My Iranian Dream Route

homeintheair9 Comments

As you guys already know, Iran was one of my favorite travel destinations. Why? I have explained it in the Top Visited Destinations page, check it out.

But I have not been everywhere, and I certainly want to go back and visit the rest. The country is wonderfully big. That is why I have planned a route that I will do in Iran at some point. The route of my dreams:

Map_iran_nonames

Lets start from the green dot: Tehran

Tehran

The cheapest place to fly to is Tehran, so the first place will be here. You gotta visit the capital and one of the largest cities of the world. But what is there to see here? Palaces, mosques, bazars, the photogenic Azadi Tower and the real life. A must for me is to walk around the old Rey city within Tehran. It is one of the oldest cities in the region and contains endless historical monuments and tales.
Duration: 4 days at least.

Badab Surt

Travelling east, first stop is Badab Soort which is an incredible natural phenomenon you will not see anywhere else in the world. I think the picture speaks for itself.
Duration: 6 hours for the journey and the stay there in total.

Badab-e_Surt_Samaee

Khalidnabi

Same day I would travel even further east to the very secluded place of Khalidnabi. It is basically a small mosque containing the tomb of a prophet named Khalid. I don’t know much about him, but the quite graveyard and the little prophetic mosque looks stunning on pictures. First time I saw this place I thought I have to come here!
Duration: 4 hours inclusive travel time

khalidnabi

Mashhad

Heading same day further east to Mashhad I would probably arrive at night and try to find a place to sleep. Luckily Mashhad is a city that never sleeps. Being the most holy city in Iran this is a must see for everyone. And it is pretty famous for having one of the most beautiful and largest mosques, the Imam Reza mosque. Here ceremonies are held every day and the city and mosque and museums takes days to absorb. Also interesting cities like Neyshabur, the Kang Village and others are close by. Ideally, I would go to Turkmenistan from there but Turkmenistan is very hard to get into so I will leave it out from this blog post.
Duration: 5 days

WP_20160324_19_51_00_Pro

Yazd

From Mashhad I would continue south to Yazd to enjoy the extremely iconic architecture. The skyline of this city gives purpose to the lives of photographers. Not to mention the beauty of the Amir Chakhmaq Complex.
Duration: 3 days

Yazd

Shiraz

South west is the next stop. Shiraz stands out with its gardens. Here the Eram Garden is one of the most beautiful gardens in the world and I definitely wanna see it. But the best reason to come here is to visit Naqsh-e Rustam and Persepolis. Some of the most ancient archaeological finds in the world. This is where Iran really shows it’s rich history.
Duration: 4 days

Naqsh rustam

Susa

Okay, now the trip really starts to get interesting. Travelling north west I will get through some really culturally interesting places like the Ahwaz, but my destination is the city of Susa where the tomb of Prophet Daniel lies in a holy mosque. This is no ordinary mosque, and even sharing a “google” picture hurts my heart. I just wanna see it myself.
Duration: 1 day

Karmenshah

Here is more super ancient history. The site of Taq Bostan displays rock reliefs that I want to study.
Duration: 1 day

Isfahan

Do I need to say more? Of course everyone wants to come here to experience the incredible mosques and architecture.
Duration: 3 days

Kashan

Okay here I have a lot of things to do. The most important one is buying a real handmade Persian rug. Kashan is the best place to do that. If you know anything about Persian rugs you have for sure heard about the Kashan. But there is more: Other than being just as pretty as Isfahan here lies the ancient underground city of Nushabad. This place is just mind blowing to read about. Imagine an ancient time where humans actually lived beneath earth, sheltering themselves from the sunlight. It is a mystery why. These ancient underground cities are being discovered all over the world and no one has yet understood why.
Duration: 4 days

Nushabad

Visadar

Okay, now I would probably wanna go Qom to see the most religious city in Iran or to Tabriz to see the stone houses, but I will probably be exhausted and my time is running up. I will probably go north to Visadar to relax at the waterfalls for a day before heading back to Tehran Airport to get back home.
Duration: 1 day

Complete route:

Iranmapnames2

Total Duration: 27 days

I will never have that long vacation again 😥

So what do you think guys? Are all the places worth it? What wouldn’t you do? And what did I leave out that I definitely should go see? If you are an expert on Iran or lives there let me know your opinion please! 🙂

Seven modern wonders of the world

homeintheair11 Comments

In my last post I called the CERN facilities in Switzerland “our times Wonder of the world”. It made me think what else out there could be categorized as such and I made a list of 7 wonders of the modern world.

The originals

Do you remember the original Seven Wonders of the World? The ancient ones are all destroyed except the Pyramids of Giza. Later few architects agreed upon naming a new list with structures that still are standing today. This is maybe the more famous one featuring well known landmarks like: Taj Mahal, The Great Wall of China, Petra and Colosseum amongst others.

Here are the very original 7, and the New 7:

Ancient and new

My modern 7 wonders

In my list I have tried to choose wonders that have the most significant impact on the world we know in 2018. I imagine that nothing will ever beat the Ancient 7 Wonders, because they have simply outperformed anything in their time. In our modern world new technology makes it easier to break records. Therefore, the candidates for this list has been chosen through following criteria:

  1. The level of impact it has had on our self awareness as humans
  2. Shown an outstanding achievement in our ability to create.
  3. Is memorable and iconic.
  4. Is going to be well preserved for centuries.
  5. Has an actual function rather than just made to show off.

I was trying to think what they will remember us for 3000 years away from now. Which landmarks will be visited by tourists 3000 years from now? What has transformed into museums?

Here is the list: The Seven Wonders of the Modern World

Modern

A little bit about every one and the reason

  1. Large Hadron Collider, CERN, Switzerland
    I have mentioned the importance of this facility many times before. Basically it has been the reason for many important discoveries and helped us understand the universe better. If you wanna read a little bit more about it, check my blog post here.
  2. Panama Channel, Panama
    Besides being one of the longest and hardest engineering projects in the history and killing more than 25000 people in the making,  the Panama Channel has even today a huge impact on the history. It is basically the number one reason behind USA’s success and super power status today. The importance of maritime force and trade is way more than you imagine. Destroy the Panama Channel, and you will see the decline of the US power pretty quickly. This is also the main reason why I chose the Panama Channel above the Suez Channel which is longer and just as impressive engineering wise.
  3. ISS, Outer Space
    Need I say more? The International Space Station of course is a wonder. Not only the whole world is collaborating, but it is collaborating to reach out into space. In 3000 years when the Earth is only visited for tourism they will visit this station and say.. here it all started!
  4. The Palm, United Arab Emirates
    The Palm is so iconic that it doesn’t need introduction. The reason why it made it to the list is, that it shows a whole new era of narcissism. We have build islands before, but never in a shape to impress people from the air. In addition, this could be the start of a new era of creating land instead of conquering it.
  5. NEEMO, Aquarius, USA
    This facility is maybe the least known on the list. NEEMO is an underwater laboratory ran by NASA. They basically send their astronauts here to live underwater in 3 weeks to prepare them for the harsh space environment. Again, this place had a huge impact on making us understand our own capabilities as human beings and therefore it made it to the list. As a teen I dreamt about being sent there and finally to space.
  6. Burj Khalifa, United Arab Emirates
    Now this one I was a bit in doubt about. It is the tallest building in the world, the skyscraber of skyscrabers. But the record will soon be overthrown by another tower in Saudi Arabia. However, I decided to include it because this really kickstarted the race to the skies. In addition, being located in the desert, this building has a very important function of keeping the whole city of Dubai together. Everything in Dubai is done indoors and the need for huge a building is therefore legit.
  7. Dìxià Chéng, China
    This is another less known facility. Can you imagine that beneath the capital city of Beijing is a nuclear shelter large enough to house the whole population of 6 million people of Beijing? Well this is the name of this shelter. Just the thought of it makes you get goosebumps. Hopefully, no one would ever nuke China and it will stand as a memory of the time when humans were so afraid of killing themselves, that they spent billions on structures like this.

Other structures in scope that did not make it to the list: 

  • Transit siberiean railway, Russia
  • Atacama large milimetee array, Chile
  • Hubble telescope, Outer space
  • Three Gorges Dam, China
  • Cheyenne mountain bunker, USA
  • Tokyo train and metro, Japan
  • Shanghai metro, China
  • Hashima Island, Japan
  • Boeing Everett Factory, USA
  • Ski Dubai, UAE
  • Rungrado May Day stadium, North Korea
  • Suez Channel, Egypt
  • Zhangjiajie Glass Bridge, China

Take a look at the candidates. Did I miss any important? Do you think something else deserve to be on the list? Let me know in the comments!

Top one place to visit in Switzerland

homeintheair4 Comments

What if you had the chance to visit Switzerland for 1 day only – what is the one experience you should visit? There are many amazing places in Switzerland but the one I would recommend is the only one I consider an actual Wonder of the World: The CERN campus!

20180329_082817 - 2
Me arriving at the reception in CERN. If I look tired it is because I woke up at 3 am to drive from Bern to Geneve to make it to the early morning guided tour. 

 

What is CERN?

I think most people know CERN by now, but if not then here is a little background:

CERN is the most advances scientific research center in the world. The density of knowledge and great minds in this campus is not seen anywhere else in the world. Also they have the most advanced and the biggest machinery to perform their experiments. The engineering work of this is what I consider the Wonder of the World!

Here they try to answer the most fundamental questions of the universe by experimenting with nuclear particles. This helps us to understand how the world actually were created and unveiling some of the most complex questions about our reality. How does the world work? Why are we here? Can God possibly exist?

Oh yeah.. and they also invented the World Wide Web!

20180329_090510
The worlds very first Large Particle Accelerator. This one is now retired, but they have build even better ones. The Large Hadron Collider is the most famous and biggest – 27 km in diameter.

But it doesn’t seem like something for me?

Maybe you aren’t interested in science but when I say people should come here it is because you will learn a life lesson here. I think every well rounded adult should have at least some basic understanding of what this place does. How are we gonna answer our children’s silly questions if we haven’t even looked into science?

What will you answer if a 5 year old asks you how come we exist? Why we believe in God? Why we don’t believe in God? What is the universe made of? Why can’t I fly? What other universes can you imagine and who is right and who is wrong?

No matter who you are or what you believe in, you should look into this! Bring your brain and come here. Don’t think you know anything about science before you visit this place.

Even if you believe in whatever conclusion you hear the scientist say. You need to come here to understand that this is our times philosophy hub. Answers are never clear even if some people would try to convince you they are.

Everything is free there. Go there and take the guided tour (book in advance). Even if you only grasp 2% of what they are telling you, it will be worth it!

20180329_104219~2
Me philosophizing at CERN xD

What did they find out so far?

I consider myself somewhat a man of science but even I only grasped like half of what the Pakistani scientist told us on the tour. However, the basics is this:

They have built the Large Hadron Collider which is the essence of the Wonder. This is basically a big circular tube under high pressure and low temperature buried 100 meter beneath the Swiss/French border. They use this machine to accelerate beams of particles and make them hit each other right where they have built enormous sensors to detect all data from the explosion, process the data and send the most interesting and newest discoveries to scientists all over the world to analyze.

Discoveries could be new unseen particles, antimatter or bosons. Antimatter is basically the exact opposite of matter.. of everything we know. In theory everything has an opposing counterpart: Night and day, hot and cold, love and hate, matter and antimatter. But for some reason antimatter just disappeared when the world was created. With this machine scientists have been able to recreate it.

Another important discovery was the Higgs Boson that you might have heard about. In simple form the boson is a particle that gives gravity to everything. Gravity is not just something that exist out of nothing, it is an actual particle that gives it. Meaning everything in the world has been in touch with this particle. This was also discovered using this wonder of a machine.

20180329_102502
You can actually see the scientists working on this tour! Isn’t it amazing?

I am not an expert

Okay guys, I am not an expert and I have not discovered the answered to everything. I like to learn always and of course I don’t understand the physics behind this fully. I find it interesting so the above is simplified to make it as easy to read as possible. If I am mistaken please enlighten me!

For me this was a true wonder to see and experience. Just as impressive to be there as it was to visit the Pyramids of Egypt or the Great Wall of China.

Is it unique?

Someone asked the Pakistani scientist if there was any other thing similar. He answered that there are particle accelerators in the USA but they are linear which makes it hard to do the collisions. Also he said that China is doing it as well. I think they are building one just as impressive. But will it be the same wonder? I doubt it.

Not because I don’t trust Chinese science. Not at all! But because CERN is actually international. While Chinese and American like to do everything themselves CERN is open to the world. First of all CERN is totally independent from the industry and military. This is ONLY about science – not war or economy. In my honest opinion peace and science works better together. Only when all the world’s brightest minds work together we can create amazing things – have anyone read the Babylon story of the Bible? Once we get divided by nations and languages we loose everything.

Well in CERN more than 100 nationalities have united their greatest scientists only to enlighten the world in a peaceful manner. You cant feel anything but humbled walking around it’s streets and laboratories. This is a strength not seen anywhere in the world not anywhere in history since the Babel Tower was built!

After walking the tour an old Dutch gentleman asked the scientist: “Amazing.. where do you start?” And the scientist responded: “9 o’clock in the morning”.

20180329_091912
You can’t feel anything but humbled walking around in this place were geniuses have worked their whole life to unveil the mysteries of the universe.

The Travel World Cup 2018

homeintheair4 Comments

Alongside the Fifa World Cup 2018 I have conducted a little competition of my own that I called the Travel World Cup. Here I paired the same countries competing for the Fifa Trophy with the each other, but instead of playing football I was asking a number of people where they would like to go the most.

The rules were simple:

I show a number of people 3 pictures of each country, and they vote for which one they would like to visit the most.

For the group stage matches, I gave points like the following:

  • If a country won the vote with more than 55%: 3 points
  • If the votes came out between 45% – 55 % for each: 1 points for each
  • If the country lost the vote with less than 45%: 0 points

The number of participants varied from match to match but was in average 122 participants.

The same 32 countries competed within the same 8 groups as in the Fifa World Cup. The knock-out phase was also accordingly – however, with the winners of the Travel World Cup group stage instead.

Expectations

Of course there is no World Cup without trying to guess the outcome beforehand. Just like you have an idea that Brazil is a good football team, you also have an idea about which countries people would rather visit.

But to have more clarity I did a survey to see in which continents I should expect the best travel countries to be. Here I paired up the regions and asked where people would rather go backpacking.

Latin America 48 % | 52 % Europe

Australian continent 65 % | 35 % Central Asia

North Africa & Middle East 68 % | 32 % Sub-Saharan Africa

Basically this told me about which countries I should not expect to win. Here Central Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa clearly did not do well.

Any of the remaining regions I expected to do well. Specially Europe, that has some of the most “traditional” favorites for people who has not travelled much. For example, who haven’t heard someone say he would love to visit Paris or Rome or Greece?

My experience is that people are often very concerned with safety while traveling and believe most of what the media is telling about a country. And thus I thought the middle eastern and south american countries would finally lose. My top 4 expectations were: France, Switzerland, Australia and Japan.

The voters:

In average 122 people votes for every match. The maximum amount of votes was 179 for the Argentina-Iceland match. The lowest was 28 votes in the Croatia-Nigeria match.

Depends on where the voters come from it might have a big influence on the outcome. The distribution was as follows:

Where people are from

Another influential factor is how well traveled the voters are. Well basically the voters are you guys, and being on a travel blog already means you have some experience and knowledge about countries.

The voters were also very well traveled. In average, you guys have traveled 13 countries.

And the winner is:

Here it comes.. but if you are interested in more statiscs and analysis you can read the paragraphs after:

Winner is: ICELAND

Winners2

2nd place: Australia
3rd place: Japan

Power ranking:

  1. Iceland
  2. Australia
  3. Japan
  4. Brazil
  5. Morocco
  6. Spain
  7. Mexico
  8. Colombia
  9. Argentina
  10. England
  11. Switzerland
  12. Tunisia
  13. Russia
  14. Denmark
  15. Sweden
  16. Egypt
  17. Costa Rica
  18. Panama
  19. Peru
  20. France
  21. South Korea
  22. Germany
  23. Uruguay
  24. Portugal
  25. Poland
  26. Croatia
  27. Iran
  28. Belgium
  29. Nigeria
  30. Saudi Arabia
  31. Senegal
  32. Serbia

All the results:

Group stage:

 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Brackets:

Brackets

 

Analysis:

The surprises

Let us have a look at the many surprises of this game:

  1. The biggest surprise for me was seeing Iceland win it all! Beating out great travel destinations like Morocco, Denmark, Croatia, Argentina, Japan and Australia. This was a surprise for me, because I do not find Iceland more interesting than so many other places but I guess the northern light has its appeal.
  2. The second big surprise was that France lost big time. It lost all of it’s matches but getting 1 point against Denmark by scoring 48 %.
  3. Colombia is one of the countries you always hear is so dangerous. However, it made it to the quarter finals only beaten by Brazil. This is a huge surprise and made me happy to know that people are not getting afraid of visiting anymore.
  4. Only 2 European countries made it to the quarter finals: Spain and Iceland. I thought Europe was much more popular.
  5. The 4 semi finalists came from each their continent!

Other things I personally found disappointing:

  1. All African countries was eliminated quickly. Morocco made it to the quarter finals, however Egypt lost early to Spain – in my world totally not understandable even though I love Spain!
  2. Iran only received 1 point. Totally underrated Iran!
  3. Serbia being the least attractive travel country of all 32.

Emotions

Well.. it is no secret that I have favorite countries of my own. You can check out my lists of favorite places I have been to and not been to here and here. Therefore, I have been really disappointed with some of the results.

How can Egypt not make it futher than the Round of 16? It should be the number one travel destinations based on quantifying attractions. I mean, the biggest amount of history and archeology – not only related to the Old Egyptians but everything from Whale fossils in the Sahara desert to the amazing Mamluk’s mosques. Also it has borders to 2 different seas and thereby many beautiful beaches. Not to mention the only remaining Wonder of the World – the Pyramids!

Also it is really hard to understand how Iceland can be more popular than culturally unique countries like Japan or enormous countries like Brazil and Australia. Don’t get me wrong, Iceland is beautiful and also has some unique natural sights like the geysers, however most of what you find there can also be found in Norway, Sweden and most interestingly Greenland. The last I would have seen win it all but not Iceland. In anyway – Congratulations to this small but extremely competitive country!

Why did Iceland win?

This got me thinking a little about why Iceland won. There is a statistical logic to it:

Europe was one of the continents voted very popular to backpack in. However, because most of the voters were Europeans they probably have visited most of the “common” European countries already. Iceland, however, is in the outskirts of Europe and is often forgotten and hard to reach. It is still Europe though, so very popular and the only country not visited so it got all the European votes as well.

Of course this is just a statistical explanation, but of course Iceland is a legit interesting place to visit. It’s uniqueness is undeniable and so it deserves to win!

Here are some of the comments for why Iceland was chosen in the final game:

“Iceland intrigues me so much. I’d love to go in the winter and visit the Blue Lagoon and natural hot springs”

“I chose Iceland because it is so much lesser known than Australia”

“Hard decision! But I have already been to Australia so I want to give Iceland a try”

“It just looks like an unbelievable country, those places you only see in TV”

“I want to see the Northern Light!”

How people perceived the question had a big influence

There is a big difference in how the voters perceived the question: “Which country would you rather visit?”

I have seen people from the country asked for to vote for it just to support their own country. Others have always voted on the opposite country than their own because why would you visit a country you live in?

Others have probably perceived the question as “which country is best to travel in?” so they voted for that even if they have already visited and seen it all.

It is hard to avoid these differences in how people vote. Let me know how you perceived it in the comments and if there is anything to do to ensure alignment in the perception for next time!

Next tournament?

Is it gonna be in 4 years? Or should I do it more often with other countries? Maybe some that doesn’t necessarily make it to the FIFA Football World Cup? Should I do this every year?

Let me know in the comments if you enjoyed it, enjoyed reading it and how often you want me to do this? Maybe never again? 😛

The prejudice about Albanians and my experience traveling there

homeintheair8 Comments
20180430_120618~2
InsThe Albanian Flag – picture taken by me 

When I told my colleagues back home that I will be traveling to Albania their reaction was a surprised face with the words: “Albania? I have heard they are a bunch of thieves over there!” and then the jokes started about stolen Mercedes’s and terrorism.

To be honest, the reaction disappointed me a lot but did not surprise me. Albania is one of these many countries with a bad reputation for absolutely no good reason. Actually no reason at all.

Where does the prejudice come from?

I will not attempt to explain this because there is never an excuse to have prejudice. So the answer is that it comes from narrow minded people. Any person who thinks bad about another entire population or ethnicity is either stupid or consciously evil which is worse.

That said, Albania has large disputes with other countries about territories – thus many neighboring countries have a large Albanian minority and as you guys know, minorities are always picked on. Again – because of stupidity.

Another answer is the media! I have heard specially bad things about the Italian media portraying Albanians as criminals and drug dealers. Again – not an excuse to actually believing in it.

What is the deal with Kosovo?

You might have heard that 3 Swiss football players made the Albanian eagle sign after scoring against Serbia in the FIFA World Cup 2018. The players have roots in Kosovo, so why the Albanian eagle?

IMG_20180708_032210_e
The Eagle sign by Shaqiri (Picture belongs to Yahoo Sports).

Here is the quick story:
There once was a country named Yugoslavia that consisted of many different people: amongst others; Slovenians, Croats, Bosnians, Serbians, Montenegrins, Macedonians and Albanians. Albania was not a part of Yugoslavia though. The Albanians living in Yugoslavia were from a region close to Albania but on the Yugoslavian side called Kosovo.

At some point the country split up (after a long bloody war). The Serbians tried to keep the country together under their rule but no one else wanted that. Eventually they agreed upon borders and everyone settled with their own country – except Kosovo. Because Albania existed, they were seen as immigrants by the Serbs and the right to have their own country was not recognized. Of course they could not just merge with Albania, because that would have been seen as an “invasion”.

Long story short – after a long struggle Kosovo is now recognized by most countries as an independent country. Not Albania, not Serbia – just Kosovo.

So how is Albania actually?

Mind blowing! It is certainly the most underrated country in Europe. Surely, you have already heard about the beauty of Belgrade, the famous bridge of Mostar and the amazing waterfalls of Plitvica. All those are well known tourist attractions in Balkan, while Albania is almost empty for tourists despites it’s unique history and beauty.

The people are very friendly and are actually good English speakers. I did not encounter any even slightly suspicious behavior from anyone. The country is very diverse religiously and everyone seem to respect the other’s way of living.

Albania has had a very dark history and was one of the last countries to recognize the end of the cold war, and that is very pronounced when you visit. You see it in the museums and the architecture of Tirana.

The Albanians are also very honest about their history, and they are not shy to talk about it and explain it to you. Because of that, their museums are very interesting. If you have been to Berlin, you would maybe think their museums were interesting but also a bit depressing. Tirana’s museums will not depress you but terrify you. And while Berlins museums are kinda apologizing for the horror, Tirana’s are just pure honest which makes them so much more interesting!

I will soon be doing another blog post about the history of Albania and what you can expect and learn from that country. If you are interested in knowing more let me know 🙂

 

 

The best European capitals

homeintheair2 Comments

Europe

Here is the list of my favorite capitals of Europe that I have visited. So remember the list does not included non-capital cities which Europe and also it does not include capitals that I have not visited yet.

1. London

London is my number one city in Europe and worldwide coming in at a 3rd place. I love to get lost in it’s busy hipster streets. This multicultural city has such a high density of hipsters and creative people that you will find gems on every second street you step your foot on.  Seriously, it’s magic is real and one of those cities I could see myself living in.

2. Rome

Rome is just a historical fist hitting you right in between your eyes. There are so many must sees in this city. It even contains a whole country within it – The Vatican. Exploring the history of the romans and the Christianity really makes you feel you are in the middle of something huge. This feeling is everything I look for when traveling.

3. Prague

Prague is the grown-ups Disneyland. With all it’s castles, beautiful bridges, colors and spires it really looks something from a fairytale. It is also a very underrated city that does not get much attention. In addition, because I am a fan of horology I just have to love Prague for having the Astronomical Clock. A must see!

4. Tirana

Maybe the most underrated capital of Europe. Tirana is the capital of Albania and is truly unique not only as a European capital but also different from the rest of the world. Here you can smell the after effects of the cold war and the brutal regime. It has some of the same elements of Berlin, but while you just get sad visiting the trains of the World War II and the cold war in Berlin, in Tirana you just get horrified. But Tirana is much more than just that – it is rich in beauty with it’s colored streets, mosques and churches and the mountainous background.

5. Bern

Bern is the most cozy capital of Europe. It really makes you feel you took a time machine 50 years back. It’s streets are old, it’s cars are old and it’s people are old.. very much in contrast to the rest of Switzerland. And it is beautiful! And there is a bear walking around. It really is one worth a visit – and the best thing of all: Huge discounts on swiss timepieces!

6. Madrid

Madrid faints a bit in relation to the beauty of the many other wonderful Spanish cities (and no I definitely do not mean Barcelona). But Madrid should not be underestimated. It has some of the most beautiful spots in Europe. The presidential palace is one unique sight. It’s food markets are also exceptional. In general it is hard not to have fun in Madrid!

7. Stockholm

Stockholm is probably the most beautiful of the 3 Scandinavian capitals although Copenhagen comes quite close. Stockholm is basically not a city but a bunch of interconnected small islands which makes it look gorgeous. Also it has a vast variety of very interesting museums – Vasa and the Noble Price museum to mention few.

8. Paris

Paris used to be my number one city in Europe as a teen. I have been there 4-5 times and still I love it. But my taste changed and the city changed. It is a dirty and rude city – now it is said. But it’s epic architecture is still beautiful and photogenic and you will enjoy sightseeing there a lot.

9. Sofia

One of the most charming cities I have ever visited. It’s mountainous background is breath taking. It is cheap and has a lot of delicious food. For some reason the Bulgarians don’t know how to cook badly. It is also the only city that has 4 churches for different branches of Christianity, a mosque and a synagoge right besides each other.

10. Brussels

How to make a list of European capitals without including the actual capital of Europe? Brussels is quite interesting and having signs all over the city in 2-3 languages really confirm the feeling of being in the heart of Europe.

What else?

What did not make it to the list? I have visited 10 other capitals of Europe. You can find them in the template-section by clicking here.

 

A thought from the Colosseum and today’s violent media

homeintheair5 Comments

 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Did it not occur to anyone in the audience that getting entertained by seeing slaves get eaten by beasts is madness? That it is not okay to get entertained by seeing other struggle to death? Or did no one question it because everyone thought this is normal? It was just the custom. And everyone was happily entertained so who would ever question it?

Do we do anything today that is wrong but never  questioned because that’s what everyone is doing? Any behavior or daily thing they in the future might think is crazy? Are we even better than they were back then? Did we only stop this madness and replaced it by wars so we can get entertained in the news instead of in the arena? Is it wrong to get entertained by action, war and horror movies? Maybe the characters aren’t real but we still get entertained by seeing others suffer and struggle.

In the future,  will they think we are bad people for watching the news and movies? Do we fool ourselves thinking its informative and educational while in reality it’s nothing but entertainment?

Probably not..  But who knows what future people might think about us. The point is, I am not sure we are better humans than the romans. Maybe on the individual level we are  but as a generation as an era or an age we are probably not.

It is just beyond my understanding how people can do to each other what we see in the news today. But anyway, sorry for the depressing thoughts. But history is often cruel – luckily it is in the past and we can actually learn if we study it, travel to it and think about it. Always search for history when you visit a new place! 😉

IMG_20170406_194115_516.jpg