Taking the black (beret)

"Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children. I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post. I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls. I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men. I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all nights to com." [George RR Martin, "A game of thrones"]

For me it is better than that. Tomorrow I am starting my military service but it will be only for nine months.


We found this tank in Kiev, in the museum of the great patriotic war. Sasha told us a lot of things about it. It appears to have been the most powerful weapon of the soviet army during WWII. Then I couldn't imagine that I would have to deal with something like this a year and 3 months later.

This is also my first try of  "forging" a photo. One person was GIMPed out of it.

Hope to see you again soon.

P.S. By the way, TV series "Game of Thrones" rocks, as well as the novel. I am taking with me the latter, with the hope that I will have time to read a bit.

Picnic in Paris

I bet many of you have noticed the spikes people use on exposed surfaces to keep birds away. It seems that this particular bird could not care less :) I guess people should reconsider their effectiveness.

In the mean time, at the background you can see a typical Parisian activity, that is picnic by the river. We realized quite soon that we had to do the same as the food in Paris is very, very, very expensive!
There is one district though that has more reasonable prices, but we found out about it on our last day in the city. More on this tomorrow!

Up and down

The world is turning upside down!

We are in the middle of a tremendous economic crisis, a man-made satellite is about to crash on Earth, there might be neutrinos that travel faster than the light in vacuum and Facebook made yet another change.

If the world does end in 2012 I will not be surprised at all!


Spotted: under the pyramid in Louvre, what was hidden there again?

A facepalm for a minister

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Today, I read in the greek press:

• People with income as low as 5000 euros will be taxed. (Poverty limit by eurostat: 6500 euros). The official justification is that with this measure the high incomes which are hidden from the state will be spotted.
• The minister of economy declared that we are not in a crisis but we try to avoid to become like Argentina, with complete destruction of economy, institutions, social fabric and the production base of the country. Someone should tell him that we are already there. And any rags left by the previous governments are day by day destructed by him and the rest of the gang.
• The same guy told that the recently introduced temporary fee on real estate for 2011 and 2012 will be permanent and included in the regular tax system from 2013. I am relieved! I feared that it would become permanent from now.

Then, I browsed through the photos we shot in Paris earlier this summer. And found this one. Should I feel desperate? should I laugh? Facepalm!

In the park

There is something about this picture that I like a lot. Maybe it is the colors, maybe the composition...
Spotted in the English garden in Munich one summery day.

(This beautiful picture belongs to Kostas, posted with his permission :) )

The barrel is now open!

Wow, these are very dedicated people!
From what I'm guessing, the barrel is now open and people are parading once more (from overwhelming joy?). But this time the weather was not on their side. The group suffering the more is the musicians. The other people carry umbrellas conveniently enough!

What is also puzzling, is that there are people standing for more than an hour watching the parade passing by...

Octoberfest

It is this time of the year again! Octoberfest is here!!

Today was the first day and the parade of the owners of the breweries reached the Theresienwiesen, place of the Octoberfest. Tomorrow, the mayor will open the first barrel of beer and offer the first glass to the prime minister of Bavaria.

In the picture you see just a glance from the parade, the beer carried from the Hofbräu München maybe the most famous bavarian brewery. I have no idea if the barrels are empty or not :)

Fun facts about the Octoberfest,
- it started 200 years ago as a celebration of King Ludwig's wedding
- people like to wear their traditional clothes (dirndl for the women, lederhose for the men)
- Munich hosts 6 million visitors in a period of 3 weeks
- 6 million liters of beer are being consumed and 3 million chickens (it is typical to eat half a chicken)
- there are tourists everywhere!!!

Nice... what?

Remember the fresh fruit in Rome? This time we found 'nice hair' (orea malia = ωραία μαλλιά) in Bologna!

It is funny how all the languages have influenced each other during the centuries... And it is even funnier how the same word sometimes means different things!

Tell us, do you have any funny examples of mixing up words which sound the same but have completely different meanings in different languages?