Kali Ellatha

Greece is blue which happens to be one of my favorite colors. The sky is blue, the sea is blue, and they decorated the whole country with blue here and there which matches nicely the white, green and pink. I'm still dreaming of the tomatoes which were of course not blue, but nicely red and so incredibly good

This year I have been lucky with business trips, and the one last week to Greece was no exception from that perspective

Ok, the cats are not blue either, atleast not all of them (copy right A.)

Greek stereotypes

In addition to work, this turned out to be a trip of exploring Greece and Greek stereotypes. Before going, I heard many things about Greece and Athens, but as it was a business trip I couldn't explore it all of course,. However, based on the little introduction I got to Greece and all kind of Greek stuff, I made some conclusions. The negative comments seem to be exaggerations and all the good ideas about Greece turned out to be very correct and I even discovered many more very nice things :)

And even if there apparently were some strikes during my stay, it was very difficult to imagine the recent violence to take place here.

My hotel was just next to the Akropolis, and I spent many good moments in the surroundings including dinners and bars, some inspiring working time, and even a visit to the new museum. The unofficial guided walk the first evening can be summarized to “on your right, you can see Akropolis…” :), while from outside the museum, the comment would be "in your front and back you can see Akropolis"

I'm now a hat addict...:)

I really liked Greek fashion, and nobody believed me when I repeated that I'm not a girl who is into shopping. In addition to several other nice things, I also found some hats, and I wanted to buy them all, but finally with a reasonable logic, I decided on two – one pink and one white.

A friendly lady in a shop even made a photo to show me how nice the blue one was also from behind. She almost convinced me, but unfortunately shopping limits in terms of items and budget were already passed since long..

Short island visit

The main problem with Greek islands is that there are too many of them and they all seem to wait to be discovered. This time, there were several constraints to consider but finally we went to the little island Hydra which was not far, and with convenient timetable for departure.We did not regret.

from Greenland to India...

In March my work took me to Greenland and India, and I also went for a family weekend in Stockholm and even managed to see a friend in Malmö. It was all in the same trip, and I'm still trying to understand where I have been and what I have seen... such a crazy trip :)

"So how was your trip?"

This would be the most common question when coming back home after a long trip. My quick answer this time was "oh absolutely wonderful". With a little bit more of time, there is of course much more to be said.... for a trip so full of contrasts and so rich and intense in all kind of ways. How to tell about India and Greenland at the same time?? One by one, or comparing, focusing on the differences or maybe even finding the similarities? the weather, the food, the culture, the religion, the silence and the noise, the space and the crowd of people and the smells and the tastes, the sun and the stars, the people and the animals, the colors and all the feelings and thoughts that all this trigger – where to start describing all this?

In words...

One day I was the little sister/youngest daughter/cousin being home for my birthday party, the next day I was an expert giving lectures and advices. Half the trip I spent in minus 20 degrees and the other half in plus 30 – imaging how my luggage looked like...:) I saw icebergs and northern light, temples, beautiful coffee places and small fishing boats. I travelled by helicopter and went dog sledging in Greenland and by train and auto richa in India. I laid down on an iceberg and I swam in the Arabic sea. I ate French fries for 10 days and then curry for the following 10 days. I met all kind of people, and so many were so nice and interesting, maybe that can also be another blog post.... My body and mind lost completely track of space and time but I think I suffered mostly from jetlag and cultural shock once I came back to Budapest – but then I did it for quite some time and maybe I still do... :)

and in pictures...

So, even if I don't know how to tell about it all, I have such a big need of sharing so let’s start slooowly with some pictures..:)

Boat trip among icebergs - Ilulissat


Boat trip in the backwater - Trivandrum

Fishing boat in Greenland


Fishing boat - South India


Church -Nuuk


Church on the beach - Trivandrum


Cottage Ilulissat

Park in Chandigarh

about pumpkin oil and other important things

Just a little bit spoiled
I have to admit that I got a little bit spoiled the last two weeks; the food in India is just so great, and even if my colleagues got slightly tired of it, I was eating it happily until the end. Only when I came back to Europe, I realised how much I wanted something lighter and with less curry. And the tradition of good food continued also in the last part of the trip where I tried Ethiopian food for the first time (oh how good it was) and also some really delicious fish dishes. So one reason not to write anything for the blog is that I have been on a little culinary discovery trip...

Indian lunch - this time with pancakes

So after some time at hotels and restaurants, there are both good and bad things with being back home... The good things would include the possibility to cook, while the bad things could for example be that I have to clean my room and also serve my self the juice...And most of the time, there is only one type of juice in my fridge and not even freshly pressed...hehe

Anyway, after eating more or less the same every day for 10 days with lots of spices, I’m quite happy to enjoy some simple and light food. Since, I’m back I’m having salad and beans every day.

Steamed vegetables with pumpkin oil

Tonight, I made something really simple, but oh so good; steamed broccoli and corny flower with pumpkin oil. I learnt it at the first cooking course where we had it with the fish. Today I ate it with couscous, red onion tomato salad, some black beans and pumpkin seeds. Very nice!

As probably obvious from the name, this is something very simple to prepare. Just steam the vegetables until they are crispy, and serve them with pumpkin oil mixed with balsam vinegar (2 spoons of pumpkin oil for 1 spoon of balsam vinegar) and some salt and pepper.

Same same but different…

Of course it is impossible to fail something this simple, but I did notice some important improvement between this time and last. Tonight, I used very good quality pumpkin oil and what a difference it made! Last time, I didn’t like it so much, and after today I understand that it was the pumpkin oil that was not that good. The conclusion would therefor be that the secret is to use good oil.

The good pumpkin oil with it's friend balsam vinegar

In India I bought some really nice long black pepper at a local market. It had a really interesting flavor, somewhat a round taste - not so strong. I also like their shape and I remember the friendly man at the market selling it

Mysore Devaraja market.Unfortunately I didn't make a photo with the kind man selling the pepper, but this is how nice the market was.

I guess everything is relative

Last week coming back from Delhi, I took a taxi from the airport as I had quite heavy luggage. It was 5 PM and rush hour in Budapest. Normally the traffic in Budapest is bothering me a lot and I always wish for regulations of using cars in the city. This day something was strange and different, I felt like I was the last human on earth or something, it was so quiet and peaceful with almost no cars on the street.

I'm happy not to drive in Delhi...
Traffic in Delhi is something unbelievable with more and more cars every time (according to Indian Times there are around 2 million vehicles only in Delhi) - traffic jam, beeping and a very interesting driving logic :)


There are cars, auto-rickshaws, bikes and people everywhere. It happen to us more than once to drive with a normal car on the pedestrian road and we were not the only ones doing it. Everyone is beeping all the time but it's a friendly way of beeping, more like "beep beep", not aggressively "beeeeeep" like in many other countries, but still it does make a lots of noise. And of course, pollution is really heavy - air is full of smog and even if you see that the sky is all gray, you realise to what point it's bad only when you get out of there.

Traffic jam - an exercise in patience
Let's hope that the new metro will be ready soon and help up the situation... And anyway, once you are in the traffic jam, there is no need to get upset or worried, but just to relax and accept that you will be late - a good exercise in patience. And maybe people living there are so use to the pollution and all the noise and then waiting in a traffic jam is finally a good occasion to have a nap... :)

I guess everything is relative..
So coming back from India, I was hit by the silence in Budapest, while just 2 months ago I came back from a 2 weeks trip to Sweden, and I had bad head ace for a few days due to pollution and the noise of the city with cars, sirens, and people shouting made me really tired.

During the few days I was in Budapest before leaving again, I didn't completely get use to the silence - so I enjoyed it a lot, what a nice feeling it is to have a rest for the ears even in a big city.

Also here in Miri, it seems calm, no street noise is reaching my hotel room at the 10th floor... me and my ears are so far having a rest :)

to have or not to have a guidebook ??

I love books, but there is one type of book that I cannot decide if I like or not; guidebooks.

I think that reading in a guidebook while traveling easily takes away to much attention from the experience. Surely its nice to get to know things about the place but there are so many ways. It is of course very nice to know someone on the spot and this way of discovering is not possible when going alone, with or without guidebook. Internet offers lots of information and once there the locals and the tourist office will give good information.

Last year when we went to India, we brought a Lonely planet but actually we hardly didn’t open it. India was so overwhelming itself that I couldn’t also read about it, I was so busy just being there.

Even if I’m sure it will be the same this year, I feel more prepared as I know what is waiting for us there. I wanted to read a bit before and as I’m going once more in a few months, I thought I would get a guidebook.

I went to a second hand shop for books in English and I found a Rough Guide to India. It’s from 2003 but the stuff I’m interested in cannot have changed since then. The book is really detailed and I hesitated quite a lot; do I want or not a guidebook?? - I almost read the whole guidebook while deciding :) Finally I bought it, I decided I can always give it back to the secondhand shop when I don’t want it anymore.

Somehow, those kind of guidebooks is a bit too much for me. They give such detailed information that the traveler will know exactly what will appear around the next corner and then the pleasure and excitement with traveling is going I must say. It feels like they already did the travel for you and you just have to repeat. And it must be better to look at place in real life as it is there in front of us instead of in the book...

Anyway, I now I have my Indian guidebook, it has its temporary place at the table next to my bed and it did already offer some interesting reading. And the more I read, the more I realise that I want to learn about this crazy country and it seems like the guidebook is a good start.

So, maybe I can say that I like guidebooks before and maybe after traveling but not during...

Dutch - a new dimension to the street sign game

Pretending to be a serious blogger and no posting for a week or so... To my defence, I've been to Holland for a few days and what a pleasure it is to get away from computers, internet and other electronic stuff for a while.

the street-sign-game
For me, a Swede in Hungary, the street signs and advertisement are more part of the game “Guess what is written here..” than actual information. A player in this game gets points every time she understands a word with the final aim to get a full sentence and hopefully to learn some new words or grammar constructions. This game has the great feature that the full message is in many cases lost and the player can escape all stupidities violating our public space such as “How to loose 15 kilos by eating a lots of Christmas food” or "which famous person did what kind of un-interesting things lately".

the Dutch language - a Swedish perspective..
The same game in Holland is very easy, almost too easy. Again, I realised that Dutch (atleast in a written form) is so similar to Swedish. Walking on the street, everything seems to be a bit misspelled (hehe) but it is still very understandable. In addition to all the words that are almost like in Swedish (straks, begreipen, stroom and many more), there are many words inspired from English and also of course with Latin origin. At an outdoor bar, I realised that I can even order my orange juice in French - jus d’orange.. :) What concerns the rest you can easily imagine it from German, even the grammar structure is similar to German. So, as conclusion, if the Dutch language didn’t have all those crazy “hrrch” sound in almost every word, it would be the most easy language to learn!

Maybe one day, I'll give it a try and become one of the 5 millions who have Dutch as a second language. It may even be proven to be useful; Dutch is actually the native language in several countries and also the official one in three Unions. Knowledge of Dutch can also be useful if you want to learn some of the creole languages or Afrikaans. Apparently, also in Namibia many people can understand it. However, without moving to one of these countries it may not be worth it – most Dutch people has a really high level of English and other languages...

Of course, this is not news to anyone, Swedish and Dutch are naturally similar, both being members of the Germanic languages family (North respective West, but still..). Anyhow, I was very happy to play my street-sign-understanding-game in Holland and to bring it to another dimension with the Dutch…:)

And if anyone got tempted to learn.. here is a nice free online course:
http://learndutch.elanguageschool.net/