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Friday, November 10, 2017

Milan (Italy) - Get Up!

MILAN (Italy)
10 November – 12 November 2017

Another one on our to see  list of performs, Bryan Adams, was performing at the Mediolanum Forum di Assago, near Milan. This wasn’t at all a difficult decision for us. The moment we knew tickets were purchased, flights to Milan were booked and accommodation reserved right next to the venue at half decent Royal Garden Hotel, all of 280mtrs away. SORTED.

We had a pretty basic plan but often they’re the best.

Fly into Milan. Hire a car. Take a day trip up to Lake Como. Got to Milan that evening for a bit of a look around, hit the concert the next day and fly back to Riga before anyone knew we were actually out of town.


Riga - Latvia
On the way to Milan


Lake Como - Italy


Lake Como - Italy


Lake Como - Italy

Driving out of Milan airport and heading the 50+kms north to Lake Como introduced us to certain peculiarities and odd features of the Milan ‘topography’. 

The first was the inordinate proliferation of roundabouts. It was as if all the redundant and inconsequential roundabouts on this planet were sent en masse to inhabit, live and breed in Milan. It was unlike anything I’d ever witnessed before. It was as if  love affair of the Milanese had gone far deeper than just that. It had developed into an addiction and then mutated into a violent sort of illness from which recovery could never be possible. It was genuinely alarming.


Lake Como - Italy


Lake Como - Italy


Woman are multi-taskers - it's obvious


Lake Como - Italy


Second, somewhere on our drive through the back-burbs of Milan we encountered a prostitute haven in the woods. Every second bend was occupied by scantly clad women whose booty mass was on show for all passers by. Both odd and amusing, it was 10-15kms worth of roadside wares for the frisky Italiano, or whomever else was passing by. I've never experienced a stretch of road like it in my life.

After beating the roundabouts and prostitutes we made it to the gloriously picturesque Lake Como, in the Lombardy region of Northern Italy, and were fortunate enough to have delivered a glorious mid-November day that made sightseeing absolutely delightful.


Lake Como - Italy


Lake Como - Italy


Lake Como - Italy


Set against the foothills of the Alps the lake is shaped like an upside-down Y. We drove from the town of Como up to one of the major points of Bellagio where we stopped to take in the views and walk through the quaint town prior to having a wine or two with a bit of light lunch.

That evening we decided to go and check out a little bit of Milan, and as seems to be the case with me fairly often I’ve discovered, the places that I’d either had prejudices against, or had heard bad things about, are often the ones that seem to impress. On this occasion my impression of Milan had come from family who had made their own assessment that Milan was a nothing place…well, to that I say, let me introduce you to Linea Traghetti Gaggiano Milano. This canal just a little outside of the city centre is just a mecca for nightlife with bars, restaurants and more bars filling the promenade for what felt like kms.  It was outstanding!


Linea Traghetti Gaggiano Milano - Milan - Italy



Linea Traghetti Gaggiano Milano - Milan - Italy


Linea Traghetti Gaggiano Milano - Milan - Italy


The centre of Milan itself also had some attractions. Unfortunately we just didn’t have the time to take it all in and appreciate what was there but as a place to come back to, definitely. It was obvious from first brush that the city is built around fashion & style. Whilst still being the industrial capital of the north there is more than enough to keep the visitor engaged and intrigued for some time. So Milan, apologies, I judgement of you was completely unfair and I stand correct against my initial assessment.

BRYAN ADAMS – GET UP!

I forget how many times I’ve seen BA play live but I think it’s close to six or seven.
No matter what your opinion is of his music, whether you like him or not, his live performances are always outstanding and he delivers. Looking back over all the performers that we’d seen, there’s not one artist that gets close to delivering 29 songs in a set. The next best, from memory, were the Foo Fighters who performed for 3hrs in Riga, (26 songs).


Bryan Adams - Get Up! Tour -  Mediolanum Forum di Assago - Italy


Bryan Adams - Get Up! Tour -  Mediolanum Forum di Assago - Italy


Bryan Adams - Get Up! Tour -  Mediolanum Forum di Assago - Italy


Bryan Adams - Get Up! Tour -  Mediolanum Forum di Assago - Italy


Bryan Adams - Get Up! Tour -  Mediolanum Forum di Assago - Italy


Here’s the set-list for the night.

Artist: Bryan Adams
Location:  Medionlanum Forum di Assago, Assago.

Saturday, October 28, 2017

Belfast (Northern Ireland) - The Troubles



BELFAST (Northern Ireland)
28 October 2017

The Troubles was an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland during the late 20th century. Also known as the Northern Ireland conflict, it was primarily a political and nationalistic conflict, fuelled by historic events.

Growing up in Australia names such as Sinn Fein and the IRA were all too well known with bombings, murders and other atrocities making in as headline news fairly regularly.


Belfast - Northern Ireland

Belfast - Northern Ireland

Belfast - Northern Ireland


My understanding of the conflict, as basic as I could understand it as a kid was a movement to end discrimination against the Catholic minority from the Protestant, unionist government. Of course my understanding severely undermines the actual complexity, volatility and gross violence of the conflict. So I don’t pretend to know anything about anything other than the headline news. Still, considering we were in Ireland and Belfast, Northern Ireland was not that far a drive away, I wanted to go and see some of the Peace Lines  that acted as real of separation between predominantly Republican & Catholic neighbourhoods from Loyalist and Unionist Protestant neighbourhoods.

I find the idea of building such overt and crass structures for political reasons to be both absurd and antagonistic. Such a tangible, observable display of a schism has got to undermine any process of reconciliation by its sheer magnitude. It becomes part of the conscious psyche, the real split only goes to consolidate the bitterness of the feud no matter the action status. As a powerful symbol of divisiveness it certainly it certainly scores points.
The plan by the Northern Ireland Executive has committed to the removal of all peace lines by mutual consent by 2023. It will be interesting to see if this time frame is adhered to.


Belfast - Northern Ireland

Belfast - Northern Ireland

Belfast - Northern Ireland

Belfast - Northern Ireland


Seeing them for myself its hard to believe that they actually exist. There’s a heaviness to the atmosphere here, it’s almost palpable. They may be very crude constructs but the purpose they serve magnifies the conflict and hatred that they represent.


The Dark Hedges - Ballymoney - Northern Ireland
If you're a Game of Thrones fan then apparently you'll 'just know'

The Dark Hedges - Ballymoney - Northern Ireland

The Dark Hedges - Ballymoney - Northern Ireland


We also spent about an hour or two in Belfast, enough to have a quick walk around, pick up an odd souvenir and have a drink. Not enough for us to make any real assessment of the place but Lonely Planet named Belfast and the Causeway Coast together as the best place to visit in 2018, so it looks like we were ahead of the game in that sense.


The Giant's Causeway - County Antrim - Northern Ireland

The Giant's Causeway - County Antrim - Northern Ireland

The Giant's Causeway - County Antrim - Northern Ireland


In our day incursion into Northern Ireland we did also make it to the Giant’s Causeway on what was a windy, cold and rainy afternoon. The Causeway itself is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns formed as a result of an ancient volcanic fissure eruption. Certainly an impressive site on a nice day, on a cold day like the one we encountered it was more of an act of will to go and see it.


The Giant's Causeway - County Antrim - Northern Ireland

The Giant's Causeway - County Antrim - Northern Ireland


Like the rest of Ireland, the Northern part has a lush greenness about it. It’s the type of picturesque view that you quite often associate with any stories and movies that dedicate anytime to showcasing Ireland. Again, on a sunny day you could almost fall for the emerald green in this part of the world…almost.

Thursday, October 26, 2017

Dublin (Ireland) - It's not even just about 'The Hype'

DUBLIN (Ireland)
26 October - 29 October 2017


When I think about it, living in the western suburbs of Sydney and going to Catholic schools, my association with the Irish was inevitable. It would have been hard to have got by me considering that six (6) of my formative years were spent at Patrician Brothers Blacktown, although as we're now all too aware, the 'fiddly' deeds of the brothers have now been discovered some 30+ years after the fact. Aside from that, we had a lot of Irish in our community, there were Irish bars aplenty around Blacktown (The Mean Fiddler amongst the good ones (then) and of course I grew up with an absolute passion for U2.

They always seemed to be good natured folk, quick witted, ready to laugh, ready to chat, always with a story and to belt out a tune. With a little bit of gloss from a Guinness however their good nature can also fuel their desire for a bit of a punch up if their mood takes them that way.

The Hard Rock Cafe - Dublin - Ireland

Of course another bar
This was on the whiskey tour that we did on our first night

The well known Temple Bar - in Temple Bar - Dublin - Ireland

Dublin - Ireland


Dublin was a city that both Inga and I wanted to visit. I think that we were guided by the impression set by the people, by the bars we've visited and generally the great stories that we've heard from others than have visited.

...What we found out however is that all those ideas and impressions formulate a large part of the unknown puzzle, but Dublin itself, well, there's a little bit more to it than just that.

No prizes for guessing

Love it when 'Whiskey' is spelt properly
Another Whiskey Bar - Dublin - Ireland

If you get sick of Whiskey then have a Guinness
Dublin - Ireland

Outside the Temple Bar - Temple Bar - Ireland


Dynamic, entertaining, buzzy and beguiling. That was our impression of Dublin. Good nature, good cheer and the nightlife, well, just unbelievably cool. For some reason I'd also thought that Dublin might be a little bit run down, a little dishevelled but that was far from the case. It was actually quite an attractive and engaging city to be in. So alongside its historic buildings such as the cathedrals, churches, Georgian squares and town houses, castles and pubs, there's also some cool restaurants, hotels, boutique stores and bars. It was that vibrancy that we found so engaging and just made Dublin a cool place to be in.

The Irish R&R Experience - Dublin - Ireland

The Irish R&R Experience - Dublin - Ireland

The Temple Bar...again

It's like...can you go wrong?
No, no you can't - Temple Bar - Temple Bar - Dublin - Ireland

Shall we have another? But of course
Temple Bar - Temple Bar - Dublin - Ireland


We thoroughly enjoyed our time there and in many ways didn't give ourselves enough time to fully enjoy it. Without question, a place for us to return to in the future.