Pája ...having times of my life

The journey to our dreams.

2010-09-04T17:44:00.003+02:00

Lately I have been thinking and wondering about how to get what we want. (After we realize what we actually want!, of course.) After realizing what it is - your dream - the long journey begins. Journey of learning and getting disappointed, overcoming challenges, getting to know new people on your way and ...learning. From people around you, from books, from your mistakes, humbly looking around and observing. Observing, fighting with laziness and getting there, where you finally find YOURSELF. Taking steps,action and making decisions.

There will definitely be obstacles, "aha" points, moments when you want to give up, moments when you are down and sad, wanna almost give up and get actually satisfied what you have now and don´t want to go further.
At this point it is cool to have people around you who care about you and don´t let you stop. These moments, however, make you stronger . But note here: we need to find out WHY these moments happen and WHERE they want to shift us. There is always a reason. And it is worth it to think about it and to actually find out.

Good luck with fighting with obstacles:-) Because there is always a path for each of us. It is never straight. In the curves we find learning points, which create our journey and make us learn, become better and at the end, when we are persistent enough we reach for our dreams....

When is the right time to move on?

2010-05-12T18:51:00.002+03:00

I would like to follow up my previous post about the reason of working. I have come to the point when I have started to wonder when do we actually realize the point, that it has been enough and move on to another company/place… How can we measure the marginal learning(and maybe the curiosity of change)?

I have decided to move on and to go for a change, however I am very happy at my current work.
Reason? Change, new things, new encounter, new learning, new challenges and my inner feeling. There is no time to be waisted. I was reading a book by R. Kyiosaki and he said, that young people should change job on regular basis, not to stick with one company for many years. I think, that it depends on field we are working and on our aim. If we want to specialize and make a one-company carreer(climb the ladder), no wonder if we stay 1++ years. But for general learning change is fine.

BUT, this kind of change requires a strong decision and determination. And vision - knowing what you want and how to get there.

WHY are YOU working?

2009-12-04T23:10:00.004+02:00

People are working for money - many people say. Franky, working brings us possibility to buy things we need for surviving in this materialistic world. Thats true. (unless you are marrying sb. like Tiger Woods, which is no victory afterall!)

But there are also other reasons why people work. I work manily to LEARN.
Every day, there is something interesting to learn. I like to do new things, which broaden my mind. Regarding the old, familiar things - I am trying to find something new (new angle, new approach, ...) I believe that as long as I am learing, there is potential for my personal growth. Every day (at least i try) I reflect and write to my "diary" what i learnt that day. It can be a little tiny thing, but after a month or two i see, that every day was worth it, every day there was something new to learn - not just another day in the office! With this knowledge I am heading towards my future aim and I am trying to learn as much as possible in the field I would like to pursue in the future.

Second thing is the poeple you are working with. People that are close to me are truly smart and inspirational ones. Its a pleasure to have them around and be able to learn from them, to get inspired.

Even though there are hectic days and tiiring evening deadlines, I am glad that I am getting such a possibitity to learn in the job that I am doing now.

And you? Why are YOU working?

The passion in our lives

2009-06-02T15:41:00.009+03:00

After a long silence I have decided to post kind of philosophical post (as usually:)). It is supposed to be a thought about the passion in our lives - what is fulfilling our lives - what are we living for - what do we devote our energy to...

Why I got into this thinking today? What was the impuls?
I saw a post from Marjam about focus and planning. And how actually to reach our goals. I think it is really inspiring. Also my friend Jarda has just started his blog and I read a few posts that require some thinking. Last but not least I saw a reality show "A Model Life with Petra Nemcova" In short- about 7 young girls from all over the world came to NY to become a Model. And Petra was making a first interview with them - and asking them what they want to reach in their career, what is their passion... Inspiring. (Note: Models are not always stupid)

What continued after the impuls?
I sat down and put on paper a few thouhts. What I would like to do and achieve in coming 6 months. There are many changes and challenges ahead: new job, further studies as a postgraduate student, learning spanish, travelling, keeping the life balance and sharing great moments with Edu and my family and friends. And with all that I was finding out what is the THING, to which I would like to devote my passion in my life. I am still stumbling. I am not sure yet what exactly it is. I am already aware of some directions (having a great life experience so far), devoting my time to things that make me happy and develop myself further. But what exactly is the PLAN, I don´t know yet.

How to sum it up?
It is great to keep our eyes open. To keep searching. To be on our way. It is not a failure if we haven´t exactly find out yet, what the others has already found. Their passion in their lives. I am always insipired by people, who have found it. I believe that once I will become one of these people who will ispire others with having my own passion.

Inspiration and Feedback

2009-03-22T00:21:00.009+02:00

I am sure it has happened to you too. Someone is talking, having a presentation or just chatting in a pub, playing at a concert. And you get so much inspired. I like these moments. And I try to catch them, remember and give feedback if possible.

I beleive, when you like something a lot, you should not leave it just for yourself, but tell the people, the musician, the lecturer or your friend that you liked what they have said, what they have just played or what they have just shared with you. Everyone likes to hear it and it makes them even more eager to carry on their path with a passion.

It has happened to me recently two times.
Firstly, just a few days ago after one concert. I liked it a lot and I happened to talk to the main musician and tell him that they played really well and I had a good time. He told me: "You really liked it?" When I nodded, he said Thanks and frankly smiled.
Second time, I was inspired by a very cool presentation at our university. I sent an email to the lecturer with big Thanks and a follow up on the presentation and points what I liked. He got back to me happy to hear my feedback.

To sum up, don´t worry to say Thanks or tell somebody that you liked what they said. I belive this keeps people going and whichever honest feedback shift them further on their way.

As we say: "Sharing is caring".

A Thought

2009-03-01T21:55:00.004+02:00

"There is a funny thing about coming Home. Looks thesame, smells thesame, feels thesame... You realize what changes... is You."

from a movie: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Who is your "friend"?

2009-02-13T19:56:00.007+02:00

Without any doubt - Facebook became a part of the Generation Y´s life (Gen Y - ppl in their twenties and thirties)
The other day I have been wondering about the Facebook ethics. I have not found any formal document regarding this issue. Anyone knows, if there is any?
My point is that people are using something, that they really don´t know how to use. Some people are more conservative with putting their personal info online, the other change their status every second hour to let me know that they have just gone to take a shower.

But the basic question I have been thinking of is following: Who to add into your Facebook account? The current number of my "friends" list is now (after a recent adjustment) 287 people. However, some of them are very close, some of them I have talked to just once or twice. The second group I try to reduce (nice to be in touch, but email is just nice tool of communication). And when it comes to adding people to your "friends" list, what is right? Who you should add and who is ment to stay out of your cyber life?

Facebook has its "Life cycle"(taken from a marketing perspective). The theory is elaborating on 4 phases - Introduction, Growth, Maturity and Decline.
The first two phases come together. The new user of Facebook is excited and keeps on adding new friends, interacts, puts all the pictures he has from now and from the past. The Maturity phase follows, while the user realizes that he is already wondering who to add and who to ignore (esp. the completely unknown stalkers) and starts to reduce the status updating frequency and pictures-of-every-day-life uploading. Accodring to myself, the Decline phase = the "reaching the know-how" how to use Facebook comes last. I think I am on the way there... :) Nowadays I choose who I know enough to add him into my cyber life page and which pictures and situations I want to share with all my "friends". As I mentioned above, the list of my "friends" has reached quite a high number. So, my question is - to delete or not to delete. And if so, who to delete. What is the measure of being a "friend" on Facebook. And here we come back to the beginning - Where is the written ethics of Facebook?

The good thing about my final exam

2009-02-08T01:56:00.010+02:00

Fistly I have to say, that I have successfully passed both exams (huge thanks for the support) and that I am no longer forced to study for any kind of exam in order to get my university degree. Only a master thesis to be written.
On one hand this thought sounds cool and exciting. On the other hand, life now seems a bit empty without all the lectures to come, tests to be writen and hours to be spent with books. Life will change. But that´s life :)

During my study time (aprox. one month) I have realized two things. Firstly, the whole studying for Commercial communication and International trade exams gave me a big picture on the field of economy - international trade especially (which was actually the purpose:P). Many things got finally connected and shaped, several of them had just clicked. I got more into the monetary functions, how the banking and trading system works and so on. Actually, I am gratefull for this kind of final exam, cause now I see that during the passed 6 years I have really learned something, that hopefully I will be able to push forward in coming years.

Secondly, there is one thing I have again made sure about: I admire people, who are mastering the feild of their work. Who understand the reasons and the consequeces of issues that they are dealing with in their professional life. What do I mean exactly? The lecturers at our universities, the economists that write commentaries to the newspapers and people who know what is "behind the thing". These people inspire me and motivate me to strive for the same. To become a master in a field that once I will be working in.

Finishing one part

2009-01-15T00:43:00.005+02:00

Yesterday I got a grade from my last subject at the uni, which means, that I have fulfilled nearly all school obligations - except for 2 state exams and final thesis. These will arrive in a nick of time. I have sate exam from minor and major specialization in coming days. Later on I will write my thesis and graduate :)

The whole "finishing the uni" thing makes me think how GREAT these 6 years have been. I have been also thinking if I did my best to get the most out of it and I think I did (well... sometimes I could have been studying harder ;) )!
Now, new chapter of my life is coming slowly! Exciting, sad, challenging, happy!

But for now: STUDY HARD, baby!:)

2008-12-22T01:47:00.005+02:00

I had a very nice and a special visit a few days ago (which now feels like ages ago again:(). Let me share a few pictures :)
With Edu we visited Vienna, Prague, Brno, Strakonice and Šumava mountains.

The power of a song

2008-11-30T02:39:00.004+02:00

I was browsing youtube.com just now and I found one song that I have been listening very frequently during my stay in Malaysia. I had it in my MP3 player on hunderds times.

And since then I have come across it just now - a few minutes ago.

Somehow it was a very special feeing. I closed my eyes and I felt like being back. Sitting in the Kuala Lumpur´s LRT(subway), travelling to work, sitting on my chair at the office, working, coming back home, dropping by at Edu´s, cooking dinner and then falling asleep, waking up, going to work again, seeing twin towers from the LRT, seeing the slums, temples from the subway, malay people sitting next to me. It was such a vivid flash back!!!

What a power of a song!

My minor specialization

2008-11-21T00:22:00.003+02:00

I have to say I made a very good choice.
At the University of Economics while studying two years of Master´s we have the posibility of choosing a minor specialization next to the major one. There are many options and I chose Commercial communication. And I have no regrets.

The whole-semester course block is focused on media communication, advertising, PR, market research. All these topics mentioned above have a course itself lasting at least one week. And now why I like it so much: For each lecture we have an interesting person from a certain company, who can tell us, how it really works out there. And that is what I appreciate. Finally at the university, we can get the glimps of how these things work in real from a perspective of mostly very interesting people. Sometimes our teacher who is responsible for the whole course organizes an excursion - to a television, radio, marekt research company. And I really appreciate it.

Finally, already two months of Commercial communication is shaping my ideas of what I would like to do in future, what I might be interested in and what is not my cup of tea. There are more ideas for the future coming up. So lets see till the end of the whole course.

University of Economics in Prague

2008-11-16T23:38:00.006+02:00

has been awarded as one of the top business universities in the World! Welcome on the red carpet of 27 top World´s business universities :)

http://www.eduniversal.com/business-school-ranking/country/czech-republic/53

PS: Congrats to VSE and all the people who are in charge of this success!
PS2: Proud to study at VSE!:)
PS3: Knowing this, the studies will not get any easier (or tougher hopefully ;))...

Being "special"

2008-11-14T20:07:00.008+02:00

After coming back from Asia, where European people tend to stand out from a crowd, I am one in the million now?!

This is basicly one of the biggest diferences that I have encountered while being back. Noone cares. Well, it can be both - advantage and disadvantage. You live your life peacefully and noone gives a sh*t. On the other hand you are no longer the one who people concider as "the different, special one". Well, honestly I have to say, that I liked the feeling of being differnt. To have the opportunity of being an example for the others, give my opinions on different topics, but also learning from locals, feeling that I am the only European in the whole subway train. I didnt mind people looking at me. Well, I am just curious how long would I need to stay in the "different" country, till it gets upsetting or till I get used to :)

Here are a few questions that pop in my mind while thinking about this topic:

What is the difference that matters?
Why do people want to stand out from the crowd?
Why do we want to feel "special"?
And when we get to the point of feeling special, how can we benefit from that?

Are you special? Or one in the million?

Cesky preklad meho blogu (Czech translation of my blog)

2008-10-15T00:54:00.005+02:00

Pri serfovani jsem narazila na moznost prekladu textu - sluzbu kterou nabizi Google. www.translate.google.cz Osobne mi to prijde jako super napad.
Zkusila jsem si prelozit nejeden muj clanek a vybrala jsem jeden - o potapeni. Prikladam kousek pro pousmání (diky me anglictine, preklepum a googlovskeho prekladu) :)

" Druhý den našeho potápění v Sipadan byl prostě skvělý. Chodili jsme spolu na zeď colourul plné korálů a ryb. Najednou z ničeho velký Sea Turtle přišli a plaval jen jeden metr ode mě! Naše Divemaster (osoba, která je dodávána s námi na show okolo nás) se nám to trochu jeskyně, ale také plaval přes otvor ve vápencových, viděl žraloka asi 2 m dlouhy, škola plavání ryb nad námi .... prostě paráda. Když jsme se viděli jedno velké ryby z ničeho jiného velkého někdo přišel!"

Reintegration is always an issue

2008-10-15T00:05:00.007+02:00

Once coming back from abroad, you must be sure, it will come. Sooner or later. The only thing is, which attitude you will have to it, how much you will let it come close to you and how you will face it.

I have always had a reintegration shock. Even though I was thinking sometimes its not there, but it is.

How does it look like?
- I tend to deal with ordinary people the way I used to in Malaysia (sometimes I had to encounter that locals did not get my points and I had to explain on, sometimes with higher voice)
- the weather has been always an issue, especially the autumn foggy one, that is letting me into depression
- not to mention the people, they have been always missing there home (Both my stays abroad - Sweden, Malaysia - its both thesame!)
- rice. I have a special attitude towards rice since I have come back from Asia. Cant define it, but I do :)
- I try not to bother my environment too much with: the stories, comparisons, inner moods, which actually means that I keep it in myselft, that leads into my more reserved mood.
- I am back to my timemanagement (try to be on time)
- I feel more stressed out. With school, and other things, eventhough I try not to take stuff too seriously, but I feel stressed inside :S
- I busy myself with school, nowadays I am having interesting courses in Marketing communication, that make me think out of the box and give me different perspective on things.

Basicly, I think there is no common advice how to overcome a "reintegration shock". With the trend in today´s World I believe it will become a serious issue. The main factor is time, I believe. With time things get "better" and the abroad stay is becoming less relevant in current life reality that is now full of studying, working or living present life. However, its still there and will be. And that is why the abroad experience shouldnt be feared. The life we lived, the exprience we gained, this all makes us stronger and with wider our World view, that in today´s busy cosmopolitan Big Apple full of different kinds of issues is so important! Moreover, I got to think that the main purpose of all this is to put the experience in everyday life, influence people, share the experience and in the end even run a business in the same field...

To conclude, reintegration shock is worth it.

Indonesia - dropping by for a visit

2008-09-27T17:11:00.009+02:00

When I met Tya last year, I did not think I will be dropping by for 6 days to her home city Bandung so soon.
And indeed. My last days of semester break I set off to Bandung (West Java) and spend with Tya, my ex house mate, few great days.

Firstly - Indonesia is different from what I have come through in SouthEast Asia so far. People are nice and very different in many corners of the whole country, because there are huge distances from one island to the other one (no AirAsia to ease the distance handicap). Basicly, there are still old tribes living in Papua (the naked ones we know from National Geographic:p), there are also university students using interent in Bandung and there are 21st century shopping malls and skyscrapers in Jakarta.
As soon as I exchanged Malaysian Ringitts I became a millionare, cause of the Indo currency! :) If only all these millions were not a Rupiah, but an Euro :)

What I liked was, that Bandung is very green city - many trees, light wind and dry weather (what a paradise compared to humidity and heat back in Malaysia). Bandung was main city for Dutchies, when they conquered Indonesia back in old times. I recommend to visit! (Great number of Factory outlets and best Brownies ever!)

I stayed with Tya at her place, we made several trips - to a volcano Tangkuban Prahu, that was still "steaming", to tea planations, to hot springs, just around-in and out- Bandung (all great places to visit) or just chill in J.Co donuts with friends.
Great experience was to see kids playing Anklung (musical instrument) - little poor kids are learning how to play Anklung and then they perform daily for foreginers.

We also made one day trip to Jakarta, where we saw National Museum. The most interesting was to see whole map of Indonesia (the whole archipelago) and the various people living there. The tribes in Papua, people from Aceh (province on Sumatra that was the most hitten by tsunami 2004), Javanese people, tribes from Sulavesi (Celebes) ... they all have different face features, but look simmilar.
In Jakarta we visited the Old town with Tyas friends. In Batvia Cafe I ordered a beer, that came in a tea pot (cause of Ramadhan i had to drink BEER from a TEA CUP!) Near Old Bank I saw a young Indonesian couple holding hands. That would be not possible at all in Malaysia. Perhaps the relegion there was not that strong.
Anyway, I really had a great time in Bandung and Indonesia. Thank you, Tya!
I am sure I will come back one day. I really would like to see Borobudur and Prambatan (Budhist and Hindu temples in Central Java) and of course see Tya again (Although its your turn now, gal!)
Dinner with Tya´s mum at a goreous place with a magnificent view on the whole 2million Bandung

Tangkuban Pragu, the Volcano

With wooden colourful puppets after Anklung exhibition

Buddy check, deep breath, jump, bubbles & entering a new world!

2008-09-10T04:18:00.005+02:00

Scuba diving! My new passion and huge discovery!

My first encounter with scuba diving was about a year and half ago, when another intern, Janne from Finland, asked me, if I am interested in a scuba diving course. I said: Well, yes, why not... and i was not sure what does it all involve, this scubadivning. But now i am grateful for that decision.
After about a month lasting course (one lesson per week in a pool) we went for our first open water diving to the Redang Island on East coast of Malaysia. It was really cool, but after that I was thinking that I will just hide my PADI licence of Open Water Diver somewhere in a drawer and i am not gonna dive anymore, cause of the lack of opportunities...
BUT next time was it on Phi Phi Island with Eduardo, when we started with a night dive. That was an experience. To enter an underwater world, when everything around is black. We were going round one island and we were watching underwater world by night with a flash light - watching a moray eel and other colourful fish and corals.

When going scubadiving from a boat, you have to assamble your equpment on the shore, prepare all the important stuff, like a mask, fins, wet suit and tank with oxygen...
On the boat you just get into all that and do a buddy check (buddy is the person who is diving with you, in case you get out of air, he gives you his bit of oxygen, which happned to me also these days!) Buddy checks your equipment in 5 steps, if everything is allright and then just "Giant strike" jump in the water and slowly going deeper down and explore the unknown...

Just now I got back from the World no. 3 site for scuba diving - Sipadan Island. It is an island in Celebes Sea, East side of Borneo. This island is like a tower coming from the bottom strait up. A few years ago there was a lot of publicity made by J.J.Custeau - he explored the island and stated that place as a marine paradise.

And indeed it is. You have to buy a permit in advance to go there, since it is a marine park.
Our first dive in Sipadan was like entering a paradise. The island itself is a little green patch in a aquamarine sea, "kde se vzal tu se vzal":) White sandy beach... And when we juped out of our boat, the real uderwater paradise was yet to come. Beatiful colourful corals, rainbow fish - Clown fish in anemone (Nemo), sharks, water turtles (a plenty of them!)....
Our second dive we were not that lucky, cause we went on a spot called Barracuda point - a place where barracudas meet and creat a big cirles, but that happenes only when a big current comes. But we did not see them. Anyway as one diving place said "the worst day diving is still better then a day in the office", it was a great dive in the end :)

Second day of our diving in Sipadan was just great. We went along a wall full of colourul corals and fish. Suddenly out of nowhere a big sea turtle came and just swam a meter from me! Our divemaster (a person who comes with us to show us around) took us to a little cave, we swam also through a hole in the limestone, saw a shark about 2 meters ling, school of fishes swiming above us.... just great. When we saw one big fish out of nowhere another big one came!
An hour long break between dives (each day two dives on Sipadan) we spent relaxing on the island, just walking around with a cup of tea...

Scuba diving opned a new, unknown chapter of my discovery and adventure part of myself. If you ever wondered to try it, I can recomend it 100%. It is loots of fun!

Expats in Malaysia

2008-08-14T13:27:00.005+03:00

Well, firstly - I am NOT an expat.
Expat means a person, who gets to travell to another country on business and lives there for some period of time. They get allowances and high salary. Higher then locals of course. And then, they can afford stuff..
I couldnt help but wonder, how is the life of these people....

Since I have been living here I came across many people of this kind. They usually have big and luxurious appartments, fancy cars! What a life :) And all I came across were nice people!
In Malaysia, the good thing is that this country is very multicultural and expants (or foreginers generally) are treated nicely.
I am also wondering till which extent foreigners get into deep understanding of Malaysian culture mix and the whole backround of governmental censorship and simmilar intriques... At this point it is always important to have a close local friends to get you into the picture. The other day, my friend Alan was telling me about the elections here and generally about the "backround".¨I was grateful to him for opening my eyes in that field. Because foreigners normally DONT KNOW.

But back to Expats. Im glad that there is such a vast infrastructure build for expats. For example there are supermarkets focused on "Westerners", as well as shops full of fashion clothes, expat focused furniture... and of couse many Western food oriented restaurants. (which are also pricy).

Nevertheless, I have to say that life here for an expat must be quite easy going, not much stress (as I was talking the other day with one of my friends, she plans to stay in Malaysia - on of the advantages for her is exactly this "easygoingness"). People are respecting you as a foreigner and the economic growth here so far has been powerfull, environment is nice, flourishing nature...

On the other hand, I couldnt stay several things (especially above mentioned, the heat, no parks to stroll in and sometimes too easy approach to things. Finally, I am an European and i am structured.

To close up, I am glad to have the opportunity of living in this country for about a year now and I am gratefull for realizing all the things about "foreigner living abroad". Now I can say, I value my own culture a lot, my country. I was also happy to see other countries in Southeast Asia and my thumbs up goes to Malaysia for such a quick growth in past few years! (heya oil and petrol lah :p) And who would think like me one year and half ago that Malaysia is worse than 3rd world, I have to tell them, that it is not true :)

My holidays in Malaysia

2008-08-07T06:36:00.005+03:00

It has been about 2 weeks now since I have been in KL!
I truly have a great time here, especially because being here with THE one :)

There has been several things that surprised me since the last time. Firstly, since our Czech currecy has appreciated a lot, somehow even when the petrol prices has risen in Malaysia, for me things are cheeper here. E.g. before (2007) RM1 was CZK 6 now its only 4,6!
Secondly, I havent experienced any rain since I have been here. Apparently purely dry season nowadays. No rain, but a propper food poisoning experience for the first time in Asia (!).
I have started to write my master thesis, but well, to be honest I wrote only very brief brainstorming what it should be about, so I am not making a big plans about writing a big piece of it here.

With Edu we made a trip to a new capital, Putrajaya, then with Evicka Skokankova visiting KL we went for a nice trip to Batu Caves and Perhentian island, which was very cool! Now several trips are ahead - Redang in two weeks time with my Edu and later on we also go to Borneo for diving. I m getting excited...

I like the relaxed atmosphere that we have here. Its great to be happy again and it feels just nice! I also like to catch up with my friends, I am being updated about news and meet new people. Basicly I can say, I am Happy!

AIESEC UKM trainees visit (I met Huda, a girl who was attending as a newie Jordan conference, the one where I was a faci)
Paul van Dyk was playing in KL! Second time already
Perhentian Island with two Slovaks and 4 more internationals

On a visit in Putrajaya, new govermental capital of Malaysia

My holidays plans

2008-07-11T11:28:00.003+03:00

My holidays has already started! After finishing passed semester I worked to make some money for my further plans. I was working 4 weeks all together and swapped between 3 jobs (from hostess to office job...) it was cool, cause i got different experience, that i wouldnt get if i was just layzing at home. At the beginning of July i moved home from Prague and here i am just LAZYING :) (im visiting my grandparents, im just at home and enjyoing that summer-ish mood) The other, coming, part of holidays I will spend far from Europe, yes, South-east Asia again. BTW. SE Asia became very popular among my friends, too, cause there are many backpackers these days from Prague, that i hope i will manage to meet in and around KL :)

Well there must be some-thing(-one) that makes me come back lah :) Im really looking forward! I will spend about 2 months in KL with Edu, also Evicka will come over, so we will go to some beach resort, I am honored to travell with Tya (and maybe with Irene) to Indonesia and aslo we plan with Edu do to diving to Sipadan, the best diving place in South East Asia (the tickets are already booked!!!)yaay, cant wait!
In the meantime I will sutdy Spanish, go to the gym, read books, i will try to start with my master thesis and of course hang around in KL, go out and party!... and enjoy layzing in KL :) 2 weeks to go...

Sensation White 20008

2008-06-09T12:29:00.001+03:00

This year again. And again great... People, atmosphere. Just amazing.

Just a little update

2008-05-03T21:30:00.005+03:00

Quite some time since I have been posting on my blog.

So, what´s up?
- Im continuing my MA studies, actually finishing this (second) semester and being confident about exams to come.
- Applying for Minor called Marketing Communication starting in Sept.
- Having just a brief idea what I am gonna do during this summer
- Spending great 10 days far away, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia during the end of April
- Catching up with my closest ones
- Attending my cousin´s wedding...

How I have made my life easier !?

2008-04-09T17:40:00.002+02:00

Recently I have been reacongizing quite strongly my new attitude towards life. I dont know if its good or bad. But it has changed.

I believe things has changed during my stay in Malaysia and because of people I have been spending my time with (no complains at all:)).
So, what has changed? Recently solutions for my challenges have thesame answer: "It will work out somehow, dont worry." And seriously it works. I am less stressy, I am not thinking about consequeces (what if i dont write that test...) I am keeping the future to future and I live the present. Some people may take this as pretty annoying (as me before), but ... what to do? :P

Seriously this kind of approach makes me more relaxed, less organized and more random, but happy with my present life. Of course I have some "vision" which currently is only finish my studies and see what happens later. People around me are starting to search for jobs, appartments. I am listening when they talk about it, store it in my memory, but dont work out these things yet.

Well, all in all I like this kind of life philospohy, eventhough sometimes I would like to know where exactly I am heading... but honesly: Isnt life more exciting, when you dont know what comes and when you are not worried about what will happen? :)

Barcelona, The Girlie trip

2008-04-07T17:33:00.007+02:00

Friday till Sunday we spent in Barcelona. We=my friends Kathryn and Hanka. The weather was awesome(25 degrees) and we saw these typical sights, lived the spanish spirit. Got annoyed with siesta when all the resaturants were closed because of the typical break and we were starving. On a whole I really liked Barcelona.And somehow I feel naturaly closer to the spanish way of living :) On the top of all, we tried chupitos, the alcohol shots being on fire. Amazing.
Here come some pics from the city of Gaudi.

Nice Memories ... and my last moments in KL

2008-03-17T23:54:00.010+02:00

I couldnt help myself and I decided to post some nice moments of my trip in Thailand. Just have a look... :) Meeting Evicka infront of the Royal Palace in Bangkok
Riding and elephant! I did have a respect towards this walking mass!
Sunset...
Phi Phi Island...
Long tail boat & me :)
The sea by day...
...and by night
On THE Beach...
And this is the last day with my dear flat mates. Migz&Tya

And from the last last hours in KL i better dont show any pix, cause my make up is rather water-ish:P

In the Dark

2008-03-11T19:07:00.004+02:00

In the Dark is a song by DJ Tiesto, that is right now in my playlist. And i felt like posting something on my blog..
And somehow this is also how I have been feeling recently. Eventhough, there has been sunny for several past days, my mind doesnt really take this fact up. I feel like working as a robot. Studying for uni, every week thesame, several chapters of microeconomics, several lectures and seminars. Friday home, Sunday to Prague... For past 3 weeks all thesame.
Dont want to complain, I am just sharing the fact of reintegration. The good thing about this is that I am meeting my good friends and I am trying to make myself busy with different events. I am grateful for having my friends and for all the catching up... However, the robot efect comes. Making my mind busy with something.
Lets see if the trend is upward and if thigs will somehow get better.
For the time beeing, I would like to be back in KL with the ppl I left over there.

Beck is Back

2008-03-01T09:46:00.002+02:00

Dunno how to start :)
I am sorry for skipping blogging about my adventures in Thailand, but i will get back to it and for now the fabulous pix from there you can see on my Facebook.

Not it's been about 12 days since I have been back home. As my friend wrote on her blog, being back after some time is weird, cause things seems to be the same, and you dont know what has changed. For me, nothing really - except for a new colour of our neighbour's house:P that's striking, really:)

To be more opened, my first days i felt kind of clumsy back here. I had to be updated about things, esp. regarding university. I had to study since my second day. By then i had already a test. The good thing is, i am getting busy with uni, which kind of helps. On the other hand i BADLY miss KL, esp. the people and my easy life style. I think my mind is still there, I try to keep in touch with ppl and lately we called with Tya and it was thesame like chatting in our living room, laughing together, crying together :P :) Anyway, i feel to be online all the time, when i dont study or i dont have lectures :)

My biggest shock back home: Its soooooooo grey here. No green trees... cold (obviously it's February).

Even random people at the lectures start to ask me where I was, cause of my suntan that I gained in Thailand. So... The whole story on and on. And people gets excited. Wow, Malaysia... that must have been great! Sure it was. For me, i cant really feel the exoticness:) of my stories... For locals who dont travell that much it's sth unbelievable. That's the point - I gonna pursue my life with having my experience in my heart and all things i have learned and people i have met of course.
The rest its up to me, people I care about and destiny...

PS: If you are ever wondering to go on internship abroad, GO! It's truly life changing experience & in the end, you gain even more than you thought you will!

PS2: I would like to thank to all people I got to know in Kuala Lumpur & on my travells,cause each and every one gave me a new ideas, new thoughts and some of these got very close to me, which I value a lot. Please keep in touch!

Are you hungry in Cambodia? Take some spiders:P

2008-02-20T05:56:00.004+02:00

One of the biggest culture shocks in Cambodia was, when we stopped on the way from Siem Reap to the capital Phnom Penh. The bus driver stopped on the way and let us go out of the bus to eat something.
Suddenly the sellers of the food started to approach us - tourists. With a big plates piled with something black. SPIDERS. nice black big spiders. and to make sure for the one who purchase it that it is still fresh, they were holding one big white bucket in one of their hands full of LIVE spiders...
Since I hate these animals I was shocked, confused and took a few pix, then immediatelly went back to the bus :S I would not eat such a thing!!!:)
What an experience..

Cambodia! What a trip!

2008-02-04T04:57:00.000+02:00

Since Thursday I have been in Cambodia - a Kingdom of Interesting contrasts, poor people, great nature and history which is shocking and unbelievable. When we (Meike, my friend from Germany&intern in KL and me) first came to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, we were kind of lost, since a Tuk Tuk driver dropped us somewhere in the middle of some market :S. The environment was following: Many motorbikes parked next to the market, stalls with everything, mainly untrustworthy food and clothes. Dusty streets full of Tuk Tuks, motorbikes, old cars, khmer alphabet everywhere. :)
The people here are different from Vietnamese, from Malaysians, Indians... this is my discovery - each South East Asian country have theirs special nationality and different kind of people. No Asians are thesame! Same Same, but Different.

Then we manage to find another Tuk Tuk that took us to a radom hostel. From there we set off to night life in Phnom Penh. We had some typical beef and sea food BBQ, which was very nice and later on we went to sleep, since we were really tired.

We were waken up at 5am with an Indian Music coming from a marriage stall just down there under our hostel. In the moring we visited S-21 (Tuol Seng Museum). Very strong experience. This museum served as Torture camp in a former high school building during Khmer Rouge period of time in 1975-78. We hired a guide and she went through the whole story with us. In the middle of the tour I have to give up and i did not finish the guided tour. This happened to me for the fist time in my life. My breakfast strarted to feel wants to go on strike & my feelings were too strong and I couldnt listen and see anymore the terrible conditions, that people had to face every day. Especially to see the faces on photograpsh of ppl who were tortured in this camp. You can not imagine the look in their eyes. Meike finished the tour with the concluision, that this happed in Germany too and that this kind of Genocide is breathtaking terrible.

One more shock - I saw a Mekong river. Wide, dirty, with floating different things in it + children playing in it next to a guy who was piing in it...

After this experience we continued to Royal Palace. This was nice, big palace, silver and golden decoration. Later on in the afternoon we took a bus from PP to Siem Raep - to a city of Angkor Wat.The busride took about7 hours (300km) and led us through several typicl villages in Cambodia, which answers all the questions about Cambodian life - poor conditions and low low awareness about enviromental issues.

Our first day in Angkor Wat complex started at about 9am. We took a Tuk Tuk driver for the whole day. Bought a ticket USD40 for 3 days pass in Angkor Wat and went to explore these magical temples. My favourite ones were Ta Prohm (with roots of huge trees defeating the temples - where Thomb Rider was shot)then "Face Temple" Bayon,and we climbed one of these temples. Amazing. In the evening we climbed a mountain to see a sunset. It was nice, except for the croud behind our backs. Around 1000 people at that tiny mountain. Young old thin and fat. All of us climbed a mountain and a temple to see.
In the evening I was lucky to get a ticket for a Angkor Nights - a musical&dance festival. It was overhelming atmosphere. No tourists, Angkor Wat by night, very spiritual atmosphere. Inside of Angkor Wat temple I had the chance to see a traditional Cambodian dance with a backround of lighten up Angkor Wat. The Dance itself was based on one story with different Gods involved. Nice Nice.

Second day we took it easy. Waking up 4:30 to go and be able to see the sunrise infront of Angkor Wat again. I am grateful for this, eventhough it was cloudy and we were not really able to see the sunrise, the whole atmosphere was really nice.The dusk infront of the temple... Then we continued to explore other temples. Afterwards we felt rather tired so we went bac to our hostel and decided to go for a lunch to the "happy herb pizza" place. Our lunch was very special. Nevertheless, we cotinued to do some shopping in a nearby market. Then I was able to connect to the internet for the fist time in Cambodia. Rest of the day was just nice&fun:P
Meike had to leave this moring, pitty, casue she left me alone. My today's plan is relax a bit and then spend rest of my day in Angkor Wat temples. 5.2. morning i am leaving back to Phnom Penh to take a flight to Bangkok. I hope that Evicka will be able to join me there, since they have a snow chaos in China...

That's it for today,
Greetings to all from an interesting Kingdom of Cambodia!!!

All good things come to an end

2008-01-08T14:37:00.000+02:00

Leaving.

From my perspective, this is one of the toughest parts of the stay abroad. I have experienced this already once - When I spent 5 months in Sweden. And once I came back, I was sure, I dont want to experience this feeling again. But... hey, here it comes.
Felling down, is actually not a sign of being a coward or weak freak, but a clear undertanding, that you enjoyed your stay and - in spite of all the cultural differences &challenges - you dont want to leave the place, the life-style, and especially the people, who were/are/will be part of your life/family.

Past 1 month was one of the toughest months in Malaysia for me. I still have one month to go, but now I already feel, that this time is approaching very fast. I consciously try not to think about it (not to get crazy), but it is there back in my head ...and I am beeing haunted.

I closed up 2007 in my mind&heart

2008-01-01T05:32:00.000+02:00

...with an interesting NYE celebration - first time in a big club. When we arrived (with a tube and a cab:)) there were tons of ppl and I was kinda lost. The countdown was lame, so we just made ours...Then... the network went down and I was kinda down too. I really really wanted to call to my family and I couldnt. I was there in the middle of thousands drunk ppl, the artificial snow was falling down, ppl were happy watching the fireworks and kissing each other... somehow I felt I was on the wrong place :S
But things got better after some time at 3am I was able to reach even Peru:), not even home yet, but we were dancing, drinking and "having fun".
This NYE was not the best one, but an experience for sure.

Year 2007

2007-12-27T13:54:00.000+02:00

Last year, when I was posting about previous year 2006, I ended my post with following words:"And so now at the end of year 2006 I am gratefull for this amazing year. I was given many challenges, happiness, some sad moments, ups and downs... I hope the year 2007 will be at least simmilar...:)"
And here I go, the year 2007 has past very fast and I am happy to look back how this year has been and what it has brought to me.
January - I made it: submitted bachelor thesis and ...Bc. Pavlina Beckova -yay! Carrying on with my Master studies!! Also Ski Trip happened, that gave me new friends that I hanged out with for coming cool months.

February - studying, living my ordinary life again...

March - Spain! First time in my life I went to Spain to visit one of my best friends - Pablo. Erasmus reunion was very nice!!!
- Another Erasmus reunion happened, this time in Prague&Strakonice - Joost from Holland came to visit me. We had a lot of fun and good time.

April - I started to teach English! I really liked it and I am convinced I will carry on when I come back from Malaysia. I won Photo Competiton at my University! I started to think about going abroad for an internship...
- Uppsala trip. Awesome. Hard to find words for that.

May - I got to know, that rest of this year I will spend several tousands km far from the Czech Republic, in Malaysia. First I was shocked with this idea, but.. why not? :) - Bye bye parties, finishing semester at the uni, spending time with my friends&family...

June - 23 year old lady is counting down. Sensation White. Holidays with my family, very nice...
- 3 2 1 ... and here I was. Malaysia & Singapore Trip.
- My new life has started. June and July were rather tough months, but I made it :)

July - Excitement from the new culture, but also missing home already - the food, culture, people... Fighting with cockroaches and stuff...
- NAC 2007 experience, Perhentian trip, Scuba diving course...

August - This month somehting changed. Something nice began. Happy month:)
- Going to Cameron Highlands, my new room (old-new) from IKEA!!! I attended Indian Engagement and the end of the month I spent on Redang "Fairytale" island scubadiving. The best ending of the month - Paul Van Dyke was playing in KL!

September - Mixed feeling from Earthquake in Indonesia & Health of Malaysians, Working hard, trip to Penang with Edu - first time I saw buddhist monks "in action".

October - Vietnam. OMG. What an experience. Things are different there. It is not like we know these ppl from back home selling cheep clothes... Different. Rice feelds and the poor conditions... I was happy I am doing my internship in KL.
- AIESEC gatherings, parties, Divali preparation - Indian Xmas...

November - Missing home... Feeling down... Prague exhibiton, meeting my Czech friend in KL, so nice! Taman Negara!!! Unbelievable - muddy Cave Exploration, night jungle walk... so nice! Full Moon Party in Pangkor.

December - NLDS 2007 & Zouk Out in Singapore... my dream came true - but I had to fight for it.
- Change in my stay. My mind set off on long journey to the other side of the World :) But let's carry on...
- Indian Wedding, Xmas preparation, Xmas celebration - Online with my family!

When I was wishing that 2007 would be even better than 2006 I did not know what I am wishing for. And indeed, it happened. If not better, it was as good as. My life is happy now and I am gratefull for all these experience!!!!
Sooo, Cheers for 2008 ;)

My Christmas in Kuala Lumpur

2007-12-25T12:09:00.000+02:00

My Christmas day, 24th December was very pleasant and in the end I was falling asleep with a smile on my face. Here are images to show you closely what were Xmas in KL for me...
Xmas at work
Xmas Decoration on my bed side table. All this I got from my parents delivered.
Doing potatoe salad online with my family (KL 6pm, Strakonice, CZ 11am)
The ones I wanted to sped Xmas day (and I did:))
Xmas dinner with fellow trainees (I popped in to wish my friends Merry Xmas)
And then back to have an online Xmas dinner with my family. In the end it worked out very well and it was an unforgetable experience... Thanks to Internet:)

Malacca

2007-12-23T15:44:00.000+02:00

My pre-Xmas days 22nd and 23rd I spent in old merchant city of Malacca. Very cute town, in past conquered by Portugese, Dutch, British and then finally got its independence.

Cute place, nice bunch of ppl - a lot of fun (especially sitting in McDonalds doing crazy stuff, shopping Xmas presents, running among old monuments to be on time for night light show or trying fried icecream!!! :))
Some images from our trip:
Malaysian Tshirt Design - very truthful
Malacca's red famous church
...and with us:)
With my kids Jasper and Seda :)
Would you believe I was sleeping on this?
With Love from Malacca...

6 months...

2007-12-17T15:28:00.000+02:00

...that changed my life.

After living half year so far from home, I realized that yesterday it was exactly half year, since I have been here, in Malaysia.
I feel, that i gained soooo much. The new cultural perspectives, amazing work experience, great friends for life, love and much much more.

I think I have changed a bit so far
*I am more self-confident in the way I am behaving, thinking and presenting... (but not too much, no worries:P)
*I value Czech culture a lot
*I learned that the most important is to "Be Myself"
*I went through moments that made me stronger (hygiene in Vietnam, crawling through narrow cave full of bats and mud, stressy days at work, coming Xmas)
*I am thinking, dreaming, speaking in English 24/7
*I learned that it is hard to go for what you want and to decide, for things you want, eventhough the decision has IMPACT on certain group of people.
*I learned that you have to plan propperly to travel and enjoy 8 months
*I am thinking in Marketing perspectives, which makes me feel to be more into things I am working on
*and many more...

I am pretty sure, that this experience I would recomend to every single person in this World. Thanks, AIESEC for changing my life!

Christmas in Malaysia

2007-12-16T04:36:00.000+02:00

It was just a matter of time, till I get down to the topic of Christmas. Back in The Czech Republic we celebrate Xmas as the most important family and religious festival. Mainly with my parents and my brother it is the main main family event of the year. This year I am not with them in person. I am in Malaysia and this is how it feels:

1)I am in a Muslim country (Majority doesn’t celebrate Xmas a main celebrations of the year)
2)I could see Malay Xmas (Hari Raya) Indian Xmas (Deepavali) and now… Christian Xmas – welcome in the multicultural country. And this is the reason. Here they celebrate everything, but nothing properly. No unification…
3)I can see a lot of Xmas decoration everywhere
4)BUT the main reason (birth of Jesus Chirst) I haven’t seen anywhere yet. It is just artificial Xmas trees, a lot of glittering lights, colourful chains and cheaply looking American carols playing in the restaurants and shopping malls
5)Everything is on sale => ppl go shopping (OMG so many ppl in shopping malls I haven’t seen since I have been here!)
6)…but for me, I have NO feeling of Xmas. It is actually getting me slightly uncomfortable, when these ppl celebrate Xmas (important festival for me) with the feeling similar to St. Valentine’s day (taken over & just for the sake of celebrating it&getting leave from work)
7)The only feeling of Xmas was, when I was packing presents I bought for my family and sending to them back home. Every Sunday we are chatting over Skype and lighting up candles according to advent tradition! These are my little Xmas in Malaysia.
8)The plan for Xmas Eve is to have a trainee dinner and then online dinner with my parents, this is what i am looking forward to.
our borrowed Xmas tree (with my present already-suitcase:))

Indian Wedding

2007-12-16T04:30:00.000+02:00

Very interesting and nice experience. After Indian Engagement I was invited for the wedding itself. Kanesh and Geeta were getting married. Geeta is a sister of my colleague Sutha.
Firstly many prayers happened, then the couple were blessed by the priest and instead of our exchange of wedding rings, the groom tied to the bride a bracelet and that was a symbol of the marridge to begin. Then we went for a indian wedding dinner...
For me it was a cool experience also because it was the first time of me wearing a tpical Indian dress-saree!

Zouk Out 2007, Singapore

2007-12-11T06:40:00.000+02:00

Zouk is a club, a famous one. There are three Zouks in the World - in London, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. It is one of my favourite clubs. This Saturday night was a special one. In Singapore on "Sentosa Island" on the beach was organized a big gig.
First I did not think I would go, even though I really wanted. In the end, I followed my dreams and decided to go. We bought the tickets, bus tickets to Singapore and here we were. Line up of DJs was quite promising - Carl Cox (Godfather of UK techno) Armin Van Buuren (No.2 DJ of the World, while he saw him in KL about 2 months ago) and others.

With Edu we arrived to the island round 10:30 and explore the 4 stages with different music. We faced a slight "money exchange" challenge (we had hard times exchanging Malaysian Currency into Singaporean one), but things always works out:)
Later on at the spot we met our friends from KL and Sinagapore and were partying in group. At 2:30am on the main stage Carl Cox started to play and I got into ectasy, which lasted till the dawn:)
I have never danced the WHOLE night till the morning. But the DJs were pretty good. Carl boosted the whole beach and later on Armin while playing Trance people went crazy too. Jumping barefoot on the sand, appreciating Red Bull and seeing the dawn at 7am was a great experience. In the morning my feet were having hard time to walk, but luckily they managed and we came back to KL with a bus, where I was sleeping the whole time.
Thanks for another dream come true :)))

Pangkor Island - Full Moon PARTY

2007-11-28T07:13:00.000+02:00

Following up on the previous post, I have to assure everyone, that the upwards trend is successfully carrying on. :) This weekend I spent on an island, not far from KL. Breeze, waves, sun, fun, unwind, party…

4 of us (Katalina from Colombia, me, Edu and Edu’s Malay colleague) set off by car on Saturday morning. We reached Pangkor Island around noon and went strait to the beach. I couldn’t help myself and called home, since I knew how different the weather in the Czech Republic is. I sent some sun to my mum & let her listen to the waves :P

In the evening, there was a “Spanish Full Moon Party” = beach+music+people+alcohol :P Party started slowly around 11pm, while continuing with water-pipe, dancing on the beach under full moon. At midnight a “Religious Police” came and told us to switch off the music, because the Malay (Muslim) community is not happy with the loud music&idea of the party. So we switched off. After one hour we continued till 3am :P

Sunday was very relaxing, waking up late, eating breakfast while having perfect sea view, beach, sunbathing. We rented canoes and went to the island opposite of our beach. My first time canoeing on the sea :) On the island I saw the special birds with double nose :)
It was sad to leave, but I had a great time with awesome relax :)

The "V" Phases

2007-11-23T08:08:00.000+02:00

Once people are abroad, they are going through different phases. These phases usually form the shape of V (with the reintegration it is a shape of W). Phase 1 - Coming to the country, exploring it, new culture excitement. Phase 2 - Getting used to the culture, stereotypes… At the certain point I reached the bottom, of the “V” letter, phase 3. This bottom, I think, came last week.
I like Malaysia, it’s variety & exotic temper. BUT I started to suffer from the culture overdose, I got indifferent towards the local cultures, took seriously things that don’t need to be taken seriously, I don’t like strangers, who approach me all the time “hi, how are you”… Yeah, at certain point of time I am just fed up with all this. Plus, the fact that Xmas is coming, my Heart will leave to travel several thousands km away for a while, my internship is slowly coming to the end and also hassle planning of my big trip at the end of my stay here.
This all caused that last week I broke down. I did not expect it. Again a new experience came. Fear, being fed up, insecurity… The whole “bottom process” lasted about a week. Weekend full of relax helped me. Laying at our swimming pool & chatting, having fun with Tya, visiting museum of Islam here in KL, go to the Cinema with Neha (my jungle colleague) and nice evenings helped me to jump from the bottom to “better tomorrows” phase :P I am thankful to my flat mate Tya and other friends here & Edu and my parents & friends home, who helped me to overcome this.
Yep, it is cool to have ppl, who take me back to my happiness :) So now I am ready to complete the “V” shape with upwards trend curve :P
I believe when these phase appears, some little change & step out of the stereotype is needed. Also relax proved to be a good medicine…

NaLDS 2005 reflection

2007-11-15T15:47:00.000+02:00

National Leadership & Development Seminar 2005 in Germany ment a lot for me. Since it is exactly 2 years back and NaLDS2007 has just finished i am kind of reflecting on what happened within these 2 years since I have come back.
NaLDS is VERY different conference from the others I have attended(i think it was about 30 conferences). One week focusing on yourself, your values&visions... basicly digging deep into yourself, discovering what is there.
I think since then not that many things changed. I just got more self-confident, got various valuable international experience, my network of friends has expanded & I realized many things, learned a lot. My thought i brought from NaLDS 2005 was, that whatever I do, I should be happy. It is not true actually, I realized withing following years. Sometimes you have to "suffer" for your happiness. And if you deserve it, it will come. Moreover some things, I dont work out that much anymore. I simply believe that some things are "ment to be"...
My values from two years ago also hasn't changed much, there is core of these, that are important for me and I think I stick to them.
When I look back, the people from my workshop are doing well, i am still in touch with some, they took up leadership positions, are MC or on the internship. In many of our decisions NaLDS palyed a role - even if a small one - it did. Here I see the sense of organizing such a conferences. So few time to think of ourselves, what we want, what we believe in, what we want to be, where we want to head...

There are experiences in your life, that you will remember forever. NaLDS 2005 would be definitelly part of these kind of events.

How did I become the Tarzan

2007-11-10T14:43:00.001+02:00

This post might be a bit longer than the others. So if you feel like travel with me to the oldest National park in the World, get yourself a cup of something nice, expect unexpectable & let's go for a jungle trip!

Taman Negara (translation is a National Park) is 130 million year old jungle, nowadays National Park of Malaysia. I chose it as a destination of my next trip. I wanted to experience the real jungle. 3 people joined me- Neha,my colleague(India)&other trainees- Martin(Germany), Aaron(Canada). Before the trip we made a big fuzz out of it, googling what to take to the jungle & ppl made fun of us, that we wrote down a list of all important things like mosquito repelent, things against leeches, knives...
Our trip was for 3 days & 2 nights.

We set of on Thursday morning - travelled 3 hours with the bus, followed by a 3 hours lasting wooden-boat trip on a wide&dirty Pahang river to the place of our stay - Mutiara Taman Negara Hotel (the only one in the jungle, luxurious place, but we stayed in the hostel rooms, nice too). We could book different trips there (get a guide, pay&go)

Our first trip was to the Orang Asli settlement - Aboriginies people of Malaysia. Very interesting. The tribe we visited, have their own jungle janguage (tum=river), live in the jungle, make their living out of wood, hunt animals for food. We were showned how they make a fire. View a video here! Women there live separate from men and in the tribe (aprox.20ppl) there is a chief, who is "leader" of the group plus a doctor, since they take all the medicin out of the jungle. We spent there about half an hour and then strong wind started to blow, leaves from high trees started to fall down and sky became dark. We could see lightenings coming, plus thunders make the atmosphere in the jungle pretty "scary"... This was the point of time I started to respect the jungle.
We went home. The rain has started. We had our dinner = things we brought from home.
The next trip we booked was the Night Jungle Walk. We were praying it stops raining. In the case, it was raining, our walk would be cancled. Our prayers were successfull. We went.
Raincoat(what if it starts to rain again), flash light, long sleaves, long pants (all against leeches), mosquito repellent, mobile phone. Courage.
At 9pm we set off. We plus other 10ppl and our guide. We left behind our comfy hostel site and entered a real jungle. High trees, different plants, all green(black at night:P), On the way we saw sleeping birdies, small, medium& big spiders. When I say big, I mean it! In the middle of the walk it started to rain a bit. The canopy (upper part of the trees with the leaves) managed to contol the rain till a certain point, so we did not get wet too much. But the rain became stronger. In a while it was a typical rainforrestial rain :) The path become muddy. Walking over roots, having flash light that doesnt shine much, raining like hell - in the middle of the oldest rainforrest.
I couldnt help myself I had to share my feelings and I called my mum, all the way from the jungle to the Czech Republic:)
We came home afer 1 hour, wet, muddy, but happy! & slept like babies!

Next day, Friday, was THE JUNGLE DAY!
We started our day with a bufet breakfast. Yamiiii!
The plan of the day were two activities - Jungle tracking & Cave exploring.
Jungle tracking was a daily walk in the jungle. During the day the jungle looks different. Different sounds, many trees, flowers, animals, muddy track. My shoes were in a while dirty. A little movie here. In a group of 10ppl we reached soon a "Canopy walk way", which is 45 meters lifted walk way, while you are climbing in the trees, watching the forrest, rivers from above. AWESOME feeling:) See yourself!!!! We continued our tracking with climbing a 334m mountain. Some of us gave up, cause it was a steep walk. I did not and decided to sweat my shirt from inside out. The view was worth it. On the way down we met a wild pig & I swang on the liana like a Tarzan :)
We came home all exhausted, hungry, longing for a sleep. I took a shower-aaaaa... so good! & had the best canned Bake Beans ever. Not really time for sleep, cause we continued with Cave Exploring. All 4 of us came to the meeting point with our guide with no temper, sleepy, silent and tired. We were said that this tour is mostly sitting in a boat, looking at the cave, seeing some bats, tracking a while in a jungle, so we thought we gonna get some rest.
BUT.

Now... here comes the adventure of my life...

We took a boat, about 10 minutes, that brought us to the place from where we had to track to the cave. We were about 7 ppl plus our guide. OK, let's go. Some of us had a slight difficulties with the tracking, since the path reminded of muddy ponds that led through many unexpectable roots of the forrest trees. The way to the cave was not easy and my trousers and shoes were resembled soon advertisment on dirt.Nevertheless, all of us reached the cave. Our guide told us to leave bags we carried in front of the cave, since there might be some tight places in the cave. I took my camera and money. The plan was a boat and relaxed admiring of cave. The reality was: while entering the cave we had to try hard to climb the stones to get in. Right at the beginning two ladies gave up. We continued crawling through a little streem of water. My feet were wet. Mud was gone :) Trying hard not to get wet my camera. There were at least 3 tough points. One just when we entered the cave. I did not expect what has just come and it was kinda shock for me. Second when we were in the middle of the cave and we had to dip our legs till knees in the river. In the river I saw snakes!, and above my head were flying bats. When I lighten up the ceiling of the cave i could see hundreds(!) of bats. The toughest point was, when i had to squeeze in one very narrow cave spot. Creeping through dirt, little space, water... By that time I was calming myself down&hoping i can get out of this place soon. We spent in that cave about 20 minutes. By the time I saw the Sun again, while leaving the cave I felt like this was the adventure of my life&I was grateful&happy I made it. When we came back to the place we left our bags and friends, who did not want to get it, my hands were still shaking . During thesame muddy way back my shoes got dirty again. However by that time I did not care about any kind of insect - mosquitos, leeches. Nothing. I was glad I made it and I was looking forward to the shower and dinner.
As an award for all of us we went for a fancy dinner (bufet style) and ordered a beer. We&our Indian friends, who we met on our Cave trip, had a lot of fun during the dinner & later on while playing cards.
The last interesting advanture was, when at night I woke up&wanted to go to the bathroom, which was next door. At about 5am I opened the door and on the porch, there was a wild pig staring at me. I closed the door immediately. The pig flipped over the dust bin in front of our door. Looked what it can eat and went away, back to the jungle. Just then I was allowed to go to the bathroom.

We left our cool hostel today morning, full of advanture and unforgetable memories.

Happy Deepavali to everyone!!

2007-11-07T09:23:00.000+02:00

This culture diversity brings many big celebrations in a quick point of time. Hari Raya was the big celebration for all the Muslims at the end of Ramadan (last month), now the festival of lights – Indian Diwali/Deepavali is coming. Indians all round Malaysia/the World are celebrating their biggest festival. Christmas are coming soon. That is gonna be MY big celebration! Looks like my roomies are staying home too, so I will not be alone :)

At work the funny thing during these festivals is, that the day before the actual celebration, we can go home ONE hour earlier. For these who are celebrating the festival (Muslims-Hari Raya, Indians-Divali, Christians-Xmas) can go home TWO hours earlier :) So I have to wait nowadays. But my turn of short working day will come on Xmas :)

I truly like getting to know so many cultures at one point of time. I try to get the most out of it, listen to different cultures and sometimes I am pretty shocked. The way of living life is very different for different nationalities. I am happy & grateful living my life like this.

Czech weekend

2007-11-05T13:30:00.000+02:00

Finally, after 5 months the days has come :)

On Saturday I received email from Skvara (Ex Czech MCP) and his friend that they have just arrived to KL and want to meet me. They were backpacking for already some time(which everyone can see from their image :P) and on the way to KL Skvara lost his passport. And his friend was lucky to get Dengue fever! Anyway, things were ok now and we met in KLCC Starbuck’s & had a nice chat in CZECH! :) Talking to ppl face to face in Czech, after 5 months is a cool feeling. First a bit strange (my Czech sentence structure was rather vague) but then I got into it again! Ppl should never forget their native language even when living long time abroad, I think.
Later on in the evening we all went for a “Haloween party” that we trainees had on Sat night. I also invited Czech guys. The party was ok, but with the only bug - I realized (shame on me) that I cant drink alcohol anymore. After one beer my stomach refused to drink more :( Dunno what is happening with this, but I hope will get well soon!At the pic i am drinking plain water!!!

Ppl were having different different scary disguises – but the one, that had the most success was the Mike’s one – “Facebook costume” :) I was a fairy :)
Sunday was hard to wake up – at least for some ppl for sure… and with Tya, Neha & Eduardo we went to a “Walk Through Prague” Photo Exhibition. This was organized with a cooperation with a Czech ambassy.
Jiri Vsetecka, the Czech photographer had his presentation on photo and also I had the opportunity to show my friends how Prague looks like, which I enjoyed enormously. I also did some networking – got to know Czech ambassador, some other Czech ppl … and talked Czech J I got to know, that in KL live about 35 Czechs. Just 35 :) I hope we can gather for Xmas or something.
Later on we went to the Expat qarter “Bukit Bintang” and had our lunch in one of the newest shopping malls in KL. We were lucky to get a nice sofa in Indonesian donut place… Very relaxing to have a coffee and a tasty donut!!!!
In the evening I cooked “polivku z pytliku – poctivou hovezi” Czech soup – this was the end of Czech weekend :)

Cau Decka :)

2007-11-02T13:04:00.000+02:00

What’s up? No, tak se celkem nic zajimaveho nedeje. Leading normal working life. Office, domu, vecere, spat… to same den co den. Vikend, pivko, alkohol, spim spim spim, Monday… :P

Musim priznat, ze celkem consciously thinking na muj konec tady, ktery se blizi. Planuju vejlet do Thajska a do Kambodzi v unoru. Koukam kdy budou zapisy do skoly, jaka to bude zabiracka az si dam Ekonomii 2 a taky myslim na moje Vanoce tady. With my parents uz pripravujem predpotopni plan jak prezijem den bez rodiny pospolu – pohadky, stromecek, ryba a salat. Prezili jinni, preziju taky :P Mrzi me jen, ze jsem zmeskala tatkovo oslavu 50tin :(

Jsem rada, ze jsem ve spojeni s kamaradama z domova – velky thanks klukum z Prahy – Hajence a Jardovi, nedavno jsme se po skypu tak nasmala… :) Diky Facebooku jsem up to date se vsim co se kde sustne – kdo s kym je in the relationship :P a kdo no longer listed as single :) sranda. Ted se blizi doba NaLDS – uz to je two years co jsem se ucastnila, ale stejne to ma na me stejnej impact.. rozjimam a reflektuju co a jak se zmenilo. Myslenka dne/ The thought of the day: Drive jsem chtela byt za kazdou cenu stale happy. Dneska vim, ze to tak nelze. Clovek musi obcas obetovat veci kvuli jinym vecem, diky nim se bude v budoucnu citit krasne a happy. A pak si toho pocitu of happiness vice vazim…

Moje favourite place v Kuala Lumpur je uz od doby co jsem sem prijela park u Petronas towers. Ve stredu vecer jsem tam zas zasla a rozjimala, did some reflection a jen si uzivala ten obrazek – petronas towers in light, osvetlena Fontana, lidi sedici povidajici… Mam rada tu atmosferu tam …

Dalsi vec v kterou verim je, ze aspon co jsem tady, nechci zasadne zasahovat do meho byti a osudu tady – co se ma stat, stane se. Stejne tak random jsem skonicla pri mem traineeship hunt v Malajsii. Nechavam otazku vztahu, kamaradstvi, prace a traveling otevrenou. Clovek nikdy nedokaze presne vsecko naplanovat, tak se snazim aspon trochu planovat a zbytek nechavam na osudu, jak to ma byt, tak to bude… Nekdy je skoda se kvuli vecem zbytecne stresovat.
For English speaking: Sorry, but this is just a random sharing in Czech... not a big deal :P

Blue Mosque

2007-10-29T12:51:00.000+02:00

On Saturday (after a long planning process) we finally visited a Blue Mosque in Shah Alam – about 45 min by train from Kuala Lumpur.

Our trip took about 3 hours & our crew consisted of 3 beautiful ladies – Tya(Indonesia), Rina(Kenya) & me (Czecho-Malaysia). This mosque has the talles Minaret in the whole Asia, 4th talles in the World, they say. It was built in 1985 and looks very pretty. All in blue. When we got there, we got to know, that unfortunately today we can not get in, since we are not Muslim and we will not pray. Tya was the only one who could enter to pray. She is Muslim. Saturday was the day, when all people, who are planning to go to Mecca rehearsed praying and going around Kaaba(the black holy stone). There was even artificial Kaaba in front of the main entrance and two big circles-to go around. Even though we couldn’t get in the Mosque, we took many nice pictures and had fun, chat & walk around.
The view was really impressive.

Deepavali - Indian "Christmas"

2007-10-29T12:44:00.000+02:00

Deepavali or Divali is a major Indian festival that is very significant in Hinduism. Known as the "Festival of Lights," it symbolizes the victory of good over evil, and lamps are lit as a sign of celebration and hope for humankind.

I am grateful to experience this festival here in Malaysia, since Indian community here in Malaysia is vast. Plus I live in an Indian neighborhood - Brickfields.

On the streets there are many boots, stalls displaying clothes, flowers, food, Indian CDs, DVDs… During the night the main street is: Too loud (Indian music), Litten up with tons of little glitter-lights, full of people & Bustling with life!

Since I am working for an originally Indian company, we also wanted to remind this big festival here & with my colleagues we made a plan to decorate our office with “Rangoli”. This is an ornament made of colored rice. It took us about 4 hours (coloring the rice, putting it together into a nice ornament…) We did that after office hours on Friday & we had a lot of fun while doing that. My colleagues told me, that I would never imagine doing this when going to Malaysia to work in Marketing :)

Now - how did we do the rangoli:
Fist colour the rice:

Then put rice on the pre-painted ornament with a chalk:

And... done :)

AIESEC AWARDS NIGHT 2007

2007-10-22T14:20:00.000+02:00

This night is worth blogging or at least worth sharing pictures. It was very nice event, the ones who deserved it were awarded, those who did not deserve it, had a lot of fun :P I had a lot of fun and a lot of delicious food!
One of the “cultural shocks” were the performances during awards – Like “grammar school group pop dancing” performed by Uni students, “two girls dressed in black&white, dancing on the stage on Chinese music”…. Nice but shocking at this kind of event.
After the event we got to the Zouk club, where the official Moto Grand Prix pre-party was in the full swing. DJs like Seb Fontaine were pumping up the place and with my friend Katalina we ended up jumping on the couches in the VIP area :P Very very nice evening.

Today

2007-10-18T16:24:00.000+02:00

This is a special post about Today. Today, the 18th October 2007. Could be one of the normal days I have here in KL, but... same same but DIFFERENT...
The day started nice, I kissed my Sweetheart for good bye and went to work, slightly late, since we slept in, but not too late. I had my daily agenda, work work, chasing people to finish some stuff, exchanging some emails with my friend, roomie and co-worker Tya.
During lunch break we made plan with my other colleague for another trip (spontaniously we decided to go in a month for 3 days to a real Malaysian jungle). I love planning trips!
Lunch we had with two other colleagues - fun, smiling around, eating Indian food, pleasant atmosphere. Then - shopping spree - in the shopping center we all three bought an Indian dress - promotion :P Tomorrow we are all wearing it, since we are invited for an Indian occasion after work!

5:30 was quickly to come, the time was passing fast since we had somehow a lot of work & fun at work:) Random comments of different colleagues of mine!

The concern of the day - buying dress for Saturday occasion - AIESEC Award Night. With Tya we left rather tired office and travelled downtown, Bukit Bintang - neighbourhood full of shopping center. Our mission was not very successfull, regarding shopping, but we had a lot of fun, relaxed evening, during our shopping I broke my shoes' heel :P and Tya was also hunting for her new shoes, since the ones with a little hole are not cool anymore :P !
Glad coming home, relaxing shower... Nice to be "home" again after the whole day... But very nice, "ordinary" day!
Let's get a nice sleep now :)

My Perception of Malaysia after 4 months

2007-10-16T14:59:00.000+02:00

Four months in Malaysia. This country is not that distant, foregin and exotic for me anymore. I feels like at home here nowadays. Second half of my stay is ahead. 3,5 months working in my company and half month of travelling over Cambodia and Thailand - than's the plan.

What in Malaysia doesn't bother me anymore?
*I dont get angry, when I am obviously ripped of in a cab.
*I dont get angry, when something doesn't work ("What to do" approach to things).
*I got used to the daily rain(rainy season&storms, that came now)
*I got used to the food.
*I got used to the style of working (but learning from my job!)
*Hygiene (I am more resistant towards dirt) However, Malaysia compared to Vietnam is superclean.
*I got used to EARNING my own money & keeping budget
*My new lifestyle - working time X free time X travelling X enjoying myself :)

Still matters for me
*Food - more cooking at home, European/Czech food is treat for me (obviously not for my stomach:S, strange, how it fights my delicious favourite food)
*Family & Friends back home (missed big AIESEC LTC Sec gathering:( )
*Keeping up good job - learning from things, my job is a big variety, challenging & satisfactory for me
*Facebooking :P i think i got addicted :)

Feels strange
*Back home is already snowing! (while here 26 degrees feels like cold!)
*Christmas ahead
*Normally I would be sitting at my university
*I am less resistant towards alcohol :S A beer and I am tipsy already... :)
*Fellow trainees/friends leaving Malaysia (that's life)

Smazak - Fried Cheese

2007-10-11T14:32:00.000+02:00

After 4 months. Potatoes with butter, smazak v trojobalu/fried cheese-carefully greezy, tatar sauce, tomatoe salad, coke. What a feeling:)
BTW: Nasledujici den mi mily smazacek privodil pocity kolem zaludku pripominajici houpajici se lod... Vtipny, jak tu nejim tucna jidla.. a kdyz jedno prijde... :)))

My Cutlure Shocks in Vietnam

2007-10-06T19:14:00.000+02:00

There are several things that surprised me in Vietnam (after 4 months in Malaysia). They are worth sharing, I am sure!

*Motorbikes EVERYWHERE! Adrenalin while crossing streets!!!

*Seeing Rice Fields & how rice is dried
*Graves & Thombs on rice fields (not a normal organized graveyard) Enjoy your Vietnamese rice...

*Cows crossing the streets. Let's wait, please:)

*Electricity on the streets of HaNoi. Thousands of cables, unsafe... (barbers on the streets just plug in their device and carry on with their "black" business)

*Girls from AIESEC we met are studying "World Economy". How can you study this in a Socialistic system? I guess different topics then we have back home in "International Trade" classes

*Littering on the streets - no trashbins (at night they clean the streets)I tried to seek a dustbin, but then I gave up. Strange feeling to throw away a plastic bottle just like that...

*Vietnamese people - blindly follow the system, hardly get any learning point from things. At the first sight very friendly...
*Noone really speaks English in Vietnam. I love Malaysia.
*They promise everything. Always say "YES" even they are not sure about things. And be sure 90% even dont know what are you talking about...
*When they want to travell somewhere, they have to deposit a huge sum of money to the bank, to make sure that they will come back

*Flexible business - when it starts to rain, each street shop sells and displays rain coats!

*Food in the "restaurants" rather good - a lot of beef - undercooked
*Hygiene. No comment. :P
*Menu in Restaurants-Meat: Pigeon, Turtle, Snake, Beef, Pork, Chicken, Cock, Frog... No vegetarian meals :P
*Maybe I even ate a cat.. (see a VIETNAM post)
*5 Beers for 1 USD - dream land:)

VIETNAM

2007-10-06T16:38:00.000+02:00

Past week I spent in one of the South-East Asia Countires. Vietnam. I took a week off at work and on Sunday flew with Air Asia Low cost airlines. My travell buddies were my friend and colleague from work Jana from Germany and my boyfriend Eduardo from Peru joined us on Monday.

Vietnam is still a Socialistic Country, Communism in a full swing. My first challenges were with getting visa. I had to apply in KL, Malaysia and after the whole hassle (bringing chocolate, begging them...) they issued visa for me & I got them on Friday, while flying on Saturday night :S

We spent 5 days around Ha Noi, the capital located on the North.
Sunday we just hanged around in HaNoi, we met AIESEC girls (AIESEC, truly global network:)), they took us to a nice restaurant to eat some typical Vietnamese food. A lot of beef, spring rolls, rice. Btw. my chop sticks eating style is upper-intermediate now!
In the evening we were just hanging out in the "cosy" streets full of trees & bustling with life, ppl sitting on streets, eating, riding their motorbikes, which were EVERYWHERE, EVERYTIME, EVERY DIRECTION! In this city as a local i guess you never get bored.

Monday we set off for a very nice trip, South from HaNoi. Tam Coc natural reserve. Spectacular views, beautiful countryside. Seeing how the rural areas look like - a lot of rice fields, rice is being dried in front of the houses, on streets, while motorbikes are riding on it, chicken wonder around... Beautiful hills, rivers. We took a boat/canoe ride though caves... pretty interesting and nice. In the evening we met Edu and went for a dinner downtown. From now on there was 3 of us to survive in Vietnam:)
Tuesday we should have gone to UNESCO reserve Halong Bay - East from Ha Noi, but (as natural disasters follow me here in Asia) we couldnt go due to Typhoon (Tajfun), that just came to Vietnam. Strong wind and rain till the end of our stay in Vietnam. So we had to reconcider our plans. It was kinda dissapointment, but what to do. :)
So the master plan was: Parfume Pagoda Trip - we went with a bus about an hour out of HaNoi, to the "middle of nowhere village" there we got off the bus and in rather strong rain we were seated in a canoe, a Vietnamese lady with a typical Vietnamese hat was rowing and 4 of us (one Dutch/Iranian guy) were sitting and "admiring" beauties of the countryside in a downpour. After 2 hours of freezing on a boat we reached our aim - place from where we could walk to Parfume Pagoda. We took a cable car, though, to get there. The view there was AMAZING! Pagoda was OK, buddhistic place of sacrifice, carved in a cave. It's called "Parfume" due to some legend... :)
Way back on the boat was a way better, since it was not raining anymore, we were chatting with our new friend from Holland, who was in Vietnam on holidays. We talked through Dutch politics, issues... interesting:P
Wednesday we were hoping that the Typhoon is gone and we could go to Halong Bay, but not really, all the cruises were cancled. A day in HaNoi was rather nice, eventhough it was raining. Ho Chi Minh Museum was okay. A highlight was a Water Puppet Theatre in the eveining - a typical Vietnamese cultural thingy. Viet music is played on typical intstruments, and wooden puppets are showing different typical scenes. Very nice.
The Experience of the day: Restaurant we went to for a lunch. We ordered a food and I decided to go to the bathroom. Cutlure shock. SUPER DIRTY. When I wanted to wash my hands, i had to overlook all the used and not washed dishes from the "restaurant" guests. But OK. On the way out of the restaurant we saw a bag which was full of CATS- miauing!!! Well, maybe my lunch was not beef...

Thursday we were still hoping... waking up early for the possible curise... but we were not ment to see Halong Bay. One more day in "chaotic" HaNoi. After sleep in we dicided to have a lunch in one of the restaurants. Infront of the place was a funeral preparations in a full swing. We ordered the food and watched the scene. After 15 minutes of hungry waiting for our lunch a waiter came: "Sorry, but we dont have any food" :S well, noting surprises us anymore:) We changed a pub. The other one seemed to be ok, so we ordered. When waiting for the food, i spotted that at the grill table is a cage full of pigeons. And right at the moment i saw the cage, one of the pigeons was ment to be a lunch of somebody. In a sec it was on a grill... Nothing surprises me in Vietnam anymore. It was a tough noon for all 3 of us. Disappointment from Halong Bay, restaurant hunting, rain...

Later on we went to the Museum of Ethnology. That was our mood turning point and pretty interesting experience.
I had the opportunity to talk to a guy who was a guide there. He shared with me the whole communistic situation. My eyes opened. People are threatened. Noone steands up against the regime. 70% out of 82 mil. of inhabitants are working in agriculture industry -rice- and have no idea about the Western world-> they support the communistic party... And I could really see, how my country (Czechoslovakia) suffered 20 years ago as well. Many questions and thoughts raised in my head...
Evening was very nice too. We had kinda BBQ on one of the busy street. Beer, meat, bread!!! We met Australian guys, who we spent the evening later on drinking beer and going to a local pub. Cool!
Friday was absolutely "holidays" relaxing - sleep in till 11, lunch, souvenirs shopping, coffee in a Cafe (oh, how much I miss Cafes in Kuala Lumpur!!) and then just saying good bye to HaNoi and taxi took us to the airport...

Penang weekend trip

2007-09-20T17:50:00.000+02:00

With Edu we set off on Friday evening on weekend journey to the north of Malaysia, close to Thailand - Penang island. The whole trip was very nice, except for the rain, that lasted both days, but allowed us to see quite some places of interest there.

I was fond of the trip to the biggest Budhistic complex in South-East Asia - Kek Lok Si. We had the chance to see the prayer with all the monks, music, scented sticks... Impressive! One thing I was wondering about, was, how many times was displayed one particular chinese sigh. All over was the infamous "nazi cross". I havent found out what does it mean...

In the temple with "Budhistic decoration"

Budha in the Shrine

Chinese architecture - can! Chinese food - can not! :P

For more pictures - either Edu's photos or mine

Future of Malay Mankind's Health

2007-09-19T10:24:00.000+02:00

An observation worth sharing:
Whenever you are sick in Malaysia(flu, sore throat, fever, or something more serious - doesnt matter), the doctor ALWAYS pre-scribes ANTIBIOTICS. Today: The Doctor: "hmm.. so you have a slight fever, tireness, pain in joints, your nose is running.. hmm.. flu, I see.. I think you need antibiotics!"

Of course, I said that I dont want them, since flu is not to be cured with antibiotics, but laying in my bed and rest.

People here take antibiotics about 7 times per year. The demaged microflora is being pempered with the indian spicy food, no worries! :S They prefer to work while being sick. For breakfast they eat spicy, oily food containing rice and fried meat-Nasi Lemak. Everyone suffers from gestric problems, no wonder... well ... cultural differences, for sure...

Earthquake in Indonesia

2007-09-12T16:41:00.001+02:00

Still fresh. Today evening stroke Indonesian island Sumatra an Earthquake with 7.9 on the Richter scale.
I was in a cab on my way home from shopping with Tya, my new roomie and a new trainee in my company. She is from Indonesia. Suddenly I received a call from Edu. He said that there is an Earthquake in Indo and I should check with Tya and Amel from Indo, if their families are all right! And I was sitting in a cab, next to Tya, shaking myself, my heart beating very fast suddenly.
I told Tya in about 5 minutes, when we got home. We checked internet immediatelly.
I called to my parents and brother. Let all of them know I am allright. They even did not know yet. Surely. Strange feeling.

This was the first time to bring myself that close to such a storng Earthquake and threat of Tsunami. Remembering all the disaster from 2004, when Tsunami stroke... i was still shaking checking Breaking News on BBC. I was comforted by Tya later on that the quake is not that bad, her family is ok and things will be allright. For Indonesian though, quake is rather often, they did not bother much, when they see should be OK. But somehow I know that back home the geography of South-East Asia is not very well know and my friends might think I could be in danger..

The Tsunami hopefully will not come, however Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia are in threat. MALAYSIA too... I believe everything will be all right...

... after several hours everything seems to be OK, just a tiny Tsunami came and i am rather relieved...
… to be continued – Wednesday: second day. Another smaller Earthquake in Indo. Next by building -from where I work- in Petaling Jaya (Part of Kuala Lumpur), was evacuated in the morning due to quakes that they felt. I still try to calm down myself, since people in the office take it easy and they are not much bothered about the whole situation. They are used to.
But definitely it takes my energy away. Worries, shock.. I am checking online news… but sometimes they show just the “worse” pictures and stories to make people threaten.

3 months in Malaysia

2007-09-11T12:30:00.001+02:00

These days I realized that it is already 3 months, since I said bye bye to Europe and landed in South-East Asia. I would like to follow up on those 3 months and recall important moments here - with pictures.
My first day - First "Purple" Party

Impressive "Cafe del Mar" in Singapore (awesome chill out place. Loved it!)

Finding "Paradise" places

Getting to know new ppl from different countries...

...friends

...and the ones closest to my heart...

New point of view how Indian company works, meeting new, experienced & clever people in our company. Many thoughts in my head how to give MY value added to my company.

Trying SEVERAL totally new things first time in my life

Culutral differences...Same same, but different...

Settled now - not only because of my new room & bed:)

...after 3 months here, gratefull for all challenges so far, gratefull for all learnings and happiness that I went through and gratefull for best moments that are happening lately... I am living times of my life...

...and the ride continues, baby! Many plans in my head. The only bug is, that the time is going too fast! There are moments I want the time to stop:)

It's up to you!

2007-09-02T06:28:00.000+03:00

Lately I am woring on a new project at work and for inspiration and a pop up of creativity I came back to "famous" AIESEC It's up to you! questions.
And when I was going through I realized that all the sentences I used to see on the walls of University of Economics in Prague came true here in Malaysia...

Are you talking about CEO's or talking with them?

Are you eating Chinese take-out or dining in Beijing(Kuala Lumpur)?

Is your summer internship a lucky break or a breakthrough?

Are you looking for a summer job or a life changing experience?

Will you see where your future leads or lead your future?

Do you like to travel or is the world your playground?

Will you keep on dreaming or live your dream?

Yeah, it is really up to you! :)

Paul van Dyk - Gig in Malaysia

2007-09-02T04:25:00.000+03:00

For my name-day on 31st I got a present from Edu - ticket for Paul van Dyk's gig here in KL, famous club Zouk! YAAY! He came to promote his new album called "In Between" Before the gig I cooked dinner - Bramboraky and some chicken-with a success:). All 6 of us(4guys,2girls) later on went for the gig. It was AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWESOME! 4 hours set! We were very close to Paul and we did enjoy the whole atmosphere!
Here are some pictures:
Paul van Dyk playing
On our way - Edu and me

Crazy party - with Carla

"In Between" Carla and Mahen

More pictures?

Scuba diving on Redang Island

2007-08-27T18:01:00.000+03:00

Following up on previous post – last 3 days I spent on one of the most beautiful islands I have ever been to.

The journey there was OK, we traveled about 8 hours up North-East with the bus. 5 people together – Janne, me, Major Kee (our instructor) and 2 Chinese 50 years old guys! The journey itself was tiring, but we all survived and after some time we lend on the coast of Pulau Redang.
First impressions: White sand, pure water, palm trees, hammocks on the palm trees and vision of scuba diving…enough to feel satisfied!

First day - Friday and we made 2 open water dives. All 7 of us (2 people joined us later on in the morning).

During the first dive we practiced all our skills we have learned during our pool sessions in Kuala Lumpur – mask clearing, hovering, gaining neutral buoyancy, running out of air… Afterwards we were exploring the bottom of the sea – corals, sea sponges, different fish, Nemo:)…
The dive usually lasts about 1,5 hours plus assembly of the scuba diving equipment. Later on we had a lunch, I was soooo hungry :) Second best part on the island was the relax after each and every single meal we had – laying on the hammock under the palm trees.. resting and falling asleep while listening to my MP3 music and watching the sea! Pohodicka!
Second dive was the way worse for me. The problem was my leaking mask. I had to clear it many times(under the water, of course), but still I saw big fish – Trigger fist(aggressive one), a shark!!! Corals. The maximum depth was 10 meters.

It really felt like exploring a new dimension of the world, that I have seen before just on series like Discovery Channel!
Third dive was a “Navigation dive” – going after the compass and following the given directions. After the experience with my leaking mask I changed it and that was a mistake! – my new mask was fogging like hell and I did not see anything. Luckily I was following my buddy with compassJ I did a lot of mask clearing, but I did not enjoy the dive much. 1,5 hours under the water.
Last dive was the best one! Saturday after the lunch we set off on a boat and did the boat dive. Prepared with all the tanks, camera and enthusiasm we lend on a spot far from the island and started to explore the bottom of the sea. First we saw some streams of fish, then a big moraine fish hidden in the rock, a huge jelly fish, which I did not know it is a jelly fish (I assumed it was a big sea flower:S) and I swam very close (nothing happened fortunately) also a sea turtle swimming!, the deepest point was 22meters!!! My ears were due to proper equalization perfectly OK. Always when I saw a big fish (even 2 meters big fish) I got scared and was breathing very fast from the regulator. It took me always some time to calm down.
There was a statement in my study book that “It is proved that Scuba divers have more fun that ordinary people”. I laughed at it when I saw it, but in the end the new dimension of the underworld plus bunch of nice people and relaxing atmosphere on the island made me believe it is true!

Diving course

2007-08-23T14:51:00.000+03:00

For about 3 weeks now I am doing with my Finish friend Janne a Scuba diving course. In the end (today) we are heading to an Island (simmilar like Perhentian, which we have been to last month) for scuba diving!!!
But what did the whole course ment for me and why I payed half of my monthly wage for it?
* to fight my fear
* to go through 5 pool sessions – each duration 3 hours (always tired after work, coming home 11pm, jumping in my bed and sleep...)
* to experience having my eyes opened under the water (biggest challenge for me) mask clearing + swimming with opened eyes from one side of the pool to another, while realizing, how people feel when they are partly blind
* to breathe first time under the water – from the tanks
* to have BCD (buoyancy control device – kind of vest) on me for the first time and swim with it
* to talk with hands signs under the water
* not to have time to go through my diving book (till now!!!)
* have a new experience

Indian engagement

2007-08-19T20:38:00.000+03:00

My friend and colleague from work - Sutha - invited me for Engagement ceremony of her sister Geeta. Of course I was happy to accept the invitation, to see, how such an Indian tradition looks like.
When we arrived to the house of potential bride, she was currently undergoing make-up procedure, then tying a sari procedure, all took (with help of 3 her friends) about 2 hours. She looked like an Indian princess afterwards!
Then in the living room (they prefered to have the ceremony home, instead of in the temple) the priest was preparing all important for the engagement - prayers, fruit, flowers, fire.. very colourful. Meanwhile all the guests (50ppl) arrived - women in Saris, men in traditional suits. First the potential groom couldnt see Geeta. She came in her "first" Sari, talked to priest, then she took another Sari from him. This one was gifted to her from her mother in law and she went to change. Which took about 20 other min. Meanwhile traditional Indian music was played!

Final ceremony was very beautiful. Geeta came, looking gorgeous with a wreath of flowers, accompanied with her friends. Her "man" joined her. Priest was praying, they exchanged rings, got "bindi"-the dot on forhead... Afterwards all went to eat a dinner and ... Engagement was over. The wedding is on 15th December... and I am invited... :)

I was very grateful to Sutha for being invited for such a event. It is always great to see how the traditional habbits looks like! And also to see how different our "Czech/European" engagement looks like...

Peruvain Dinner

2007-08-19T20:04:00.000+03:00

Eduardo from Peru invited a few friends for a dinner in the occasion of celebration of Arequipa (city, from where he comes from).
The dish was very nice - potatoes, chicken sauce, olives, egg, red wine, pleasant atmosphere,outstanding company :) ... hmm... perfect evening!!! :)

My NEW old room

2007-08-19T19:54:00.000+03:00

Since about two weeks I have had a newly furnished room. Thesame appartment, thesame cool flat-mates, but just little bit of IKEA made my life here nicer!1) Someone has already said that it looks a bit like in the red-light district, but I dont care, cause:
2) It is cosy and cute
3) The bed is awsome, wouldnt change the money I gave for it for anyting else!!!:)

What made my day

2007-08-15T14:13:00.000+03:00

On a way from work I poped in to Petronas Towers to buy tickets for a Malaysian Orchestra. The way back I had to take a subway. The platoform was overcrowded with long lines of people. Ridiculous. In the line I met a couple (about 35 years old) and their 2 kids (about 10years) from Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Their father started to talk to me, we were chating the whole time we spent in a line and then later on in subway. Their whole family travel round Malaysia for 1 month, different places...
I found it really cool. Young family to travel all over the world, when they have holidays - active time spent together, getting to know new country...

I also talked with them about cultural difference and "rassism" in their country and here.. Here is almost none :)

It was very nice meeting them. It simly made my day... :)

60th Anniversary of India Independence

2007-08-15T08:41:00.000+03:00

Since my company is Indian, many Indian ppl are working here. Today is a big celebration for them, 60 years ago the independence from British happened. That is why many ladies wear today a Sari and guys wear traditional clothes. In the morning they were going around and chatting,giving away the traditional food, all this seemed to be like a big festival in the office:)

Cameron Highlands

2007-08-15T08:21:00.000+03:00

There was a weekend free on 11th,12th Aug, so I send out email to my friends with a message, if they would be interested in a trip to Cameron Highlands. That’s how it began (there simply must be always someone who makes the plan).

In the end we set off 6 people – Janne(Finland), Carla(Ireland), Carey-Anne(South Africa), Caro(Belgium), Amilia(Indonesia) and me for a weekend trip.
Cameron Highlands are located North from Kuala Lumpur about 3,5 hours drive and it is a place which is rather high, so that the temperature is around 15-20 degrees – and not humid. Perfect place for planting tea, strawberries…

With Amilia we went with a bus from KL, the others took Carey-Anne’s car. Our bus was one big disaster - caught a traffic jam, stopped on a way up the highlands due to the “overcooked” engine – and the driver was cooling it down with a plain water. Nevertheless, I did not make a lot out of it, cause I wanted to relax. Simply as it was.

When we arrived to Cameron Highlands, all of us went strait to see one of the famous Tea plantation, called Cameron Valley. It was my first time seeing tea plantation and the view with the sun, green hills, tea plants and guys harvesting the tea was awesome. The only bug was, that my stomach was on a strike, due to consuming on Friday night (for the first time in my life) combination of antibiotics and alcohol. Learning point jaxvina – never again.

In the evening we had a typical Chinese food called “Steam boat” – big mug on a table with two different soups, in which we gave different meat and vegetable to be cooked. I think I don’t fancy this meal again, but was interesting to try.

Sunday the weather changed, it was foggy and cold. When we went by car to a strawberry farm and we saw a rain coming, we even started to sing of happiness, that the cold weather is coming. Crazy.

Strawberry farm was OK, nothing special, though. Another 3 hours we spent on a BOH tea plantations, bigger and nicer than the ones yesterday. BOH is a brand of very famous Malaysian tea, which is produced right in Cameron highlands, in a factory, where we could step in! Very interesting to see how the tea process is carried out. Drying, fermenting, flavouring.. Another learning point – the green tea and black tea are coming both from one plant. The only difference is the processing of the leaves.
The view was spectacular. Indeed! Afterwards we just had some tea in a nice restaurant, with cool view, food and were ready to go home. I really liked this trip, mostly cause it was very relaxing and the people were fun to be with!
...for more pix check my flickr again :)

Update

2007-08-09T18:54:00.000+03:00

There are many things happening lately!!!

Capoeira
I took up this Brazilian dance/sport/art - Capoeira classes. I go there with my friend Nadeem every Monday after work(except for the last one when I was sick). It is cool in all aspects – interesting people, new experience, exhaustive feeling afterwards and doing finally some exercise – good for my body!

Free time
I have no free time :) Weekends are planned a month in advance(and I was worried what I will do here:)), so I can not complain, that I would be bored. Sometimes is good, but sometimes I just need some relax. When I come back from work, there is even no time for taking it easy – either dinner with other interns, or meeting with friends, or shopping or Capoeira or …

Diving course
I took up also a diving course – scuba diving with tanks, yay! 24-26 Aug. I gonna spend diving on Island Redang, watching Nemos and Corals… The course itself contains of 5 pool sessions, getting to know all the equipment, diving in a pool. Each session is about 3 hours long. First session was this Wednesday after work. Pretty packed day. It was surprisingly easy to breath under the water with the tanks! I felt like flying in the water, really!!! I take the course with a Finish guy, Janne. We have quite fun, but watch out, no laughing under the water! I tried once and my mask was full of water immediately :)

August – month of Nationalhood of MalaysiaIt is 50 years since Malaysia is an independent country. This year 2007 the celebrations will be huge. Exactly it is 31st August (On my nameday!!) And by now, there are plenty of Malay flags displayed everywhere all over KL/Malaysia! We are planning what to do on that day, since there will be many parades, big festival and fireworks. Also famous DJ Paul van Dyk is coming for a gig in a biggest club in KL – Zouk, so I guess I don’t want to miss this :)

Status: HAPPY!

2007-08-05T10:20:00.000+03:00

I feel happy:), worth sharing, he?
I am not sick anymore, got settled down in my new room-I just moved within our old appartment (will do some shopping in IKEA on Monday), have a new roomie from Ireland, Carla, with who I get on well, yesterday we watched very pleasant movie Miss Potter, we had some pasta for a lunch(no rice:)) today, tomorrow heading to work again, next weekend a trip to Cameron Highlands(backpacking!), on Wednesday starting a Diving course and most of all I have a bunch of nice people around me ...and due to that all I simply feel happy now:)

What is it like to ....be sick in Malaysia

2007-08-03T06:58:00.000+03:00

Every day - new experience!
After Tuesday's heavy rain in the morning I got to work soaking wet. The AirCon doesn't help much to keep you warm. Wednesday morning I did not feel well, so strait from work I went to see the doctor and experience what is it like to be sick in Malaysia.
Not much different though. I subscribed at the counter, while the Indian assistant doctor was curious where do I come from. "Czech Republic" - "aa..hmm.." - "Europe" - "aaa! OK, I see" :)
The Chinese lady-doctor invited me into her "office" and the procedure started. At the beginning I was laughing in mind while remembering the lectures at the secondary school, when our teacher tried to teach us the "At the doctor" phrases:)
"What are your symptoms, Pavlina?" She asked. I answered properly while talking about my sorethroat, fever and tireness. Then she tried to inspect my breath, you know, when you have to breath in and the doc. is inspecting your chest and back. She even did not ask me take off my rather thick cardigan. I was wondering, if she can hear anything. Then she measured my temperature - with the thermomether under my tongue and afer 1 minute she took it out and said: "Hmm, not bad.. just 98,2.." :) I repeated her diagnosis and thought, that they might have a different scale... :) (European normal temp. is 37degrees)
Finally she said I gotta lay in my bed, drink a lot and wrote me the Medial Leave from work and prescribed anibiotics (!-for sore throat and flu!!) I payed 30RM (6EUR) and went home with the idea of future 5 days(involving weekend) in the bed.
Just to add, the fever here is rather different from the European feeling - here you don't know, if you are sweating due to the fever or just due to the weather... And rest assured that I do sweat a lot nowadays! :)

Superhero Party at Brickfields

2007-08-01T11:05:00.000+03:00

Last Saturday was a blast! David and Andrea threw their bye bye party, since leaving this week after one year being here. The theme was "SUPERHEROES". The party turned out to be awsome, full of Supermen, Catwoman, Whoopi Golberg, Mr.Bean, Pocahontas, Transformer, Flinstones... Guess what I was:) Amilia came over to my place before the party, to disguise. She was an Indonesian superhero and me - Little Mermaid Ariel:)

...the party was simply superb. The only bug. I drank quite some alcohol... and due to that I left the party rather early:))

Personal sharing

2007-08-01T08:45:00.000+03:00

Who reads my blog regulary knows a lot about the food, weather, what i miss from home, where I travel... But I would like to share now, how do I FEEL here on a whole and also share some of my challenges so far.

I came here 1,5 months ago. Since then I have experienced many good and challenging moments. I would say first 2-3 weeks were really hard, cause i did not have many people here to talk to, to share the culture shocks with. As I already stated previously, AIESEC internship is different from ERASMUS and the other interns know each other before, when you as a newie arrive. Getting intergrated was/is one of those challenges. Although I am easygoing, not always ppl are your type and have time to getting to know or are not willing to. And you simply cant be "best friend" with everyone... But quite some people here are really nice - to have a chat with or just hang out, so I am happy about that.

Secondly, I was prepared, that there will be the fu**ing insect - cockroaches and stuff. I try to take it easy and don't mind it, but after my fights I realized that those invadors are simply grose to me and I don't want to live with them in one room, especially while sleeping. So when I go sleep, I am rather worried, when I hear any little noise in my room. But the thing is, i HAVE TO learn how to respect those little creatures, since they will not die out for the period of coming 7 months since Im here:)

On a whole I dont sleep well here. Jet-lag is long time over, but usualy I go sleep round 12 and fall asleep 1 or 1;30 tossing and truning on my squaky bed. The outcome is, that I am getting more and more tired and then it takes my energy away. I am moving to another room on Saturday, so maybe situation will improve:) I would like to settle down soon and have my own, long term, nicely-furnished room...

There are also other little things that I don't like - rain in the morning, being overlaoded with rice:), stressed out people at work, packed public transport,...

To sum up, so far i have experienced a lot. I do try to take the most of it, eventhough there are definitely things I don't like, i try to respect and learn from things. I have to admitt, that I did not expact this to be already such a big learning for me as an individual - from cultural, personal, relationship and work perspective.
One of the deepest leranings: Family and good friends are the best asset that you have. If I am down and I know that I can call, chat, write to people I know will not let me down, it is an amazing feeling... THANKS!
Another big learning - respect towards people, their life, culture and things they do. And thirdly, I see how the company works and how different leadership styles work and I try to capture things I would like to avoid in my future career.

WHAT I am missing the most

2007-07-31T14:41:00.000+03:00

Except for my parents, bother, grandparents,Prague roomies, friends back home and in the World I miss following:

As previously mentioned, the food here is good, but I miss the most Czech food: Spenat s bramborami a vajickem, Svickova, Bramboraky, Palacinky z Narodni Tridy, Sunkofleky od maminky, Rajska od babicky, bramborovy salat a’la Beckovi, cesky chleba s pomazankou, mozzarella a dalsi druhy syra, gulas z bufiku ve Strakonicich hehe...

Climate – I know that back home is summer too, but I just miss the chilly mornings, mild evenings…

Seeing European people walking down the streets & European guys;) (I am not rasist!)

Pubs and beer – simply the atmosphere "na zahradce s Gamrinusem, fried cheese "U Houdku" and so on"

Saturday shopping in Strakonice with my mum

Oranized public transport – in all aspects

Slightly horror story

2007-07-27T14:53:00.000+03:00

Yesterday I went sleep in a good mood. I was laying on my yellow bed and trying to fall asleep. Suddenly I hear noises.. Like something is in my plastic bags on the floor. I turn on the light. I have the anti-insect spray in my hand. There is something moving. Ahh, cockroach, I assume. I use the spray. But no result is yet to come. My room became after my chemical attack uninhabitable.

I decided to move to living room (did not want to share my room with cockroach and did not want to breath RAID spray), brought my pillow and bed sheet and lay on the sofa.

Roman, my Ukrainian roomie came home and wanted from me a vodka (for making his ears clean..?.. don’t ask me why:)) I said, that I had it in my room and now I am not gonna go there. So he switch on the light in my room and suddenly a HUGE (10cm) cockroach ran out of the door form my room. As a typical girl, I started to jump on the sofa, cried “Kill it! Kill it!!!!”

Roman tried to smack it with his shoe, but it tried to escape, it even tried to fly away. Oh my God! I was producing a nice scene for a hysteric movie, shaking, screaming… Finally, Roman, my hero, killed the beast! I sat on the Sofa, still shaking. We opened the bottle of vodka and had a shot for calming down. Then a beer for a better sleep.

Cockroaches are simply very disgusting and when big, even more odious. They will simply not be my friends here…

The FU**ING Rainy Season is here

2007-07-25T13:20:00.000+03:00

Past few days it rains during the day. And during the night, too. The sky is harldy ever blue. The rainy season is here, baby!

Today I had another cool experience with going home from the office, while not having an umbrella. Mine is broken and I think I should seriously concider to buy one.
I stepped out of the office, out of the building, had my MP3 player on, which made my mood merrier. Walking in the rain. Yaaay:) In the subway I spent just few minutes going to my station, slightly wet clothes on. The way home from LRT (metro) station takes about 8 min. During this period of time I felt like being a star in the "Wet T-shirt Contest". My greenish blouse became more and more transparent so did my white pants. Men passig by were turning their necks like the turles do.. Malaysia, Truly Asia...:)

Rain season lasts till December... Several hours rain per day. Hope it will stop raining at least sometimes for some travelling...

Culture shocks, part 2

2007-07-22T10:09:00.000+03:00

Riding a bike in a rain forest
Seeing a huge spider on my own eyes!
I am freezing at work due to Air Con (but slowly getting used to that, my colleagues love my colourful cardigans:P)
Seeing sky scrapers for the first time in my life (KL, Singapore)
Eating with hands
Seeing a cockroach running around in my room
People here spend ages in huge Shopping Malls
While shopping I saw cooled black chicken and wrapped chicken feet even with nails (a delicatessen)I am not really into tasting this...
Driving on the right side of the road and very aggressive
People laying on the street, sleeping
Positive: Casual Fridays at work
Payment of the rent to the landlord in cash every month (no bank transfer)
I expected modestly dressed women and while walking downtown I saw Chinese ladies in miniskirts (the same on parties)

Luna Bar with Amilia

2007-07-22T06:24:00.000+03:00

Saturday was pretty rainiy, so with Amilia, my friend from Indonesia, we decided to go to National Musum and see more of Malay, Indian and Chinese culture. Most intresting there for me was actually the Indian things (Indian ppl came here about 2000 years ago and see their habbits, e.g. their big celebration "Thaipusam". Then we had a dinner in Indian restaurant - a true bannana leaf (eating with hands from a bananna leaf). It was already evening and two girls were eager to explore the big city :)Petronas Twin Towers are just simply very irresistable.
Our aim was to go to "Luna Bar" a poshy bar on 34rd floor of a hotel in a city center. AWSOME view! We ordered nice coctails and let ourselves to be spoiled by the view, drinks, nice gezelig sofa:)

Culture shocks part 1

2007-07-21T04:13:00.000+03:00

Being on the other part of Earth, experiencing different culture for alrady 1 month, I am putting down continously things, that surprised me here and that could be called as a cutlure shock. Here come some of them:

Eating the Indian food on a banana leaf!
Getting used to the time difference (still facing some challenges with that)
Meeting my Filipino coleges in our Indian company and going with them for a dinner to a Malay restaurant, while teaching them some Czech phrases
Different climate, but slowly getting used to it
Positive: toilet paper present at every rest room so far (except for the University:S)
Positive: everybody speaks English here!
Different flora – instead of the European trees I meet on my way to work palm trees, banana trees, tropical flowers
While travelling in a tube, it is hard to get out of the vagon - no system of first getting off and then getting in, you have to fight to find you own way out!!

TGIF

2007-07-21T04:05:00.000+03:00

Working process is implies waking up early (7:30) going from work late (5:30)... But then THE day comes. THANKS GOD IT'S FRIDAY! This time I was very much looking forward, when I finish the work, cause afterwards we went for a dinner and then to a Tropiq bar for a beer. They had offer 3for2, so we celebrated the working week to come to the end!!
With Flic(AUS),and my future roomies Jeff(AUS) and Irene(NETHERLANDS)in the Tropiq bar

Pulau Perhentian trip

2007-07-18T15:58:00.000+03:00

Pulau(Island) Perhentian is located on North-East part of Malaysian Peninsuala.

We set off 6 people from Kuala Lumpur and travelled about 8 hours. With jetty we then carried on to the island, about 1 hour travelling.

I will share the most interesting moments:
Meeting cool people!Jana(Germany), Hannu, Janne (Finland), Carey(South-Africa),Flic(Australia)

Our housing. Jungle wooden house, two beds, which 3 ppl shared, lizards on the wall. Sleeping under a net agains mosquitos (princess feeling:P)

Diving, sknorkeling. Seeing many colourful fish, feeding them from my hand, seeing a sea turtle, shark and FINDING NEMO:)

Being on the pretties beach I have ever been. White sand, palm trees, aquamarine water.

Hiking threw jungle on the island at night with Janne. First we went to see the sunset on the other side of the island. We had a dinner, bbq there and when was rather dark we went back. With just two little lights. Jungle full of strange sounds, hight trees... Cool experience.

Relax, sleep, fun, challenge, new experience...
for more pics check my flickr account..

ERASMUS X INTERNSHIP

2007-07-17T13:52:00.000+03:00

This article might be interesting not just for those, who went for the student exchange, but just for those who are working and share simmilar experience as I do now.

Erasmus is (according to my experience) VERY different from actuall interns life, what I did not expect at the beginning. Erasmus (student exchange) is very much about partying, meeting new people at certain point of time, when noone knows anobody, and then with your friends you meet often, also during the day, bonding ppl, making real friendships, travelling a lot...

Intern life is in a way different. You arrive to the community, where ppl already know each other and you have to assimilate somehow. Slowly get to know the people. The work takes the majority of the day, you are tired afterwards, so you (I) try to relax in the evening, or go for dinner with friends out. Then weekends are to be used for travelling, but you don't want to wake up early on Saturday, cause of the lack of sleep during the week. But still there is time to explore new cutlure, cities, places, getting close to people. That is so far my experience and who knows, whithin 6 months I might have a different point of view;)

Both are very different lives, but both brings fun, friends, getting to know new cultures, bring good x challenging times and HEAPS of learning. And that is why I went for both of the experiences.

Who I am missing the most/Kdo mi chybi nejvic

2007-07-12T13:27:00.000+03:00

NAC 2007

2007-07-10T18:40:00.000+03:00

After the demanding preparations, the fruits is yet to come. NAC was fruitfull, indeed. Delegates were satisfied, interns, outgoing members and returnees were sharing experience. For me it was another cooool faci experience, for sure! I had also several culture shocks:) For more see the pictures:)
Our Faci team

Facilitating ALBATROS game with Eaton. (a game about culture shock, very impacting one)

My dinner and lunch for two days totally thesame... (breakfast was rice too)"What the hell does the fish in my dish?!"

Culture shock! I wanted to have a shower when coming to the spot, totally disgusting sweaty, what a surprise, the shower did not work. No idea what to do. Do you see the red pipe? Normally it is used by muslims for something else then shower.. Well.. Sometimes things just have a different purpose of use.. And so I had a "enjoying" shower.

Playing games on the beach! First evening I went with a friend of mine along the coast and when he told me, that that this ocean was acutally responsible for the Tsunami, I got a huge respect towards the sea!

Great pleasure to present my own country. I felt pride to present Czech Republic to people, that were really interested in it! I showed pics on PPT of Czech landscape while playing the most famous Czech componist Smetana - Vltava. Ppl told me, they had goose bumps!! Yeah!

Sculling. Topalki. Boat race. Different as well as simmilar. We were in semifinal, but people appreciate my quick drinking spirit hehe

A punishment comando. Watch out, guys!

Petra/Jordan - one of the 7 New Wonders of the World

2007-07-10T15:28:00.000+03:00

Congratulations! Petra deserves it!

Preparing for National Ambassadors Camp

2007-07-05T19:10:00.000+03:00

I did not acutally expect myself to get that busy here:)
Since Monday I know that I will be going this weekend for NAC (National Ambassadors Camp), as a facilitator, leading workshops and actually organize the conference. What is NAC? It is an AIESEC (the organization I came here with) conference, where people who are in Malaysia on an internship and Malaysians who want to go on internship meet and share experience, prepare for culture shock.. something simmilar like our OPS, click and roll down.
Since Tuesday my day schedule is very very simmilar. I leave the work at 6, then have a very nice chat and coffee or dinner with Sutha, my collegue and a new friend - a 28year old Indian girl, coming from Malaysia. At 8 then I move to a nearby MC AIESEC office, the National Committee and we discuss the sessions, and other important stuff regarding the conference. I get home at about 11pm and still need to work out ppts, sessions... And I fall asleep at 2am and alarm clock morning rings at deadly 7:30.

On a whole it is very nice, I am looking forward to the comming weekend very much, I am gonna have a different role than usually - faci plus intern, who is gonna present my own country - ambassador of the Czech Republic. I am sure all the busy days lately are worth it!

The Equator Weather

2007-07-03T19:15:00.000+03:00

The weather in Malaysia is very different from the weather in Europe. Logical already from the geographical features  As soon as I lended in KL IA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport) I did not notice such a difference, because it was very early morning, quite warm but OK. By the time I approached KL itself and walked out of the departure hall I felt a bit like in a drying room. Rather humid, very warm.

The weather here is unpredictable. It should be a dry season now, but rather often in the morning it is a clear sky, warm about 27 degrees, so when I go to work at 8am it is already quite warm. The whole day I spend at work, just seeing the sun outside from a window and when there is a time to go home, it starts to rain. It is not the kind of European rain, but a tough downpour (not Monsoon). I have already seen also a huge storm, and I had a pleasure to be exactly on my way home. So rule no.1 – always have your umbrella-ela-ela-e :) on you!

I think I kind of got used to the climate, even though it is not very comfortable to sweat all the time. I am just very happy, when there is at least some breeze. Mainly in the evening on the parties… it is just different :)

What I also realized is that the Sun here is very strong. Especially sun bathing around 11am in Singapore (about 100 km from the Equator) was not very smart. My whole body’s skin is currently pealing off from the sun burn. Next time a sun cream with a high protection, baby!

Another funny story worth mentioning: Every night I sleep with a fan, but despite of the fact I have no Air Con the air is ok, I am taking shower in the evening as well in the morning. In our bathroom there is a window permanently opened, so in the morning there is quite a fresh air for having a cool shower.

When I mentioned Air Con, the people are crazy about it here! Wherever you come (except for my room :)) there is Air Con set up for at least 18 degrees, sometimes is just a huge shock! And I am waiting until my body gets tired of the temperature difference and get sick.

About the Monsoon: Beginning of October there should be a rainy season coming over, lasting till February. That means, that heavy rain occurs with a strong wind, that is called Monsoon (in Taiwan area is called Taifun and resembles Tornados in US) Looking forward  But the locals told me, that the weather is very unpredictable. Now it supose to be a dry season, but the rain occurs rather often. The average temperature is about 30+, I really don’t know, because I have no thermo meter.

That’s all for now, hope wherever you are, you have a sun shining (at least in your hearts :P)
Cheers!

Random post (appologies to English readers)

2007-07-03T13:53:00.000+03:00

Nedokazu si dost dobre predstavit, ze me deli ve skole uz jen rok a pul od opusteni univerzity a straveni zbytku zivota praci, treba podobnou jako delam ted!
To clovek pozna, jak si vazi skoly, az kdyz z ni vypadne!

Videos from Singapore added

2007-07-01T15:37:00.000+03:00

A bike ride in the jungle (shitty road, nice trees, a bike)

Cafe del Mar in Singapore (awsome bar/cafe.. chill out place)

Skyline of Singapore

Hindi prayer

2007-07-01T14:08:00.000+03:00

It all started so innocent... On Thursday I finished work sharp at 5:30 and was in a mood going exploring Brickfields, the Indian neighbourhood, where I live. It was still light and I somehow get jumped into a big street market (so called Night Market) with all different kinds of fruit, also clothes, food, shoes, fish... 1000s colours all around and 100s people on the street, mainly shopping after comming from work (99% Indian ppl) As I was wondering around I happen to go next to the house, that on first sight looked like an old indoor small market place, but when I came closer I saw shoes in front of the room and inside very colourfully decorated interier, about 20 people standing inside and in the middle there was a man a “priest” wearing some kind of long orange skirt. In the first moment it was clear, that it is a Hindu prayer. As we were told to be culturally sensitive;), so I just stood behind ppl not to disturb them and I was observing what is happening there. Fistly I was a bit scared, that I will be an invador or sth, but then I “prayed” with them. All the women we wearing the typical Indian Panjabi suit and men were quite typicaly dressed, too. I found quite interesting, how big role played at the prayer fire, they kept on lightening it up on and on. Then all went into a row (i already had courage enough, that I joined) and we got a white powder – each of us a bit and put it behind the eyes on a nose and then later on thesame with a red powder. Both man and women. Since then I was having bindi (a white-red dot) on my forehead. Then I sat down next to the wall and they started to pray more personally, talking to the “priest”, who gave them a candle afterwards and some flowers and bananas to hold it and pray with it. Then they had to walk several times around the main “altar” in the middle of the room. On the altar there was some kind of stuffed animal, to which then to people were silently talking one to one and gave it the fruit and flowers.
I stayed about half an hour and then I decided to leave. I still went to the market, bought a pinaple for 0,5 EUR :) and a ncie T-shirt.
Quite interesting experience...

Key learning points so far

2007-06-29T15:40:00.000+03:00

Observe to get to know the culture. Ask people to understand the culture. Be open for the culture experience. (me eating the sea food that I don’t eat usually, trying unknown Chinese food…) Just like that you can live the true culture.

Take things as they are coming. Not to be sad if anything is not the way I wanted it to be, because I believe it was ment to be like the way it is. In one minute I am home alone and longing for a company in a few minutes later a friend is coming over, and in some minutes later I am at the party with the other trainees…

Life is a challenge!

Set the expectations. If the expectations don’t match, re-set them 

You are not choosing the people you are working with. The point is to cooperate in a neat way even with the people, with whom you think is hard to cooperate.

BE YOURSELF

Get to know about the country you are going to as much info as possible, to try to prepare at least a bit. I felt I was not really prepared, even though it is not too different here.

2007-06-28T19:54:00.000+03:00

Internet at Brickfields, our flat, wireless... Soooooo coooool! Finally! Thanks Migz for fixing that! Let´s re-connect with home!

New Tattoo :)

2007-06-28T07:41:00.000+03:00

I had my new Henna Tattoo done. At one Indian stall with E-rings and other little thingies I saw that a lady offers also Henna tattoos. It is a fashionable stuff for Indian ladies, they usually have tattooed both whole hands – for different important occasions like weddings, engaging, or just for daily life to be in  So this one is my first souvenir here. The whole process of drawing took just about 10 minutes and the price was OK. The tattoo itself will last about 10 days.

The Food

2007-06-28T07:38:00.000+03:00

One of the best things here in Malaysia is probably the food. Before I came here, many people kept on telling me that they would love to come back just because of the lovely food.
My first impressions were already Hard Core :) First meal was in the Indian neighbourhood, typical Indian place and so was the dish - rice with some meat and sauce, served (typically) on a banana leaf, eating with hands (with the right one… funny is that after the meal is the whole hand very yellow from all the curry). And the food well matching drink is a lime juice with ice (limo-ice).
What I really like is, that they offer everywhere fresh juice from squeezed fruit like water melons, oranges... As the culture is here very diverse – having Malay people living in one country together with Indian and Chinese people - also the cuisine is very diverse. You can find easily everywhere various types of restaurants - many Indian ones, Malay, Chinese or Thai.

The dishes are on a whole quite cheap, so I eat out every lunch and dine outside very often with other trainees, too. Per dish it is about 2 Euros with a soft drink included.
Indian food is pertty much about curry, chicken, rice, flavoured rice with chicken, or noodles. And Indians are so far my favourte. They offer also some Indian bread, which is usually dipped in various sauces (mainly curry).
Malay food is more or less greezy, noodles... I have tried once so far. The less I like the Chinese cuisine so far, the dishes are rather oily and full of the soya sauce, very different from the Chinese ones that we have in Czech, back home. And of course eating with sticks, which is funny to use, but I alrady ate 3 times with them, and I managed :)
I also like the Thai meals, I have alrady tried Green curry, that was not that spicy, since here you can bet that the dish will be rather hot - anywhere! Thai use a lot of pinaple and sweet-sour combinations... hmm... do you feel hungry already? :)

There are also lot of chains like McDonalds, KFC and those kind of restaurants, but so far I have not had a single burger. Today we have been in kind of European restaurant, where we got also European cutlery-knife plus fork. In Malaysia you get everywhere just fork and spoon!

So.. that is about the food here. Sometimes I just remember the typical Czech food like “smazeny syr” or other tasty fattening dishes, but so far I feel I eat quite healthy here. We will see after the whole 8 months :)

Singapore

2007-06-26T13:35:00.000+03:00

Due to getting my visa/working permit I had to visit Singapore, a state and single island located on very South of the Peninsula, down from Malaysia. I set off on Friday after work, spent 5 hours in a bus, while talking to George, a retired Chinese man. From him I got to know many useful and interesting information, it was just nice to talk to some local person.
Nevertheless, I departed in Singapore, took a taxi and went to meet Reindhard, a DHL trainee in Singapore, who did his internship in KL before and he let me stay at his place for my whole say in Singapore. I have to admitt, that the place, where he lives was breathtaking. I felt like in a sea-side resort.
Saturday morning Reindhard joined me to make a grand-tour sight seeing in Singapore. The city center itself is not that huge, so we did not have to use the public transport that much.
We started with a view from DHL building (what a luxury place to work, man!) Cool view! Then we continued to see Little India, with all the small stalls, shops with all the little things, smelling after scent sticks burning... Definitelly it had its atmosphere. When talking about India, we couldn´t miss the temples – Hindu Temples. It was my first expereince with it, fist impressions – very colourfull, we had to take our shoes off, in the temple itself was hardly anybody, it was quite open-air, about 7 little rooms seperately built with locked doors, behind each is an Hindu God and at certain time the doors open and people pray to the particular God. Not enough temples? Allright, next station was just on the opposite street – a Chinese temple. With a typical chinese scent inside and Budha statues too. Interesting.

As a contrast in about an hour we could admire the opera in a shape of national fruit smelly ”durian”. We crossed over the Esplanade bridge and got into the City Center, having the sky line up our heads. Tall scy sky scrapers...
As another contrast to that we jumped in for a food to a typical Chinese place, I ordered something I did not really know what it is (which happenes here in about 70% cases), but it was not that bad, although I had a slight fight with eating with poles:) As a dessert we had kind of jelly, tasting after nothing thing.. The best was a drink though – a fres squeezed water melon!
Recharged with the food-energy we carried on to China Town. Singapore – one state – one city. But I felt like I spent one day in many different countries. China Town was very colourfull, all the small shops, markets down the streets. And again different atmosphere compared to a Little India or the City Center with high buildings.

In the evening, quite tired, we finished up on the Santosa Island, South from Singapore. We caught the sunset on palmy-beach :P and made some cheeky pics...
The probably best part of the day was yet to come, cause already it was night and we went to “Café del Mar”. This is kind of open air Café, originally established in Ibiza. DJ plays up the stage chill-out house music, there is a swimming pool, umbreallas and beds with pillows on the beach... We ordered a coctail and just layed down on a chill out bed, listening to the music, talking... What an atmosphere!
Beginning of Sunday I spent at the swimming pool, about 2 hours. I felt really relaxed, sunbathing... When I decide it is enough of sun (about 11am) I realized how big mistake I did not using the sun-cream... Red like a pig and a nice shape of sunglasses (purely white, compared to rest of the skin)... Funny, when everyone is now noticing hehe.
At midday we sett off to another island-trip, this time Pulau Ubin. An island, that belongs to Singapore, but is very different. Singapore itself is very modern, very well-planned, cause of the few land, the government is strict, you can not even buy and chew chewinggums!!! Littering is fined...
Pulau Ubin is not big, but kind of old-fashioned, people live in wodden houses, fishermen have their farm there and the rest of the island is a jungle!! Yes a jungle! You can actually rent a bike there in a port and explore the island yourself on a bike. That was an advanture! First we just went for a walk through kind of botanic garden, seeing all the trees like pappaya, coffee, durian, pepper,... Suddenly it started to rain – a serious downpour! So we hide under a tree and tried to not get soaking wet with only one umbrella. At Ubin island I tried for the fist time a cocoa nut and its fresh juice. Delicious.
The island was very nice – many animals like lizards, dogs, cats, spiders (about 15cm size!!!-I saw 3 of those) and flora is amazing – palm trees, bananas, pappayas...
The evening was compared to the afternoon program rather different – from the jungle we went again to the City Center, admire the sky scrapers with a can of beer :)
Very nice 2 days! I have to admitt that I had a really nice guide, thanks, Reindhard!

Monday was a way stressy. I had to get the visa, it was rather complicated and messy, the Malaysian ambassy moved, so I had to search for it without the map... But finally I got it, went shopping and then I took the bus. When I sat down in the bus, I immediatelly fall asleep.
Tomorrow starts next working day and I feel like having a week off for such a nice holidays. Singapore was great!

The Trainee life...

2007-06-20T14:41:00.000+03:00

Slightly feel the alcohol still hehe:) Read through, if you wanna really feel the usuall trainee life....

OK. Today. The second working day here. I will just keep you guys up to date, how I feel about the internship, the whole stay here... I have to admitt that there are ups and downs for sure. Today after work at about 5am I wrote down on the peace of paper: “Sometimes the things are not just the way you want them to be. OK. I will just put down my current thoughts while I am after my second day at work. I do hope I will have something interesting do do. So far Just watching around, getting to know the company. I am sceptical to any interesting project I will get. I hope I get one. We will see. Everyone keep on telling me, it is the first days – doing really nothing, so I trust them.
I feel pretty well, that the beginning is usually hard. Not knowing people, that already know each other for quite a long time usually, fist days in the company. Different culture. Not much things go the way I would like them to be. I am at the very beginning. Long way to go....“

I was quite frustrated from the work, I felt I haven´t got much into the trainees community so far. Not my best day today, though. While I went out of the office (after checking my emails for about 10 minutes while having about 40 emails in inbox) I got into the tube, it started to rain. But not normal rain. A tropical one! So I got off in my station „Bangsar“ and I had to go home. I went about 5 minutes ...soaking wet, jumped right in the shower.

If the day was not that nice, the evening was 100% better. It was a bye bye dinner of one Japanese trainee - Takuya, who stayed here about 1,5 years. We got together, about 15 trainees and some AIESEC ppl. We had a nice Indian food, I happened to meet many ppl, had a nice chat and I feel kind of connected now. Afterwards we went to the bar (5 guys and me hehe) had one beer. Imagine: In a bar, very comfy sofa, cool climate, wind, palm trees up my head, 5 guys around, bustling KL city, Malaysian beer Tiger (!!!!!! - not bad one). I did not feel bad;) Then we finished our quite expensive beer and went home by cab. We took another beer back home, some Bacardi Coke and had a chat. Tomorrow work.
I will go over the weekend to Singapore to pick up my visa. I am going there with Janne, the Finish guy and probably with Salah, the Belgium guy. He doesn´t know yet.

Hehe and again – another time meeting a cockroach, this time a bigger one (about 3cm). As I expected, I started to scraem and luckilly guys were around so I asked them to get it off my room. Dan from Enlands sprayed it, but did not help, so Migs from Kenya just killed it with a shoe! Hehe, I did really scream and jumped on the bed – scared! As expected:))))))

I will get back to you with more concrete reports about different stuff here, I have already made a list;)

Have fun,
miss you all, though...

P.

Kuala Lumpur - first impressions, first sight-seeing

2007-06-18T13:14:00.000+03:00

In the morning, my room-mate from Belgium Salah and me set off down-town. First we were window-shopping in a huuuge shopping mall. Quite nice one, modern and fashionable!! We happened to come across a Sunday market. There was mainly different exotic fruit, food, flowers... some sea-food on a piece of wood – a lady came, took it, boil it in a boiling water at the stall, put some spice on it an ate it.. and anothe one and another one! We stood, watched her.. a bit like culture shock:) Then we went to KLCC (center of the city) and while getting off the subway I looked high and saw the towers – Petronas towers. Hiiiiiiigh! I did like the view and the towers itself – magnificent! It is possible to go up, it is for free, but you have to queue early morning to get tickets. I have to see it once. We made some pictures and then we just chilled around in a nice park just in front of the towers. The kinds were jumping and swimming in a nearby swimming pool. While sitting on the grass, chilling out, watching on the Petronas towers, I realized finally that I am here – Malaysia, KL!!! Very peacefull place, although it is inside of the city center. We had a nice chat about Salah´s thesis, which he is writing here. About Islamic banking. Interesting. Suddenly it got dark and we had a dinner in a typical Indian restaurant – some rice, chicken, beef, drink...all just for 7 ringgit (1,5 EUR) It is very cheap to eat out!
The city itself is very very big and modern. My past thoughts about old dirty city were wrong. At least in the center. It is very clean, modern building, parks, a lot of green parks, flowers, trees...
The streets are very busy, the cars they don´t care about pedestrians, when they want to cross the street. They drive right, so sometimes it is a little bit confusing.
The weather... It is humid and warm. Today it did not rain like yesterday, it was also a little bit windy, but still I sweat the whole time, even now at night! The shower doesn´t help much. But I think I can get used to this climate pretty fast.

PS: more photos on my Flickr.com account www.flickr.com/photos/paja

Party

2007-06-18T13:04:00.000+03:00

In the evening there was a party thrown by Flic, Hannu and Kat – trainees that live quite not far from our appartment. It was a purple party, so everyone was wearing something purple. Funny and a good idea. I borrowed a tie from Nadim and then we had some nice face-painting:)
The party was really nice. Many new people, it was a bit hard to remember all the names, but on a whole I did try! Many trainees from different parts of the world: Australia, Germany, Colombia, Slovenia, Kenya, UK, ... I am in touch mainly with the people, who live in Brickfields (the part, where I live), but I hope to get to know more also other ppl. There were also some locals, AIESECers. I brought the BCHEROVKA liquer, typical Czech one, on a whole ppl did not like it cause it is so strong:))
People were dancing, drinking, sweating - cause of the heat – still!... We left at bout 4am, quite tired.

Arrival to Malaysia

2007-06-18T13:00:00.000+03:00

Soooooooo, I am here, sitting in my VERY tiny room (on a bed) and writing my first impressions post. I am happy, that my lap-top works, cause I forgot the lap-top battery at home and during flight I was worried, that it will not work. Both flights were quite tiiring. I really liked the look of the plane Boeing 777 – painted in blue sea:) 12 hours in a plane from Zurych to KL. In the morning 6am (Malaysian time, midnight Czech time) the plane lended in Malaysia... NEW BEGINNING HAS STARTED:)

Some observations/adventures so far:
When going from KL International Airport to KL Central station, where AIESECers were waiting for me, i was amazed by the flora – back home we have „normal“ forrests, here the forrest means palms, banana trees...:)) I even saw the sun-rise form the train, romantic;)!

Meeting AIESECers (ppl who picked me up and who organized all the stuff before comming here) was fun – first some girls came to me to see what´s my name and who I am waiting for, then they went back to some group, than came back again with a group of ppl of 6 and started to shout and dance an AIESEC rall call:)) fun!

My flat – it is much better than I was expected! No cockroaches so far, juchuu:)) Clean rooms, big kitchen, tiny bathroom (shower and an European toilet!) a big
living room and 3 different size rooms. Balcony view to a bannana/palm forrest and skyscraper:)) My flat mates are: a Kenyan guy Steve (who I haven´t met yet) and an Slovenian guy from Ljubljana (who I met already, but told me, that he wants to move - closer to his work).
In this case I would move to his room (which even has an aricon and furniture) my room is very tiny, as I already said. Just bed and fan, nothing else. And I bought cute yellow kids bed sheets for my bed;) Internet is not here, but Nadim (the Slovenian guy) told me that there will be one within a month! Yes! There is actually not much to do, while not working or hanging outside or reading... So the internet will be warmly welcomed.
I spent morning with AIESECers – Lavanya, Michelle, Gin, Rene showed me round a bit, we went shopping, then for a breakfast and then home sleeping.

Breakfast – huh, awsome! We went to the Indian place, ordered some specialities, we shared rice, noodles, kind of omelette and many sauces! Cool! A bit hot, but OK. The best thing was, that all was served on a separate banana tree leaf!! Welcome in a different culture:) We ate with a cuttlery, not hands;)

Weather – humid. It was a bit sunny in the morning, but the temprature was OK (29 degrees), when the sun came up, it was more hot. Everywhere is aircon – cars, shops, flats... If I did not have in my room a fan, I think I would melt! In evenings it usually rains. So it did today. Very heavy rain, that it was hardly possible to see the neighbour house(skyscraper;))!

In the evening there is a party, so I gonna meet the other trainees... Looking forward!

2007-06-14T09:58:00.000+03:00

READY TO GO...
Tomorrow early morning I am leaving my country, parents, friends for 8 months:) Let´s see how it will be... Stay tuned for my adventures;)