Outlandish

Arriving to the Budapest bus station for the first time can be a bit confusing. The bus from Bratislava leaves you outside the station area and there are no signs to anything, ATM, taxis, anything. I remember the desperation, the following of random people to an underground tunnel, of trying to locate someone, ANYONE with even little English. Nowadays I'm a professional bus station goer there but I noticed a woman of about 50 years of age asking different people something. She didn't seem to be getting anywhere so I went to ask if maybe she was looking for an ATM, which there is located to a place that cannot be found except by those who already know where it is (note the clever Pirates of the Caribbean reference). So, I took her to the ATM and then back up to where the taxi stop was and I called her a taxi. She wasn't very impressed with Hungarian people for starters but at least I could sleep in peace knowing that she at least found her hotel. I was very much blessed by ...

Such a coincidence! All former customer care employees supporting Finland from last year somehow managed to book the exact same week to come and see their friends in Bratislava. None of them knew about the others planning to come here. Maybe there was a super-offer on flights to Vienna this week or something but it's just so funny but brilliant. We had our old crew here all together once again!  Anni arrived already on Tuesday to stay for a week. So obviously that week I had to work overtime. Every day. Thankfully she had a lot of catch-upping to do with everybody so she had company while I booked my ass off (...no, not like that). On Tuesday I didn't even have time for lunch so when Anni suggested that we go from the office straight to one of her favourite restaurants here I was totally in. Food has never tasted so good.  It was sooo nice to have Anni here! It's so different to accommodate someone who has already lived here, you don't have to stress about ...

  First screw-up at work last week. Nothing major, but with my work experience and education background I am not so lenient with allowing mistakes to myself. But everybody screws up and I don't know any better way to learn than through mistakes. Friday I was able to leave work a little early to spend the weekend with my parents. I'm not so good with planning anything because I've learned that the more you plan, the less things go according to plan. So, since my parents had apparently brought the Finnish summer with them I had to go home after work to change instead of going to see the castle.   We did get to the castle eventually though. Bratislava is a really nice city in a way that everything is within a walking distance. So, we took the tram from my apartment to the city centre and arrived at the gates of the old town. The old town is (according to my parents) very similar to the one in Stockholm for example. Loads of restaurants, bars, tourist boutiqu...