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

Our second day takes us to Oosterscheldekering, Ypres, and Dunkirk.

Oosterscheldekering (Eastern Scheldt storm surge barrier)

We began our day two heading back into the Netherlands, to a network of storm surge barriers, designed to protect the Netherlands from flooding. Large sets of doors can open and close to control the water flow coming in from the ocean. They’re important because most of the Netherlands sits a few metres above sea level or lower, and thus are prone to flooding.

As we drove in the area of Oosterscheldekering, we encountered a lot of windmills spinning noticeably in the wind. And I wondered where all the old traditional windmills went, as in the ones with a tower made of brick with four rectangular fan blades . Netherlands has a stereotype of having a lot of them. We barely saw any of them and then it occurred to me that most of them were probably upgraded to use modern technology.

Ypres

Our next destination, Ypres, is known for the many battles that occurred there during the First World War, where the Germans introduced chemical weapons in the battlefield in the form of poison gas. During the course of the war, the town was destroyed, mostly by artillery fire.

The town was rebuilt after the war using German war reparations, with the main square following the original design as closely as possible. The In Flanders’ Fields Museum (the big building in the above picture) is a museum dedicated to the First World War.

Dunkerque (Dunkirk)

Our final destination for the day was the French port city of Dunkirk, known for the role it played during the evacuation of Allied forces from France. The Germans had achieved a breakthrough in France and had surrounded the bulk of Allied forces around Dunkirk. The German airforce was tasked to destroy these forces, so that the Germany army could conserve its ground forces for other operations, but the Germans failed to destroy the Allied forces and over 338000 soldiers were successfully evacuated to Britain.

That night, the locals were having a festival, called the “Bal du Chat Noir”, probably loosely translated as “The Black Cat Ball”. It’s so obscure that as of this writing, an English Wikipedia article for this festival doesn’t even exist. The French Wikipedia describes it as a festival to celebrate the opening of the carnival season (i.e. the Christian Carnival), and that it’s local to Dunkirk.

From what I can tell, it’s kind of like the Carnival in Cologne, where people party in the streets dressed up in costumes. There’s no shortage of reasons for people to party!

Stay tuned for day 3!

• Oosterscheldekering
• Ypres
• Dunkirk

Every now and then I get this annoying problem in GGTS (Grails/Groovy Tool Suite – Version 3.6.2.RELEASE at the time of this writing), where the IDE just complains about how it can’t resolve a class.  The weird thing is that the file that the IDE is complaining about is in the same package as the class that I’m trying to use.  It built before, and the source hadn’t changed – so clearly this should not be happening.

The Fix

Hitting the Clean button on the Eclipse side (Project -> Clean) seems to make the errors go away.

This apparently has been a problem since June 2010 (forum post reference here), so I’m surprised that it is still an issue in the current version.

At Frankfurt Airport, when Edward and I lined up to check in, we were the only two Chinese people in line.  We seemed very out of place.  Some of the people gave us these stares that seemed to ask “why are you flying to Kiev?” We wanted to visit Chernobyl and shoot AK-47’s.

Our experience on the plane was dreadful.  Four crying babies/toddlers plus jet lag plus one hour delay was not a good combination. No sleep for me I guess.  Worst flight ever.

Awkward Car Ride

The hostel arranged transportation for us and so when we arrived, I looked for someone holding a sign with my name on it (first time ever!).  The driver was not happy at how we were late (not that we could do anything about it).

Probably since he was late, he drove like a maniac.  He drove way faster than the posted limits and passed every car on the highway.  The expected 45 min ride was reduced to almost 20 minutes.  The driver didn’t speak English.  No one said a word during the entire ride.  Awkward.

I had read before that people sometimes get driven to random places by taxi drivers before they get mugged.  By getting the hostel transportation, we minimized that risk.  Despite that, I was at peak alertness the whole time, making sure he was going the right general direction (I vaguely remembered the directions from the airport to the hostel).

Dream House Hostel

This is by far one of the hostels I’ve ever stayed at.  The staff were extremely helpful.  We asked them like a thousand questions and they happily answered them every time.  They treated security very seriously.  Kiev might not be safe, but I felt safe leaving my passport and cash in the locker in the room.

Security Measures

During our trip planning, we had read about the potential dangers in going to Kiev from the Canadian travel report about Ukraine.

The report tells travelers to “exercise a high degree of caution”.  It warns of dangers such as pickpockets, passport scams, armed robbery, racially motivated violence, muggings, etc.

Seeing how the hostel’s security was pretty good, we left our valuables in the room.  We each carried a decoy wallet with nothing in it except a scan of our passports and the cash we needed for the day.  No credit cards, no real ID, no cards at all.

If anybody steals a wallet, no big.  Better to lose $30 than all our money.  Nobody can scam us for our passports if we aren’t carrying it.  I didn’t even put on a hidden money belt.  The less I brought the better.  We felt pretty prepared, and luckily nothing happened.

Language

People in Kiev generally speak Ukranian or Russian.  I know neither.  I also don’t know the Cryllic writing system.  Even if I wanted to ask in English how to get somewhere, I can’t even pronounce the name of the place.  When I went to Greece, I could at least pick out the greek alphabet (side effect of studying math and physics), but in Kiev, I can’t even read anything.  Too bad.

Food

The first night we arrived in Kiev, we had no idea what kind of food was around here.  We couldn’t even read the menus anyway.  Picking a restaurant was a matter of randomly walking into a restaurant.  To our surprise, our random pick turned out to be Japanese food.  Interesting.  No pictures needed.  Vancouver has an abundance of Japanese restaurants.  Beer is worth taking a picture of though.  I can’t even read the label.

One of the hostel staff had recommended to us the Golden Dukat Coffee House.  I wish I took more pictures here, but I found someone else’s travel blog with good pictures of it!  Good coffee, good dessert.  And they have an English menu!

We were told that Borscht is one of the traditional soups in Ukraine.  When I tried it, its taste was so familiar and I had to think about where I had tried it before.  It tasted a lot like the vegetable soup that people can get at Hong Kong style cafes (羅宋湯).  I Googled it later, and apparently the Hong Kong recipe (while a little bit different) is a derivative of it.  What a coincidence.

Independence Square

By far the largest city square I have been to.  For me this was the place to see in Kiev.  The pictures here don’t do justice to how epic it was.

At the square, there would always be these people carrying pigeons around.  They kept coming up to me with me and I had no idea what they wanted.  Later I found out that apparently they’re trying to get tourists to take a picture with them holding a bird.  Not sure why that’s cool but okay.

There were also people dressed up like Mickey Mouse or Shrek trying to get little kids to take pictures with them for money.  They did this even when the temperature was above 30 degrees Celsius.

St. Andrew’s Church

Nearby our hostel, there was a nice church.  It’s architecture was quite different from anything I’d seen before.

Friendship Arch

This arch was built to commemorate the unification of Ukraine and Russia when Ukraine was still part of the Soviet Union.

Street Market

On the way from our hostel to Independence Square, we walked along a long stretch of road with many street vendors selling souvenirs, trinkets and other random stuff.  People there even sold gas masks, replica German WWII medals, and fake guns.

Trip Ideas for Next Time

After we came back to Vancouver, we found out that the hostel started offering tours to abandoned missile silos, helicopter rides, and Yak plane acrobatics!  If only the hostel were offering those tours.  We would have totally gone to those.  There’s always next time.

Links to photo albums:

• Kiev
• Kiev (Edward’s Photos)

Getting There

Just like the time I went to Barcelona, I had to wake up at a ridiculous hour to catch my flight.  Even though the flight was at 10, we had to take a few regional trains to get to the airport in Karlsruhe-Baden.  It was so early that when we got to Karlsruhe, we could see the sunrise.

Along the journey, a friend of mine forgot this iPod on the train and by the time he remembered, the train started leaving the station.  He watched the train leave with his iPod and could do nothing about it.  He immediately went to the Deutsche Bahn office for help.  The helpful staff there immediately called the next station that it would reach so that another employee could get on the train and retrieve it.  Lucky for him, they found it.  He would end up picking up his iPod after we came back from London.

I ended up sleeping for the whole flight and once we arrived we had to go through customs because the United Kingdom was not part of the “Schengen Area”, which is made up of a group of countries that allow travel within the group without going through customs, as in they have no internal border controls.

It was really easy talking to the customs agent because there was no longer any language barrier like in the rest of Europe.  It felt so nice speaking English again.  I no longer felt bad about not being able to speak a particular country’s language.  Speaking English felt so nice in fact, that I ended up having a brief chat with the customs agent about things like how I was liking Germany and what not.  Unlike the customs agents I see at the border between USA and Canada, the one in London was really nice.  I had initially thought that Londoners would give a really snobby vibe like the Parisians, but it didn’t seem like it so far.

After going through customs, we went to buy tickets for a bus to the city center.  Unfortunately for us, the lady selling tickets refused to accept our euros (good reason for that I suppose), so we had to exchange some money at a ridiculous rate.  We bought both our return ticket at the time too and for some reason the ticket lady wrote down 3:50 am for our return bus reservation (our flight was for 7 am).  We looked at it and we were just so sad to see we had to wake up at a ridiculous hour yet again to make our flight.  But then, we decided to stay up on our last night in London and not pay money for another night’s stay at the hostel.

The bus took us to Liverpool Street and from the looks of it, the districted seemed like an economic center.  People wearing business suits going about their business filled the streets.  From there, we bought our Oyster cards (kind of like the 八達通 in Hong Kong).  It is a prepaid card for taking the London public transit system.  One simply has to place the card on the scanner when entering and leaving the station.

We took the metro to King’s Cross and proceeded to find the hostel we booked.  It turns out that the hostel used to be a courthouse, which is kind of cool.  The interiors still have some of the furnishings of a courthouse and even has courtrooms that have been redecorated into hangout areas for guests.  Unfortunately for us though, when we actually saw our rooms, we were less than satisfied.  We got a super small room for eight people with beds arranged in two rows of four.  The only way we could get in and out of our beds was to crawl from the end instead of getting on from the side.  Solid walls surrounded the other sides and gave a really cramped feeling.  The showers there weren’t that clean either.  Regardless, that was the place that we had to stay at for the next two nights.

Imperial War Museum

Our first destination was the Imperial War Museum.  The museum chronicled the British Empire’s involvement in wars since the First World War up to the present.  In addition to exhibits from the two world wars, it even had exhibits on terrorism and the Iraq War.  Like many museums in London, this one was financially supported by the government so entry was free.  Upon seeing the building, one could already notice the 15 inch battleship cannons placed in the front – one from the HMS Ramillies and the other from HMS Roberts.

When we entered the museum, we were immediately overwhelmed by the sight of all the military vehicles in the museum’s atrium.  They had everything – tanks, fighter planes, rockets, artillery cannons, submarines, etc.  There was even a piece of rubble from the World Trade Center.

In addition to the exhibits about the wars that Britain fought, there were exhibits for the Holocaust as well as genocide in the modern era.  In the World War I section, there was even a reconstruction of a trench.  When I walked through it, I saw statues of soldiers going about their daily life at the time, like a soldier manning a machine gun or a soldier writing a letter to his parents.  In the World War II section, the museum managed to get a hold on the actual bronze eagle that was once on the Reichstag in Berlin.

We stayed at the museum until its closing time at 6 and afterward, we looked for a place to eat.  Just like in Rome, we looked at the Rick Steves’ European travel guide book for a recommendation.

Trafalgar Square

The guide book led us to a pub in Trafalgar square.  Before going to the pub, we decided to check out the place first.  We didn’t spend a lot of time here because we were in a hurry to eat.

The Lord Moon of the Mall

Following the guide book, it led us here to try out London’s “pub grub”.  The way the pub worked was that people had to find a table, take note of their table number and then go up to the counter to order food.  The servers would then bring the food over according to the table number.  I ordered sausages and mash (aka bangers and mash).

The pub itself seemed really British to me.  I don’t really know how, but it just gave me that vibe.  After our meal, we walked around the city for a little bit.  Since Trafalgar Square was really close to the tourist parts of London, we decided to go there.

Westminster

Westminster, one of the districts in London, is what people know London for.  This is where the Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and the Palace of Westminster are all situated in.

We didn’t stay here very long since we knew we’d be back here the next day when we took the walking tour.  We were all really tired too so we were all very eager to go back to the hostel to sleep.

Wellington Arch

At the beginning of the tour, everybody gathered by the Wellington Arch, a triumphal arch dedicated to Britain’s victories over Napoleon.  It is also the site of London’s second smallest police station up until 1992.

Part of the arch is also used for the ventilation from the London Underground (subway) and the heat coming out from the vents sometimes causes people to believe there is a fire.  Every now and then, somebody ends up calling the London Fire Brigade about it.

War Memorials

Throughout much of the city, war memorials can be seen almost everywhere.  Some are dedicated to certain people such as Churchill or Monty, while some are dedicated to Britain’s former colonies or even to the war effort on the home front.

Buckingham Palace – Changing of the Guard

Pretty much everyday at Buckingham Palace, tourists can see the guard change at Buckingham Palace.  We didn’t intend to go see this so when we arrived at Buckingham Palace, we saw a large concentration of tourists watching it.  There were so many people that I couldn’t even see what was going on.

To see the guards up close, we went elsewhere where there weren’t that many tourists.  In the past, people were allowed to go up to the guards and annoy them, but ever since one of the guards flipped out at a tourist, tourists are no longer allowed to go up to the guards anymore.

We tried to annoy the guards anyway though.  The tour guide got everyone to shout out “penis” really loud to see if it would make the guard laugh.  According to the guide, it works about 1 in 4 times.  This guard didn’t laugh though.

Trafalgar Square (again)

The first time we came here, we didn’t really know the significance of the statue in the city square, but the tour guide explained it to us.  The statue was of Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, a British war hero involved in the Battle of Trafalgar against the French and Spanish navies.  His fleet won the battle so decisively that his fleet took no losses in ships despite having a smaller fleet than his enemies.  Unfortunately for him, he died during the battle.  It is said that his crew put his body in a wine barrel to preserve his body so that he could have a proper burial in England.  However, since his men had won such a huge victory, they ended up drinking the wine from the barrel that the admiral’s body was in, hence producing the phrase, “tapping the admiral”.

Horse Guards Parade

The next destination was the Horse Guards Parade, basically an area with an open field for horses.  It wasn’t that special I suppose.

Westminster Abbey

According to Rick Steves’, Westminster Abbey is one of the most magnificent churches in the English speaking world.  When I read that, I figured that it might not be as good as the churches that I saw in Rome.  Nonetheless, I still wanted to check out this place.  It would have been nice to see the inside, but it would cost a hefty 13 pounds to enter.  With such an expensive admission fee (compared to churches everywhere else which have free entry), I couldn’t bring myself to pay that.  The churches in Rome are probably way nicer anyways.

Palace of Westminster and the Big Ben

Pretty much right beside the abbey was the house of parliament, also known as the Palace of Westminster.  Attached to this building was the Big Ben.  I didn’t really get a good picture of the palace during the day though.

More Pub Grub

At the end of the tour, we went to a pub that had connections with the tour guide so we all got discounts on our meal.  I ordered fish and chips, one of Britain’s specialties I suppose.

Churchill War Rooms

After eating, I went to the Churchill War Rooms Museum, while my friends went to the National Gallery.  The war rooms was a museum set up such that it displayed the underground complex that the British government used during WWII.  Many of the rooms had been untouched since the end of the war.  In some instances, once the war ended, the staff went home and never returned to the command center.

The meeting room, map room, and many of the dormitories in the complex still had the old 40’s vibe.  Paraphernalia was left untouched.  Even maps showed the old names for different British colonies and still had the pin holes leftover from mapping out troop movements.

A large slab of concrete covered most of the complex to protect its occupants from bombs.  Nobody knew how well the slab would protect people, but luckily, the complex was never hit.  While walking around the complex, there are areas where a speaker will play the air raid siren sound.  I guess that was for authenticity, which was really cool.

Buckingham Palace

Now that the wave of tourists had subsided, I finally got the chance to get a good look at Buckingham Palace.  It was one of those places that didn’t look amazing in architecture and was a place where one would have to go while on a trip to London.  Maybe the next time I come to London, I will buy tickets to visit the inside of the palace.

The Cafe in the Crypt

For dinner, we looked at the guide book yet again to find a place.  This time we were recommended a place called “The Cafe in the Crypt”.  It was under a crypt of a church in Trafalgar Square.  When I ordered my food, the server for some reason was really delighted by the fact that I could speak English.

Platform 9 3/4

I hadn’t known before that in the Harry Potter books, Harry Potter went to Hogwarts from King’s Cross Station, which happened to be the station that our hostel was close to.  On our way back to the hostel that night, we came across the famous Platform 9 3/4.  There was even a cart halfway through the wall – just like in the books.

English Breakfast

Because the breakfast at our hostel sucked so much, we all decided to go have an English style breakfast on our last day.  The breakfast came with eggs, mushrooms, bacon, tomatoes and sausages.  It was really oily, but delicious.

The British Museum

According to Rick Steves, the British Museum “is the best chronicle of human civilization…ever”.  With a recommendation like that, we had to go to it.  After seeing it, I agree with Rick Steves.  The museum had information on pretty much every continent in the world.  Its most well known artifact, the Rosetta Stone was also on display.  Apparently, it was the stone tablet that allowed modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.

In the exhibit on ancient Greece, the museum showcased a lot of sculptures from the Parthenon.  I guess that would explain why I didn’t see any of those things when I went to Greece.  Another really nice exhibit was the one on mechanical clocks.  It displayed a lot of the different mechanisms that clocks were built out of.  Being part mechanical engineer, this was of a lot of interest to me.  I ended up analyzing the entire mechanism and figuring out exactly how clocks work.

The Millennium Bridge

Our next destination was the Tate Modern Art Gallery.  Before going inside, I went to see the nearby attractions first.  I learned of the Millennium Bridge during my engineering courses because it was an example of a badly designed bridge since it was affect by resonance.  Simply put, the bridge physically wobbled as people walked on it.

Shakespeare’s Globe

Based on the original Globe Theatre, this theatre is a modern reconstruction of the old one that burned down.  I didn’t know before that the original one had burned down.  I thought I was seeing the original.

St. Paul’s Cathedral

During the Blitz, St Paul’s Cathedral became a national symbol of resistance.  During the sustained strategic bombing of Britain during WWII, this cathedral somehow still stood.  Many of Britain’s heroes are buried here, namely Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, Sir Winston Churchill, Florence Nightingale, the Duke of Wellington, and Charles Cornwallis.

Normally, it costs money to go inside as a tourist, but since it was Sunday, the church was open for church services.  This allowed tourists to go in for free, but they weren’t allowed to take any pictures.  As usual, I disobeyed that and took pictures anyway.

I probably could have done something similar at Westminster Abbey also, but that was on the other side of town so I didn’t bother.

Tate Modern Art Gallery

Like many museums in London, this one was also free.  Looking at the different works of art here, I understood pretty much none of them without reading the description.  Interpreting art just isn’t my thing I guess.  Although, there was an exhibit about anti-Nazi works of art that was really interesting.  One photo in particular portrayed Nazi Germany as a house of cards, while another showed a bunch of skeletons depicting what Germany will be like in the future.  Another photo, although not anti-Nazi, it depicted the Japanese waking up the “sleeping giant” known as China when they invaded.

Chutneys Euston

For dinner, we went to a vegetarian Indian buffet.  For 7 pounds, we could eat as much as we wanted.  What a good deal.  That was my first time ever eating Indian food and it was really delicious.  I ate about three plates before I was full.  I didn’t get hungry until 3 in the morning.

Tower Bridge

At night, we went to see the Tower Bridge and the London Tower.  I originally thought the London Tower was just a tower, but it turned out the tower was actually part of a giant castle.

We walked across the bridge and saw the HMS Belfast, a British cruiser docked on the side of the river.  Apparently, the ship had been converted into a museum and was part of the Imperial War Museum.  If I had known about it earlier, I probably would have visited this too.

Going Home

Since our bus time was 3:50 am from Liverpool Street Station, we took a taxi to there to wait.  We went to a nearby restaurant and stayed there for a few hours playing cards.  When the bus came, we got on it and just slept.  We slept some more on the plane and on the train until we got home.  My original plan was to nap when I got home, but after so many naps earlier, it didn’t feel necessary anymore.  It probably would have ruined my sleeping schedule too.  I still felt the effects of the sleep deprivation the day after too.  Either way, it was a good trip.  I think I want to come back some time in the future.

More photos here

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Flight to Barcelona

I woke up at around 3:30am to get ready for the flight to Barcelona.  I had slept at around 10:30pm the night before in order to not feel absolutely terrible in the morning.  We took the first train out to the airport at 4:40am and got there about an hour before our departure at 6:45am.  While going through security, I forgot to take of my belt and because of that, the security personnel checked me with the metal detector wand all over the place.  For some reason, he seemed to also have a huge suspicion that I was hiding something in my pants.  Once he let me go, we were on our way.  On the plane ride there, I tried by my best to take a nap, but this little kid cried for the whole duration.

Sagrada Familia

After dropping off our stuff at the hostel, w went to the Sagrada Familia, an unfinished church that began construction in 1882.  When I saw it, I thought it was really weird that the construction crew used modern cranes to build architecture of the old style.  We tried to go inside, but there was a huge line up.

After wandering around town a little bit, we came across this market that sold all sorts of things.  Apart from pretty normal items like clothing, vendors there sold N64’s, used power tools and even military regalia.  A lot of that stuff was probably stolen.  We walked around some more and then headed down to the beach.

Barceloneta

The area we were in, the Barceloneta, was a stretch of beach coastline looking into the Mediterranean Sea.  It had the nicest beach water and sand – even better than what I saw in Volos.  Looking around the beach, I learned that it was legal for women to sunbathe topless. It was actually quite prominent.  The weather was really hot too – perfect beach weather I suppose. 

I lay down under an umbrella on a beach towel while the others went for a swim.  I ended up falling asleep.  I suppose that made up for not having a good sleep on the plane.  After spending about an hour and a half at the beach, we went on a walking tour.

The Walking Tour

The first destination in the tour was in the Gothic Quarter.  We reached the memorial for Eulalia of Barcelona, a 13 year old girl that was brutally subjected to torture from the Romans for refusing to give up Christianity.  She died from the 13th and final torture that involved her being put inside a barrel with blades shoved inside it and then having that barrel rolled down in incline.  It is said that a dove flew out of her dead body as she ascended to Heaven.

The next destination was the oldest synagogue in Europe (as opposed to the one in Prague, which is the oldest active synagogue).  From the outside, it doesn’t look anything like a synagogue.  It just blends in perfectly with the buildings around it and the building itself doesn’t have any valuable looking ornaments or decorations either.  The only things that separate it from the other buildings is sign in Hebrew on the doorway and some signs for tourists to know that it’s there.  In this Jewish district, the tour guide mentioned the expulsion of Jews during the Spanish Inquisition.  I thought it was kind of amusing when I was caught by surprise at the mention of it – kind of like that quote from Monty Python.

Afterward, we went to Plaza de Sant Felip Neri.  The significance of this place was that the plaza was the site of a air attack from Italian bombers during the Spanish Civil War.  Shrapnel damage from the bombs still scar the walls of the plaza.  On another side of the plaza, the bomb damaged was repaired but one can still see the slight difference in colour between the bricks which shows how much of the wall had been destroyed.

One thing about the streets in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona is that a lot of them are really narrow – probably only about 10 feet wide.  We walked through these streets for most of the tour.  In one of those streets, we came across a mosaic of Space Invaders.  Apparently, there is an artist who goes all over the world putting them up.

The next destination was the Placa Nova, which used to be the location of the city gates back when the Romans lived in Barcelona.  The remnants of the gate and the aqueduct still exists.  Across from the gate is the City Architecture School, which has a joke drawing by Picasso splattered over it.

After walking some more we saw the Barcelona Cathedral which housed the tomb of Eulalia of Barcelona and also the Placa del Rei, the historical location where Christopher Columbus reported his discovery of the Americas to the Spanish royalty.  We also saw some Roman ruins after climbing a mountain with a height of 16.9 meters (that’s what a plaque actually said) as well as the Placa de San Jaume, the political center of Cataluña (the area of Spain that Barcelona belongs to).

The tour guide also talked about the origins of the flag of Catalonia (Cataluña is the name in Catalan).  It is said that a great warrior Wilfred the Hairy, after being wounded in battle, drew stripes along a copper shield with his blood-stained fingers, hence the four prominent red stripes on the Catalan flag.

We also walked along La Rambla, a popular tourist street in the city.  The tour guide also showed us a city square that featured some of buildings designed by an architect named Gaudi.  Apparently, his designs are all over the city.

Next was the Placa George Orwell.  As a memorial to him (he was involved during the Spanish Civil War), the city named a city square after him.  Ironically enough, this plaza used to be under 24 hour surveillance kind of like Big Brother in his book “1984”.

We finished the tour at a bar and socialized with other people in the tour group for a little bit and drank Sangria.  I got to talk to these people who used to work at the same hostel we stayed at in Hamburg.  It was such a coincidence.

Barcelona’s Skateboarding Fame

After that, we walked around the city to look for the skateboarding spots that Barcelona was so famous for among skateboarders.  I’m not a fan, so I could not recognize the place from skateboarding videos, but it was cool to see a lot of skateboarders in one place showing off their tricks.

Tapas

For dinner, we tried Tapas, a Spanish delicacy.  Tapas are basically a small appetizer dish, but patrons generally order a few of them for a full meal.  Along with Tapas, Paellas are another Spanish delicacy that’s also really delicious.

Sangria is Evil

That night, we spent a little bit of time at the hostel bar.  We all drank Sangria and the thing about that drink is that it tastes a lot like juice, which means it is really easy to drink too much.  And that’s what I did.  I puked a bunch and got a pretty bad hangover the next morning.  I never intended to drink that much in the first place.

While we were drinking, we talked with this black dude and he always had racist jokes to say.  He went on about how white people could never get away with saying racist comments, which was so true. 

Park Güell

I spent the next morning puking too which sucked a lot.  We went to the beach again that morning, but I felt so bad at that time that I decided to go back to the hostel to rest up a bit before doing anything.  I felt a lot better in the evening and so we all continued sightseeing and went to Park Güell.

Park Güell was basically a park that featured a lot of Gaudi’s architectural exploits.  Since he hated the use of right angles in his work, much of the design had curvy edges.  Spanish architecture here was so different from the architecture I’d seen everywhere else.  It was really distinct and unique.

A Less Intense Night (at Least for Me)

After visiting the park, we went to the hostel bar like the night before.  Except this time, I didn’t do any crazy drinking.  We met the same black dude from the night before again and this time he went on about how much he loved eating fried chicken, which just made me crack up so hard.  He perpetuated that stereotype.  Once the hostel bar quieted down, my friends went out for clubbing while I stayed at the hostel and went to sleep.

Mini-Sandwiches

I found out later that they returned at around 6 am.  Two of them were really high on weed apparently when they came back too (weed is legal in Barcelona so long as one possesses less than 50g).  They missed the hostel breakfast that morning and slept in until 12pm.  Once we all got ready, we went out for lunch at a mini-sandwich restaurant. 

The place had so many varieties of mini sandwiches and they all looked and tasted delicious.  I wanted to try all of them, but I was pretty certain that I couldn’t eat that much since I wasn’t hungry for lunch yet.

Montjuïc

After eating, we went up to Montjuïc.  The mountain had a lot of really nice architecture, just like a lot of places in the city.  Also on the mountain was the site of the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.  We walked around the Olympic stadium and got a really good view of the city.

We walked further up the mountain and reached the fortress at the top.  At the time, we didn’t know there was a gondola that took us up there, so we walked the whole way, which was super tiring in the intense heat that day.  Fortunately, seeing the fortress was worth it.  From there, we got a really good view of the entire city, all the way around. 

After walking around so much, we all got really hungry and took the gondola back down and looked for a place to eat.

Paellas

After trying Tapas on the first day, we decided to try Paellas this time around.  Paellas are basically a rice dish and consists of either vegetables, seafood, or different varieties of meat depending on the type.  We ordered one with seafood and chicken in it. 

Being able to pick meat off bones and peeling the shell off of shrimp was so satisfying.  It was totally unlike the German dishes that involve none of that peeling whatsoever.

Writing at the Beach

We spent the rest of the night at the beach to get one last look at it before leaving the next morning.  When we got there, the sun was already setting so it was quite comfortable at the beach without the sun constantly cooking us. 

As the sun set, it actually got really cold.  While sitting at the beach, I started writing bits of this blog entry in my notebook.  Writing on the beach was really satisfying.

My Joint-Rolling Experience

When we got back to the hostel, two of the people I went with wanted to use up the rest of the weed that they bought.  I refused to do any weed when they offered it to me – even if it was legal here, but I did want to try rolling a joint.  They passed me some of the weed and rolling paper and then taught me how to do it.  In the end, I rolled a better joint than both of them and it was only my first try too.  They called me a “stoner prodigy” and said how I’d be a really good stoner if I ever did weed.  No way I’m going to smoke it for real though even if rolling a joint was an interesting experience.  When the others started smoking the rest of the weed, I returned to the hostel and went to bed.

Flying Back

The next morning we all woke up at 6 am to get to the airport for our flight back to Stuttgart.  For pretty much the entire trip home, our whole group barely talked.  We all had this zombie look on our faces from waking up way too early and not sleeping enough.  It took a few hours for us to return back to our normal state.  We all felt it was a good trip – except for the part where I had too much Sangria.

More photos here

The day after going to Munich, some of my friends and I went to eat some traditional Japanese food.  We went to a restaurant called Tokio Dining (http://www.tokiodining.de) and at the time they had a deal (until the end of June) where the first 20 bowls of Miso Ramen served each day would be half price.  I actually went to this restaurant once before, but for some reason I never blogged about it the first time.  As I kept writing this, it sounded more and more like a restaurant review.  Either way, the food was so good the first time I went, I decided to go again.  It was the best Japanese food I’ve ever had.  And by Japanese food, I don’t mean sushi.

I’ve never had Japanese food in Japan before, but I’d say this place was the closest thing.  As we walked in, the chefs greeted us in Japanese, and if I knew how to reply in Japanese, I totally would have done that.  When we went in, we were the only people there and that usually says something about how good the restaurant is, but not for this place.

Jasmine Tea

Unlike Japanese restaurants in North America, they do not serve green tea to all their customers by default.  It might be a German thing where they like to charge for every drink – even water.  I ordered their Jasmine tea since it is one of my favourites.  They served it in a very traditional looking (at least to me) teapot with a teacup.

In addition to looking good, it also tasted good.  The tea had been steeped for the right amount of time for it to have flavour and yet not have taste that was too concentrated.

Edamame

My friend had this the first time we went and this dish was perfect for him because he is a vegetarian.  Edamame is a dish that has immature soybeans that have been boiled in water with a little bit of salt.

I tried a little bit and it was pretty good.  I can’t say that it’s super delicious or anything because I’m a huge fan of meat.  It was pretty fun trying to get the beans out of the pod though.

Takoyaki

The appetizer I had the first time I went was the Takoyaki.  It is a dish that has a ball-shaped pancake with grilled octopus meat as filling.  It is also served with Japanese mayonnaise, takoyaki sauce, katsuobushi (dried fish flakes), and green onion flakes.  The restaurant served it in a wooden boat shaped dish, which made it extra cool.

When I bit into one of the takoyaki balls, the pancake layer felt so soft and delicious.  The octopus part was even better, but I think I say that only because I’m a huge fan of octopus meat.  The sauce and the fish flakes made it even better.  As I’m writing this part, I’m craving more of it.

Ikura

Ikura is the Japanese word for roe, which are basically fish eggs.  The restaurant called it Ikura Oroshi and the word Oroshi apparently means a strong wind blowing down a slope (if I got the context correct too).  I guess it makes sense when considering how it was served.  It was served on a small mound of water chestnut with the caviar on top.  On the side of the mound, there were a few strips of sliced cucumber and I guess that would represent the wind.  I never realized how much sense the name of the dish made until I looked it up while writing this part.

The dish was really small, but that makes sense because roe is quite expensive to serve in large volumes.  When I bit into one of them, they just pop as my teeth sinks through the outer protective layer and when that happens juice comes out.  It had the coolest mouthfeel.

Miso Ramen

Our main dish was the Miso Ramen.  The noodles had a soup base made of miso (hence the name) and was served with a slice of pork.  It also had other ingredients such as bean sprouts, seaweed, half a boiled egg and corn.  All of that made the noodles so much more delicious.

The noodles were soft yet chewy in a way and that was perfect for my tastes.  Many people think that the instant ramen and this kind of ramen are similar, but their only similarity is that they’re both noodles with the same name.  They taste completely different.  Although the dish was kind of small, everything in it was so good that I ate all of it – even the soup.  While I was eating this, I faced a dilemma.  In Japan, it is customary to slurp the ramen loudly to show appreciation of the food, but in western countries nobody does that.  In the end, I just slurped it like how I normally ate noodles (something like in between the two extremes), while my friends were really careful about making any slurping noises.

Conclusion

Everything here was so good that I would want to go there to eat all the time until I get sick of it.  I never thought I’d be going out for Japanese food while in Germany, but I think this worked out really well.  On our way out, we said thank you to the chefs there in Japanese.

When I go back to Vancouver, I will try to find another restaurant that is on par with this if not better.  That shouldn’t be too hard since Vancouver does have amazing Japanese food.

From the Basilique du Sacre-Coeur, to the Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower, the Musee du Louvre, and the Arc de Triomphe, it wasn’t very hard to take tons of photos in Paris because all the tourist attractions were just so beautiful.

After being in Europe for over 2 months, I finally visited Paris three days ago. Going to Paris is something that many people in North America (probably the world too) dream to do. I woke up early in the morning for my train from Stuttgart that left at 7 and met up with my friends from Bosch.

On the train, sitting together proved rather difficult because that went against the preassigned seating provided by the French TGV. We tried our best to find vacant seats, but in the end, two of us ended up sitting elsewhere. I managed to sit with the rest of the group for the duration of the train ride.

Along the way, the train passed through the French countryside. Only farm fields separated Paris and Stuttgart, with the exception of a few cities and towns. We joked about how the only things in France were farm fields and an Eiffel Tower. After a four hour journey, we arrived at the eastern train station in Paris.

The train station in Paris set my first impression the city. I didn’t see Paris in the beautiful setting that all the tourism advertisements showed. Seeing that the first place I go to in any city is often the train station, I ended up basing my first impression on that. To my surprise, the metro here lacked the maintenance that the trains in Stuttgart got. In general, the trains looked much dirtier and vandalized in more places. I saw graffiti in all of the train tunnels, and beside all the train tracks. In some areas, the station smelled like a dirty washroom. The trains themselves looked very old as well, but that’s just aesthetics. One of the trains even used tires and not train wheels, so it ran like a bus on train tracks. Despite this, the metro served as our only means of transportation within the city. We took the train to our first destination.

Our first destination was the Sacre-Coeur, a basilica located on the summit of butte Montmartre, the highest point of Paris. Unfortunately, the Sacre-Coeur was not exactly in the best part of town. The enormous amount of street performers, street vendors, and people trying to get me to donate money caught my attention right away. They really liked bugging the foreigners. I guess they think that if foreigners can afford to come to Europe, they must have lots of money. Some of them were like pushy salesmen that wouldn’t leave people alone. Some of them even know how to greet people in different languages. I heard them say phrases like “ni hao”, “konnichiwa”, and “arigatou”. I wondered about how many more of these people there’d be at the Eiffel Tower, when I already saw of many of these people at a lesser known landmark. I tried my best to ignore these people and focus on where I was, the Sacre-Coeur.

Looking at the basilica from afar reminded me of the Dom in Cologne, but this place was a little smaller. Unfortunately, the church did not permit photography, otherwise I’d post pictures of this place. I must say though, after seeing the Cologne Dom, this place didn’t seem that special to me.

When we left for the Notre Dame afterward, we passed through the poorer part of town. For some reason a big crowd of people stood outside selling prepackaged food that one could get from the supermarket. Why would they end up selling the food that they bought? Or maybe they never bought them at all.

Our next destination was the Notre Dame. The Notre Dame was one of those places that almost everybody knew, so many tourists visited it. In fact, there were so many tourists there that the city decided to post armed guards wielding FAMA’s at the site in case anybody tried to cause trouble. Like many other European churches, the church also had the old European design. The design here definitely rivaled the Cologne Dom.

The Notre Dame was situated beside the Seine River, so the natural next thing to do was to walk along the Seine. Unlike the Rhine River, the Seine was a lot more polluted. As we walked, I saw many more street vendors, but these ones sold retro photographs of Paris, post cards and various antiques. In the distance, we could see the Eiffel Tower. Before heading there though, we went to visit the outside of the Louvre. Seeing the pyramid in the courtyard instantly reminded me of The Da Vinci Code, when they revealed the location of the Holy Grail. Further outside the Louvre was the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel which was a smaller arch that served the same purpose as the Arc de Triomphe. Further down the road, was an obelisk that Napoleon once took from Egypt during the Napoleonic Wars.

We walked along the Avenue des Champs-Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe, but before getting there, we had to hurry to the Eiffel tower so that we didn’t miss the time we reserved online. Because of our reservation, we didn’t have to wait hours like everyone else. Hundreds, if not thousands of tourists waited their turn. As I expected, there were a lot of street vendors here too, but the ones here weren’t as pushy.

In every picture I’ve ever seen the Eiffel Tower looked so small, so the sheer size of it total surprised me. At the base of the tower, I tried to take as many pictures as I could of the tower using the photography knowledge that I crammed the night before. Hopefully, my pictures turn out really well.

The view at the top of the Eiffel Tower totally struck me in awe. One could see as far as the eye could see. I pretty much saw all of Paris from here. In the distance, I could point out some of the landmarks such as the Louvre, Seine River, Arc de Triomphe, and Les Invalides. I also saw how the streets were laid out in the whole city. It differs a lot from the modern urban planning in the way that the roads don’t form grids. They seemed to go in random directions. No wonder it was so hard to find where we were going at times.

I could even see rain clouds slowly moving toward us. We didn’t choose the best day to go to Paris, but we couldn’t exactly predict the weather a month in advance. On the way down, it rained pretty hard, but it stopped about two hours later.

In the evening, we decided to go for a drink at a local cafe, since we were all so tired from carrying our things and walking around all day. Looking at the menu, I found that the price of beer is very high. In Stuttgart, I typically pay around 3 to 4 euro for half a litre of beer, but here, it costs 8 euros. That makes sense, I guess. Stereotypes do say that Germans are a lot more crazy about their beer than the French. I ended up trying a beer called Saint Omer. I don’t really know how to describe the beer so I can only really say that it tasted quite good, but not as good as German beer though.

After our little break, we went back to the Eiffel Tower to take pictures of it from afar. As the sky began to darken, the tower lit up. It must look even prettier at night. Unfortunately, we didn’t stick around to see it.

We went to the hostel since we were all so tired. For dinner, we ate baguettes that we bought from the local supermarket. And since we were in France, we had to have a bottle of wine. From the window, we could see the Sacre-Coeur.

After dinner, we went around some more to see what Paris looked like in the night. Because of the rain earlier, the wet cobblestone roads reflected the lights nearby. We stopped at a bar for a quick drink before heading home. This time, I ordered a beer called an Amstel. It had quite a strange after taste. By about 11:30 pm, we were all ready to sleep because we all woke up so early to catch the train and walked around so much, so we went back to the hostel where would recharge before continuing our journey the next day.

Little did we know when we organized our trip to Paris, this weekend would fall on the time change for daylight savings time, and as a result we had one less hour in Paris. We just slept one hour less to make up for it.

In the morning, we woke up early to get to the Louvre when it opened to avoid the enormous line up that we saw the day before. After passing the security check, we went to get our tickets. To our surprise, residents of the EU could get admission for free. I showed the ticket staff my work visa and got my free ticket. That saved me ten euros.

The main highlight of the Louvre was probably the Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci. I don’t think many people know why the painting is so famous, and I don’t either. Like everyone else, I went to see it purely because it’s famous.

The whole area we were in housed many Italians and Spanish paintings from the Renaissance. I didn’t understand any of the paintings, but I noticed that people back then really liked to paint about Christianity. A lot of the paintings showed Jesus on the cross. In other paintings, they really liked to paint naked people. Naked men, women and kids showed up in so many paintings.

The next group of exhibits we went featured art from the Americas, Africa, and Asia. They displayed mostly sculptures from various native groups living in the area a long time ago. It was quite interesting to see the difference in art among all these cultures.

Afterward, we looked at the section on Egyptian art. Here they showed various relics left over from the Ancient Egyptian civilization. They displayed various styles of sarcophagi used in the past and also urns of mummified remains. Among all the relics, the ones they showed the most were the stone tablets and papyrus paper with hieroglyphics written on them. I don’t know what any of it means, so for all I know the writing could just be something ordinary like, “today I went fishing by the river.”

At this point, we realized that the museum was so large that we wouldn’t be able to get through it all. So we looked at the map and chose to see what we wanted to see most.

We then arrived at the exhibit about French culture from the 14th to 17th century. The decorations in the rooms was decorated the same way as the old French style and it made the room look so beautiful.

Our next exhibit was Ancient Greece. The majority of items here were statues of the Greek Gods. These statues were pretty much everywhere, but they were all interesting too. It goes to show how devout the Greeks were when it came to worship.

The next item on our list was to find the Code of Hammurabi. Along the way, we went through the exhibit for Mesopotamia. Although not far from Greece geographically, their culture differed immensely.

When we arrived at the Code of Hammurabi, I saw a giant stone, but on it were a set of laws inscribed into it. It basically spoke of the consequences of actions that people did. A lot of it resembled the principle of “an eye for an eye”. For example, if a builder builds a house collapses on its owner, then the builder shall be put to death.

After being at the Louvre for about five hours, we were ready to leave. We didn’t even see half of the museum. I’m sure there are people that stay there for like ten hours or something. I even saw people sitting down with their artboards and drawing the sculptures they saw. As we left, we saw a huge crowd of people waiting to get in. I’m glad we went early. We barely waited at all.

After leaving the Louvre, we went to the metro to make our way to the Arc de Triomphe, located on the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, the rich district in Paris. It is a monument constructed for Napoleon to showcase his triumphs. It stands in the center of the Place Charles de Gaulle. The monument also honours the soldiers who fought and died for France during the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. Also there is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from the First World War.

The flame at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is always lit. It serves as a memorial for all the soldiers killed in action who could not be identified during the First World War. I went up to the grave to pay my respects and gave him the traditional three bows that the Chinese typically give to the deceased.

Also there was a plaque of Charles de Gaulle’s famous BBC radio speech to the French people in 1940, telling them not to lose hope, and that the war does not only affect France, but rather the entire world.

The arc also named the major victorious battles of the Napoleonic Wars. The inside walls of the arc name most of the generals who served under Napoleon and the names of those who died are underlined.

When we were finished at the arc, we went back to the Eiffel Tower to get one last look of it before leaving. On the side of the tower were the names of famous French engineers. As an engineer, myself, I had to look at each name to see which ones I recognized. I ‘d say I knew about a quarter of them. They were people like, Lagrange, Carnot, Ampere, Fourier, Clapeyron and Laplace.

While we all took more pictures of the tower, we had the idea of getting our French friend to wear the stereotypical French hat and hold a baguette while we took pictures of him with the Eiffel Tower in the background. It was so stereotypically French that this teenage girl got so excited seeing that she wanted a picture with him. We joked that if working at Bosch didn’t work out for him, he could make a living taking pictures with tourists in Paris! We stayed there until it was time leave for our train back home.

Paris was quite a beautiful city to visit, especially in the tourist locations, but some parts of the city were quite dirty, especially on the metro. That part of the city I didn’t really like, but the rest was amazing.

On the train, I tried to go to my assigned seat, but unfortunately a family had taken up all the seats there. I didn’t want to make them all find new seats, since I knew how hard it was to get everyone to sit together as a group without reservations, so I went to find an empty seat instead.

On the way home, due to some technical difficulty, the train made an unscheduled stop in the middle of nowhere. This delayed us by about twenty minutes and we all wondered how we were going to catch our connecting train. We found out later that our connecting train was going to wait.

As we crossed the border, the police came by checking people’s passports. In the entire wagon, only one of my friends and I were checked for passports. They did that probably because of the fact that we looked foreign.

As the train got closer and closer to Stuttgart, I was reminded of the fact that I’d have to go to work the next day and that I’d return to my usual routine once again. At the same time, I felt really good about the fact that I can now cross off another place on my list of places to visit.

Photo album here

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