Surabaya oh Surabaya,,

Welcome back to another episode of the Pathetic Travellers!

This will be a solo-pathetism by me, as Sani should have came along but he had to to do some job in the Military Academy (maybe ecchi ecchi stuff,, don't get your imaginations go wild just yet!). In early August as you all know I'll be chief of adjudicators for this National competition, who then will select who the country will fund to go to the Worlds round; in Antalya, Turkey!!! *wants wants* ^^

This time i had to go to the preliminary meeting located in Surabaya (one of Indonesia's major cities, west of Java) with the people from the Office of Higher Education (Indo : DikTi). Instantly i was already imagining a boring meeting like the pics from newspapers of meetings held in the house of representatives with fat-bellied representatives sleeping due to their oversized lunch, overcomfy recliners, and overcooled air conditioners hahaha.. booooooring!

Obviously i was wrong.. Read on..

The story of pathetism starts from my trip back from Magelang (a city 45 minutes north from my city), so after the comfy car ride in the Military Commando shuttle, who dropped me and Heru (me house mate) in the bus terminal, where we parked our motor bikes in one of those overnight parking garages.. After 5 minutes of walking where me and Heru argued which way was north, we reached the garage and lo! It was closed,, i checked the time; 12:30 AM,, *curses!*

so we walked anothe 5 minutes to the main road to get a cab back home *while wishing we had asked the Military Commando car to take us straight home instead of be goodie two shoes*. The bad thing about some of the cabs here is that they refuse to use the argometer (for those who wonder, its those bleeping cute red digital numbers that gets added with every kilometre you ride and automatically calculate your fare,, magical eh? :D) and instead they have a fixed price. Now this is the part where i was thinking of debating with the driver on how exactly did he make these "rates", and what are they based on; distance, terrain of road, weather or what? But before i could do that Heru saved us by finding another cab who was willing to go by the rules *also it was lucky since the debate i nearly waged would've probably cost us our lives, or at least our shame*

While watching movies like Need for Speed, have you ever wondered what it felt like to be in one of those cars? Now i have felt so. Imagine the speed like in the movie, without Eva Mendez or the flashy guy in the movies, downgrade the car by about 180 degrees, add an amazing stink sensation that awfully is close to what fart smells like, and offensive taste of music that makes you shout above "WHY oh WHY did humans invent Music????", and you're there! I thank God every day from that day that our car did not crash, or roll, or skid, or jump, or break into pieces! --"

So by the time i got home it was 1.30 AM, i needed a bath, i needed my bed, i was tired, and i felt i needed a psychiatrist to cure my taxi trauma.. Imagine going to bed with that,,

and wake up at 3.30 AM!!

So why did i wake up at that time? Because my flight to Surabaya was at friggin 6 AM in the morning!

Airports are so peaceful in the morning. I decided to sit nicely in the Dunkin Donuts stall the have there, sip a warm Vanilla Latte, sinking every taste of coffee milk and vanilla blended nicely in one warm mug, while munching into a lovely smoked chicke croissant.. Ladies and gentlemen I am practically in heaven (the way my body was numb from the night before, it actually felt like i already passed away). I observed people, as usual; there was another guy who wore sunglasses at dead dark mornings, there was this guy who jumped up and down because the debris of his cigarette caught his feet, there was a fat dad with a cute teenage daughter sitting beside me talking about which best; to get an iphone or the new Prada bag (yes very substantial compared to talking about petty issues, say AirFrance's recent accident and the loss of lives)

As usual, Lion Air's service and schedule didnt feel really "Lion-ey", felt more like a "Sick kitten" as they were late by like 2 hours due to "operational and technical reasons" - i bet the pilot just forgot where he put the keys to turn on the plane, or say the air crew was wondering where the hell was the left wing of the plane were o.O

Arrived in Surabaya just in time for the meeting. Nice city, not as bustling as Jakarta, and VERY hot my God i was trying my best to look as "corporate" as i can be and the heat just made me look like an out of place bussinessman in the middle of the fish market wondering where to buy meat --"

Meeting was good but i will not bore you to that, this is about the travels..

The way back to Jogja was very pleasant and educating for some reasons.

1) Be careful if you are in Surabaya's Juanda airport. If you don't pay attention to what the people are saying through the loudspeakers then you would think you're not in an airport. The way they delivered announcements make you feel like Sudanese people queing for food in a Red Cross camp, or a PoW about to be excecuted in Abu Ghraib.

2) Before checking in make sure you go to the toilet, for both (number 1) and (number 2). Once you get to the terminals lounge nearly all the toilets dont function. So if you gotta take (number 2) and you dont have enough choice then you can do (number 1) on the green plants they have in there and argue this is the innovative way of watering plants. If you must do (number 2) then pray to God your pants are both super absorbant and not odor leaking. I would suggest Nike's dry-fit shorts and 2 crates of Glade's de-odor products.

3) Check the type of plane you will be taking in your flight. A Cessna means you will be riding a windowless plane using seatbelts and helmets (true story!), a Boeing means you'll do fine but crampy, an Airbus is your best option, and a McDouglass means you must be careful! The last plane i mentioned is coded MD so note this very well. If you are assigned to seat 36D, as entertaining as that sounds (go wilden up your imaginations, there was a curvy lady beside me at the time who facilitated mine :D) that would mean hell. An MD plane's jets are at the rear of the plane, not on the wings like Boeings and Airbuses are. What you get in 36D is not squishy and enjoyfull "double pillows", but you will get a window the is right next to the jet engines. What next? If you're a fan of F1 or MotoGP you might enjoy this, as the sound, vibration and SMELL of the jet engines is not impermeable to by the windows, meaning it leaks!!

4) When number 3 happens, feel free to curse at hand, and spend 70% of your flight standing up, or stay seated but you will have questionable hearing and will need to go with me to a psychiatrist, but for more obvious reasons. Cute, hot, long legged stewardesses is not a help, as they can only offer you "cottons", now i would imagine they at least give you their numbers for compensating all the troubles but no thats not imperative. So what you end up is heart-ache.

So finally i can enjoy the week's end, full of shock and post-trauma of travels. How was your week?

long-live pathetism!!

Pathetic Traveller - Fiasco at the Airport!

Okay, so this article is a continuation (the second part) from the article "the things i do.." (so if you haven't read that one, look for it in the archives of this blog, if you have, read on..)

After the magical Saturday that i had noting that a lot of the things i planned and how i imagined would go went pretty much as planned. It was beautiful.. You'd know by now that after that Saturday, the next day i should be continuing my obligations as ALSA's 4th DCA. My plane is once again the all-time famous emerging rookie airliner; AirAsia!!! I've been using much of AirAsia's services; my annual holidays to Malaysia and Singapore have used this airliner the past 2 years. So far in my eyes they have a clean slate of record.

Sunday, 18th April 2009. I woke up at 7, and promised to myself that after updating the blog, facebook-ing, and checking KasKus, i would start ironing my clothes. Fido spent the night in the house as he was consulting with me for his ITP TOEFL test, so by that time he's already left for FE UGM to do this test..

At that peculiar morning i was busy interacting with people thru the world wide web. Called my dear friend Nonie who was in a sorta crisis, then had a chat with Gabriel and challenging him to a LAN Company of Heroes duel once he lands from the US, it was very very productive morning laaaaahhh hahaha..

You should know that my plane, as it says on the e-ticket (e-ticket means you copy paste the itinerary shown on the website after you've paid for them, then copy into word and print it all by yourself.. they say "e" stands for internet related, i think it states for "economic" or in javanese it would be "elek") is at 1245 hours noon, so i'm pretty laid back, no rush, i thought. At 1000 hours i started ironing my clothes, and since i'm a big guy, ironing makes me feel like those guys who warm and smooth the ice on a hockey ring.. At 1100 hours i was packing, made sure my music player was charged, and i bought a book with me for easy reading (actually to help me doze off on the plane and later on the bus)

You should know that I'm typically a punctual guy, and that means i have this nerdy fashion of calculating distance, traffic density, and the time necessary to get to a place. I believed that if i reached the airport by 12 i'd still be fine (usually so). I spent the last 15 minutes checking whether i left something. So Heru took me to the airport; stopping in a supermarket to get myself some undies (i've no idea why but my undies are always dissepearing, my suspicions lie with Adi, it seems to make sense if he had these kind of fetishes) and perfume (the entire UII delegation boys only had 1 perfume, and i refuse to smell the same like them, its just horrid)..

We reached the airport around 1205 hours. At that time i still had time to joke around with Heru. Shortly after i said my goodbye, then he left. 2 seconds later the announcer at the airport shouts "AirAsia flight to Jakarta has just departed" i misunderstood the word "departed" with "landed" for about 3 seconds until i realized what was going on (sheepish, i know, but it happens at times). What goes thru my mind is that i run inside and steal one of the cars in the landing strip and somehow throw my shoes at the cockpit windows so the pilot can stop and let me in. Overacting, I know, but in emergency situations come emergency state of thought..

Immediately i ran (panicked) through the entrance doors, the security there was very astute, they idenfied the signs of frantic/insane passenger on my face (widened eyes, weird facial expression, sweating like a cow, and most obvious i was running) so they let me thru directly. Now normally i'm a good samaritan, an obedient civillian, so i usually pass the x-ray whats-its-name gates with calm, cool and confidence.. But this time I can't relax, my bloody plane's starting to taxi down the runway.. I in the future will propose to the FAA that in cases of emergency, the suspicioun of terrorist passengers should be lifted (let's face it, if you plan to bomb a plane, you'd be well planned, and there's no way terrorists would be in my position, only a lousy one would be late for a plane) and that priority should be given to the careless and obnoxious passengers like me.. But noooooooo, i still had to pass my bag thru the x-ray thing (look, i know that in some movies you see terrorists assembling the bomb in the plane so they can pass the security with raw harmless looking tools, but seriously, i will slap the person that tells me you can make a bomb using 2 clothes, 2 shorts, a pair of sandals, 1 perfume bottle, 1 body splash bottle, and 3 underpants!!!!).. so that just took 10 seconds of my precious emergency right there.. touche!

Once i finally reached the check in desks, no one was there, apparently AirAsia has a policy to leave late passengers alone and fall to their doom.. Nice! This view is even worse than the view of the butts of the baggage loaders you get in T3 Soekarno-Hatta, and no the toilets in this airport has nothing to be proud of --"

Frantically i texted Heru with the last drops of energy in my mobile (i left the charger in Jakarta T.T) telling him to take a u-turn and come back to the airport. I felt lost with anger, loneliness, and despair. Heru came 10 minutes later and helped me ask around. Two notes on this information gathering;

1) The clerks in the AirAsia desk are such bums, the locket says "closed" but there was a guys there, and because this is urgent we thought he'd have some solidarity. But noooo, he ignored us while pointing to the closed sign. I'm pretty sure he was probably playing solitaire or something..

2) The ladies manning the information desks are real cuties aren't they? It's a good strategy to grow the habbit of asking within Indonesians, although it seems a little unethical but it works. I promise to myself to always prepare a question for the ladies in the information desk everytime i have bussiness in the airport..

Okay, so all hope is lost. Although the plane left about 30 minutes early, every passenger is supposed to be in the airport 2 hours prior to the flight, and my mobile was dead remember? So even if they called there was no way i could've known.. From any point of view this was my bad..

To make things worse, I called my CA in ALSA.. She was understanding, but she also told me that even if i get to Jakarta by train, I'd arrive on Monday (10 hour trip), and I'd be no use since apprently if i didnt judge the preliminaries, i'm not eligible to adjudicate in the elimination rounds..

7 years.. For 7 years my career in debating hardly has any taint in it, and now it does. I realize i was unprofessional; i didnt help out a lot prior to the competition, i skipped 2 days of the competition to return to Jogja, and now i can't even make it till the rest of the tournament. I know now how lousy I can be professionally. I suppose i try to see it on a positive note, I still think this is all worth the trouble. I blame no one but myself.

Apparently, the Pathetic Traveller not only finds travel stupidity in the journey, but it can also be in the form that even before the journey starts i manage to make a fool of myself.. hahahahaha

The things i do..

I'm pretty sure you people have done crazy things, i'm convinced that a lot of you have sacrificed things just to prove something, especially when its to that person that matters..

This is therefore a classical story, but i just thought i'd share mine, and the things i do..

Let's not mention names, just for the sake of privacy and stuff.. And no this isn't an episode of the Pathetic Traveller, but apparently when i travel alone i still find that stupid things happens to me.. so here goes me and my story..

I couldn't publish this anytime sooner, because for the last 1 month i've been cooking a plan, a plan to throw this girl a surprise party, and it's not just an everyday party that we're used to (at least that's how i see it)

Credits goes to 2 of her close friends, and 1 of mine, which without them this story would never be able to be written right here right now..

My surprise for her comes a little late, about 24 hours late actually, 1 day after the actual birth day.. I don't mind, i believe that people need space and she probably had plans of her own in this party, which you will read later on that i found this to be true actually.. I planned to throw a surprise party, but not in a hotel, not in a fancy restaurant, not in my place, or her place, but in an orphanage.. Yes, i plotted that this special event will be held in an orphanage with around 50-60 kids.. I feel that there's no better way to share your happiness than to share it with those whom cannot enjoy happiness on an everday basis..

I find out later that this plan criss-crosses with my pledge to help out the team in ALSA E-comp *curses*... i know that because of campus i've been abandoning a lot of my work for ALSA, and i do know that added with me skipping 2 days of the competition would definitely blotch my professionalism, and my reputation in debating. I am sorry to the team in ALSA, but this is just something that i can un-do, it's one of those things that you'd just do even if you know it kills your name, but you also know that you're less of a person if it doesn't happen.. more or less how i felt about this..

At last after offering my resignation and selling Sani's name, they decided better to give me the luxury of the time off.. So if you must know this is my itinerary for in between 15-22 April 2009;

- 15 April flew to Jakarta, stayed a night in Sani's place, departed 1345 hours from Jogja

- 16 April drove to Depok, where UI Campus is, worked from 0900 to 1800 hours accrediting judges from Universities all over the country. 3 hour recess, at 2100 hours i continued with motion designing up until 0300 hours, 17 April.

- 17 April, at 0025 hours i slipped for 5 minutes out of the night session to make sure i send her a birthday sms, then continued to work till 0300 hours. From 0300 to 0400 hours had a chat with an old friend about life hahahaha.. at 0400 hours my cab leaves for the airport, got onto a plane on 0600 hours, arived in Jogja at 0700 hours.

- 18 April, from 0900 to 1300 hours prepared the surprise. Event ran from 1400 hours to around 1600 hours.

- 19 April, 1245 hours is my flight to Jakarta, continue my duties for the ALSA e-comp team.

Crazy? Maybe. Necessary? Definitely.

Arriving at the airport at 5 in the morning on the 17th, i find that the cab drivers a little upset for some reason (which i found out later because that i fell asleep on the cab and probably snored, and that before falling asleep i forgot to give him money for toll fares and stuff so he had to take it from his own pocket) so with unease and guilt i gave him extra fares, which then he smiled *me growls* least the guy is happy, I'm on a mission and i don't need a person cursing me with bad luck.

Then i noticed people was looking at me with mocking looks. Apparently i decided to only wear a tee, shorts, sandals to the airport, and people somehow judge that violates like some unwritten ethic code or something. Okay, i don't need this, so i went to the toilet to change. Remember this toilet? At noon you'd see men offloading baggage, but at this time of hour you only see the dark. Okay that's a nice change from the noon views but it still ain't helping, people should be guaranteed that when they pee, they have lovely views, at least thats a slice of happiness we deserve. Went out with changed clothings; semi-formal clothing, jeans, and my air force 1 sneakers. I walk out with confident which then dropped drastically when the cleaning guy knew i changed and passed a snigger at me *curses*

Let's fast forward this a bit; in a nutshell i met some loud group of chinese women out for holidays, met some guy who for some reason were wearing sunglasses at 5 in the morning, then nearly missed a flight because i sat on the wrong waiting zone.. i was sleep deprived, the flight attendants were not nice, and i was alone.. so i slept the flight thru.. Landed in Jogja and AirAsia had a dangerous landing, nearly jumped up again upon landing and into my doom.. Let's skip that part ><

The rest of the day was only catching up with sleep at home and went to the orphanage to lock the rundown of things. At that night, my friend Agung was having his birthday the day before, so he took me and Heru, my room mate, to this seafood place.. Upon arrival we parted with Heru for a while as he's off to sell some goodies.. After getting a table, this conversation happened

- "Dit, i think i saw **** (locked her name, remember) inside.."

- "Oh, yeah?" (thinking of greeting, but decided not to) "Well, lets leave her alone, order in shall we?"

- Agung is extraordinarily quiet, so i had time to think [Wait, she isnt supposed to see me here!! If she does all my plans will crumble to the ground!!!]

What happened next was stupid, we plotted a plan how i can survive without being noticed (seriusly the squid hotplate is too good to pass). So i hid in Agung's car, foolishly enjoying music, realizing one of the guys in the group of friends with her, felt a little uncomfortable with that but who cares. 1.5 hours ladies and gentlemen, 1.5 hours i was trapped like a duck waiting for her group to go.. and when they finally left, the electricity in the place passed out.. Nice..

The next day (earlier today actually), i was busy preparing this and that, ordered food, picking up a cake and prayed the whole journey that it didnt become melted or squashed (imagine a 25-30 cm diameter cake bought by motorcycle), then worked with my friend and the orpahange ids and had a little audition in singing "Happy birthday"..

All in all, I think things go according to plan neatly, and I'm happy. To see that expression on her when she saw the kids was holding out to her a cake with candles on it and the symphony of the imrpovised orchestra of orphan kids singing the happy birthday song with fun and sense of unity as their sole capital of synchronization, for me it meant the world. I have invested lots, I have spent time, i have depleted my energy. But to see the smile carved on her face throughout the event, it makes the pain i had to endure unfelt. There's only certain people who can draw up what i felt today doing this in the composition of descriptive sentences, and i am not one of them, so i wont try.

Tommorow i will be heading back to Jakarta. As dreamy as things are today, it all must come back to reality, i need to face angry people tommorow, but at least i'm facing them knowing that today i'm a man who accomplished a mission.

This is my story. This is what I do for those who are significant in my life. What's your story?

Pathetic Traveller's - Euro Pathetrip

(DRUMROLLLL....) JRENNNGGGGG JENNNGGG JENNGGGG JJRREEEEENNNNGGG ploink ploink (tune of "Final COuntdown" playing) SHOOOOBIDUBIDUMMMMM LALALALA TRALALA TRILILI YOODDLE-III-UUUWWWW (lights, sound, fart.. ACTION!!)

We're back!

From the nasty tales of the journeys of two impoverished students of Jogja, we present to you another product of Vivid Productions.. In this episode of the "Pathetic T

raveller", I will be presenting montage of photos from our euro pathetrip.. the uncen

sored version hahaha.. you know how people say that pictures can talk thousands of words, well we think pictures can also display stupidity!! In this first part, you will see how the kickass duo cope with new environment, cold temperature, and all round hill-billy-ness (popular slang in Indonesian is "ndeso"-red)..

we're almost pretty convinced we look pretty cool in this winter dress-up..

this is us wondering why in God's good world did we ever dare to even sign up for this competition..

i can almost swear Sani has NOT been drinking in the gala...

This is where the brave duo stalls in front of an XXX ADULT STORE arguing and pushing each other on who should enter the store first.. wish there were more of these stores in the old country!!

We thought this could be good for a part of a promotion campaign that UCC can do --that is if they want their students to all resign--

These pictures are copyright protected, any illegal take over of this right will given reward as these pictures contain toxic level of stupidity and we really dont want them..

Okay, that's enough for today's episode, we'll be back from more euro and ALSA actions!!!

Pathetic Traveller's Big Day Out

Okay, so some of you may now, but most of you probably don't. Between the dates of 15 April to 22 April 2009 I'm helping out UI (Universitas Indonesia) in their annual Law Faculty Debating Championship (ALSA E-Comp), and that means making trips to Jakarta prior and post competition.

In this year's e-comp i sit in as the DCA --deputy chief adjudicator-- which means that i help out in motion design, adjudicators' accreditation, and room allocations, etc etc.. it's not simple work, i do feel guilty i haven't really been maximum in my work before d-day as campus demands have been quite a spoonful for me :-/

Sani (you're starting to hear this guy's name a lot, not that it's because of some other peculiar reason! but simply we are involved in activities which the consequences are travelling together; thing is, nothing ever goes right around the "pathetic travellers") will be featured in this blog.

In today's episode of the never ending series of the "pathetic travellers", the mighty duo is taking on the big rotten apple; Jakarta!

I start having that query uneasy feeling when before the trip Sani mentions 2 things;

- "Dit, we're picking up my car in Eastern Jakarta. The thing is i've no clue on Jakarta.."

- "Our AirAsia plane will be landing in Terminal 3 in Soekarno-Hatta airport"

ring-a-ding-ding, my mind goes.. hmm, it does kinda tingle.. problemo numero uno is that Sani wants me to co-drive this car with him, and we have to cross all the way from East Jakarta, thru Central Jakarta, to South Jakarta, and go a few more clicks south to Depok, where UI is.. Jakarta may be one of the most frighetning places on earth for me, because the thought of getting lost is even more possible in this city more than any other in the world (this applies to me, sampling uses 1 case where my mum and i lost contact on a train in Jakarta and she had to pick me up 3 stations later.. this never happened to me ever, not before that incident nor after it.. so my statistics are valid).. 

ring numero duo; did i hear right that AirAsia is landing in Terminal 3?? Okay, this is nopt my first time flying out, and there's always only been 2 flight terminals in that airport. So what's this T3 thing? Cold sweats is washing down my spine *gulp*

to fast forward the story (we went to the airport, debated on getting the new edition of The Economist or not, argued which flight attendant is most cute, cursed myself since my plane seat didnt work if i laid back on it it'd fall down to the back and i dont think the guy behind me would find it funny if my face appears on what was his magazine 2 seconds ago), we arrived in this T3, and voila! It appears to be an expansion for the airport.. Place was lovely, brand new, the toilet had a design that when you pee you get to see men loading off baggage.. nice, could've given us views of trees or lovely ladies, but no *sigh*

after a whole night panicking how we would get to Jakarta's central station the next day (to pick up the devilish university debate team), we decided to nick the map Sani's uncle had.. He was in the driver's seat and i was his loyal navigator.. kawai!^^

Although I have read Allan and Bar'bara Pease's book "Why women can't read maps and men never listen", I find a factual error on the facts stated in that book. I can't read maps also! As part of the male sub-race archetype i made all sorts of reason to Sani; "this map is outdated", "it's the government's fault they had poor urban planning" etc etc..

Still it doesn't really help when you're entering a state of "lost". I often hear National Geographic's jingle for every traveller; "Let's get lost". They obviously have never been to Jakarta.

Isn't it ironic that we got lost in our own Capital City of the state???

It's a good thing that we found our way back on track. Initially we thought we were participants of that show, The Amazing Race, having being lost and all, and we were thinking of paying someone to drive ahead of us showing the way hahahaha..

After around 1.5-2 hours (i'd imagine normally it takes less than that long), we found our way.. yay! Only to find that the train the kids was taking was late 30 minutes *curses**bangs head on monitor*

It may seem that this adventure is caused by our stupidity, but as part of the FAA regulation on reality shows on blogs, it is our obligation to provide you some moral sense within the story; cities should be comprehensive, and its not asking too much because the level of comprehension that people have upon its city is parallel to the level of influx of visitors upon the city.. and this is the capital city for cryin out loud, not some hobo hillbilly places in the middle of a jungle!

How can people have that slogan "Visit Indonesia Year" when the tourists don't even know how to get to places. Holidays = stress reduction. Not the other way round. Another prove of the weak links of this country, wants to bite off more than they can chew..

European cuisine dancing in the tounge of an Asian

Let's start with the premise that i'm an eater. I love food, i love to eat. I basically eat all (except eggplant, and too much caviar) forms of cooking.

I see cooking as an art. So let's start talking about the art of cooking in Europe. My sampling is of course subjective (this is after my blog not yours haha) and through my experiences of entering the lands of gold, gospel and glory.. I lived in Europe once, yet maybe at the time my juvenile tounge hasn't got itself comfortable with certain stereotypes of food, which unfortunately for now it has a mind of its own and can decide what's good or not :p

You see me and a mate, Sani (I've mentioned him before) was on this debating tournament in Cork (not cock, mind you!), about a 5 hour trip from Dublin, Ireland (people there pronouce the country as "eirann"). Of course besides the scenery and the lovely caucasian girls that i admire in the winter symphony, one of my adventures was to taste the delicacy of their food once again (debate was simply an added bonus.. i mean torture)

However this time I'd have to say i was neither singing nor dancing having taste the food they have over there. Don't get me wrong, I still think in many ways its still an artistic form of the human creation (then again in art you have those abstract paintings that makes your head tilt and say "hmmmmm" while trying to understand whether the painter meant something or was simply throwing blobs on canvas :Peace:). 

Okay, so let's start with breakfast; while most of the food at breakfast was free, for some of the time i had to spend 10 euros on a single breakfast (coming from a country who 80% of its population eats off less than 1 euro every day, this is drawback numero uno for me). Breakfast is usually plentiful and brawny; the casual eggs and ham, with a side of bread, jam, butter, and orange juice (still puny compared to what US people eat for breakfgast though -hey that country's mentioned again --"). This I find neutral, i guess bulky breakfasts with meat is something i cannot argue. Debating people would call this "truistic" or "non debatable". Nerds.

Moving on to lunch. This is where moi finds most problematics with. I understand that most Europeans are "on-the-go" people, yet i come from a culture that once Europe had, like the Gaelic people who enjoyed good slow times relishing their food until the Romans come and old Obelix has to smash them with his Menhir (okay getting a little outta focus here.. moving on). The lunch is very distinguishable; simple sandwhich with salami, or plain salad (which seems very much like simple chopped vegetables thrwon into one plate for me). So there's this lecturer from another university in Indonesia whom despise we resent very very much, she bought Indonesian chilli sauce! Praise the madam praise the madam smooch smooch.. So that saved our lives. To add to the note, pepper and salt is used by me very much in lunch times, I'mnow thinking of researching the amount of salt and pepper consumption Europeans have for lunch times, triple compared to breakfast I'd imagine.

To end this, we'll go to dinner. This part of the day is most relieving for me. After loosing 3 rounds of debate, a nice warm fat steak is enough to comfort me again. I'd say its still in the plain side of taste, however. But at breakfast i don't long for lunch, and at lunch i crave for dinner. One of the best meals we had at the time was in this boutique Thai restaurant, which was lovely. Actually not too lovely, but combined with 7 days of bitter weather and food complications, this was practically a paradise for our taste buds. Yet, our community back at home would smack us in the arses if they knew how much we'd spent that night for a decent meal.. 80 euros!

You must understand this is not a mockery, but its more of a testimonial of how a lost, impoverished Asian dude finds the everyday meals of a whole different continent from way back home. I still appreciate European food. Yet next time I'll be sure to bring more herbs, stackloads of instant noodles just in case..

There's more stories from Europe, which in later episodes i will name "Tales of the Pathetic Travellers" credits to myself, Sani my mate, and Europe for giving us a blast of an experience! Bravo!