Hamburg is the second largest city in Germany, perfect destination to explore its culture walking or on water. The port of Hamburg is the second largest port in Europe. Huge numbers of rivers, canals and lakes offer many opportunities for sightseeing the city from water. Hamburg has more bridges than Venice, Amsterdam and London, all together.

The picture shows the Fleetschloesschen, a little canal castle, is a former public restroom, then a customs office and now a cafe and restaurant.

Homeowners in the famous Winterhude neighborhood kept their boats on the Goldbekkanal, one of the many branches of the Alster River. The Alster River flows under the Sengelmannstrasse Bridge in the Hamburg neighborhood of Ohlsdorf, nearly five hours from the city center.

Many of the buildings in Hamburg are converted into lofts and commercial space for publishing, advertising and architecture firms.

Hamburg has more than 40 theatres, 60 museums and 100 music venues and clubs.

25 Hours Hotel is perfectly situated in the business district of Hamburg.”25hours” has a dynamic design aesthetic, an extraordinary service model and an extensive entertainment programme.

The design, appeals to guests that maintain a spontaneous lifestyle. For young and young-at-heart creatives above all, the property has already become the preferred location for a stop-over in Hamburg. Creating a wholly communicative atmosphere, the open areas of “25hours” have taken on a special role, modelled to form the backdrop for a permanent get-together.

Lobby and restaurant lead guests over the lounge bar into a large, flexible meeting and event area. In guestrooms, the bright design mix, drawn from the 60’s and 70’s, is studded with playful details that are regularly updated.

Each rooms has hairdryers, TV, phone, Alarm clock ISDN, modem and LAN internet connections, safety deposit boxes available at the front desk.

Hotel Side is situated in the city centre of Hamburg, very close to the shopping areas, the Alister lake and the Opera House.

The hotel is marvellous with its breathtaking facade combining glass and natural stone, offers visitors peerless view of its top eight floors. The design of the hotel is made by Jan Stormer and is complimented with interiors by Matteo thun. Matteo added beautiful colours which brings warmth, energy and life all over the structure.

Hotel Side offers 178 fully-equipped guestrooms, very spacious and elegant. Each one has internet, satellite & pay TV, radio, 2 IDD phones with voice mail, fax & modem plugs at the desk, electronically controlled shades, in-room safes, minibar, bathrobes & slippers, cosmetic mirror, hair dryer.

In the hotel you van have a snack in the stylish restaurant, which offers Euro-Asian cuisine, or have a drink in the Fusion bar where a live DJ spins the mood. Then if you get bored ride the lift to the 8^th floor terrace for 360 panorama view over the skyline.

The hotel offers SPA treatments with pool, jacuzzi, sauna, steam bath, solarium and wellbeing. For business travellers there is 6 variable function rooms for 2 to 300 people, including a private function room of 240 qm with separate foyer and bar.

The first coil (weighing about one kg) is usually worn when the girl is five or six years old. Some girls are coiled at the age of two. The second coil is added when the girl is about eight years old and the third is put when she reaches the age of 12. Year after year, new rings are added, until by the time of mirage, their necks are 25 centimeters long. Once fastened, the rings are for life, to remove the full coil of brass would cause the collapse or even fracture of the woman’s neck. Girls who have stronger necks wear more than four coils (weighing about 5 kg) by the time they are 15. But most girls start showing signs of damage to the neck in their teens. The neck muscles weaken and are unable to support the weight of the head. This makes the girls even more dependent on the coils. In the past, removal of the brass rings was a punishment for adultery. The punishment was, that since the neck muscles had severely weakened, by years of not supporting the neck, the woman must spend the rest of her life, holding her head with both hands or lying down.
It is a myth, that the brass rings have elongate the neck of the wearer. Any orthopedic surgeon will tell you that: lengthening the neck would lead to paralysis or even death.
The women are able to carry out a somewhat ordinary life: they can marry and have children, and they are able to weave, sew and do light work. Although these days, they spend most of their time, making money, by posing as circus freaks for the tourists visiting the hill tribes in Northern Thailand.
The origin of the ring-wearing ritual in the Padaung hill tribes remain unclear. Palong hill tribe mythology says that the mother of all Palong’s was half woman, half dragon, with a long, beautiful neck, and that their unique custom is a tribute to their mother-dragon.
Visitors to their villages are amazed by the neck rings worn by the women of the tribe. The neck rings of a woman are, in fact, a single brass coil placed around the neck. The length of the coil and the added weight presses the clavicle and the rib cage, resulting in the appearance of a very long neck. In fact, the neck does not elongate, this is impossible.
Nowadays, the small refugee village of the long necked Paduang hill tribe, is completely geared towards visitors and tourists and is seemingly on every tour agency’s day-trip list. The Long-necked Paduang have become the most popular tourist attraction of all the hill tribes in Thailand. Tourists pay boatmen about 500 Baht (US $1= Baht 42) to reach these villages, called camps, run by tour operators. Access to camps is from Huay Puu Kaeng, an area controlled by tour operators. Guides take tourists around camps where Padung women are on display. Each woman receives 500 Baht each month for wearing the coils all the time.

The Thailand Government is working very hard to keep these woman a touristic attraction but with civilization already knocking on their door, it is a good idea to visit them before like most of the other eccentrics cultures it gives itself up to Hamburger and Coke…..

1. Island of Sylt, Germany

The island is closer to the coasts of Danmark, but it is german and is the place where the elite spends its summer vacation. This is tevtonian equivalent of Martas Vineyard with sand dunes, sea lighthouses and cute buildings, in which are located boutiques of Lui Vuitton and Hugo Boss. Beaches at the eastern coast of the island are suitable for families, but the western beaches are the real Mecca for the surfers. Indeed the village is known as “Sylt’s Saint Tropes”. Sylt is favourite destination for vacation of Boris Becker, Claudia Schiffer and Ralf Schumacher. You can reach the island by flight from Munich of Frankfurt, or by train from Hamburg.

2. Island of Kea, Greece

Kea, the closest of the Cyclades to the mainland, has a reputation as the island that the Greeks were clever enough to keep to themselves. It is a place with a laid-back atmosphere, great walking, good swimming and nice beaches, while Ioulidha, the town at the centre, has a collection of delightful tavernas. On Island of Kea you can meet lots of Athenian families and yachting types of people. Ferries to Kea leave from the port of Lavrio, a 90-minute bus ride from Athens.

3. Island of Lopud, Croatia

Croatia is awash with minute, barely populated islands but Lopud, one of the Elafiti islands, with its handful of bars, shops and restaurants and a couple of hotels, is one of the most charming. There are no cars on the island, hand-pulled wooden carts being the preferred form of transportation. Unusually for Croatia, Lopud has sandy beaches, the largest of which is Sunj, reached by boat or forest path.To get there you need to Fly to Dubrovnik, 45-minute ferry to Lopud.

5. Comino, Malta

Gozo’s smaller sibling. So small, in fact, that there are only four permanent residents and a hotel that is only open between April and October. However, what Comino lacks in human interface, it makes up for in nature reserves, a bird sanctuary, beaches and the much-feted Blue Lagoon. Limited sights include the old isolation hospital, a tower, and a chapel dating back to the 14th century. To get there you need to Fly to Malta, then catch a ferry to Comino provided by the hotel.

6. Iles d’Hyeres, France

This collection of three islands off the Cote d’Azur is kept crowd-free through impressively high levels of French bureaucracy – numbers allowed to visit the island have been reduced (ferries stop running when a certain number of people are on the island) and smoking is usually banned in summer. Crack the rules and regulations, however, and you discover a particularly French idyll. Porquerolles, the largest of the islands, produces an acclaimed rose wine and has fabulous fish restaurants. Le Mas du Langoustier is one of France’s most romantic hotels, while the Notre Dame beach is rated as one of the best in Provence. Ryanair flies into Toulon-Hyeres airport, which is a short drive to one of the ferry ports to the islands.

7. Eilean Shona, Scotland

An island off the coast of Scotland that has stayed off the radar by being privately owned (albeit by Richard Branson’s sister, Vanessa). Situated at the entrance to Loch Moidart, between the islands of Mull and Skye, there are five distinctly basic cottages and one substantially grander main house which comes with a cook/housekeeper. Neither cars nor bicycles are allowed on the island but rowing boats are provided free. Two miles long, there are 300 acres of woodland.Drive to Castle

9. Aland Islands, Finland

A veritable smorgasbord of islands – roughly 6,000 of them – that lie between Sweden and Finland, they are a blend of ancient Viking burial mounds and weatherboard house lifestyle fantasy. Unadulterated wholesomeness, with cycling and fishing opportunities galore, along with general Arthur Ransome-esque messing about in boats. The best time to visit is late August, when the Finnish schools have gone back and rental prices dip.

10. Monte Isola, Lake Iseo, Italy

Europe’s largest inland island (three kilometres long) is in the middle of Lake Iseo. It has a couple of villages, a handful of restaurants and bars, vineyards, a nice walk through the olive and walnut trees to the 13th-century church of Madonna della Ceriola and copious amounts of tranquillity. Fly to Brescia with Ryanair, then take a bus or train to Iseo, followed by a ferry.

11. Ile d’Aix, France

Just one mile long, the island where Napoleon negotiated his surrender to the British has a more rough and ready feel than the ile de Re, its celebrity-sated sibling to the north. The barracks built for Napoleon’s soldiers have evolved into housing and a summer-only cinema, there’s a particularly impressive fort, a museum commemorating Napoleon’s stay (La Maison de l’Empereur), sandy beaches, a hotel (predictably called the Napoleon), plenty of camping and – this being France – a boulangerie and several very good restaurants, including Cafe de l’Ocean and the more gourmand Les Paillotes. Fly to La Rochelle with Ryanair or Flybe. Bus to La Rochelle port, ferry to ile d’Aix.

12. Island of Losinj, Croatia

Located off Cres, Croatia’s largest island, Losinj has attractive Austro-Hungarian and Venetian touches and is peppered with ornate villas. There is a pine forest and a particularly nice harbour with a floating fruit market at one end. A three-hour ferry from Pula.

13. Island of Gotland, Sweden

Bang in the middle of the Baltic, Gotland is a land mass of Scandinavian perfection, offering a staggering array of medieval churches, bucolic farmland, fossil-filled beaches, highly chilled beach clubs and yachting. It is perhaps Europe’s most stylish island; the cobbled streets of Visby, Gotland’s medieval capital, are fringed with vintage fashion shops, Sixties-inspired coffee shops and frighteningly clever furniture stores. And being almost completely flat, the cycling is superb. Flight to Stockholm, then either another flight to Visby with Skyways, or a bus ride followed by a three-hour ferry to Visby.

14. Rathlin Island, Northern Ireland

Definitely one for the summer months, not least because that’s when the two main B&B options are open, Rathlin Island is north of Ballycastle in County Antrim and 14 miles from the Mull of Kintyre in Scotland. Four miles long, it is home to around 70 people and copious seals. Caledonian MacBrayne (028 2076 9299; www.calmac.co.uk) runs twice daily ferries all year round from £3.80 day return.

15. Island of Porto Santo, Portugal

Located 75km from Madeira, Porto Santo achieved fame late last year when Monarch Airways disgorged a passenger it claimed was being disruptive. Once home to Christopher Columbus, Porto Santo, unlike Madeira, has 8km of fine yellow sand. Although it is not a party island, there’s a museum dedicated to Columbus while the volcanic landscape lends itself to good walks in spring and autumn. Thanks to Nato, a full airport runway was built in 1960; flights are currently via Funchal on Madeira (15-minute flight time) or Portugal.

I will start with Tonny’s Restaurant, which is one very good place for mexican food. It works 24 hour a day and they have a lot of interesting Mexican and breakfast dishes. You can get oxtail or catfish and eggs, seafood tostadas, shrimp omelettes, and of course the standard Mexican fare along with pancakes, french toast, sausage, bacon, horchata, etc.
Go to the Tonny’s Restaurant with Google Maps.
Second best in my list is Connal’s Burgers which offers traditional burgers and shakes. They have interesting menus including Grinder Submarine Sandwich, Connal’s Famous Original Hamburgers, Salads and French Dips.
Go to the Connal’s Burgers with Google Maps.
Third is ranked Lebanese Kitchen and it gets high accolades for several reasons. They serve Lot’s of food and it is very very tasty and inexpensive. The shish kebab were packed with flavor. The baba ganoush was smoky and yummy. I loved the stuffed grape leaves, while my friend claimed the falafel was the best she’d ever had.
Go to the Lebanese Kitchen with Google Maps.
The Forth place is for Wolfe Burger. This place doesn’t have the best burgers in town or anything, but they’re still decent enough to splurge on every now and then you’re in the mood to spend a lot more than usual on a burger, fries and coke. Some pluses of this place is the personal, people who works there are so friendly and make really tasty Veggie burgers and Buritos.
Go to Wolfe Burger with Google Maps.
The fifth place takes Sinbala, a great little Chinese eatery which serves the BEST Chinese sausages hands down. Of course the sausage is what everyone goes for, but the rest of the menu is great also. Large drink menu and the Taiwanese ice is one of the best you can order there for low cost.
Go to Sinbala with Google Maps.
I hope these places will come in handy if you need some fast, cheap and delicious food in Pasadena, California