Every ending is a new beginning?

This time I’m writing a bit more serious. That’s because this week has been really, really controversial for me. There has been a lot of things going on. Things, that have gotten me really happy and then things that have gotten me really sad… It feels like every up is followed by down that is twice as hard. You feel like you’re on the top of the world and the next moment you feel like sh*t. Feels like whenever you get happy you get punished for that. And it really gets you. It makes you think about things. Think about what’s important in life and what is not. Think about the directions you’re going to take, decisions you’re going to make, think about the future, the past, the present… It all gets you!

Earlier this week we were having a home going party of one my best friends here in Spain. Of course, it was fun, but then these kind of happenings have also very sad aspect in them. Saying goodbye is never easy. And although you know it’s not probably the last time you see, you also know that things will never be same. It reminds you about how all this is here only for a while, temporarily. Of course you “know” that beforehand, but still you get surprised how it hits you. You meet so many new people, make so many new friends, have fun together, enjoy the time and the people… and then it’s all taken away and you have to go back to how it was… Except that nothing is how it was anymore.

 

"McAuto" :D I'm gonna miss you McFriend!

But with every ending, there’s a new beginning! Suddenly, at the very same home going party. I met someone new, maybe someone I had been looking for, maybe someone more than a friend! Maybe, just maybe someone who totally changes my direction! So, like I said, it has been really controversial week! The feelings go up and down all the time - in a blink of an eye.

When you think of it more, I think it’s like that with everything, when you are in here… or anywhere else away from “home”. The thing is, in here, you haven’t got anything stable, nothing familiar and so you have a “fresh start” (like I mentioned in my earliest posts). But in the same time, you have to build everything new: routines, relationships, everything. And just when you’ve done that, it’s all blown away! So nothing is certain, you can’t trust on anything. But at the same time you are still reliable on just the things that you have at that moment, just the people you have at that moment! It all makes you live on edge. All the time, all the time. I can tell you, mi amigos, it’s heavy!

But still, in the end, I guess that’s what this should be all about? Living in the moment. Carpe Diem!

See the mirror in your eyes
See the truth behind your lies
Your lies are haunting me
See the reason in your eyes
Giving answer to the why
Your eyes are haunting me!

Falling in & out of love
in love, in love
Falling in & out of love
your love, your love

Armin van Buuren ft. Sharon den Adel - In and Out of Love

Only in Spain!

I’m going to tell you guys about a festival here in Sevilla this weekend! During the week I heard that a local event management company is going to arrange a small festival here in Sevilla. The festival, Primavera Open Air, was advertised to be the “Spring Break Festival” with up to 8,000 participants! This was all thrilling: a festival in Spain should be pretty cool. I was going to go to the festival with a German girl I had met earlier. She was going there to take some pictures as a freelance photographer and she wanted some company. And by the way, she is the one to thank for all these pics as well... Thanks!

We decided to walk there. From the map, it didn’t look like the venue is far away… But it took us an hour to walk there! But still, the journey was pretty much fun: at one point, we thought we were close as we started to hear some very loud music… But when we got closer to the source, it turned out that there was just some guy at the parking lot with a car full of audio, playing really loud and about 100 people dancing around! Johnny, la gente esta muy loca, whatta f*ck? :D Back in Finland, police would end something like that immediately. But not in here, not in Spain, it’s so cool!

As we continued, we eventually got to the actual festival site. And this festival, I’ll tell you, was something really weird from the beginning to the end! First of all, in the entrance, the security guys were dressed up in uniforms, as if they were police or something! On the other hand, the guy taking the ticket was just an old guy smoking cigarette with just normal clothes :D And the 8,000 people? More like 800 people... Anyway, we got in and headed out to the stage where there was a band playing. The music was really good, really different from what I had heard! It was really weird but cool mixture of electro, funk, rock and house -music! Really good mixture!

The music was playing really loud, and all of a sudden, about a half of the sound disappeared! I thought: Did I lose part of my hearing? Or am I that drunk? What happened?! Then I saw these guys lifting up a fence that had fallen down (and probably unplugged some wires)… “OK, this doesn’t look good” I thought. But the band continued playing and the crowd didn’t mind… Then, after about ten or fifteen minutes, there was a big bang and all the electricity from the stage went off! I was thinking, “This is not happening, it’s not possible!” :D The band was confused, the organizers were going desperate and the crowd started singing football songs! Now this is Spain!

The show was pretty wild one... intentionally and unintentionally!

Eventually they got the music and lights back on and the show continued! The stage show performed by the band was really crazy, Loca! Lastly after all these happenings during the gig, a guy came on the stage… Dressed up in a full body costume of penis! :D AND he had rollerskates! I just can’t stop laughing when I think of all the things that happened and in the end there’s a huge penis spinning around the stage with rollerskates! Hahaha! Only in Spain can this happen!

I'm working, all week long,
I dream the days away,
I wanna... sing my song
so let the music play
I have to get my fix, and fly tonight
and when the clock strikes 6, on Fri-day Night
I need to blow it all away
 
I Can't wait.. for the weekend to begin...
Michael Gray - The Weekend

Travelling in Andalucía: Gibraltar

The second day of our travel started pretty early at Marbella. We headed southwest towards this huge rock known as Gibraltar. A small city in the south end of Spain… Except that it is not part of Spain, but the UK instead! While driving there the view was – again - more than nice and it got better all the time we were closing Gibraltar! When we were almost at the border, a huge queue of cars started to gather ahead of us: I guess it is popular for Spanish people to go shopping in Gibraltar as they have no VAT (ALV) at all in there! And so then we stood in the queue for an hour or so…

Gibraltar, here we come!

Finally, we reached the border and the Spanish customs officers who couldn’t care less changed into these very polite British “Bobbies”, which was funny and also a nice change at the same time! After the customs we encountered something interesting! You see, Gibraltar is a pretty small piece of land and most of it is covered with the “Upper rock” – a huge rock that you can’t build houses on – so there is not a lot of land to use in there. And so the weird thing was that when we were driving the road leading to the city we came across an airfield… Like literally: drove across a fully sized airfield! There’s not enough room otherwise, so they just made an intersection right in the middle of the field!

A road crossing the airfield? I would say that DON'T pass when the light is red!
Also, a pointer for the pilot when landing: do not break late! :D

After getting through the airfield we got our first look at the city of Gibraltar, home for some 30,000 British and also some Spanish (I think). Altogether, Gibraltar didn’t differ from the Spanish cities a lot. The streets were as narrow, there were as many scooters, people were driving on the “right” side of the road and architecture was pretty much the same. Anyway, it is still another country and for example all the signs were in English, the currency was pound and so on. By the way, the prices were the pretty much the same as in Finland, except that they were in pounds! So basically a beer was 4,50£ which is like 6 Euros!

So after having some f*cking expensive beer we decided to head up to the Upper rock! There are a lot of things to see up there! First of all, the view in there is amazing! You can see all over to Costa del Sol in the northeast, city of Alcerigas in the north and Morocco, Africa in the south!  Besides the views there are some cool caves on the rock, including some old British fortresses. And then of course the Makakis, the little monkeys! :D Those little fellas are really a fun to look at and even hold in your arms!

I will definately recommend anyone visiting Andalucía to also visit Gibraltar, it is quite amazing!

Sun is up
Move your body
I got moves and all the night I will not sit, yeah.
I came up
For this party
I wont stop till mr.dj stops the beat, yeah sun is up.

Inna - Sun Is Up

Travelling in Andalucía: Ronda and Costa del Sol

Two months in Spain has now passed and last week I got my first visitors here as my parents came to Sevilla to see the city. As they were visiting, we decided to travel a little bit here in Andalucía. So, when it comes to travelling, the public transportation is pretty good and not extremely expensive. However, if it’s possible, I personally recommend renting a car instead! Renting a car can be actually quite inexpensive if you get it for a few days at least. For instance, a small car for a weekend (3 days) can be only 70 euros + gas, which for example 3 people is not bad at all!  Also, renting a car gives you a lot of liberties when it comes to deciding where and when do you want to travel.

 Andalucían landscape... One picture is more than 1000 words!

So I rented a car for me and my parents for the weekend! This was actually the second time in a week that I made such a trip to the coast. Earlier I went to the Costa del Sol with a friend of mine to scout the area little bit… The scheduled travel plan for Friday was to drive from Sevilla to Ronda in the mountains and then continue to Marbella in Costa del Sol.  So, after a short adventure in the dense traffic of Sevilla we got to the highway leading to Cadiz and on our way to Ronda through the towns of Dos Hermanas and Villamartin. By the way, this road: 371 to Villamartin, is really nice! I wish I could someday come back here with a motor bike – the roads and views are just amazing!

Ronda is an old city from the Moorish times, located in the mountains between Sevilla and Costa del Sol. The town is built on a really steep and high cliff with an amazing valley in the middle of it. There are also huge bridges crossing the valley, uniting the two parts of the town. I had already visited Ronda earlier, but it was still as impressing as it was the first time. Definitely a place to see in Andalucía!

Unfortunately just when we arrived to the mountain town of Ronda it started raining. So after we left Ronda and headed to the mountains it was raining and we basically drove inside of a cloud (täysin pilvessä) and so the views were not that good :( However, when we got out of the cloud, we saw some magnificent views before we eventually arrived to the sunny coast aka Costa Del Sol.

Costa del Sol, some 350 kilometers slice of the Spanish southern coast from Tarifa to Almeria is very beautiful region of Andalucía with hundreds of beaches on the Mediterranean Sea. Also, it is the most touristic part of Spain together with the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean. Marbella is one the numerous tourist cities along the coast. The city comes alive especially in the summer when the weather is at its best and all the tourists come to the town. Marbella is also the place where the rich people of Spain want to spend their time. Such places like Nikki beach and Puerto Banus boast with the Jet Set life and some nicest hotels and casinos on the coast! In the end, in my opinion, Marbella is a nice little town to visit, but maybe not during the high tourist season. 

Vamos! A la playa!

Stay tuned for the next post where I’ll tell you about the rest of the travel: Gibraltar and Cadiz!

You know we go
where the feeling is right!
You know we go
where the groove is hot!
You know we go
when the feeling is right
feeling is right, feeling is right..

Vamos a la Playa
A mi me gusta bailar
el ritmo de la noche
Sounds of Fiesta!
Loona - Vamos a la playa

About business...

I have now been here at Sevilla for a little over a month and life has started to feel a little more normal. “Business as usual” as the saying goes. The first four weeks have kind of felt like I’m just on vacation! Not only because of all the crazy partying but also because I guess that’s how you first feel when you go to a different country and culture. But now, after being here for five weeks, I feel like I’m able to tell you guys a little more about what exactly I am doing here as an intern!

I am basically working every day except for the weekends. And actually, the things I have been working with at my work have been very interesting! In fact, I feel I have learned quite a lot of new and interesting things and that it’s been a real benefit to me! I mean, obviously I knew that this placement will benefit me somehow, but after one month I can say that I am positively surprised of how much I  I’ve learned!

My job assignment and tasks include both administrative tasks and marketing tasks in two totally different projects the company is working on. The marketing part divides further on into Online marketing tasks such as SEO (search engine optimization), Social Media marketing (such as Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and so on, you know ;) and then of course traditional marketing (creating databases of possible clients and collaborators and also contacting them).

           Parque Maria Luisa and Plaza España - pretty nice views to go jogging..!


The thing that I really like about my internship is that I really have various tasks which makes working a LOT more interesting! Another thing that I like that the organization is quite small so I get actually quite a lot of responsibility on many tasks and get to be iniative. It’s not so common for an intern to get so much responsibility so I welcome it with open handed! Overall, working here has been so far very, very taughtful and useful experience and I have learned things I could have never learned in my studies! I could say that in this case as well I recommend doing the practical training abroad!

Soundtrack: Tiësto ft. Kay - Work Hard, Play Hard
Time to loose my mind,
Cuz’ I work damn hard
so I’ll play damn hard
Lost in the night,
Cuz’ I work damn hard
so I’ll play damn hard

Unexpected meetings, Part dos!

Ok guys, you have to get used to the fact that my posts are a little bit late. There is in fact quite a lot to do here. So I don’t have so much time to write all these things after all. Quite controversial really: When nothing happens, there’s time to write, but nothing to write about. When there’s a lot happening, there’s no time to write about it! :D But yeah, let’s cut to the point, shall we..

 Couple of different ways to travel around the city centre ;)

My second week here in Sevilla was still pretty cool! I got a better hang of my work assignments and started to realize what it is all about. Besides that, I finally started to know the city a bit better. Yes it’s already my second week, but you see: I work every day with 9 to 5 basis. In addition, travelling to work takes about an hour one-way so when I get back home, there’s not much time or energy to go touring.

                

The week went by pretty fast but then on Friday I was just walking in this Plaza del Duque trying to find myself some roller skates and suddenly somebody shouts my name! I turn around and see this girl from Austria who I met the week before at Malaga (and who I told you about)! I mean, what the f*ck? What are the odds? :D Anyway, I had promised her to show around the city and so I did! We went together on this city tour that my work mate was arranging the same evening and we got to see the most famous places here in city centre!

Sevilla at nighttime, pretty nice-looking place!

The next day, on Saturday, we decided to go out to party a little bit! Some other people I got to know earlier had the same idea so we had a little party at our appartment. In the end there were a bunch of Finnish, couple of Dutch, couple of Slovenians and an Austrian so pretty international again! During the first two weeks I’ve met so many new people that I’m not even sure if I can remember them all! :D Well, at least these two Slovenian girls are worth of mentioning, they were so great! I even invited them to Finland :D And did you know that Finland leads the suicide rates in Europe, Hungary is the second and the third in this questionable race is Slovenia. Well, neither did I!

Oh, sometimes
I get a good feeling, yeah
Get a feeling that I never, never, never, never had before, no no
I get a good feeling, yeah
Avicii - Levels

Unexpected meetings… Part uno.

Allright people! I'm sorry I haven’t posted anything for a while, but I’ve been busy (yeah right!) doing things… :D Anyways, two weeks have passed here in Spain and I guess it’s time to take a little peak what's exactly been going on here, aye? Lot of this is all actually quite unbelievable, but read it yourself!

Let’s start with last weeks weekend which I already mentioned you. Just why did I end up some 200 km away from Sevilla in Malaga for just one day visit only? Well here’s what happened: a good old childhood-friend of mine from Joensuu called me during the week. I was just at work at the moment and couldn’t answer it right then. I thought: “Okay, he’s in Finland so I’ll have to get back to him when or IF I remember.” But here’s the scary part: Just the night before I had had a dream where this same friend of mine appeared! And in the dream I was supposed to meet him, but I didn’t, and he was angry for me because of that – in the dream I mean.

      The first impression of Malaga, Andalucia.           Estacion de Malaga María Zambrano

Well… after that I totally forgot about the whole episode (naturally :D). I didn’t remember it until on Friday night when I was enjoying this marvelous cerveza grande on this nice little street bar in Sevilla. I thought I could give my friend a call and ask what was he calling about. So I called him:
-“Hi, what’s up? You called me earlier this week. You know, I’m here in Spain now so...”
- “Yeah I know. I’m in Malaga.”
- “WHAT? Whatta hell? What are you there for?”
- “Well, I’ve been traveling around Spain for 3 weeks now. Right now I’m in here and it’s my last weekend.”
- “I’m so there!”
And the next morning I was sitting on a train to Malaga! It’s about 200km to the southeast. Takes about 2 hours 45 minutes and 19,85€ to get there by train. So not so bad really!

Some dudes sk8boardin'...

...at the flood water canal! :)

Already on the way there I realized the difference in this country as the level and country-like views of Sevilla changed to these "kinda-like-mountain" hills as I was watching the view on my way to the coast. When I got to Malaga, it felt great! Why? Well because of the coastal climate: Warm but not hot, moisture but not pressuring, just great. As I walked out of the station, I immediately rated Malaga not as close as classy as Sevilla. Malaga is more like a tourist city and obviously a harbour city. But all in all, it felt great!

My friend was living at this nice, clean and laid-back hostel almost in the city centre. One night cost 10 Euros so it wasn’t too expensive either! At the hostel we met this nice girl from Austria who's going to appear in the story later! Basically, what we did the rest of the night, was partying our reunion in Spain by visiting all kinds of bars and clubs in the city. I felt a bit tired somewhere around 4 am so I left back to the hostel. My friend, he still stayed, although he had a flight back to Finland 11.30 am the next day…

They sure got some big churches in Spain!

The city at night time.

The next day I awoke at 10 am… aand saw my friend still sleeping in his bunk! I woke him up and said: “If you catch the taxi right now, in 5 minutes, you just might make it!” :D He had been partying until 7 o’clock in the morning and then slept about 2-3 hours! Obviously “Johnny, la gente esta muy loca” is not very far from the truth! :D I went to have a long shower and my friend had gone by the time I got back. Did he make it? Well make a guess in the comment box I'll tell you guys... ;) Anyway, I took the next train to back to Sevilla and kissed Malaga goodbye… At least for a while!

Soundtrack: Sak Noel - Paso (Nini anthem)
I'm telling to you mama, there is no need for a drama,
but I don't wanna study, I just wanna party.
I'm a nini ma', you know what a nini is? 
Don't wait for me awake, I'lI come at home late. 
Maybe at five, maybe at six,
look at me mum, I'm dressing like a... bitch.