Eight: done!

Okay, remember how I wrote, that I want to do something moderately crazy with my hair? Moderately enough to find a job? Don't expect any sort of Rhianna or Lady Gaga style, I just dyed part of my hair blue. Electric blue. And actually I have a job and new offers keep coming! Maybe this is what brings me luck, probably I should dye it all pink and blue.

It all took 24 PLN for a toner and 30 PLN for whitening my hair. It's my green-haired sister and I:

Task 14: Get a professional photo shoot done

Because who said it's all gonna be for higher purpose?

Wait, I think it was me.

Anyway. I won't be 24 again, and I imagine myself sitting in an old armchair, and looking at pictures from when I was 24 and still had my own teeth. When I was 8 I wanted to be a war correspondent, taking pics in the heat of battle, I never had those dreams of being a model or even a singer (I had a crush for Prince William though, I would be a perfect princess, Kate Middleton is a tough competition). So... with all the vanity I have, yes, I want to have a nice picture of myself taken. Does anybody know a good photographer?

A short manual about how to sell everything, hit the road and find love

Well, I'm not gonna tell you how to sell everything, hit the road and find love, but Luis will, if you start following his story. I found out about him from Leila (who is by the way my infinite source of cool stories). Luis is a sketcher, who started his awesome World Sketching Tour. He aims to travel the world and sketch what he sees, to set his foot on five continents within five years. 

You can't really see it, but this guy has a bounce in his step. 

I took him to Fotoplastikon and then (the weather was awful) we had hot chocolate in Wedel, where we sketched a bit together. Well, I was a big fan of this project, now I'm even bigger one. I'm inspired and excited about his journey. I got some really cool advices concerning drawing and shared my long-distance-relationship experiences (it's not as terrible as people say). Oh, and he sketched me! Yay!

That's me, cool, huh? 

I'm not gonna say anything more. Check this guy out, follow him and let him inspire you.

Here is his Facebook fanpage, and here you will find his website.

Good luck, boy, for you and your beautiful girlfriend!


What was the most inspiring person you ever met? Come on, share your experience!

What are your plans for today?

Look what I found:

See? I was serious about filters and stuff.

A sticker.

I thought it's cool and empowering, so I just sticked it on my laptop. But then I realized that it's not really that cool. It was a day like this when Marco Polo left for China, but no pressure, dude. This is one of those traps. Whatever you do, there will always be an Asian third-grader doing it gazillion times better. Or Marco Polo (who hit the road for the first time at the age of 17 and had nothing to say, because his father decided for him). 

There is no point in comparing yourself to others. Just do your job, make your mistakes, fall down, stand up and fall down again. There are you and your aim. If Hussein Bolt was checking where are other runners, he wouldn't be Hussein Bolt.

Thirteen: Come back to Japan

I have managed to spend 20 hours in Tokyo, while I was having a very complicated trip from Chiang Mai to Mexico City. The trip was a part of a pretty big adventure, a week before I changed my plans totally and decided to quit a year-long trip in Asia and go for the Unknown. In a strange country engulfed with a civil war, with a man I loved madly. Well, it's a long story. 

I managed to set my foot on a Japanese soil which was a unique experience. There are places in the world, which make you feel like in a different reality. I remember feeling like this on my first day in India. After I left my hotel, suddenly I felt like I am in the middle of 4D National Geography documentary. 

And Japan is just different.

It's silent and clean. And people are super nice. And I managed not to get lost. And everything was clean, did I mention this? It was so clean, that you could lick pavements. There are ladies wearing real kimonos, and there are real hand-pulled rickshaws. You go to a country, having all those stereotypes in your head, knowing that these are only stereotypes you shouldn't follow and yeah, surely all those tales about cows in India and kimonos in Japan... let's be serious, no one does it anymore. And suddenly, it turns out that they actually do it. Surprise.

A Lady wearing kimono! Just like this, going to a grocery store or I dunno, to buy a new katana or to rake her zen garden.

A hand-pulled rickshaw! And it's not even a Hokusai's print!

I felt so zen there. Super calm, no hurry. Probably because I was just high with a drug called love, but I bet Japan itself had something to do with it too. I want to see Hanami, and sleep in a house with a paper walls and go to Kyoto and just get lost in Tokyo like Bill Murray and Scarlett Johanson in Lost in Translation. 

Super-duper depth of field

Apparently I have some catching-up with my blog to do, right? I was wondering if I should write about it, but I don't think I can resist: I got a new camera and it's awesome. Which means that now all my dreams will be photographed with a super-duper brand new digital SLR camera. And an automatic mode, unless I learn how to use it properly. The day I brought it home, I took a picture of every single flower I found, all my fingers (and toes), books, and pretty much everything I found, including that awesome lamp I didn't even know is that awesome before:

Yay! That's me! Everything looks prettier with a depth of field, even me!

And all the pics have cool depth of field, so I should probably put some filter on them, add something about love in helvetica and start a fanpage "Ten Awesome Years Photography" on Facebook.

Twelve: Run a hostel

I did many jobs so far. I was an event manager. I was a kindergarten teacher. I was a marketing trainee. I was a human rights educator. But the best of my jobs so far was being a receptionist in a hostel. I loved it. I loved meeting people.

Like that guy, who stopped in Warsaw during his trip from Amsterdam to Beijing on a horizontal bike.

Or that Dutch girl, Wytske, who was researching on Polish Jews

Or Ale, a geeky Italian, who became my best friend

Or Raffaella, the cutest sweetest little babe ever.

Or the University Orchestra from Coimbra in Portugal

Or those elder ladies from Israel, who came back to Poland after 60 years in search of the country of their childhood.

Or Ayesh, Josh and Andrew, Australians who are just an example on how one can crash an album-release-party of one of the most popular Polish rappers and steal all Red Bulls from the frigde.

It was just fun. And my bosses were honest and carying for us. And I love taking care of other people.    And it helped me to get rid of my shyness. And Iąm still coming back there and hanging out with receptionists and guests and suddenly realizing that I just wanted to visit the hostel and for some reason it's 5 am and I'm coming back barefoot from a party.

That's why I want to run a hostel. I was wondering if it's not too big aim for the next 10 years, but... aim high, right? If it won't work, it won't. But if it will, it's gonna be legen - wait for it - dary. I'm totally able to make my hostel the best one in Europe. If you have spare 30 000 euros, now you totally know how to invest it.