Monday, October 26, 2009

wellness weekend

went to ikea the other day and it was quite good, i like just walking around in there. i bought a knife which i have been needing for awhile, i can cook twice as fast again now.

went on this wellness weekend thing on friday night with iaeste. basically hiked through the night, it was snowing for a couple hours, it was cold, i was wet, the trail was deceptively uphill, i was tired. drank a bunch of wine prior as well. stopped for hot soup and stuff, it was good. made it to this shelter thing at like 4 am. the stars came out, there was a fire, i threw a sandwich on the ground, i tried to eat a sandwich and pulled my jaw muscle. ate breakfast, walked down and the sun was coming up, napped for like 20 minutes on the grass. went down to the town brunnen, to this place called swiss holiday park. there are roman baths there, which are basically just nicely set up hot tubs and steam rooms and saunas, it was so relaxing. there was also a nap room that smelled nice, had calming music and comfy chair/bed things. great! after the spa was dinner at this italian restaurant, i had some delicious pasta and soup. took the train home, got stuck in arth goldau for like 45 minutes. went home and still stayed up for a bit to frame some pics and put them up around the house, it's much nicer now with a bit of art on the walls, also dave painted a picture and that is up as well.

had a good sleep in day on sunday, made some delicious breakfast of eggs benedict. nothing better than poached eggs and hollandaise sauce. just chilled all day, went to play some telephone pictionary which is a sweet game, put some pictures up, stuff like that.

it's been a good week so far, just cooking a bunch of food and baking again tonight. no plans for halloween weekend yet, just party somewhere i guess.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

eindhoven

last week i baked some chocolate muffins and they were very tasty. it is also very cold here now. i ate some roasted chestnuts from the roasted chestnut stand in the train station.

last thursday i took a plane to dusseldorf and some of my relatives (my dad's cousin and her kids who now also have kids) came and picked me up for the hour drive to eindhoven in holland. it was a great time, i ate so much food. went to go see these giant seawalls in zeeland on the north sea which was like an hour and a half drive away, went on a boat, ate a lot of mussels. these dams were built in the 60's-70's and they are massive. without dams, 65% of the netherlands would be underwater. pretty cool. it is really flat there. holland is famous for windmills, but the only windmills i saw were giant wind turbines. and i saw a lot of them. it was also really windy.

came back to the house, ate hot pot for dinner, just ate so much food. shrimp and beef and some crab too and it was just good. stayed up and chatted for awhile and now i know a lot of stories about my dad.

woke up the next day and went to go see one of the kids' football matches, it was pretty cool just to kinda walk around and act like a local. the kid was very good, scored two goals. also after every game they make them take penalty kicks, so that when it comes down to penalties in the world cup or something they will have a lifetime of experience. pretty serious.

after the game i went just for a drive around eindhoven, got some of the stuff pointed out to me, places that my dad used to work and go to school and live and stuff like that. very cool. then went to eat dim sum in this restaurant in the middle of the city. it was also pretty good food. then just walked around town for a bit, some pretty cool art and stuff just around the city. then went to phillips stadium, where PSV plays their matches, there was a game that night but tickets were sold out...next time though.

i got the kids to take me around the neighbourhood and show me their school and parks and stuff, they took me to the bibliotheek. it was fun, kids are cute. also pretty cool seeing a bunch of asian kids running around speaking dutch. went out to the most ridiculous restaurant for dinner, all you can eat pretty much everything that exists. so much fish and seafood, i must have eated 100 shrimps. like sashimi, pickled herring, shrimp, carpaccio, and choose your own grill, so steaks and lamb chops and fish and more shrimp and fish and just. have not eaten that much good food in a long time.

they also took me to a store and i bought some food supplies, like noodles and lemongrass and stuff like that. i went home and just had so much stuff in my backpack. the best were stroopwafels and this dutch black licorice called droop.

i had to get up at like 6 on sunday to drive back to dusseldorf to catch the plane back to zurich, it was such a good weekend though, i'm gonna go back soon.

i came back on sunday morning and pretty much immediately went hiking by kandersteg, it was very cool, green fields, red and yellow trees, and white snowy mountains. a little chilly, but nice fall weather and colours. it was looking really terrible when we walked out the door but i'm glad i went hiking, it was a good short 3 hour one. took a bunch of good pictures too i think.

Monday, October 12, 2009

thanksgiving and europapark

chilled out last week for the most part, went to watch district 9 in perhaps the smallest theater in history, it was a good movie though. went on a tour of a nuclear power plant on saturday morning, it's about 30 minutes away from here, close to germany. very cool to go and stand inside the cooling tower, it's like a big steam room. lots of info that i'm sure i should have remembered from the past 2 years of studying stuff like that. definitely neat to see and something that i would not be able to see at home.

we had thanksgiving dinner on saturday night, got together and ate so much food, chicken, sweet potatoes, pie, just lots of really good food. and some good wine too, nothing better than friends and food and good times really.

had to wake up early on sunday morning, to take the train to freiburg for europapark. apparently the biggest amusement park in germany/europe? in any case it was pretty cool. roller coasters are awesome. after bungee jumping, all of a sudden theme park rides are pretty chill, it's a really cool feeling. of course some carnie food like mini donuts, but i think the ones at the stampede are still pretty good. slept a lot on the 3 hour train ride there and back though, all that food for thanksgiving really took it out of me haha.

flatmates were out for the weekend in istanbul, it was pretty nice to have the place to myself for awhile though. the leaves are falling off the trees, i crunched a bunch of them on my walk to work today.

Monday, October 5, 2009

oktoberfest

went for all you can eat sushi last wednesday in waldshut in germany, ate far too much and couldn't really breathe. after not having sushi in months i realize now that it could very well be my favorite food, very tasty. and some other asian foods besides sushi too which was also good i have to admit.


oktoberfest is in munich and we took the train there on thursday night, it's like a 5 hour train ride from zurich. drank some beer on the train there in preparation. got there and found our campsite, which i liked a lot actually, there's nothing better than camping period, even if it's not really that legit and it's kinda like camping in your backyard. just something about sleeping outside under the stars.


w0ke up early, head down to the oktoberfest fair grounds by a short tram ride. eat a big pretzel. manage to get seats in the hofbrau tent, proceed to drink 3 liters of very good tasting beer in about half an hour. the atmosphere in the tents is just incredible, people singing, drinking, cheers-ing, in general having a great time. and also the food, the food smells/tastes so delicious. the fair itself is also very cool, pretty much like stampede except for more drinking and different (tastier) food. went on some rides after the beer tent, after eating half chickens. bought a sweet hat. went on the ferris wheel, in a fun house, some spinny ride that was probably not a great idea, and bumper cars. the bumper cars were difficult to drive. kind of slept in a park i think. ate some more random food like popcorn and a sausage. walked into another beer tent which was very rowdy, but unfortunately could not get a seat. by the way you need to be sitting at a table in order to buy beer. went back to the campsite and somehow managed to meet up with everyone else that we separated from after the beer tent at a convenience store on the way. just chilled out and ate some delicious pork roast dinner at the campsite. played some settlers of catan which i won. i like that game. felt great, just chilled out, laid on the grass outside for awhile, i would say that 70% of the group weren't doing that well and were passed out in their tents.


head out to the grounds again on saturday morning. pretty much repeated what happened the previous morning, but this time the tent wasn't the greatest. food in there was still delicious though. went on some more rides after that, roller coaster, giant swings. ate half a roasted duck. left the grounds, wander through some trains to get to this giant park. a standing wave on the river through it had people surfing on it. took a nap in the grass by a small waterfall. the city of munich is very pretty, i really liked the buildings. walked around the center of town for awhile, past the royal palace, some churches, and ended up in some bar/restaurant. it was pretty much like the german equivalent of an irish pub. ate some sausages and sauerkraut for dinner, it was soooo good. and a few more liters of beer obviously, it was really, really good weissbier too, definitely one of my favorites of all time. too bad they don't export augustiner from munich. just means i'll have to go back. some delicious apple strudel for dessert too. wander back to the campsite, singing very loudly on the tram ride back. played this game called telephone pictionary which was very fun.

woke up and packed up, caught a free walking tour. ended up eating and drinking more, in the hofbrauhaus, this big beer hall. caught the train back home.