Today sucks... it is funny that today is supposedly the "inspirational day"...

I have already wrote the news about how the day was full of bad news... and yet, one more bad news was awaiting me. Well then... only an hour and 3o min to go and this day is over. Can't wait.

blue tooth

Today we headed for a trip to Brdy. The place which is soon gonna be ruined by US radar, unless our politicians get some sense or Czech nation revolts or US backs off.

Anyways, it is a beautiful piece of land with forests and hills that one can wonder around for ages... for ages as we did, when we got lost there... :o) ... as the blue touristic mark dissapeared out of the blue.

Guess what happens when you eat blue berries :o)...!?!

Still awake...

I am still awake although my body keeps on trembling from exhaustion... I spent my first night at work. I worked till 4.30am, then slept for two hours on two cushions while freezing so much, to get up after 6am and continue working.

The striking part is that our main boss made us dinner last night as well as made me breakfast today!

The deadline for our project was today by 4pm when we had to hand it in to the Ministry. We finished all work by 2.20pm. We had 20min before the bus was going when my supervisor said "we must have forgotten something, as there are 20min left!" I froze. That was the last thing I wanted to hear. Suddenly her eyes dropped onto a bottle of wine, when she shouted "that is what it is, we have 20min to drink". So we drank some wine and then set of for the bus. The timing is simply way too important.

There is nothing as good as looong shower.
And the darn horse-fly bites are extremely itchy till today.

Tomorrow I have a day off. I mean it is Saturday. And I get to do nothing. Nice :o).

Canooing aka *Fried cheese hunt*

For the first time in Czech republic I got to experience "to go on a water". My supervisor invited me to join her and her friends to go for three days canooing, to ride the river. I was excited to hear that but nearly cancelled it due to the huge amount of work. Well, my supervisor did not let me get out of it, fortunately, which meant three days of great fun, with lots of alcohol.

Few of us met on Friday and took a train to Smrcna where we were to start canooing from. We were 10. When we arrived, the rest of the guys were already there waiting with boats announcing we have no place to camp since there was no official place to camp, plus one local farmer forbid us to camp on his field. Luckily though, the train stop had unusually big wooden waiting room where the 10 of us could comfortably fit to sleep. When we prepared our sleeping bags, guys took out bottles of coke followed by rum and vodka and started mixing. In a bit there were several Coke bottles circling while the guitar was being played...

On Saturday we packed our barrells and got boats on water (my supervisors' husband managed to sank his canoe with his wife the second they slid from the ground onto the river, pretty scary start :o)). Dry clothes is something very rare when on water. The water was pretty low in the river and there were lots of big stones to be slalomed around. As soon as we started canooing we got attacked by bunch of horse-flies so instead of paddling I started to kill the horse-flies with my paddle. It actually works :o).

There were rough stony waters mixed with calm waters where we always co-canooed and while waiting for all the 5 boats to come, we energized ourselves from our Coke bottles ;o). At that time my supervisor was already "bathed" three times, as well as two more boats tipped over... And it was our turn to tip over. The worst is that such accident comes out of the blue and to be completely fair I have to admit I quite dislike water, so tipping over was quite scary at first, especially in a rocky river water with strong current. Of course my paddle got taken by the current and since my partner was saving guitar (not me :o(( ) he lost his too. I thus got the privilige to "go" and hunt for the paddles while he was getting water out of the boat. Our friends managed to catch one paddle, for the other one I had to climb over the rocks in the river for some 50m. When I finally joined the group of the boats in the calm waters close by, I found out I completely messed up my leg by falling, scratching and hitting into the rocks. It was quite incredible as within seconds my knee swelled as several lumps appeared there while I continued bleeding from scratches. Pretty cool :o). But learning from past lessons (my Thai scar) I had a little medical supply with me and started curing myself on the very spot. Oh, and a new lesson learnt is, it is good to put the whole swim suit on straight away before setting of onto the river. It saves you the embarrasement of changing while balancing on a big stone in the middle of the river . :o)

When we arrived to Stvoridla, that is when the river got mostly calm and we continued most of the way by co-canooing (all five boats holding together) and refreshing our throats.
*We asked for fried cheese for lunch, they did not have it*

When we arrived to first town and a place where we where to spend the night, we went to one restaurant (there are some restaurants were you have parking for boats) to fill our tommies.
*The fried cheese was on the menu, but they did not have it!!!*

We crossed river to arrive to our camp, there we were told the camp is closed, so we unpacked, build tents and continued using nature as toilet. It kept on drizzling. So wet clothes kept on staying wet. Some of us set for the town to have a little party. When getting to a local hotel (4th category) they had this *great combination of fried cheese (eidam, camembert, blue cheese)... BUT my stomach was full. The plan was to go for lunch there next day.*

On Sunday morning two of us went shopping for breakfast before the others woke up. As we were eating the camp owner came shouting at us to leave within 10min as she had told us last night the camp was closed. Well, at least, she made us start canooing early :o). Although we stopped 100m later to park again and do some more Coke shopping but could not go to the hotel for lunch anymore.

In the middle of the day we did a little break and walked to see some local "castle". Mine and my supervisors' steerer stayed by the boats and by the time we got back they finished one buttle of rum. I guess it was thus good that they suggested that they go into one boat and I will go with my supervisor. The guys were so drunk they could not walk straight, they managed to tip over on a calm water, including falling into water once in a while from the bank when losing balance.
We did a short stop at one river pub while waiting for all the boats to arrive.
*The pub served fried cheese! We ordered one with my supervisor, paid for it, in order to be told 5 minutes later that the cheeses fell apart in the deep fryer and they gave us money back!*

Sunday afternoon was quite tough to paddle. The rain got worse, as well as the wind, so it was pretty chilly and we were happy to make it to our target place for the night. 10 of us rented a cottage for 4. Two more tramps who joined us during the evening stayed the night there with us. It was pretty hilarious night. *Especially since we finally got to eat fried cheese!"

Monday was final day, we did not go too far as we needed to return the boats. Thus most of the day we did co-canooing while we played guitar, sang and drank. Co-canooing was fun especially because we tried to co-canoe through rough waters too. :o) By 3pm we arrived to our hand-over place. Some were to return to Prague by car, some by train. The "best" was that we arrived at the train stop by 5.30pm to catch 8pm oclock train. But at least I got to learn cha-cha and salsa steps (I think I did not mention this group of people are all current or former dancers) and I got to eat corn straight from the field.

Safari II.

We had a minibus for the two of us and our driver. The roof of the minibus gets to be lifted so we could stand up and watch the nature and animals freely. And what we saw was amazing... gazellas, lions, elephants, giraffes, antilopes, monkeys, buffaloes, zebras, emus,... and a turtle!

SAFARI for 5 Euro in Kenya

When coming to Kenya I would never dare to think I will manage to go for Safari. Firstly, I thought there will be no time, since the training is from 8.30am to 6pm each day. Secondly, I assumed the price shall be so high, I will not be able to afford it. But sometimes the life decides otherwise.

When receiveing the training programme, I have noticed we have two days off - Friday and Saturday. There was some programme organized but I thought I could try to check how much would Safari do and in case try to go there.

The most amazing Safari in Kenya is supposedly Masai Mara, except all warned me that it takes some 8 hours on road one direction. I talked to my collegue here, a guy from Slovakia if he would like to join me, so that in case I do not go alone. The lady who was to help us arrange did not really respond, so I decided I will sms the Kenyan guy whom I met on the plane, as he offered to arrange the Safari for me through some Travel Agency he knows.

Well and as it worked out, he has booked for us a semi-luxurious tent with build in new bathrooms by Talek river in Masai Mara. The drive was to take some 5-6 hours one way, which was fine. But most importantly, he insisted he will fund the whole trip no matter how much I have insisted upon paying our costs.

To be honest I could not really believe it, so I kept on expecting what is gonna happen or what my go wrong. But by 7am on Friday this Safari minibus comes with a driver and we set on a trip. The road went quite fast as we kept on talking on all possible subjects. Early past midday we made it to Masai Mara. And within some hour we made it to our place where we were to stay over the night. It felt like little oasis, the place was incredible. The place is like a garden and each tent is separated by trees.

We got lunch and by 4pm were ready to go on the safari.
The end of first part for now.

Travelling to Kenya

Actually the trip to Kenya, although long was pretty unsual.
I flew to Vienna first with tiny plane, I thought such planes are used only in Indonesia. So that was rather an unpleasant surprise.

I boarded the plane to fly to Cairo at 3pm. I was sitting next to one African lady who was pretty loud with expressing all inconveniencies as well as highlights from her travelling. This way we have learnt (why flying Egyptian airlines) how outrageous it is that there is no alcohol available and that she is really getting thirsty! :o)

There were quite few male flight attendants and one started to joke with me, ... being flushed to the toilet, ... but that was all to turn out great as suddenly the flight attendants comes to my place and asks me to go to the back. When I come he serves me 1st class deserts and invites me to visit his IT business while waiting for my flight in Cairo.

As I need a visa, I stayed with my new African friend and we were joined by one more Kenyan man. They both spent lots of time talking which spared me the effort and I could just listen and do nothing. The African lady managed to find out that there is a bar serving alcohol available at the airport and she insisted upon inviting us.

I agreed to get a whisky. I forgot my alcohol pad which I need on Sunday nights, so I used this whisky, poured it on the napkin and was ready for my weekly activity. :o))

Boarding plane to Kenya was good, my Kenyan "friend" who has invited me for food in Cairo airport also managed to arrange me three seats to sleep on at the plane, so that was great. Getting up at 5am was thus slightly easier.

I got picked up by the NGO staff. We were driven to this land that this NGO owns. After seeing it in the morning, I call it the kingdom inside of the republic. It is incredible. Place located on a hill will little vilas scattered all over the place, flowers, blossoming trees, cut bushes... no more to say to that...

And I am soooo sleepy.

10 days out

Just sitting at the airport in Vienna, having an hour or so to spare before boarding the Egyptian airlines. My next transit city is Cairo and the final destination is Nairobi. I was already warned to beware of lions, infections and locals. But that is as much as my preparation goes. Too much work and honestly, I can still hardly believe I am flying to Kenya.

It is a working trip and I sincerely hope we will be taken care off, thus this complete dispreparation will not turn against me. But to give me some credit, I looked up a time difference and a weather forecast.

I should arrive to Cairo at 7pm, I hope I will get a chance to find some TV with football. It would have been better to be in Vienna when we play. But hopefully Egyptians are freaks as well.

auch

I have upgraded...

Prone to bouts of cynicism, sarcasm, and thorns, you excite a certain kind of man. Hoping to gather you up, he flirts and winks and asks you out, ultimately professing his love. Then you make him bleed. Why? Because you're the rare, independent, self-sufficient kind of woman who does want love, but not from a weakling.

You don't seem to take yourself too seriously, and that's refreshing. You aren't uptight; you don't over-plan. Romance-wise, sex isn't a top priority--a true relationship would be preferable. For your age, you haven't had a lot of bonafide love experience, though, and this kind of gets to core of the issue. You're very selective.

The problem is them, not you, right? You have lofty standards that few measure up to. You're out there all right, but not to be picked up by just anyone.