Santa Monica - BW Series

I finally had the opportunity to visit my host family from Huntington Beach again!
One day we visited Santa Monica - you all know the famous end of the route 66 and the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company from the movie Forrest Gump.
The Santa Monica Pier is definitely the loudest place in LA. Everywhere musicians, artists, self-exposers and Donald Trump (Mhh okay, he could also belong to the third group). Most of them are pretty good (congrats to the nice saxophone man who was making everybody dance). And a special thanks to this cute baby seal - you were the true star of this day!

If you ask me if a trip to Santa Monica is worth it I would propably say no. The Pier is very small - 20 Minutes and you've seen all. The roller coasters are expensive and really boring (better visit Six Flags or Knotts Bery Farm - I love it). The offers in the little shops are ok - just things you don't need. What I liked the most was the Ferris wheel because you are over the sea and have a beautiful view over Santa Monica and Muscle Beach.

A Visit to North Cyprus

Travel to North Cyprus isn't easy. First you have to fly to Turkey and then on to Ercan Airport because it isn't an accepted republic except from Turkey. It belongs to Cyprus but in 1974 Turkish armed forces occupied a part of the Island.

North Cyprus has a very wild and unspoiled nature. On the one side you can see the impressive Beşparmak. On the other side there's the coast with the Mediterranean Sea. Our tourist guide described the island as "a beautiful extraordinary place get stucked in the 80s". There is no train infrastructure, no waste system. Lots of pretty places were very dirty unfortunately and I saw many street animals. It reminded me a lot of Egypt.

North Cyprus has very friendly people and an excellent food culture ( very very sweet!).
What I liked the most is that the people accept everyone. Most of the inhabitants are Sunnis but in every place there is a mosque and a church. The female inhabitants don't wear headscarves and long clothes. They kiss in public and woman are treated equal. In political issues North and South Cyprus are separated but in their hearts they belong together. The local people don't want a divide...like in Germany history. I saw greek restaurants next to Turkish coffee shops and the owners played cards together.

It is definitely a place to experience with its good and bad sides. If you want to discover culture except of beaches then it's definitely worth it.

A place we visited was Salamis, once the biggest and richest city of Cyprus. Today just a part is apparent - statures of emperors, thermal baths, an ancient theatre and a lot of columns.

Off into space!

Maybe I belong among the stars

Here are some very artsy pictures we did with a projector. We got the idea from bryant on Instagram. I am very happy about the result, it was a lot of work. My favorite picture is the game over one, I look very strong and confident what I don't really am.