Money Saving Tip #1 - London Busses for Beginners

A normal bus journey in London is 1,50 £. If you pay with your Oyster Card it's 1 £, and if you use the bus off-peak which means after 9.30am, you pay 80p.
Since there are two World Cup matches today and it's Friday, I decided to take the bus today and have some pints tonite. So why not going after 9.30 am and save another 20p?
You can take the 134 bus from Muswell Hill directly to Central London (for 80p). So far, so good.
When you get into the bus, make sure that the display says: "134 Tottenham Court Road" and not "134 Muswell Hill Broadway". Otherwise the bus driver will ask you to leave at the next stop and you pay 80p for 200m and another 80p for the remaining journey. Grrrrrr.

The Missing Screw

Couple of weeks ago I started skating with LondonSkate. Every Wednesday skating two hours through London. Last time I lost the screw that is fixing my brake. As I wanted to skate today, I tried to fix the brake before. So I tried to find a skate shop. There is one next to Marble Arch tube station called the Club Blueroom.

For the first attempt I took the scooter and tried to get to Marble Arch. The thing in London is, you are never allowed to turn in the direction you need. If you need to turn left, you are only allowed to go right and so on. Really annoying. After 20 minutes I got lost and decided to go back which took me another 20 minutes,

So I decided to walk to Tottenham Court Road station and take the Central Line to Marble Arch. After 5 minutes I found the skate shop, but they couldn't help me. The suggested a hardware store around the corner, but it was already closed. I didn't want to spend more money on the tube and decided to walk back and looked for a shop in Oxford Street that sells screws. Nothing. No screws at all. Carrying my rollerblades around, no screws and all the people in Oxford Street... You probably know the feeling when you are already really annoyed and people in front of you change the direction three times in two seconds or just stop moving, I really hate that.
After all, I spent more than two hours for a bloody screw with no results. Eventually I just removed the whole brake and practiced to skate without brake.

Thunderbolts and Planes

On my flight back, the plane was struck by a thunderbolt. There was a big bang and I could clearly see the thunderbolt. It was a bit scary but I was relieved when the crew didn't panicked. A few minutes later the captain made an announcement that the instruments were still working and that planes are designed to cope with thunderbolts. Even a Ryan Air plane ;-)

World Cup Atmosphere in Germany

The atmosphere in Germany is just fantastic. So many people watching and celebrating football together. Everything and everybody is decorated with colours and flags. It's too bad that I am not in Germany for the World Cup, but at least I could watch the Ecuador and the Sweden game at home. I am really optimistic after these games :-)

The first thing I saw back in my city yesterday was an Italian car parade. Lucky Italians. I am pretty sure they are practising diving. Probably you know this video ;-)
You don't miss a goal when you are using the train during a World Cup match. A staff member will announce half time and final results of every game. Great service.

One Night at Stansted

I went back to Germany last week. My flight departed at 6am and so
I spent the whole night at Stansted Airport. There were a lot of people there, most of them sleeping next to their luggage. I could never sleep calmly at the airport. Must be a paradise for pickpockets.

I killed the time with drinking coffee, reading, wondering
around and watching football. People were playing 5-aside outside
at the parking area using two big columns each side as
goals. 2am in the morning - football everywhere these days!

The pressure in the cabin is changing during a flight. I realised
it, when I opened my bottle later again and spilled water over
me and my neighbour. Sorry about that.