The last time I was in Berlin, it was on a school trip. We stayed somewhere near some remnant of the Berlin Wall, in a dingy hostel. We went to the Legoland centre and the Opera, and apart from that I don’t remember much of it (it was almost 10 years ago). I do remember […]
I’m sitting on the 2nd floor of the Beethoven Haus Museum, which is situated in the historic house Beethoven grew up in (although, renovations have changed it significantly from Beethoven’s time). It’s a little room, with a set of couches arranged in a cross in the middle of it, a few windows, and a sign […]
Yesterday was Nyepi, which is the Balinese new year. Unlike the Western new year, where people are rowdy and hungover, Nyepi is famously a day of silence in Bali. Everything – and I mean everything – on the island shuts down for the entire day. All the shops are closed, the airport is closed, no-one […]
Last week, I had the pleasure of going to Kuala Lumpur for some, shall we say, administrative reasons. I went there briefly last year, too, but this time I was doing it more as a splurge trip: I was in a nicer hotel and spent some more money doing nice things than the backpacker cheap-as-chips […]
This week, I had the pleasure of joining in a Hindu ceremony in my local village in Bali. It was meant to start at 3pm, at 3pm I went out of my house and Grandma (not my Grandma, but she’s the Grandma of the homestay I live in and sure acts very grandmotherly towards me, […]
When I was in Europe, I was lucky enough to spend a day at Disneyland. As I explained to my American roommate at the hostel, I’m not Disneyland fanatic, but I do enjoy an opportunity to go when I can, considering there aren’t any in Australia or close by to us. I’ve been really lucky […]
Last week, I took a big step in my life, and I moved to Bali. Technically, I was meant to move the week before, but an erupting volcano in Flores meant I had to quickly adjust my plans and I ended up delayed by a week. This was, as you can imagine, not the best […]
In Amsterdam, I went to the van Gogh museum. It’s pretty impressive and well worth the price of admission to go there and just see the entire history of van Gogh’s works, from his earliest studies to his later, more abstract works. But I couldn’t help but wonder, towards the end of the museum: was […]
The National Concert Hall (NCH) in Dublin is a very imposing building. It is a massive stone structure which would not be out of place as a Monarchial residence. It reminds me of the majesty of some buildings in places like Paris or London: buildings fit for Kings and Queens. Wikipedia tells me that it […]
I always thought the UK was a train country. By that, I mean you always hear about how good the trains are there, how easy they are to take, and how connected the country is. I also think the Victorian steam era of the UK heavily features the development of its rail network, so it’s […]