Lisbon - "Saldos!"

This day seemed to be either boring or interesting. It really depends on the point of view. I took antihistamine and burana, and I was ready for the adventure.

Luckily there was this 'saldos', which means 'sales'. I guess it was the top of saldos, because the prices were so down that it amazed us and more surprisingly it got ME to shop CLOTHES.
50% Shop 1One was great shop - don't go there after the mid-day, because it's so crowded after works and school. It can be compared to Z.I.P or very stylished H&M, but in Portuguese way.
I accidentally bought a coat, a vest and a belt = 40€.



We also visited Portuguese fair, which can be translated in Finnish 'kirpparit'. It wasn't what we have used to think as 'fair', but I guess this is a cultural matter. Luckily it was morning so it wasn't that crowded. I didn't buy a thing, because the tables there were full of different kind of batteries, phone shells, used jewelry etc.
NOT INTERESTED.



13:00 was our hotel visit. We have been visiting many hotels in Finland, and hear about their booking systems and other stuff, but this 'visit' was the lamest of all. Seriously. It was our own hotel, and the man behind the reservation desk just didn't know what we wanted to hear, so every drop of information had to be forced out of him by stupid questions.
Another visit was this "Osiris travel agency", that gave us a free guide in the beginning of this trip. Actually I didn't catch anything useful from this place either, except that Portuguese people think "Finns are very serious. They have no time to smile and they seem to run 24/7". I was a lil bit confused, but I guess it's not a surprise.

Dining together! It's like having 2 families gathering around, and after that Italy might get bloody. (Lol, I quoted this one from one yaoi anime ;D)
In Portugal, remember three things while having a dinner - ignore random sellers, give a 10% tip AND ask at first if the starters are FREE or are they expensive. We fell on this trick and ate starters while waiting for the main dishes.
Big mistake.
Luckily I didn't take that big dinner, a sandwich with cheese and ham, but I didn't get the ham xD so it was all and all 2€.
After that, our 17 person-group wanted to pay the meal, and the check was OVER 220€!! Wait, was this the cheap Portugal we thought we were visiting??
Everyone paid their meals, but then begun the drama. Our starters costs over 50€, and the second group (not our group) didn't want to pay a cent because they were fooled.
At this point our group was losing our last drops of nerves and it was so close we begun to yell them to be adult-like. We paid the starters AND very big tip (because 10% of 220€ is big money..), and I have to thank Jutta and the other girl for the money the kids didn't want to pay.



And again free time.
We decided to go to check a huge shopping mall in Colombo area. This shopping mall was actually VERY COOL looking and if I remember right, there was over 500 shops in 3 levels. Unfortunately I was already so tired that I didn't feel like shopping at all, so I was just wondering around behind other people.
We didn't hang around long (because it seemed saldos was over in that place), and we went back to the hotel.



Notes:

My stereotypes of Portuguese people went totally wrong. Surely I should have been thinking about it's location, but~ I had this 'sekunda-espanjalaisia' (2nd type Spanish) stereotype, but colour of people varieted so much you couldn't tell the 'original folks'. Other thing is, that Portuguese face traits are pretty different, compared to Finnish. They have bigger and wider eyes and 'longer' faces. I just noticed.
*scream* THEY ALSO HAVE FEET KILLING HIGH HEELS!

Lisbon/Portugal 2010

Unfortunately I had been sick for last 5 days before this trip, so I wasn't very sure I would survive alive. I got a terrible cough and fever, and it seemed like it would continue for a very long time. And the best part was when my eyes decided it's time to get red :D



My friend from the same classgroup came to my place 20:30, and we had ordered a taxi to take us to the airport (Airport Yellow Taxi), and it cost 34€/2 persons. The cheapest choice here.
We were supposed to be at the airport at 04:00, and check in immediatelly we got the flying tickets. But as we noticed, time flew pretty fast and people of our group came there a little bit late.

It was -5C when we departed, and when arrived, it was +15C, so it was a lil bit a reliefment to get to Portugal with my health condition.
We jumped immediatelly to the bus of sightseeing tour and we got pretty good image of the Lisbon at the first hour of our arrival. Actually during that bus trip we got the whole image, and I guess it didn't change at all during the trip.
The guide told us many 'great' clubs and bars, and it seemed he forgot to tell us more about the history of Lisbon/Portugal, the normal life of people, politics etc. Surely the younger part of our travel group would have bored to death if he would have told us those things, but I think it would have been great to hear something wider information.

Our hotel, Turim Suisso Atlantico, is a 2 star hotel. We got no special expectations for the hotel, so there were no disappointments. The hall of the hotel was impressive, it got all marmoric cool creamy look and everything, and we thought our rooms were something similar.
Unfortunately they weren't :D Our rooms were plain and small. Wall-to-wall carpet was 'the weirdeness'. The best part was that the hotel wanted to upgrade their two star system to four star system, so there was some sort of building contract going on. Drilling, banging and yelling. Oh that was something...nice.
But, since this trip was free, no complaining.



I, Paula, Jutta, Inka and Sanni decided to go to see the Castle of São Jorge, a historical castle that has been on the highest hill for many centuries. Because it was very sunny day, it was very pleasant to visit the place. Surely I think it must be the one of the most photographed and visited tourist attraction in Lisbon, but during our visit there were a small amount of people around. So it was quiet and nice, and in the end of our sightseeing we just sat on the stone bench and tried to tan :D



After our first touch of the history, we went to see the shopping places. What a luck we got, because the sales had started just for the time of our trip, and everything seemed so cheap (*3*) I actually bought a pair of high heels, which are pretty common but really beautiful (15€).
In the evening we went to the local food market. Gosh, after getting back to the hotel, we fell asleep immediatelly we put our heads on the pillows. (21:00). So that must tell you how 'stressful' and tiring day this was.

♥♥♥

Notes:

The architecture of Lisbon is pretty strange. It's full of historial buildings, but yet the street walls are a mixture of ceramic mosaics and stone. If you think that the wall texture is beautiful, or there's some beautiful particulars, it will be ruined by air condition machines. Oh I hated to photograph the walls because of them ;(
The other thing was the street art, graffitis. You cannot believe how they disturbed and ruined the buildings! I have no idea what kind of idealistic message they had in themselves, but they were annoyingly everywhere.





Food is seriously cheap (compared to Finnish food). How about this? Chips bag + doghnuts + tissues + coca cola. Finland = 9-10€. Portugal = 3€. The snacks/'small food' here is like a good meal in Finland. Germany sausage with fries and 'english egg', salad and some rice = 4€.
Though your dining at the outside can be disturbed by strange fellows who try to sell you something like sunglasses, umbrellas, drawings, watches and drugs. But they will leave when you narrow your eyes and say over 5 times "no", like in French.
The best slogan was "Buy one get one", and the second best was "Shoe puts."

#1 Beginning

Yees. I thought it would be good to refresh this blog (and delete all the vain entries), and start to write something that has a meaning.
Like travelling.

So here's some sort of info who I am and what I've been doing.

My nickname is Rufusu, and I often use 'R' as my sign. I've been having troubling issues with my real name, so I use it only in real life with friends and 'business world'.
I'm currently 20-years-old, Finnish.
I used to live in Lapinlahti (East-Finland, North-Savonian area), and now I'm living in a single apartment in Espoo (South-Finland, Capital city area). I've lived here about 1 and half a year, and I think I won't move back to the home anymore. (Haha, I got this far already :D)
I graduated from Lapinlahti Art High school in 2008, and now I'm studying to become a travel agency officer in Omnia school. Yet I have no plans what I really want to become, since Customs got my interests but they don't educate anyone in a next two years.

I like music, Japanese culture and language, travelling, movies and different kind of ppl. Though I have my stereotypes and prejudices for everything, I try not to judge anyone at the fist sight. But I've noticed mostly the first sight image is the right image, almost always.
What I like is to do something creative yet not-very-granny-stuff. I like to sew cosplay costumes and take a part of cons in Finland, and I also like to draw with my Wacom. (My artistic hero is Daisuke Ishiwatari, who's also a great musician and game maker).
My artworks can be found dA and Holy Order III website.

In my childhood we used to travel around Lapland with my family. We went to North-Sweden quite often, and 2001 I got to see Norway too. 2003 we made a school exchange trip to Denmark, and I also got some taste of South-Sweden too.
Between these 'scandinavia trips' I have visited Greece/Crete twice, though my parents travel there about twice a year. They're so fair ppl :D
And last November I had my chance to see Estonia! Since I've lived in the middle of forest almost my whole life, my parents couldn't have any chances to get me to see Estonia, I finally in age of 19 had my chance to see CHEAP ALCOHOL. Whoah.

My future travelling plans:
- 1.2, Lisbon/Portugal
A school trip, and lasts 5 days. It's a cultural and travelling information trip, and I hope there will be some good connections to make. I hope I can update this during the trip, because I believe there's good internet cafés like in Greece.

- 25.2, Shanghai/China
A job for a month, I go to Shanghai to work for great elevator company and I really hope I have a chance to write something down here too. (because I've heard Blogger doesn't always work, because of the Chinese cencor-system...)

Ok, lets get this work o/
がんばってをください！！

R