No, I’m not dead, I’ve been traveling for the last weeks, three continents and five countries, now relaxing home in Coruña for Christmas, and trying to catch up with email, sorry if I didn’t answer yours, but it’s taking me a while (or maybe it went to the trash when I deleted the thousands of emails from different mailing lists and social networking sites).

But I have to answer some posts I’ve read in other blogs, post some pictures, and talk about many changes that happened lately. More to come soon.

Oh, and don’t trust Spanish news today, it’s Dia de los Inocentes (equivalent to April Fool’s Day). Yes we do it December 28th, with Latin America and the Philippines, and it’s the right day to do it! 😉

From Fussen (the town where Neuschwanstein castle is) I crossed the border to Austria to drive through the Tirol, and back to Germany to the town of Garmisch. It’s a nice drive through the alps, and the highlight is the Zugspitze, the highest mountain in Germany. The border between Germany and Austria goes throught the mountain and there used to be a border checkpoint at the summit. On the road you can see the usual speed limit sign as in any other European country, although in Germany there’s a difference, the limit in the motorway (freeway, highway,…) is suggested instead of mandatory.

In the Austrian side there’s a golf course at the botton that provides amazing views of the mountain.

Germany generic speed limit sign at the border

Austrian alps

Zugspitze

Zugspitze Panorama

Zugspitze Panorama from golf course

My first coup d’etat attempt, interesting. I got the news through friends’ twitter during lunch, then back to the office and business as usual, just following the news. It made me notice how exaggerated the newspapers are in other sides of the world.

The worst part is that the government declared curfew from 12 to 5am, breaking all my plans for tonight 😦 the bars close and back to the hotel. An interesting week after a close typhoon, and a 6.0 earthquake.

And tomorrow is holiday, Bonifacio‘s day, Philippine revolutionary leader against the Spanish. What some forgot to say is that he was killed by order of another revolutionary leader, Emilio Aguinaldo, the first president of the republic.

Continuing the series of my Eclipse Summit trip, after the conference finished in Ludwisburg with the usual drinking with the IONA and ObjectWeb/O2 folks in the biergartens (this is becoming a tradition) I drove to the near Stuttgart to drop Brett in the train station. Traffic was horrible, maybe due to the train strike everybody had to drive to work, but it took us forever. Besides that, driving in the autobahn is a pleasure when there’s no traffic, no speed limit, so I got up to 190 km/h with the crappy Volkswagen Touran that we got in the rental car agency, that got Brett a bit scared.

Stuttgart is home of Mercedes and Porsche. I went to the Porsche museum, but as it happened last year with the BMW museum in Munich it was a small place while they were making a big building explicitly dedicated to it. Still it’s always amazing to see a Porsche Carrera GT.

In the border between Germany and Switzerland it’s Konstanz, known for being in the Lake Constance, "der Bodensee" in German, and very well conserved as due to its proximity to Switzerland border it avoided being bombed by the allies forces. I rode for first time a ferry to cross the Lake in the car, going to the Neuschwanstein Castle, but that place deserves another entry 😉

Stuttgart Schlossplatz

Stuttgart Schlossplatz

Stuttgart Schlossplatz

Stuttgart Schlossplatz panorama

Konstanz

Konstanz lake

Two weeks have passed already since I arrived in Manila, one more to go. I think this has been the hottest November in my life, around 30 degrees everyday, 90%+ humidity, short sleeve all the time.

Food as always the great danger, trying to stay healthy is a bit of a problem with so much good food around. And of course we did Spanish food 6 or 7 times, yes it’s not the same as in Spain but it’s close enough, specially after months away.

The language is getting easier, Tagalog has no mystery for me now 😉 I know all the bad words and some of the good ones, so I’m pretty covered. The fact that most foreigners don’t even try makes them be very impressed with just few words. Philip and Brett are trying to catch up, but I think I still know better my way around.

Philip had the stupid idea of renting a car and driving around one day, really really stupid, no only the idea of driving in Manila but just thinking of him driving. So he was trying to switch lanes and couldn’t and a policeman pulls us over, "reckless" driving he said, 5000 pesos / 120USD and takes his driver license. After some arguing and pointing out the fact that we are not Americans, helped by the usage of some Tagalog words to make the cop laugh, it got reduced to 500 pesos bribe, that’s what I call the "puti" tax (puti = white), Philip drives like a old woman compared to the other people here.

It’s still amazing how much fun they have around here with foreigners, people staring at you and laughing, saying things in Tagalog, like "he’s white" and laughing thinking that you don’t understand, a boy saying "he has a pointy nose, he’s so white!", even I got a marriage proposal. Sometimes you feel like you are being stalked, but in general is pretty funny, you get a lot of stories to write in the blog.

And after the alerts for the Typhoon, nothing happened other than strong winds, until just now when we were hit by an earthquake, 6.0, that while being in the 27th floor makes it a bit scary, the building was swaying for a while.

Manila panorama from Ortigas business district

Frankfurt am Main is a financial center in Europe and has one of the busiest airports. It’s the home of the European Central Bank. It has an interesting mixture of old buildings and skyscrapers, that can be seen together, pointing that blending between old and new that you can’t find in many places.

R�mer square

Frankfurt skyline from Eiserner Steg

Frankfurt panorama from Eiserner Steg

R�mer square panorama

Frankfurt panorama from Eiserner Steg

These are some pictures from my trip to Ottawa for the Equinox Summit. First time in Canada and so far bad experiences with immigration, to get in and to get out! Remember to take with you *some* proof of what you are going to do there, or they are just going to be a pita. To get out, the US immigration decided to do some extra checks on me, due to my common name they said, although it was the same name as the previous 20 times I entered the US, sight. Luckily the plane waited for me and that was tight as I was flying Ottawa-New York-Los Angeles-Manila-Cebu, miss the first one and you miss 4 flights.

Anyway Ottawa was hotter than expected and I just had some time to take a quick walk around the Parliament area, very nice building. From the hill you can see the Ottawa river and the Rideau Canal that gets frozen in winter to form the world’s longest skating rink. Definitely the city must be more interesting in winter.

Canadian Parliament, Ottawa

Canadian Parliament, Ottawa

Panorama from Parliament Hill, Ottawa

Canadian Parliament, Ottawa

More images from my road trip from Charlotte, North Carolina to Charleston and Beaufort in South Carolina. Charleston is know for being a major touristic destination and the place where the first shots of the American Civil War were fired.

More pictures in my flickr account. 

Beaufort

Beaufort panorama

Beaufort

Beaufort panorama

Beaufort panorama

Beaufort

Beaufort

Hunting Island lighthouse