New blog!

My new blog is here:
Story of My Life

I guess some readers are still hanging around here.. :)

P.s. It kills me to read these old posts, I miss you France and especially Lyon ❤

Looking from the window above

My Interrail Trip 13.-17.11.2010!

So here we go, my ramblings about my very short 5-day interrail trip in 3 countries. I purchased a 10-day interrail pass including 5 travelling days and it cost 160€. It might sound pretty expensive, which it was, but the train ticket prices in Europe are sky high so with that in mind it was a pretty good investment. All the photos are from Bologna, Italy.

Our neighborhood in Bologna was pretty modern.

Dortmund, Germany

My first destination was the city of Dortmund in Northern Germany because I have a friend who lives there and I really wanted to see him. The train ride took me through Genève and Basel (Switzerland) and Mannheim (Germany) and was about 12 hours long. I'm really surprised how fast it went without even once opening my laptop or considering to hang myself from the urine-colored train window curtain. The landscapes in Switzerland are breath-taking.

I really liked Germany, it's a cheap country and the people are nice and laid-back, too bad it was raining like hell the whole weekend and we didn't have time to do everything we had planned.

The 'Unaway' Hotel. ...Wait, what?

Simultaneously changing traffic lights for pedestrians and bikers. One question: WHY?

Roermond, Holland

The next day me and my German friends went to Holland because the stores in Germany were closed and apparently that's what happens in Germany on a Sunday haha. Roermond was a small town near the border of Germany but they had an interesting array of outlet stores so I was in heaven. I also got to walk around on the small streets of the town and I really liked the Christmas vibe there. I didn't take any photos there, don't know why.

These are both from the same neighborhood. Italy at its best: contrasts.

And where would that traffic sign be pointing at?

Bologna, Italy

The next day I spent on the road again and when I got off the train in Basel (once again), I found out that my journey to Italy would take 4 hours longer than expected. I was SIXTEEN (yes, 16) hours on train that day and I nearly lost it during. So, if you're planning your interrail trip the most important thing to have in mind is that nothing ever goes according to plans. Ever. Period. And that the trains were invented by Satan itself, not to mention the schedules they are run by. But I finally made it to Bologna and it stopped raining and everything seemed a little bit better at that point.

I met my Finnish friend at our hotel on Monday night and the hotel was surprisingly okay seeing as how we only paid 20€ for it per night including breakfast and everything was all new. The location was also perfect for us because the concert hall of Never Say Die was located within walking distance of our hotel.

On Tuesday we were walking around a bit, took some photos, visited a small mall (lol) and ate delicious Italian pizza in a traditional ristorante. After that we panicked a bit because my Italian friend who also was going to the concert told me that it was almost sold out so we had to start looking for tickets. Well thanks to her, pomegranate Breezer and Mr. Jack Daniels, we finally made it to the venue and were the first ones to get tickets. The concert was AMAZING and I really enjoyed seeing all the bands and meeting people but I must say that my friend's lost wallet at the end of the concert was a bit of a buzzkill. Well, all's well that end's well and I was really happy to get some sleep after a night of mayhem like a good ol' rock concert.

On Wednesday we travelled back to France (in ONLY 7,5hrs) and I was so happy to see all the familiar neighborhoods and people once again. I must say that I've never been that happy to be back home haha. We didn't see much of Bologna on Wednesday, just a grocery store and Bologna Centrale (the railway station). Oh, and annoying Italian people. By the way if you ever consider travelling in a TGV train, please do! It's an experience like no other for someone who's used to slow, dirty, shit-smelling Finnish trains from when Finland was still ruled by the caveman colony. Oh and for the record, the Italian train system sucks if you're on an interrail. I had to pay 20€ extra to get out of that bloody country (in other countries the maximum I paid for a seat ticket was 4,50€).

Some photography took place at Bologna Centrale.

While chugging a big McDrink! It's good to remember that some things never change.

The most familiar scenery during the trip. Landscapes passing fast by in Milan.

On a Friday

Hello long time no see! I was travelling a bit around Europe for 5 days (Germany, Holland, Italy) and I didn't have internet or any interest in blogging. I'm going to post some photos here later about my trip. Now I'm hanging out here in Lyon with my friend who came to visit me all the way from Finland so I don't want to spend my time on blogging while he's here. Next week I'll be back in the picture for sure!

I edited the layout a bit and here's the new banner and the version 2.0 of Sweet Wonderland. I was so fed up with the old version so here's some very much needed change! What do you guys think? :)

P.S. If anyone knows how to center the banner, please do tell me! I'm running out of ideas and lack the motivation to make yet another new banner.

What the fuck have I become?

So during the vacation I visited a safari park that is about 70km away from Lyon. The park is called Le Safari de Peaugres and it's cool because at first you take a car route where you can see the animals walking right there outside your car (really cool) and then you take a longer route on foot where most of the animals are in enclosures. A ticket to the park costs 14,50€ which wasn't really that much in my opinion considering the price level of France.

So first here is the car route part.

One question: WTF is this?? A donkey with striped legs?

For reference, here are the real zebras that by the way I was really excited to see. I don't really like horses or animals looking like horses but zebras are just way too cool not to like!

I don't know what this is either but they were just lying there in the middle of the road and didn't really mind if you tried to get them to move (the car vs. the.. umm thing?).

Emus! Do they really eat all the time?

Bears were lying on the road as well.

I was very excited because I got to see my favourite animal ever: african elephant! They are so cool.

The polar bear wasn't too excited though. But I was really happy to see one of those too because I think I've never seen one before.

Pumba! I loved that one, he was there with the elephants running around ridiculously fast haha.

So that was the end of the car route. I also saw deers, buffalos, a baby zebra etc etc during the car route but I was too lazy to take pics of all of them.

Pelican. Those are so cool.

I liked the penguins too even though they were these small ones that I've already seen in the London Zoo. Seems like animals are way more active on the other side of the globe (reference point: the polar bear). Does someone know in which zoo you could see the real emperor penguins or do they just have those in Antarctica? I'd really like to see them.

This was the house of the reptiles. Pretty thing.

A crocodile. As lazy as always.

A python, eww. I'm not really afraid of snakes but they just disgust me so bad I don't know why. There's just something about not having feet...

Bats! These were so cool, scary and HUGE at the same time. I really hope not ever coming across one in real life.

Umm I don't know what these are in English or Finnish but the French word for these is 'otarie'. Some kind of seals? Well anyway these were really cool and they had their own show a bit like the dolphins have in Särkänniemi. It's really funny how they can walk with that tail.

These I absolutely loved! I don't know the name for these either so I prefer to call them Madagascar animals. They were freely running around, jumping from tree to tree and so on. It was so funny when they were running around us.

Timon! These are so funny too. Seems like I managed to see at least one half of the cast of Lion King there. I also saw Rafiki (I guess I forgot to take pics of the monkeys because they kind of freak me out) and some other animals as well. I didn't take photos of the lions itself for some reason. Oh and I saw the cutest little monkey there! It was the size of a rat so cuuute.

Tigers.

And a snow leopard (?). That's about it. They had loads of other animals as well but I was a pretty lazy photographer that day and I guess this was enough anyway.

I just laughed so hard haha. The quote of the day: "Si et 85% des français c'est des cons qui écoute de la musique de merde lol et la culture française c'est nul. En France il ya que des truc nul les seul truc bien c'est des immitations en moins bien des truc americain et anglais."

My French friend isn't really happy today haha. Loosely could be translated into: "Yea and 85% of the French people are douchebags who listen to shitty music and the French culture sucks. In France there are only things that suck and the only good things are cheap imitations of American and English things."

So the bottom line for today could be that however I might be in love with the French culture, not everybody really is and that some things really can suck here there's no question about that. But today I'm happy because I got the new album of a great French band Chunk! No, Captain Chunk! and I'm going to see them on Saturday wooohoo!

Dear France, today I hate you

Past couple of days in Lyon and in France in general have been pretty intense. People have gone totally mental over the fact that Sarkozy is going to raise the age of retirement from 60 to 62 (!!! Finnish people would be more than excited about that).

All these pictures are taken here in Lyon yesterday. I got them from here.







The main streets of the city look pretty much like this. Today I walked 5km from school to home because all the metro stations were inaccessible. Well, guess I have no choice but to stay home today (again) and wait for the situation to normalize. Le Figaro says that it's going to normalize within 5 days so let's hope for the best! Nice way to start the vacation :)

This video was shot here yesterday at Place Bellecour (one of the main areas here and the metro that I take to school everyday goes from here).

France, je t'aime

Days to go: 4

Today I finally got the last ones of the needed papers and forms for France. I can tell you that renting a flat in France isn't the easiest thing to do! You need birth certificates and passport copies and blabla the list is endless! But I'm glad it's all taken care of now :)

So I thought I'd share some information about the city I'll be living in for the next 4 months or so. Here we go!

(map by me)

The city I'm going to be living in, Lyon, is located in the south of France, near the borders of Germany, Italy and Switzerland. Because of the great location, we're already planning on visiting the neighbouring countries, and I really hope I'll get to see them during my stay :) Paris is also a must-see location, because I've never been there.

Lyon is the 3rd biggest city in France with a population of around 500 000 people but combined with the urban areas the population gets to 1,8 million. It's not too small a city and I'm really glad that there's probably lots of stuff to do.

I'm also very excited that the river Rhône goes very close by our apartment :)

If you have anything to ask about my new hometown, please go ahead :) I'm probably going to make a better entry about the city when I've settled in.

P.S. Thanks to everyone who's shared their opinion on the banner. You can still do so in the previous post!

We finally made it!

DAYS TO GO: 5

I'm so stoked right now because we finally got our own apartment in France! It was about time, less than a week to go..

Anyway, this is my new blog during my stay in Lyon and I hope you wanna take part with me on this very exciting adventure by reading this as I'm going to try and update daily :) I'm going to be updating a bit also before my departure so you get to see how I'm getting prepared.. or the lack of preparation (more likely).

First question! Which banner do you prefer?

The one I currently have up...

Or the more frenchy one I made when I was bored.

Oh and you can comment on FINNISH, ENGLISH and FRENCH :) I'd also like to know why you are reading my blog :)

Sweet Wonderland

This blog is about my style and my exchange adventures in France. I'm writing in English, hope the Finnish readers don't mind too much :)

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