Somewhere last year I discovered the website Dopplr, which is a webtool to track your travels.

This week they created an annual report for each traveller. Here  is an overview of my travels last year.

front, originally uploaded by gorik.

After 3 months of radio silence I guess the time is right to inform the world I’m still alive.
My Argentina story still needs a part 3, but in the mean time lots of other stuff has happened and some of those things I will even write about.

Since Argentina I have done some more traveling, to Marseille, Los Angeles and Paris (3 times).

I also bought a house, which I’m working in every weekend, hoping to move in before the end of the year.

Since a picture says more then a thousand words, here are some links to my pictures.

• LA
• Marseille
• House

From August 6 to August 26 I went on a trip to Argentina. This is part 2 of my report.

The day after the Froilan party we had to get up early to leave Santiago Del Estero and to travel to Cafayate. It was the first time we started to see the mountains and the beautiful landscape with big cactusses (or is it cacti?).

On the way we stopped at a museum, the Museo Pachamama. What we thought to be yet another boring museum full of old pots and pans and rocks and arrow heads turned out to be a place full of beautiful art, the buildings, statues and paintings were amazing. Of course today I left my camera in the bus (but luckily I can show one of Gunther’s photos).

After the museum we made another stop at Ruins of Quilmes, what used to be a fortified citadel but was destroyed by the Spanish. We climbed the hill and had a great view of the area, while remembering the hundreds of Quilmes that died when they were forced to walk all the way to Buenos Aires.

In the evening, after arriving in Cafayate, we went for dinner in a place where the food was not really great, the house wine sucked and the live band played shared the same quality as the wine.

Because we were too late the day before, the next day (Tuesday today) we started with a visit to the local winery, the Bodega Jose L. Mounier. Wine tasting before lunch time, it is something else for a change. Although Cafayate is supposed to be the capital of the white wine, I also liked the red and the rosé. The wine tasting did have it’s effect, it was a merry groeptje in the bus when we rode to our next location.

We drove through the impressive Quebrada de las Flechas to arrive in Cachi.

The next day we first visit the local museum and cemetery before we continue our trip to Salta.

The road to Salta is espectacular! We stopped near a mountain top at the Piedra Del Molino (3348 mt.) to take some pictures and were rendered speechless by the scenery. This was one of the most beautiful views I saw during my trip in Argentina.

In the evening we arrived in Salta where we would stay for 3 days in a few apartments. Although some of us were very tired we went out at night to celebrate the start of Gunther’s birthday that would begin at midnight. We ended up in a bar were a local band played covers of the Stones and the Doors and had a few cocktails to make the fun complete.
And then to bed because the next day we had to be at the Finca to go horse riding.

to be continued …

From August 6 to August 26 I went on a trip to Argentina with Joker travel agency.

View Larger Map

We traveled in a group of 11 very nice and beautiful people.

From right to left you see Tineke, Gunter, me, Jos, Kirsten, Virginie, Gerda, Ed, Annemie and Veerle. Nr. 11 is Puntu, who took the picture.

After some confusion about our flight at Brussels Airport, we managed to catch our flight to Rome and the connection flight to Buenos Aires without too much problems.

Our first day in Buenos Aires we did a tour of the city (or not, depending who is asking) and got our first Tango lesson. We ended the night with dinner and drinks in the Via Via.

The next day, Rolando and friend (whose name I forgot) came to tell us about the customs of the people in the North of the country and they learned us about the Chacarera and the Zamba, two popular dances in that region. In the evening we left to the station to catch the night bus to Santiago Del Estero.

After a long night of driving and trying to sleep in the bus, we arrived in Santiago Del Estero. First we visited some museum in the center and then we took taxi’s outside the town to the patio of Indio Froilan, a famous bombo maker. Froilan’s wife learned us some more Chacarera and then we were served a great Asaso meal, with all kinds of meat (goat, cow and who know’s what more). And Virginie got cake because it was her birthday. After this we left to a local festival for some more Chacarera dancing. And night we had an appointment at the theater. I saw a lot of people playing harp and after a few songs I realized this had to be a harp festival. It started out to be a bit boring but after a while some very good players played for us and at the end a crazy woman made the night to be a success after all.

The next day we had to go back to the Patio Del Indio Froilan, because it was Sunday and every Sunday there is a big party going on at the premises. We drank wine and danced all afternoon until after nightfall. And Virginie got a late birthday present from Froilan, a handmade mini bombo, which she will now will have to carry with her the rest of the trip.

To be continued …

IMG_2681, originally uploaded by gorik.

Yesterday I got my new car.
It’s a Mauretius blue Audi A3 1.9 e Tdi.
It’s a very smooth drive and fuel consumption is pretty low (because it is the e-version). Although I don’t have to pay the fuel, I still think it is important to have a fuel-efficient car in these times of global warming and high fuel prices.
Of course, my second car is a Range Rover, so I have to compensate a bit as well

Here are some more pictures.

P1000228, originally uploaded by gorik.

I spent the past two weeks again in Lillehammer, Norway.
This time I didn’t visit the fjords or make any other long trips in the weekend. Instead I stayed closer to Lillehammer and went bob-sleighing and hiking.
Here are all the photo’s.

Now that I’m back home in my tiny appartment in this crappy town called Tienen I was looking around to maybe buying a house, closer to home (haha), I mean closer to the town where I grew up and a lot of my friends still live.

So I started looking online at immo sites until I found something that I could affort without spending all my monthly pay on paying of a loan. Trying to make an appointment to visit the house I call the real estate agent who apparently was located in Borgworm (which afterwards I realised is the Dutch name for Waremme, a town in the french part of Belgium). When I call the number I get a french speaking women on the phone who confirms that she doesn’t speak dutch (like most of the walloons) so I try my best french (which is still pretty bad) and she tells me I have to come to her office, which I found a bit strange but I assume we would drive from there to the house.

When the day of the appointment came I drove about 30 minutes all the way to the real estate agent in Waremme excited to finally see the house. So the lady asks me all kinds of questions about my income etc. (still all in French) and then says ‘Ok, now we have to schedule an appointment to visit the house’. A bit pissed off because I just wasted a few hours on a day off just to help this lady fill up her database I make an appointment for wednesday evening 19:00 (because 20:00 was too late!).

Next day the lady calls me to tell me the date didn’t work out for the owner so she proposed scheduling a new appointment the wednesday after. So I was forced to wait another week before I could see the house.

So last wednesday I finally saw the house, luckily the owner was bilingual so I could understand all the details about the house. May I remind you that the house is located in Flanders in a town where 99.9 % of the people speaks Dutch.

The house was actually pretty nice, but with still a lot of work to do and the asking price was somewhat above the market value (since the market is declining) and also it was already for sale for a long time (I heard from my friends who live nearby). Still, I was/am interested so the next day I picked up the phone to make an offer, but at the real estate agent nobody picked up, although the voicemail nicely stated all the official opening hours and guess what, I was calling in these hours. I also noticed a website mentioned on the booklet I received the day before, so I surfed to the site to see if I hadn’t misunderstood the hours (I’m terrible with numbers in French) but there were no opening hours mentioned on the website. However, the site did state in big letters ‘We speak Dutch and English’. Yeah right!

Later that day I was able to reach someone at the office but she said the person responsible was not in and that she would call me back the next morning. Today, after waiting all morning I called back myself and finally got the lady on the phone. I state that I want to make an offer on the house and mention the amount which was a little bit lower than the asking price but still a fair price.

The answer from the real estate agent was: ‘But the owner wants this amount ! You should make an offer that is above that amount.’ I try to explain her about house value and the reality of the market and she finally stops nagging about my offer and then tells me I have to come over to sign a paper for this offer at her office. I try to debate the absurdity of signing for an offer without even getting feedback from the owner first, but she insists so we finally agree that I will come over on monday. Luckily I planned to be home a few mondays in a row to recover some holiday from last year.

But all this makes me wonder how long this lady has been in the real estate business. Fist of all, if it is not an open sale (or whatever they call this in English), your asking price should always be higher than what you expect to get in the end. Ever heard of some who enters a store, asks the price for a tv and then gives a bit more because it’s a nice tv?

Secondly, if I make an offer, it is the start of a negotiation. Typically when someone asks 20 apples and you only want to pay 15 apples, you will bid 10 apples to agree in 15. Or with a house you could agree to raise the offer if the owner fixes some things before moving out. But when you start asking for meetings and signatures for every stage in the negotiation process, people tend to get bored of all the hassle and start looking for something else without raising the initial bid.

So I will go to sign my offer but have also started looking at other house because although I like this one and probably would have increased my first bid, I don’t like all this hassle at all.

Here’s an update for all my stalkers out there that are too lazy to follow any of my other internet excretes.

I got home in lovely Flanders a few weeks ago and was treated by the lovely weather this region knows so well: pissing rain and ice cold winds.

Last weekend the weather was much better, just it time for our yearly visit to the part we would love to annex, the Belgian Ardennes.

My original plans to go back to Alabama from the end of May till the end of June have been changed. Instead, I will go to Norway for 2 weeks beginning of June.

No real plans yet for the rest of the semester, besides visiting Argentina in August (but technically that is next semester) and going to weddings, visiting festivals, cleaning up my apartment and showing up at work from time to time.

Tonight I stopped by my favorite American supermarket Target to buy some Cheerios and other low calorie food when I saw a bottle of Blackstone Merlot I couldn’t resist.

At the counter the lady behind it asked me for my ID (do I still look younger than 21?). By seeing my Belgian passport she asked:

- “Are you from Belgium?”

- “Yes, I am”

- “Aren’t you the people who make the waffles?”

Building a Peaceful and Better World Through Sport and the Olympic Ideal

Today the Olympic torch was walked to London.