A human is inside of these balls- like a hamster in a cage
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Video: Hanggliding in Interlaken
I went hanggliding today in Interlaken, Switzerland. It was amazing. About every 30 minutes today, I have turned to Michelle and reminded her that I was up in the air, flying like a bird, a thousand feet in the air- hanggliding. She rolls her eyes and reminds me she was watching and doesn't need so many reminders. Michelle captured this video as we were closer to the ground. I thought it would be frightening or scary, but it was a really steady and unfrightening ride, even for me or those afraid of heights. In this video, we did a dive and some turns- like being on a rollercoster, but smooth as ever.
More pictures to come when I get home and upload to computer.
Our Korean friends
We met these three awesome Korean on the train from Füssen and they taught us several words in Korean and we spoke for hours. We said goodbye as we headed off to Bern Switzerland and try went off to Munich. Two days later, as we were walking back from our hike up Harder Kuhn, which I will tell you about later, we saw them again and said hi, but thy were across a busy street and so we didn't talk to them.
Today, as I was about to run down the hill and take off on a hangglider, I saw one of them that was readying to go paragliding- So at the bottom we all got together and took a couple of pictures. Ironically, two of them are studying statistics and the other mathematics, Michelle got along with them really really well.Monday, August 16, 2010
What?
We passed some time in the Lindau train station. Some photography class was taking place and so we got them to let us use this- I still don't know how it applies to photography, but it must somehow.
Video: hockey game Füssen vs Red team
Walked around the town and then just wandered out of th town center and into a neighborhood a few blocks and stumbled upon two hockey arenas and entrance was free so the decision to watch and enjoy was an easy one.
Sleeper train?
Trains lull Michelle to sleep. I am left writing blogs, thoughts, and emails, and taking in the scenery as well pictures.
Church, wrong train, Switzerland
Last night we found a place in füssen but afterwards we found out that the church was an hour away by train. Well, because of Michelle's navigation skills we got to church fine, due to my navigation skills on the way back we took the wrong train going in the wrong direction and costing us a lot of time and as a result it is midnight and we are still on a train, trying to get to somewhere we can sleep. Definitely an adventure.
We just got to Switzerland tonight.
Füssen: random pics
Cool church
Beautiful river on our walk.
Convinced Michelle to go watch a few minutes of a soccer game
A little of everything- duck, chicken, ribs, stuffing, ham stuff, beets.
Cordon bleu
Bumper cars in dachau
I am easy to spot in this video- for the first 10 seconds, I am the idiot whose car isn't moving, apparently you need to put the token into the car (not like lagoon or the u.s.a. Where the cars just go when you press the gas) after my car gets going the guy is standing on the edge of my car until I prove to be a terrible driver and he jumps off to save his life. Also, I meant to hit that car at the end of this video even with the worker on my car, I gave him a chance to get off and he just stayed on my car.
It was a blast.
Goodby Munich- hello Füssen
I have been calling it munchen.
Here is my beautiful wife with her backpack. Train from München to about 5 different cities and transfers (bus and train) so that we can go see the Neuschwanstein castle. But the ride was an adventure.
Jumped on this bus and we got caught behind a tractor on a narrow road for 5 minutes and I think it made us miss the train that would have got us to Füssen earlier.
If this picture shows up- remind me to tell you the story of our encounter with this person.
We finally made it to füssen and found a cool and inexpensive B&B.
Video: dachau Oktoberfest
Video of the small town oktoberfest.
Warning: don't watch if you tend to get sick from moving video cameras
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Dachau Festival
After the concentration camp we went to dinner and we saw all these ladies dressed up in traditional German dresses and the men in leprachaun shorts and cool shirts and vests and boots, and so after dinner I convinced Michelle that we should follow them and so we followed some people a few blocks to see where they were going and it was a huge carnival and a huge crowd of people eating and drinking pitchers (1 pitcher at a time per person) of beer, a band playing on stage, everybody talking and laughing, a waitress darting through the crowd carrying a full pitcher of beer that spills over the top and onto the floor, 10 people to a 6 person table and close to 200 tables- the whole town of Dachau must have been there.
It was just like you'd imagine or see in a movie with German's and lots of beer. We got through the walk way with no beer spilling on us and at the other end was a fair going on.
We walked around and got ice cream and people watched. Michelle let me ride in the bumper cars and after I figured out how to put the token in front so that it would go, I had a lot of fun and it was awesome.
I thought to myself. People really are the same everywhere- they may dress different and they may speak an unknown language, but they find joy and entertaiment in similar ways (and sadness and pain too). I saw a huge group of people enjoying time with their friends, riding bumper cars, playing carnival games, licking ice cream off a cone in the rain, and eating good food- people all looking for happiness ( I mean it is "the object and design of our existence") and I think and saw that many don't know where to find it.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Frankfurt temple
This is the Frankfurt temple at around 5:35 pm (TLFS Time) - too late for session.
Googles amazing walking directions took us straight to the back of the temple. Beautiful temple "that we'll go inside someday." hopefully thursday.6 nimmt!
About 6 years ago when I was doing my internship in Peru, a German lady that was staying at the same hostel that I was staying at taught me how to play this game.
I recognized it in one othe store windows and we bought it. It is a very fun game. We couldn't understand the instructions so we couldn't play until we got to an Internet connection and learned them.
Trains, trains and automoBuses
One of the best and worst parts about travelling to 10 different cities in 30 days is learning to navigate completely different transportation systems, in several different languages, and then actually arriving without contention to your desired location when you want to be there.
We have been to 8 different cities so far and have done pretty well in getting to where we wanted to go, but today we failed, I feel like we just fell behind in The Amazing Race or something akin to losing a game where the consequences are just the mental anguish that lingers on, replaying for a while what you could and should have done differently, but that doesn't erase the feeling of failing. We left Salzburg and after a few transfers we made it to Frankfurt and found our hotel and then we started to navigate the metro system and it did not follow the above map, and we were so thrown off and in disbelief that the train wouldn't go where it said it should that we looked so confused people started explaining to us in 100% German some things that seemed important- like a construction change in the stop we were trying to get to. Finally some high school kid who spoke perfect English saw our desperation and asked if we needed help? He helped us circumnavigate the construction and get to our transfer which we finally did, but we arrived to the Frankfurt temple 1/2 hour later than the final 5 pm session. But because I asked Michelle if I could plan the last third of our trip it is really "flexible and up in the air" according to me and "unplanned and homeless prone" according to her, so to say the least we are dealing quite well with the setback and now we are even happier with our unplanned plan. Sidenote: the Frankfurt temple is far away from the city and the farther away you get, the more you become the only ones that speak English. I think it is more fun like that.Inspiring Art
I have seen a lot of art on this trip- most of which was forbidden to photograph, but this piece was personally given to me by some jack of all trades (doctor, tour guide, journalist, artist by night) Korean professor that we met on the sound of music tour.
Life is like a game of tetris
I admit I have played several games of tetris while traveling on the train while Michelle sleeps comfortably and after hours of taking in the beautiful scenery stairing out the window like a kid at the candy store.
So I was thinking how much life is like a game of tetris- Here are a few thoughts that may or may not make sense- Life is like a game of tetris.... You never know what you are going to get. You are only given certain defined pieces to work with but you get to decide what to do with them. Each piece you play is only a small part of the whole game, but the whole game can be defined by a well placed piece or a poorly placed piece. Sometimes during the game you are given all the right pieces that fit together like a childrens puzzle. Those times never last forever. It's easy to focus and get frustrated and lose your focus when you receive a piece at the wrong time (it isn't that te peice has changed, it's just that the board and timing have) that has no apparent place and that causes a hole. Covering the hole, or mistake and just stacking blocks on it is a recipe for disaster in the future and will ultimately lead to a bad game Working on not covering up the hole, but removing the blocks over it allows you to stay safe and not be threatened by it in the future It seems impossible to never create a hole. You can always recover and fill the hole i you make the right moves quickly after your error. It's fun It's frustrating It takes practice to be really good You only know a move or two in advance It's sufficient to know only a move or two in advance- you don't have a choice to play the present piece ( you can't demand to see the next fifty pieces before you start playing) It just keeps going and then stops suddenly. The more you play the harder, faster, and more difficult it gets- the pieces fall according to past performance. The game is personal- you don't play against somebody- everyone gets different pieces in different order ****that is all for now- any other thoughts or comparisons can be shared
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Me Sleeping up at Strawberry
One of my favorite things to do, even with my shoe(s) on