BEST OF HONG KONG

Life has been a fastforward-sequence from a romcom these last couple of days. I can't even remember the last time I put up the computer. Thailand? May be. You simply have no time for editing and writing when the scene around you is a technicolour festival.

It's now about two weeks ago we left Thailand to go to Hong Kong. Since then, we haven't had one single island-style day, which might not be so odd since we've entered East Asia, the buzzling euphony of colours, flavours and feasts for every sense.

Our time in Hong Kong has been fast-flying, exciting, wuthering and fantastic. Being such an expesive vacation-place, my wallet is glad we did not stay longer, but my heart sure is crying.

THE TRUTH BEHIND THE INSTAGRAM PICTURE

Instagram pictures are just pure moments of perfectness, fortunate captures in the exact right moment, non?

Well.

ART.SCIENCE MUSEUM SINGAPORE

Julia is such a nerd.
She likes biology and chemistry and math and even went through the natural science program in high school, whereas I chose not to be that ambitious and studied social science instead, secretly longing for the day I would pursue my true interests of the more creative sort.  

Now Julia wants to study psychiatry instead and my art persona is no longer hidden, but still, it somehow felt like somebody had modelled the ArtScience Museum in Singapore to perfectly fit our specific wants. 

Located right next to Marina Bay Sands, it should be no problemo finding our way there - if you are not one of the Axelsson sisters, that is. We jumped off by Marina South Pier. Don't do that. You'll

have to walk in the gazing sun for 20 minutes before turning up at Shoppes at Marina bay, something that would have taken you 2 minutes if you just exited at Marina Bay.  

...It was not even our first time in the area. (!!!)

Oh my, this is going to be an interesting trip... 

Speaking of interesting, they have this permanent exhibition on ArtScience Museum called Future World. We both managed to get in on Julia's student card, which ment two exhibitons for 19 S$ each.

And then the fun began... 

PICTURESQUE GALLE FORT

 Along the south west coast of Sri Lanka,
there is a small town called Galle 

with an UNESCO-certified fort.

We spent a day there, traveling back to Europe for a lovely couple of hours. 

~ HERE'S OUR STORY ~ 
~ IN PICTURES ~

WE ♥ COPENHAGEN - An Inspo Essay

The beautiful thing with having a steady full time job in Sweden is that on public holidays, you get to be paid for doing whatever you want, since you are free for those days without it having to affect your paycheck. This might be old news to some, but for us youngsters, at our first few years in the grown up world, this is nothing short of magic.

Good thing number two with living in Gothenburg, Sweden is, even though the winters are pretty much monkey poop and the people are shyer than any other culture's most introvert people, that there are great possibilities to flee the country for a day without breaking the bank.

A few click and we had booked our trip to

COPENHAGEN, 
DENMARK 

a day for photographing, increasing our HRC-pin collection 

and losing Felicia's Christiania virginity - entering the grounds, we mean! 

....? 

The day in pictures, are you ready? 

INSTAXPIRATION EXTRAVAGANZA

Our little baby is now about 2 months old and it's crazy how much we've already grown fond of it. We might have spent... 800? (Or is it more?) SEK already on feeding and a couple of bucks for accessories. 

But it has been worth it. The feeling when the picture slowly appears on the piece of shiny paper is nothing short of magic. 

One of the few white walls at our place had to act gallery for the best snapshots of Barcelona. 

ALL OUR BEST PICTURES FROM BARCELONA

To make it easier for y'all, we now give you the opportunity to either just scroll down, look at the pretty pictures and be done with inspiration-gathering (after you left a comment, off course!) 

OR 

you can scroll down, be inspired and explore more of Barcelona on Suitcasepacking by clicking the teal links. 

Greeeat right? 

As ush, click click click to make the pictures bigger!

AT THE BUNKERS DE CAN BARÓ

When having done their research prior to Barcelona, they thought they had all the great places nailed to their bucket list. You know, Park Güell, Sagrada Familia, Montserrat...

So when Dani in the lobby said he liked to give them tips on what to in the city, they said yes just to be polite.
...Yes, the heroines of this story can be a tad too smug sometimes... Because Dani of course had a whole list of off-the-tourist-track things to do, like the hidden bar behind the sandwich shop Pastrami and the Bunkers de Can Baró.

Bunkers? Like in the war? The girls were intrigued, and accepted his google maps-print outs, adding it to their checklist for the trip.

ART DECO meets WONDERLAND: Introducing PARK GÜELL

Pinterest sure has been a bigger influense in my plans and goal than it maybe should have. After finding amazing pictures, I pin them to my board "Oh the places I wanna go" and then they're stuck. I have no choice but to go there. 

That compulsive behavior led us to the inner China last year, seeing places I didn't even know exsisted for real before pinterest showed me they did. 

So even though I had been in Barcelona once before, I had no idea this kind of scenery could be found outside a Disneyland before I found a picture on Pinterest. It's quite an amazing world to live in compared to a couple of years ago. Before internet, there are just so many places I wouldn't have had the chance to see. 

But enough sentimental blabbering now. If I were you, I'd ask me to shut up and just keep the pictures coming. If you are looking for info on how to get here and stuff, there is a section for it in the end.

BARCELONA FROM THE SKY

THE FIKA PROJEKT: Eating the gigantic KANELBULLE of Haga

THE FIKA PROJECT: PART TWO

In our attempt to try and mastering the art of Fika in Gothenburg, we were bound to cross paths with this famous mutated baked good at some point. 

The concept is really simple - you take the typical Swedish cinnamon bun and make it about 4-5 times bigger. When we started The Fika Project, Felicia pitched ideas on what to eat and where to Julia and Jonas, and when she said "..Oh, and so the gigantic kanelbulle in Haga, naturally..." Jonas admitted He. Had. Never. Been. In. Haga. 

THAT WAS THE UTTEREST FORM OF DISGRACE TO YOUR GOTHENBURGIAN HERRITAGE, 

Julia and Felicia thought and off course also told him so, and the next stop on the Fika-map was set. 

WHEN LIFE IS LEMON-ISH, TAKE A WEEKEND TRIP - 24 hours in Stockholm

Although Gothenburg is The Best Swedish Town - true story -, we do come second in one area: the musical scene, as in having more than one musical currently playing. Because of that, we had to go all the way to the grand capital to see the Swedish production of Book of Mormon. 

We had the fortune to stay at relatives, as Jörgen, Felicia's mother's boyfriend, so kindly opened up his home to us. 

When trainprices are what they are, our two night stay resulted in only one day in Stockholm, as the cheapest train left from Gothenburg at 8 pm friday night and the return trip started early sunday morning. But even though that, we had time to spend 24 great hours in Stockholm. 

Here's our day. 

JULIA & JONAS PRESENTS: TAIPEI IN PICTURES pt 1

This is a part of our series 

TRAVEL CORRESPONDENCES, 

where our friends provide us with pictures from their fantastic trips abroad to help us spread inspiration.

This digital postcard comes from JULIA & JONAS, Felicia's sister and her boyfriend Jonas, from when they were in Taiwan this autumn.  

After enjoying the many quirky cafées and bustling city of Seoul, Julia and Jonas had a more serious agenda to take care of; 19 years ago, Jonas got adopted from Taiwan, and this was the pilgrimage back to see if he could get in contact with his biological parents. 

Did they succed in finding his birth parents? 

THE STORY ABOUT THE SUMMER PALACE IN BEIJING

Once upon a time in China, 

two Swedes were on a tourist trail,

searching for the not-at-all-hidden treasures 

and ended up in the Summer Palace in 

BEIJING

What waited them was not lurging mystery 

or etheral fog tucking the grounds in 

with acients stories, 

no, 

because the two Swedes had been out for quite a long time now

and were frankly quite tired of old buildings 

so they did what they do best

and strolled and strolled and strolled 

and took staged photos and ignored the signs in broken English 

and ate one or two really disgusting hotdogs

(seriously China, what do you put in those?!?)

and the day was not perfect 

or forever memorable, 

but quite nice and comfortable 

and visually pleasant 

and that is certainly good enough

LISEBERG CHRISTMAS MARKET

Fake snow in heaps, snowmen on parade and a fantastic tale on ice. 

We grew up today,

bought blue cheeses for hundreds of kronor

and drank glüweihn without having to show ID.

Christmas at Liseberg has been a part our holiday celebration since it opened 2001. 

It's the perfect place to go for afterworks, gift shopping, getting full on free samples... 

It's also quite romatic, if you're into that.

SOULFUL SEOUL - A photo essay by Jonas & Julia

Earlier this fall, Julia's boyfriend Jonas went to South Korea to study korean. 

Julia sure is Felicia's sister and therefor seized the opportunity to visit him during the end of his studies. 

Felicia and Jonathan seized the opportunity to get their hands on some asian pictures since the traveling aches was starting to get to them.

And also because we love the idea of spreading traveling inspiration and tips even for places we are yet to visit. 

We want to be a place on the internet where you go to get tips and inspiration for your next trip for as many places as possible, as well as the place to go and take a minivacation and be amuzed when everyday life isn't that exciting.

Look at the pictures, read the cations and escape to hypermodern yet traditional Seoul for a while... 

ON THE TOP OF TIANMEN MOUNTAIN, CHINA

Our problem is our ambitions being too high sometimes.
For this post we originally wanted to do a whole guide with prices, tips, maps for this day of ours on Tianmen mountain  - Tianmen means heaven in Chinese - in Zhangjiajie, Hunan Province in China.

But then time goes so so fast and editing photos is a betch and we were back in Sweden again, back to 9-5 and laundry times and trying to keep floating. And our fenomenal advice and anekdotes from the day were left in the fog on the hill tops.

But you know what? We have to remind ourselves that Something... not quite what we had in mind is still better than Nothing at all.
So here it goes. This are our best pictures from the day when we knocked on heaven's door.

SOMEWHERE IN STOCKHOLM

"I'm from a place where we never, openly show our emotions

We drown our sorrows in bottomless bottles and leave them to float in the ocean

I'm from a place where we never, separate people from people

Some generalize, but in general I still believe that we are treated as equals"

"Somewhere in Stockholm"
by Avicii

TRÄDGÅRDSFÖRENINGEN IN GOTHENBURG

Light was unfortunately falling and so was the temperature. 

Autumn is coming for real, and soon, but yet we have a couple of nice bright days left. 

LISEBERG - SCANDINAVIA'S BIGGEST AMUSEMENT PARK: Day 1

This summer, we've been fortunate enough to spend two picture perfect days in Liseberg, one of Sweden's biggest tourist attractions (for a good reason? we'll see...) which also, coincidentaly, happens to be where we both work.

In Gothenburg, almost every kid is crazy about Liseberg. It's the place you go with your friends on your first outing by yourself at thirteen, and it's the place to bring your first date at sixteen. In our childhood, one of the highlights of oth summer and winter was to go crazy on rollercoasters for a whole day, or stroll around and taste as many types of candy as possible in the cozy christmas market.

One might think that when you go to an amusement park every day all summer, it's not that amusing anymore, and in the beguinning of this summer, we were ready to agree. But working in happyland also has its perks - free tickets for us and our friends. So we decided on reliving our childhood utopia and do a real thing of it this year; tourpasses for everyone, tons of ice cream and a positive attiude even though the tolerance for turning upside down seven times in a row had drastically decreased since our youth.

And you know what?
It was as perfect as it could be.