1.13.2005 happy new year... er, yeah, whatever
well... let's just get on with it.
new year's was fantastic in london... got to hang out with fatti a couple times, met up with cathy and chilled
for the weekend, stayed at this rather dodgy hostel... yeah, good times! we went to this restaurant and lounge
for new year's eve, and had the early dinner cuz it was cheaper. well, we were stuck there cuz there aren't
supposed to be in-and-out privileges, but i talked us into getting some fresh air... we walked around for 45 min.
before deciding to head back in to lounge a bit more... mistake.
by the time we went back out again, around 11:15pm, the cops had already cordoned off the street next to the
river thames from embankment to parliament. we scrambled around with what seemed like half of london to find a
place to catch the fireworks, and luckily, we found a decent spot on whitehall. the fireworks were awesome.
possibly the best i've ever seen... at least 3 times i thought it was ending, cuz of a massive group of
explosions, but it just kept going... sweet.
anyways, the rest of the weekend was good. had some yummy chinese food, watched 2 movies (the poetic
house of flying daggers and
the funny and sweet garden state),
rode the london eye for the first time... yeah, definitely good times.
otherwise, since then, life has just been a blur... been going to bed too late, trying to set up this new comp,
chatting with friends, or otherwise wasting time when i could be sleeping...
oh, i've started looking into the possibilty of doing a masters degree in international development... i was
inspired by cathy and the reasons why she decided to go to sheffield to study. i'm really thinking hard about
it and i think i'm going to apply... i'm waiting for the prospectus from each of the universities i'll probably
apply to, and then it's just a matter of doing the paperwork... ok, there's that small thing about getting
academic references, but we'll see how that goes...
what else is there? oh yeah, i turned 28 on monday. thanks to all who sent in birthday wishes! party at my
place on saturday, jan. 22. lates!
1.24.2005 the light at the end of the tunnel?
yoyoyo. i realized i haven't posted any pics since september. boo on me. i also forgot that i had prepped a
whole stack of pics, but i just haven't posted them yet. boo on me again. ok, i'm gonna try my best to post
more pics, cuz it appears that people still do come to the website, unless they're web trolls or something...
my place was rammed...
so last week sucked. large. mostly it was work... but there were a couple personal things that happened which
made the suckage all that much worse. thankfully, i ended the week on a high, by hosting a party at my place
sat. night for my birthday, even if it's a bit later than it should've been... but while a few close friends
couldn't make it to my party, a lot more people would've been away last weekend, so i postponed it.
cristina, carolina and marta
i invited a lot of people, though i knew that quite a few already wouldn't be able to make it... just didn't
want them to feel left out or feel like i didn't want them to be there. you know how it is. well, even with
a few last-minute cancellations, there were over 55 people in my little shared flat. it was a pretty diverse
group, too, from all over the place... canada, germany, spain, china, italy, ireland, england, mexico, greece,
bosnia, netherlands, australia, hungary, ecuador... i think that's the list.
international? caroline (french) and mark (dutch)
in fact, angie, who came from dortmund just for my party, remarked that she had only moved out 4 months ago
but i had changed all my friends! hahaha... well, not quite, i just invited everyone from the broad spectrum
of friends that i have here... that's why i'm rarely home. maybe another thing is that, with so many people
leaving aachen, you're bound to meet some new friends, right?
who's the lucky birthday boy? :P
so, it was good times, as always. spent a lot on drinks, of which i probably only needed half or what i
bought... spent a lot of time cooking, from 3pm until almost 9pm, but it's all good. everyone liked the
tortilla espaņola (spanish potato omelette), and the garlic chicken wings were good too.
got some good presents too, quite a bit more than i was expecting... coolz! i'll post more pics from the
party another time...
anyhoo, not much else to report on right now... waiting for the prospectuses (prospecti?) from all the
universities before deciding on which ones to apply to, but i'm about 90% sure i've got my list of 5 schools
already... they are, in rough order of preference: london school of
economics, university of manchester,
university of bath, king's college
london, and university of birmingham. any other suggestions?
so you were expecting more bday pics? well, too bad! hahaha, you'll have to wait for them, just like everyone
else. instead i bring you pics from last saturday's architecture students' party...
irena and me
in spite of its name, there weren't actually many architecture students there at all. irena's an architecture
student, and even she wasn't planning on coming, but she decided late on sat. night to check out the party with
a few of her friends. her brother, dario (who i may have mentioned through my basketball escapades from before)
was going all along, but after some relentless pressure at work (dario and irena both work as student helpers
at ericsson), i guess she thought it might've been good.
mark and yvonne
well, i had decided to go with mark and a bunch of spanish people, including emilio, who hooked us up with the
tickets... we then tried to get as many people to go as possible, and we managed to bring along yvonne,
francesco, and mark's 2 sisters, who were in town to visit him. anne bailed on us, after agreeing on wed.
night to come as well, but i guess her
erasmus application took
priority (as i suppose it should :P)...
jenny, irena and dario (l to r)
so how was the party? well, the company was great... but the music was crap. they kept cycling through
different genres of music, from old 80s rock to progressive house to german schlager tunes.
not cool. i only really liked the house and hip-hop sets, and out of 3 hours, i think there was maybe 30-40
min. of good music. bleh. drinks were expensive too. at least there was a lot of eye candy... heheh.
also met one of irena's friends, jenny (dunno her real name... somehow i don't think "jenny" is a real german
name, you know?), who is a customs officer. she does drug investigations! deadly... i was like, could you
bust someone here if you saw something, and she said that while she had the power to do so, she wouldn't, cuz
she was alone and a small woman. still, cool beans.
hmmm, fatti came to visit on the weekend, and i managed to catch up with her a bit, first at helen's place
(which is maybe the most kick-ass flat in aachen, possibly almost as good as jason's place) for dinner, then
for brunch on sunday morning... yeah, i guess she tried to make up for not coming the weekend before for my
bday party, but it was good to see her again.
oh yeah, also caught 2 movies after work on friday with yvonne... first, we saw
closer, with
julia roberts,
jude law,
clive owen, and the always-gorgeous
natalie portman (did she not look
amazing with the blonde wig or was that just me)... great movie. i was thinking about it
the entire night, even after the second movie we saw,
the aviator... i mean, the raw emotions
depicted in closer were just so powerful... i don't see how the
aviator got 11 oscar nominations. i mean, it was good, but it wasn't that good.
so what else... oh yeah, guess what? i'm going to see u2 in dublin!
u2 in dublin!!! crazy! i hooked up pre-sale tickets by being a member of
u2.com, and i get to visit breda at the same time! deadly! dublin! u2!
too cool!!!
ps. i have an extra ticket for the concert... who wants it? :P