Dreamhack Winter '12 - Day 3

Saturday, 24th November '12 
This day was far less productive than the previous two days, although the finals and after were absolutely cray cray. But I took a grand total of like 5 pictures today... so really this post ain't gunna mean shit to most people. But hey, it's my blog. What up.

Because I'm basically suffering from early on-set dementia, I don't remember exactly what I did or when... but stuff happened, promise. I remember there was a lot of long-ass breaks between games... and they were spent napping in the car or in the press area. I basically gave up taking pictures because, for the most part, I felt too weird asking more players for pictures. I also wasn't happy with the way the pictures were coming out... even after my yoda lesson, they still just didn't look as good as I had hoped. Me thinks I should take a class... I've been meaning to, but god-damn they're so expensive. 

Dreamhack Winter 2012 - Day 2

Friday, 23rd November 2012
Alright, let me preface this entire entry with the fact that I'm writing this with a minimal amount of sleep. Forgive any kind of horrid gushing, grammar, lazy phrasing etc.

So yesterday was just insane. I woke up to find that HerO has followed me on twitter. After squealing for like a solid 5 minutes (and waking David in the process) we began to get ready for the day. We arrived an hour or so before games started, so we spent most of the morning trying to locate a dude who could hook us up with a press pass. And we did. It was so easy too. So we totally got access to the twitch lounge where all the bigwigs and shit hang out. While sitting there, I was trying to be inconspicuous but I was just, OMG. They can see the admiration and hero worship in my eyes, OH GOD. WHAT AM I DOING HERE fasldjfalsjdf. haha But it was so awesome.

TheSTC, ForGG and HerO

Taeja and Myself. I always get such nice pictures with this guy. :D 

The rest of the day was just Dave and I hanging out either by the player area, twitch lounge and later on in the day, at the streams. I haven't taken nearly as many pictures this time as in Summer, but I just feel even more weird asking about it. It's made even more awkward by people thinking I introduce myself automatically by saying "I'm married". ugh... I need to enunciate better. Not married people, my name is Mary! Sorry I suck at speaking!

Anyway, the games were crazy. For anybody who reads this and is actually interested in SC2 in have to watch the last game with TLO vs. Snute was insane. My brain and my heart were just all over the place in that game, it was just the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

After the games finished, we headed over to the hotel bar at the Scandic Elmia and just casually hung out with some of the players. (Inside I just kept repeating to myself "Is this even real life??!"). I went to sleep quite late after hanging out with LiquidRet and a Swedish player called Andre. I mean... pinch me, wtf.

To the pictures. :)

               With Naniwa... I was rude and interrupted him watching games so he was a bit rude back to me. But I got the picture anyway  muahaha

TLO of course :) 

Dreamhack Winter - Day 1

Thursday, 22nd November '12
There isn't really much to write about the first day. The majority of it was spent in a cafe waiting to be able to check-in at my most ridiculously priced hotel.

We spent the night before driving to Rostock, we then took a 7 hour ferry to Trellaborg, and drove from there again to Jonkoping. It took about 13 hours in total, but I slept through a lot of it, so that was good. When we arrived, we weren't allowed to check-in for a few hours so we (David and I) sat around and waited in a cute little cafe till we could check-in.

Myself and Yami. Lovely to see her again :)

Fast forward a bit and we arrive at Dreamhack! In between was basically just becoming a person again (shower, nap, etc). The first day wasn't that busy though... mostly just walking around and trying to orientate ourselves once more, meeting whoever we can etc. Though, to be perfectly honest, I spent a rather large amount of time just playing around with camera and my manual flash trying to get good pictures... and failing. So much failure was had. Eventually I was saved by some wonderful guy who had the same flash as me, and he explained what settings he used and why. It was a great photography lesson and hopefully the difference will come out in the pictures.

TLO and HerO

Dawsons re-invade the Motherland

Thursday, 1 November '12

I enjoyed a lovely long-ass trip to Ireland on Thursday. It literally took 12 hours, door-to-door. I left around 10am in the morning to the airport, flew in to Dublin and then had to take a bus to the train station. I had to wait in the train station for hours given that I missed the afternoon train by 30 minutes. I only realised once in the train station that I didn't bring an adapter... le fuuuu. So I had nothing to do for two hours at the station... I ate some bad fish and mash and napped on an uncomfortable bench in the station. Eventually I made it onto the train to Westport and towards the end of the trip, some lovely guy opposite me on the train offered me his charger and so I could watch my tv shows for the rest of the trip. I finally arrived around 11pm and was picked up at the station and taken to... a pub.

99% of my Ireland family reunion was spent in various pubs around this tiny little village. The Irish sure know how to drink! The weather most of the weekend was FREEZING and switched between pouring rain/sleet/hail.

Friday, 2nd November '12
After waking up in the night to the joyous sounds of my cousin throwing up, and then at 7am the following morning to the dulcet tones of the fire alarm. I enjoyed an extra crispy croissant and we proceeded to spend the day celebrating my cousin Tom's 18th birthday. We had a reservation at a hotel for lunch, but before then, enjoyed a wee little walk around the town.

Afterwards, once more we visited a pub and then Cosy Joes (it wasn't sure if it was a club, restaurant OR bar), and then another pub... (are you seeing a pattern?) I ended the night in a pub where some diddly dee (random Irish from the town bring 'trad' instruments, to play 'trad' music in their 'trad' little pubs. It was adorable). It was quite amusing that, while standing with my aunt, she pointed out how every person entering the pub had a possible link to our family. "Yeah that person is related to us, that person might be related to your grandmother etc etc". It was crazy.

I was dead tired though and soon walked back to the

Halloween Weekend.

Friday and Saturday, 26th and 27th October '12
This was a crazzzy weekend. On Friday I went with my room mates to a student party somewhere in Tiergarten. It was a Spanish night and they literally had buckets of Sangria. I have no idea why, but we got there soooo early and were the first ones there. There wasn't any music or anybody there, just the decorations. But it soon filled up... and it was a night to say the least. Note to self: Sangria and vodka aint a good idea.

My room mates had a good costume, I did a piss-poor job of corpse bride with whatever I owned.

Room in Konstanzer str. 5, Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf

My apartment is in a really good area, and I have a u-bahn and major bus stop very close by. I can also ride to the S-Bahn with my bike in 10 minutes. The apartment isn't overly big, but it has everything I need and it's much cheaper than what I was paying last semester.

Berlin Aquarium

I went with a friend to the Berlin Aquarium. I LOVE AQUARIUMS. They even had the reptile park in the same building... basically my perfect day out!

Be prepared for a whole bunch of pictures of snakes and jellyfish. You're welcome.

Random food photos...

Bruschetta for my flatmates

Dumplings with the girls