when you’ve got nothing, you’ve got nothing to lose

the time has come! to say I’m nervous would be the biggest understatement made in this century. I’m so nervous about everything that may or may not happen in the next 6 months.. but it’s an excited nervous – talk about fear of the unknown. I’m unbelievably excited about finally being on my way, 12 months down the track from first starting to plan this trip, and I’m actually doing it. there are far too many emotions that I’m thinking and feeling now, especially after a fantastic final few days in europe. on one hand, I am so ready for the huge challenge, but on the other, I can’t wrap my head around the fact that I’m actually doing it.

better believe it sunshine, you’re on the plane!

kenya believe I’m going to kenya?!

do re me fa so la ti do

austria for the day.

being in europe always makes me realise how bloody huge australia is. particularly when you can just ‘pop in’ to austria, just a day visit, no biggie. crazy stuff. I remember when my sister had one of her exchange students, either eva from austria or veronique from germany, we had this picture at home that showed how big our country was – pretty sure a teacher told us that it’s hard for europeans to comprehend how big it actually is.

aha, the exact picture. cheers google

insane really. so when I arrived on tuesday at 7:30am in munich and was unsure of what to do, I thought ‘hey, why not squeeze in an extra country?’ so I did. when in rome, right?

so a day trip to salzburg, austria occurred. after only a 2 hour train trip (where from melbourne, that literally only just gets me past bendigo… delightful), I was in another country! and none other than the city (arguably) made famous from the sound of music. not that I really cared about that, but I was humming ‘when you know the notes to sing, you can sing most anything’ for the bigger part of the day, probably like every other tourist. awks.

but seriously, what a beautiful town. can you call a place a town if it has a population of 150,000? it seemed quaint enough too. now there’s a word I haven’t been able to use before, quaint. it really really was, especially down one of the streets where the street signs are all like the old fashioned hanging iron signs … some are still originals.

aside from the rain and the puddles and the cold wind, it was a really lovely city that deserved more than just 10 hours of my time.

alive, all of the colour in the night

maelu patisserie, munich.

I like to think of myself as a relatively simple person, with simple needs and simple requests.. oh shit, I’m starting to sound like my mother..

I don’t need someone to buy me huge diamonds or designer brands, big cars or nice shoes. they would get either lost, or stolen, or just ruined. but if a man wanted to impress me, all he would have to do is bring me here. and spend what I believe to be a small down payment on a house, on patisserie goods.

so after the impressive front window display, where I really really really wanted one of everything, but thought that might be a little excessive, I started with ‘my pink lady’ and a darjeeling estate tea. I am such a tea snob and the fucking tea bag was hand stitched. could not wipe the grin off my ugly mug.

it was like a shiny pink dome of goodness, greatness and sweetness. the bottom was chocolate sponge, then apple mousse with a centre of rose scented cream.

but that wasn’t enough.

so I got a glass of champagne with some pralines: mango/passion fruit, nougat and salted caramel.

did not need dinner last night.

give me the beat boys and free my soul

café ck

without a doubt my favourite place for coffee in berlin. it felt like my little home when I went every day that I was in berlin.

if you ever find yourself in berlin, and missing coffee like we have in melbourne, go there. corey, one of the baristas, is fabulous and knows his shit.

other amazing coffees to mention
– no fire no glory
– bonanza coffee
– passenger espresso
– antipodes
– the barn roasters

only hate the road when you’re missing home

my worst fear, losing a family member or a beloved pet when I’m overseas, happened today.

rest peacefully now mia, my beautiful but neurotic & cardiac challenged maltese of eleven and a half years.

I’m so sorry I couldn’t be there with you.
♥

laugh until we think we’ll die, barefoot on a summer night

berlin.

I have totally fallen in love with this city. four and a half days is so not long enough to fully experience a city, but I feel like I’ve done pretty well. I said that about paris, but I really mean it. even though when people speak german to me I get all flustered, worry about not understanding them, and instead of trying to understand (like I manage to understand when rowdy speaks german to me), I say something like “uh… australian… only english…” and then want to apologise but don’t know how in german so I splutter out “desolée” (clearly french). how embarrassment.
it’s not surprising that I’ve received more than just a few weird looks in four days.

this is another city which I feel I have conquered by foot – and later, by tram. and in staying true to myself, I have sought out so many cafés whilst being here. I’m certainly not coffee-ed out, but I have definitely had my fix. even if most of the beans they use are from kenya, I have a feeling coffee might not quite be the same when I get there.

also, berlin is super weird. there was one point on saturday night when I was walking around aimlessly, that I felt like I was in that scene of mean girls where they point out all the cliques. the main square at alexanderplatz had all these groups just sitting around; pretty obvious to see the emos, the bums, the tattooed and pierced, the school kids, the athletes (they were hardly athletes but were all wearing roller skates).
berlin is full to the brim of absolute loonies, hilarious characters who don’t care what they look like, but they are happy! berlin is full of creativity, musicians and street performers doing what they do best, artists showing off their works – some on planks of wood, others with chalk on the pavement.

and then there’s this guy. the guy who thinks its a good idea to wash his clothes in the grotty fountain in the middle of alexanderplatz. with washing powder. the same fountain where the following day I saw not going, being emptied, scrubbed and refilled. but hey, he was happy.

my favourite experience was going to the sunday flea market at mauer park. it was amazing. full of dirty hippies with dreadlocks, random stalls that sold everything from lampshades to couches to old guitars to half used bottles of shampoo to intricately hand crafted bracelets. it had more than just a couple of beer gardens in it, as well as being able to just wander around with your beer. I spent nearly 4 hours walking around, sitting, drinking, getting my hair almost dread locked (then I chickened out and got one of those hair wrap things), buying anklets from the guys below, drinking more beer, watching karaoke and making it back to my apartment to have a quick power nap after drinking too much beer (code for having an accidental early night).

I want to be them when I grow up.

some people call me a space cowboy

my favourite parts of the east side gallery.

this city never sleeps at night

tattoos in berlin.

right so I’ve had a pretty decent introduction to berlin thus far, I think. and I didn’t get here until 4pm on Thursday. and I’m counting this as day one.

I’ve seen more bald women than I’ve ever seen, more facial piercings on one person than I were physically possible, so many mohawks, parts of the berlin wall, graffiti on absolutely everything, people in lederhosen just walking down the street, nearly been run over by a few dickheads on their bikes, far too many people that dress like me (I thought dressing like a well-off hippy was my thing, obviously not), people wearing far too little clothes, more buskers/street performers than melbourne on a sunday afternoon, people (men & women) wearing fishnets, a girl with bright red hair but fluoro pink eyebrows, dreadlocks (I’m jealous of these people)… I don’t think I can list anymore things. and I love it. I love diverse cities like this, it reminds me of home – although I don’t think melbourne is as out there as berlin.

something that has become quite clear to me is that in berlin, you have to have a tattoo to be a berliner. and I think I’ve managed to see some of the worst tattoos in the world; seriously, one guy had connected duplo pieces all down one arm. in colour. dude, if you’re gonna commit to getting a sleeve, at least make it worthwhile. all I can tell from that is that you obviously had such a great fucking childhood that you had to get your favourite toy tattooed on your arm… seriously, great decision.

or there was the girl who had an ‘ä’ on the back of her neck, rather large, like the size of an ashtray. but it didn’t have two dots above it, it had three. that’s not even a real letter. I find it pretty funny that I judge people with stupid tattoos when I’m sure people have said mine is, but I feel like its a privilege that only tattooed people have – non tatted up folks don’t have the right to judge (I totally just made that rule up).

then there was the guy who had his entire calf muscle tattooed black, like just the back of his leg was that black ink colour, like he decided on a deign, hated it, asked the next tat artist to cover it but he hated that too so just ended up “colouring in” the entire leg. that might not be the story, actually it’s probably not the story at all.

now I can’t help but think people who get tattooed now (like at my age) with something they believe is a truly meaningful thing, or of something that is a really pivotal moment in their life, something that means something… is that still going to be their main turning point/their main ‘something meaningful’ later on? who’s to say that what you believe now as a twenty-something is what you’ll believe later as a sixty-something? who’s to say that the meaningful event you got tattooed on you is going to be as meaningful as an event that will happen to you later in life?

then there’s obviously the argument that “the body is a canvas, why not decorate the walls?”, which I think is a really cool way to look at it. I love people who get stupid little tattoos everywhere just because they like it. I think that’s brilliant. thus making this entire rant stupid, useless and pointless.

wow, this is a bit of a turn around from the girl who is craving to get a sleeve of her own. I admire people with tattoos – bloody hell I’m attracted to people with tattoos. and I always will be.
but berlin has almost made me start to question if I’ll ever get another tattoo (dad you’ll be stoked to hear that).

aw shit.

rock it to the early dawn

I miss my guitar so much that I want to steal one from a busker.

I would be spoiled for choice

I’m on my way to the promised land

thoughts from my time in turkey

people who know me know how much I love beer. and after a week of drinking wine in paris – and just so we’re clear, there’s no such thing as too much wine – beer was a welcome change. it seemed a sin to drink beer in paris. I’ve come to learn that I love turkish beer, called ‘efes pilsen’. so so good. one a day, kept my turkey belly away (well… so did gastro-stop, but drinking beer sounds better, so we’ll stick with that)

the view from our pension in ayvalik, I’d go back there in a heartbeat

speaking of turkey belly, what the phuck. that was a cruel 2 days. I don’t even know if turkey belly is a thing, but considering you can’t drink the water, I assume that when I got exactly the same symptoms as when I had bali belly, it was the same thing therefore must exist. I’m just lucky it didn’t last 2 weeks like the time I got bali belly. what a shitty tour it would have been. literally.

ruins in ephesus, seeing all the ruins in turkey was pretty amazing because it shows how vast their history is, but I won’t lie, in the end, when I saw ruins, I just thought it was another bunch of old stones… lucky I’m not a historian.

when I first got to turkey, hearing the ‘call to prayer’ every few hours was definitely a new thing, if not a little annoying. now I find it calming, a reminder that even in the busiest cities – like istanbul- everyone can stop and find the time to pray.

view from the boat one night, beautiful big expanses of turquoise blue water

kindness is a universal language.
shop keepers welcoming you into their shop, without the pretence of having to buy something, with offers of tea and coffee. this happened on my first day in istanbul, where I walked into a shop to look at their incredibly intricate hand painted ceramic bowls, and the shop owner offered me some apple tea while I was walking around. being a little dubious thinking that if I drink his tea, that means I also have to buy 100 bucks worth of stuff – and also worried he might try and ‘roofie’ me – I said thank you but no thank you. he then goes on to tell me that its just the way the turks show visitors hospitality and he wanted to make me feel at home. so I accept, he leaves the shop (with me still in it), goes next door to the cafe, and brings back 2 teas. talk about hospitality, I was totally shocked with his kindness. and I wasn’t roofied. what a gentleman.

the day we went to ölüdeniz, a lovely beach – shame about the stones where the sand was supposed to be.. I guess I’ll never properly fall in love with europe due to their lack of sand at their beaches

I saw the most attractive man I have ever seen in my life in turkey. I know I haven’t really lived that long, so I’m hardly in a position to say ‘ever’ but in my 22 years, it’s true. I’m not a shallow person, but this man was beautiful. tall, dark hair, slightly tanned, excellent muscly arms (which I am a sucker for) without looking like a creepy body builder on roids, and the most piercing green eyes I’ve ever seen. I was certain that people that pretty don’t exist in life, they only exist in magazines. well that’s what I thought before. I saw him the first time I went to see the protests in taksim square, he was selling paraphernalia, like turkish flags and headbands and whistles etc. at least I had my head screwed on enough not to spend a million just so I could look at him. I don’t mind an attractive man standing up for what he believes in. might be why I have such a strong attraction to john butler.

beautiful old tiles just randomly on the ground in antalya

so my tour group was fantastic, we were so diverse and different – 2 paramedics (not including me), a nurse (not including me), a vet, a mathematician, a physio, a bed and breakfast owner, an eternal student, a retiree & a (annalise I forgot what you do.. shit, sorry!) they were all doing a 15 day tour of turkey, while mine was only 11 days; and I won’t lie, I was actually a little sad when they all left me in the hostel on my last day before I was heading back to istanbul. my first ever tour and while at times it was tiring, exhausting and frustrating, it was amazing, informative and a fantastic way to make new friends. miss you lot already!

dinner on my last night with the tour group, overlooking the bay in antalya.. shame the food was shit. I guess you do pay for views at beachside/tourist towns

my last dinner in istanbul found me talking to a french canadian, arianne. I was doing my whole ‘sitting like nigel no mates in a restaurant’ act that I usually do, when someone came up to my table and asked if I was alone and could she sit with me. I wish I had balls like that! even though I’d only just finished my tour, my last day in istanbul was very much a solo day – so it was really nice to chat to someone for an hour. if you’re reading this arianne, thank you for your company!