Mdina/Rabat Area

Okay, let's continue with the Malta trip photos, shall we? Before I started, though, I'd like to say that because there were four of us, we decided to use the Airport Transfer facility to get to our hotel. After we arrived, we found the Airport Transfer desk easily, so we booked the two-way transfers right away. Then we were told to wait outside (there was another Airport Transfer desk near the waiting area outside). Unfortunately, we had to wait for over 30 minutes (after 30 minutes, I came back to the desk to complain and even then we still had to wait some more) as apparently there weren't anybody else (yet) leaving to the same direction. The other four or five groups (who stayed in a different area) could leave the airport within 15 minutes already. Thankfully it was already over 8 pm, so it wasn't scorching hot to wait outside, but we were worried that MIL would've been way too tired already. 

R2 and I both agree that the airport transfer in Malta wasn't as effective as the one we used in Budapest. However, at least we didn't have to wait too long for our car back to the airport (only 10 minutes after the appointed time). Oh yeah, we paid €10 per person for the two-way airport transfer. 

Okay, now on to the photos. One day we decided to go to Mdina/Rabat area. We actually decided to go there the day before, BUT turned out the bus going there only left every hour. Although there were three different bus who go to that direction at different times (every hour for each of them), but still when we missed the first bus, we had to wait for a long time. That's why we decided to go elsewhere that day and we made sure we were in time to catch the first bus to Mdina the next day. We were a bit worried that there would be no seats left as the journey would take around 70 minutes. Luckily for us, though, there were plenty of seats. Phew!

Actually, even for shorter distances, a lot of bus drivers in Malta were a bit crazy whenever they hit the brake to stop their buses and it was tough for MIL who has bad legs. One time the bus was totally full, so we had to stand up. A woman with her son were sitting on the front seats and she immediately got up to give MIL her seat and she had to stand up for the rest of the journey (30 minutes). Very thankful for passengers like her! 

When it was time for us to leave Mdina, we were SO lucky that when we got to the bus stop, 20 seconds later a bus arrived and again we found seats. :-D After all, it was such a hot day and we were tired already. Since we didn't buy any bus card, we had to pay €2 bus fare per person for each trip.

Here are some photos taken in Mdina/Rabat area. We went to a church, a museum, and a catacomb (which was rather tricky to find) since we bought the Combo Ticket.

The lovely church floor tile.

The next few photos were taken from the museum. 

The giant squid and my hand. OK, OK, to be fair, my hand is more like a kiddo's hand in size (probably a 10-year-old kid LOL), but the squid is close to 1 metre long.

The photo below was taken in St. Paul's Catacomb. In some places it was so dark that R2 had to use his mobile's light to guide the way. The steps in some parts were rather tricky/slippery as well, so we had to be careful. It was a fascinating place, though.

 One of the many colourful windows/doors in Malta.

Last photo: a funny toilet notice we found somewhere. Mind you, the toilets were quite low, especially for men he he he...

Lisbon Trip #2

OK, let's continue the tour then. After finding out where the train station was, we had no specific idea on where to go next, so we just went downtown to a place where there were lots of places to visit on the map ha ha...Our first stop was Arco da Rua Augusta. Rua Augusta is a place where there are lots of stores and cafes and restaurants and at the end of it, you can see a huge square. We paid €2,50/person to go up the arch to have a 360 degree view of Lisbon.

This is the arch:

There are lots of buses passing by this square. It's funny because when the sun is shining on one side of the square, people would flock towards that side to eat/drink outside, whereas the other side would be empty LOL!!!! There's also a metro station at one end of this square (that we only noticed later LOL!!!)

And here are some views from up there:

Here are the photo of the stairs. It felt kinda claustrophobic because it was a small one (only fit one person at a time). The great thing was that there was a button at the bottom and the top of the stairs that you had to push to find out whether or not it was clear to either go up or down. If there was somebody coming up or down, the lamp would be red, but if the coast was clear, then the lamp would turn green. Very practical!

From there, we decided to go visit the nearest church, the Lisbon Cathedral. When we arrived there, we were lucky enough to be able to hear some people rehearsing a song. The acoustic was amazing! Mind you, I had never heard anyone sing in a church like this (only in normal churches), so I had no clue how wonderful it was. I managed to take a short video clip of it. Here goes:


Here are some photos of the church:

After that we went to have lunch in a nearby restaurant as we were so hungry. We'll continue the tour in another post because I have a lot more photos from the next place we visited that I'm going to share.

FIL's Funeral

Today was the day my FIL got buried. I was a bit confused on when I should start taking pictures, but anyway I just used my instinct, I suppose. There were six of us who carried the casket to church and then afterwards the same men lowered the casket to the ground.

When we arrived at church at around 10.45 am and we went inside to wait for the casket and the guests to come, MIL started sobbing when she saw the four flower wreaths that we had ordered. Here they are:

I think we started right on time (11 am). There were about 30 people present. The priest gave a lovely sermon and speech, we sang some songs that MIL had chosen - accompanied by the organ. Then the priest started saying "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust..." while making a symbol of a cross with dirt on top of the casket.

 
After that as per what MIL had requested, our family stood around the casket together: MIL, R2's brothers and wives, R2 and I, our two nephews and the elder nephew's fiancee. Then starting from the eldest (MIL), one by one each family's representative recited a text that we had chosen to say goodbye and then we laid down the flower wreaths that we had ordered. MIL actually wrote a special poem for FIL by herself, whereas the rest of us mostly just chose from one of the usual goodbye quotes available in the funeral homes.

After that the guests took turns to come forward to say a few words of goodbye and then lower their flower bouquets/wreaths around the casket. Then the six men carried the casket to the cemetery and we followed behind...It was around 15'C at that time and the sun was shining. It started raining at around 3 pm and the temperature dropped a few degrees.

 
The casket was then lowered to the ground like this...

Then again one by one we lowered the flower wreaths/bouquets around the casket and then we left to have the memorial service. The ground would be covered properly by hired workers and I found out that ordering the gravestone could take weeks.

 
We had set aside all the cards that MIL had received on one table along with a photo of FIL.

 
After lunch, one nephew started reading the cards along with the names of the senders. Then the priest called on anyone who wanted to say a few words about FIL and that was the most touching moments ever. I think everybody had wet eyes and I heard sniffles here and there and people blowing their noses. I was too touched to take any pics during those moments, but I suppose it wasn't really appropriate to be taking pics unless I had been an outsider. It was more respectful to just listen to what each person had to say.

After that we were served some cake and coffee and we stayed to chit-chat for a while. All in all it must've taken around 3 hours. All in all it was a memorable day for everybody.

Rest in peace, FIL...you'll stay in our memories...

P.S. There were lots of hugs offered, even among the men, though it seemed to depend on how close they felt with one another. :-)

St. Stephen's Basilica

Yesterday I felt unwell so I didn't write any posts. Let's carry on today then. With Free Budapest Walking Tour, we passed through St. Stephen's Basilica. The tour guide told us stories about the church and then let us take pictures with the church. Here are some of the pictures.

The church from different angles:








Some details of the statues...



We didn't get inside the church at that time, but we did go inside on a different day. I think we paid around 200 HUF each to get in (around €0.75) but it wasn't a guided tour and we just put the money in the offering box in front of the main chapel, so we just looked around the place ourselves. You have to pay a separate fee to get up to the tower to take a look from there, but our tour guide told us that we shouldn't have bothered 'coz during the trip we would go up to Castle Hill area where we could take better pics of the city from there. I'll write about Castle Hill district in a separate post.

Here are some pics of the inside of the church (they still use the church for masses):







Then we went to a chapel, a room behind the one on the above pictures. However, we couldn't take pictures using flash in that room.



Wonder what's in the above "cabinet"? It's St. Stephen's mummified fist. If you wanna see it clearly, you have to pay (put some money inside a box and then the cabinet would be lit up for 2 minutes). We didn't pay the money - instead we waited for another tourist to do it, but still I couldn't really see it too clearly. If you want to see a clear picture of the mummified fist, click on this link.

The story goes that when St. Stephen's body was dug up, they found out that only his right hand was mummified, so some people thought it was a divine miracle, though experts offer a different POV using science as a method to explain why only that hand is mummified. The hand was cut off into three parts and Hungary got the fist (I think the other part goes to Vienna, but I forgot where the last part goes to).


On the left hand side of the church (I mean if you walk out of the church itself, then it's the left side street) there's a gelato shop, so we went there to get some. A small flower-shaped gelato with 2 flavours cost 350 HUF (around €1.30) whereas a medium flower-shaped gelato with 3 flavours cost 450 HUF (around 1.70). I chose chocolate (in the middle) and raspberry. It was DELICIIOUUUSSS!!! :-D

Here's a pic of both our ice-cream:


OK, I'll end this post here before it gets too long ha ha ha...