:: @ Choepie’s ::

In order to give a bit of a better idea where I’m hanging out.. I incorportated googlemaps from now on… there’s still shitloads of work to be done, but at least you have already an idea how Spain looks like… just click here to see the map of Spain, or click on the right menu. To access. The red markers on there, are checkpoints, where I’ve been lately and I’ll link some blog entries over there… to be continued.

Thanks to Andy, who’s code I raped to make this possible !

All good things come to an end. When everybody thinks there’s still enough time left, suddenly the time is now. Andy prepared his trip around the world for almost a year and gave us frequent updates. While we were all interested, the thought stayed, yeah, plenty of time left… suddenly an email comes for a Leaving do… Last friday it was. It was excellent, quick and dirty. We did an attempt ‘Bar crawl Lapalma’. Cyclist would qualify this as a 1st category. It’s not the first time we do an attempt, we tried this on one of the leaving do’s with Gareth as well. We failed both times. (or should I say won ?)… I really can’t remember. Then again, all good things come in pairs… a second leaving do for Andy is scheduled for tonight. The plan is to take it a lot easier then last friday. Another plan that is doomed to fail.

My parents were calling me to check if I was still alive… it has been a long time since I let something known… actually, I´m shit busy. Last weekend Ana and me spend in Leon. Not before taking Isabel and her little Ana out for a day. She’s having a hard time for the moment so a bit of fresh air felt well. Ana ofcourse enjoyed the fresh air around Madrid and we hardly noticed she was there ! Leon was for Friday, Saturday and Sunday. We really liked it, and the weather was excellent. A visit to the Musac is worth some time. Got to leave you guys, have Skate classes now (ok, it’s raining, but it’s under a bridge now and OK I can’t move my neck and shoulders because of some muscle issue, but that might pass with moving it a bit…) anyway, I’m off… more later..

Pictures of Ana & Leon press here ! 

I would like to write some words for my dear Vietnamese readers ! You really score high in my logs ! Please keep on reading. (although one of you might explain me why)…. I did add some nice spamfilters for my comments, so don’t enter over there. I do like your food though.

Right, I have some days of now, It’s raining in Spain for about a month and more and more people are affected by it by now. Spain is just not prepared for more then 2354 raindrops a year. It’s a difficult situation because more and more people are affected by dryness as well. Never good. What is good is that I don’t have to work for 4 days. I rented a car and will leave Madrid for a couple of days but we have no plans yet whereto. A dear friend might need some company at this moment so priorities need to be set right. I haven’t done to much lately… this weekend funky stuff is on the agenda in Spain… there’s a winlounge or something : an event which combines tasting wine while dj’s are animating the crowd. There is as well an electronic event in IFEM (Madrid) E-life with electronic music and gear… no idea what it is but it sounds funky, and there is a ‘creamfields’-a-like festival in Zaragoza, Wintercase.. Kraftwerk, Chemical Brothers, DJ Hell, Miss Kitten, LFO, ken Isji, DJ Krush, Tiefschwarz….  absolutely boring !

I just returned from Belgium and UK now, I had some stuff to do in Belgium on wednesday and I took advantage to have a chat with my boss who is actually bossing me from Belgium. A good chat though and I got out of it what I wanted so far so good. Saturday there was a Punks & Sluts party, again perfectly organised by Curlito and his half orange (litterally translated from Spanish), Half of the time I kept the Champagne bar what wasn’t a bad thing to do, but most of my friends stayed at the mainbar so I had to go to there once in a while. I remember my mother picking me up to go home ! We agreed on that because a) I don’t have a car and b) an announcement was made for HUGE alcohol control in the area, so I actually called my mom at ?? at night to pick me up. I felt like 16 again ! It was great, I should do that more often. I think the party was great as well. I should ask my friends if I had a good time

Sunday I flew to London Gatwik for a training. Actually we were in Camberley which must be about the most borring place in the world. There is absolutely nothing to do there. The hotel wel traditional English, which means, expensive, very nice but very boring. Luckely there is Ms Hoobs there who took us out 2 nights to some pubs in the middle of nowhere. Actually everything is in the middle of nowhere there. So it ended up all pretty nice, First night we went with Mark to a bar in Fleet where we were to meet up with Nicky, Mark I saw about good a month ago when he was visiting Jimmy in Madrid, but Nicky (dive instructor) I hadn’t seen her in 2 years or so. It was so nice to see her back and she took us to one of her favourite bars in the area were we had a typical pie ! (Chicken with mostard pie… excellent). Niki joined us later on that night. The food I had in the UK was surprisingly good, if you don’t mind putting some extra weight in a short time. The beer thought I’m not very convinced, so I swapped fast over to what is known in the UK as ‘Wife beater’ aka Stella Artois
Being named after Niki Lauda, Niki couldn’t have anything else than a proper sportscar and he took me out for a ride in his Lotus Elise, and I must admit that it is pretty scary, sitting on the left side in a car, without a steering wheel in your hand and driving on the wrong site of the road at a ‘reasonable’ speed. I enjoyed it very much ! This car is pure driving, I was surprised there was a radio and airco in it. I’ll try to get a picture of his car in here someday.

Next day we met up again with Nicky and Niki (makes it easier when you’re drunk) for a couple of beers in the Quaies and a curry in a local Indian restaurant. Class food, uncomparable with the Indian restaurants in Madrid. The last night we met up with Raf and Mats for watching one of the games of the Champion League in a rather boring bar in Camberley.

It was a good trip, but if it wasn’t for Mark, Nicky and Niki we could have died from boredom !