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Jan 13 2009

New Year Update

It’s been a while! Almost a month since an update. A combination of travelling, being busy, working, and being sick is the root cause.

I’m writing this on my lunch break so I don’t have much time. I might let the photos speak for themselves then…

Speaking of work, I passed my midpoint review. I start looking for a full time position this week.

Photos:

Christmas in NYC

Intrepid Museum (A WW2 air craft carrier)

New Years Eve in LA: Together As One 2008

First ski trip to Snoqualmie

Dec 17 2008

Update and Photos

Well it’s been busy, cold, snowing, freezing, and many other things here. Yesterday it hit -7C on the way to work!

Have not had much time to write, so I will summarise: Went to the space needle.

That’s about it.

Going to LA for new years eve to see AvB play a 9 hour set, and going to New York for Christmas soon so I will update everyone with more exciting things then. Since I can’t tell you about my project.

For the moment, photos:

Intern Happenings

Live Search Christmas Party

Snow and Egg Nog

Space Needle Adventures

Dec 05 2008

First week at Microsoft

End of the first week!

First of all, my new contact info:

Phone: +1 425 881 1019

Address: 16607 NE 36th Ct #JJ202, Redmond, WA 98052, USA

I have now moved in with Jack, and the place is much much better. Internet doesn’t drop out all the time and it’s a house instead of a hotel room. Now that I’m finally settled in, I will start unpacking!

Have been eating out a lot this week because it’s the only time interns can really socialise. Fortunately most places have some sort of vegetarian thing. Best thing I’ve had yet is a Mushroom Burger from Red Robin, even if it is really really fatty. Amazing.

Work has been really cool. I can’t tell you about most of it! NDA and all that. What I can tell you is that I’m working on Windows 7, and I’m in the application experience team. And that Windows 7 is running on my dev box, test box, and now my laptop and it’s awesome. Despite the leaked info people don’t really know much ;)

Day to day, I get up when I like (I try to get to work at 9 though), and walk about 25min to work (it’s not far, but uphill on the way there). I get into work, check my corporate email, and start the day…

During this time I can get free drinks from the fridge (soft drink/juice/milk) or make starbucks coffee. I work on my project… which i cant say anything about… and then have lunch at the awesome cafeteria at 12. We usually have lunch as a team.

When it gets to about 8 hours I head home in the cold and pass out after a few hours. I can never seem to find enough hours in the day when I work full time. I really enjoy it though!

I could definitely do this for the rest of my life every day…

This weekend will be a combination of relaxing and partying. And maybe some uni work, but we’ll see.

Pics: NEO Day 2 Walking to work

Dec 02 2008

New Employee Orientation: Day 1

Well it’s 7:20am on day 2, I survived day 1!

Sleeping pattern is fairly normal now. Took ages to recover though. I handed back the car but I will probably end up getting one later this week because Seattle is impossible to get around without a car. I’m probably moving out of the hotel and in with Jack (http://jackvalmadre.wordpress.com/) since he doesn’t have a roommate and he has fast internet!

Day 1 was a combination of boring full time employee information and awesomeness. It’s hard to put into words just how awesome this company is. I definitely want to work here. I know already!

We had to sign documents, get our photos taken, and then we learnt about the company history, benefits, etc. There are 17 Australian interns, and some Brazilians and Canadians coming soon.

Today I meet my manager, Justin, and get my key card. I also have to open a bank account, get an SSN, and get a crappy phone and sim card.

No phone number yet, I will probably move in the next few days anyway. When I’m settled I’ll update you all. Not going to unpack just yet!

Photos are taking ages to upload on this horrible connection. I’ll edit this when they become available or make another post.

Edit: Arriving in the USA:http://tompa.corrodedreality.org/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=12210

Nov 29 2008

Welcome to Redmond

I am writing from Redmond, Washington, USA!

It’s been a hectic few days. Packing and moving out was relatively painless. I arrived at Brisbane International at about 8am, met up with Matt (another intern) at about 8:30, and checked in at 9:30 before meeting up with Jack and John (also interns). Flight left at about 12:05, and I managed to get back the GST on my laptop cause of duty free.

The flight to LAX was just over 12 hours, and we were ahead of schedule. I managed to sleep for some of the flight, but still got in two movies (A fish called wanda & Crimson tides). Food was alright, but we were still really hungry by the time we got to LAX. We grabbed our luggage and went through customs, before dropping it off at the transfer point. At this point I didn’t realise someone had taken away my luggage trolley with my fedex folder containing all my import documents. I lost everything except my passport, and I didn’t notice until I got on the next plane. Luckily everything is printable again except for a few small things. I will need to get another training plan before I can leave the country and re-enter again.

We next took Alaska Airlines to Seattle airport. Dylan’s skis that he lent me (thanks again Dylan!) got delayed in customs and we had to stick around until the next flight before I could claim them. This wasn’t much of a big deal though cause we couldn’t check in to our places for at least 3 hours. I picked up my rental car and drove us all to the key pickup. It was bloody scary for the first half hour, having to keep telling myself to keep right and not turn into the wrong lane on left turns. Luckily I have a GPS in the car.

Getting to the key pickup, Matt and Jack had theirs available but John and I didn’t. We rang up the company who took almost 2 hours to sort out where our keys were and what to do. We ended up having to go to the other place to get our keys.

I like the two bedroom houses but I don’t like my place. It’s like a glorified hotel room. I will see if I can move on Monday at our introduction.

Matt John Jack & I went out for dinner and then went shopping. Being black friday things were hectic everywhere, but we missed most of the big rush. We ended up going home and by that time we had been up for about 30 hours. I dropped them all home and then slept for 16 hours waking up at 4:30pm today.

Photos are coming but I have some important things to sort out first regarding uni at home. It might take me a few days to reply. Also don’t bother calling me because my phone is still dead, and I haven’t found a cheap one to replace it with yet. However I do have a home number, but I will post it soon (don’t have the extension yet).

I start work on Wednesday after two days of introduction. Maybe I’ll post after that!

Jun 16 2008

Rock am Ring, Coming Home

Well I am writing this from Brisbane: yes! I am now home. A lot has happened in the last week and a half, so I will start with Rock am Ring.

The time had come to venture to Germany for the first time for Rock am Ring. The festival starts on the Friday and finishes on Sunday night. Because you need to camp, we got there on the Thursday. I tried booking cheap flights to Germany for Thursday, but unfortunately they were in such high demand that the price was impossible. So I ended up taking a Wednesday flight to Frankfurt-Hahn airport, where I proceeded to the town of Koblenz.

Finding a place to stay in Koblenz was not easy. All the Rock am Ring buses leave from Koblenz, and there is only one hostel there - which had obviously been booked out way before I tried to get there. So I tried a site recommended to me by a friend, couchsurfing. The idea is that you let someone stay on your couch and in return you buy them something or let them stay on your couch when you have one to offer.

After lots of emails I got a reply from a girl named Lisa, who lives in the centre of Koblenz. She kindly offered me a place to stay on the Wednesday night, before my friend Max would pick me up on Thursday. We walked around the town in the day and at night she showed me videos of Rock am Ring from years past.

The city of Koblenz is quite beautiful, where the big river Rhine meets with a smaller river where the boarder of France used to be. The main attraction is a giant fort on top of a hill next to the river, which used to be a major defence system for old Germany. You can still see the cannon holes and powder rooms.

On Thursday night Max and his friend Marcos finally arrived from Karlsruhe to pick me up. We gathered some supplies from the local shops (including a $8 bottle of vodka from Aldi!) before heading to the Nürburgring. Even kilometres away we were held up in a line of cars waiting to park. For at least an hour we slowly crawled along until we took a ’shortcut’ that got us to the closest campsite. We met up with their friends and set up the tents (at 2am) before drinking and passing out to get ready for the first day of the festival.

The next morning we went to get our armbands. For some reason this was one of the major reasons I was looking forward to going to the festival. Armbands for most Aussie festivals are plastic or paper and fall off after a few days. The ones they give out in europe are fabric and you can leave them on for years. By this time the campsite was already looking like a third world country with an unlimited alcohol supply.

In the early afternoon after breakfast and a few drinks, we headed into the festival. Even though we were at the closest campsite, it still took about 20-30 minutes to walk to the racetrack where the stages were. The first day was the best, seeing Serj Tankian/Incubus/Rage Against the Machine/The Prodigy in a row. The amount of people was just insane (85000) and the mosh pits for Rage were about the craziest I have ever been in. I got some great videos.

The second day I woke up to the German national anthem being blasted through portable speakers and a generator. The germans kept feeding me more alcohol, and after making my vodka infused tetrapak I drank more and more. I don’t remember about 4 hours during In Flames and Opeth. Offspring and Metallica were great, though I wish Metallica played stuff from their new album. It was awesome seeing Johnathan Davis afterwards though, who did a solo act tour for the first time. At the end of the night it was time for the Verve and Bitter Sweet Symphony was worth the wait.

The third morning we packed up the tents and went to the final day. The acts weren’t as good this day but it was still respectable. Unfortunately I started to get sick at the end of the day and I couldn’t mosh for Queens of the Stone Age. (Still sick now a week later!)

So that was Rock am Ring, now for the reason why I am in Brisbane…

The night before I left for Rock am Ring I got an email from the Travel Agent in Brisbane. I had previously asked to change my flights earlier for reasons outlined in a previous post. They said it was pretty much impossible to change the flights, so I booked others for when i was “really” going home… So the travel agent said she had checked again and that there was an opening from the 11th to the 19th but spots were filling up quickly. I was just about to go to bed since I was going to Rock am Ring, but I suddenly had the opportunity to change my flights so I stayed up contemplating.

By 4:00am I decided I could make it home, so I rang up the Travel agent and asked her to book it for me. I ended up with 1 hour sleep and about 11 hours of rebooking flights and organising the next week.

After I returned from Germany, I had 24 hours to pack and clean my entire room. Not an easy task! After hardly any sleep I began my 40 hour journey back to Australia. 2 hours waiting at Gothenburg, 2 hours flying to London Stansted, 2 hours on a bus to London Heathrow, 10 hours waiting at London Heathrow lying on a metal bench because the check in was closed, 11 hours flying to Bangkok, 2 hours waiting in Bangkok, 9 hours flying to Sydney, 2 hours flying to Brisbane.

I was picked up late Thursday night by Dylan and Jason and have been sleeping just about all weekend!

So that’s about it for the travel blog, I will add some photos to the end of this post and that will probably be it for a while…

Photos of Koblenz available: here

Photos of Rock am Ring: here

May 27 2008

Spring/Summer Update

Well due to popular request, here’s an update!

I’ve been busy recently, after my holiday to NL/BE. I missed 9 days of work, so it was quite hard catching up and I had quite a few sleepless nights last week as I handed in my project. Also I had to prepare a bit for my summer job.

I recently tried changing my flights to 5 weeks earlier for a number of reasons:

  • All my friends are going home (most are leaving this week)
  • I need to organise a place to live in Australia
  • I need to plan my thesis
  • I need to organise vacation work at the end of the year
  • I don’t have any travel money

I contacted the travel agent but flights are all booked out. The Bangkok to Brisbane flights are extremely busy this time of year. They wanted over $1000 to change the flight! So I’m stuck in Gothenburg until the end of July. I will have to do a lot of long distance organisation, but at least I get to experience a bit of European summer.

I would have liked to have visited lots of places but I simply never had the cash in the first place. I could take out a loan and pay some of it back with my summer job, but I do not like taking out loans. Besides, I’ll come back eventually (3 years or less if I have it my way).

Most of this week is saying goodbye to my Erasmus friends as they head home. On the weekend we had a BBQ at one of the local lakes, Stora Delsjön. It was really nice there, but way too cold to go swimming (I didn’t even bring swimming gear to Sweden!) Pictures at the end, along with some more pictures of Spring/Summer here.

Next week I am off to Germany for Rock am Ring (which I booked back in January). This will be my last trip out. I wanted to see more of Germany but train travel there is horribly expensive (moreso than Sweden, for some reason). At the moment I don’t have a place to stay for the first night so it looks like I’m going to be pulling an all nighter on the first and last days. The rest of the time I will be staying at the campsite with my friend Max and his mates from Germany. Should be crazy!

I have started my summer coding job as of yesterday and it doesn’t even feel like work, which is always good. The sun is coming up at about 3:30am and going down at 10:30pm.

I have to get some more sleep before I start work today (it’s 7am, had a bit of a party last night saying good bye to my Canadian neighbour Liz). I’m off!

Pictures: (by the way, I’m quickly approaching 3000!)
Walk home from uni (Spring Edition)
BBQ @ Stora Delsjön

May 13 2008

Panoramas

Today I decided to go through all my panoramas and make them in Photoshop. So here’s the result, panoramas from three continents:

Pictures: here

May 06 2008

The ASOT350 trip

Part 1: Stockholm

I left Gothenburg early on Saturday morning after not much sleep the previous night. I got to the train station and realised that I had booked the slow train to Stockholm. It might be only 2 hours difference, but on the slow train it feels like a lifetime! (The fast train, the X2000, has powerpoints next to the seat and internet access onboard. It also is much more comfortable and is awesome when it tilts.

I arrived late in the afternoon after 5 hours. I made my way to Roger and Mel’s place, where I helped them set up the IKEA stuff they bought. Not long after I already had to leave again to make my way to the first party of my trip: Sphere Experience!

The Sphere Experience was Sweden’s attempt at reviving large scale dance events. The Swedish government is very sensitive about drugs and alcohol, and as someone said to me: “The minute they hear a bass drum kick, they shut the event down.” This makes it difficult for promoters to hire large venues, and the end result is a complete lack of a community to attend the events. Anyway, Sphere was the first one in a while, and also had problems. About a week before the event they reduced the price by 200:- (about $35 AUS) and I wasn’t happy! I rang them up and asked for my money back or an upgrade to VIP, which they obliged. However 3 days later, the event was cancelled!

A friend told me that they had only sold about 400 tickets. A headlining act, Cosmic Gate, also pulled out. Anyway, they decided to hold a smaller Sphere Experience at the Gamla Tryckeriet in Alvik on the edge of Stockholm. Fortunately for me the event was only 250:- instead of the 600:- I originally paid for my ticket.

The venue was quite cool, very similar to the warehouse rave style I’m used to from Brisbane. I thought the venue was a club, so I dressed up (as you can see in the photos). I met some awesome swedish guys who I partied with most of the night. Funnily enough I met quite a few swedes that had been to Australia recently, which sparked conversation. I loved the headlining acts too, and stayed until closing (which was 15 minutes early, as opposed to most events where they try to finish later!). Weirdly, whilst cheering for the DJ a Swedish guy asked me if I was racist. Supposedly I was making some bad hand gesture with my glowstick. Getting back to Roger and Mel’s was a little hard, as I ended up missing two buses on the complicated way home.

The next day I slept in until 2pm or so and then went to Roger’s brother’s place to have dinner with his family. Awesome food! I also had a go on the brand new Wii Fit game, which is pretty fun with it’s balance games. Still tired, I went to bed early ready for the long trek to Amsterdam the next day.

Photos from Stockholm: here

Part 2: Amsterdam

I had originally planned to stay in Eindhoven for two nights, but 2 days before the event at Eindhoven got cancelled too! Amazing notice they give… Anyway, I decided not to stay in Eindhoven as it’s quite boring for tourists and I extended my stay in Amsterdam for two more days over the Queen’s day celebrations. From Stockholm I took the bus to Skavska, then flew to Eindhoven, and then took the train to Amsterdam (80 + 100 + 80 minutes!) Funnily enough this ended up being half the price of getting a flight from Gothenburg via KLM.

I arrived into Amsterdam at about 8pm and headed to the Bulldog Hostel where I had previously seen before during my first trip. It’s quite a cool hostel with good security, comfy rooms, included breakfast, and their own branded coffee shop next door. After putting my stuff away I headed to Dam Square.

To my surprise Dam Square was full of carnival rides. I knew Queen’s day was happening but I didn’t expect them to have the rides right in the middle of the city! It was really cool to see the old buildings lit up by the lights of the rides. I was pretty tired so I headed to bed and got up early the next day for Queen’s Night.

This time in Amsterdam I wanted to go to all the tourist stuff I missed out on last time. First stop was the sex museum. Only €3 entry, it guides you through a history of sex in Amsterdam and the world. Some of the oldest pornographic pictures are here, and the only thing that is different is that a lot of people didn’t shave. They also had an interesting history of the Red Light District.

Next I headed to Vondelpark, which is where the citizens of Amsterdam go to get away from the city life. It’s a beautiful park about 20 minutes walk from the centre. I just stayed, relaxed, and watched the world go by.

As the afternoon progressed I headed back home and orange was everywhere (the national colour around Queen’s Day). People were starting to drink and there was a lot more people out and about.

I had time to visit the Amsterdam Zoo so I walked about 20 minutes to the site. It’s a very old zoo and some of the original cages and displays from the late 1800’s are still there. It started to rain so I headed indoors. By the way, they have the most awesome ‘Warning, animals may bite’ sign on the displays, you can see it in the photos.

By the time I had reached the hostel again, orange was *everywhere* and the music had started. By the time the sun went down, there were people dressed in orange everywhere and people were out on the canals.

I should probably explain what Queen’s day is! Queen’s day is the Netherland’s biggest holiday, celebrating the Queen’s birthday. Everyone of all ages parties on the 29th and 30th every year. 750,000 people flock to the middle of Amsterdam, and there’s so many people they have to shut the public transport down and ban all traffic from the city centre.

Two Aussie mates from Gothenburg met up with me later that night, and we just went walking around to check out all the parties. It was unreal; there was a party on every corner, with music from all genres. The drinking age in the Netherlands (and most surrounding countries) is 16, so everyone over 16 was drinking, even the oldies. Street parties ranged from huge crowds with famous DJs to live bands singing traditional Dutch sing-a-longs whilst the drunk old people badly sing along.

After a fair while exploring, we split up and went to bed to get up early for Queens Day. When I woke up at 10, All I could hear was music and people, EVERYWHERE. Outside my window there was 2 or 3 houses blasting music. When I stepped outside the hostel, there were boats everywhere on the canal! All were painted or dressed up in orange, packed with people. Only in the Netherlands would the council permit people driving around boats in the canal drunk, whist DJs play music on the boat loudly and everyone dances. Absolutely amazing sight.

Speaking of which, the police are some of the most calm police I’ve ever seen. When people stumble around or do something in public that Australian police would jump at just to relieve their boredom, Netherlands police look and laugh and make sure everyone is just having fun without anything serious happening. It’s how it should be everywhere.

Amsterdam was PACKED. It was almost impossible to move in some places, with one block taking me 30 minutes to cross when it would normally take me 30 seconds. The pictures really say a thousand words on this one, there’s no way to put it into words easily. Everyone young and old was having a fantastic time.

At 1 or 2 in the afternoon I headed to central station to catch a train to Leiden. Armin Van Buuren was putting on a free party in his hometown where some pretty amazing DJs were playing. In Leiden it was the same as Amsterdam but just on a much smaller scale. The party was really well done though, it was awesome to see young kids and old people getting into trance. I also got Markus Schulz signature, and talked to him for a few seconds about coming back to Australia. My DJ signature collection is now complete!

I headed back to Amsterdam to do some more partying before I went to sleep for the trip to Antwerp early the next day.

Photos from Amsterdam: here, here, and here

Part 3: Antwerp

After checking out of the Bulldog, I headed to the train station whilst eating some fries and mayo. This was my first international train, and it was quite relaxed. No passport checking or anything, just tickets. You aren’t even bound to a time, just a date. 2 Hours later I was in Antwerp, the old city of the diamond trade.

The narrow streets combined with the very overcast weather gave my GPS a hard time. I ended up getting to the hostel which was right in the middle of the city. It’s in a little side street next to the old church, and all that signified I was in the right place was a giant green door with ‘hostel’ on it. Inside I was greeted by a very ..belgian man who set me up for the night. It’s hard to describe the people from Antwerp. They come across a little less friendlier than the Dutch, though this might be due to them not wanting to speak English as readily. The hostel was a very old building that felt like it was going to fall apart. This gave it character though! Much more relaxed than the commercialised Bulldog. The stairs are incredibly steep and you climb the equivalent of 2 storeys in about an area of 2sq metres.

Antwerp is a nice city with a channel running through the middle. It’s home to a big shipping port and until a few hundred years ago it had more shipping business than Amsterdam. There is an old fort on the river which is pretty amazing to see, and if I wasn’t so tired I would have walked the 1km or so pedestrian tunnel that went under the river.

The public transport system did not have an English translation so I decided to walk the 4.5km and see the city. I was on the way to the main event of my trip, A State of Trance Episode 350. For those of you who don’t know it, ASOT is Armin Van Buuren’s radio show, the most popular online trance radio show. It is my main inspiration as a DJ and got me into trance, as well as getting me through several late nights programming. 350 was celebrating 7 years of broadcasting, held at club NoXX in Antwerp and broadcasted live to 7 million listeners around the world (!).

After finding an ATM (which seem to be extremely rare in Antwerp), I waited outside the club. They were only letting the first 2000 in and the club was going to be full only a few minutes after opening. I arrived over 2 hours early and chatted with some cool Canadians and Brits whilst waiting in line. Inside the club, I was amazed to see that using the bathroom costs €0,50 every time. I knew that was the case in public, but in a club?! The club itself it quite good, surprisingly no lasers but lots of moving lights and the entire roof is covered in LEDs which act as a giant display. Every DJ did an amazing set and I met quite a lot of people including 2 Australians and a few Dutch (who are always friendly to English speakers).

I got back to the hostel with blistered feet and sore legs at about 6am. I woke up at 11 knowing that I had to check out and head to Brussels. My legs wanted to sleep another day or two.

Pictures from Antwerp: here

Part 4: Brussels

After I woke up I went downstairs to see a breakfast that seemed extremely fitting to the hostel’s character. A huge loaf of fresh bread that was anything but square shaped, some cheese I could not identify and will probably never know what it was, and of course coffee and orange juice. I ate and then headed to Antwerp Central train station to catch a 40min train to Brussels.

Another interesting run-in happened at the train station. I bought a drink from the bakery in English, and the man standing next to me immediately said “In this country, we say sorry before,” whilst giving me a death stare. Bewildered, I didn’t respond, to which he said “But I bet they don’t teach you that do they!” before storming off. At first I thought I had run into him without knowing, but I soon realised that he was angry at me for not apologising for speaking English. The tourist guide to Antwerp said the people can be a bit up themselves, as they even refer to Antwerp as ‘The City’ and never ‘Antwerp’. I guess that was an example!

The train to Brussels was really short, and it was cool to see the transition to a modern city with new buildings. Brussels is a completely bilingual city (French and Dutch, albeit mostly French). All street signs, street names, advertisements, etc are in both languages. I checked into the hostel which Matt recommended and had a long needed shower before passing out for 18 hours.

I woke up the next morning and went exploring. In this time I saw the Grote Markt which has a town hall from the 15th century. Next on the tourist list, I saw Manneken Pis, a famous fountain of a little boy pissing. He’s much smaller than I expected. Next on the list was trying Belgian waffles, and I bought one with chocolate and banana. Absolutely amazing.

I then went up to the top of a parking building to get some panoramas of the city. There’s quite a nice view to the old part of the city and to the Atomium.

Before heading to the Atomium I had to stop by the church next to the parking building and St Cathrine’s metro stop. It has a public urinal bulit right onto the church wall. You can be thrown in jail for pissing on a church in some places!

I took the metro to the Atomium stop to get some better photos. The structure was build in the late 50’s as a temporary exhibition, but they never took it down. I was going to go in but the line was horribly long and I had to catch the train to Utrecht. I headed back to the hostel and checked out, ready to catch my second international train.

Pictures from Brussels: here

Part 5: Utrecht

Utrecht is a city south east of Amsterdam. I had previously been there for Trance Energy at the Jaarbeurs event hall. I had no idea what was on the other side of the central station though. The Jaarbeurs side looks so new and modern.

Coming out the other side I was greeted by the Amsterdam style markets and buildings. I then saw the canals, absolutely beautiful. In Utrecht, which was first settled by Roman soldiers almost 2000 years ago, the canals are lined by old cellars for the houses above. Recently though, they have been converted into restaurants, cafes and theatres. The city has a really nice atmosphere: like Amsterdam, but without all the tourism.

I checked into the hostel and talked with an American who had been teaching in England. Soon after though I had to head to the final party of my trip: Solarise at Club Poema. The club was really small and you got to party with the DJs which is always good. I got a photo with Re-Ward, who is extremely tall! Unfortunately I had to come home at 3am because the hostel would have locked me out until 8am, and after 8 days of walking and partying I wasn’t up for waiting outside in the cold.

The next day I met a Canadian soldier who had a few weeks off from serving in Afghanistan. Really cool guy, very interesting to talk to. I took a canal cruise, and then in the evening the old church (15th century) began to ring it’s bells. Turns out it was a World War 2 remembrance day, and it was extremely surreal as the town began to gather to the church to have 2 minutes silence. Having the bell ring repeatedly and everyone slowly walk was extremely surreal, almost creepy.

As much as I love Utrecht, I had to leave to head back home. I took the train to Eindhoven, then the bus (which was free because they were on strike!) and then relaxed at the airport for a few hours. I cut it pretty close but managed to catch my train after the airport bus.

I am currently writing on the train, and I’m about to get in to Gothenburg at 11pm. This week will be catching up with University as I head into my final 3 weeks. I then start my Summer of Code project and the next week head to Rock am Ring for the concert of a lifetime! Check out all the photos I took on this trip, I took over 500 in total. Time to catch the tram and then pass out.

Pictures from Utrecht: here

Apr 24 2008

Netherlands/Begium Trip Plan Changes

A few days ago I got an email from Ticnet (the Swedish TicketMaster) saying that the event I was going to on the 26th was cancelled. I was absolutely amazed, first they reduce the price by 200:- and then they kill the event completely. At least I got my 570kr back today! I also just found out that some of the artists will be performing at a club on the same night, so I guess that will have to do (no Cosmic Gate :().

Then about 2 hours ago, I get an email from Timoco (Netherlands Ticketmaster equivalent). Clockwrks in Eindhoven has been cancelled! ARRGH!

So I’ve made some changes to my trip. Instead of spending two days in Eindhoven (which was probably a bad choice anyway - it’s not really touristy), I will be spending another two days in Amsterdam. Fine by me! I could spend a lot longer in that city and not get bored of it. At least this time I will have a proper chance to explore, and now that the sun is going down at about 21:00 you get more time to wander. Now that I will be in Amsterdam, I will be able to go to Leiden and perhaps Delft for two other events that I couldn’t go to previously. At least rail in the Netherlands is fast and cheap!

Also, ASOT350 in Antwerp will now be held in a club, and from 8pm-4am. This means I won’t need a hostel for the night! €16.50 saved!

Now that I am staying in Amsterdam longer, I will check out VU University. I am almost certain I will save up to go there. Because…

I GOT IN TO GOOGLE SUMMER OF CODE!

I will be programming for the open source project Mixxx all through summer, which will fund my…

BACKPACKING!

Yes! I can now afford to go backpacking. I have already planned (in my head) Germany, Netherlands, France, Bulgaria, and the UK. I may check out some other places too. The best thing about Summer of Code is that I can do it from anywhere I have internet access!

Today, as I was getting my refund, I took some pictures of the town in spring mode. Trees are starting to get their leaves again, and people are starting to come outside! It’s quite a contrast to winter.

Pictures: here