360 Degrees

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To conclude

To conclude:

It was one of the most beautiful years of our life!

The pleasure of discovering

We met new kind of persons
We met new cultures and religions
We made new jobs (fruit picking and packing, Social working, etc.)
We discovered new kind of landscapes
We made new activities and courses (Massage, Scuba diving, Trekking, Skydive, yoga, meditations, Bungee jumps, safaris, sand boarding, etc.)

A sensation of freedom

The pleasure of taking decisions every day
The pleasure to have time
The pleasure of reading

The changes in us

The world seems smaller
We feel ourselves more as citizen of one world
We have learned to know each other better
It’s with a larger and deeper vision of our world that we will process further on

Our advices for a World trip:

- From 1500 euros, taxes included, you can find ‘Round the World tickets’
- It’s important to manage the visits between rich and poor countries
- It’s important to find a balance between touristic visits, activities (courses, sports, trekking etc.) and working (Picking fruits, NGO, volunteer work, etc.)
- Nothing better than a World trip to know more about your partner
- To communicate with everybody through this Blog (website) was wonderful. We received more than 7000 visitors from 34 different countries in 10 months.

Here some further pictures after the trip:
Nic and his sisters in Brussels

Tina and her family in Sao Paulo

We are currently living in Tina´s motherhouse in Sao Paulo.
If you want to keep in touch with us, you can follow us on our new blog:
http://www.dreams360.blogspot.com/

And don’t hesitate to leave us messages whenever you come on one of our Blogs!

Tina and Nicolas

Himalaya - Entry to Mustang (Tibet) - Climbing to 6000 meters

We took the plane to Jonsom and from there went to the entry of the legendary Mustang Region, the last authentic part of Tibet. On the picture, you can see us with Edith and Yves, two Belgians we met during the treck.

Then, we went up several days untill Thorong-La. A pass at 5400 meters. From there, we went on climbing untill 6000 meters with our Sherpa guide Hem.
We didn't suffer of Altitude sickness and were very lucky with the weather during this ascent. Some days, we had to leave at 4:00 am to have favourable conditions...

On the last pictures, you can see a traffic jam of donkeys and goats, and one of the numerous suspended bridges.

Nepal - Himalaya - Annapurna - Kathmandu

Namaste! We are now in Nepal, our last destination before to come back to Europe. We really enjoy the Nepalese people.
First, we visited Kathmandu and its monkey temples :)

Then, we took the direction of Pokhara, to start trekking. The region is wonderful and wild. One day of the trekking, we woke up at 4:30 in the morning to climb on the Poon Hill (3200 meters).
There, we could enjoy the sun rising on some of the highest mountains of the world! On the pictures, you can see Anapurna I ( 8092 meters) and Dhaula Giri (8167 meters). Height of the ten highest mountains in the world are in Nepal.
Patty and I, were sick with a cold that day, we tried to climb but it was hard, so we went back to the Tea House to wait for Nic and Hem (guide). When they cameback we left again.....9hs walking......it start to rain in the middle of the way, we saw a lot of lechees, I got a bite and also Nic....

Also during the trekking, we have been arrested by Maoists. We had to pay them money in order to go on. Fortunately, they were peaceful.

India - Jaipur - Rajasthan

A really good friend Patty from Barcelona - Peru, is with us for 3 weeks!
From Delhi, we went to Jaipur to visit the wonderful palace of the Maharaja.
The city itself is crazy. The walls have been painted in pink as welcome sign. That's why it's called the pink city!
It's a mix of camels, cows, elephants, rickshaws, car, people etc. Very impressive!

India - Agra - Khajuraho - Varanasi

From Jaipur, we went to Agra and the famous Taj Mahal.

Then, we took the train to Khajuraho. If you pay attention to the picture you will see that some of the sculptures are erotic. It's supposed to show love to the gods ...

Finally, we went to Varanasi, the holy city of India.
We went on the Ganges during sunrise. Same if it's not so clean, I decided to take a bath as it's holy. Each Indian is supposed to take at least one bath in the holy Ganges in his life.
It works in three steps: the first dive is for the Gods, the second for you and the last for the next generations.

Afghanistan 1 - Kabul

First of all, we want to say THANKS to Alexia and all the NGO "Afghanistan Demain". Without them, this fantastic part of our World trip would not have been possible.
After 9 days in Delhi we got the visa to Afghanistan. At the beginning we didn’t want to tell anybody, because we knew that they would be worried, especially our family. We decide to come here because Nic has a friend who is working for a French NGO, www.afghanistan-demain.org, and she was going back to Belgium on 19/9.
First, we were a little bit afraid of what we were going to see and experience. I think that it is normal, especially in a country where all the news on TV, newspaper, etc we see, are bad. But when we arrived, we met all the staff, most of them Afghans, and we really felt "safe". Of course there are safeties rules that we needed to respect. Like for ex.: We go to the places with a driver, live in the NGO house, etc. All the people that we met and worked with were really nice and in all the places we felt welcome. About the jobs that we did here, I made a report about all the 3 centers that they have and also I gave classes about creativity to the children. The children that we work with are the poorest ones, most of then are between 8 and 16 years old. They study 4hs a day in the centers and the rest they work, trying to bring money for their families. Every time that I went out, I need to wear trousers, tunic, and a scarf on my head. At the beginning I felt weird but in the end you get used to it. Alexia made a farewell party to the staff and the women couldn’t dance in front of the men, so for a moment we closed the living room to allow the women to dance. There are few places in Kabul (restaurants) where you can feel somewhere in Europe, Brazil, etc. One of them is called Atmosphere, it is a French restaurant where they have a swimming pool that you (women) can go and swim.Well I will let Nic to explain more about our experience here ;-)

Why Afghanistan? After so many weeks of travels, sightseeing and new activities; we wanted to put a social dimension to our trip. We knew that Alexia, a Belgian friend, had been making a fantastic work in Kabul for more than one year. She told us to come and we could work as volunteers for her NGO. We know that we could make social works in countries that are more peaceful. Nevertheless, here was the opportunity!
We were in Delhi, India, not so far from Afghanistan. Of course, we knew that there were risks of kidnapping, terrorist attacks and riots. Nobody except Alexia recommended us to go. We seriously thought in the positive and negative points of the trip and finally decided to go. To take risks to help people was more acceptable to us than to go to Afghanistan just for tourism. We knew that during 3 weeks we couldn’t help a lot but it was better than nothing. Once arrived, it was really worth. The work for the NGO was great! The main purpose of the NGO "Afghanistan Demain", is to re-insert street working children into the public school.
I helped to orient the poor families of the childrens into Micro finance institutions and vocational training. There are 70 persons working for this NGO and on our arrival, only Alex, Tina and I were foreigners. Usually they only have 3 expatriates working there permanently. All the rest were great Afghan Colleagues. We like the Afghans! They are proud and beautiful persons. A funny side was also that we were happy to be in the routine again. To wake up at the same time every day, to follow a timetable, to live in a house was such a pleasure for us, after having traveled so much.
Also the expat life was interesting, many people who chose to live and work in Kabul looked a bit strange to us. Nevertheless, some of them were really interesting. One day, we were received by the French Ambassador and we had a delicious dinner in his house.