Sardinia Gang in Sweden

From left to right me, Nicola, Pietro and Claudio in Sigtuna, an old little swedish town famous for a Viking museum and some runic stones.

HCLT team

Me and HCLT team at Punjabi restaurant.

Thanks for the great time guys!

Danshera festival

Danshera is one of the most important indian festival. During the festival three big paper puppets filled with crackers are burned. They represent Rouna and his brother and son.

This is the story. Rouna once kidnapped Rama's wife. Rama looked for his wife for 10 days (Danshera means 10th day) all over India. Finally he found her in Sri Lanka but Rouna refused to free her. Rama then killed Rouna, his brother and son.

Thus, burning the puppets is a sign of destroying evil spirits.

Delhi curious buildings

Lotus Temple

This is a Bahai temple, very modern and famous because of it's special shape of a lotus flower.










Monkey Temple

As you can see this temple is a huge monkey staute, the temple is actually inside the statue.

My portrait (thanks to Dawn)

Dawn, thanks for the wonderful pic! I love it!

Himachal (India's Himalaya)

Himachal, is a state north of India which includes the Himalaya's part that is in India's territory.

Shimla

Shimla is the capital of the Himachal state. It was built by the british and it was the summer's capital of India.

It is about 2400 meters hight and it has therefore a very nice weather compared to the hot temperatures in Delhi. This makes it a very popular resort for Delhi's people to go during summer vacation.




Manali

From Shimla a bus took me to Manali, a small town about 200 kms away from Nepal border.

Here you can see high mountains and very beautiful valleys and forests.

Many Tibetan refugees live here, so there are many buddist temples. The Dalhai Lama himself lives in this region (in the town of Dharmasala).

New Jaipur

Just few kms away from the old town there is the new Jaipur, the capital of Rajastan.

It was founded 300 years ago when the old Jaipur was abandoned by its inhabitants.

It is a busy 3 million people city, with heavy traffic and intense life.

It is also known as the Pink City because all the buildings are pink.



This is the palace of the Maraja. He and his family is actually still living here so it is possible to visit only some parts of the palace.

Inside the palace there's a museum with many paintings, weapons, furnitures, clothes and many other kind of items that were of common use in the past.


Don't have so many pictures here couse we actually spent most of the time in the car (damned traffic) and in this palace, inside which it is not possible to take pictures.

Old Jaipur

This is the Old Jaipur, the ancient capital of Rajastan.

It is about 300 Kms south of Delhi, less than 10 Kms from the new Jaipur the modern capital.

This city was abandoned 300 years ago mainly because of the lack of water.

Now it is still inhabited by 20 000 people and there is a very beautiful palance that once was the residence of the Maraja.





This is one a garden inside the palace.

There are different buildings inside and each building has a different function.

Part of the building is the actual residence of the maraja's family, other is dedicated to the public functions and were open to anybody.
There is also a temple.




This part of the palace was the actual residence of the Maraja.

It is the highest part, on the top.

It is built to be as comfortable as possible and it even had running water and some primitive cooling system.

From the windows it has a very nice view of a park and an artificial lakes where elephants usually take bath.




This is the courtyard where the maraja and its courts could talk to the people. The maraja himself could appear from the window of his palace while his ministers sat on this porch you see on the left.
The people were standing on the courtyard around it.

Red Fort (Delhi)

The Red Fort is the most famous momument in Delhi.
It was the residence of the Moghaul emperors and it was built by the same king that had built Taj Mahal.

The first picture is the entrance of the Fort. The door at the entrance takes you to a nice market where you can do some souvenir shopping.

I bought some paintings here, Moghaul's style paintings in rice paper... very nice ;-)









This is the second door (after the one above) to pass to enter the real palace.

This door is made using three different architectural styles: islamic, hindu and tamil.

When the king sat on his throne this door was the first thing it could see. This reminded him that every decision should be taken considering all the cultures that were part of his kingdome





This is the palace where the emperors used to live. You can even see the throne in the middle.

The merge of the 3 cultures of the empire is actually the main theme of the whole complex. You can notice, if you pay attention to details.










These are the buildings behind the palace. There's a mosque, a palace for guests and a palace for women (since the were muslims women had to live separately).

In the middle is the garden where there where shows with hundreds of dancers.

Taj Mahal (Agra)

Hi, finally a post from India! And of course the first could only be about the Taj Mahal!

Well I guess I you all have seen it on tv ;-)

The Taj Mahal was built in the 17th century by Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his wife.

It is situated in Agra, an very old city about 200 Kms south of Delhi.





Taj Mahal is situated in a bigger complex, surrounded by walls and accessible from 4 different gates.

In the complex there's also a Mosque and a palace for guests.

To visit the building you're requested to take off your shoes. Actually it is sad that the building was originally much more white and bright but because of pollution it has now lost part of its brightness.




So, this is the Mosque beside the Taj Mahal. The Mughals were indeed muslims and they were not originally from India but they came here from Persia.

Quartu's beaches

Stella di Mare
Stella di Mare (sea star) is a small village outside Quartu S.E. on the road that goes to Villasiumius.


Nothing special here honesly, but there a beach which is quite nice and it is just outside the city.






Is Mortorius
Keep following this road to the east direction and you'll soon meet a very nice place called Is Mortorius. Here there is a pine tree forest with a very nice beach. The water is so nice and clear that you can even see the stones in this picture...








Cala Regina

Another very nice bay, just few kilometers more to the east. The water here is very blue and clear, just wonderful. A very good place expecially when it's windy, this bay is protected from the strong winds that often blow in Sardinia.







This again is Cala Regina, just another perspective and with an autocton in the picture ;-)

Mari Pintau

This is one of the most famous beaches in south Sardinia. "Mari Pintau" mean "painted sea", this name comes from the fact that the colour of the water is so blue and clear that it seems painted.




In these pictures you cannot actually see how beautiful is this place. Actually it was windy so the colour is not at its best. But still, quite nice!



"Mari Pintau" is about 15 Kms east of Cagliari. To reach it just drive on the direction to Villasimius for about 20 minutes.

Uppsala

Hi!
these are my pictures from my weekend in Uppsala, visiting Lin. Actually I didn't find Uppsala a really special and interesting city. You can see anything worth seeing in just few hours....



Uppsala, one of the main street in downtown. Here is quite a nice and enjoyble area of the town, with many caffes, shops and lots of people on the streets.



This in an old city in a place called Gamla Uppsala (Old Uppsala) which is just outside the city. I guess in this site was the old city.


And this is an old-looking caffe in Gamla Uppsala...

Well that's it, see u next time!

Västerås

Hi! In this post I'll show you some pictures of Västerås, in Sweden.
It is not much to say about this small city east of Stockholm.
Anyway, I could make some nice picture of Sweden's winter.


Västerås, river and church

This is the main church in Västerås, the view is from a park behind the church.


Västerås the old town

This is the old part of the city. In the old red houses there are now many shops and artisan workshops.



The frozen Lake Mälaren

Well this picture is quite impressive. The Mälaren is a huge lake, some hundreds km wide from Stockholm to the inner part of Sweden. In winter is completely frozen as you see from the picture.

Japanese Castles

I will show some pictures of Japanese Castles, the ones of you that likes samurai and manga will surely will like these pictures!

First of all, there's something to say. Unfortunately most of Japanese castles have been destroyed either at the end of the samurai era or during the WWII. Let's start with one of the few original castle.

松本　Matsumoto



Matsumoto 's castle is one of the few original castle in Japan and it's of course a Japanese National Treasure. It's completely made of wood, in order to enter you have to take off your shoes. From the top of the castle you can see a very beautiful view of the city of Matsumoto and the Japanese Alps.


高島　Takashima


This castle is in Suwa and it's a small one but with a very nice garden. The original was destroyed at the end of the samurai era. But people in Suwa missed their landmark so they rebuild in the '60.


名古屋　Nagoya



This castle was rebuild after the WWII. It was the castle of the Tokugawa, the shogun dinasty that ruled Japan until the Meji era. As you can imagine is really big and impressive.



The two golden daulphins are the only part of the castle that was saved from the fire.

大阪　Osaka



Finally Osaka's castle also a very big one and again not original but rebuilt after WWWII.

From my appartment

Well, here are some pictures taken in my appartment... don't know if they're intereasting but some of you have asked for them... so here day are! Pictures aren't so good because I took them with my mobile phone (still waiting for my digital camera to arrive from Japan...)





This is me in my favourite sofa!


This is taken from my balcony, in a sunny saturday morning :-)



And this last one is the entrance room of the appartment. Well that's it for now! Satisfied? ;-)

Taiwan

Hi! this is a post about a trip to Taiwan in 2003. It was exactly the period when SARS reached the highest peak... in Taiwan the situation was becoming serious but... the tickets were paid already so we decided to go. So, here is a picture of me inside the airplane... wearing mask of course!



Unfortunately I don't have many pictures from this trip. But Taiwan is a really nice place. People are very open and friendly. We have been in Taipei and some places in the surrounding. If I'll find other pictures I'll update this post later on.

Well maybe I can describe you the typical Taiwanese Tea Cerimony.



The tea is in put in the white pot you see in the pic. There are two types of cups. One cylindric, very small and long, are only used to smell the tea. The other, a usual tea cup, is instead used for drinking. After the tea is prepared it first spilled in the cups. But you don't drink this tea. It is just used to warm the cups and to smell the tea. Then the tea is made again (with the same leafs) and put in the cups. Finally you can drink. The tea is very good in Taiwan. There are many mountains in the island. The best tea comes from the highest places.

When going back to Japan Taipei's airport (because of SARS) was a desert... I've been even stopped at the custom, you imagine why? The policemen were so bored and they wanted to talk to someone... we were 2 of the really few passengers those days.

Onbashira

The Onbashira festival, litterally the honorable pillar, is one of the most famous celebration in Japan. It is held every 7 years in Suwa, the city in Nagano Prefecture from which Kumiko is from and where I lived in 2003.

Every 7 years the main temples in the city exchanges the pillars they have in their gardens with new ones. These pillars are actually trunks of huge trees cut from the forests in the mountains surrounding the city.

There is lot of work to do and everything has to be done in the traditional way: cutting the trees, shaping the trunks, making the ropes, transporting the tree, everything is done by hand or using ancient tools. The aid of modern instruments is not allowed.



The trunks have to be transported from the mountains to the city for tens of kilometers. This is done by men pulling the ropes while other men are riding the tree. The way to the city is not an easy one. The trunks must be pulled down some incredibly steap slopes and thrown to a river. Floating to the river, the trunks are then transported to city. While these dangerous operations are done people continue riding the trunks!!! As you can imagine accidents can always happen...
It actually takes months before the trunks arrive to the city. So the celebration is done in different days during the year, following the trunks coming to the temples. I wasn't there myself but I've been told the most exciting (and dangerous) part is when the trunks are taken down from the mountains to the river. I've seen some pictures and it looks both crazy and amazing.



Once the trunks arrive in Suwa, they're taken off the river and transported to a street that takes to the temples. Several hundred thousand people arrivee to see the festival. As you can see from the picture the streets are incredibly busy and it takes two days for moving the trunks of few kilometers. In the meantime a large part of the city become a party place! People are just in a great mood. There are lot of stands where you can drink sake for free and families living in that area invite strangers for lunch (it happened to me too!).



And there are lots of events in the streets: parades, dancers and japanese drummers among the others.




This is the end of the celebration: the trunk has arrived to the temple and the people are trying to make it stand up. There are four temples and each temple has 4 pillars, i.e. 16 trunks. The city is diveded in 16 areas and to each area is responsible for one pillar. It is a great honour to be the boss of your area, but the biggest honour is to have the tallest pillar (of course each pillar has a different height and the biggest goes to the main temple). In the picture you can recognize one boss: he's on the top of the pillar wearing a white yukata.

Unfortunately this post is not enough to understand what is really Onbashira. But believe me in one the most amazing things I've seen. For the ones of you that can read japanese, you can check this link 御柱web.

Some party in Sweden...

This was probably the last party I had in Vårdgymnasiet...
It was October 2003 if I remember correctly.