At the time we went, Iceland was one of the few countries in the world that allowed vaccinated foreign visitors. All that was needed was proof of vaccination – not even a pre-entry COVID test. The fact that most people were vaccinated meant that most people were not wearing masks in the city, but this was before even the Delta variant – it seems like so long ago now.

I had been itching to go travel somewhere since the pandemic began, and this was a very welcome nudge towards normalcy. Flying with Icelandair was the same as before: the seat and leg room is pretty comfortable, but there’s no food included with the airfare. The only difference is the extra bureacracy related to COVID, which increased how long it took each person to get through immigration, resulting in long lines after the plane. It didn’t help that we arrived so early in the morning that the food places weren’t even open yet and we had to wait in line while hungry. Eventually, we picked up the rental car and drove into Reykjavik for breakfast. We took the day easy by just exploring Reykjavik on foot, and took a nap in the afternoon when the jet lag caught up to us.

That night, we had probably the most memorable meal we’ve ever had at Tapas Barinn. The great thing about tapas is that as tourists, we get to try a little bit of everything as opposed to ordering entrées.

I even got to try some Flóki single malt whiskey. The smokiness from the whiskey actually comes from the barley smoked using sheep dung, a traditional cooking method. I also got to try some more brennivin like my last trip to Iceland – it’s essentially a grain alcohol (40%) and flavoured with caraway seeds, which gives it a sweeter flavour than something like vodka.

I had visited Iceland a couple years ago, but it was in the winter where there was only 4 hours of light per day, and even then the sky looked like dusk.

This time, travelling there in the summer, I didn’t see the night sky the entire time I was there. I could more clearly see and appreciate the nature around me, like the endless fields of moss growing on the rocks, and sheep freely roaming the fields.

It is thought that the Icelandic sheep were introduced to Iceland by the Viking settlers. Farmers allow them to freely roam around in the summer months, and as winter comes, they round them all back up again.

Like my previous trip to Iceland, we travelled along the Ring Road to see the waterfalls, and the volcanic beaches.

This is what the view at Seljalandsfoss looks like in the summer versus the view I saw in the winter. I had no idea Iceland could be so green. In the summer, people can even walk behind the waterfall, between the rock and the falls itself, but in the winter, the trail is closed because of ice.

Skógafoss looks about the same between summer and winter, except the vegetation is greener in summer.

A kitty even came out to hang out with us! As we were walking, the cat just walked up to us and stopped, expecting pets as a payment to pass through. After that, off it went.

Unlike travelling to Iceland in the winter, there were no restrictions (4WD) to drive up to Dyrhólaey in the summer. As we drove up, I could see why. The road was a set of steep switchbacks on gravel roads that were only a little more than two cars width – and there were no guardrails.

From the top, one can see the endless mountains, or watch the waves crash against the beaches of volanic sand.

The next day, we took a Superjeep tour to see ice caves on an active volcano known as Katla. The reason why it’s called Superjeep is because it can deflate its tires (for icy roads), and inflate them back up again depending on the terrain, but otherwise it looks like your typical Ford Excursion but with big tires.

The ice caves were located a ways in from the glacier. In summer, a lot of the ice had melted, revealing the volanic sand and rock underneath.

Only just now as I was writing this, did I realize we were travelling on a literal volcano, but I suppose it’s safe.

As we headed up the volcano, the lush, green vegetation quickly disappeared, revealing a rocky landscape with a mix of ice and black volcanic rock. Grey clouds covered the sky and it began to rain.

Eventually, the tour guide parked the truck, and we began our volcano hike. He brought his ice pick with him and used it several times to cut steps in the ice.

Despite the summer season, the temperature still felt like a mild winter. But it still meant the ice caves would not be as fully developed as in the winter season, and this could clearly be seen when comparing the ice caves from this trip versus the previous one. In fact, the winter ice cave was really more of a tunnel, while the picture of the summer ice cave was taken from the end of the cave with the camera pointing out.

The ice on top of the volcanic rock looked so alien that several movies used this place as a location for another planet. Rogue One was filmed in the area for the opening scene where young Jyn Erso hides from the stormtroopers. The movie doesn’t show the whole cave, but the similiarity is clear. If the movie had shown the whole cave, one would see why people call it the “Yoda Cave”.

It was nice staying in the cave for a bit as a brief respite from the rain. We made the mistake of wearing jeans for a multi-hour hike in the rain, and our wet clothes just made us even colder. We also got the chance to chat a bit with others on the tour. We met an orthodonist who practised in Greece by the name of Thanos (I wonder if he was aware of the MCU), and another who claimed to be a “voodoo priestess”, whatever that means.

The next morning, the plan was whale and puffin watching. It turned out to be an incredibly bad idea because I apparently get seasick, and didn’t get to see a lot. Even those who did see whales could really only see a small fin barely capturable on camera. Only a small percentage of people get to see the whale flying out of the water and crashing back down. Good thing the puffin watching was on a separate tour so I got to recover from the seasickness, but we decided not to go and instead gave the tickets away to another group that we overheard looking for tickets to the same tour.

Instead, we went to go get some Icelandic hotdogs for lunch. The key things that set it apart are the condiments, and the sausage. In addition to ketchup, and sweet mustard, they also add “remoulade”, similar to mayo with added herbs. The sausage uses lamb, as opposed to chicken/pork/beef.

Next, we headed to the Reykjanes Peninsula and the Blue Lagoon. We reached the tip of the peninsula and stood on the cliff watching the waves crash against the shore. If there was such a thing as the end of the earth, this was it. Despite strong gusts of wind, thousands of birds nested on the side of the cliff. From far away they look like white specks, but one can see them clearly with a good set of binoculars.

Next, we went for a relaxing soak at the Blue Lagoon, a man-made spa fed by water used by a nearby geothermal plant.

The water forms a milky blue colour from the high silica mud, and is supposedly good for the skin. They even sell super overpriced skincare products at the gift shop.

The area is beautiful with all the steam slowly rising from the hot springs with the light cool breeze. It would have felt like a whipping biting wind if not for the hot spring. You just submerge yourself until you feel not too hot and not too cold, and then relax with their cleansing silica face masks and a drink.

After leaving Blue Lagoon, we’d learned there was an active eruption happening at the nearby Fagradalsfjall volcano, and was happening slow enough such that it was OK to go see it.

A short walk from the parking lot led us to the lava flow. The trail continued upstream of the lava flow to the mouth of the volcano.

There were warnings for people to not walk too close to the lava flow because of risks of toxic fumes, but many did it anyway (as did we). Many curious hikers threw rocks on it just to find out that the lava flow had already hardened, even though there were still visible fumes coming out.

The hike turned out to be really long, and we weren’t really prepared to do a multi-hour hike at 20:00 in the cold, wind, and rain. As we reluctantly turned around, we saw people pointing the other and when we looked, we managed to catch a glimpse of the volcano spewing lava from afar. It makes sense now why people call it the “land of ice and fire”

It was surprising to see how watery the lava looked. I expected molten rock to be more viscous. The lava just spewed out in a splash. I felt super lucky to have seen such a sight.

As we walked back, I noticed these hexagonal patterns in the ground. Maybe this is how basalt columns form? From what I’ve read, under certain conditions, the cooling magma can cool in a way that forms these hexagonal shapes.

By the time we reached the parking lot, we were wet and cold (seemed to be a recurring theme by this point). Luckily there was a food truck at the parking lot selling hot soup.

The next morning before heading out to the Golden Circle, we started the day off with a nice brunch at Sandholt.

The unexpected star of the breakfast was the bread. As an amateur baker myself, this is the bread I aspire to make – it’s soft, light and airy with a crisp crust.

Next step along the Golden Circle was Geysir. The geothermal heat creates pressure underground causing the water to explode upward every few minutes. The entire area is filled with geothermal pools, some of which are so hot they’re bubbling from the heat and pressure.

It’s cool just to just stand in anticipation of the eruption. From looking at it, there’s no indication that it’s going to explode at all, and then it just does. At one point, the wind carried the water toward us and got us all wet, but luckily by the time the water hits the ground, it’s cooled down.

From the Geysir, we drove to Gullfoss. Unlike other waterfalls, this one has a unique feature where the water does a zig zag before hitting the bottom.

There were attempts in the past to build a hydroelectric plant here, but those efforts have not succeeded, and since then, the waterfall is now under government protection.

The last destination of the Golden Circle was Kerið crater. It’s believed that the crater formed through volcanic activity. Once the magma chamber emptied, it collapsed, forming the crater. The accumulation of water is not formed by rainfall, but is actually ground water.

On our last day before we left, we got the chance to try more Icelandic dishes. This time we had some lamb soup, dried fish, fermented shark, and some Einstök white ale, a local craft brew.

It’s not often that I would rave about soup, but I liked it so much I’ve been trying to recreate the flavour at home. It’s savoury soup with vegetables, lamb, and herbs/spices. I can’t say I was a huge fan of the dried fish and fermented shark though. The dried fish is served with butter and its flavour reminds me of super tough beef jerky with a light fish flavour, while the fermented shark has a texture of a ham with a soury tang. Perhaps it’s an acquired taste. The beer was great though.

That’s pretty much it for Iceland. We got the chance to try all sorts of local delicacies, and see a piece of nature we wouldn’t normally see in our part of the world. At the airport duty free, I even got to pick up some Brennivin, and a bottle of the Flóki sheep dung whiskey!

See more pictures of my trip to Iceland here

I always thought that Petra was just a single structure – the same one that gets shown everywhere, but that structure is just The Treasury that’s a part of an entire city built in the rocks.

From the entrance, we walked 30 minutes through a winding gorge formed by a fault line that tectonic forces split apart until we reached The Treasury. Stray dogs followed us every step of the way hoping for scraps of food. Leaving at 6:00 didn’t help because the only people that the dogs could beg from was us.

We arrived so early we were practically the only people there. We admired Petra on our own without the large crowds of tourists everywhere. We took our time walking up to it, all around it, up the slope to get a better view (nobody is allowed inside it though). We did all of this before the crowds showed up.

Petra was the capital of a kingdom of the Nabataean, a group of nomadic Arabs who established the city as a major trading hub. The Nabataeans constructed massive structures by carving it all out of the sandstone. Although it’s called The Treasury, the building is believed to have been the mausoleum of the Nabataean King Aretas IV.

The area around Petra is also home to the Bedouin people, a group of nomadic Arab people who inhabit the desert regions in northern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. In the modern times, many have abandoned their nomadic lifestyle and many Bedouin around Petra work as tour guides, offer camel rides, among other things. One of the Bedouin people there is actually the descendent of a woman from New Zealand who married a Bedouin man and wrote about it, called Married to a Bedouin.

The area is over 250 square kilometers, something I totally didn’t expect (because I totally did not do my research before I went). I’m not too big on hiking and I was totally not prepared for a hike that day – I would have totally brought more water, and more food along with me that day. Despite that, I hiked up the 900 or so steps to the monastery anyway, while getting hassled by vendors trying to sell me their junk. Temperature-wise, the temperature shot up to a whopping 20 degrees Celsius from the 0 degrees Celsius just two days before. My body did not like that.

We spent about 8 hours in Petra, walking along the rock faces, seeing the ancient ruins, hiking up the hill, but if I had more energy I totally would have hiked up the other trials for even better views of the area.

For dinner we had mansaf, probably the national dish of Jordan. It’s a delicious dish made with lamb and rice dish mixed with a yogurt sauce! This tasted even better than the chicken rice dish we had the day before. I had no idea that lamb and yogurt was such a great combination. It was a great meal to refuel after such a long day.

More photos of Petra here

We flew into Israel from Tel Aviv and boarded a train to Jerusalem. I totally expected the Middle East to be pretty warm in February, but nope, it was snowing tiny little flakes in Jerusalem. If it weren’t for the Europe trip before this, I would have actually not brought any winter clothes, so I definitely lucked out there.

The Way of the Cross

The crucifixion of Jesus Christ is probably what Jerusalem is most well known for. The Way of the Cross (aka Via Dolorosa) in Jerusalem is what is believed to be the actual path that Jesus walked during his crucifixion – regardless of whether you’re religious or not, it’s still pretty cool to see. This was a key event in the establishment of Christianity. The crucifixion of Jesus is considered to be historically true even by non-religious scholars.

The Way of the Cross begins with Jesus’ encouter with Pontius Pilate, the man who orders Jesus’ crucifixion. The Church of the Flagellation is built on the spot where Jesus was flogged by Roman soldiers before he carries the cross.

It’s said he falls three times during his walk.

Along the way, Jesus encounters several people (although some of these encounters are disputed):

• Mary – his mother
• Simon of Cyrene – he helps Jesus carry the cross
• Veronica – she wipes the sweat off of Jesus’ face, and so Jesus’ image was then supernaturally imprinted on the piece of cloth, now known as the Veil of Veronica
• the pious women – Jesus stops and gives a sermon

Eventually he makes his way to the location where he is nailed to the cross. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is built on the spot where it is believed he was nailed to the cross, and his subsequent death.

This is supposedly the spot where Jesus dies on the cross (below)

He is then taken down from the cross and anointed on the stone slab below. Anointing is a ceremonial ritual where a person’s body is smeared in aromatic oil to introduce a divine influence on the body.

Finally he is laid to rest in his tomb.

Of course his body isn’t physically in there, because supposedly after his ressurection, he ascended to heaven.

The entire Way of the Cross and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was extremely crowded and people lined up everywhere to pray in all the spiritual locations, like Jesus’ tomb, the home of the Virgin Mary, the Stone of Anointing, etc. People even touched all the surfaces that Jesus was said to have touched and I could see them in deep prayer.

Western / Wailing Wall

In Judaism, the Western Wall is one of its holiest sites. The actual holiest site lines behind the wall, the Temple Mount, but due to restrictions, Jews are not allowed to pray there, and thus the wall became the place where Jews went to pray.

Some Jews go on a pilgrimage to the Western Wall, some spend hours praying there. If you look closely in the video below, there’s a fellow running in circles and singing while people around him are rubbing their beards against the wall.

The Temple Mount

The Temple Mount is a flat plaza built on top of four retaining walls (the Western Wall among them). Although Jews are not allowed to enter for prayer (e.g. praying, singing, or other religious displays), people are allowed to enter the area as tourists.

The Dome of the Rock is one of the Islamic structures built on the Temple Mount. Unfortunately, non Muslims are not allowed to enter. Inside the dome is the Foundation Stone, and has religious significance to both Jews and Muslims.

Yad Vashem

This is Israel’s official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The entire memorial consists of a museum dedicated to the history of Jewish persecution throughout Nazi Germany and the places it conquered.

The eternal flame honours the victims of the holocaust. In front of it is a stone crypt containing the ashes of the victims.

The Hall of Names pictured above contains the the names of millions of Holocaust victims. The shelves around the room contain the names, while the cone above display photographs of the victims. The people standing in the photo are all Israeli soldiers – Jerusalem had a huge police presence with a lot of them openly carrying assault rifles (I felt very safe). Even some men in public that I saw had buzz cuts – presumably they are/were in the military. A few days before we arrived, there was a terrorist attack where a driver rammed a car into Israeli soldiers.

This train car is an example of the cattle cars that Nazi Germany used to perpretrate the Holocaust.

The Garden Tomb

Some sects of Christianity don’t believe that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre contains the real tomb of Jesus Christ. They assert that the real tomb is actually elsewhere, which they dubbed the Garden Tomb

Outside Jerusalem’s old town

Because Israel has so many Jewish people, McDonald’s started a special chain that serves only Kosher food. Even though it’s kosher, it tastes the exact same as regular McDonald’s which is pretty amazing for what it is.

Oskar Schindler is famous for saving 1200 Jews during the holocaust. He is now buried in Jerusalem. Putting stones and pebbles on the grave is an ancient Jewish tradition to honour the deceased.

There are also a lot of stray cats everywhere! I didn’t see any dogs though, just lots and lots of stray cats everywhere. People must take care of them though because they all look pretty well groomed.

Photo album: here

Each elephant has a story of what it spent its life doing while in captivity such as elephant riding, or illegal logging, etc. Some even have injuries like broken hips from their past abuse. But now they get to live out the rest of their lives in the sanctuary.

The santuary is not just for elephants, but for cats too! There are also dogs lazing about as well.

We started the tour off with feeding the younger elephants. Even though they’re only a few years old, they’re still huge. It was cool to feel the elephant grab an entire bunch of bananas with its trunk and put it in its mouth. For a brief moment, I felt the scaly skin of its trunk, covered in dirt, brush against my hand. The reason elephants are covered in dirt is because the dirt protects their skin from the sun.

We got to pet a few of these elephants. I learned that elephants actually have hair! Some elephants had less hair due to their abuse. The guide explained that when they are used as riding elephants, they tend to lose a lot of hair from people climbing on and off of them. Their skin feels scaly as one might expect, but the sparse hairs are quite stiff – kind of like the bristles on a toothbrush.

It was so hot that day, they went playing in the river. It was probably the hottest day of the trip so far. So hot that I really didn’t want to move out in the sun.

This guy came running right for us. The guide said some of these elephants were the same ones we fed, and so it was possible they recognized our scents thinking we had more food. There are no fences in between humans and elephants, and there are attendants everywhere that the elephants listen to.

The guide told us that the more sunken in the elephant’s head is at its temple, the older it is. As it ages, the air inside the elephants skull slowly leaves, which causes the sunkeness. I definitely noticed this between the smaller/younger elephants and the larger/old ones.

Be sure to check out Mike’s video about the elephant park. It’s got clips of us feeding the elephants and us trying to dodge them as they charge toward us. There’s even an elephant that peels the bananas before eating them!

Going to this place was totally awesome and I definitely recommend it for anybody travelling to Chiang Mai. For the rest of the pictures of the elephant sanctuary click here.

Dog lovers out there beware, some people eat dog meat in Korea – in a stew form, called Bosintang. We had to go to a shady shop in an alley in Myeongdong to get it. I didn’t know that it wasn’t a mainstream thing to eat until the lady at the tourist info center told us.

The meat was very tough (typical carnivore meat), and it tasted a lot like lamb. To be honest, it was pretty good, but it’s not something I would eat more of, since beef, chicken and other mainstream meats taste so much better.

Now for something less weird than dog meat. Our friend who lives in Seoul took us to a Korean restaurant to have something more mainstream.

It’s nice to know a local who is able to introduce us to such delicious food! Aside from the pork, we had acorn jelly, chives, seaweed, etc. Next, there is eating fresh seafood at Noryangjin Fish Market – a giant warehouse looking building where people sell seafood and then buyers can take their purchases to a nearby restaurant for preparation.

Somehow it was clear to all shop personnel that we were Chinese, and people kept yelling at us in Mandarin to buy their seafood. One shop kept insisting to us that we buy crab, and as we kept refusing, they kept lowering the price even though we actually did not want to buy it for other reasons. This “unintentional” haggling, however, did get us a slightly better deal on fish, giant prawns, clams and octopuses.

Eating the octopus raw is interesting since when the tentacles were served to us, they were still squirming as they were freshly killed. I learned that the whole point of eating this is to feel the tentacle grab on to the inside of the mouth as it is chewed, but otherwise it is pretty tasteless.

We also had Korean barbecue, although for some reason, the place we went to was super expensive for very low quality meat.  We still don’t know why it was so expensive.  We went to another Korean barbecue place that was a lot better and cheaper, but I felt that the Korean barbecue restaurants were on par in terms of quality.  And oh yes, there was also lots of kimchi.

E-Sports

I’m not a fan of StarCraft, but I play DotA 2, so naturally we watched a DotA 2 tournament. There was no cost to watch the game, but there wasn’t that big of an audience either, so a rowdy audience was definitely missing. The game was exciting and we saw a lot of pro plays, but the cast was all in Korean.

Before entering the stadium, we saw people at the entrance wearing Zephyr shirts, and I thought, “they must be fans of that team or something” and asked them for directions for where to get food. Later, I found out they played for Zephyr. Awkward.

During the intermission, I got to chat a bit with “Whiplash”, one of the English casters, who was casting the game for Internet viewers. It was weird at first since he introduced himself by his online name – quite unexpected. From him, I found out that teams who play in Korea generally live together in the same house so it’s easy to practice together.

Pet Cafes

I heard much about them before my trip. It definitely sounded intriguing. Go in, get a drink, pet the animals, right? Kind of, only if you find one that likes being pet by you! Most of the animals we saw didn’t really pay any attention to us except for this one beagle who was licking my friend’s face non stop.

Plastic Surgery

Ads. Ads everywhere. In the street, in the metro – complete with before and after pictures. Walked by a lot of clinics too. Yup it’s definitely a thing in Korea.

Link to more photos: here

For Easter weekend, the interns and I went to Greece. Instead of only going to the famous tourist areas like Athens, we also went to a city called Volos to check out the beaches they had there.

Getting to Greece

Typically, we leave early in the morning for trips, but this time we left during the night in order to make our morning flight to Volos, Greece at Frankfurt-Hahn Airport. Originally, we all thought the airport was in Frankfurt, but apparently, it was a 2 hour bus ride. Apparently, Ryanair likes to use airports named after big cities, but the airport itself isn’t located in that city.

We started our journey by taking the U-Bahn to the Stuttgart main train station to catch the a train to Frankfurt am Main. From there we would take a bus to Frankfurt-Hahn Airport. We arrived in Frankfurt at about 3 AM and during this time, we ran around the streets looking for our bus. Because of all these transfers, we barely had time to sleep. I think I only slept for about 4 hours intermittently. It was a good thing that not a lot of people took the train at night because this let us lie down on two seats and put our legs on the seats in front to sleep better.

After 2 train transfers, and a bus transfer, we boarded the plane. By now it was already morning. We were all still really tired. All we did was sleep. I’m surprised I still managed to fall asleep really well even with little kids and babies crying around me. I didn’t really get a chance to look out the window very much though. Although for the brief moments that I was awake, I managed to see the Swiss/Austrian Alps (I don’t know what our flight path was).

I left the house at around 11:30 PM, and arrived in Volos 10 hours later. If only we knew about the Frankfurt-Hahn thing, we would have tried to fly out of Stuttgart International Airport.

Volos

We checked out the town for a bit and stayed there for a night. This place isn’t very known among tourists going to Greece, so there weren’t a lot of tourists anywhere. We pretty much went to this place to check out the beaches.

We rented a car here so we could drive from Volos to Athens the next day. When we first got into the car we realized it was almost out of gas. We thought that it was normal to get the car with a full tank and return it with a full tank. While driving around Volos, we saw how the Greek drove. I’ve got to say that the drivers in Volos are some of the worst I’ve ever seen. I don’t know why, but nobody cares about driving on their own lane (lanes aren’t even painted most of the time). Nobody yields for pedestrians unless there’s a light. And while we were driving, people rode mopeds without wearing helmets and all they did was squeeze through spaces that cars couldn’t and cut off the cars. On the highway, they even drove on the shoulder.

After looking at the beaches, we drove up to the top of the mountain overlooking Volos, a site for archaeological excavation. It was supposed to be the ruins of a city from 5th century BC, but we didn’t really see any ruins except for some stones buried solidly in the grass. But what we did see was the most spectacular view.

In the evening, we tried Greek hard liquor called Tsipouro. The ones we got had 42% alcohol by volume. The taste of it was repulsive. I’ve drank hard liquor with a similar percentage of alcohol before, but those didn’t taste bad. The food they served with it was quite good though. I particularly enjoyed eating the octopus. Later on, we ate some more Greek seafood. We got to try other foods like ray-fish, squid, and cuttlefish. I’m craving some of that right about now.

On the Road to Athens

We all knew of the high oil prices nowadays so we thought it might have been more economical to take public transit from Volos to Athens. We asked about a car rental and after doing the math, we found that the two options were about the same, so we opted to rent a car. We drove the Opel Corsa for about 330 km from Volos to Athens. Little did we know, we had to pay tolls on the highway. The Greek also like to put up these mini-churches on the side of the road. On the highway, we could see these and they represent the people who died there.

For a while, we didn’t really know where we were going once we got into Athens. Once we arrived, we tried to find a suitable parking place for the car that was near a metro station. We decided not to drive around Athens since it would be very hard to find a parking spot. The car simply got us around Volos and to Athens. We stopped the car and asked people for directions multiple times. Out in the suburbs, not many people spoke English so communication was quite difficult. Although, on one occasion, one of the locals spoke Hindi, which one of us happen to know.

The first place we tried to park at turned out to be partially blocking a driveway so we had to move. While parking the car though, I opened the door slightly to look outside to check the spacing of the car to help the driver. At this moment, my phone slipped out of the car seat and onto the street. Luckily I realized my phone was missing as the car started driving away. I quickly got out and ran after some people on the street who picked up my phone. Luckily they were just walking away thinking about whether to keep it or not. I literally ran out of the car and called out to them saying, “Thats mine!” despite the fact that they might only know Greek and not English. If I had been even a minute slower, my phone would have been lost. Good thing the people who found it were nice enough to give it back. I was prepared to run after them.

After a huge sigh of relief, we found a new parking spot. We left the car near an apartment about 20 minutes by train from our hostel for two nights. Every now and then we’d think of the car and hoped that it was still there. Even if the lady who lived at the apartment said we could park there, we still weren’t sure if it would get towed or ticketed.

The Acropolis

Once we checked into the hostel, we walked up to the Acropolis, the location of the most famous landmark in Athens. Unfortunately, due to a restoration project, there was a huge metal crane in front of the Parthenon. I don’t know why, but landmarks I visit always seem to be under maintenance whenever I go there. But the good thing was that going up to the Acropolis was free because of Easter.

At the top of the Acropolis, there were a lot of remains of ancient Greek architecture. Among these was the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, The Erechtheum, and the Parthenon.

I don’t really know a lot about Greek history, but it seemed like these places attracted a lot of tourists simply because they’re famous. I doubt a lot of people have an in depth knowledge about the Greek culture. I’m sure a lot of people just looked at these ruins and thought they were just some old stones.

Greek Architecture around the City

Apart from the Acropolis, I also saw many other ancient Greek buildings. A lot of the Greek architecture was very similar because of their use of the columns, but it was still very interesting to look at.

It seemed like because it was Easter, a lot of the attractions that otherwise would have cost money were free. We would have had to pay to go see the Temple of Zeus.

Around the City

One of the things that was very peculiar about Athens is the amount of stray dogs on the street. I thought it might just be owners letting their dogs run around freely without a leash, but these dogs had no leash.

While we were walking around, a lady was walking her dog on a leash when the leash caught onto my friend’s leg. My friend, seeing this dog, decided to pet it. Unfortunately, that dog’s attitude isn’t same as what he’s used to in America. The dog tried to take a bite at his hand. Luckily, he moved his hand away fast enough before he got bit. The dog’s mouth was so close that its slobber got on his hands. The lady didn’t even apologize for it. It made us think that the Greeks weren’t very nice people.

Everywhere we went in the city, we saw tourists. In fact, there were so many tourists that I sometimes heard more people speak English than Greek. And as tourists, they were everywhere in the city center. There were tourists from all sorts of countries, but when it comes to interacting with the locals, it was either English or Greek.

Like in Paris, people tried to sell me things on the street. Instead of selling mini Eiffel Towers, they sold this toy tomato. When you throw it on the ground, it’ll splatter, but slowly go back to it’s original form. It looked so cool, but it seemed like something that would only be cool for about 5 minutes if I had one. A lot of people also tried to sell fake brand name sunglasses and purses. I’d laugh really hard if they tried to sell fake LV bags on the street in front of the LV store.

Apart from the old Greek buildings, we also hiked up to the top of a hill to check out the view from the top. There was also a church there.

I don’t really know why we went up to the top the hill in all the trips we take. It’s something that we always do. Try to get as high up as we can just to look at the bottom.

Christian Culture

Prior to visiting, I never knew the people in Greece were so Christian. Seeing that it was Easter weekend, I saw a bit of their Easter traditions.

At night, people held candles and all walked to a church. I don’t know what they did when they got there, but the walk attracted large tourist crowds wondering what they were up to.

Food in Athens

Since Athens is one big tourist trap, one can expect to see lots of restaurants selling overpriced food for tourists. But regardless of that, we got to try some really delicious, but probably stereotypical, Greek food. One of the things that confused me though is why they called their salad “Greek Salad” when just “salad” would have sufficed. Maybe that’s their way of getting tourists to try it.

People around the city were all grilling lambs for Easter, but unfortunately, I never got the chance to try some. I’m not missing it though, because I was never a fan of lamb meat anyway.

National Archaeology Museum

On our second day in Athens, we visited the National Archaeology Museum to look at the history of Greece. Luckily for us, we didn’t have to pay to get in because of Easter.

Unfortunately, a lot of the exhibits weren’t open so we didn’t spend a long time here.

More Beaches

Because we didn’t get enough of the beaches in Volos, we decided to visit a beach in Athens too. What surprised me here is the girl that decided to go sunbathing with her top off even though it wasn’t a nude beach.

At one point, we all sat down by the beach enjoying some beer. That the one of last opportunities for relaxation in Greece before we had go to leave the next day.

Going Home

In order to avoid traffic at the tolls, we woke up so early that we had to miss the free breakfast at 7 at the hostel. We all got up at 5 in the morning and by 6:30, we were on the road back to the airport in Volos. Despite getting a full night’s sleep, I somehow still slept for 3/4 of the car ride back.

On the drive home, we could see smoke coming from some of the houses. At first we thought someone’s house was burning down, but later we figured that it might have been people grilling lamb for Easter.

Later, we realized that we left way too early. We aimed to arrive at 11 am, but we arrived at around 9 am for a flight that departed at 2:15 pm. The airport in Volos was also in the middle of nowhere. We spent the next two hours doing next to nothing. During this time, I finally finished reading that book I started a while back.

When we returned the rental car, the amount of gas in the tank was in the red zone. We wondered if the car still had enough gas to go to the nearest gas station. It didn’t seem likely that there was a gas station anywhere near the airport. It was in the middle of nowhere.

We tried accounting for all the things that could make us late like looking for the right way to go, traffic jams, etc., and none of those things happened. For the whole trip one of my friends kept making fun of my other friend for making us all wake up early. In fact, he was so worried about being late that he thought we should skip coffee in addition breakfast. Skipping breakfast and not eating for 5 hours wasn’t very fun.

On the plane, I was bored out of my mind. My phone and iPod had all run out of battery and I was forced to sit there staring out the window. Even doing that was hard because I didn’t get a window seat. Because of my boredom, I took some random pictures.

We arrived at Frankfurt-Hahn Airport at around 4 in the afternoon, and from there we took the bus back. We all spent so much money in Athens that we all had just enough to get home. We didn’t think we’d make the 4 o clock bus in our original planning, so we arrived at the Frankfurt Hbf a lot earlier than expected. Getting to places early seemed like the trend of the day. We got there at about 6 in the evening, and had to wait until 9 PM for our train. By now I had been on the road for almost 12 hours. We ended up browsing through a bookstore and walking around town until our train arrived. After 17 hours, I finally got home.

More photos here

Day 58

Water Costs Money

Now if somebody asked me what I didn’t like about Germany, I would say that it is how water here costs money. In Vancouver (not sure about the rest of Canada), water is free. We use as much water as we want and it costs us nothing. However, we do pay for the energy to heat the water. In Stuttgart, people pay for each cubic meter of water they use. Those that don’t want to spend more money than they have to (most people) know how to take a shower in less than like five minutes. I am used to enjoying my showers and taking over ten minutes in the shower. After realizing that water here is so expensive, I too, must now start thinking about my water use. Apparently, on average, people only use one cubic meter of water. I somehow managed to use seven. Clearly, I like to take my time in the shower.

Being Foreign Attracts Attention

On many occasions, I had random strangers start talking to me. I believe it is a combination of two things. The first is that I’m Chinese and the second being that I speak English to the people that I’m with. Almost everyone has this kind of sixth sense where they know someone is looking at them. This happens to me all the time. It’s almost as if people here have never seen an Asian before. This happens most often in the small towns. In the city, it doesn’t happen as much and is probably because more Chinese people live in the city center. And on three occasions, I’ve had people say stuff to me that had to do with me being Chinese. The first was when this random guy at the train station looked at me and said “ni hao” as he was walking by. The second was this kid that looked twelve years old who said “good evening Chinese person”. The third was someone really drunk on the metro who said “ni hao ma” to me. Yes, “ni hao” is probably the most common Chinese phrase that non-Chinese speakers know, but it doesn’t mean they have to go around saying it to Chinese people they see. Even though I’m Chinese, I end up speaking English most of the time. Whenever I go on trips with my friends from Bosch, the only common language between our group is English. On a few occasions, the locals would talk to us in English. I don’t know why. Maybe they want to practice their English or something. Or that they have an urge to speak to foreigners.

Drinking in Public

In Vancouver, one could get a ticket for drinking in public. In Germany, it’s perfectly okay. When I go home late at night, there’s always people walking around with beer bottles on the street. Some of them drink on the subway, or even on the regional trains. I’ve also seen people drinking in the morning. I found that even more unusual. I’ve even been offered a drink in the morning by a random stranger on the metro. I respectfully declined.

Churches and Castles Are Everywhere

Out of every city I’ve been to so far, almost all of them have at least a castle or an old church. It’s understandable though, because so much of the architecture was left over from the past. But whenever I go anywhere, seeing castles and churches doesn’t seem as interesting as before. Unless of course, it’s extra special like the Dom in Cologne, or the Hohenzollern Castle.

Some Restaurants Have Their Own Breweries

I thought this was super cool. The fact that some restaurants brew their own beer means that they brew it in their own unique way. As a result, each restaurant’s beer tastes a little different. Weizen from place A might taste better than the Weizen from place B. I always though Pils was too bitter for my taste. But yesterday, I tasted good Pils.

The New York Yankees

This team is probably the only team that sells the most merchandise to people who aren’t a fan of them. In North America, I always see people wearing hats with the Yankees logo on it. Most of them weren’t fans of the team. It was a fashion statement. Apparently, people in Germany do it too. I doubt most of them even watch Baseball. I see little kids wearing Yankees toques.

Dogs That Bark Don’t Bite

Now this is a theory that I don’t really want to test, but Germans say this a lot. I don’t know the logic here. Everyday when I go to work, these two dogs in someone’s backyard will always bark at me. For as long as I’m in their line of sight, they’ll bark. I don’t know if they’re happy or angry. I don’t know much about dogs. But I assume they’re angry when they start mixing in growling with their barking. According to the Germans, those dogs won’t bite.

Weird Obsession with Carbonated Water

Carbonated drinks are popular everywhere, but here I see people drinking carbonated water and carbonated juice all the time. At work, every other desk has a bottle of those drinks on it. My landlord buys giant crates of it. I’ve tried it, and frankly, I find it to taste the same as their non carbonated counter-parts. The only thing extra is the fizzing. Is that why people must have it?

Lax Smoking Laws

This is probably my biggest pet peeve. I hate the smell of cigarettes. In Vancouver, people must be a certain distance away from the entrance of a building in order to smoke. In Stuttgart, people smoke indoors. People smoke inside the train station, inside bars, and inside the office building where I work. I suppose this is really good practice for holding my breath as I walk past those people. I feel like I’m shaving years off my life every time I smell the smoke.

Since I am kind of a 20th century history nerd, some of the sites that I wanted to see involve the Second World War, which led me to this trip to Nuremberg, the former stronghold of the NSDAP (The Nazi Party). It was also a change from what I was usually seeing: castles and churches, or in Deutsch, schloesser und kirchen.

I would have gone to Nuremberg with the friends I’ve met here, but none of them were as excited about it as I was, so I went alone. Going on trips alone as its advantages. The main one being that I can decide on where I want to go, rather than have to compromise with the group.

Before I left the house this morning, I made sure to check the weather. If it rained, or it was too cold, I wouldn’t go. Luckily for me, Google Weather told me that the temperature in Nuremberg would be 0 to 6 degrees. That’s warm enough for me.

Along the way, the train stopped at a few stations and when I saw the people outside, I had a suspicion that it was colder than what Google told me. Seeing the people all bundled up in toques, scarves, and big jackets, it had to be cold. Every time they exhaled, I’d see a thick fog. Later on, I even saw a lake that was completely frozen over. Hopefully the weather warms up this afternoon. In the meantime, I’ll be on the train, where it’s heated.

Looking outside the window, I got a really good view of the German countryside. In some parts, all I saw were farmlands and a few small houses. The grass sparkled as light passed through the morning dew. I guess it was warming up after all. I also saw some wind turbines and forests in the distance. I didn’t even see any paved roads until I got closer to the town. The view was made especially better with the bright blue sky and the light of the early morning. Some people took advantage of such a good day by going horseback riding on the dirt roads by the farmlands.

The usual routine for visiting a new city for me involves going to the main station (Hauptbahnhof) and then following the signs there to the tourist information center to get a free city map. Usually the step that follows is going to the old town (Altstadt). However, in this city, there was one place I had to visit. It was the National Socialist party rally grounds (Reichsparteitagsgelandes). On the site was a documentation center that recorded the history of the origin of the Nazi Party and their story up until the Nuremberg Trials. Also on the site was the area which the rally itself was held (Zeppelinfeld) and the incomplete Kongresshalle.

My first destination was the documentation center. Since all the descriptions in the museum were in German, I got an English audio guide. The documentation center also had little to offer in terms of material items to display, but they did offer a large amount of information through text.

The exhibits began with the Treaty of Versailles and the Great Depression. At the time,many Germans were used to being governed by the German Empire and did not approve of the Weimar Republic that replaced it after the end of World War I. The exhibits moved on chronologically and discussed the origins of Hitler’s paramilitary groups such as the SA (Sturmabteilung) and the SS (Schutzstaffel). There was even information about the Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend) and how the educational system at the time taught children about the Nazi’s anti-Semitic values.

An item I saw on display was an original copy of Mein Kampf, a book Hitler wrote during his time in prison because of the Beer Hall Putsch. Others were a bronze sculpture of Hitler’s head, propaganda posters and a broken helmet of a German soldier.

While walking around the museum, there was an old man taking his grandson (assuming their relationship) to this place. I don’t think the kid knew just how serious it all was, but the grandfather looked like he was tearing up a little bit.  He looked old enough to been around during the Nazi State.

Other exhibits showed the history of the party rally site itself such as the architect, Albert Speer. There was also information about how Hitler came to power, the anti-Semitism that he instilled in the minds of the people and the terrible deeds against the Jews that he was responsible for.

The history of the war itself was brief, and focused more on the events before and after. There were clips of Nazi propaganda films, such as “Triumph of the Will” and of documentary films such as footage from the Nuremberg Trials. One of the clips spoke of a song that many Germans sang. The sole purpose of the song was to spread anti-Semitic ideals. The lyrics in the song spoke of Moses parting the Red Sea. But the lyrics involved the sea flooding Moses and the Jews while they crossed to enact the “Final Solution“.

The documentation center was constructed inside the incomplete Kongresshalle, where its purpose was to be a congress center for the Nazi party. However, due to the war, the building was never completed. If completed, the area would have been larger than the coliseum in Rome.

After exiting the documentation center, I walked around the rally grounds and found that it had been converted into a park. An artificial lake that was created as a water reservoir in the 1900’s still existed there. I walked around it and saw the Grosse Strasse (Great Road). The 40 m wide street pointed in the direction of the old town and represented the relationship between the role of Nuremberg within Third Reich and its role during the medieval times. Walking further I reached the rally grounds, known as Zeppelin Field. I recognized it immediately when I saw it. It is the site of where the iconic video of American soldiers destroying the swastika at the top of the building was filmed. I walked up the steps and took a picture of the entire area near the spot that Hitler once stood to make his speech. I walked on to the platform where he made his speeches and tried to visualize what it would have been like at the time. At the rally there would be a million people listening, watching the military demonstration by the Wehrmacht and the Luftwaffe and the cheering of “Heil Hitler”.

Since the war, there was little use for the area and since then, the spectator stands have grown grass. The field itself was converted to a football field and a bike track. Part of site is even used for motor sport events.

Since the entire area was converted into a park, there were lots of cyclists, and joggers. I saw people walking their dogs too. One dog got started shaking all of a sudden and I joked to myself that maybe the dog was afraid of Hitler. But really, the dog just got excited when another dog came by. I also saw swans on the shore of the lake and tried to take as close up of a shot as I could. If the lake wasn’t frozen, there’d be kayakers too. I hoped the ice was hard enough for me to walk on but unfortunately, the ice cracked when I stepped in it. It would have been cool to walk around on a frozen lake.

Further from the rally grounds was an old SS Barracks. It is now a government office that manages immigration. These buildings are a few of the last remaining structures that followed the Nazi style architecture.

After visiting the rally grounds, I moved on to seeing the historical European monuments, AKA schloesser und kirchen. There is no shortage of them in Germany. Out of the three churches in the old town, I only managed to get to two of them. The third one, St. Sebaldus Church, was closed when I got there. The Kaiserburg Imperial Castle was also closed, so I only managed to visit the lower levels of the castle and couldn’t make my way to the top. At the bottom of the castle was a church, and as I walked past it while heading back to the main station, I could hear a church choir singing. I would have stayed to listen to it, but I had a train to catch.

Despite the fact that there are so many churches in Gemany, the fact is that each one has a unique design. The two churches I visited were called the St. Lorenz Church and The Church of Our Lady

One thing I always enjoy when I visit the old parts of town is that there are always street performers. The music they play always sounds like it’s vintage and retro and really gives the city a historic ambience.

In addition to these attractions, Nuremberg also has the Germany National Museum, a toy museum and a Deutsche Bahn Museum. Since I only took a day trip, I didn’t have enough time to visit them all. One of the points of interests that I am quite disappointed in missing is Courtroom 600, the courtroom that the Nuremberg Trials were held.

At the moment, I’m riding the train back to Stuttgart and writing this. I look out the window and see only the reflection of the inside of the train due to the darkness of the night.

My photo album for Nuremberg

Japadogs were at UBC today.  After wrestling with my impulses I decided that I wouldn’t buy one.  Even if they were incredibly good Japanese style hot dogs.