The arrival of Winter, Depression and Homework

the sky is getting darker day by day.. the wind speed seems to pick up.. and im feeling depressed. Doesnt help that my PARCEL is delayed for 5 weeks (yes it might be lost.. stupid Singpost. To think i trusted u~) .. and i have an Ancient Greece essay to hand in. Its not a lot of work, im kinda glad i have it though. Maybe i should visit the library on Monday, concentrate and finish it all at once.

I cant wait for Winter to come.. which means Nov is here, more lessons, more trips, and the possiblity of my PARCEL landing in my mailbox. As much as i hate Singpost, i really hope they didnt screw up and lose my parcel. And i cant wait to fly over to Chicago for my brother's graduation! Civilisation, factory outlets and Family!!! which also means i could maybe request some gao lak, bak gwa, and good food!

Arh.. i really just want my parcel right now.

London 19th - 23rd Oct

We had to transit (stupid RyanAir, NEVER ON TIME) in London, so we thought, yah why not travel in London? We put up at Juliana's friend's place, and that saved a heap of pounds. Sure feels good to understand/read the things u see...

Taking the London bus was painful already, when the airport shuttle cost 16 pounds ( 48 sgd) and the normal double decker was 1.5 pounds (4.5 sgd for a SBS bus ride? NO WAY!!!)
We visited Leicester Square (China Town) first, due to Cheewee's craving for Laksa, managed to buy cheap tickets for Les Miserables (i still cant pronounce it!!!) and walked to the Trafalgar Square. My god, so many pigeons again. We saw the Parliament Square, Big Ben, London Eye, St. Pauls, Tate Modern, Millenium Bridge etc.

The next day, its Football! We went to the Chelsea-Portsmouth match, quite funny, the crowd started to sing Jose Mourinho when Ballack scored the second goal. After a while, it was like watching Tv.. just that there was no zoom and no playback. That was 66 pounds lor. At night we visited Soho, saw the London Bridge (its a scam!!! london bridge is not falling down! its made of concrete!!! totally not the one u see with the lion roar on tv). We have all been cheated...

Sunday, went on a shopping spree, bought a 7 pound long coat. Finally something cheap in London. The boys went crazy over the football jerseys, while i stocked up on my winter wear. Had lunch in China Town and joined in the HCJC mini MAF in Imperial College. Damn weird lah. Met up with Zhengda and saw Yongbin too! At night we stayed in and saw the Barca - Real match. Everywhere is football mans.

And on our last day, Yinghao and I went to Oxford Street (TOPSHOP!!! Miss Selfridge!!! Marks & Spencer!! French Connection!!! ) SANNY!! i should have never given u my Topshop discount card!!! I had KFC! Lund has no KFC Lor... damn sad. We also visited Harrods. My god its like a castle! Its so lavishly decorated, with freshly baked Krispy Kreme... its remarkable.

ChinaTown

The National Gallery

Many many pigeons...

At the London Eye

Shakespeare Museum

Les Miserables

Chelsea Match

London Bridge

Night view

Zhengda and I

Harrods!!!

Italy 13 - 19th Oct

Italiano~~!!!
Yeap we set off to Venice, Florence, Pisa and Rome on the most unlucky day of the year! We had so much free time waiting for flights and transits, we begun playing HEARTS. yes hearts again! dunno why the Queen of Spades is now affectionately called Ah-Ma. Poor Yinghao kena the ah ma so many times, there were even times he shot himself (apparently no beginner's luck).

VENICE -- 14th Oct, Sat

We finally arrived Venice on the Saturday morning.. checked into our campsite (not so good experience with Amsterdam's one...) and we basically only had half a day left in Venice. We spent most of our time eating Gelato (FANTASTIC! Well worth our one euro), getting lost in the shaddy streets about 1 metre in width, walking past the St. Marco Square (which apparently didnt leave a lasting impression for me.. i promptly forgot that its the one featured on the cover of my travel guide). We had our pizzas and paninis by the steps of a fountain, listening to a flutist, pretty nice atmosphere! At night we went grocery shopping... and bought some really cheap wine back. Well of coz u cant expect much of cheap wine.. tastes a bit like plastic and ribena (speaking of which i miss very much!) Funny thing is we started playing Hearts again at night.. and Chee Wee was sure to be the loser ( and so i assumed) i said whoever is the loser will have to finish the sucky wine! Dunno why i so suay, kena bombed by Ah ma so many times... and i ended up drinking the damn bad wine. Should have never said those words. Had to go toilet twice in the middle of the night.

FLORENCE -- 15th Oct, Sun

We took the early train out of Venice and checked into the Eurostudent Hostel. The location is not too bad, but we were given an attic room with 5 beds. Quite a nice room though, just that we only spent 5 hrs in that room. We visited the Duomo, Piazza Della Signoria (where fake David is) and i bought a fake Fendi bag!! Who says Italy is strict on Fakes? Rubbish, its like another Siew Sui Street in China. We spent some time resting in the Loggia d. Signoria, where loads of nice marble sculptures were placed in an open hall. Juliana started sketching the Hercules fighting the Centuar, whereas Cheewee volunteered to do the back view of it. Hmms. I'll show u guys the drawing next time, think the pic will be banned by Singapore goverment (which Juliana will speak of it again later in Rome). Oh and did i mention that i have cravings for GAO LAK? YES they have it in Italy. Yah obviously not good, but we had it anyway.

Pisa -- 16th Oct, Mon

We had to take an extremely early train to Pisa, to aviod the long queues etc. We were even the first few to go up the tower! Pretty cool sight, just that its 12 euros for a trip less than 30mins. Climbing up already took me 15 mins by the way. I got dizzy from the spirals and not to mention i have a bit of vertigo... the 7th and 8th storeys are def not for the faint hearted. Ok lah not so bad lah.. im just talking rubbish. Pisa is really small, just the tower, cathedral, musuem... yah.

Rome -- 17th - 19th Oct, Tues - Thurs

We went on to RomA~ How can anyone not go there? Checked in and had an early nights rest. Must wake up early for Vatican City! heard the queue is HORRIBLE. We left early around 7 am and Weicheng became a pickpocket's prey on the metro. Its quite amazing huh? So fast got hit by pickpockets. No worries, we are seasoned travellers, we hold on to our valuables like gold. It wasnt long before we heard of the metro crash ard 930 am (we just entered vatican city i think, after queuing for 1.5hrs). soon we see everyone's parents calling them... quite scary ah? Luckily we came to see the Vatican city early! Vatican City and the St. Peter's basilica was not bad.. but the trip up to the Dom was again VERY SCARY. WahS its like 320 steps after the elevator ( yah imagine us going up without the elevator just to save 4 euros). I think travelling on budget does make u fitter. Going to the top of the Dom was like going up a slanted Pisa, imagine contorted spiral steps to the curvature of the Dom. We also saw the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, Colosseum etc. Haha it was also at the Colossuem that Juliana exclaimed that the Singapore government wants Yinghao to wash his hands (i forgot what he touched). Hilarious mans. Very nice place, i will post up pics later!

Poor poor Robinson

11th Oct - (also my mum's birthday). We had a mini gathering at Sparta to discuss our Italy-London trip. We had grilled honey chicken, sweet and sour pork, onion egg, stir fried beef and some veggie. Eh not bad eh? I think when i go back i can cook quite well liao!

Well we were watching the Euro Qualifiers England vs Croatia. Poor poor Robinson. I cannot imagine how screwed up he feels mans. Gary Neville passed him the ball for him to clear, amazingly the turf was uneven, and when Robinson kicked, the ball so happened to bounce over his foot...and into the goal net. Robinson totally missed the ball lah!!! Poor poor Neville, conceded an own goal.

And i wonder how screwed up Beckham must have felt while watching this at home.

England lost 2-0. Hur hur. Which makes me worry about the match im gonna watch in London. 66 pounds u know!!!

Chelsea better win Portsmouth. I dont wanna be stuck in a riot.

Lomma Beach

Steph, Lingwei and Clement are gone for the farm stay over the weekend... Yinghao and i decided to explore the 'beach' supposedly 15-45 mins away from Lund. In fact, we took like 1hr to get there! its freaking tiring lah.. so many ups and downs. and my bike isnt even a mountain bike..

And i had a really good lunch and dinner! We found a chestnut tree outside Yinghao's place... boy am i craving for gao luk...We had black soy sauce chicken, oyster cabbage and sweet potato rice!

Mid Autumn Festival

Yeaps! The Asian Contigent had a mini celebration! The Hong Kong, Japanese and Singaporeans came together to eat some mooncake.. We bought some pizza and ate just outside the AF buiding. And its freezing cold! The temperature in Lund has dropped suddenly to around 12 degrees in the day. Heard from Ann that yesterday night it was as cold as 6 degrees. Heard Stockholm's average temp was 6degrees! Crazy!

Anyways took some pic here:
i also promised to make a comparision btw Tomoki and my brother rite?? Here it is! I mean brother 1 and 2 is the same person. Looks alike rite? The lips and the nose!!

Germany 27 Sept - 03 Oct

When we were stranded on the island of Stockholm (Grinda) , Wayne made an impactful statement: We never fail to have obstacles in our way whenever we travel. In Amsterdam, it was too freaking cold. On Grinda, we had nothing to eat. And in Germany, i would say, time was not on our side.

We spent 1 day in Munich (too little time), 3 days in Berlin (bad time management), and 2 days in Wiesbaden (west of Frankfurt) and Frankfurt (too much time).

So here begins the journey to Germany. I knew it wasnt gonna be all smooth when i kena pigeon shit on the way to Chee Wee's place.

We celebrated the start of our holiday by having a mini feast. I decided to bake beer chicken (well Oktfest rite?) while Chee Wee had carbonara and some soggy veggie, Yinghao with his oyster veg and beef, Juliana with her unqiue desert (imagine falafel with rasins, honey, peanut butter and choc rice inside). Steph and Weicheng bang seh us and went to Copenhagen in the morning!! The meal was pretty good! Think i shall buy better beer and more cheese with my beer chicken though.

***
We took a night train to Munich, the trip was rather pleasant, except the next door cabin had a party going on till 2/3am. Yeah party in a train cabin, the walls are not exactly thick. We arrived 8 am in the morning all fresh and happy! A good start huh!

1st stop: Theresienwiese. Oktoberfest held there. We had sausages with sourkraut, half a chicken (its damn good) and some beer. The beer there isnt cheap (7.5 euros for 1 litre) and its a stronger brew than normal. Its the morning and not so happening yet. So we moved on.

2nd stop: Olympiazentrum. The home of the Olympic stadium built for the Summer Olympics in 1972. Its kinda grand and nice.. but im no archi farty.. We walked by the BMW musuem (prob some archi marvel).

3rd stop: Marienplatz City Centre. Walked ard, saw some lousy cuckoo clock dance around.

4th stop: Frottmaning. Home of Allianz Arena. You know that mashmallow stadium used for the World Cup 06? yeaps thats the one. Pretty cool. Went for the tour, saw the changing rooms etc. Managed to catch the stadium light up and change to red.

5th stop: back to Oktfest. Really hungry! Got a brastwurth and a big big pretzel. People were drunk and some idiot was blowing some whistle throughout the spinning ride. Its like a big amusement park with beer glasses and puke all over the floor.

***
We took another night train to Berlin, but in a smoking cabin. ITS LIKE HELL. In the middle of the night i woke up, and i saw fumes in front of me.. its like a chimney inside... We reached in the morning and booked into Sunflower hostel. Its pretty nice and cozy, i would recommend this place if u wanna go Berlin!

1st stop: Soviet War Memorial

2nd stop: Reichstag Parliament Building

3rd stop: Brandenburg Gate

4th stop: Jewish Holocaust Memorial

5th stop: Topography of Terror Foundation

6th stop: Check Point Charlie

7th stop: Sony Centre (changing lights. though i din see any)

On the second day, we went to the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. Terribly depressing and sombre site. Ended the day around 4pm, went to the Museum island and moved to the City to do some shopping! Bought Birks! (28 euros!!) ate Vietnamese food and went back to the hostel to chill. Beer is cheap! 2 euros for 500ml.

It says: Work sets you free. Yeah rite.

Berliner Dom:

On the third day, we went to Kaiser Church (kena bombed like mad), Sieges-saule (Freedom Women) and parted ways. I decided i had enough of Jews (the others went to the Jewish Musuem) while i walked the Musuem island to visit the History Musuem and bought some souvenirs along the way. By den it was time to say good bye to Berlin.

***
Took a train to Frankfurt. Took another train to Wiesbaden. Damn German trains are always late! and because of that i missed that Wiesbaden train. Luckily im intelligent enough to take a local S-bahn. Reached Wiesbaden around 9pm and met Dikun! Took another train to Hattenhiem and tadah! We are at the vineyards!

Think for the two days i was there, Dikun really took GREAT care of me mans. Early in the morning, breakfast was meepok with sausage and ham, if not, toast with hard-boiled eggs and ham. Dinner was pasta with baked fish (fantastic!) and minced meat (ha! i cooked it!) . Tried some Apfelwien too. Abit weird le.

1st day: Walked around Frankfurt and Wiesbaden. Nothing much really. Just that i saw Wal-mart (oh how i miss it)

Frankfurt


Wiesbaden

2nd day: Looked around the vineyards and saw his landlord's cellars and wines. Just that it rained the whole day! Didnt get to do any harvesting...

***
The ride home was TERRIBLE.
1021 : Hattenhiem - Wiesbaden
1100 : Wiesbaden - Frankfurt Main
1255 : Frankfurt Main - Hamburg
1730 : Hamburg - Copenhagen
2223: Copenhagen - Malmo
2321: Malmon - Lund
2340: LUND!!!!
0015: Sparta...
Bloody hell missed the last bus and i had to walk home. The END/
m