so i finally got caught up on the christmas trip post. now, let's see - last weekend i just went skiing, in engelberg-titlis which is about 2.5 hours away, it was 2 train transfers though, which is far too many while carrying skis and boots, i am really not impressed with this whole swiss skiing thing so far. i think one, it would be better with a car obviously, but still, two, it takes forever from the time i walk out of my house to the time i start skiing. for example, at this hill, it took 4 gondolas about 30 minutes to get from the base station to the top, and then walking up 5 flights of stairs, and about 500 m before you can strap in - ridiculous. in any case, the snow there wasn't too bad, the weather was great for awhile, then it got pretty foggy and the light was pretty flat. in any case - i got some good skiing in nonetheless, and by the end of the day i'd dropped a couple cliffs, caught some air, and skied some bumps. can't wait to go harder and hit bigger stuff, i'm really enjoying this skiing thing. the ski out at the end of the day was pretty good too. unfortunately had a bit of a backpack debacle, but at the end of the day nothing bad happened so it's all good. heard some german pop music at the apres ski hut, played some chinese chess waiting for the train home. had a nice relaxing sunday, didn't do too much really, just play a bunch of guitar - can play some barre chords now, somehow. can't wait to go home and get an electric actually.
in other news i also got a new ski jacket, the old helly one was finally giving out, the zipper broke and it was actually really really old. from sport fabrik i got a nice north face jacket on 70% sale from 750 chf, such a good deal actually. also got some running tights - haven't taken them running yet though...something about this winter is making me really lazy. it sucks. gotta get my act together soon though, 3 months is not a long time for a marathon...
inspired by 'mayham' and the best ham i've ever had in my life, we held a 'ham and mayham' party last week as well, centering mostly around ham and beer.
all is well at work, maybe the one important thing that i will do here is present my work at a design review, surprisingly some of my work has been useful. in any case, this will probably be the extent of my involvement here at alstom.
going skiing again this weekend, at laax-flims this time, should be good i hope, less gondola and backpack debacles. excited though, can't wait to get more air.
also, the dream seems to be dying. i am kinda sad, i got a job for the summer in calgary, so i guess if anyone reads this, i will be home by may 10th.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
christmas trip
so went on this trip over christmas and new years. the day before leaving i had to eat the rest of the food in the house, that was not very pleasant overall really. night train on christmas eve to vienna, austria. pretty cramped night train, awoken at 7 am with a bun and coffee, the bun more or less thrown at my face.
since it was christmas day there wasn't really anything open, took the u bahn through a ghost town basically, dropped stuff at the hostel, headed off to schonbrunn palace. pretty elaborate place, there was a small christmas market outside. coulda gone inside, but the 15 euro or something didn't really seem worth it, seen some palaces before anyway. wandered around the gardens and the 'yard' more or less, there was a zoo that i tried to snipe pics from outside, a big hill, no snow, just green grass on christmas day. some weird looking squirrels, runners with incredibly poor form, and a lot of tourists. got a hot wine at the christmas market, also eggnog with essentially 2 shots of rum and whipped cream on top. after this we headed towards the main part of the city where we stumbled on where all the government buildings, national library, stuff like that were. there were a couple art museums, so, after getting hit by some solid rain, we headed into the kunsthistorisches museum, art history museum. there was a ton of stuff in here, a lot of older art that i'm not a huge fan of, stuff like portraits of a million dudes. some of it was definitely cool for sure, the building itself was beautiful also. there was also an egyptian section, a badass statue of thesius clubbing a centaur, and some history on the habsburg empire as well. too much though, definitely pretty tired from walking around this. after the museum, went back to the palace to see a really shitty concert, scammed by some guys selling tickets outsides basically. not good. enough on that. went to eat some sushi at 'wok and more' which was pretty good, then just went back to chill at the hostel, played some pool and hung out.
woke up the next day, went to check out this st. stephen's church, there was a big mass going on, it was very cool actually. definitely one of the top 3 churches that i have seen so far, there were a lot of people though - but good to see nonetheless. took a short walk to some random park, where they used park benches to fence off the grass, rather than using benches. went to a nice small cafe 'kleines cafe' actually it was called, appropriately, to try some of this famous austrian coffee. i ordered a brauner, which is basically something like espresso with just a bit of milk. really good, i thought. and had some apfelstrudel as well. took the metro to some random stop cause we wanted to see the danube river, and ended up next to this pretty cool church, completely deserted, got some good pictures of it too. it was a nice walk on the bridge across the river, beautifully sunny day. visited this museum called haus der musik, just a pretty cool music museum. there was a room of mozart remixes that would have been perfect for a dance party. had supper at some badass restaurant in a wine cellar which was quite good actually, and so intense from the dark environment. it was like we were meeting to discuss important news from a faraway land. then we went to go see avatar in 3D. it was very, very awesome. i want to watch it again in imax 3D. such a cool movie.
woke up the next day, went for another pretty good viennese coffee, walked around a bit again, checked out the royal library and stuff like that, looked from outside of a butterfly garden, had a photoshoot in a park. went to eat at the centimeter, where we ordered 'the sword', far too much meat and fried food in one place at one time. schnitzel, pork chops, chicken wings, fries, and 5 L of beer at the table also did not help. post centimeter nap was very necessary. after this, we went to the opera for some standing room tickets for like 4 euro. the opera was 'la forza del destino' - i liked it very much, i love live orchestra anytime so i would have been happy just with that. but the singing was incredible and the translator screens on the seat in front helped a lot. it was really incredible and the opera house itself was very beautiful as well. saw all the austrians wearing their coat and tails and fur coats...one day, i will be classy enough to go back and get front row seats. great experience for now anyways.
next day the main goal was to hop on the three hour train to budapest, the ride there on the austrian train was great, equal in comfort to the swiss trains, the countryside was really awesome to see because mostly i just get to see big cities. but it was still green, in december, old looking houses and farms and little villages, great to see because it's something i don't usually think about while traveling. the train is good for that. arriving in the station in budapest was a bit hectic, got heckled by a bunch of sketchy people offering hostels and taxis and stuff, but overall not terrible at all. after withdrawing about 40000 from the bank machine (haha 1 chf/1 dollar = 180 hungarian forints) made off to navigate the metro system to find our hostel. got a nice sit down chat with the guy running the hostel and he basically told us what to do and where to go. went first to go check out these two super cool new buildings, one was an arts center where we found out that we could see a concert for about 1.50. it was nighttime and they were lit up, and right by the danube so the bridges and river and the lights were just amazing, took some time to check it out and take some pictures. went back to the main train station to meet up with everyone else, then just had some supper, went to sleep.
woke up the next day to hit up this really cool indoor market - basically they had everything there, food, clothes, fur hats, more food. whole pigs, foie gras, liquor, fruit, so many eggs, veggies, bread - yea i love markets, especially farmer/food markets. very cool. grabbed some food, cabbage roll and goulash - so hearty and cheap also and tasty. after the market we headed toward the buda castle, walked up a bit of a hill and checked out a great view of the city, and the river. after hanging out here and seeing the hungarian changing of the guards, we headed towards the thermal baths - budapest apparently is famous for them. on the way, somehow stumbled on a christmas market in the main square, which was actually really well done. had a nice warm hot white wine, and sampled the hungarian christmas delicacy known as the steaming bread tube. basically dough wrapped around a cylinder and roasted over a fire and covered in sugar/nuts/cinnamon etc. so good. hit these thermal baths - there were a lot of people there, a lot of pools as well, but besides being pretty big and looking bad ass it wasn't as great as i expected - the roman baths that i went to on the wellness weekend in switzerland were really amazing i thought, compared to these. still good though - after some good relaxing we headed back towards those awesome art buildings to catch a show - a hungarian pop star. grabbed some super cheap kebabs on the way, and the friendly shopkeeper offered all of us a small cup of cola. weird haha, they didn't really know what was going on, hadn't really heard of canada and we were just kinda wandering around in some random part of the city as well. the 1.50 tickets to the hungarian pop star meant we had to get there a bit early and standing room towards the rafters - still really good though, more comfortable than the standing room in vienna at the opera (where it was also packed and really hot) so this show was pretty good in that regard. i love live music as long as it's not horrible so this show was actually quite good. obviously had no idea what he was saying, but he was definitely rocking out. towards the end there was a violin solo type thing which was very good also. also there was an electric mandolin. went back to the hostel, to sample some 'unicum' which we had picked up at the grocery store earlier - it is a herbal liqueur of some sort - tastes absolutely horrible though. it is like jaegermeister gone rogue, and i really like jaegermeister also. yea, haha glad that i had the unicum experience though, apparently hungarians just love it. also had picked up some hungarian beer earlier - not so good, in my opinion. hung out for a bit more and just chilllled.
next day, headed back to the christmas market in the main square, of course ate some more steaming bread tube. went shopping for some ridiculous clothing, in four stores that were pretty much exactly the same. pretty cheap though and i got some sweet shirts. walked down through more of the market as well, was cold and cloudy and foggy though. walked along the river, towards some bridges and towards parliament. the buildings themselves are pretty cool i thought. didn't get pre-bought tickets so didn't actually get to go inside but it was a nice walk nonetheless. randomly took a metro and ended up somewhere in the main part of town by the food market earlier. just hung out in a restaurant and had about 70 beers before heading back, grabbing backpacks, and hopping on a night train bound for prague.
this night train arrived in prague at 3:30 am in the morning, it was tooo early. had some wine on the train, the guy running the car tried to sell me some beer also. in any case, arrived in prague in the middle of the night and proceeded to start wandering. found a mac donalds, a main square where there was a christmas market set up, walked towards the river and ended up just wandering around some cobblestone streets looking for a metro station. somehow we ended up at the hostel, which opened at 7 am, at around 6 or so i think, so just chillin in a tram shelter for awhile. luckily they had a room for us right away so grabbed some well deserved sleep for awhile. the next day was new years eve, so woke up and by the time we shook off arriving at 3 am, it was already time for supper. found this good place for some hearty food and good czech pilsner urquell. a nice little walk over charles bridge and headed over to some big famous club for new year's eve - 5 floors, nothing really that special though. a lot of guys. also handed out some terrible champagne at the door. in any case, that was another year to add i guess. got home pretty late, and then just slept and had another bit of a lazy morning.
next day, took the metro and went to walk around the town, stumbled on this beautiful hotel restaurant cafe where i had some delicious onion soup and eggs and breakfast. the washroom there also had the most majestic golden swan tap. then we found perhaps the nicest mall i have ever been in, and proceeded to walk around the city until we got to the main square where there was another christmas market going on. here was where i got the best ham i have ever had in my life, it was amazing. there were also freshly made stroopwafels as well. very cool christmas market - i think either the prague or budapest or basel ones were my favorite. somehow we ended up eating some more at another restaurant, and then basically just headed back to the hostel to chill. me and chris decided to go on a night adventure on the metro and ended up wandering around, taking some great pictures, and somehow ended up at the train station that we had arrived in. prague is really a beautiful city, in terms of buildings and architecture, cobblestone streets it is hands down the most 'badass' city i have been in. lots of architecture styles, but i would like to think that the prominent one was 'gothic' so lots of spiky spires which are really awesome. ended our adventures at mac donalds again, got some beer at the mac donalds, no big deal, some family was there with their kid, just havin some beers at the mac donalds. in any case mac donalds is pretty good once in awhile. as we were heading back, it started snowing! the first snow on the 'christmas' trip. it was very nice actually.
last day in prague. tried to get to the walking tour, ran up and down the longest escalators in the world i'm pretty sure in the prague metro - well i guess that's just one more side comment here - you never really know how far underground you are in the metro, like in madrid, munich, budapest, vienna, prague, berlin - how far are you underground?? like there could be 3 or 4 huge escalators before you get to the ground surface, it's incredible. anyways, ended up finally making it to where we're supposed to meet for the free tour. really great guy, keith, showed us around the city, pointed out some super neat things. took a bunch of pictures along the way obviously, the main churches, the lame astronomical clock, some defenestrations, the river, the bridges, the castle, jewish quarter, synagogues, and this cool bagel place also. great tour, it was definitely snowing a bunch and pretty chilly though. after the tour, i got more of the best ham in the world, and purchased a prague hat. then went grocery shopping for supplies for the long train ride home. also 10 dollars bought enough food for 3 people for like 3 days i think. so cheap.
hopped on the night train bound for home, hung out in the train car which was pretty comfortable i thought - side note, between the three night trains i would say that this last one was the most comfortable. talked to this very awesome german guy, otmar, who told us about what it was like living in germany when it was still east and west germany. super, super cool. also german people in general i have found are very outgoing, friendly, super cool, speak great english. really amazing i think, really like german people. it was a 14 hour train ride from prague to baden, but somehow the train got delayed by like 3 hours because of the snow on the tracks over the mountains, so basically didn't end up getting home till 17 or 18 hours after we had left. in any case, it was an amazing trip, and i just wish that i had more time. i would love to go back to vienna again to see some more ballet or opera or orchestra, back to budapest for sure, very friendly people that just want you to enjoy their city, lots of museums and things to see and do that i didn't really get a chance to, and back to prague because i didn't even get to go explore the castle. or have enough absinthe.
for the rest of that weekend, just chilled out and relaxed and cleaned up before having to head back to work, sigh, on monday. happy new year everyone!
since it was christmas day there wasn't really anything open, took the u bahn through a ghost town basically, dropped stuff at the hostel, headed off to schonbrunn palace. pretty elaborate place, there was a small christmas market outside. coulda gone inside, but the 15 euro or something didn't really seem worth it, seen some palaces before anyway. wandered around the gardens and the 'yard' more or less, there was a zoo that i tried to snipe pics from outside, a big hill, no snow, just green grass on christmas day. some weird looking squirrels, runners with incredibly poor form, and a lot of tourists. got a hot wine at the christmas market, also eggnog with essentially 2 shots of rum and whipped cream on top. after this we headed towards the main part of the city where we stumbled on where all the government buildings, national library, stuff like that were. there were a couple art museums, so, after getting hit by some solid rain, we headed into the kunsthistorisches museum, art history museum. there was a ton of stuff in here, a lot of older art that i'm not a huge fan of, stuff like portraits of a million dudes. some of it was definitely cool for sure, the building itself was beautiful also. there was also an egyptian section, a badass statue of thesius clubbing a centaur, and some history on the habsburg empire as well. too much though, definitely pretty tired from walking around this. after the museum, went back to the palace to see a really shitty concert, scammed by some guys selling tickets outsides basically. not good. enough on that. went to eat some sushi at 'wok and more' which was pretty good, then just went back to chill at the hostel, played some pool and hung out.
woke up the next day, went to check out this st. stephen's church, there was a big mass going on, it was very cool actually. definitely one of the top 3 churches that i have seen so far, there were a lot of people though - but good to see nonetheless. took a short walk to some random park, where they used park benches to fence off the grass, rather than using benches. went to a nice small cafe 'kleines cafe' actually it was called, appropriately, to try some of this famous austrian coffee. i ordered a brauner, which is basically something like espresso with just a bit of milk. really good, i thought. and had some apfelstrudel as well. took the metro to some random stop cause we wanted to see the danube river, and ended up next to this pretty cool church, completely deserted, got some good pictures of it too. it was a nice walk on the bridge across the river, beautifully sunny day. visited this museum called haus der musik, just a pretty cool music museum. there was a room of mozart remixes that would have been perfect for a dance party. had supper at some badass restaurant in a wine cellar which was quite good actually, and so intense from the dark environment. it was like we were meeting to discuss important news from a faraway land. then we went to go see avatar in 3D. it was very, very awesome. i want to watch it again in imax 3D. such a cool movie.
woke up the next day, went for another pretty good viennese coffee, walked around a bit again, checked out the royal library and stuff like that, looked from outside of a butterfly garden, had a photoshoot in a park. went to eat at the centimeter, where we ordered 'the sword', far too much meat and fried food in one place at one time. schnitzel, pork chops, chicken wings, fries, and 5 L of beer at the table also did not help. post centimeter nap was very necessary. after this, we went to the opera for some standing room tickets for like 4 euro. the opera was 'la forza del destino' - i liked it very much, i love live orchestra anytime so i would have been happy just with that. but the singing was incredible and the translator screens on the seat in front helped a lot. it was really incredible and the opera house itself was very beautiful as well. saw all the austrians wearing their coat and tails and fur coats...one day, i will be classy enough to go back and get front row seats. great experience for now anyways.
next day the main goal was to hop on the three hour train to budapest, the ride there on the austrian train was great, equal in comfort to the swiss trains, the countryside was really awesome to see because mostly i just get to see big cities. but it was still green, in december, old looking houses and farms and little villages, great to see because it's something i don't usually think about while traveling. the train is good for that. arriving in the station in budapest was a bit hectic, got heckled by a bunch of sketchy people offering hostels and taxis and stuff, but overall not terrible at all. after withdrawing about 40000 from the bank machine (haha 1 chf/1 dollar = 180 hungarian forints) made off to navigate the metro system to find our hostel. got a nice sit down chat with the guy running the hostel and he basically told us what to do and where to go. went first to go check out these two super cool new buildings, one was an arts center where we found out that we could see a concert for about 1.50. it was nighttime and they were lit up, and right by the danube so the bridges and river and the lights were just amazing, took some time to check it out and take some pictures. went back to the main train station to meet up with everyone else, then just had some supper, went to sleep.
woke up the next day to hit up this really cool indoor market - basically they had everything there, food, clothes, fur hats, more food. whole pigs, foie gras, liquor, fruit, so many eggs, veggies, bread - yea i love markets, especially farmer/food markets. very cool. grabbed some food, cabbage roll and goulash - so hearty and cheap also and tasty. after the market we headed toward the buda castle, walked up a bit of a hill and checked out a great view of the city, and the river. after hanging out here and seeing the hungarian changing of the guards, we headed towards the thermal baths - budapest apparently is famous for them. on the way, somehow stumbled on a christmas market in the main square, which was actually really well done. had a nice warm hot white wine, and sampled the hungarian christmas delicacy known as the steaming bread tube. basically dough wrapped around a cylinder and roasted over a fire and covered in sugar/nuts/cinnamon etc. so good. hit these thermal baths - there were a lot of people there, a lot of pools as well, but besides being pretty big and looking bad ass it wasn't as great as i expected - the roman baths that i went to on the wellness weekend in switzerland were really amazing i thought, compared to these. still good though - after some good relaxing we headed back towards those awesome art buildings to catch a show - a hungarian pop star. grabbed some super cheap kebabs on the way, and the friendly shopkeeper offered all of us a small cup of cola. weird haha, they didn't really know what was going on, hadn't really heard of canada and we were just kinda wandering around in some random part of the city as well. the 1.50 tickets to the hungarian pop star meant we had to get there a bit early and standing room towards the rafters - still really good though, more comfortable than the standing room in vienna at the opera (where it was also packed and really hot) so this show was pretty good in that regard. i love live music as long as it's not horrible so this show was actually quite good. obviously had no idea what he was saying, but he was definitely rocking out. towards the end there was a violin solo type thing which was very good also. also there was an electric mandolin. went back to the hostel, to sample some 'unicum' which we had picked up at the grocery store earlier - it is a herbal liqueur of some sort - tastes absolutely horrible though. it is like jaegermeister gone rogue, and i really like jaegermeister also. yea, haha glad that i had the unicum experience though, apparently hungarians just love it. also had picked up some hungarian beer earlier - not so good, in my opinion. hung out for a bit more and just chilllled.
next day, headed back to the christmas market in the main square, of course ate some more steaming bread tube. went shopping for some ridiculous clothing, in four stores that were pretty much exactly the same. pretty cheap though and i got some sweet shirts. walked down through more of the market as well, was cold and cloudy and foggy though. walked along the river, towards some bridges and towards parliament. the buildings themselves are pretty cool i thought. didn't get pre-bought tickets so didn't actually get to go inside but it was a nice walk nonetheless. randomly took a metro and ended up somewhere in the main part of town by the food market earlier. just hung out in a restaurant and had about 70 beers before heading back, grabbing backpacks, and hopping on a night train bound for prague.
this night train arrived in prague at 3:30 am in the morning, it was tooo early. had some wine on the train, the guy running the car tried to sell me some beer also. in any case, arrived in prague in the middle of the night and proceeded to start wandering. found a mac donalds, a main square where there was a christmas market set up, walked towards the river and ended up just wandering around some cobblestone streets looking for a metro station. somehow we ended up at the hostel, which opened at 7 am, at around 6 or so i think, so just chillin in a tram shelter for awhile. luckily they had a room for us right away so grabbed some well deserved sleep for awhile. the next day was new years eve, so woke up and by the time we shook off arriving at 3 am, it was already time for supper. found this good place for some hearty food and good czech pilsner urquell. a nice little walk over charles bridge and headed over to some big famous club for new year's eve - 5 floors, nothing really that special though. a lot of guys. also handed out some terrible champagne at the door. in any case, that was another year to add i guess. got home pretty late, and then just slept and had another bit of a lazy morning.
next day, took the metro and went to walk around the town, stumbled on this beautiful hotel restaurant cafe where i had some delicious onion soup and eggs and breakfast. the washroom there also had the most majestic golden swan tap. then we found perhaps the nicest mall i have ever been in, and proceeded to walk around the city until we got to the main square where there was another christmas market going on. here was where i got the best ham i have ever had in my life, it was amazing. there were also freshly made stroopwafels as well. very cool christmas market - i think either the prague or budapest or basel ones were my favorite. somehow we ended up eating some more at another restaurant, and then basically just headed back to the hostel to chill. me and chris decided to go on a night adventure on the metro and ended up wandering around, taking some great pictures, and somehow ended up at the train station that we had arrived in. prague is really a beautiful city, in terms of buildings and architecture, cobblestone streets it is hands down the most 'badass' city i have been in. lots of architecture styles, but i would like to think that the prominent one was 'gothic' so lots of spiky spires which are really awesome. ended our adventures at mac donalds again, got some beer at the mac donalds, no big deal, some family was there with their kid, just havin some beers at the mac donalds. in any case mac donalds is pretty good once in awhile. as we were heading back, it started snowing! the first snow on the 'christmas' trip. it was very nice actually.
last day in prague. tried to get to the walking tour, ran up and down the longest escalators in the world i'm pretty sure in the prague metro - well i guess that's just one more side comment here - you never really know how far underground you are in the metro, like in madrid, munich, budapest, vienna, prague, berlin - how far are you underground?? like there could be 3 or 4 huge escalators before you get to the ground surface, it's incredible. anyways, ended up finally making it to where we're supposed to meet for the free tour. really great guy, keith, showed us around the city, pointed out some super neat things. took a bunch of pictures along the way obviously, the main churches, the lame astronomical clock, some defenestrations, the river, the bridges, the castle, jewish quarter, synagogues, and this cool bagel place also. great tour, it was definitely snowing a bunch and pretty chilly though. after the tour, i got more of the best ham in the world, and purchased a prague hat. then went grocery shopping for supplies for the long train ride home. also 10 dollars bought enough food for 3 people for like 3 days i think. so cheap.
hopped on the night train bound for home, hung out in the train car which was pretty comfortable i thought - side note, between the three night trains i would say that this last one was the most comfortable. talked to this very awesome german guy, otmar, who told us about what it was like living in germany when it was still east and west germany. super, super cool. also german people in general i have found are very outgoing, friendly, super cool, speak great english. really amazing i think, really like german people. it was a 14 hour train ride from prague to baden, but somehow the train got delayed by like 3 hours because of the snow on the tracks over the mountains, so basically didn't end up getting home till 17 or 18 hours after we had left. in any case, it was an amazing trip, and i just wish that i had more time. i would love to go back to vienna again to see some more ballet or opera or orchestra, back to budapest for sure, very friendly people that just want you to enjoy their city, lots of museums and things to see and do that i didn't really get a chance to, and back to prague because i didn't even get to go explore the castle. or have enough absinthe.
for the rest of that weekend, just chilled out and relaxed and cleaned up before having to head back to work, sigh, on monday. happy new year everyone!
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
skiing in flumserberg
a couple of sick days at home last week, which wasn't all that bad just did some relaxing, played some guitar. pretty chill weekend, watched the movie '500 days of summer' which i really like actually, pretty cool movie i thought. on sunday went out to flumserberg for some skiing, great weather, great snow. it's about 1.5 hours away by train to the bottom of the gondola which was really convenient. i have never seen so many people walking around in ski boots either, they just wear them everywhere, for the 1.5 hours from baden on the bus to the bottom of the gondola, i don't understand how their feet are not just killing them. the skiing was great though, exponential increase in ability, i feel great now, just to hit the trees and the bumps, excited for that for sure. off-piste is also something that people do not do here, there is untouched snow everywhere. good day.
ate some cheese fondue yesterday, also made some wings the night before that which were also good. baked some shortbread cookies with some assistance also, turned out pretty good i thought. not many people at work this week, mostly just me, and my boss unfortunately. in any case it's been slow, can't wait till thursday night, hopping on a night train to vienna, from there to budapest and prague, i'm really looking forward to this christmas trip with some great company.
merry christmas happy holidays and have a great new year!
ate some cheese fondue yesterday, also made some wings the night before that which were also good. baked some shortbread cookies with some assistance also, turned out pretty good i thought. not many people at work this week, mostly just me, and my boss unfortunately. in any case it's been slow, can't wait till thursday night, hopping on a night train to vienna, from there to budapest and prague, i'm really looking forward to this christmas trip with some great company.
merry christmas happy holidays and have a great new year!
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
winter
last thursday i went to germany for groceries, except for this time to familia markt which was just glorious, it's like superstore. i was overwhelmed by the selection and spent two hours in there and too many euros. yea, and ate chips and drank beer on the train home.
friday went to zurich to play in this amateur volleyball tournament sponsored by alstom. there were like 80 teams or something, we got manhandled pretty well, i don't think any swiss people got the 'amateur' memo. they all showed up in court shoes and kneepads. in any case, i thought it was really fun and now i want to play volleyball again. got a couple good hits in any case.
saturday i made banana pancakes and i will certainly be making a lot more banana pancakes in the future. took a train to basel, walked around and hung out. it was pretty cold actually - it's been snowing the past few days, just a little bit though, but even at -5 or -10 it's soo cold for some reason. hung out at the christmas market in basel, i thought it was really good. drank some gluhwein (hot wine) and checked out the decorated streets. good stuff, took the hot wine into a bank to use the bank machine. is that weird? drinking wine from a mug at an atm? i wonder how that would be received in canada. went for dinner in this restaurant that i had found on the internet, basically it's some sort of vietnamese/chinese/indian/thai/indonesian type restaurant which was actually really, really good. i got some 'beef noodle soup' not quite the same as the original or whatever, but definitely really good. there is one in zurich as well so i will be going a few more times for sure. after dinner was a chilly walk to the theatre, went to go see the nutcracker ballet performed by the madrid ballet. basically i would not want to fight a male ballet dancer. i don't understand how it is possible for people to make their feet do that also. it was pretty cool though, i liked it and i definitely want to see another one, with a live orchestra next time hopefully too. wandering around the streets at night, we stumbled into some cafe/restaurant type thing where there was a live funk/soul/jazz band playing and chilled out there for awhile, pretty cool. stayed the night in basel in the plainest hostel room ever.
next day, woke up and hit up fondation beyeler, a really awesome museum art space thing. the building itself was beautiful, and there was some really amazing art in it as well. some van gogh, monet, a bunch of picasso, giacometti, cezanne, all of those guys basically were there. my favorite was an impressionist painting of water lilies by monet. the temporary exhibit was really great too, this artist named jenny holzer and she had a bunch of led lights and some really striking pieces i thought. very very cool place.
hopped on a train to cross the border to mulhouse in france, to check out that christmas market. probably don't need to go to mulhouse is my overall impression. the market was pretty good, the basel one was better though in my mind. again, all the streets were decorated and stuff which was quite nice. ended up walking around for awhile, bought a model dinosaur, drank a bunch of hot wine, ate macaroons which were so good, tried to find a restaurant but then just ended up going back to basel to the same place as the night before. it's called lily's and it is so good. they also have really good tea.
so far this week, there was a christmas party on monday, we did secret santa and beer pong tournament as well as photo contest results - the photo contest was an idea by brittany and i to have, it turned out quite hilarious and pretty well. did a bunch of cleaning last night, and then today, i have taken a sick day. i am unfortunately kinda sick, this is terrible. oh well. so far i have played guitar and ate soup, i guess i can't complain too much.
this weekend i'm gonna rock some skiing on sunday i hope. and getting ready for christmas trip. time's flown by so fast, can't believe it's already christmas. happy holidays everyone!
friday went to zurich to play in this amateur volleyball tournament sponsored by alstom. there were like 80 teams or something, we got manhandled pretty well, i don't think any swiss people got the 'amateur' memo. they all showed up in court shoes and kneepads. in any case, i thought it was really fun and now i want to play volleyball again. got a couple good hits in any case.
saturday i made banana pancakes and i will certainly be making a lot more banana pancakes in the future. took a train to basel, walked around and hung out. it was pretty cold actually - it's been snowing the past few days, just a little bit though, but even at -5 or -10 it's soo cold for some reason. hung out at the christmas market in basel, i thought it was really good. drank some gluhwein (hot wine) and checked out the decorated streets. good stuff, took the hot wine into a bank to use the bank machine. is that weird? drinking wine from a mug at an atm? i wonder how that would be received in canada. went for dinner in this restaurant that i had found on the internet, basically it's some sort of vietnamese/chinese/indian/thai/indonesian type restaurant which was actually really, really good. i got some 'beef noodle soup' not quite the same as the original or whatever, but definitely really good. there is one in zurich as well so i will be going a few more times for sure. after dinner was a chilly walk to the theatre, went to go see the nutcracker ballet performed by the madrid ballet. basically i would not want to fight a male ballet dancer. i don't understand how it is possible for people to make their feet do that also. it was pretty cool though, i liked it and i definitely want to see another one, with a live orchestra next time hopefully too. wandering around the streets at night, we stumbled into some cafe/restaurant type thing where there was a live funk/soul/jazz band playing and chilled out there for awhile, pretty cool. stayed the night in basel in the plainest hostel room ever.
next day, woke up and hit up fondation beyeler, a really awesome museum art space thing. the building itself was beautiful, and there was some really amazing art in it as well. some van gogh, monet, a bunch of picasso, giacometti, cezanne, all of those guys basically were there. my favorite was an impressionist painting of water lilies by monet. the temporary exhibit was really great too, this artist named jenny holzer and she had a bunch of led lights and some really striking pieces i thought. very very cool place.
hopped on a train to cross the border to mulhouse in france, to check out that christmas market. probably don't need to go to mulhouse is my overall impression. the market was pretty good, the basel one was better though in my mind. again, all the streets were decorated and stuff which was quite nice. ended up walking around for awhile, bought a model dinosaur, drank a bunch of hot wine, ate macaroons which were so good, tried to find a restaurant but then just ended up going back to basel to the same place as the night before. it's called lily's and it is so good. they also have really good tea.
so far this week, there was a christmas party on monday, we did secret santa and beer pong tournament as well as photo contest results - the photo contest was an idea by brittany and i to have, it turned out quite hilarious and pretty well. did a bunch of cleaning last night, and then today, i have taken a sick day. i am unfortunately kinda sick, this is terrible. oh well. so far i have played guitar and ate soup, i guess i can't complain too much.
this weekend i'm gonna rock some skiing on sunday i hope. and getting ready for christmas trip. time's flown by so fast, can't believe it's already christmas. happy holidays everyone!
Monday, December 7, 2009
skiing
last week i saw people carrying umbrellas in the snow, i didn't really realize what was going on but then i realized that it would be so weird if i was carrying an umbrella in the snow at home, so i put it away and put a hat on.
the weekend was pretty good. it was a very long train getting to this ski resort, les diablerets, close to lausanne and lake geneva in the french part of switzerland. carry skis boots and pole and a massive backpack for 4 train transfers was not that fun really. makes me appreciate throwing stuff in the car and driving 45 minutes to the closest ski hill. in any case. there were like 70 people on this iaeste organized ski trip, rented out a whole chalet so that was good. beers on the long train ride, hot wine at the chalet, hung out for the rest of the night more or less, flip cup and stuff. also ran outside and slipped and smoked the back of my head soo hard on the ice, but all it well and i have used my regenerative healing ability to heal it within 2 days. funny thing is that was the only time that i needed a helmet.
walking in ski boots is not that fun either, the walk to the bus station, the bus, and then two gondolas before getting on the glacier was not really appreciated. the gondolas were 150 people jamming into small boxes, not even close to being as good as the 8 person gondolas at home. in any case there were only like 5 runs open at this place on the glacier so i will reserve my judgment of skiing here for a while longer.
so i have never put skis on before, so more or less i looked like a new born baby deer for about half an hour until i got my life together. in any case by the end of the weekend i was throwing down some decent turns and from now it's basically just hitting bigger stuff and getting better, pretty excited, i love learning new things. also i had a pretty awesome teacher that helped me out a lot. good thing is that dave is the exact same size as me somehow and he's going from skiing to boarding so we can switch it up whenever basically so i hit a couple runs on the board and that was fun too.
i guess there was a lot of debauchery the ensued at the chalet, as can be expected from any regular ski trip. i brought speakers and the laptop to start a party, and that certainly happened. ate some cheese fondue which was delicious, washed some dishes, took some showers, good weekend overall basically.
train home, took a long time, more carrying of skis on transfers, went through lausanne. from what i saw of lausanne it is quite pretty (i.e. the train station and the street outside the train station haha) basically just everywhere is decorated with christmas lights and stuff now, even just here in baden it is very very nice in the station and in the old town. i got an advent calendar it is awesome.
i think that's about it except for today is the day somehow that i have miraculously made it this far in my life, 21 years is a long time now that i think about it. good times all around, lots of great friends and great people in my life, thanks to all of you.
the weekend was pretty good. it was a very long train getting to this ski resort, les diablerets, close to lausanne and lake geneva in the french part of switzerland. carry skis boots and pole and a massive backpack for 4 train transfers was not that fun really. makes me appreciate throwing stuff in the car and driving 45 minutes to the closest ski hill. in any case. there were like 70 people on this iaeste organized ski trip, rented out a whole chalet so that was good. beers on the long train ride, hot wine at the chalet, hung out for the rest of the night more or less, flip cup and stuff. also ran outside and slipped and smoked the back of my head soo hard on the ice, but all it well and i have used my regenerative healing ability to heal it within 2 days. funny thing is that was the only time that i needed a helmet.
walking in ski boots is not that fun either, the walk to the bus station, the bus, and then two gondolas before getting on the glacier was not really appreciated. the gondolas were 150 people jamming into small boxes, not even close to being as good as the 8 person gondolas at home. in any case there were only like 5 runs open at this place on the glacier so i will reserve my judgment of skiing here for a while longer.
so i have never put skis on before, so more or less i looked like a new born baby deer for about half an hour until i got my life together. in any case by the end of the weekend i was throwing down some decent turns and from now it's basically just hitting bigger stuff and getting better, pretty excited, i love learning new things. also i had a pretty awesome teacher that helped me out a lot. good thing is that dave is the exact same size as me somehow and he's going from skiing to boarding so we can switch it up whenever basically so i hit a couple runs on the board and that was fun too.
i guess there was a lot of debauchery the ensued at the chalet, as can be expected from any regular ski trip. i brought speakers and the laptop to start a party, and that certainly happened. ate some cheese fondue which was delicious, washed some dishes, took some showers, good weekend overall basically.
train home, took a long time, more carrying of skis on transfers, went through lausanne. from what i saw of lausanne it is quite pretty (i.e. the train station and the street outside the train station haha) basically just everywhere is decorated with christmas lights and stuff now, even just here in baden it is very very nice in the station and in the old town. i got an advent calendar it is awesome.
i think that's about it except for today is the day somehow that i have miraculously made it this far in my life, 21 years is a long time now that i think about it. good times all around, lots of great friends and great people in my life, thanks to all of you.
Friday, December 4, 2009
i have been eating for like 4 people i think
okay i don't think i did that much last week. oh wait, i bought skis! so friggin excited. going skiing tonight, i have never been skiing and only snowboarding before, i am actually just so jacked to learn to throw down some switch 5's. it is gonna be a good weekend.
went to all you can eat sushi again on the wednesday, so ridiculous, it's just that the food is moving, stimulates the hunter instinct, every time i go i eat far too much, yet i keep going back. last week was american thanksgiving so this guy duane from work had a nice dinner that again i ate far too much at. it was actually good though, turkey and stuff. other than that just playing a lot of guitar and it's cold out, just started snowing last week or so, it's nice though, i like it, it's kinda a bit like home. went exploring in the forest behind the house on sunday, wandered around and somehow ended up climbing a ridge, then found that there were stairs that were just on the other side. very cool though, i'm going to miss that so very much, the fact that i have a forest and a mountain behind my house essentially. went and ate a bunch of cheese fondue as well. work christmas party a couple nights ago as well, got a guided tour of baden which i actually thought was pretty interesting. the oldest train station in switzerland in 1854 or something, the clock tower used to be a prison up until 1984, the castle used to be a fortress and there were some wars here and stuff. made the biggest burgers on record last night and watched some planet earth, pretty good.
anyways, that's about it i think. SKIING!
went to all you can eat sushi again on the wednesday, so ridiculous, it's just that the food is moving, stimulates the hunter instinct, every time i go i eat far too much, yet i keep going back. last week was american thanksgiving so this guy duane from work had a nice dinner that again i ate far too much at. it was actually good though, turkey and stuff. other than that just playing a lot of guitar and it's cold out, just started snowing last week or so, it's nice though, i like it, it's kinda a bit like home. went exploring in the forest behind the house on sunday, wandered around and somehow ended up climbing a ridge, then found that there were stairs that were just on the other side. very cool though, i'm going to miss that so very much, the fact that i have a forest and a mountain behind my house essentially. went and ate a bunch of cheese fondue as well. work christmas party a couple nights ago as well, got a guided tour of baden which i actually thought was pretty interesting. the oldest train station in switzerland in 1854 or something, the clock tower used to be a prison up until 1984, the castle used to be a fortress and there were some wars here and stuff. made the biggest burgers on record last night and watched some planet earth, pretty good.
anyways, that's about it i think. SKIING!
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
london
on tuesday i purchased 'battle studies' by john mayer for an exorbitant price at the local record store. it is a good one, pretty chill and maybe a bit more serious, still good and worth it though. on wednesday, i baked a delicious meat pie, tourtiere as it is called in french canada. and attempted lemon meringue but that was a failure, i will work on that one, still baking is not my area of expertise.
left for london on friday night after work. it was a logistical nightmare, i hate flying out of basel and the basel airport on cheap airlines like ryan air and easy jet. it takes ~1.5 hours to get to the basel airport on train+bus. then 'jamming' to get on the plane cause there are no assigned seats. the flight is only 1:10 or so. london gatwick is a ~45 minute + ~20 pound train to the city center. between leaving work and getting to our hostel, took about 6 hours. next time, flying out of zurich to london heathrow, on british airways or swiss air, i will pay the extra little bit for a little more quality.
in any case, london was absolutely amazing. like one of my favorite places so far. threw down our stuff at the hostel, it was chris' birthday on the friday actually, so had to go out, there was no other choice. met up with rachel who got there earlier in the day and her two friends that are living there, it was very much appreciated as well to have locals show us around. proceeded to eat some MACdonalds which was probably a poor decision, and then wandered the streets of london essentially to get to this one bar. got there at around 2, drum and bass was playing, the tube doesn't start running till about 6, so there was no choice but to stay out until about 7 am. great decision. woke up the next day, went to the natural history museum, there was a skating rink outside, it was funny watching people skate. pretty clear why canada vs. england in hockey has never happened. the natural history museum was so awesome. animals, nature, dinosaurs, pretty much just everything that is awesome that exists was in there. spent a good long time hanging out in there, it was very very cool. after the museum we went out to eat at this local pub, it was kind of out of the way but very nice, the food was just very, very solid. just good, proper food, i got a steak, there was a meat pie, and fish and chips. nothing special, i love just good food though. after this pub, we headed over to camden market, this big permanent outdoor/indoor market that i'm pretty sure sold everything, and it was about infinitely big. vintage clothes, shoes, bags, hats, everything for cheap too. we were only there for a couple hours, although if we had stayed longer, i would have likely bought 100x more stuff. so cool. smelled like food too. good food that was available for reasonable prices, like 3 pounds ~= 5 chf maybe. man, i would go back to london just for proper food. also had a starbucks latte, not like i love starbucks that much or anything, but for 2 pounds ~= 3 chf it was actually reasonable rather than the 7 chf that you would pay in zurich. after the market was a theatre show. took the tube to picadilly circus, there were just a ton of people there. i guess it's supposed to be pretty much like times square so yea there were a lot of people. the show was very good, Avenue Q, it's like an adult version of sesame street, pretty inappropriate but hilarious and very well done. seeing as the previous night had been a late/early? one, just headed back to sleep after the show.
the sunday morning we walked through hyde park, just this big park with trees and a ton of squirrels. lots of people walking their very english looking dogs. guards riding horses. overcast day. very nice walk. went to join this free walking tour of all the palaces and such. got devastated by an intense rainstorm. finished the tour. saw most of the sights. went shopping a bit more. got ready to catch the tube to the heathrow airport to go home that night. yup, pretty much just did not make it to the airport on time at all. completely missed the flight. luckily, there was a little bit of confusion with the flight time etc., and the very nice british airways man changed our tickets to the monday morning free of charge. what a nice guy. british airways is pretty classy. so is the heathrow airport. so rachel calls up her friend and she lets us stay over at her house for the night. went and got some greasy chinese take away. it was probably not the greatest, but i haven't had black bean sauce in forever so it was pretty good. woke up early the next morning just to make sure not to miss the plane this time. ate breakfast and had a pint of cider at the airport. it was great.
just a great trip, read a paper on the way back, missed doing that. understanding what people say, reading signs, doing a crossword, i miss just being able to speak to people. definitely want to go back.
callouses on my fingertips, guitar is so fun. i would rather do that than sitting at work right now.
left for london on friday night after work. it was a logistical nightmare, i hate flying out of basel and the basel airport on cheap airlines like ryan air and easy jet. it takes ~1.5 hours to get to the basel airport on train+bus. then 'jamming' to get on the plane cause there are no assigned seats. the flight is only 1:10 or so. london gatwick is a ~45 minute + ~20 pound train to the city center. between leaving work and getting to our hostel, took about 6 hours. next time, flying out of zurich to london heathrow, on british airways or swiss air, i will pay the extra little bit for a little more quality.
in any case, london was absolutely amazing. like one of my favorite places so far. threw down our stuff at the hostel, it was chris' birthday on the friday actually, so had to go out, there was no other choice. met up with rachel who got there earlier in the day and her two friends that are living there, it was very much appreciated as well to have locals show us around. proceeded to eat some MACdonalds which was probably a poor decision, and then wandered the streets of london essentially to get to this one bar. got there at around 2, drum and bass was playing, the tube doesn't start running till about 6, so there was no choice but to stay out until about 7 am. great decision. woke up the next day, went to the natural history museum, there was a skating rink outside, it was funny watching people skate. pretty clear why canada vs. england in hockey has never happened. the natural history museum was so awesome. animals, nature, dinosaurs, pretty much just everything that is awesome that exists was in there. spent a good long time hanging out in there, it was very very cool. after the museum we went out to eat at this local pub, it was kind of out of the way but very nice, the food was just very, very solid. just good, proper food, i got a steak, there was a meat pie, and fish and chips. nothing special, i love just good food though. after this pub, we headed over to camden market, this big permanent outdoor/indoor market that i'm pretty sure sold everything, and it was about infinitely big. vintage clothes, shoes, bags, hats, everything for cheap too. we were only there for a couple hours, although if we had stayed longer, i would have likely bought 100x more stuff. so cool. smelled like food too. good food that was available for reasonable prices, like 3 pounds ~= 5 chf maybe. man, i would go back to london just for proper food. also had a starbucks latte, not like i love starbucks that much or anything, but for 2 pounds ~= 3 chf it was actually reasonable rather than the 7 chf that you would pay in zurich. after the market was a theatre show. took the tube to picadilly circus, there were just a ton of people there. i guess it's supposed to be pretty much like times square so yea there were a lot of people. the show was very good, Avenue Q, it's like an adult version of sesame street, pretty inappropriate but hilarious and very well done. seeing as the previous night had been a late/early? one, just headed back to sleep after the show.
the sunday morning we walked through hyde park, just this big park with trees and a ton of squirrels. lots of people walking their very english looking dogs. guards riding horses. overcast day. very nice walk. went to join this free walking tour of all the palaces and such. got devastated by an intense rainstorm. finished the tour. saw most of the sights. went shopping a bit more. got ready to catch the tube to the heathrow airport to go home that night. yup, pretty much just did not make it to the airport on time at all. completely missed the flight. luckily, there was a little bit of confusion with the flight time etc., and the very nice british airways man changed our tickets to the monday morning free of charge. what a nice guy. british airways is pretty classy. so is the heathrow airport. so rachel calls up her friend and she lets us stay over at her house for the night. went and got some greasy chinese take away. it was probably not the greatest, but i haven't had black bean sauce in forever so it was pretty good. woke up early the next morning just to make sure not to miss the plane this time. ate breakfast and had a pint of cider at the airport. it was great.
just a great trip, read a paper on the way back, missed doing that. understanding what people say, reading signs, doing a crossword, i miss just being able to speak to people. definitely want to go back.
callouses on my fingertips, guitar is so fun. i would rather do that than sitting at work right now.
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