Ireland! Day four and five! We went to Bel and fast!

On day four we mostly planned our stay in Northern Ireland. We used our mobile internet traffic to browse the interwebs for things to do. We spent the afternoon on a walk to Prehen Woods, a small patch of forest 30 minutes on foot south of Derry. The way there was marked by a beautiful motorway and a boring residential area. The forest itself was completely lacking people which was a good thing. Not the most exciting forest, but relaxing nonetheless. All the pictures were done on analog cameras, they might follow once I cleaned my dev stuff and got some development going.

The next day we got up early and took the bus service to Belfast. We saw a church thing that might actually not be a church but more of a thing.

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We went on a saturday. Which brought the big advantage of being able to visit a lovely food market. It featured some grocery stands but mostly freshly prepared food. And fish.

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And lovely baby clothing.

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We ate breakfast/lunch (someone should invent a word for that) consisting of a beef steak bap (which is like a regular burger) and some paella. Both dishes were really good. Unfortunately there was not so much space available to sit down, which was a bit of a downer. But then again a great band played some relaxed jazz/reggae/rock.

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And so many cupcakes everywhere. Note the boxes on the side containing another truckload of fancy decorated cupcakes that drown in colored icing, silver pearls and colorful sprinkles. Of course we didn’t buy any as we both preferred taste over looks, and sugar icing and sugar pearls and colorants just don’t taste that great.

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As we went back outside to stroll around the city, it started to rain. Constant, annoying, wet, pouring, mean rain.

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Not even a giant herring could cheer us up.

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As an emergency solution we did a boat tour of the harbor with this lovely tiny boat.

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The boat instantly pleased by being kind of indoors and with chairs.

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This are the Titanic Studios, where Game of Thrones is made. Also a lot of the exterior settings are actually located somewhere in Ireland. A good choice by HBO to produce the series on this beautiful island.

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The harbor looked like a harbor, with docks and stuff. Somewhere in this harbor the Titanic was built by Irishmen before it was sunk by an Englishman, as the locals never cease to point out. “She was fine when when she left us.”

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I am enjoying myself so much. And my raincoat was basically useless as it just soaked up all the water and kept it around me.

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In this dock the Titanic or the sister ship Olympic or maybe some completely unrelated ship was built. The guide was fun, I guess, as we could hardly understand him. But he sounded nice.

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Doro has a bit more fun than me as she actually brought proper rain clothing to the land of everlasting rain.

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Navy seals hiding on the bank.

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They built an impressive giant thing that was quite big. I have about a million pictures of it, but I only show you this one because I am a good person.

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And by the end of the tour the sky cleared up and the rain stopped. Big success.

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We enjoyed the little tour a lot, not only because it provided shelter from the rain, it was also interesting to see the docks, the size of the machines and hear a bit about the story of the harbor. We saw “THE TITANIC EXPERIENCE” (yes, it has to be all caps and be read in a deep dramatic voice) which is just a fancy wording for museum that features stuff around the Titanic. The interesting thing about the building was, that the top edge of it was constructed in a way that it would be exactly the height of the nose (technical term for the front thingy of a boating machine) of Titanic. The building was quite tall. But I did not find a picture of it in the folder. Can’t be that interesting then.

We said goodbye to the lovely boat people and their boat and went on.

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We then finally did some city strolling. Unfortunately Belfast is quite boring on a saturday night if you are not interested in spending a lot of hard earned money on beer in small bars full with people. The shops close at very early, the pubs are expensive.

We saw this cathedral. Its tower has been blown away by the IRA and was not rebuilt. Instead, to appease the situation a sky needle was constructed.

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Before the shops finally closed we jumped into an outdoor supply store and looked for a rain jacket that would actually repel rain instead of sucking it all up and using it to chill the body down to cozy 12 degrees Kelvin. We were so lucky to find a big rack of jackets on sale and after trying on several different options Doro bought me a very nice Northface jacket that I then wore for the rest of the holidays.

After nightfall we got on the bus to Derry and went home.

That was absurd

Today I had one these bizarre meta-moments were you look on what is happening closely around you and you realize how absurd all that is. I am still shaking my head in disbelief.

I was called by a company doing market research and consumer studies. They had my number because I took part several years ago in a study about McDonald’s. I got some pocket money for it, so I was fine with being in their database in contrast to all those telemarketers who steal 1 hour of your time to ask you about the benefits of thermostats. No joke. I worked in a call center and annoyed people after 9 pm and asked them if they wanted a thermostat that was regulated when they talked to it.

So this company from back then called me again. They did this already twice before but I never fitted in their profile of a young man using a specific brand of shaving mousse.

This time it was about sweets and I eat sweets and apparently I named the right brands, which I fortunately remembered from having them seen in shelves. I usually don’t care about brands. They offered my 50 EUR for 2 hours of my time and I said yes.

So I went there, I watched a TV commercial mock up, answered dozens of questions with a digital thingy that wirelessly transmitted my choices to some people behind a one way mirror and was already a bit puzzled about the effort they put in this. But I was in a room with 20 others, we all looked at three big screens and so I thought they get quite good value for money through large scaling.

Then we were finished and a few chosen, including me, were asked to stay for the group discussion. We got some sandwiches, some drinks and then talked about the famous world of this one variety of branded candies. We talked and talked, we rewatched the mock-up commercial, twice, and speculated on brand identity, interpreted the spot, discussed the poor choice of context and generally dissected every bit of the awful commercial. Then we discussed the design of three new boxes, that have half the number of sweets and a new design, that looked like mid-fourties targeted mid-twenties with the design language of the late 90s. We did not cease to discuss the shape and color and general appearance of the box and its price and its target audience and whether or not you would give this box as a present (we really discussed this for long and several times and with different premises and perspectives and ….) and at this precise moment I had an out of body experience.

Well kind of.

I looked down on the room. 8 people sitting around a table, one guy in front leading the discussion. One in the back typing the protocol. A camera facing the table. Two microphones dangling from the ceiling. A one way mirror hiding who-knows-how-many people watching our discussion.

10+ people spending 3 hours in total discussing a stupid ugly box of candy and an awful commercial that is so generic and boring and stupid that people won’t remember it for a second. All that for a company that thinks optimizing their crappy product will give them half a percent more in sales, probably not even outside the error bars. Countless hours and resources and money invested into this project to tickle out another position behind the comma.

All this is happening every day in so many places at the same time. What a waste of human life time. What good could be done with all this energy.

The longer I thought about it, the worse it got. Most commercials try to increase the market share of a specific brand. And they take this share from another brand of the same company. And then the executive of brand two gets angry and spends even more money to get his share back from the other brand from the same company.

If one day all commercials would cease to exist people would still buy products. Maybe they would rather buy the stuff they need but that is not a bad thing. All those people involved in TV and print ads are a waste of time and resources and energy. Science is struggling to get funded and companies pay companies to pay people to discuss whether they give a box of chocolates to neighbors or colleagues. I got 50 EUR for analyzing a stupid box of candies. This is madness.

Douglas Adams proposed to put this useless middle part of modern society, the part that is neither “thinker” nor “doer”, in a big space ship and let them discover a new home planet. While they believe in being the pioneers of society, the rest stays behind and enjoys a life without telephone sanitizers and advertisement agencies. Unfortunately in his version the world is eradicated from a disease transmitted by infected telephones. This idea was too good to work.

Random Berlin pictures

Berlin, 2013

strolling around Mitte and Prenzlauer Berg with the guy from down under.

Ireland! Day Three!

Oh it’s posts galore today!

We got to Ireland through Amsterdam, looked at Derry by day and by night, and now for the next day!

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Lovely day, isn’t it?

We started our day with rain and grey skies. But what to expect when you go to the country of the big rain.

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So what we wanted to do was to got to Bellarena (red circle in fig. 1) by train and the get to the beach on the west side of this kind of horn and then go up to the top and back again on the other beach on the east up to Castlerock (blue circle in fig. 1). The trip looked nice in the guide and on the map. A nice walk at two beaches, maybe four hours in total.

I should really take a class in map reading.

We ended up taking the way indicated in red in fig. 1 below. Doesn’t look so bad. It were 8.4 km.

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Bellarena train station. Nice weather, great start!

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Idyllic little settlements along the way. We did wonder how to get to the beach, but the locals just send us along the way and we just hoped for the best.

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The landscape was amazing, everywhere small groups of sheep and cattle. We prepared for a rainy day and had to put away all the rain clothes for the moment.

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Cow!

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The weather changed quickly that day. Soon we had to change from warm and dry anti-rain coating to yay-the-sun-is-so-warm non-coating every ten minutes. The next one is from Doro I think.

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And sun it is again! At some point the walkway was gone and we just kept on walking next to the motorway. We still felt hopeful for a nice day although we kind of really liked to see a beach soon.

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The grass is always greener on the Irish side. The color is not messed up, it was the most amazingly green lawn we’ve ever seen. And it went on for miles (maybe one or so)! We later found out that the Irish people are famous for farming lawn, rolling it up and selling it to the world’s golf courses and fancy gardens.

They stared at us for ages and started to run as soon as we approached the fence.

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Then it got beautiful. The farms of cows and grass changed to a military firing range on both sides. The sun also went away again and everything was dark and moist. Still no beach in sight.

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But hey, a firing range is not that bad. We instantly started to miss it when the next thing came up.

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That’s right. A prison. Endless miles of a grey wall to the right. And no chance of getting picked up as hitchhikers. We already were beyond the point of no return where we would have walked a longer way back than we expected to keep on. So we continued and chose this lovely spot near the prison’s visitors center to have our lunch. Great times!

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And then it went worse.

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Heavy rain from the side made us wet to the bone in a matter of seconds. At least our backpacks were rainproof. And doros jacket. Mine not so much.

In the distance you can already see bits of the ferry, marking Magilligan Point where both beaches were supposed to meet. And the beach on left looked nice, but wet and inaccessible due to steep rocks. Thank you, travel guide!

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Lovely. At least the belly kept me warm. Or it would have, if it wouldn’t have been the camera being protected by my unprotective leaky rain jacket. Luckily the 5Dmk2 is waterproofed. I wish I was a 5Dmk2. (taken from doros mobile obviously).

Look how much fun I have!

We wouldn’t have guessed that without the sign.

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We finally arrived at the ferry station and went to a restaurant there to dry and warm up. We had a nice cup of tea and desperately asked for the way to Castlerock. We spent the last 2 and a half hours marching all the way from Bellarena. The waitress was impressed. But she informed us, that the way to Castlerock is even longer. Yay.

But luckily I asked loud enough to also impress a guy and his wife at the table next to us.

“Oi give ya a lift.”

From there our day brightened. We finished our tea, our driver finished his meal and then he drove us to Castlerock. He gave us a tour of the area, told us in his lovely Irish accent about the landscape.

“Luffly bitches we ‘ave ‚ere. Only foive star bitches on the island. And beautiful legs up on the cliff”

He was talking about beaches and lakes by the way.

He then showed us what Castlerock has to offer and then let us out at the train station.

The sky was lovely and we were just so happy to be away from the motorway.

I fell in love with the village quite instantly. The dunes, the beach, the sea, I was just overwhelmed. I didn’t even care anymore about my hurting feet and my wet clothes.

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What would I give to live in one of the houses facing the beach in Castlerock.

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What better place to walk the dog?

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Yum.

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I apologize for the HDR-ness.

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We then took the train in the evening back to Derry. We had both blisters on the feet and were quite exhausted but I was so happy about the evening at the beach that I didn’t care that much. So we enjoyed the short train ride home and fell into our beds.

Ireland! Black! and white, too!

Still the first real day in Derry. After dinner we went out for some night action.

I pulled the large lever on my camera into the black and white setting and cranked the ISO up to several thousand units. Like a boss.

One of the many flags in the bogside.

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The Derry Peace Bridge. Meant to bring peace to the city by connecting two otherwise disconnected areas. It costed several bazillion pounds (equal to twice the amount in kilograms) and is only open for pedestrians.

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Color! Just like black and white but more colorful!

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Some artsy blocks symbolizing the benefits of having a concrete casting company.

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The pack looking for trouble.

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see what I did there?!

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Fancy to let an old church? Just head to Derry!

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Up!

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We then went back to the place and then into the beds and closed eyes and slept. For many many minutes.

After a non-sufficient amount of time Doro woke up by the sound of a male voice. Thinking that the missing flat mate arrived and brought stuff and did not realize, that people were sleeping at 2 am, she opened the door to shut him up. It wasn’t the flatmate. It was a huge drunk bloke smelling of beer and screaming “WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?! I am the owner, where did you get the key, I am the owner!” At this point the other door opened and our host came out, drawing the attention from Doro to herself. Slightly more puzzled the bloke realized he was mistaken. Behind him stood a little lady, saying nothing, clinging to her purse. The guy was informed, that our host in fact moved into this house and he went away, claiming being the owner. Doro and Valentina went back to bed. I hardly woke up from the whole thing. Doro could hardly get back to sleep.

The next morning Valentina informed the agency that gave her the house about this strange encounter. She got to know that the owner of the house did not know about her moving and gave his key to one of his employees at his bar to use the bed for some sexy time with the girl he hooked up with. We were lucky that it didn’t come to him mating just next to us.

Fun times!

Ireland. Day two. This time actually on the island

So. We arrived in Derry.

Here you find the story of how we got there.

Due to some circumstances we slept the first night in Valentina’s flatmate’s room. The flatmate decided not to move in until we were gone. Wise move.

The room had the nice and vibrant color pink on every wall.

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We slept quite well mostly because we got a nice and large duvet from Valentina.

The next morning we were ready to explore the vast and interesting city of Derry. Valentina was cleaning the kitchen as the previous tenants of the house left it covered in sticky goo. Did I mention she just moved in there a few days before us?

After the promised “only 20 minutes” turned out to be more than an hour, Doro joined in cleaning the fridge to avoid waiting another 2 hours. Nothing says holidays as cleaning a fridge that has never been cleaned before. Only 2 hours later than expected we opened the front door to leave.

This is what Derry looked like.

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Despite the horrible look from the pictures I kind of liked the look of the town. The one above is the main playground for the kids. We met children from 8 to 12 years from 8 to 12 pm there. The area we stayed is called the bogside or just the bog. It is the area of the working class people and has nowadays the highest unemployment rates of the whole city. It reminded me of all these movies about working class people, mostly in scotland, but apparently it looks similar in Northern Ireland.

Some of the photos might look a bit overdramatic. I listened and listen to the smashing pumpkins tonight.

As you might or might not know, Derry was the location of the Bloody Sunday shootings when the british occupying forces shot 26 unarmed civilians and wounded many others. This event is covered by the Derry murals that depict several scenes from this day and others. Although they are not that well executed technically it is still impressing how present the events are in the town. More on that later.

Some random inner city shots.

Derry is famous for its wall, also called the “Maiden City” as it was never penetrated by foreign forces. The wall still stands and circles the inner city which is on a hill, facing the river foyle on one side and the bogside on the other. In the inner city the people of Derry decided to put the most atrocious post-war modern architecture.

And obviously they don’t know how to place ATM machines.

At least the King didn’t make it. Probably the only royal ever permanently chased from the city.

We toured the city on the wall and had some views on the town, but honestly, everything the town has to offer can be seen in an afternoon, the most interesting things being the bus and the train station as they provide fast escape routes from the city into the beautiful countryside around.

The area in the kind of valley is the bogside where we stayed.

This is the loyalist quarter in the inner city. Note how the sidewalks are painted in the union jack’s colors to clearly mark the royalist territory. The sign says:

LONDONDERRY

West Bank Loyalists

Still Under Siege

NO SURRENDER

And to make the point even more clear the lovely royalist people burn every year a huge pile of wood and some Irish republican flags. The republicans respond by marches through the city, resulting in violence every year. Already the name of the city “Derry/Londonderry” shows the division of the city’s population. The loyalists keep their tight bounds with the british royalty while the Republicans avoid to mention the enemy’s capital.

Throughout the country you see whole streets that either have all the Union Jack or the Republican flag attached to lamp posts, houses and sidewalks.

The IRA is no more but their acronym can be found all over the bog side. Freedom fighters for the one side and terrorists for the other.

We then went home, it was night by the time. We waited on several occasions for a long time on our host and therefore spent far more time in the city than necessary.

We had dinner and went out again for an evening walk. More on that later. Probably more photos than words next time.

Ireland! Day One! Amsterdam!

We went to Ireland.

We just felt like getting too much sun in Berlin. We needed to act fast. So we booked flights to visit our acquaintance Valentina in Derry/Londonderry. But as most of you, unknown readers of this site, know, every trip you’ll ever do has to begin in Amsterdam.

Cops and wooden shoes. Amsterdam!

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We left happily in the morning at about fuck-this-is-too-early o’clock. After a nice fligt in the luxury class airliner provided by easyjet, we only felt like enclosed cattle in a transporter for about the time of the flight. But luckily we had a very (very!) funny person giving us the safety instructions.

Die Zeit vergeht ja wie im Flug! – The funny steward.

and

Oh schade, schon gelandet! – The funny steward.

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Schiphol is made from estimated 8922376 km of under- and overground tunnels. It takes 1:30 hrs from Berlin to Amsterdam. It takes 2 hrs from the arrival gate to the train station.

We hid our luggage in the luggage hiding cabinets and took the train to the inner city.

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The trains were huge. Not this one, though.

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More like this one. It’s about the size of an Airbus A380 if it would be the size of an Amsterdam train.

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Hah! Signs! My german genes instantly triggered rewarding hormones in my brain-thing. This sign might say:

“Please pick nose!”

“Please sniff your finger two times upstairs!”

“Let’s duel with finger guns upstairs!”

“Airgun suicide cabinet for two on the diagonal to the left.”

As I was unsure, I followed all of these instructions. At once. Just to be sure.

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Again, a very clear indication of what to do. Point at the hand sticking to the post with your arm stump.

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I know this one. Don’t grope females from the front. Always sneak up from behind.

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This grass was impressing. But in hindsight we’ve seen better grass elsewhere.

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Young rowdy (sitting).

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A coffee shop. I heard they don’t sell coffee but you can inject the Marijohanna inside.

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Yum.

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Doro pointing at things.

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The red light district.

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I heard that somewhere someone is planning to put THC synthesis pathways into ordinary veggies. I like that idea. Until then you can buy what you need on a street market in Amsterdam. We didn’t because I am naturally high, as I already introduced the THC synthesis pathway into my pancreas.

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English breakfast in Amsterdam on the way to Northern Ireland. How ironic.

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These are postcards. They’re like emails on paper. But slower. And you pay money for sending them. Not like in a flatrate. You pay like every single one separately.

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Proof that there was weather.

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Artsy graffity.

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Finally. The giant’s causeway.

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Posers.

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Not posers.

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This is pretty much all you need to know about traffic in Amsterdam. There is just too much of traffic. Helmetless people (and women) on scooters and bikes and in cars all running into each other. On high heels. With dogs.

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This is a place. We got really good sandwiches at that specific place.

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For my friends from down under.

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Look how sunny it was! And we even didn’t have an Apple product to shield our eyes from the blinding light!

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A lonely violinist in a street playing violin music on his violin.

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This is really deep.

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Street gymnast.

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Street photographer.

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THIS IS THE LUNCH WE BOUGHT! It’s a sandwich (good for eating), lemonade (good for drinking) and cups (good for lemonade)!

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Mating sandwiches making baby sandwiches.

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Best lemonade that we had at this precise moment (but also afterwards).

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Someone told me to go there. I did go there. I did not go in there, because time.

This was our day in Amsterdam. We enjoyed the rest of the day by waiting at the bag drop counter, waiting for security, waiting for security again, waiting for boarding, waiting for taking off, waiting for landing, waiting for unboarding, waiting for the luggage, waiting for the bus and then waiting for Valentina to pick us up from the very cold and rainy Derry/Londonderry.

But more on that later.

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