an interesting conversation..

I was having a very thoughtful debate with myself as I talked to a friend as to whether Croatia or Romania would be the right pick, and this is what came out of it. I wrote it, and then really liked how it had come out. Perhaps Romania is the right choice..

i dont know, i haven't decided between croatia or romania.

like it would definitely be croatia, but i want to navigate without language.

i want to communicate with the locals without any sense of speaking english.

i don't necessarily mean that I am looking for trouble, but rather, that I am looking for culture. Not the westernized facade put up by countries.. The pure and raw kind.

My intent.

I try to encourage people to travel as much as they can, and for a long time, I did not know why, or what motivated me to do so, other than I had done it, and it was 'cool'. I came to Barcelona however, but this time, I had come to study. My motivation of doing so was that I would come, take some classes, and while I did so, I would party and enjoy Barcelona, the usual motivation. Nonetheless, a few classes kicked in, and everything had changed. I would no longer see life the same way. I answered a question in class, and pointed out that, yeah, I had been to many countries in my life, (17 to be exact) but I had never come to realize what brought human beings together. What made us human? We were different, we were far from any other species because of a trend that Tomasello in his Origin of Species (1999) labels as a cultural transmission. He defines it as

A moderately common evolutionary process that enables individual organisms to save much time and effort, not to mention risk, by exploiting the already existing knowledge and skills of conspecifics

(Conspecifics is defined as those in your same species).

The idea is further built upon by something called the ratchet effect, which is basically that we add on to what our ancestors have discovered, and that way, our knowledge is not limited by the fact that a human being will eventually die. But his knowledge will always live on (if considered worthy).

Tomasello gives the examples that we are basically born upon the shoulders of giants, those being our ancestors in our past. I cannot beg to agree more, but my question is not that of how we got to where we got, it is that of what has actually changed in human evolution. We have grown as human beings because of our ability to take ideas, and build upon them for centuries, but it's education that precisely accelerates that process. Everyone becomes educated on the ideas of others, and we build upon that knowledge to go towards a better future. Now, picture the idea of a wild human, what is known as a "feral child". It is in essence a child who grows up in the forest, taken care of by animals or by himself, grown to defend himself and learn to be in the wild. What then? Is nothing innate? Many examples have happened time and time again (see Chilean Dog Boy). In that example, we can quote one particular thing:

He's showing signs of depression, is aggressive and is not speaking much although he does know how to speak.

What does this tell us? We must be mad. Take a human being, and imagine he is taken away by kidnappers of a different culture, and try to force him to learn your culture. That is what was done to this Chilean kid. He was simply of a different culture, but he was forced to change. Our cultural differences are much greater than I originally expected. Many feral childs end up not adapting to the human race because they get accustomed to living in the wild. It all came down to who they were. This pushes the point of culture, and its relevance, and its get me back to the point I was trying to get across.

My intent in encouraging people to travel, to know the different cultures out there so that they get different eyes. I want people to understand the difference between their conspecifics, so they can grow to learn that a human being is not just an American, or a Chinese, or an Indian, or any culture, it is the ability to grow to be different that makes us human. That is why I know encourage people to travel. I want you to learn that we can be anybody, and no other species can do that. That is our similarity, and that is what makes us human.

qk.

Well time to read ladies and gentleman.

After a lot of going out, and drinking it up in Barcelona, the time has come to.. read?

Yes, indeed. I was assigned loads of reading for the weekend and I want to finish most of it today. The priority of course are the classes I have tomorrow.

I went out to Montjuic, and took 26 pictures. I was extremely proud of how much I had improved in taking "good pictures" rather than just hundreds of them.

I had two new beers, the classic Duff Beer =], and Damm Lemon (which was 6 parts beer 4 parts lemonade). They were both pretty good, I enjoyed them.

I'm off to read in Montjuic, so long.

qk.

Pictures, amazing homeworks, i love my life!

I went out last night, and it was great. I had an absinthe shot which brought back really good memories of the last EUROTRIP =].

I have a Computational Photography assignment, and I can't wait! I am supposed to take a picture of something in 4 different angles. I don't know what it will be yet, but I was thinking I am going to get Buzz to be in all four pictures. I may do a classic metro picture with things changing, but the metro is generally too crowded, although that may be a bonus. If I don't do this, today I want to go sight-searching, in order to find a place in the mountains, and go from there. I would have to go at four different times of the day, so I am really excited about it. I kind of want to capture the city at day, and at night. My camera however doesn't permit for such features, so I can't really take pictures at low level settings. I'll figure something out.

I have had most of the same beers, I had Heineken last night, and I also had a Voll Damm at the Espit place, if I recall correctly.

The fire shot place has become "the place to be", apparently. Like 30 of the people from the Georgia Tech group seem to have decided to go there on the same night. I opted not to, and went out with some friends to an Irish pub, mainly because I knew that place was really small and it was going to be way too crowded and not as fun, but i'll go another day.

Croatia and Romania have become definite musts. I shall plan them as soon as I can, because I am now dying to go.

Tech kids everywhere.

As I walked onto the campus of the Universidad Polytecnica de Catalunya, or as they want to call it now, BarcelonaTECH, haha, I noticed we are everywhere. The cruel ratios and geeky shirts isn't a GeorgiaTECH thing, its a TECH thing. By the way, I think BarcaTECH sounds so much better, BarcelonaTECH is too long.

Today after the campus tour, the Sevilla and Atletico de Madrid fans are everywhere. The Copa del Rey final is tonight, and i'll probably go out to a bar and have a drink and watch the match. It'll be intense hahaha. I want to go to the shot place tonight, probably after the football match, so im finishing up on reading the articles and preparing my questions for class tomorrow =].

qk.

Went to shot place! Awesome!

The shot place was absolutely awesome, I had 7 shots, and I loved every one of them, they were great. I also had three beers yesterday, two of them were Heineken and La Estrella, i'm still trying to remember the third one.

I had these shots:
Blanco y Negro
-insert shot name here-
El Pacto con el Diablo
B52
Some Weird Naranja Shot
(2) Lagarto Shot (blue)

I will get better at keeping track of names. but the place was really fun, I enjoyed it a lot.

qk

My heart has calmed down now.

My heart has calmed down now. I’m very picky about airports, and when I get to them. Today, I got to the airport 2 hours in advance, and my heart was beating irregularly to say the least. I usually get here 3 hours in advance, but after I took tram 2 and got off at the wrong spot, I hurried to get to central station to take the main train to Flughafen or whatever it’s called (it means airport) to get to the airport. Of course, as I get here, the lady helps me check in and the usual, and then I go what gate? And she responds, it’s not out yet, it’s still a little early. Before I shook her and screamed in panic, I calmed down, and realized that I wasn’t that in a hurry. I mean, I still felt that way, but it wasn’t actually a true fear. I was panicking so much that I even had my ticket number with me but was unable to correctly enter it in the machine. I kept typing it in and missing a digit, so the guy had to come help me type in a number. At the time, I just felt relieved that I wasn’t going to miss my flight, but now, looking at it, how easy can it be to type in a number? God... I really had to relax more, but oh well. The jet lag was getting much better, after flying for the last week, I am more than ready to get to Barcelona, and settle down. I am going to start a money-saving plan, because I definitely spent too much money in Switzerland where I was, let’s just say too excited. I jumped off a canyon, I went to eat at fancy chocolate places, and took taxis. I obviously have to start using public transportation and use the metro in Barcelona, because my standard of living is too high. I will budget myself, and look at every little thing I spend, as to be honest, I have started to spend things on pleasures, and not just necessities. (Beer and shots are a necessity).
On a pleasant note, I spent an absolutely wonderful evening last night with a friend from Zurich. We had a spectacular cheese fondue, with a bottle of wine, and some great people I met. As the wine kept flowing, we came to the discussion of our actions, and how self-centered every individual is, and how the possibility of being selfless is inexistent. It was a great college topic, and it basically came to the conclusion that you can’t be selfless because you want to be selfless. It goes under the assumption that any action you take, you take it at the time because you want to take it, and if you want to take the action, it comes to give you, in the least, peace of mind. You do something always for yourself. Yes, the action may be selfless because you do it for someone else, but there is in the least, a benefit for yourself. The debate rounded upon whether there was truly a benefit to yourself for every action you took. I personally disagreed because I felt that getting peace of mind is a benefit you get when you do an action, but it is not the motive for your action. Your motivations can be truly selfless, and although the action is not selfless because you do always get some sort of benefit, if your motivations are selfless, then you are doing it solely for other people. It’s nice to get that off my head, and I am glad to finally calm down. It was a stressful day, but I learned from it. I can now control myself better, and I feel that this really helped me control my airport stress levels, and perhaps not go too early to catch a flight =p.
The time has come to leave the desires of this world, and begin yet again, to use what is cheap, and only necessary.

I’m on a boat!

Catchy title, I know! Haha. I hopped on a boat in Zurich, Switzerland, and little did I know where I was going, or what I was really doing, but I was up for the adventure. Just sitting on the boat seemed absolutely spectacular. Apparently the boat goes all over the lake which borders Zurich, and I was there for the entire 4 hour round trip. I thought that was pretty neat. I took a look at the menu, and they had 8 different types of beers in their restaurant. This was definitely going to be a fun ride. The first beer I had was called Eichhof Lager hell, a great name. My fries were particularly salty, which made the consumption of beer an absolute necessity. After taking picture of a couple with her parents (not creepishly but rather because she came over and asked me if I could take a picture of her, using her antique portable recyclable, camera), hearing a young child tell his father about taking him to the scary cave with a bear, and observing a lady play triominoes, this trip kept getting more spectacular.

The small cities near Zurich which surrounded the lake were particularly like toy houses. They looked funny and cute. It was truly a different feel, small settlements with large fields of grass, one house atop the hill, the calamity of the towns was truly breathtaking. I heard the young child begin to make scary bear noises, as my second beer arrived, Eichhof Braugold Premium (Stange). There was another beer on the menu called Panache Eichhof Braugold Premium (Stange) which seemed strikingly similar, and she goes, oh its just basically watered down. I later found out they just put like a bit of Sprite in it. I had to order it next and see the true difference. We then stopped at an intriguing island, and I truly wish I could’ve gotten off for a few minutes, but I stayed on my seat with my beer, and enjoyed the view. I found it funny that I was the only one under 50 on the boat, but then I realized that out of all the places that I would retire, this one ranked high up there. The distribution of greenspace, with calm waters made you really want to live in the small towns which were surrounded by mountains. By now, I was more than halfway through my napkin, in which I originally wrote this story, and the waiter looked over at my word-filled napkin, truly dazzled. I stood up to take a picture of the dock, using the mountains as a great background for the dock. It was then I realized that although it was great to take pictures of the view and of nature, people was what fascinated me. The emotions and expressions which people display were a true depiction of the beauty of human feeling. Many a time I wonder, amongst all these mountains, who is out there? Who inhabits that one house atop the hill, in the lost landscapes of Switzerland?

I went to Interlaken yesterday, and the city truly touched my heart. It was surrounded by mountains, and the small town had spectacular houses, it was the place I wanted to be. The human passion use to be that of discovery and essentially, construction. Quickly, the desire to discover died out as our passions shifted, and evolved into developing our ability to think. There still exists those few lads who dare to climb Everest, but undiscovered lands quickly diminish. Half a century ago, we had to go to the moon, essentially, just to satisfy someone’s need to see more, and discover something else. I truly respect those who continue to discover the little that is left, but I can’t help but notice how we choose the wisdom within us instead of the wisdom around us. It is the nature around us which got us to think in the first place. Let us never forget that. Our schools encourage solely the learning of the mind, and not that of the body. I heard in a great TED talk, that it seemed we use our body simply to carry our head around, and that was it. Inspired by the talk, I came to realize that all of us are tested in the areas of math and science, but only some of us come to experience, for instance, dance. The boat I am in continues to go through the mountain, and the views only dazzle my mind. I have run out of napkin, and so I take a sip of my third beer which is evidently not the quality of the normal version, and I finally come to realize, I have arrived in Europe.

I love Switzerland ;).

Switzerland was absolutely amazing. I met with my best friend in Zurich, and she took me to Interlaken. At Interlaken, I jumped off a cliff. There is no other way of putting it, I went with the guys from Outdoor Interlaken, and we did Canyon Jumping. They were really professional, as much as canyon jumping goes of course, and I fell absolutely in love with it. It was truly phenomenal.

I am really happy I got to experience this, and I also had two beers here in Switzerland which were great.

I had two beers, Sternbrau Special Beer, and Halden Krone Premium, both of which were great.

Badenstrasse 420 =].

As I arrived at Zurich, Switzerland, I remembered that I had completely forgotten how to even practice any attempt at German I would use when I got into the country. Nonetheless, I was up for the challenge. All I had to say to my cab driver was Crowne Plaza. Of course, he was a little confused and needed something slightly more specific, so I had to be a smart ass and read out the street name in a German sounding accent (which probably sounded retarded considering I am terrible at accents).

Nonetheless, it was a success. He nodded, and then proceeded to say Ah! Badenstrasse "insert gibberish to represent 420 here", which sort of scared me, but I felt he knew where he was going.

We had a great moment of silent as we both saw the bill increase quickly, as this Swiss friend sped through and nearly emptied my bank account. Nonetheless, we had made it to Crown Plaza. Now I wanted to be polite, ah crap, my cover had to be blown.

I perhaps knew how to read a little, but how the hell am I supposed to say keep it in German? Apparently its "halten Sie die Änderung". That sounds like stop the car I'm about to die, but apparently that's keep the change. Anyways, I paid him with Franks, which to be honest (I was going to say frank, just for the pun of it haha), is play money. It's the funniest thing I've seen, the money is all colorful, ahh... I love it.

I'm about to go outside to a pharmacy, perhaps buy some contact lenses liquid, and take my camara out for an adventure. Switzerland looks like a truly calm, and really beautiful place. The distribution of green space, and the overall setup of the city have made it truly enjoyable.

This makes 17 countries, I had one more beer at like 5am at the airport in Barcelona, and I haven't had any shots yet.

qk, out.

Understanding simple things...

Where do we draw the line between learning how to use things, on making things simple enough for us to use?

The problem with simple things, and things that do things for you is that we make objects be taken for granted. Like cellphones. You may not believe so, but today, phones replace a sense of direction, maps, and face-to-face communication.

Things we want become things we need.

And then we get to a point where we completely forget how the basic things in society are done. Sometimes its good for every day things to be simple, but if complicated things are made easy, we quickly stop thinking, everything becomes effortless, and we become dummies, useless ones. Norman gives the example of the car steering wheel being a 'natural choice'. Nonetheless, the difference between a natural choice and something we learn when we are very young is indistinguishable.

Here we go again..

For those of you who followed me last summer, you probably remember http://panama-europe.blogspot.com. Well, here I am again. This time, I flew into Europe from Atlanta, on May 12th, 2010, and arrived in Barcelona, a decent number of hours after transferring from London (Heathrow Airport).

I can't explain how glad I am to be at the 'Residencia Onix' in Barcelona, Spain. This place, unlike others, offers anything you will ever need to be a student studying abroad. Last year, I traveled 11 countries with only a backpack, this year, I have one goal in mind.

By the time I leave Europe, I will have visited more countries than the years I have been alive. Currently, you can check out my country list >>>, which has the 16 countries which I have been to. I only need four more countries to surpass my age, 19, and only like 10 hours after landing, I find myself waiting to check in for my next flight to Zurich, Switzerland. Switzerland will most likely be Country #17 :).

I like to keep count of many things, as you may see, and in addition to countries I have visited, last year my friends and I held the "100 Beers in Europe", wherein we tried to drink 100 different types of beers. I failed at keeping track effectively, so this year, it will be different. I will try to keep track of all the beers I have to the right, as well.

Lastly, my friend William decided to join me in Barcelona for the summer. We decided to have a different type of competition, inspired on the bar called 'Chupitos'. 'Chupitos' has over 600 types of shots, and they are all different. The competition starts on his arrival, and it has a variety of rules which I will explain later, if I remember, but the point is, whoever loses, or fails to get to 100 shots, has to take a rather embarrassing shot, called Monica Lewinsky. What that entails, I will leave for your imagination to figure out.

Other places which I am heavily interested in going to include:
Zurich, Switzerland
Deva, Romania.
Somewhere in, Croatia. :).
Denmark perhaps :D?

That is all for now. :).