svizzera , italy , germania , spain

well well . i know its been .,,,,,,,,,,,,mmm along time i have to admit . but i can explain really . I apologize for this long post but its full of adventures I hope .

lets see in February i got my visa to go to switzerland ( svizzerra ) , i got it and that same night i booked my flight , next day packed and then off i go . :D amazing , traveling was never that simple for me .

Svizzera a Lugano . ( switzerland in Lugano )
lets begin with the culture shocks :

well switzerland has 3 official languages : italian , german and french . and has 3 parts accordingly ( the german , the french , and the italian part ) .
i was in the italian one , the county ( elmokata3a ) was called Ticino and its capital was Lugano (where i lived specifically ) .

first culture shock : Italian issue , so the second i arrive i had no way of communication whatsoever except my poor french which was soooooo rusty . so i arrive , should find the place am supposed to stay in and well i had my British phone working successfully so saved the taxi talked with the landloard on the phone and voila i arrive .

second culture shock , i couldn't shop for food coz i couldnt understand what is it ( was in italian,german ,french ) , and the food is very expensive there , more than UK aloottttt .

third : going the university : I HAD TO CLIMB A HILL EVERYDAY TO THE UNI . for someone who hates excersize (me ) that was an extreme , from driving a car for years and then i managed walking fine in Edinburgh , but i was shocked by the fact that now i had to climb a hill , soooooo exhausting , and ps : no elevator at school ( at least not for students ) so 3 more floors to climb .
i lost 4 KG in these 6 months . :)

i arrived to lecio "gallileio gallelei " my home at dinner time my sweet flatmates are there cooking , you can imagine dinner times with almost 10 ppl in the kitchen cooking :D:D wonderful and busy with lots of countries and dishes .

as spanish people i lived with : ester (and she was in the same school too SUPSI, i loved her , first day to school with her sitting in the bus and talking,lovelyyyyy , thank you sweetheart ) , natalia , sweet and it took us sometime to know each other communication problems heheh,marc ( who hated me when i called him marcos ) :) ,
as Portuguese : daniel ( can’t even explain what he meant to me ,my stay there and life ) , bruna ( beautiful, lovely party girl ) ,
germans there was robert ( funny , really nice guy , with alot of spirit , driving us crazy with the football matches he and marc watched ) ,venchenzo ( well i discovered he is a vegetarian after he left :D , mostly quiet and peaceful guy ),
an italian georgio ( was working and living is switzerland , he made me cook the worst koskos i ever imagined )
and finally 2 chinees :Wo and Jacky ( who had a problem with trusting ppl and finally she did and was so nice ) . fabrizio was my Swiss landlord , i have to say he was like my second father there taking care and watching over us even when we went skying and i was on the floor he was there to save me . hehehe .

and these were my "gallileio gallelei " family . :D i know i am spelling it wrong but bahhhh , i lost hope to say it correctly .

now work wise :

its a factual information that the swiss architectural life is not easy at all , its horrible , work work work like you have been born to work and nothing else . life doesnt not exist . from the first week till the week i left i have been working day and night , and all can testify for this fact .
my class mates there were jenni , an amazing funny finish girl and always optimistic ,love her spirit , conni ( german ) , well we started not so well but we ended up as really good friends , she loves cooking and i wish to visit her restaurant some day , there when i always believe never rush to judge ppl , lars the architect , well thanks to him i learned to make architectural models , we had our disagreements alot but finally i won 2 arguments with him yesssssssssss i did it :D , officially totally german argumental attitude hehehe . Finally sule and gokchen (turkish ) , really fun party lovers crazy yet cool , hehehe .

basically the days and nights at the uni were like this : working with jenni and conni enjoying the Swedish radio with songs we hear over and over again like : day and night , a memorable song .really wonderful company and it made the hard time pass smoothly and nicely . love you girls

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Switzerland is an amazing country to enjoy , wonderful nature and beautiful weather , so fascinating lakes. but i cannot imagine myself living there honestly . bad paper work service , language issues ( ps : i learned a bit of italian :D) , not an easy life generally .

down the hill from my university there was an Egyptian shop ( aladino articolo ) , it was always closed but one day i passed and i saw ppl outside guess what !!!! talking arabic , no not just arabic , its Egyptian yeayyyyyy .
well mohsen pasha he offered me leb asmar :D and he was there with his brother and gabry pasha . see i have never met Egyptians outside of Egypt that funny ,caring,loving and welcoming , they were amazing . every time i went down from school and was feeling bad , i knew that this is the place that will make me cheerful and happy again , and of course gabry with his shay el3arosa ( an egyptian typical brand of tea he got from home ).
step by step i met the rest of the group , this is where gom3a ( mohamed ) he had his bar there and always cutting his fingers and we rushing him to hospitals :D:D , ra2oof , the technician guy and the DJ guy with long hair ( cant recall their names sorry ) .

mohsen, gabry and gom3a , they always cared about me as if i was a lost kid and always helped me no matter what . i guess they saw me as an Egyptian girl alone there , they felt responsible to keep an eye on me . if i seek advice , help , support , i knew that i had family to depend on .some took me around visiting places and experiencing different environment where we usually say (mamy da3yaly ) thank you mam . and thank you guys alot . i wish you were all here in Scotland instead . :(

lets see my day in switzerland usually : going to uni working all day , back home for a nap , dani waking me up to have dinner , we have dinner ( sometimes he cooked for me , thank you alot, mostly food with fish in it like bacalhau fish he had from portugal ) i guess mam sent him in her behalf to feed me fish . sometimes i cooked to him too egyptian food . then we go up my room for sweets and chocolate , then if i have work i continue to work all night , if i have some time we watch a movie.

weekends . lets say that dani and bruna always had a plan and a party to go to , of course pushing me to go too . when i had less work i go . crazy ppl love them .


skiing in switzerland :

the country of the Albs , how could i not go skiing . it was easy when we rented the cars and drove up the mountains but when it starts being on the snow with your ski shoes and slags ,,,,,,mama mia , its hard , its painful , took me 2-3 weeks for the bruises to heal BUT its terribly fun . :D

the problem is in standing up when you fall and also in stopping when you ski. well i could never stop so i crushed into ppl alot and into other stuff :D , you dont want to even imagine .
getting up : my first attempt to get up took me 15 mins to just get up from the floor , and when i did natalia came down the slope , we crashed and she ended up buried under me in the snow hahahaha.

natalia noooooooooo , nada noooooooooo , boooommmmmmmmm............................
we were the joke for every adult and child there , i assume we were being on video , i wonder if its not on youtupe yet.

traveling around switzerland :

well part of our study course is to travel to : geneva , basel , bern and zurich . here comes more architectural visits and more fun than barcelona really .

attending the basel fair in Basel ofcourse ( german part ) ,and clubbing in "bar rouge " on top of the tallest building in switzerland , ps : all the club had glass glazing all around it , i.e you see all the city from up there, also the toilets , you get in and you take off your clothes in front of all basel ( no wall just glass ) :D amazing ha .

seeing the lake of geneva ( in the french part ) with the fountain that resembles the one in Jeddah ( Saudi Arabia ) yet this one you can actually walk under and be splashed with its water .

Bern ( german part ) which is the official capital of switzerland also with its historical medieval buildings and cosy atmosphere makes it a really beautiful city , thats the only city i felt i can actually live in . oh and we visited Einstein house hoping to be geniuses as he was . :D

Zurich ( german part ) which basically is like a maze , you know you are always lost and its too much to handle because its considered a second capital so everything is there .but the best swiss chocolate is from there : a shop called Sprungli , i totally recommend to visit , wonderfully ymmy .

:D

more cities i had been to like Laussane ( in the french part ) when my brother came with becky ,iccza and george in easter holiday . and we also visited another city beside lassane and went on the funicular up the mountain .

visiting also bellinzona i guess thats the name of the city with mohsen and gom3a , nice view and great ice cream and coffe ..












Spain here i come .

after that i head to spain as a school trip , Barcelona . a wonderful city and astonishing architecture . specifically Gaudi with his mind blowing designs .
i am not sure what else to say about this trip , the only problem is that we had a very busy schedule with visits from sagra defamillia to alot more architectural buildings . walking from 8 am till 10 pm continually .
the food is really nice , different tapas and the sea food dish with rice .

Italy , yeayyyyy .

since i lived in the italian part of switzerland then this meant that it took us only one hour to be in milan . sometimes we went clubbing in milan and back , lugano wasnt the perfect place for a night life really .

one weekend me and dani (my dear friend and travel buddy :D ) rented a car and headed to bolognia for a day then to Florence (firenzia ) for another day , was really inspiring . especially Florence , its full of statues with stunning details you never see anymore ....was a unique weekend would never forget .

another weekend we head to Genova with the dani , bruna and the erasmus girls ( elisa and evelin, amazingly crazy and unforgettable girls ).
the best thing about Genova is that its on the Mediterranean sea , so i finally saw the see after along long time , this is the second i realized how much i do miss Alexandria with the smell of the beach and all the crazy times i had there .
standing there staring at the sea and imagining that your city and friends and everything you left behind is just in front of you, indescribable feeling .

heading to milan with my classmates ( as work ) for the "Milan fair" where all the designers come from around the world to exhibit their work and new talents try to exist . the amazing thing is that the whole city transfers into galleries and showrooms , normal furniture shops are showing off their work and every where you look there is art or furniture or visitors yet all of these.

an adventure in Milan:
i was planning to go to Romania and i headed to take the plane from italy , well problems happened and i didn't travel and had to go back to Lugano . another problem here is : by the time i arrived to Milan to take the train to Lugano it was 11 pm and there were no more trains .
so i am stuck in Milan 11pm , with no place to stay and cant go home , oh and in addition to all that 2 arabic guys flirt with me in the station , so i start replying in an angry voice in Egyptian , hahaha , scared the hell out of them .
at such a situation you just dont know what is going on wrong with the world or with you and your bad luck all has combined in this night = night mare . finally i figured there was a tourist help desk which was miraculously open , no idea why . i ask them for a hostel address to stay in and they call book me one give the address . hehehe . the adventure doesnt end here , see i have never been in milan alone before and i had no clue about any streets yet or where i was at all , i always depended on dani . so i go out of the train station and trying to figure out where is the bus station and which direction i should go asking ppl not so easy ( ITALIAN ONLY ) :( , luckily at the end i ask a women on the bus station , she understands and she also speaks english . gooodddddddddd... she calls the hostel and asks about its place takes me to the hostel and then leaves . again thank you mammy i knew you were there with me . :D .

as hostels you only rent a bed in a room , this means you share the room with other people you dont know , you just mind your own business and thats it . so here i wake up and one more shock waits for me : the Brazilian girl sharing the room with me ( i dont even know when did she come in, the night before) , she is in bed and mmmmmmmm well with a guy . i guess that's enough . :D .
well she ended up to be nice at the end and i had breakfast with her and she helped me find my bus back to the train station , and then she leaves with her guy for coffee hehehe . and i head back to lugano , sad and disappointing that i didn't go to see little sis but ended up with a new adventure .

everything happens for a reason . i end up in lugano with a guy proposing . :D . my shortest relation ever : lasted only 3 days .



Germany ............

well the only place i went to in germany was just across the boarders from Basel to the vitra museum where the first building of zaha hadid has been established , scary building .
well it was nice really with all its miniature furniture , and the building of a Japanese architect which had soft concrete , wonderfully smooth and soft ..
we ate cranberries ( toot ) from the trees directly ( it was part of the Japanees architect concept to have his building in nature with cranberries trees surrounding it ) .

finally we had only one problem , to go back to switzerland by the bus we need to pay , well in switzerland we used swiss Frank and we didnt notice that we r in germany and we need euros .... hehehe . also the other buss driver said its ok to pay in frank , clearly of course it wasn't ok , so well we were stuck , but thanks to connie and her skills she convinced the bus driver to take us back for free . :D

Finalmente :

here my journey finishes and the wisdom part should come : its always different when you travel as a tourist or as a study or work . you start noticing things you would have never seen as a tourist , you look at everything with a different perspective , more professional , even working with different nationalities you really know people better not just as enjoyable time but in hard times and stressful moments , you find some who come out of nowhere and show you that you can do it and you are not alone at all .

sharing is caring , loving people isn’t hard but departing them is devastating .

People are the ones who make a place , an event , a stay and life a good one or a dreadful one . if you have great people around you they lift you up and show you the wonders , if bad people they just drag you down to the dark hole where the light doesn’t exist .

I was really blessed but having amazing people around me in Switzerland and this is what made my experience a great one, one I know it will be hard to have again . you can’t choose the people you meet ,work or live with but you can choose if you enjoy their company or not.

You can have a blast time discovering or just indulge in your pain and sorrow . my Swiss experience was all about discovery , adventure , taking risks , finding problems and be happy to solve them on my own or with friends ,meeting different mentalities and looking deep into them .

thanks for your patience , if you did actually read it all , J

thanks for everyone I met there and I am hoping and planning to keep the friendships I gained and the people I loved there , if you love back as much , then you will have the same hope /plan for me .