Many people ask me, Where Do I Find The Energy to Travel All The Time... and now, so do I!
OK - rolling two days into one Blog entry, as yesterday would have been just flights and airports (not most exciting I can tell you). This trip is my last flight-trip in a while (maybe three weeks or so) and BOY! am I finishing on a high. 18 hours of travel, flights and transit on Friday - and luckily dodging the Lufthansa strike in the morning. Birmingham - Munich, Munich - Vienna and Vienna - Tirana... those were my flights on Friday, leaving home at 7.30am - checking-in at the hotel in Tirana at 1.30am .. NICE!
The good thing about all these travels is that I am getting very familiar with European airports - I know the corners of the terminal where you can get free Wi-FI even when the 'official' allocation is up in Germany. Vienna airport offers free Wi-Fi for a 24 hours - but only certain parts of the terminal does it work fast. German airports offer OK food - there is a nice Asian place in Vienna... and so on... Look out for my 'Traveling through European Airports' guide book in the next year or two ;-)
Flights weren't the most comfortable on Friday, big rain clouds over the continental Europe so the planes were shaking nicely on the two last flights of the day. And .. people seem to know how/when I am on the road, just like yesterday I got a request to do some work for Saturday morning. Now, luckily I do know a bit about the internet at airports so I was able to download the things I needed.. and then stayed awake until 3am at the hotel editing things ready for them. Can't say too much about the project now - but if you follow me on Twitter or here on the Blog, there's something coming out in couple of weeks to make you... well, it's worth it!
Albania - first time here, and arriving on the last flight of the day to Tirana - NOT GOOD! The taxi drivers know this and tourists are easy pray for them. Almost got taken to an 'un-official' Taxi, but managed to sneak away from it.. still got fleeced by the driver (but got a receipt, so it's all Business Expenses :-)). And you know you are in trouble when the Taxi driver looks at the hotels name/address.. nods his head and as soon as he starts to drive he gives a call to a friend trying to figure out where the hotel is :-) Sitting at the back seat when the car is driving 160km/h on a 30km/h zone.. with the driver shouting to the phone and keeping one hand on the steering wheel.. it does wake you up a little.
Saturday got to explore Tirana a bit, 34 degree heat and sun beating down on you - made my walk a little shorter than I wanted it to be. But I learned few things.. if you need to buy sunglasses or watches.. the streets of Tirana are a good place to do so. Also - you can get yourself weighed at most street corners. And the cars.. they need to honk the horn if : A good looking girl is anywhere near the road, Someone is crossing the road, No-one is crossing the road.. or just because you feel like it. It was a constant blare of car horns during the walk..
Nice lunch then in Cafe/Bar Oslo - who did NOT serve Solo or Brown Cheese!! Little nap in the afternoon (see I am becoming a baller myself.. they all keep sleeping through the day!). Before hitting the gym with Team Finland in the evening as they were running off the effects of the flight at the arena ahead of the Albania game.
The gym in Tirana - it is different to most that I've seen. The lights made a nice noise when they were turned on once the team arrived to the gym, in typical fashion the opening of doors worked as air-con - at the parking lot behind the arena the local Driving School was holding lessons and kids were running around. It had a feel of innocence and familiarity to it - and not taking things too seriously. The same can be said about the two 'jokers' in the Finnish squad.. it didn't take much to ask Mikko Koivisto to give a short interview to Sasu Salin (Finnish readers can enjoy the duo's interview).
Other than that - typical training session after a traveling day, stretching, running through few key plays, shooting and bit of game time. Finland have traveled without Captain Hanno Mottola - who must the missing a brilliant trip to Albania. After the training the team headed back to their hotel to get some dinner and sleep, me... back to the hotel room where I can see myself in a huge mirror - which reminds me of the 'tele screens' from George Orwell's 1984.. maybe someone is watching me from behind this mirror?? (they might get bored rather quick).