It has been two weeks since I got back from a nice holiday. For those who didn't know, I went down to Germany to see the globally on-the-spot event -- World Cup 2006. It was not an ordinary lying-on-a-beach holiday, but a really exciting, hot, fun, crowded one plus a little bit of stressful. I don't think I have never felt so stressful on a vacation before which is not a nice thing. However I did have lots of fun during the period and it was such a special holiday, so overall I would give it a B+ mark.
It was tough enough to get this vacation arranged. All the on-demand and highly priced accommodation, troublesome transportation to connect to all the cities, and not to mention I actually bought my ticket a year ago before knowing which teams were getting into the first round. Still remember I sat in front of my computer on the first day of sales and kept refreshing my screen with the F5 button to get the latest availability while betting on which national team to buy. At last I bought South Korea and fortunately it did get qualified.
Members of this trip included my sister Wah, her boyfriend Gary, Brian and me. Wah and Gary flew to Frankfurt from Hong Kong and we met them up there. Right when we arrived they already said we would have bad luck for that trip... touch wood. But they were right. I reserved a hostel for the first two nights in Frankfurt a few months ago. When Wah and Gary arrived the hostel said they were a few minutes late and they had given the room to the others! Damn it! In the reservation it did not mention the room have to be taken before 6pm! Well, arguing was no use, they did not have any room and there was nothing they could do. We ended up having a 2 persons room and have 2 (Me and Brian) slept on the floor. We managed to find another hotel room for the following night, of course it was expensive though. The 3rd day we were supposed to pick up a rental car from a big H brand and drive to Prague. I reserved a car a few weeks before the trip and highly mentioned it needed to be automatic and be able to go to Prague and a car was chosen based on these two requirements. The company was so kind to give us a free upgrade. Offered us a nice big expensive car for no additional charge! Hell knows... that bloody car could not be driven to Prague due to security reason! We waited 4 hours at the train station for them to drive the only available car which satisfied the two requirements from another city which were 2 hours away. I was so pissed. Who said big brand is more reliable!
Gary was the driver. Scary enough to begin with, he had got less than 2 years of driving age, always drove with a speed of 30km/h in Hong Kong with a small car, and he had never driven on the right side before! Since we were already late when we got the car, we used full speed to jump onto the car and to get going. Just to mention a few things here which caused me using all of my limbs grab whatever possible in the car in order to comfort myself a little: 1) He crossed lines without looking around to make sure no car is in the way, perhaps he did... partly 2) When he braked, he lost control of how deep to press down, several times we almost hit the car in front 3) When he turned, he was not sure which line to get into on the other side 4) When he tried to turn on the left right signal, he always wrongly turned on the front wind screen wippers but still continued to change line 5) He did not have enough concentration to handle a sudden traffic event. What would you do if you were me in such a situation? Normal people would just say "Go away and sit back, I am driving!". Well, my dad always warned us not to sit in a car like this. I don't have a license and I was already in the car, what could I do?! Keep yelling at him to drive slowly and paid extra attention on the road situation for him seemed to be the only two things I could do. At the end of the first journey, a 5.5 hours trip took us 9 hours to get there and it was already 2am when we arrived. At least we were safe though, thanks god. That was exactly what I thought when I got out of the car. The poor summer house owner waited me for a whole day, I felt so sorry about it.
The day after we decided to not taking the car which was a wise decision. After such a stressful day we got to relax a little and travel around the famous city Prague. The next day, Wah suggested to go to a church which located something like 80km away from the city. I was not really that interested in seeing just a church which were so far away, but since that was what she wanted, we just followed. We got up in the morning, Gary said he knew where the church approximately was and he got all the natvigation system set up in the car. So we started another day of "exciting" driving. We drove for one and a half hour, passed a couple of road blocks due to road work. Drove into some really really small village almost impossible to see anbody around. We thought it was because we took another road than the suggested one so it took longer. After more than 2 hours of driving we finally stopped by a wee motel and asked. Jesus... the place the church was located was absolutely the opposite direction of where we were!! To get to the real place we needed to drive another 2.5 hours... Then, Gary honestly told it was only a guess that he had picked the original position on the map... I could say nothing, yet I promised myself not to trust his direction again. They insisted to continue going to the church, when we finally got there, probably you could guess what happened, the church was close. What a joke! That was really one of the worst day in my life. On the way back from the church, Gary drove really quick even though I had warned him a few times. Probably he was tired of a day of driving so he lost some of his "attention", he leaned onto a middle bar in the highway with a high speed after he continously occupying the left lane for more than 20 minutes. Everybody was shocked of course and I was sitting right on that side. To be honest, I had no fear at that moment perhaps I was more or less prepared for a accident, so to say. The left side of the car was all scrached, the side lamp was broken, and there were some small dent. I felt kinda happy from inside though, because that was the only way to make him learned and it was lucky enough that nobody got injuried. The rest of the journey was still streeful, at least I can still sit at home to type my blog now.
Enough for the exciting part. Should write some of the fun parts. However I will leave it for the next post.
We spent a few days in Brian's home in Scotland with his family. Sara and her friend Marianma travelled all the way from Africa back home for xmas too. Nice to see them again, it has been a year since we met in the Gambia. Christmas in the West is always the same to me, very much like Chinese New Year, people meet up with friends and families and involve continuous eating events. 
To some people Christmas is celebrating the birth of Jesus, but to a lot of them it is just a once a year family reunion, the idea is entirely the same as Chinese New Year. 
I have not been home for a few Chinese New Years already, not been able to receive my eldest sister's red pockets (Only married people give them). I am really looking forward to Feb.
Same as usual as Elizabeth said, I had my birthday on Christmas Eve. Brian made me a nice sweet birthday cake. Prior to Christmas I received a few birthday presents. My sister said I was robbing people by visiting during Christmas time. Having being born on Christmas Eve was not my choice though, although I quite enjoy it.
this time is no different. Although I don't really think we are particular good at cooking, people seems to like it very much. As long as they enjoy our food we are happy to cook :).
