Lord Byron

I tend to call rural or desolate places beautiful much more often than towns and cities. However, this place is far beyond simple beautiful: it is mysterious, magical, almost unreal. It is one of the places you would not like to live in just because returning there once every few months must be such a pleasure. Its name is Sintra and it is a medium town not far from Portugal’s capital, Lisbon. I am afraid it might be overcrowded in the summer so if you ever go there, choose another season, as it is a place where you should stroll, not gallop.

To the left: a few high palm trees, two great, grey chimneys, a house with a tower (!), all in olive, pink, white and yellow. Below: a tall forest composed of a hundred different types of trees, some green, some light brown, some still leafless. Only the grey sky above does not want to play this colorful game outside my window. Somewhere else, you might be charged extra for such a view. Here, you get it no matter where you stay.

A word to remember: azulejo. Even the railway station is covered with this painted tilework. Sintra is famous for Palácio Nacional. It is indeed exciting to see its chambers, courtyards and big kitchens, however the mix of Moorish, Gothic and Manueline styles looked a bit out of place for amateur eyes of mine. What I missed was the story behind it, like in so many other castles and palaces, but there is no one to blame but myself – I could have read about King John I, who had a room decorated in as many magpie pictures as there were women at the court, to silence his queen of Lancaster after being caught kissing another lady. A ridiculous apology, if the story is true. I could have tried to learn about King Manuel I, who happened to live in the Age of Discoveries (or was it the Age of Raids?), under whose rule the palace grew bigger and even more excellent. Was it a place full of international guests? Was the king fond of singers? Did he find it easier to rule the realm from his residence or maybe he came to Sintra to run away from the realm’s troubles? Are modern sintrenses as colorful as their palaces and sweet as their travesseiro or are they grey as that day’s sky, overwhelmed by the touristy noise?

Such places require time to be discovered and understood – otherwise they just become another item on a long list. There is a park I did not visit, a hilltop with the ruins of a Moorish castle that I did not climb, Pena and Monserrate palaces that I did not even see, and a hundred people I did not talk to. Sintra, I needed one evening to fall for you, but you are still a stranger to me. If you ever give me a chance again, I shall truly discover your mysteries.

We were supposed to spend 12 days hitch-hiking around Norway, the country which I miss almost as much as Iceland. The only plan was to start in Oslo, go immediately to Trondheim and then choose our way back to Sandefjord, from where Wizz Air flies to Poland. We packed one big backpack with as much food as possible – in order to do so, we obviously had to sacrifice our desire of being fashionable hitchers. One tent, two sleeping bags, a map and  positive thinking – that was all we needed to begin with. There were moments of doubt, but the people we met deserve our eternal gratitude. Let me tell you about them…

I could hardly believe that we met someone who did not know what a gas station was and who travelled without a personal interpreter. Needless to say, we used our hands a lot and made a hundred funny faces before being safely left on a highway junction. I still wonder how on Earth we were able to understand that this kind couple came from Thailand.

On the same day: the evening approaching, our morale lowering (300km to go), waiting in a small town of Ringebu. I think we even checked if there was any bus to the North, but all were already gone that day. A small, red Ford stops. Guess where the driver is going to? Nordkapp! The driver decided to take a few days off from his work in Switzerland and go the furthest North he could. A wonderful weekend trip, isn’t it? His tiny car had already served as a bedroom and a dining room and he was kind enough to make it a guest room as well! Besides, he was going straight to Trondheim and he stopped from time to time to view the breathtaking Norwegian landscapes. Honestly, I do not know if I would go for such a trip, mainly because of loneliness. In the times when hitch-hikers are a rare phenomenon, going over 7000km all alone prevents you from sharing it, which I think is the essential part of traveling. Dear shoot-me-but-I-forgot-the-name, we hope that you got to your destination safe and sound!

Then the rain came and made it hard to get out of Trondheim. A Hungarian woman eventually helped us: she saw us when she was going to work and we must have been standing there for a long time, because she took us to her car on her way back. Then a road that we intended to take turned out to be closed and we ended up in Kristiansund (not to be confused with Kristiansand), given a lift by one of the most interesting and nice drivers on our trip, whom we nicknamed Jarek. He was going there with his cute little daughter who was lovely shy in our presence. He was a good example of my stereotypic Norwegian: serious yet smiling, distanced yet trustworthy, not talkative yet telling the most interesting stories, very kind and generous. He would have given us a key to his hut in the mountains if he only had taken it. I honestly do not know why we did not ask for his telephone number.

We had a strange luck to get rides one way up. From one of the most beautiful places (see below) I have ever hitch-hiked a couple took us to the top of the Trollstigen. I must admit I was a bit afraid of driving on this crazy road just with a highway-appropriate speed, but this guy apparently did it every day. I think they were supposed to do some weather measurements and go back. After a few hours of standing there (~700m above sea level), we finally got a lift. I do not have any strong recollections of the driver apart from that he was working on a building site on the top. We were heading to Geiranger and went on a ferry with him, where we asked people directly if they could take us. We ended up in a caravan owned by an older German couple whom we met a few times during next few days (and were given a lift two times). They took us to a picturesque site where a glacier had its end (or beginning?), they stopped to take pictures and let us contemplate the nature. We sat on chairs by a table at the back of their car! It was in a way like a coach trip but much, much better and interesting!

Another one way up ride was more crazy: there were some mud avalanches in the mountains and they closed a road that we wanted to take so we had to drive 100-200km more that day. After being given a lift by a lovely Dutch-Kiwi (what a shame that I do not remember her name…was it Mirna?), we had to stand in a heavy rain on desolated crossroads. An elder man stopped but did not speak English at all – I tried hard to pronounce “Geilo” properly and his enthusiastic nodding seemed to be a positive answer. The road was very steep and offered marvellous views over Vassbygdevatnet lake. Imagine our surprise, when the driver “said” he was going fishing now and left us there. We nicknamed him after Quasimodo because he both drove and looked slightly mad. From the place where we stood we could clearly see the road 5-6km before us. As the traffic was extremely low, we cast spells on every car we saw to stop and take us, but it took good hour or two before a young German couple saved us from sleeping on rocks.

What hapenned next had been my most extraordinary hitch-hiking experience. At first, a man gave us a lift in a very comfortable 4×4 car. He was going along our route only for a few kilometers and then was going to turn and go to his hut in the mountains. However, he was keen on talking to us – a perfect hh-driver! He worked on some sort of secret water-based source of energy and was a lobbyist in Norwegian parliament. He wished us good luck and went shopping which took him  around 40min. Then he saw us still standing where he had dropped us off, approached us and said “There is a decent restaurant over there, when you get hungry just go there and eat a warm meal” and gave us money. When I refused to take it, he just said he had plenty of money and that we should not worry about it. That way we ate one of the most delicious meal in our lives (a regional trout), not only because it was well prepared, but also the circumstances made it an unforgettable moment. Then we waited. And waited. In the rain and wind, high on a plateau. After 5 or 6 hours, we gave up and I went to check if there were any trains. There was one going in the opposite direction, but we did not really have any choice. And just 15min before the train a miracle happened: a car stopped for us. The driver’s name was Dan, he was a Canadian who came to a forestry conference in Sweden and decided to see a bit of Scandinavia during his first trip to Europe. He was amazingly nice, fascinated by the landscapes, he genuinely loved and missed his family which was inspiring. He recorded his thoughts on a small digital recorder and made me explain what Scrabble was when he knew it very well! Another road was closed so he made quite a big detour to make sure we had a place to sleep. We fared him well, went to the camping reception and paid for pitching up a tent. After a few minutes, the lady approached us:

- It is quite dark over there, isn’t it?

- It is a bit dark indeed, but we have a torch, don’t worry.

- There’s a free bungalow over there, just go and sleep in it.

- Okay, how much do we have to pay?

- Nothing, it’s empty anyway.

We felt we were rewarded too much for the tough waiting a few hours earlier… We met many more people on our way, all of whom were definitely worth meeting. There was a young German married couple with a baby whom we met almost every day but were unable to travel with as their car was totally packed up! There was also a hunting microbiologist with an extraordinary knowledge about his country, there was another couple who drove us all the way to the airport even though their destination was somewhere else, another elder man who showed us Atlanterhavsveien and a few WWII monuments…

Because of its infrastructure and nature, you might think Norway is not the best place in the world to hitch-hike. If you really think that, better reread this post and book your tickets as soon as possible, because I cannot let you miss such an adventure.

]]> http://alkamid.com/2011/08/together/feed/ 2 http://alkamid.com/2011/01/my-music-in-2010/ http://alkamid.com/2011/01/my-music-in-2010/#comments Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:34:13 +0000 alkamid http://alkamid.com/?p=315 Continue reading →]]> According to my chart on last.fm, 2010 was won by Sigur Rós. I’ve just done some research: it turns out that I discovered them in May ’09, just before going to Iceland. Being there I think I understood their music better than I had before. Since then I’ve listened to them every couple of days and every time I hear these sounds, I realize how I miss this beautiful yet deserted island. Jónsi and his friends share what’s in their souls, they don’t play to be listened to, they just do what they love and you can hear this. Recently I’ve seen a movie Heima about their unannounced concerts around Iceland that gathered lots of local people, from little children to grannies. I wish I could attend them – I’ve never seen such cheerful and joyful events. Besides, they played outstandingly! By the way, when I went to a pub in Reykjavik with my couchsurfing friends, we met Jón there. I was surprised how they treated him as one of them: no pictures or autographs, he was just standing there chatting like everyone. Icelanders, I admire your attitude!

It was not the best year for Muse and Pink Floyd, the latter being my personal #1. But the last.fm chart is not really appropriate, as it contains only the music I listen to at home. In fact I listen almost twice as much on my DAP, but it’s not being scrobbled. Therefore my chart tends to be calmer and quieter – I wouldn’t like to listen to Sigur Rós when I’m cycling because I would barely hear it.

2010 brought some discoveries as well. In January I saw someone wrote that he’d already found his album of the year: it was IRM by Charlotte Gainsbourg. I listened to it out of curiosity and I must admin I liked it but, frankly speaking, French songs for me are good just because… they are sung in French. In my yearly ranking the album ended up on #7. I have an impression that she has a lot of anti-fans in her country as I met quite a few Frenchmen who said they detested her. For me IRM is a compilation of relaxing, non-disturbing songs perfect for quiet evenings and dark Sunday mornings in the winter.

The next artist added to my music library is Caroline Esmeralda van der Leeuw, better known as Caro Emerald. Around last summer, one of my favorite radio presenters, Wojciech Mann, aired two or three of her songs in his program. Before that of course I’d heard her single A Night like This because it was widespread in Polish radio stations those days. After hearing the single, my feelings were similar to the presenter’s: I liked the song, it was one of those easy to remember and inevitable to sing while taking a shower, but I thought probably it was an one-single artist. What a surprise came when I heard the album: it’s diverse, swingy-jazzy-poppy, seductive, amusing, a real candy for my ears. The lyrics are not a masterpiece though, but you can’t have everything these days!

But 2010 was also Chopin‘s year because of the 200th anniversary of his birth. It was also a kind of discovery to me – I’d known most of his waltzes and nocturnes but it had been only a fraction of what I know now. Thanks to TVP Kultura I was able to stream the whole XVI Chopin Competition for free and in a great audio/video quality! So I did: in October I watched it almost every afternoon, choosing my favorites and reading stories about particular compositions. The choosing was not an easy task, as for me almost everyone played beautifully. Despite playing piano amateurishly, sometimes I was surprised by experts’ opinions. I guess the level of the competition is so high that some nuances are essential to win. If you’re reading this and you haven’t ever heard Fryderyk’s concertos, do it immediately!

Florence and the Machine will always remind me of Cyprus because we listened to them much during our short trip to this beautiful island. Sting and his Symphonicities was not a discovery at all, but still pleased my ears and gave me an opportunity to see him live. Sarah McLachlan accompanied us during Christmas – now it’s become a tradition. The Blind Boys of Alabama also weren’t new for me, although with only one album listened to last year (Duets) they ranked #6! It’s an amazing collection of songs recorded with artists such as Ben Harper and Lou Reed, absolutely worth recommending.

Year 2011, what will you bring to me?

Sting was supposed to give a concert in Poznań for the opening of a new stadium. The tickets were sold out a couple of months before the event. Fortunately I monitored the organizer’s page and 6 hours before the concert I booked four seats even though there was a note “limited visibility of the stage”. I was late (I wish I wasn’t) for Indios Bravos supporting concert, I entered the stadium when Anna Maria Jopek was singing, but I can’t say she impressed me. Then there were some opening-related shows, fireworks, but what do they mean when a shining star is ready to enter the stage? I suppose football fans should be satisfied with their team’s new playground as it’s really huge (42k people can sit there if I remember well), the design is an eye-candy and I guess it’s not worse than other modern stadiums around the world.

It’s true that the visibility was a bit limited: between us and the middle of the stage there was a 20-30m tall set of loudspeakers and our seats were some 80m away from the stage itself. I just hoped the sound engineers did the best they could. The vision was supposed to be supported by my binoculars and two big screens on either side of the stage.

Finally, HE appeared after the orchestra and his band. Paraphrasing my beloved song’s title (which by the way was played as the second), every little thing he did was magic from the very beginning. I hadn’t even dreamed of hearing Russians live with London Philharmonic, announced by Sting in following words: “jest to piosenka o zimnej wojnie”. I admired Jo Lawry’s vocals throughout the whole performance but the duet they sang together, Whenever I say your name, was absolutely tremendous, especially with a beautiful violin intro by an Orchestra member. Sting even put on a vampire cloak before singing… Moon over Bourbon Street, of course.

The Orchestra played brilliantly – some of the members had a chance to play a solo: a lady on clarinet – Mad about you, another man on trumpet – All would envy. But the brightest person of the whole party was maestro Steven Mercurio – I admired his energy, his mastery, the funny way he jumped from one side to another, particularly at the end, when the tempo and temperature were really high. I was happy to see that the musicians had fun while they played She’s too good for me – they stood up in groups and just clapped hands or fooled around. Again I’d like to mention Jo Lawry: her voice, her handsome appearance and dance full of energy were a nice add-on to the whole performance – Sting knew whom to choose.

Sting himself is time-resistant. A calendar or passing years are terms happening to others, not to him. His voice is almost the same as twenty years ago and it’s just hard to believe in his age. There are not that many artists which sound the same on studio albums and live – he belongs to them for sure. A gentleman will walk but never run…

Unfortunately we didn’t visit the Guinness brewery as it was too late – it was New Year’s Eve, we had to prepare for a party! Therefore we only saw its big storehouse before we started walking along the River Liffey, between on-street running Luas trams. As usual, we used Couchsurfing. Our host, whose name translates to The Last Rose, was for sure the kindest and the most often smiling person whom we met during our journey. On the other hand, her flatmate was a crazy (in a positive sense) freedom fighter who debunked tons of theories that I had believed in. He even gave me a DVD with the only truth about 9/11. He was also a great patriot, therefore I learned that half of the world’s inventions was in fact Irish. What a pity that I already forgot most of them… Thank you, Irish friends, for making all those things. Soso (our host), on the other hand, made me really interested in going to Iran. She told us about her journey with her parents, about how modern this country is and how different it is from Iran that we see on TV. Hopefully I can go there in near future, before the Great Sheriff of the World decides to fight them (which I wish will never happen).

Then we went to eat a dinner with a few Couchsurfers. I met Czechs as well as Australians, I learnt “cheers” in Chinese and Hebrew. An hour after we went to a club (I think its name was Elegance) where more than a hundred Couchsurfers met. Although I had attended international parties before, this one was special. Wherever I went, I met a person from the other side of the world. I felt totally foreign there yet amongst cheerful friends. This was my first experience with “organized” Couchsurfing and I was surprised how well managed it could be. If you ever have an opportunity to attend such an event, do not hesitate – I assure you’ll feel as if the whole world was in a few meters’ distance. I could say hello to the new year twice – the first time with my parents and my friends an hour away from Dublin, then with all those people counting and dancing in joy. This is how I welcomed the 2009.

I didn’t really know what to expect: I only knew that it was a mix of some traditional Cypriot and Greek food. What I got was beyond my imagination.
At first, some cold starters were served:

- beets
- sour potatos with capparis
- olives
- bread

And three kinds of sauces: one of them was the famous tzatziki (τζατζίκι), others I couldn’t recognize. Apart from the sauces, the starters were known to us and I was getting a bit impatient. They didn’t let us wait though and after a while we were served a Greek salad and grilled haloumi (χαλούμι) cheese. I’m a big fan of cheese and I find that one delicious – it’s made from a mixture of sheep and goat’s milk, usually garnished with mint. It has a relatively high melting point so it can be easily grilled or fried.

Haloumi initiated a series of hot dishes. A few minutes later, we got pita with cheese (molten and yellow one this time). In Poland, a pita is usually a hard bread stuffed with all kinds of vegetables and some meat, a bit similar to (Polish) kebab. It’s often a fast-food here so I was surprised to see that it was soft and tasty. Then, a vegetarian dish was served (we ordered one non-meat meze): small peppers in a sauce. Unfortunately I haven’t found a Greek name for this so I don’t know what it was but I’d love to cook it one day, it was lip-smacking. Meanwhile, they gave us pickled pepper and rice which went good with pepper sauce.

My next favorite was an omelette fried with spinach – seriously, if I go there again, I’ll definitely order a vegetarian meze. But meat plates were on their way… we got grilled poultry and lamb – they were just fine, for me it’s quite difficult to tell the difference between pork and lamb as I don’t eat the latter often. The next plate was a lot more tasty for me: it was lamb in wine. Fortunately some of us didn’t like meat in wine so I gained one or two pieces, exchanging them for grilled chicken. Oh, I laughed when they brought French fries, it was funny that they serve it with a traditional dish – I don’t think they originate from Cyprus.

We were already sated when we got another three dishes: couscous, grilled vegetables and another kind of meat. I think it was the sheftalia (σεφταλιά) of which I’d heard before. It was the most appetizing meat it my opinion: special sausages garnished with onion, pepper and some other spices.

The owners were nice and smiling. I think in Cyprus it’s a good habit to exaggerate a bit after eating in a taverna and to thank the people who run it in more than one word. They seem to appreciate it – we had a little conversation when leaving, they revealed to us the Turkish delight (sweets) and told us about flaounas (I hope I spell it right), a special cake/bread cooked for Easter. Their way of saying goodbye with a honest smile and meze still in my mind (and stomach) made me want to come back there some day.

After passing by Drekagil, which is a camping/trekking base, the road turns narrower and you hear strange sound from beneath the car – I think it was caused by empty space under a fresh lava surface. It looked fresh because it hadn’t been yet shaped by erosion. Later I learnt that the last eruption in that area had place in 1960s so in geology language I was looking at a newborn child. From Drekagil cars are allowed to drive for 8km before stopping at a car park 2km before the caldera.

Before I went there, I’d read that there was a small lake called Viti (which translates to… hell) with warm geothermal water that you can swim in. Actually, Viti is my strongest memory from Askja trip. The 2km walk from the car park was a real struggle – the wind was very strong and it rained so heavily that when I finally reached Viti I was soaking wet. But I reached only the top of the crater, on the bottom of which laid the lake. The next challenge was to climb down, literally on my knees, as the slope was steep and covered by slippery mud. I was already exhausted when I finally reached the shore but what could I do: I HAD TO swim there! The water wasn’t hot, I guess it was ~28-30°C. Another thrilling experience in my live – outside the crater a hurricane and a rainstorm and inside me, little drops of rain on my face and no wind at all. Believe me, I’ll do it again if I ever have an opportunity. After the bath, I only had a short look at Öskjuvatn (the other, much bigger lake) and I went back to the car, fatigué mais heureux.

A short note about Askja: it’s a stratovolcano containing a few calderas. A caldera is a geological formation created following a volcano eruption. There are only six calderas in Europe and Askja is the only one in Iceland. Öskjuvatn fills a caldera resulting from 1875 eruption and Viti fills the explosion crater from that year. Askja is usually accessible by road only July-September due to harsh weather outside summer. More on Wikipedia.

[Show as slideshow]

]]> http://alkamid.com/2010/04/askja/feed/ 0 http://alkamid.com/2010/02/cern/ http://alkamid.com/2010/02/cern/#comments Mon, 15 Feb 2010 10:53:11 +0000 alkamid http://alkamid.com/?p=119 Continue reading →]]> On my way to La Clusaz, while dining in a chinese restaurant in Genève, I got enlightened that CERN is so close that it would be a pity not to visit it. To physicists CERN is almost what Mecca is to Muslim people – a symbol of unification, friendly cooperation, several Nobel price winners home and a place where impossible means you just have to work a bit harder on it. It is where the Internet was born, many particles were discovered (making it even harder to understand the basic principles of our Universe) and where the famous Large Hadron Colider has been working for a couple of months.

The Centre is located in a north-western part of Genève, Meyrin. Normally you would just follow the main road but we were surprised by roadworks and we had to weave in the village for a half an hour or so, spending unbelievable amount of money for my mobile Google Maps – but that’s another story. We reached it – a great ball-shaped (or maybe I should say particle-shaped) red construction to the right told us we reached our destination. The receptionist said that all guided tours were fully booked for the next 3 weeks but we could see the Microcosm museum.

The museum contains several exhibitions – from the basic physics through the history of the Internet to detailed story of proton-antiproton collision experiment. It starts with a presentation of Four Forces – all of them with simple experiments that help you remember their properties like “how difficult it is to separate quarks in a proton” or “how much would this thing weight on the Moon”. You can remake Thompson’s and Rutherford’s experiments, see how intense decay is from different elements, watch sparks caused by cosmic rays on big detectors or see how a magnet changes electrons’ path in a Cathode-Ray Tube. There are many such small check-it-yourself devices which are a real fun! There’s also a room with ?-shaped earphones where physicist of various nations try to answer questions like “where does the mass come from” or “is our Universe symmetrical”.

In the next section you can learn a lot about CERN former experiments and the beginning of the Internet. See how particles are accelerated and why a milimeter precision is crucial in those experiments. You can also see a part of LHC and other devices used for answering the most important physicists’ questions. The “craddle of WWW” exhibition is also worth seeing. You can read a bit about The Grid – a new CERN child. Will it expand just as the Web did? A riddle: what’s this?

The last room is marked as “for people who know something about particle physics”. Don’t let it discourage you – you’ll find it interesting even if you hardly understand what the story tells. This part is completely devoted to proton-antiproton experiment, it’s difficulties and consequences. Ever wondered how heavy a neutrino is?

I try to imagine how my life would have been like if I had been admitted and it’s quite… hard. I thought I would take a plane every two months or so but firstly, plane tickets COST and secondly, there’s no time for a week-long vacation every two months when you are a (especially MIT) student. I have a perfect relationship with my girlfriend (who, by the way, lightened my life about the same time as MIT admission process started) and it would be extremely difficult to survive together yet so far away after knowing each other for only a few months. That makes every particle of regret die in a second after it’s created in my mind.

I chose a very good university here and it took me half a year or so to realize that I had just found a REALLY good place for my future. Of course, when you compare to MIT, everything gets pale. On the other hand, people often quit MIT after undergrad studies, which is not so common in Poland and that suits me better, as I aim to be a brillant scientist – not a perfectly educated engineer.

I can’t say I don’t want to get there someday, however now my future is brighter (two years ago I had no idea of what I would do in the future) and in 3-4 years I may be trying to get admitted to MIT again – now on different rules. It won’t be a matter of essays and tests – if they offer me what I want and I’ll be good enough to make them think that inviting me is a good investment, maybe I find myself living in Boston for a few months. Until then, I stay at WrUT and try to do my best.

What is known:
I’m flying with my family to the Land of Ice and Fire,

I’ll spend there 14 days traveling around the island,

Because it’s one of the most expensive countries in the world, we decided to buy a good quality tent instead of sleeping in hostels/farms (4x sleeping bag accommodation for 120 euros! and that’s significantly cheaper than hotels),

I will see some of the most beautiful places in the world. I’ll walk into a volcano, I’ll go through an ice lagoon and most hopefully, I’ll see many unexpected wonders,

For the first time in my life I will have to have a 4WD car to get where I want to. I’ll drive a national road for which I’ll need gravel protection. To see all those beauties, I’ll have to cross fords,

I’ll make an experiment and I’ll try to do daily notes on geoblog. Keep track!