Vaccinations, visas and travel insurance

As my next trip to Asia will be of long duration and can pass through areas of risk, last week I was in the "Unit of Tropical Medicine and International Health Drassaness (Av.Drassanes, 17 to 21 Bajos, 08001 Barcelona, 933270550) to I get recommended immunizations: Polio, Hepatitis A & B, Tetanus, Diphtheria and Typhoid Fever, come on, they've left me like a sieve (eye, a queue of months in summer). Besides, I have recommended to take one box of Malarone (malaria medication) for me to take it only if you have high fever for more than 2 days and is in a zone with no possibility of seeing a doctor.


As for the visa to enter China, last Monday I was at the Chinese consulate in Barcelona (Avinguda Tibidabo 34, 08022 Barcelona, 932541180) to request (2 hours in line), you can enter China without a visa has been approved and stuck in your passport. To request one of type "tourist", you should be there at the consulate in your city with a passport valid for more than 6 months on the date of travel, 2 passport size photographs and a number of forms completed (these will be given in the tail) The price varies based on the entries:

An entry

25 Euros

Two input

35 Euros

Half-year multiple entry

48 Euros

Multiple entries from one year

72 Euros

In my case I asked for a visa for 2 tickets (have taken a week), more than anything because if I go back in Hong Kong and the mainland (Hong Kong is one of the two special administrative regions "of the PRC. The other is the former Portuguese colony of Macao. In these two special administrative regions covered by the administrative model known as one country, two systems. consists in maintaining a capitalist economic system under the sovereignty of a communist country's official ideology. In addition to the system economic, these two regions maintain an administrative and independent judicial system and even its own customs and external borders), or whether they enter and leave Hong Kong is like to go out and re-enter China, so I need 2 tickets .

The visa for Vietnam, luckily be processed online at many websites for about 10 € approx. Within a week they send you an e-mail you print and teach at the border (if carried out, this processed being in China I decide to Vietnam as the next destination).

To get in Thailand do not need visa if you're less than a month and you take a ticket to leave the country, the idea is that if I go, when you buy the ticket, also buy one going to the next destination a month later.

India is another country that can not enter without a visa previously approved. At first the process was in Spain but had to send by courier the passport to the embassy in Madrid (the consulate in Barcelona not processed), worth over € 100 and also does not give me time so I decided that if I, as tramitaré at the embassy of India in Bangkok (Thailand), take a week and is much cheaper.

If during the journey I decide on some other area country like Laos, Cambodia, Indonesia, etc.. These can handle a "visa on arrival" or you pay X money in the same border, give a picture and you approve the visa right there (important to take several pictures for these trips).

Finally this travel insurance when you travel outside Europe normally travel agents and offers limited, but traveling by yourself you've got to find yourself. This point is essential for me and I think it would be foolhardy to go to Asia so long without one, keep in mind that most of these passes is to pay health and if something happens you may find surprises. After comparing several, I decided to World Nomads, is designed for adventurous travelers with medical coverage, evacuation, baggage and activities for overseas venture, which is also recommended in the Lonely Planet. € 292.16 exits with worldwide coverage for 4 months and can be extended online during the trip.

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Trip to Spain

As many already know, this year I shall complete my first Christmas in America.

Until recent weeks, I hesitated to go to Spain or not at all and it seems that I managed to stay here.
The last step to get the new visa is to visit the U.S. Embassy in Spain.

This requires an appointment weeks in advance. Noting that she had been given me by Friday 18, almost certainly had not arrived on time.
As I have said many of the Messenger or Facebook, in all news programs have left pictures of the airports in the northeastern United States of delays or cancellations.


90% of the times we live in the midwest, we fly to Europe via cities in that area: Philadelphia, Chicago, New York, Washington ...

Had not arrived in time to the appointment at the embassy.
Even having done so, the lawyer assured me that in Madrid I manage "the papers" to be back in time to Kentucky.
The Three Kings do not stop in this country so classes start on Monday 4 January.

Surely he had touched me buy another ticket for another day. The joke would have been $ 1500 a portion of the $ 1200 that would have spent to travel to Europe at this time.

Those who think profs ask visitors program for the next course in the coming days in the BOE will the new call. Suerte!

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COLLEAGUES ASKING THE GOVERNMENT TO SPAIN safe haven for LGBT BE PURSUED IN THE WORLD

Madrid, 17 December 2009. The Spanish Confederation COLLEAGUES Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender want to congratulate the Spanish government for granting political asylum to a gay Iranian who suffered torture and persecution because of their sexual orientation. This is the first specifically applied for asylum based on sexual orientation persecution, as contained in the newly adopted Law on Asylum and Refuge. This last law incorporating explicitly the grounds of persecution based on sexual orientation or gender identity, has been a long battle for COLLEAGUES claim and other human rights organizations. "Ali has been very lucky to get out in time for Iran before swelling the long list that currently has 10 young gay men sentenced to death for the crime of lavat (sodomy) in Iran and are awaiting appeals or his impending execution.


Spain and Europe can not remain unmoved by the human drama of these young people, and should push strongly to the Iranian theocratic regime to prevent the hunt inhumane, "said Paco Ramirez, secretary of organization of colleagues. "From COLLEAGUES encourage you to press the Iranian embassies and consulates to force a change in judicial policy of the Persian country. Through the campaign COLLEAGUES FOR IRAN (www.colegasporiran.tk) trying to raise awareness and help make this change possible, "added Ramirez. "For colleagues, Spain continues to be a world leader in social progress and respect for human rights. There are many homosexuals and transsexuals who are currently risking their physical integrity or even their lives by not hide their sexual status in many countries. We therefore invite the Spanish government that Spain will become a safe haven for those persecuted for their sexual status, "said Paco Ramirez. "Spain should be more generous in granting political asylum can not be a policy of words without deeds, and now Spain is one of the 7 countries of the European Union unless attaches homes, accepting even less than 5% of the requests for asylum made. Spain gives 11 times less homes than Italy, 30 times less than France, 32 times less than Germany and 50 times less than the UK, "said Ramirez.

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Carrascosa guilty in U.S. court

New Jersey Judge Donald Venezia Maria Jose Carrascosa condemned the U.S. prison in Spanish since 2006 by a dispute regarding custody of the daughter he had with an American.

"I maintain I am innocent. I would ask you another chance to prove my innocence, as an international court has ruled, Carrascosa asked the judge in the courtroom before knowing the ruling by the nine crimes that in November a jury found her guilty.

The sentence of 14 years in prison, may be appealed by the defenders of the Spanish.


Carrascosa, who arrived in handcuffs and with the green dress uniform of prey, listened tearfully to the judge saying that his case was "a real disgrace. This is a case of hatred and revenge that has created you, who has seen his daughter a mere property, a piece on the chessboard. Find: the game is over ".

The ruling by Judge Venezia, which can be appealed by the defenders of the Spanish, means that if Carrascosa the meet as a whole, his daughter, Victoria Solenne, the greater the age to an end, since the baby was born in 2000 .

The girl, who lives in Valencia with grandparents, older age is when Maria Jose is free.

The judge also said Mary Joseph, said the sentence, "is what he deserves for his daughter start her own arms and the arms of her ex-husband." "You should think that your daughter this Christmas will have neither a mother nor a father to be embraced, not open the presents with any of you," the judge said he Carrascosa, but noted it would reconsider the sentence in the case of the girl back to America.

The Spanish, 44 and a lawyer by profession, was married to Peter Innes between 1999 and 2004, and his daughter, who lives in Valencia with his grandparents, was born in April 2000.

Carrascosa decided in 2005 to take Spain to the daughter by Innes and since then has refused to return the U.S. to the child, as has been embroiled in a complex legal situation, which has been complicated with the time and in which there is a conflict of case law between the Spanish and American.

Carrascosa has always defended his decision to travel to Spain with his daughter because she wanted to escape from Innes, whom he accused of abuse and having tried to poison slowly with the supposed aim of keeping their heritage, she said during the trial.

The process began when on 23 August 2006 the New Jersey Superior Court decided, at the request of Innes, that within ten days the mother must give to the child.

As Carrascosa was that time in America, the New Jersey court took away his passport and banned him from leaving the country, thus, unable to return to Spain and give his daughter on time, Jose Maria hid to try to avoid imprisonment, until he was arrested on 21 November 2006.

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