Barcelona, Spain

This is another relatively extreme tourism type entry, basically I was in Barcelona one week for a work conference.
While I could have made it out of the hotel more than I did, I really only spent one afternoon taking photos and being a tourist.

SO! 3.....2.....1.... lets do it... first up I went for a leisurely stroll through Barri Gòtic (the Gothic Quarter), this was basically a recommended area for anyone with an interest in old buildings, and trendy alternative type individuals sipping lattes.

As pictured here... some old buildings! And a statue of a man on a horse!

One thing I really liked in the Gothic Quarter were these cool little side streets that were super narrow... when us dirty foreigners think of Europe, this is exactly the kind of James Bond shit we are imagining!

Here is a pretty old church, the Cathedral of Santa Eulàlia, or more simply the Barcelona Cathedral... if you are a savage mouth breathing foreigner.

Then we wandered a little further to Plaça del Rei, the "Kings Square" which is a 14th century medieval public square. Inside of which is the Museu d'Història de la Ciutat, which sadly we did not have the funds or time to visit.

This was a beautiful big statue thing... the funniest part was the creepy owl on the other side of it...

That owl wants to eat your soul.....

Here we finally made it to Sagrada Família which is a famous church designed by Anton Gaudi, to be honest one of the most hideous churches I have seen in Europe, it looks like somebody consumed a lot of psiloybin mushrooms a handful of LSD and then created a church.

And next up some photos of the venue for the conferences party, at the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya

And a bonus pug I spotted while out and about!

Barcelona - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barcelona
Gothic Quarter - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_G%C3%B2tic
Barcelona Cathedral - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cathedral_of_Santa_Eul%C3%A0lia
Placa del Rei - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pla%C3%A7a_del_Rei
Sagrada Família - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia
Anton Gaudi - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antoni_Gaudi
Museu Nacional Art de Catalunya - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museu_Nacional_d%27Art_de_Catalunya

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Holi Festival, Hamburg, Germany

This weekend I was fortunate enough to attend the Holi festival in Hamburg with some friends.

And even more luckily we managed to get my camera inside, which was apparently not really allowed...

So what exactly is Holi Festival?

In Vaishnavism (a very specific form of Hinduism) there is an old story about Hiranyakashipu who was basically a demon god, who Brahama (Hindu God of Creation) had granted him a gift, that he could not be killed ""during day or night; inside the home or outside, not on earth or in the sky; neither by a man nor an animal; neither by astra nor by shastra"

As a result he got rather cocky and demanded that humans stop worshiping all other other gods and instead worship only him.  And as sons are fond of doing, his own son Prahlada openly disobeyed him and worshiped Vishnu.

And so the demon king poisoned him... naturally.  But the poison turned to sweet nectar in his sons mouth.
Then he had a herd of elephants trample him (not the greatest of fathers).... and again Prahlada survived.
Next he was locked in a room with venomous snakes... and again he lived.

So finally being the crappiest father ever, he ordered his son to sit in the lap of Holika (the demon kings sister, and the boys aunt) and they would both be burned in a pyre, but of course Holika had also been blessed by the Brahma to be immune to fire....of course..... Hiranyakashipu could have been a Bond villain his plans were so elaborate.

And so as the flames rose around them, Prahlada prayed to Vishnu, and was saved... meanwhile Holika was burned to death, apparently her powers faded when she chose to use them for evil.
You can read more about these stories in the Wiki links below... so what does all of that have to do with a drunken festival in Germany?

Ok so each year in India, they celebrate Holi, as the time of renewal and to celebrate Prahladas devotion to Vishnu.  They do this with huge fires, the throwing of the coloured powders, and general celebration.

Importantly, during the festival time many normal social expectations are relaxed for example: ages, genders, social castes, status.
This allows all of the citizens to participate and celebrate together, this is a truly beautiful thing.

So back to Germany.... why does it matter here?
Well mostly it is a great excuse to get out in the summer sun, throw a lot of colourful stuff at attractive people, and to drink quite heavily.   Unfortunately I don't believe that the majority of people who attended have any idea what it was all about.   Or that they would have cared if I had told them.

The process is simple, every hour, the participants rip open some small bags of colour and throw the powder into the air, or at their friends.  The people above wearing facemasks and bandanas are actually really sensible.  I was sick at the time with a serious cough... and it became an awful lot worse because I breathed so much colour.

The festival was truly beautiful though, I just wish I had been in slightly better health before going.

My next post will likely be Rock'n'Heim festival!

References:
Holi (English) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holi
Holi (Deutsch) - http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holi
Hiranyakashipu (English) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiranyakashipu
Hiranyakashipu (Deutsch) - http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiranyakashipu
Prahlada - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prahlada



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Prague, Czech Republic - the rough version

I will confess now, so as to avoid your future heartbreak... I went to Prague simply because I was going to an IAMX concert.  And I got so vigorously trashed at the concert that a lot of my tourism was conducted as an afterthought while severely jaded and hobbling around on a torn calf muscle.

But here goes...first up a quick photographic duck through the grounds of Prague Castle...

Here is yet another gold gilded gate... with requisite cherubs and such finery...

And of course the mythological hero slaying some poor fool for daring to gaze upon the gold with his filthy beggar eyes.

Haha, I hope you have the correct permissions to observe my shininess!

These guys are rather a lot like the guys at Buckingham Palace, only they use the letter Z way more often in their words.

Oh look another massive Gothic styled church...um, yes, we have seen these quite a few times now.

This one has some brightly coloured graffiti though!

This is the view from the castle grounds... you can see in the distance the Charles Bridge... its rather a big deal which is why I have no dedicated photos of it.

Then we scurried away from the seriousness of the castle..

And encountered this glorious example of street lampery!

And this... um... I don't know what this is trying to be, but it was unnerving.

Then we apparently teleported inside the world famous Astronomical Clock, which is so famous I have no pictures of that either.  But I did take this rather vertigo inducing picture of part of the main square.

And this one too, which shows the big important statue I can't remember the name or meaning of.

There was also this church, it had some significance, something about a god.

Oh good grief what this? probably some other religious thing or a town hall.... I don't know.

OH! But here are some things I do remember.

IAMX were absolutely amazing as always...even during the sound check I got to see before the show

And Chris Corner was a truly awesome man, the other meet and greet visitors and I chatted with him for a little while, we all swooned like teenage girls for a little bit, and then I watched the best gig of my life.

Ok guys that's all I have for this entry... I am actually heading back to Prague next month, so I will try to document things a little better this time around and either update this article, or write a much better one then.

References:
Astronomical Clock - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_Astronomical_Clock
Prague Castle - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_Castle
Charles Bridge - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Bridge
IAMX - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAMX
Chris Corner - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Corner

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Château de Versailles, France

The Palace of Versailles is located around 20 kilometres away from Paris to the south-west, and is easily reachable by train from Paris.  Upon arriving at the train station you will immediately be accosted by various ticket sellers and tour guides offering "hassle free" ticketing for the Palace.

Honestly, I am not so sure it really requires that... we simply walked to the Palace and purchased tickets ourselves, there was no huge wait, and the process was quite painless.  

Keep in mind there are actually several different ticket options to choose from.

Trianon Palaces and Marie-Antoinette Estate: €10

Grand Trianon and gardens of the Grand Trianon, Petit Trianon, Queen's hamlet, French and Anglo-Chinese gardens, French pavilion, temple of Love...

The Palace: €15

The Palace's most famous places: the Hall of Mirrors, Grand Apartments of the King and of the Queen, King's Bedchamber...Exhibitions are included in the price of the ticket.

You also receive an audio tour guide which is available in multiple languages.

The Passport: €18

To discover the Versailles Estate in all its glory, the Passport gives you admission to all the Palace tours : grounds, Trianon palaces and Marie-Antoinette's Estate.  Exhibitions are included in the price of the ticket.
+ Musical Fountain Show, Musical Gardens (from April to October) €25.

Hidden Versailles: €16

Guided by a lecturer, you will discover the private apartments of Louis XV and Louis XVI, the Royal Opera or the Royal Chapel. These places are open only to accompanied groups.

Almost everything about Versailles screamed at me justification for the French Revolution, in my travels around Europe I have seen all manner of excess and gaudy gold encrusted fences.  But everything about this palace just screams obnoxiousness.  I honestly don't know how they ever lived with themselves.

Look at that thing.... seriously guys... its a gate!  Anyway, enough of my revulsion and on with the history lesson...
Originally Louis XIII had built a hunting lodge on the site in 1624 after being introduced to the area by its owner Albert de Gondi, in 1632 he purchased the land outright from the Gondi family and began expanding the lodge into a complete château.  This would later form the basis of the palace as it stands today.
When his son Louis XIV became king he set about transforming and expanding on the original château making it one of the biggest palaces in the world.
And in 1682 he moved the French court to the palace establishing it as the center of leadership.

 ‘A Toutes Les Gloires de la France’ – ‘To all the glories of France’
This was inscribed on the buildings during Louis XIV's reign between the years 1682 and 1715, and the palace really was testament to the French empire at that time.

Many years, and many wars, and many kings of France went on... the palace continued to be developed all the way through to 1788 and King Louis XVI... and this is where things started to get really interesting.
From 1776 Louis XVI had been supporting the American efforts to achieve their independence from Great Britain, this of course had come at quite a heavy cost, mostly to the citizenry.  This during a time period where the famous "Encyclopédie" had been released only a few years earlier promoting the idea of Enlightenment which caused enormous upset among the French nobility.

"If exclusive privileges were not granted, and if the financial system would not tend to concentrate wealth, there would be few great fortunes and no quick wealth. When the means of growing rich is divided between a greater number of citizens, wealth will also be more evenly distributed; extreme poverty and extreme wealth would be also rare." (Wealth, Diderot) - An excerpt from Encyclopédie which neatly summarized the situation in France at the time.

The people were paying excessive taxes to help save the country from the enormous debts it had incurred during the Seven Year War and the American Revolutionary War while the aristocracy paying significantly less tax were painting their ceilings gold.

So as we walked through the palace and looked at the numerous statues of French nobility taking on such mythic poses as above... I was really quite angry.  I had never really given much thought to the French Revolution, I never studied it in school and it was just a passing note in history to me.

But suddenly it all made sense... and I had to fight the urge to throw a few flaming torches onto the ridiculous furnishings myself.

Even their table lamps had to be chandeliers... these people were asking for it.

The Hall of Mirrors... quite possibly the most obnoxious room in the entire palace....the principal feature of the hall are the seventeen mirror-clad arches that reflect the seventeen arcaded windows that overlook the gardens. Each arch contains twenty-one mirrors with a total complement of 357 used in the decoration of the Hall of Mirrors.

This travel blog seems to have taken a very negative turn for the worst... and I really am trying to write something nice, to encourage you to visit this place.  But every time I think back on it I just want to slap a rich French person.

Look how smug she is right now... she won't be smirking like that when she is chased off by an angry mob.

The Queen's bedchamber, another fine example of excessive extravagance. There is a barely discernible 'hidden door' in the corner near the jewel cabinet through which Marie Antoinette escaped the night of 5/6 October 1789 when the Paris mob stormed Versailles.

Oh such bravery and valor depicted on the walls... here young master Napoleon Bonaparte fought somewhere around 15,000 Ottomans at Abu Qir, Egypt.  Though the painting makes it look like he managed this alone I think he may have had a few friends help out.
However he certainly makes a mockery of Louis XVI, who couldn't even manage 7,000 angry French women who arrived in Versailles with various canons and assorted weapons.

This is my friend Chrissy being a photographer... look how dashing she is! Like a secret agent!

Sadly when we visited the gardens were closed... so we really missed out on rather a lot of the grounds which would have been more interesting to me.  I shall go back sometime to visit them and post an update.

Who knows... by then I may stop hating everything this place represents.

NEXT UP! PRAGUE!

References:
Palace of Versailles - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palace_of_Versailles
Louis XVI - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_XVI
Marie Antoinette - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie-Antoinette
Age of Englightenment - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment
Encyclopédie - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopedie
The French Revolution - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution


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