (guess it was a stretch to far to hope for a 30th floor suite ;0D ) so the view from the window over the river was nice but not spectacular.

however what it did enable me to do was get a good look at some of the transport used in BK, seems to be 3 main areas, road (taxi, tuk tuk and motorbike taxis), railway (BTS sky rail type thing), but what I didn't know was just how much they relied on the river for transport, hundreds if not thousands of boats flying up and down all the time...

Now what actually happened as soon as I had checked in was that I had to go and work... I had to go setup for 2 simulations running the next day, luckily in the same hotel.

Once we had finished with the work stuff for that night the 2 colleagues I had been working with together with another who lives in BK and was meeting us went for a few drinks and a meal at the italian restaurant they have in the hotel complex. This was where I got my first view of the thai perspective to 2 things:

1. Food cost levels in reverse - what I mean by this, is in the UK if you want to go out for a meal but don't want to spend a lot of money and want something simple but tasty a typical go to is italian right? pizza pasta whatever... and if you want to spend a bit more and go for something really good a nice Thai restaurant would be a good way to go. At least in Guildford that is definitely the way I see it.

It seems obvious now thinking about it but still was interesting was it is the total opposite here. Don't get me wrong there are very nice / posh / expensive thai food places also but there seems to be a large premium paid for european food. Our meal worked out at close to $100 a head for starter and main and it was all fairly typical italian food (very nice though I might add) Angelini's is the name if you ever fancy top class Italian in BK.

2. Perception of 'spicy' - now this one may seem a tad obvious but their levels of spicy are somewhat elevated! so to help any budding thailand visitor out I have created a conversion table using a well known western chicken restaurant as the europe benchmark...

UK Thailand

Lemon and Herb Doesnt exist except in some deserts

Mild Won't kill you but you better like spicy food

Medium Mental, will contain at least 10 hot chillies

Spicy You'll be lucky to eat it all and survive

Hot and Spicy Your not coming home again.

And this is based on real field research, trust me! Those who know me know that travel is closely linked with food in my world and Ive been sure to try some of the best and most interesting food while ive been here but there is always a common theme - Chilli!

I learnt this lesson on the first night, I ordered a 'Bangkok' pizza and the waitress asked me if I liked it spicy, I having a few beers under my belt went, of course! This pizza could have powered the next nasa mission, i only got 2/3 the way through it before admitting defeat! However it was also covered in sushi which was a unique but delicious addition

After this meal I went back to my hotel room and crashed as the next few days were going to be long and hard work.

Had a lovely evening with a colleague and family at their home in bangkok even gave their 11 year old son a guitar lesson.

2011-06-02T09:35:00.001-07:00

Was reay nice to see the exat living side of bangok

I wish this hotel would stop leaving scary looking fruit in my room...

2011-06-02T02:58:00.001-07:00

Went to the rooftop bar vertigo tonight, amazing view

2011-06-01T10:01:00.001-07:00

Not that this photo does it any justice.

After a hard days work I think I deserve this smoky gun cocktail and nibbles. No? 11 hours hard thinking and no lunch says otherwise. Good day went well but winding down now

2011-06-01T05:50:00.001-07:00

Bangkok - Day 1 - Spain to Bangkok via 6 hour stop off at home...

2011-05-31T17:18:00.000-07:00

Hello people.
So as I sit here a little groggy from a combination of a battle with time zones and a few beers last night I thought I should take a few moments to do a quick entry.

On Monday morning I woke up in Estapona in southern Spain on the last day of my holiday with my family. The journey home thanks to a beautiful balance of sleezyjet's inability to flex for both children and wheelchairs combined with not really leaving early enough meant a fair amount of stress was in order. For example in Malaga airports wisdom they decided that because we had a disabled person with us that our party had to be split at every given opportunity, so we are constantly in seperate queues for security / boarding etc and the paperwork is all together with one person so how does that work? anyhow we got back to Gatwick and then home and although I moan about the journey, all in all the holiday was great, good fun, surprisingly relaxing given the 17 month old in tow.

6 hours at home flew by... (oh the irony, you sit on planes and it feels like forever, you sit at home and time actually seems to speed up)

I was getting picked up for my trip to bangkok at 8pm, well at least that was what was in my diary and had been planned. Like a good little boy I took my stuff and waited outside as we'd left it fairly tight for the flight at 10 anyway...8.05...8.10...8.15 so I thought I'd just check, called the car company we use and surprise bloody surprise 'sorry sir we have no booking for you / no car available' followed by another call of 'seems we had the email but missed it and now cant do anything about it' Joy of sodding joys just what I needed when I'd already been travelling for 8 hours that day... so anyway I called a cab and set them the challenge 'how fast can you get me to T3?' and a mildly grumpy but very helpful cab driver rocks up 5 minutes later and hurtles (best word to use) up the A3 / M25 to the airport, I get there 50 mins before flight and just get to the gate in time... phew...

This was my first time on a 747 Jumbo. Ive managed to go on almost every commercial plane in use I think from a little focker 50 prop through to the amazing new A340-600 (prob my favourite plane so far) but I'd never managed to get on either of the bigger craft 747 or A380, My hope was with this trip and my New Zealand trip next month I'd get on both. I'd never truly appreciated the size of a jumbo until I got up really close at the gate and then boarded. It is an amazing feat of engineering that we take for granted every day, how something that big and heavy stays up at 39000 feet still amazes me (yes I know it's basic physics, but some of physics seems like magic no?)

The flight itself was pretty smooth, the great thing about these night flights are they are pretty conducive to sleep, something I've always struggled with on a plane, Im getting better, almost every flight I feel my fears ebbing slightly which I can only see as a good thing, but I'm still far from a 'happy flyer' and anything that helps is good, so when the BA cabin crew start plying you with alcohol and food whenever possible then shut all the lights down so everyone can sleep it enabled me to get at least 4 hours kip.

This is also how I beat jet lag, for me it's all about 'tactical sleeping' so when we land at 3.30pm Thai time ive been up long enough on the plane to feel like it could be the afternoon. kind of works for me...

The entry into BK (no not Burger King you pleb) airport was amazing, it's rainy season here which as far as I can tell seems to mean baking sun accompanied with occasional mental thunderstorms then back to baking sun. The BA Captain obviously has the remit to avoid the thunderheads as we approach, weaving in between the clouds like a computer game, it was great fun and an amazing set of clouds to look at. Unfortunately I forgot to get my camera out of the hold so don't have any picks of the journey, apologies!

So anyway, a nice cab ride (if you can call a BMW 740 a cab) to the hotel, I'm still getting over the fact that the cab had wifi in it...I felt like a nerd in an even nerdier world.

So anyways that was the journey, all went pretty smoothly, ill talk about the hotel etc in the next entry.

Cheers
Joe

Just a quick update

2011-05-30T13:34:00.001-07:00

Just got back from malaga holiday with family too much to blog so instead im saving that pleasure for the trip to bangkok which is...now just boarded my first 747 so will update when there is something other than...im knackered to say!

It's been a while, but I'm off again

2011-04-06T03:09:00.000-07:00

So my fly boy jet setting 5* luxury lifestyle continues, I did go on a trip to Milton Keynes a few weeks ago but to be honest I could not bring myself to grace my travel blog with a tale of Milton Keynes, It seemed to me I would be cheating on my other destinations by doing so. But here is a brief overview

Drove there, work stuff fine, hotel average, gourmet burger ok but dodgy belly and boring on own, tried to take photos, dull, latin food place nice and client for company, home. That's it.

So anyway I move on to somewhere much more glamourous, exciting and interesting, Bochum, again!

I really should learn Deutsche, I come to germany at least 5 or 6 times a year and every time feel embarrassed that my grasp of their language ranges from counting to about 50 to asking for a beer. Last trip I learnt Ich gehe nacht hause which means (i think) I go to my house, not particularly useful lingo. In truth I probably do know quite a few words but its like french, stringing them together is a totally different ball game.

Ok so here is the thing, 'in my 30s' which are rapidly approaching like a stampede of smug laughing buffalo I will learn to talk either french or german to a more sophisticated level than le chat sud le table. Ideally both...

Anyway back to bochum, I was lucky this time, BA had some route deal going so ended up flying business for cheaper than economy, however I've realised something. On short flights, business class is a little pointless. OK so you get access to the lounges at T5 which are nice, but as soon as you get a 'silver' card (not there yet) you get access anyway. Long haul totally different ball game, If you can afford it, do it, makes flying almost pleasurable and thats coming someone who feels closer to death every time he gets on a plane!

So here I am again, sorry not a particularly amusing entry, but excuse my tiredness the 1 hour difference weirdly gets me every time!

Joe

Krakow Feb - March 2011

2011-03-02T00:08:00.000-08:00

Awkward, thats how I describe this trip. Everything about it has some element of that word in it...
Ill apologise now for the fact that this blog entry is a little more of a rant than usual...

Also Im having to go slightly out of sync with my order of events. Had a lovely time at my sister and law's wedding this weekend but Im holding back on the photos until they return from honeymoon so expect a belated thorough blog entry accordingly. The fact that the very next morning I had to get in a car at 5.30am was...well.....

Right back to Awkward Poland...

Firstly the journey here involves flying from heathrow to munich then munich to krakow, direct flights from gatwick were an option until i saw the times were pretty much useless for a business traveller. Easyjet have obviously made the strategic commercial decision to prioritise stag and hen parties over business travel.

Oh and by the way the return is via frankfurt, not munich just to make it more....you know.

Next is the currency. Its demotivating, let me explain. It took me a while to get my head around the euro, and dollars but they are nearer a ratio to the £ than most. Indonesia with its 1:1 squillion ratio was so far out there it was fun working it all out. But the polish Zlotty, its 3.8 to the £, thats just an awkward number. because you look at a meal menu in a restaurant for example. and a burger is 25 zlotty, but my western europe brain can't help but for a second follow this thought process...

25, thats a might expensive burger... dammit thats actually only £6.50

so what you think, right? well its the fact that Im doing it with every thing I see, so Im constantly thinking damn this place is expensive followed by damn your an idiot that cant do maths quick enough, awkward and demotivating.

Then there is the language, It's not the fact that its so very different to western european languages you cant have a diddly squat clue about what is being said, its the fact that even if you attempt to learn any of it there are so many ZXYQXZZZXXX's in it that your primitive monolingual english brain just doesnt have the filters to absorb it.

so far Ive learnt that about 10 words are all written as "ZSYCHZZSZZZ" and these happen to be 10 of the most common words, so frankly, its awkward and I give up...

Enough of the negativity... I have one positive story to tell before I quit and make my way home.

In the room next door to the training I'm doing yesterday, was the Wisla Krakow football team. (one of the biggest football teams in Poland) It was their cup final last night against some second devision side called "ZSYCHZZSZZZ" and they were doing their pre match planning. I sat and listened to the manager give his pre match talk through the dividing wall and it went something like this...

"Even if we are losing 3-0 in the final minute, don't lose focus, we only need one goal to have a chance"
Now pardon my ignorance, I'm no Sir Alex, but surely thats a little 'glass half empty'
He also uttered the words (and I'm not kidding here) "stick it in the goal" and "if you get the ball shoot"

by the way...they lost 1-0 to ZZZZYYYCCCCSSS utd.

I had the amusing situation where I was in the bar of the hotel, and they chose to show the chelsea v man utd game over their own cup final. combine that with the fact that we had lunch with the players and some of the polish colleagues I was working with were loudly slating them, polish football and anyone in association with it, it didnt paint a pretty picture. We think english football has issues!

Right so I'm off home soon, so far now signing off...
cheers Joe

Journey home from Holland

2011-02-13T14:00:00.000-08:00

So I made it back, and seemingly in plenty of time too. What I thought may be a nightmare journey turned out to be pretty reasonable really.

I managed to finish up with ze cliente a bit early and arranged for a crazy dutch man oddly called 'Barry' (i can't imagine that is a particularly popular name in holland?) to drive me to Rotterdam central. He spoke better english than my Dutch, (limited to Ja!) and we had a chat about london, amsterdam, current dutch politics and some of his personal interests including some rather odd news stories circulating around his region.

Once I got to Rotterdam central station I met a lovely lady with a mobile ticket machine, who couldn't sell me a ticket, and didn't have the english to explain why. She managed to direct me to the main ticket office. Where like at a deli counter you get a ticket. 'A ticket to buy a ticket' how novel I thought, eventually I manage to get to a desk with a very helpful lady who decided it was quicker for me to catch the slow train. I thought about questioning it but decided that I'd trust her and bought the specific ticket I needed.

I digress slightly here to make a point around the trains in Europe...

Firstly I must point out that in my experience they are wholeheartedly more appealing, reliable and less rickety, crammed and smelly than in our own country. However there are definitely some regional differences, In Belgium they just do what they say they will, in Germany the myth of German efficiency is exactly that. I'm not sure in my circa 20-30 German train trips I have got the train 'on time' more than 5 times! In Holland however it seems to be different, the trains are the same double decker jobs that haunt the rail systems of most of western europe but in Holland they are on time and usually pretty good. My challenge however is with the complexity of the ticketing systems. It seems there are 4 different places to buy up to 6 different types of tickets for 3 different rail networks with machines that don't seem to take any UK credit cards. All in all Rotterdam central station slightly scares me. So god knows what it does to a less seasoned traveller turning up for the first time! this was my 3rd trip to rotterdam and it still confused me!

Anyway, having said all that I made it to Schipol airport with plenty of time for my flight. Now Schipol is massive. Im not sure the stats but I know in terms of airport size its up there with heathrow, JFK and others so after checking in I had what felt like a 3 mile hike to the 'spur' of gates I was departing from, I grabbed some noodles and went through security to the waiting area.

Now here is where the only interesting thing from the trip home happened. It turns out that I was on the flight with non other than Terry Pratchett, Now he's unmissable with his black hat and white beard and I realised that this was not the first time I'd been on the same flight as him, He must travel back from amsterdam quite regularly because Ive definitely been on several flights with him over the last year or so. I came perilously close to saying hello and making some twatty statement like 'Ive read loads of your books and they are great' or 'Hey Terry, love your creations' but then I remembered that 1.I wasn't 100% sure it actually was him (I googled his image when I got home to be sure!) and 2. would he really care what some guy he has never met thinks? Of course I could open with 'Ive been on the same flight as you lots of times Terry me old mucka' but then I'd be sure to have some kind of law enforcement waiting for me at the other end with a stalking related accusation!

Of course he was in Business and I wasn't but still had the plane gone down at least I'd have been a stat in a somewhat bigger news story.

So once we landed back in the UK, got picked up and brought home and was very happy to get into my own bed. Just a shame I had a meeting the next morning but hey ho life goes on... It can't all be the excitement of ham and cheese rolls and travel wash bags now can it?

Until next time...
Joe

All going well, 4 course meals and some giant Bunsen burners

2011-02-08T14:59:00.000-08:00

Just a short entry about today. Got up, 5am technically, ie I'm still on UK time. It may only be an hour but it's my hour and my body doesnt feel comfortable without it. Had some breakfast, managed to cobble together a kind of bacon sandwich steering between the acres of ham and cheese (they are out to get me I tell you)
Met up with my client, then we headed over to the site.
Course is going well, good bunch of delegates and fairly typical.
the fun didn't really start until the end of the day. It was getting dark and I was determined to get a photo of the site with the pretty lights, but they were not allowing photography on the site. so as we were driving off back to the hotel we sneakily grabbed a few then. Ill post them next time as its getting late.
We went for a really nice meal in what sounded like 'Smack de brielle' or something. Thankfully the food was better than the name. I had smoked duck breast which was quite simply amazing, I had no idea that much flavour could be packed into a few small slivers of meat. I then had a bacon and potato soup followed by halibut and vegetables and a chocolate desert. was delicious! if you ever happen to be in this neck of the woods (which is unlikely I grant you) then be sure to check it out, its next to the canon, stocks and statue in Brielle.

Good day, and no doubt less stressful than tomorrow where I am down to do about 3 days work in one day and then try and get home on a horrible journey.

talk soon
Joe

Brielle near Rotterdam, Holland Day 1

2011-02-07T14:28:00.000-08:00

Hello,

It's been a long day. up at 5am, tiptoeing around the house like a daddy long legs (except im quite short really) trying my best not to awake the monster (and freddy) as that would mean endless pain for both the wifey and me on my return. 5.30am pickup by the nice driver in his merc S class, thats the one that is lovely to look at, got masses of leg room but sounds like a churchill tank whenever he touches the accelerator.
Get to the airport just past 6am where it was surprisingly busy. The driver informs me that at 4.30am when he dropped a colleague of mine off it was really quiet. That would be because everyone with any sense is still in bed. I should feel lucky with my 5am lie in then should I?
Get to the airport and as usual, check in, normal seat over the wing (that way I figure im on top of the fuel tanks so if we do drop out of the sky like a sack of spuds at least it would be quick), look that's just the way my brain operates. It's the same logic as when I fly business I feel better because people in business don't die. (so ive decided)
I fight my way through security, and grab a bite to eat and a coffee. I always seem to arrive ten minutes before the gate is announced, and therefore I always end up at the other end of the terminal to the gate that gets announced. A22? nope A4, A3? nope A21, dammit. as luck would have it I was wrong this time and it was A12 smack bang in the middle, just my luck, now the plane will crash...

So we have the usual crazy boarding dance of 'im cool man, im in no hurry ill just be cool and wait why all you stressed out business types queue up unnecessarily maan' Let me tell you something if you are one of these people. You try boarding BA's short haul europe flights on either a monday morning or thursday night with this attitude and tell me you can find somewhere to put your bags! Ill queue if I want to, Ill bloody stand at the front of the queue and if you stop me ill feed you to the engines.

So the flight itself was ok, bit bumpy in the clouds but im ok with that now, I would even marginally say I get a little kick out of it.

We land in amshterjam and have the usual 27 miles taxi to the airport. Basically Schipol has some agreement with BA that if you fly in from heathrow the only runway you are allowed to use is the north one. which is basically a different airport. I saw more of holland on that taxi run than the rest of the trip combined.

I get off the plane and as I depart notice the first officer (who flew the plane as the captain obviously couldnt be arsed) looked about 11 years old. i swear the captain just brought his son in on some 'bring your kid to work day' and let him have a go... that can't be safe on an airline surely?

Next I have to figure my way to getting a train from schipol to rotterdam. Now my final destination was brielle so I thought like a nocturnal soap covered prison warden i'd have a stab in the dark and see if any trains went there.

I approached a guy in what I could only assume was some kind of railway related uniform who looked like a cross between mr bean's mutilated cousin and lurch taking a s$%t and kindly asked if he spoke english, of course he did. and I asked if I could get a train to brielle, he satisfyingly stated that brielle didnt even have a train station. So I asked him his recommendation and he stated 'go somewhere else'. Helpful.

Now luckily my good wife has sussed out some possibilities for me on the good old interweb previously so I knew that worst case I could head for Rotterdam central and make my way from there. So that's what I did. got the train.

As a side note my headcandy headphones totally disintegrated on the train. must be something about the dutch air. it was headphone padding carnage.

I got to Rotterdam and found a friendly taxi driver who could drive me to brielle, for the princely sum of 82 euros. Not that I had alot of choice, it was that or the bus to some other town nearer and go from there but didn't fancy that!.

In the taxi we passed the wonders of the industrial side of rotterdam, canals / barges / oil tankers / refineries / factories - all surprisingly interesting to look at.

Got to brielle and found the hotel, was dutifully informed that I couldnt check in for another couple of hours. Joy... Brielle is quite a quaint querky little town, like a kind of yodeling tetbury. Had a wonder around for a bit took a few pics and got cold so went back and sat in the hotel restaurant and did some work.

Whilst I was sat there one of the oddest but most benial things occurred. the place was totally empty when 6 people came and sat next to me, then proceeded for over an hour to negotiate (in dutch of course) over the new crockery for the restaurant. It turns out that the dutch don't have a word for 'sideplate' (other than 'sideplate') I found this quite amusing.

Once I could check in I went to my room and caught up on emails while I waited for my client to turn up.

Once he did we headed over to the site where we are running the programme tomorrow and set up for the course. all went very smoothly.

Then we came back and grabbed some chinese and a couple of beers.

So I'm knackered now (which apparently in germany means drunk so mildly applies in both respects) so I am off to bed.

Will let you know how the rest of the trip goes. The journey home challenged by the deadline of a flight to catch should be interesting at least...

Joe

Learning about social media in London

2011-02-04T13:55:00.000-08:00

So it seems apt that as I start my travel blog today.

"Start with a blog" was a key message today left me with. I've attended a social media course.
Really interesting and masses of food for thought.

I have slight brain overload to be fair so I'm going to break the rules with my first post.

apparently the first paragraph should be compelling. It will be next time I promise.

The point of this blog is to document my travels. I'm off to Rotterdam on Monday so it will start 'proper' then.

for now a quick ta ta

Joe