Taken outside of the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam. It's eyre to think of the beauty that this photo has knowing that Anne would have hardly ever of seen the outside of her building. Free birds flying over the canals, over worn rooftops, over the tree partly shading the warm evening sun.  This intensifies the sadness you feel when you reach the boarded room where Anne and sister Margot Frank resided, exiled in her fathers office building. The three of us walked around the house, reading the innocence in Anne's quotes on the walls, watching and listening to projector screens of the people involved in the ordeal and watching people move in a lifeless sadness that such a darkness the rooms set on every one. The quote that hit me most said by a sullen faced Otto Frank (father) on the projectors, went along the lines of "A parent will never be able to know the real feelings of their child". This quote on the screen as mothers and fathers pushed their young children along through the rooms. It occurred to me then that even the people who know us best, are still clueless to how we feel.  You could hear nothing, maybe some faint sobbing or a child too young to be engaged running around in another room.  Their was a board game set up on a small table. She Wrote of the excitement she felt when she received the board game. The final room showed Anne's release forms to the concentration camp. The form reading 'Anne Frank; status: Deceased' 10 metres further on. People couldn't hold back the tears, or never wanted to. The tears came mostly from the jewish, reading these forms, one man barely able to hold himself up. I didn't tear. I watched the heart felt emotion of those most affected, the jewish older men and women apart of the war, deserve to cry over me. We are all humans though and I should have cried. I felt nothing but sadness and hate for the cowardice acts carried out by the nazis. If only someone had driven a bullet into that combover fuck when he was growing up, writing letters, playing in the open fields. Being a kid. Anne Frank dreamed of riding a bike on the streets outside. You really gain a perspective when you think of your dreams. A young girl and her family, sent to a camp, set to do hard labour. Anne and her sister worked in the fields until nightfall, where their hell continued in crowded bunks, where disease ran rampant. Anne and her sister were badly covered in sores from scabies. Their mother stopped eating to feed her weakened girls. She died of starvation. Margot fell off a bunk bed and died. A weakened Anne soon followed. Her death, only two weeks before the liberation of the camp by British troops.

Everyone deals with sadness differently, but we all should have cried in that room.

 Taken early in the trip. An Australian artist bombing the Berlin wall in broad daylight, with his girlfriend watching on from the grass. I'm unclear about the the laws regarding graffiti on the Berlin wall, but it seems that if you are any good then the monument is your canvas. This is taken on the eastern side where the art, music and hipster lifestyle thrives, due to it's student housings, low rent and abundance of underground nightspots. I intend on looking into some english speaking courses where I can live apart of this fantastic movement.

Taken in Monte Marte, Paris from the  Sacré Cœur cathedral. It is stunning, looking out over the city, you gain a perspective of it's size and vastness. Paris has it's pros and conss (It has it's rich history shown by amazing monuments around every corner, telling stories of an all conquering empire, whilst on the other hand it is over populated, expensive, unclean and has a poor reputation for manners and etiquette) but this land mark is beautiful despite anyones opinions.

Sevilla

Finch and I were drinking vodka, with our new found mixer Sunny Delight Florida (the most artificially coloured, sugar dosed drink I’ve ever tasted, which was researched on the grounds that kids began turning orange) when nature called and I had to go to my room to drain the dam. I was feeling a little oiled (finch is trying to steal that phrase) which had me thinking to slow down a little once I peed on the ensuite seat had a look around, and left. I entered the room to find our 14 bed dorm full (had previously been the 2 of us) of drunk dudes, some half clad and others drinking from straight bottles. I was shocked, I introduced myself to everyone and was getting along quite well, until the big fella came out of the showers. One of the biggest burliest blokes, wearing nothing but a towel (I suspect may have been a foot towel as it was only halfway down his leg) swinging a bottle of mean looking poison in his right hand. “Drink up little fella, this is a fine polish liquor” he shouted in a thick polish accent. What can you say to a man who was definitely Ivan Drago double in Rocky 4, other than a squeaky “yep”. Half a glass of this shit was down my throat before I could say Warsaw and to tell you the truth it made the throat feel a bit Warsaw. I coughed, spluttered and cursed to the big fella as he chuckled and a slapped me on the back (was an Ivan hit which nearly hurt more than the shot). I headed for the exit in the politest way possible, just to get away from this brute before he smashed me over the head with the bottle, to find Finch continuing on the 8 euro smirnoff. I was for the 4 euro wodka brand but Finch wouldn’t take. I met a couple European fellas downstairs. “Where do you come from mate” I asked one of the fellas. “Australia”. “You taking the piss mate?”. he laughed “Austria”. My apologies. haha what a mix up. They were pretty nice and the girl with them had legs. The pub crawl heads to three places, the first two are reasonably priced shot bars and the third being the somewhat prestigious looking outdoor bar called Alfonsos. The outdoor allure is one that is substantial as the mercury pushes 40 on a regular basis here. at the first bar we watched Real Madrid taking on the unconquerable Barcelona, while drinking a few of the complementary shots and cool euro cervezas. The cool part is important as some places will crack you a warm beer over here without remorse. We chatted on the street with Andrew R (psych student and amateur photographer), Libia (Wild Venezuelan girl, loves the 1.80 red) and the entity only known to Finch and myself as the Israeli wrecking ball. 

After shooting with Andy.

Ahh the ball. Finch and I came across this beast on the first night of the pub crawl, dancing up on some young, thin German girls, whom didn’t seem overly enthused to be danced on by such an imposing figure. Little did we know that he was staying at our hostel and we were going to have a lot to do with him over the next few days. he hung around with us from sun rise to sun fall, he was a pretty nice dude, but I began checking corners with a mirror to gain a break from the man. A few beers in the name ‘The Israeli wrecking ball’ came to me in a shot, like the cartoon light bulb hoovering over my head. The name came due to the sudden realisation that he was the most spherical man on the planet, a short dumpy man that you could measure the area of with the equation pieR squared. I mean I have never seen a more circular human in all my life, this guy was a medicine ball with eyes. The five of us began having a few beers on the street where the prices were better, when we brought it up with him that he was now to be known as the wrecking ball and that we wanted him to give us his best shot. Finch and I braced our selves on the narrow but crowded street, waiting to take the hit of our lives. He kicked his feet like a bull, lining us up with a mean glint in his eye before stopping, laughing and having a vigorous sip of his beer. I was relived to say the least. I mean it would have been like copping a direct hit from a Boeing 747. we partied on not mentioning it again in case the extra beers throughout the night gave him the confidence to carry out a wrecking ball like hit. When we got home (a little under the weather) we logged onto the hostel computers where we watched clips of the juggernaut from X-men running through buildings with his head down, picturing the damage our bodies would have received if he had of decided to get a head of steam up and barrel us. haha. Now whenever we see a sturdy wall or ancient city protecting fortress one of us says “You reckon he could get through it” to the reply “like butter”.

My favourite shot from that night.

I’m going to try and regain some structure again after the Wrecking ball tangent so I’m going lead us off from the second bar which was in the lovely Sevilla gardens. I mingled as Finch was staggering around by himself trying to convince me someone had spiked his beer. Fuck of you drunken fool. I conversed about health reform with some criminal psychologists and spoke about their work. They were really intelligent and well spoken with opinions that were what I call expert. Everyone's entitled to an opinion, but when I meet people like this I believe some do more so than others. They were so informative and interesting to speak with, but I was getting loose and needed someone who could talk some mindless guff. With finch pinging off his brain from his spiked carlsberg. I began talking and later pissing on tree with Ozan, the big, thin turkish cat, whom sported waist long dread locks and a calmly spoken demeanor. He liked pot. We headed onto Alfonso’s where we were questioned about our dress code once more as it’s shirt and pants. We had t-shirt and thongs, but knew we were untouchable, being on the pub crawl. We danced with Andy and Libia, before Libia pounced on me attacking my face with hers. She was kissing me like it was going out of fashion, which I didn’t like so I ducked off. She turned and attacked finch with the same force. Finch also was on the Lam for a bit to get away from this crazy South American. I danced a little longer after having a chat with Brisbane DJ chris, who was alright, before andy and I decided to make tracks. I emptied my pockets in search of a few euro to eat one of the primest burger stands in all the lands. I pulled out a lone 5 euross to hoe into one of these bad boys. I explained to the depressed unkempt worker that I wanted the lot and to build it to heaven. “To Heaven!!”. It was to heaven and it was the best burger my buds have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. “That’s how you make a burger” I babbled as I scoffed, looking at Andy who I thought might lock his jaw the way he was going about devouring his burger. We had no money for a taxi as we had been chowing down with our last remaining euross converted into burger form, so we started off in the direction of our hostel. We chatted about anything and everything. How we were good guys and someday we'll catch a break with a nice girl. We chatted about Libia. I had noticed her habits before hand and we both agreed she probably needed some help. Andrew and I had briefly met in Madrid 3 weeks prior so we knew each other quite well. He is an interesting bloke to talk with and we never experienced a lull in conversation for the entire time. He is like a yankee me but a little more advanced. (He is greater traveled and undertaking a Phd in transpersonal psychology). He loves coffee, loves traveling and his greatest love is photography. In my eyes he is a pro. We went shooting together the next night and he has a true eye for it. I was able to learn heaps from shooting with him and I think my photos have been a little sharper for it. An hour and a half later we were drinking juice from cartons and watching youtube videos as the clock ticked over 5 am. It was the night I met so many good people. Ozan, the wrecking ball, Libia, Andy, the Austrians, The Pol, The psychologists, Clara the sweed, DJ chris and a couple from Slovenia.

Thanks for reading.