Two months to the day since we left Oz...

WOW!

When will it end?
To think that our return flight was originally booked for August the 12th, a coupla days after they discovered that terrorist threat! Doubt we would've been able to get home!

Well it's time to skip to the loo me darlin! One too many 1L steins at a beer hall in Munich!

Auf Wiedersehen!
Tchuss!

The best T-shirt...

... EVER!!!

and all those in favour, please leave a comment!!

This is the one i picked up in Rome.

(Sexy model shall remain anonymous)

Salzburg, we have left.
Linz, we are stuck in.
Train, seventy minutes late.
Demorado! Demorado! Demorado!
Approximate arrival time in Prague, 10:48pm.

YEE HAA!

in other news, evBSc may be facing legal action from an all powerful, global multi-national company!
but we'll leave out specific details until one truly knows what is going on...

Twenty eight minutes and counting...

Leaving Salzburg for Prague today!
and for now... another post from almost a month ago!!!

JULY 31st

headed to Naples (Napoli) in the morning. Jee had been talking about Naples having one of the three most beautiful ports in the world and of course it is the birth place of pizza, so it was definitely on our itinerary.
i'd read in the LP that bag snatching and theft was pretty rife so i was prepared for clutching my bag close to me.

what i wasn't prepared for was how much a pock mark on the face of italy Naples would be! it was absolutely filthy. around the main station area almost felt like a third world country. of course there were the usual "non-italians" selling fake shite galore, but there were a couple of guys selling laptops and mobiles too.

can anyone say "stolen goods"?

as we were walking to the korean minbak, this one guy walks up to me and says:
"do you speak english?"
"yes"
"can you break a 100 note for something smaller?"
(of course i do mate. and while i reach to get my wallet, which bag do you wanna run off with? or do you just wanna grab my wallet which is chained to my bag?)
"no sorry"
and he walks off. guess we're obvious and easy targets cos we're carrying big backpacks and multiple other bags.

got to the minbak which was nice enough, but didn't have that personal feel like the Roman minbak.
dropped our bags off and left pretty soon. on the way out Jee had a quick conversation with a korean guy who is a tour guide. he mentioned how young koreans are getting quite rude and that they'll sometimes actually threaten him that they'll write bad comments about his tours on the internet. the net is definitely one of your closest allies when travelling and can easily sway your decision making by reading other people's experiences.

caught the train to Pompeii. ended up being the wrong train. sure it stops in Pompeii, but it stops at modern Pompeii station, not old (we got our asses whupped by a volcano) Pompeii.
there's a different company's train line that runs to old Pompeii, not the standard rail line.
so we walked for about 25 mins to the ruins and jumped inside.
it's another one of those "i'm looking at almost 2000 yr old crumbling buildings in the peak of summer" experiences again, but truly interesting too.
there are a fair amount of buildings that are intact (incl a brothel with ancient porn painted on the walls!) and it's interesting to get a feel for how things may have been back before Vesuvius went ape shit. some of the resident must've been really rolling in it judging by the size of their abodes. there was one house that had a mosaic on the floor with probably one of the original "beware of the dog" signs in history!

SIDENOTE: mosaics... bloody impressive when you think about them. lots of little tiles all put together to form patterns or pictures. guess they last longer than painting, but the time it would take to make them!! that was one thing i forgot to mention about the inside of the dome of St Peter's Basilica -- it's all decorated with mosaics made up of tiny tiles. and it's definitely not small!! to look up from below, you'd think it was just a painting, but get closer and you see it's all mosaics! very impressive!

spent a few hours checking out various parts of the ruins and then headed back to Naples.grabbed pizza from a LP recommended place called Trianon which was decent.

JULY 29th

started the day with buying a t-shirt that i've wanted for a long time. saw it on the net a couple of years ago i think and stumbled across it in rome! it is the ultimate t-shirt! i shall describe it no further for it demands to be seen not described!

on to the sightseeing tho...
as we wandered to our first destination, we came across a "priest shop". it had all sorts of goodies for sale like portable altars (incl mini-crucifix and vials for holy water), mitres and those big sticks with curly tops (which could be unscrewed into sections to fit into a suitcase!)

we went to Plaza Nouvena which has three fountains, the main one being rather impressive and bearing what appears to be an egyptian obelisk too. there are a few obelisks around Rome which i believe were pillaged from Egypt after various victories or such forth.

we moved on to the Parthenon which was fantastic. (side note: i'm writing this on the 16th of august so whilst i want to include such precise details as when things were built etc, i can't remember and i don't have my Lonely Planet at hand! Google it baby!) the dome of the building has a 9m hole in the middle - purposely built that way. what happens when it rains, i'm not sure. i assume they have some sort of drainage system. that was the interesting thing about the ruins in Pompeii - the richer houses often had one room in the house that had a big square hole in the roof directly over a big square in the floor that was set at about 20cm lower than the rest of the floor to catch the rain. not sure why they did it, but it was interesting to see. maybe Google can explain.

i think the Parthenon was originally built to house the bodies of kings (or was later decided to be used for that purpose) but Raphael (the artist not the ninja turtle) loved it so much he asked to be entombed there too. he died in 1520 but in 1833 they wanted to double check it was true, so with the blessings of the pope at that time they opened it up. found that indeed he was entombed there (DNA testing must've been way ahead of it's time!) and so the pope gave him a marble sarcophagus. lucky boy!
Umberto I and Emmanuelle II are also entombed there and there were even a couple of FBI-looking guards standing in front of Emma 2's tomb. that'd be a thrill-a-minute job i'm sure!

after a cafe di granita (strong iced coffee with cream) we moved on to the Trevi fountain which was crowded but funk-tastic!

after dinner a bunch of us headed out with tripods to take some night shots of the Colosseum and Trevi fountain. got some great shots. i think billy joel and bryan adams had played in front of the Colosseum that night. there was a stage being torn down and various pamphlets indicated that the two had performed that night.

JULY 30th

Usually the Vatican Museum is closed to tourists on Sunday, except for the last Sunday of the month when it is free entry to all (but closes by 1:45pm)! thus we got up at 630am with the intention to skip breakfast and just go and line up. but the K-mumma was up before us and already preparing breaky and insisted that we ate before we left. so we had our hearty meal and then Jeong Hun, Konomi, Jee and I headed off towards the Vatican city.
We got off at the station with about 100 other people and luckily we were at about the head of the pack as we walked to the museum. the closer we got the more we could see a huge line of people. it snaked along the outer wall of the city and was up to 10 people wide in places! we knew we were going to have to wait, but this was looking bad.
so we jumped on the back of the line and started the play the waiting game...

luckily the first part was in the shade, so we could stay cool. fairly soon after we arrived, wave after wave of tour groups arrived and jumped on the back of the line. thank god we beat em!
bout half an hour into the wait, a family of four (i think germans) merged into the line in front of us. Jee was pushing me and telling me to tell them to go to the back of the line, but i tend avoid confrontation and didn't really want to do it. then suddenly Konomi - who is half my height - steps up to the towering anglo-saxons and tells them that they have to go to the back! she said that it's cos she's over thirty that she's stronger! :-)

the human serpent that we were encased in gradually wound its way along the walls of the city. what i thought was the entrance we passed by and turned another corner to be confronted by the real head of the line. bloody long. plus probably about two thirds of the line was in direct sunlight and was pretty toasty. total wait time was one hour and 45 minutes. ouch!!
got in and were put thru metal detectors and x-ray machines. i was wearing shorts but had my zip off pants bottoms in my pocket just in case there were probs getting into St Peter's Basilica. cos they have zips and the security dude ran his scanner over my pocket it beeped. he asked me "is it wallet?" and i whipped open my pocket, flashed him a grin and said "no! they're my pants!". i was quickly shuffled on...

did a kind of running tour of the museum. it's frickin huge! we chose a couple of sections of mild interest and browsed thru them on the way to the Sistine Chapel which is towards the end of the museum. to get to the Sistine Chapel, you have to walk down a few sparse corridors and steps and they continuously repeat a recorded message in about 5 different language. the message states that due to the Chapel being a sacred place, please be quiet and taking of photos or videos is prohibited. no probs i thought - been in enough similar places with similar rules.
first thing when we get in there, the noise! seemed like everyone was having a conversation! and secondly, plenty of people were taking photos. so i whipped out my cam and took a few happy snaps too! Michelangelo sure worked hard! :-)
mind you, i was a little disappointed with "The Touch". i had imagined that it covered the entire ceiling, but it is only one section of a much larger painting. delusions of granduer i guess!
supposedly Michelangelo started painting the ceiling with plenty of detail, but then realised that the details couldn't be seen from the ground so painted the rest with less detail. i reckon he just got lazy when he realised what a task it was gonna be and couldn't be bothered with the details! :-)

stick figures with smiley faces for all the angels! how the hell am i meant to paint all those feathers?! :-)

fairly soon though a few guards (not the dandy swiss guards but normal italian ones) came thru and started shushing everyone and yelling out "no photo!". everyone stopped taking pics but occasionally there would be:

Flash!
"No photo!"
pause...

Flash!
"No photo!"
(rinse, wash and repeat!)

i started taking a video of the ceiling but just holding my cam at stomach level. didn't notice a guard coming thru crowd though and he points and says "you! no photo!". was gonna protest that it was "no photo" but "video" but i just shrugged and turned it off. think it was out of focus anyway.

eventually escaped the museum. we were all starving and couldn't think of where to go or what to eat so just got a flier from a tout which had a lunch deal that include pasta, pizza and a coke for 8 euro. sounded good, but was absolutely shite. the pasta was instant packet crap that'd just had the top whipped off and stuck in the microwave. the pizza was a pita bread with tomato sauce, a slice of ham and a slice of cheese whacked on top and heated. the coke was post mix and rather watered down. but at the end of the day, we were starving and any food in our belly was fine. was a bloody insult to italian food though!

walked thru St Peter's Square and then entered the Basilica. we'd come appropriately dressed after various warnings and past experiences but there were plenty of people who weren't and were being turned away. one couple just ahead of us were turned away cos the woman's skirt was above her knees. as they were walking by, i handed her my bandana (the ever trusty bandana!) and told her to try wrapping it around her legs so it would cover her knees. she did so and got thru! they asked he there was anything they could do to thank me, but i just said remember that australians are friendly people! :-)
unfortunately though, about 50m on, there was another check point where the Vatican Nazis were checking for inappropriate dress and they must've have had sharper eyes cos they turned the couple away. bugger for them...

we waited in line for about 45min to climb the dome of the Basilica. was cheaper to climb by the steps instead of taking the elevator, so we stepped it. actually there weren't that many steps that the elevator covered anyway. but there were 330 steps AFTER the elevator that were advised not to be attempted by wusses or those with weak hearts. :-)
the closer we got to the top, the more people there were and the more jammed it became. and whilst the dome has ventilation holes, there isn't too much airflow. so we're sweating like it's going outta fashion but when we finally got out to the viewing area, it was like being kissed by angels. so cool and refreshing. view was fantastic too! all the people in the square were like little ants!

if you are near the Vatican in summer, have gelati from the Old Bridge Gelateria just across from the city walls - some of the best we've ever had!

had dinner at home then saw off Jeong Hun and Konomi at the station. were feeling a bit down after saying goodbye to friends and thinking about leaving the comfort of the K-mumma's care the next day, so had a beer at Maccas. wandered home to discover that K-mumma had bought 2 cartons of budweiser long necks!! not my usual choice for beer but when it's free, i no complain!! :-)
drank way too much but those damn koreans have a bad habit of refilling your glass as soon as it's empty! ;-)
was great just chatting away and finally stumbled to bed at a very late hour.

exiting swiss territory for Austria. should've watched Sound of Music before i left. Austria appears to be a little more 3G friendly than switz and we've had a 6hr train ride, so hopefully will be able to do a couple more posts soon. and they shall be of biblical proportions! :-)

we didn't want to leave switzerland. it's so beautiful, but who knows what lies in store for us!

does anyone know Heidi from Switzerland? the children's book or animation? she lives in a fabulous place!

in Salzburg now and hopefully will be dining on Wiener Schnitzel tonight!

as one famous Austrian once said: "Spielen ist verboten!"
and as another famous Austrian once said: "I'll be back!"

:-)

JULY 28th

so bloody hot from the beginning of the morning. we were toying with the idea of jumping on one of the hop-on-hop-off tour buses to just see Roma's main attractions but missed them by five minutes.seeing the next lot weren't due for another hour we thought we'd grab a coffee at Maccas in Roma Termini (Rome's central train station). it was FANTASTIC! cover or service charges are always a bitch in Italy, so Maccas is a sure fire way of avoiding them! but Roma Termini Maccas was something special. the seats were really comfy and it was so nice and cool inside. we actually ended up spending 2 hours in there! it was just such a blessing to be out of the heat! but we made good use of the time by planning what we were gonna do for the next couple of days.caught the metro to a small church that we wanted to see, but they have a siesta, so we wandered along the leafy Via Vittorio Veneto to Villa Borghese Park. along the way to the park was an actual Lambo shop that had two cars on display and various little Lambo knick knacks for sale. unfortunately they were siesta-ing too, so we continued to the park.we hired a bike which had a canopy and you sit side by side in. once you start pedaling, an electric motor kicks in and does all the work for you! it was great fun to hire for an hour and go along all the paths in the park! definitely do it if you go!headed back to the church which in Jee's book was labelled as Chiesa di Santa Maria Concezione, but didn't appear in the Lonely Planet. this church - or the crypt of the church more like it - is a MUST SEE! it contains the skeletal remains of 4000 faithful followers (i think of the Capachuin monks). but these skeletons aren't lying there whole in slots in the wall or anything as mundane as that. they've been dismantled and the various bones now adorn the walls and ceilings in a myriad of patterns and designs. you'll see stars made of coccyxs (what the heck is the plural form of coccyx?) with borders of ribs and jaw bones and such forth. picture taking was a no no, so i bought a couple of postcards and will take pics of them and post them on the blog hopefully! the final section had what looked like child skeletons. they had the feeling of being cherubim of death. and indeed pinned to the ceiling was one complete skeleton which held a scythe made from bones. twas a really macab!
"What you are now, we once were.What we are now, you will become."i over heard an american saying something about a similar crypt in Paris, so hopefully we\'ll have a chance to check it out too!tried once again to enter the Lambo shop but it was a no go. this time we could see a guy in the office, but no matter how often we rang the bell, he didn\'t unlock the door. i guess they\'re really sick of tourists wanting to take photos of the cars, but i really wanted to buy wanted one of the scale models of a Gallardo so i was a tad disappointed.we bumped into Jeong Hun (K-guy) and Konomi (J-gal) - a couple of friends we made at the minbak - in front of the Lambo shop. they\'d been sightseeing elsewhere and were trying to escape the heat too. went to the spanish steps where "all the beautiful people go". there were lots of "beautiful" indian guys hawking their wares too! probably all the beautiful people go there cos all the boutiques are round that area!headed home for dindins then went out with Jeong Hun, Gyu Sang (another K-guy) and Konomi to a bar called Stardust that was "the author\'s choice" in the LP. twas cosy and funky. stumbled home quite drunk by about 1am

i would like to inform the readers of Evcentric that evBSc just survived a 134m bungy jump over a lake in the swiss alps at an altitude of 1642m.

fuck yeah...

:-)

HELLO
THIS IS FROM A PHONE BOX IN BERN... SWITZERLAND
BABY...
IT REALLY
IS THE BIRTHPLACE OF THE INTERNET...!!

JULY 27th

off to Seoul! whoops i mean Rome!

four days surrounded by koreans eating korean food for breakfast and dinner, it's hard not to get confused!the korean MINBAK that i talked about before had its good and bad points, but then again, everywhere does.the place was like a large 3 bedroom apartment. two rooms were full of bunk beds - one for guys and one for gals. could fit about 10 - 12 people in each room. there was a third room which i thought was just for the family who runs the place to sleep in, but they've even got a coupla extra beds in there just in case things get extra crowded!25 euro per person. full korean breakfast and dinner included. one computer for free internet use. the mother does your washing for you!a couple and their daughter live there and provide everything!every morn and night, there was a different main dish served with rice and four side dishes every meal! and this was real hunky dory korean food! some of the best i've tasted! the first night, we had a fatty roast pork dish and there seemed to be a fair bit left over, so i was sure that's what we were gonna be eating for breakfast. but no! next morning was grilled fish!kimchi for breakfast can be a hard thing to get used to, but one learns to embrace it like a lover! :-)of course the mild drawback is having garlic breath for the majority of the day, but chew enough gum and you're fine!

Roma was darn hot too. was served up lunch by the korean mumma when we arrived then we took in some sights.headed to a huge building that's the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and a monument to Emmanuelle the 2nd (will have to double check that). the place was made of white marble and had lots of large statues adorning the building. the centre piece was a massive statue of Emmanuelle II on a horse. the place also had an eternal flame and two guards carrying automatic weapons. witnessed a changing of the guard too which involved a lot of saluting and turning around.at the gate to walk up the steps of this monument, there is a sign stating that this place is sacred to Italian people and out of respect, no one is allowed to sit on the steps. i think there may also be a semi-dress code cos i think one chick was turned away for too much exposed midriff. no probs for us though. but i wanted to check what this place was about in my Lonely Planet book, so about halfway up the steps, i lent up against the case pillar of a statue which was also providing some very nice shade. was reading my book when one of the guards at the gate starts blowing his whistle and gesturing for me to get away from the wall. sacred indeedy.this wasn't the only time we witnessed such an event. that night, we were in a square drinking beers with some of the people from the MINBAK which was in front of a building that i think was the ministry of agriculture. the cops did a drive by and didn't say jack, so we were fine. but later some other tourist came and sat on the wall which formed part of the square's boundary and part of the ministry's driveway. bout 10 min later the guards from the ministry noticed them and started whistling from behind their gate (obviously the night crew aren't ranked highly enough to be granted whistles!). they were whistling away and gesturing for the tourists to get off, but either they were ignoring the guards or had no idea what they were on about. 5 min later the cops rock up and get the tourists off the wall. i think Romans don't masturbate over porn, they have centrefold spreads of buildings and monuments and jerk off to those! :-)

anyway, back to the days events.after a pit stop in the shade, we walked thru the ruins of the Roman forum and various bits and pieces that are still left over. part of me was wondering why the ?@&! we were walking around looking at rocks that were a couple of millenia old but the other part of me was fascinated by how the Romans had built these structures with such detail that'd managed to survive for so long.continuing thru the ruins, we stumbled upon the Colosseum which was rather impressive to behold. decided to skip going in based on price and advice. if you are a citizen of Adelaide AND under 24 you can get in for half price, so remember that in your next lifetime or go now before you're too old! :-)

finished the evening by heading to a gelataria with Jeong Hun and Konomi (couple of friends we'd made at the Minbak) and three k-gals who were leaving the next morn. the gelati was some of the best we've had!!
Gelataria S.M. Maggiore... check it out if you can!! the chocolate was maybe too rich... but divine!!

JULY 25th
PISA! Come for the tower, stay for an hour!
and i mean that literally... Pisa is a small town (popn 92000) that got lucky. a dude called Pisano builds a tower on some shitty land and makes a town famous forever! it's an amazing thing to see and truly only one of a kind. not just the lean, but the design of the building is beautiful. the nearby cathedral is also nice. cost 15euro to climb the tower, so we declined ourselves that luxury. but Pisa don't have much else going for it! we caught the 10:37 train (left at 10:47) from Florence this morning, spent some time in Pisa and now we're on the 2pm train back to Florence. once we arrived in Florence, the heavens decided to open up again! and for the third time in two days BOOM! thunder and lightning! maybe the Roman gods are displeased with us! waited in station for a bit for it to slacken off then made a dash for our hotel. at the exit to the station there were black guys and arab guys selling umbrellas! guess it was inclement weather for rip off bags and sunglasses, so why not pimp some brollies! The main tourist strips in Florence are plagued by these guys selling fake louis vuitton, gucci etc bags as well as sunglasses.
the bags and sunnies seem to be sold mostly by black guys, prints of famous artwork by arab guys, little toy electric Smart cars that drive around, flash their lights, open their doors and play a short sample of annoying chinese music over and over (i want one!) are sold by chinese guys and then there are sometimes younger guys (maybe european of some sort or perhaps brazilian) that sell little train carriages made up of letters to form your name... they are anywhere tourists are likely to be. there are BIG signs around the main shopping areas of Florence in english, italian, french and spanish stating that purchasing fake goods is illegal and can impose a fine of up to 10000euros!but these guys seem to have some kinda "understanding" with the cops. there is a big police presence in Flo - well it seems so around the main tourist strips anyway. they'll constantly be driving their little cars along the streets, even thru squares that are pedestrian only areas. and if you have a bunch of the hawkers along a street peddling their crap and a cop drives along, they quickly fold up their tables or bundle their bedsheet full of bags together into a sack and then just stand there until the cops leave the area. as soon as they're far enough away, out comes the merchandise again! if you stay in one area long enough, you'll see it happen over and over again. took a short video of one such event in action which i'll hopefully be able to post for your viewing pleasure at some stage!
had pasta with a wild boar meat sauce for dinner and then headed to Ponte Vecchio (the goldsmith's bridge) for more sunset action! tis the 31st of July and i'm trying to recall the events of the last few days!
JULY 26th
a morning of waiting. i think we got to the Uffizi Gallery at 845am with the belief that it opened at 9am. there was already a huge line and it actually opened at 815am! bout an hour later we entered Uffizi, which houses "the greatest collection of Italian and Florentine art in existance." the interior was beautiful and there were definitely a lot of paintings that even an uneducated buffoon like myself recognized. Botticelli's Birth of Venus and Allegory of Spring were great.
SIDENOTE: on the train to Naples at present from Rome with a hangover. writing ability may be at a low...


towards the end of the gallery - did a running tour of a fair amount of rooms - there was a da Vinci show case that i stopped to look at but Jee moved on ahead. i watched a video explaining the Vitruvian man for a few minutes then thought i'd better hurry up and catch Jee. went along the corridors and came to the gift shop. scanned the area but couldn't see Jee so i went on thru to the exit. went outside into the blazing heat but couldn't find her anywhere. thought that she must still be inside so i headed back in to be confronted by a Nazi midget in the form of a female security guard. she said i couldn't come back in to the gallery once i'd left. said that i was looking for my wife and showed her my ticket, but she wasn't having a bar of it. i know it's for security reasons, but she could've strip searched me and let me in, but no. so i stood about a metre inside the door way so that i could get a view down the hall from where the gift shop exits. 40 minutes of standing and waiting later she pops her head round the corner from the gift shop. she'd been waiting in there for an hour for me! but she'd been sitting on a seat so i hadn't seen her when i passed thru.

a bit of looking around at shops before we grabbed a take away pizza from the restaurant outside our hotel. they never cut pizzas in italy, well that we've come across so far anyway. so we sat on the steps of St Lorenzo's Basilica and tore our pizza so shreds. it was fantastic! jee and i were discussing pizzas and i said that i think i prefered american style pizzas before because of the variety of flavours and toppings but italian pizzas are more based on simplicity and they are absolutely delicious!we headed to the Ponte Vecchio again. the sun had already set, but there were a trio of minstrels doing their thing on the bridge. they were quite talented and we decided to buy one of their CDs for the memories! :-)