Saturday, January 5, 2008

marakesh, then home

hello all
i have been in marakech for a couple days now, its is quite a frindly city.
when we arrived, we had aranged to have some one meet us. our land lady, monique, lives in paris, so she said that the house cleaner would pick us up at the bus station. we told her multiple times we would be traviling with a certin no name bus line, but when we arived in marakesh we recived an email that first asking who we were traviling with, then saying the housecleaner would meet us at a different bus station
me father and brother went to the other bus station, but she had already left, so my father and i went in search of the house
we picked up a guide who assured us he knew the street, and we were then laucnched down a zigzaging path. when he stopped for directions we ditched him and got a new guide, well, actually a group of really young guides, who took us down another street, then asked for directions, by this time we had been gone for a hour. we picked up a third guide, who then launched us back the way we had come, through a medina (a massive market) and down a couple streets to a door.
this was the right one, so we paid them 20 dh, about 2 dollars, which is a quite decent amount, he got angry and wanted 100 dh each, wich is 10 dollars, or 20 dollars total
he finaly barterd him down to 80 dh, about well 8 dollars for both, picked up our bags, and went inside
the house is odd, the living room is practicaly open to the elements, with a staircase on one side to the second floor, which has no roof and the two sleeping rooms, which do have rooofs
so the entire place is cold, evean in the middle of the day. and it is beside a radicle islamic mosque, who, early in the morning blast out their prayer, for about 10 to 15 minutes, loud enough that you would swear he is inside your room yelling in your ear
marakesh is neat, there is a centeral square, with snake charmers and pick pockets
there are thousands of shops, leatherworkers and such
anyways we head home on the 8th, leave at 7:00 our time (am) and arive at 10:00 your time (PM) and i have to go to school (chen 11) in the morning the next day!
see ya

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

merry x-mas

hello all, we have left fez, and gone on to Essaouira, which is on the coast of maroco.
we had an awful overnight buss here. the buss was the most cramped buss yet; and my mother and myself were both sick for the ride, infact, she is still home right now, sick.
it is fantastic here, there are wide open beaches, with people ready to take you on a horse or camel ride, amazing shops full of, sadly, thuya wood. Thuya wood is a endangerd kind of wood, because of its over harvisting
anyways, if you buy at the co-ops, they practice maintainable harvesting,
we love it here
we are leaving for marakkesh soon
see ya

Thursday, December 20, 2007

hello from fez


hello all, i have had a problem finding a computer that allowed blog spot to run

we are nopw in fez, and we love it here

we arived at 3:00 am by buss, got into a taxi, and were told that the driver did not know the street where out apartment was!

after driving for an hour we settled on a little hotel, that was cheap

the other dawy we found out appartment, we had been in the hotel for three days

let me put it this way
if you get in to a car, and you drive,, and drive further, and a little further than that, you will run in to our appartment. so we stayed in our hotel, wich is right down town, with cool stors nearby, and the medina about a 10 minute walk

this is the medina, whish is a crazy warren of streets, each full of buisinesses, its too steep and narrow for cars, nope they use horses. the medina itself is proably abolut 3 km long, 2 wide, and crazy

in the center are the leatherpits where they hand make leather i bought a camel leather belt. it smells like rotting animals, it looks like hell, and its work for some people
the medina is crazy, unpridictable, with camel heads marking butchers, and pretty much evry other person being a saleman

so far i have bought a traditional arab dager, you know, the ones the tuck into their belts, a lamp, about six pirated movies, my bro got a fez, a lamp made with hide!

tomorrow is the fest du mutton, AKA the festival where they all go buy a live sheep, and then slaugter it in their houses, its somthing akin to christmas
HOHOHO!!

Saturday, December 8, 2007

HELLO

hey, im in sevill, we love it here, nice and quiet
i am wondering, does anyone want to give me their postal cose and street adress, and i will mail them a letter, there are some good 1s here

Thursday, December 6, 2007

¡hola! from seville

hey im in seville, sorry for the periodic updates
we loved barcalonna, they have this great centeral hestoric disterict, surrounded by the 100 year old ¨new¨ district. we saw much gaudi, who if you dont know, is a architect from the 20´s who did this

and others, the only problem is the apartment was tiny, only 1 room, so we got on one anothers nerves
we saw lots of niro suptures, picaso paintings, gaudi´s buildings, and such. increadiably, there are nearly no cars on the street, for a city the size of vancouver, it is quiet!!
the only other anoying this is that my camera started making a grinding noise when i turned it on, i took it to a camera expert and he siad ¨kabosh¨, meaning that its finished, so im rairly using it till i can get to canada and get the warrenty
love it here, its quiet, and peacfull

Monday, November 26, 2007

hey all, im in glorious spain

hey, im in spain, yes i do hop around
capodoccia was neat, we were there for a week, visited many ruins, we made the mistake of feeding a stray we called percy (for persistant), she followed us on 5+ hour hikes, nace biig german sheperd.
we took a tour to an underground city, it went a toatal of eight floors into the ground, we went to the same resteraunt 5 nights in a row, took the night buss to istanbul, took a night plane to london, took an early mornign plane 6:00 am plane tp spain and arived here
see ya all
serge

Saturday, November 17, 2007

sorry for any inconvinence caused by the delay

hey, im in turkey right now, in capodocia, yes its been a while since my last post
since i last posted in london, we traveled to bath, sorry fraser, we missed your house, loved the city. its set in the countryside, with a refined and sophiticated air, we staid there for 2 days, then returned to london to catch our "5 hour" trip with easyjet, or so my dad claimed.
he also claimed that the seats were hard plastic, luckly he was lying, it was three hours and cummfy seats
we arived in istanbull (AKA contantanople) late at night, made our way to our appartment, climed up seven floors, and had a beautifull penthouse appartment
with a hundred DVD collection we splent plenty of nights there
lets see, there was the grand bazaar, wich is thousands of stores each selling preatty much the same thing, but each grabing your arm trying to force you into their store, i bught some eyes, they are blue eyes to ward off evil.
there is the cistern that was designed to hold of a seige, and can hold 100 000 tons of water, hidden below the city untill the 1950s
the blue mosque, with is massive and impressive... moqueness
in the mornig the call to prayer wchoes throughtout the city, and lunchtime, and supper time, wind night time...
great placew
wishu were ther
but anyways
caught a 11 hour over night buss ride from istabull to görme, had two fat people behind us, they could not fit down the buss isle with out turning sideways, the disterbing thing is that 1 looked to be 14, sad
the mother snorthed the entire night through (not trying to be rude, just telling it like it was)
got here this morning
capadocia is known for its rock spires, witch people have hollowed out, and built houses in
see ya all later