November 2006 Archives

It is the last day here in Budapest, I planed to went on the Buda hill again. Walked through the Lanchid bridge, by natrue I did not like water very much, but this bridge make me feel safe and comfortable above the river...

I took the funicular near the tunnel to go up on the hill.
Tunnel and the funicular

It was raining and getting a little bit cold. I walked around the Royal palace and some street on the Buda hill.

Street on Buda hill

The air was fresh, the rain and the fog made the place looked more romantic and mysterious...
Although I did all this by myself. I still think I had an excellent trip in Budapest.Before I always think that eastern european cities will be so different from the western ones, but now I feel that they are still connected or somewhat the same.

The next morning I got a flight back to Helsinki and back to my normal life again.

Because yesterday's long walk, I was tired. Today I started the exploration a little bit late. I wanted to take a sight seeing bus, but first I have to take the subway to the meeting point of the bus. Well, there are three different lines of subways and also different prices.Finally I figured out all the things and successfully reach the bus meeting point.

It was not a turist season, so not much people on the bus. But for me it is good to see different places in the city that by feet seemed not possible to be reached. The bus drove on the old Andrassy street, old opera house ( little bit like the Paris one) and also the rich people vila area. The end of the street is the hero square with art museum on seach side of it. Then the old railway staion, in european cities the railway staion seems always a must see spot.Bus drove through the bridge and we reached to the Buda hill, the palace and churches and castles...I feel that Budapest is a city which combined the old things and modern things together quite good and smooth. I am kinda like this style even it is in the east part of Europe.

Birdview of Budapest

After two hours the bus tour was finished. I took the subway again to one of the famous big mall in Budapest - Westin city center mall. It was huge, with a big waterfall inside the mall, lots of different shops and think you could buy anything there. The design is a little bit like the Beijing Oriental Plaza (Dong fang guang chang).

Days were passed so quick, the 2nd day here is almost finished. I got some plan for the next and last day here...

(to be continued)

From Warsaw we flied to Budapest, just one hour we arrived in Budapest. This was all by myself tour in Budapest, I will control my own time and where I want to go.

The first day, because we lived in the pest side, I decided to just walk around in this area. Since I am not very good at looking maps, I tried to remember the places that I have passed by. Lots of old european style buildings and some just mixed with turkish style, according to the history, they have had some relationship between Hungary and Turkey... (that you need to check by yourself) Then I reached to some shopping street in Pest, many souvenir shops selling typical hungarian handmade table cloth and some other things... Walking through the street there was the lanchid chain bridge. There are totally nine bridges on the river Duna to connect Buda and Pest, they are all different from each other. I think it is a quite interesting things to see them all, although I just saw four of them...

Lanchid chain bridge is not so huge, but it has special design with the lions on each side of the bridge, someone have asked the designer why the lions have no tongues? that is an interesting question and I found it is true.

Lanchid bridge

Cross the bridge is the Buda hill where the Hungarian Royal palace is.
Royal Palace

I walked around there, since it got dark pretty soon, I went back to the hotel. I trust myself that I would remember the way I came here. Unfortunately, I got totally lost, I did not know where am I and did not know where am I in the map either, one thing I was sure was that I walked to the right direction. After few minutes confusion I walked into a market hall, lots of sausage sellers and also fruits and vegetables.... Through the market hall, I tried to figure out where I should go. Ha! Good! I found the big glass building which should be opposite to the hotel, I felt happy that I was not lost just maybe walked around the hotel without seeing it...

Later, to try to get more familiar with the city, I went out again. But not too far, I found out there was another bridge just near the hotel, through the bridge I went up on the hill, luckily the weather was ok, I could see most of the Pest city view.
Szabadsag bridge

It has been a long day for me to walk around. We went to a Persian restaurant for dinner, the food was quite good and of course we would not skip the water pipe...

(to be continued)

Last day in Poland, in the morning checked out the hotel. We went to the uprising museum of Warsaw. Because Sunday the museum is free, there were quite much people. Since we were early we did not need to wait in line. Weather was bad, foggy and humid but the previous three days were nice and warm.

The museum is about the how the polish people fight the 2nd world war and afer that how they had the rising time...Interesting place...

Square in Warsaw

We had a flight in the evening to Budapest, so we went to the airport quite early. God! The flight was cancelled! Ok, went to the counter and tried to figure out what we could do. Luckily they put us on another flight at night. Well, then we have to wait in the airport for four hours.

It was a small airport but nothing more we could do about it. Hope we could get better things in Budapest.

(to be continued - trip in Budapest, Hungary)

Today is a weekend, we wanted to go to another city in Poland - Krakow ( The English name should be Cracow). Having had all the language things, we prepared paper and pen and wrote down where we wanted to go, in case in the train station there were no people speak English.

Quite smooth again, we got tickets and went on the train. It took about two and half hour to be in Krakow. The train is a little bit different than other european trains... And strange thing is the ticket including one free coffee and snack on the train, never had that before.

The late autumn in the countryside of poland is beautiful, polar tree leaves were just turned to yellow, sometimes there were different colors on the hill, but this time in Finland is already snow and everything dead...

We were in Krakow now, first thing first, we got the return ticket to Warsaw. Then walked to the city center. Oh...quite different than Warsaw, there are squares and old buildings... Because of the 2nd world war, Warsaw was almost totally destroyed, but here still saved some historical things.

Square in Krakow

I liked the square there and everywhere I saw small statues or stuffed toys of dragons.So we got a book about the tales in Krakow, to know that how the people here fighting with a dragon to protect themselves and their lands. That is why the dragon is almost a simbol of Krakow.

On the hill of the castle and palace, we could see the Krakow city, it was not too big but it was a nice and romantic place. Many other european people come here for the famous night life here, unfornately we could not experience that this time.

Birdview of Krakow

After we visied the palace and castles, the night falls. The busy night life of Krakow began. On the street I could see many turists,even this is not a very turistic season.Service here is good and at least most of the people here could speak English.;)

We took the night train back to Warsaw,it seemd that only two and half hours,I have come from the western europe to the eastern europe,even it was in the same country.

(to be continued)

Today I have to figure out everything by myself, no guide with me...

I decided to explored the city a little bit, the goal was to go to one of their famous shopping center. I thought I could walk to there whthin half an hour, so from the hotel I started walking, found the right street then kept walking, walking... After ten minutes I think I walked out of the city center and to a more rural erea. Because it seemed nothing except apartment buildings, but I was sure it was the right street, so whatelse... Another thirty minutes pased, I saw signs like airport 15km and Ikea 5km... Where am I? But I still believed that I was right and decided to keep on. Ha...finally totally took me about one hour, I arrived at the famous shopping center - Blue city mall. My feet hurts and I felt thirsty....

The mall was big but not very much shops yet, it looked rather new. Because it is a little bit far from the city, there were not too much people. I found a nice Cafe place and have something to eat and drink, I was really had a long journey to here.

To comfort my feet for the way I have to walk back, I wanted to buy a pair of comfortable shoes. I found one pair and it looked fairly ok, so I ask for the price. The young girl there seemed not understand me and she tried to answer everything in polish. God! language problem, so I took out my pen and try to write things like numbers down, then she could say yes or no. ( Well, I understand the no in polish;) Ok, took me about fifteen minutes I figured out all the things and bought that pair of shoes. Most funny thing was during the coversation I even tried to speak german (even my german is poor, and she seemed not understand it either).

The long journey back started, but it seemed much shorter than I came here, maybe I felt more confidence and more sure where I was going.

The language problem things not only happened once during the poland trip, many times in the supermarket, the cashier just pointed to the screen and said something in polish. Ok, we could read the screen and pay.

This dinner we were in a interesting Bali restaurant,again all the waitors are polish. Food was good, maybe here in poland restaurant is running like this, the cook is from the original place but the waitors are only polish. ;)

(to be continued)

Warsaw is the first big eastern european city I visited, I have been in Tallin Estonia before but felt that it is more like a finnish colony now, everywhere is finnish brand shops and fast food chain stores (even it tasted terrible).

We arrived in Warsaw in the afternoon and pretty smooth in the custom check,since I have a visa to go there. Directly from the airport to the hotel,the first feeling is that I am back to China. New big tall buildings and the road design is more like in China, think that should thank to the former Soviet Union, everything here and China is designed according to their style.

Hotel is good and the room is big, but we felt hungary then just went to a Chinese restaurant opposite to the hotel. To my surprised, the waiter and waitress here are all polish not like in other european cities' chinese restaurant,normally chinese restaurant means chinese waitress... Food is pretty good, tasted much better than the chinese food in Finland,and the price is also cheaper.

First day of the trip I always felt tired, just walked a little in the city and saw a building that they called the Polish Palace, well I think it looked like the Beijing Exhibition Center (Beijing Zhan lan guan), the same russian style.

Evening in Warsaw I had stronger feelings that I was back to China, except the language (sounds a little bit like russian). Anyway for dinner we had pretty good sushi in a fancy Janpanese restaurant.

(to be continued)

After the summer trip,I have not been traveling for a little while. Now my new traveling time is coming. I will leave to Poland and Hungary soon this week.

Well, of course then I will post more photos in my Flicker photoalbum.

See you then!

I watched the Chinese-Finnish movie,but it was so late,when I was back it was already midnight.

It was a nice and interesting movie,beautiful colors, a little bit like in the tiger and dragon movie. But still different than the Hollywood style. When the finnish actor tried to speak Chinese, I wanted to laugh and I have to listen very careful what he said.

This movie in the moviedatabase got a quite high rate and someone said it is the best finnish movie that ever made. I do not konw if you can see it in other countries,but this half Chinese and half Finnish speaking movie is quite interesting.

Jade warrior

Tonight I am going to watch a Chinese-Finnish movie - Jade warrior. It is made by Chinese and Finnish people,and they will speak half time Chinese and half time Finnish. That is kinda interesting to see how the finnish actor speaks chinese and the Chinese actress speaks finnish.

Someone said that it is the best finnish movie that ever made, and it opened a new erea for the finnish movie.

Well, let's see! I will give more comments about it tommorrow then.

I found the Transparency International website,they had the 2006 new list for the corruption perceptions.

Finland is the least corruption country among all the countries in the list. China is not that good,need to change lots of things...

Here is the link to their website then you could see the whole list:

Corruptions Perceptions Table

Lately my father starts to do some paintings,not the oil painting but the chinese traditional ink paintings.
Here is one that my cousin sent to me,she took the photo of his painting.Quite good,this is just after he studied about 2 months.

Halloween is the 31.Oct in most north Ameircan countries,lately also in some European countries. This Sat. is the All saints' day, so shops will all closed here in Finland. For what? I think most of the young people here will think as the same as I am,winter is already boring,even weekends the shop will not open.

Well,I live here so I have to try to adjust myself to it...

Suddenly I just remembered a story about ducks,it was a TV program that I watched while I was in China. In the spring time a wild duck fell in love with a local tamed duck(white ones which could not fly).And then they have babies,they looked like a very happy family,but the weather changed so quick,it is autumn and all the other wild ducks were prepared to fly to the south. This wild duck also has to go,but he waited and hoped that his wife-the tamed duck can fly with him,she practise almost everyday to fly....It was almost winter,the wild duck has to go,the tamed duck still could not fly,so he has to fly away with their children(luckily their children could fly)...After they left,the tamed duck just got very depressed and refused to eat till her death.

Oh! romantic duck story! And it was really happened because someone took the video of the ducks' life... That is why I always remembered it.It is not only human who knows love and family,also these simple birds...

I will go to a new gym from tomorrow,since I have more time to do more exercises. It is important that I need to do more exercises,since I moved to Finland I gained lots of weight,do not know why?

This new gym has lots of classes that I can go,I think it is a pretty good choice.Well,except the price here,but nothing more important than to have a healthy body.