Prague

Finally after 3 trips to Europe in my lifetime. These are the countries I've covered.

That's more travelling than I've done in South East Asia. I've only been to Singapore, Thailand and Brunei so far. Hell, I think its even more than the number of cities or towns I've visited in Malaysia. The "Malaysia, Truly Asia" campaign is not working on me.

Back to the topic. Plague Prague. Photo album here.

Top to bottom: A church, old European buildings, tourists and the Prague's main square.

Finally, my first travel to an Eastern European country. Where capitalism and tourism industry are still fresh there. That explains the swarm of tourists in Prague. Well, honestly, for me, Czech Republic is well known because I used to support the football team in Euro '04.

We took a 6 hour train ride which only costs 59 euros return ticket. We slept on the train for most of the journey, even I was supposed to study for my exam on Thursday, 1 day after returning from Prague.


Wilson brought cool sleeping accessories on board the train. Reminds me of the Demonhunter from Warcraft 3.


The astronomical clock near the town square


Prague's most famous landmark, Charles Bridge. It's about 700 years old.


Lots of tourists rushing to the front to touch the famous Saint statue on Charles bridge.


Another sign that shows how many tourists Prague has.


Another landmark is humonguous. The Prague castle. It's like a little town inside for tourist. Awesome.


"The castle is right there on the hills."


Then we visited the Communism Museum. Traces of communism in Eastern Europe are nothing but history and all being kept in museums.


Off goes Communism, comes the jazz bars in Prague. At a cheap price for the drinks and entertainment as well. Czech's famous beer, Pilsner Urquell tastes good as well. Smooth, very smooth taste.

The hostel we stayed was the Boathouse. Although it only takes 20 minutes tram ride from the city center, it was hard to believe for a place like this to have a "Hostelworld.com certified" hostel in this vicinity. But, it was 1 of the best hostels I've ever stayed in Europe. Clean. Family-runned hostel. Breakfast included. Cheap dinners in the hostel. Great common area to chill and talk to other tourists, who were all Americans, whom we met and brought to another jazz bar on the other night.

No photos with them, as my batteries were being charged. We talked to an interesting chap from Texas, Lucas who's like a walking IMDB(International Movie Database). Even the other Americans were stunned by his movie knowledge. We asked him what's his favourite movie of all time. His answer was, "Batman Begins".

I just realised I still haven't chose my favourite movie of all time.

Prague is quite a cool city. Great nightlife. But, I realised there's not much sights or landmarks there. Going to Prague once is enough, but still fulfilling.

Gotta thank Wilson for being my full-time navigator in Prague. Navigating Prague is not easy as the road names in Czech language sounds strange.

Filler post

Sorry for not updating for more than a week. Just came back from Prague on tuesday night and been studying for todays test. So, this entry is just a filler-post to keep readers entertained.

Question: What can ensure peace in the Middle East?
Palestinian and Israeli enjoying Shisha together.

No wonder Amsterdam is so peaceful and friendly amid the racial variations. (From Mario's viewpoint, sadly I didn't get the experience the "peaceful lifestyle" in Amsterdam yet)


That is Kalil, from Palestine. Who says Muslims can't enjoy in Beerland/Porkland like Germany.


Left: Behzad from Iran. Behind: Wajdie from Israel. He's my house representative. Something like block head in hall. But their beards are no match for my beard. =)

German names

Ever wondered how Surnames/Family Names were derived? Notice that some english names could be related to one's ancestor's profession. Such examples like, Smith(Blacksmith?), Porter, Shakespear (Spearman?), Archer (like Johnny Archer), Miller, and Shepherd.

Same goes for Germans here, at a larger extent i think, like Bauer(farmer), Schmidt (Smith),...

or some famous Germans...


Schumacher, maybe shoe maker?


Claudia Schiffer ( could be mariner, or someone who deals with ships)


Bastian Schweinsteiger (Pig stepper, hey, its still a profession)

and This is what I found quite a while ago in Salzburg. (Lower center)

Should be an obvious translation for those who don't know german.

woot. woot.. its raining at night.

Finally, something to cool down Munich and her people after experiencing 2 back-to-back days of 35 degrees celsius. The weather's been crazy lately.

Last week, it was colder than when I first came in spring April, due to the constant rain.

Really cold, about 12 degrees during summer is something that we need to question Al Gore's movie.

During our BBQ, it was really cold with the wind slashing our thin flesh with the chill.

Even with the help of the happy pyromaniac with a full bottle of flammable liquid in her hand, Jieming had to borrow my red jacket.

Suddenly, this weekend when summer decided to show up. So, many rushed into the nude tanning area in the gardens to sunbath until it became a non-nude area, due to the massive crowd. So, some people, according to their blogs, were dissapointed. But it was still a good day to jog. =D

Although summer here is alright compared to Malaysia and Singapore, rooms are not conviniently equiped with fans and aircon. So, some rain and wind should help a lot for us here.

So when comes the heat, off goes the shirt.

Oh, an answer to Chin Joo's question and something I haven't noted in my blog: My flight back to KL is on 4th August. So, I'll reach KL on 5th August.

And to my NUS and hall friends, I'll reach Sg on 10th August. A lot of catching up to do definitely....

%*((#$!! The rain just stopped right before I finished this post.

1 Week update

Just a short post, because I should be studying. =)


We had barbecue among all the NUS students somewhere in front of my room. From the picture, you can see roughly the number of NUS students in Munich, well expect for the 2 at the upper right.

Mohaideen, who's Muslim and can't eat pork. Cos of pork remains/oil on the grills. Still, it's great that he came for the gathering. Check out the background, those 2 are my Palestinian neighbours smoking Shisha. They quite smart to use some of our burnt charcoal for their Shisha fuel. I wonder if it's ok when pork oil actually drips onto the charcoal below the grill.

At least, theres Reuben to feed him halal potato chips. Overall, it's good leh. Everyone enjoyed it, according to their blogs. You're welcome everyone! =)

On Saturday, I made an imprompto trip to Nuremberg, just 1 hour 40 mins away. Just a solo getaway trip while my friends were mugging for their exams. I only have 1 paper this week.

Just a relaxing trip for the day. Visited a museum about Nazis in Nuremberg and a toy museum, which is Nuremberg is supposed to be famous for.

Deja Vu?


I guess Nuremberg has a huge Turkish community as well. Look at this Shisha shop.

Look how tall Shishas can be.

I found this in Ming Feng's photo album.

Something he bought for 4 Euros. He likes his funny pose. But, look at Reuben with his shades. Why did the logo block me?! I was attempting something funny as well. :/

Lego

What could an Asian like me amuse people in Munich?


Few days ago, I was carrying a 20 kg sack of rice back to my hostel. Those who saw me carrying these were giggling or just asked me, "OMG...! Is that a sack of rice?!". Many angmohs were stunned to ever seen so much rice before.

Rice is essential to our diet. But, they are rather scarce and expensive over here in Western countries. They usually come in small boxes of 1 kg. We were fortunate to find a considered back home regular sized sack for only 23 Euros.

Enough about food, time to introduce my new toy. The Lego Batmobile.


I was never a Batman nor DC comics fan until now.



The Beautiful & Beasty Batmobile.


There's even Technic parts in the engine compartment. I havent installed Flash in my computer. So, no animated GIF for u all. But, just imagine the gears turning when I push the car forward. Pretty cool rite. But try to spot a missing lego block. First time I encountered a defect in lego products.


Even the flames can turn.

The size is no ordinary compared to legomen.

Indeed the force is strong in this one.


The cockpit has nice comfy seat that reclines.

The car is huge that you need 1 legoman to steer and another for the pedals.


Definitely a great buy. 60 Euros. Thats 120 Sg Dollars. It made the B-Wing I bought, that cost 80 Sg Dollars a kiddie toy. Best of all, its the most difficult lego I've ever constructed. 2 Books inside. 4 hours to construct.

I felt young again, even though I had stiff neck looking for the parts that were scattered on the floor.

As an endnote, here's an advice to the readers. Thats what I learnt from the German culture.


RECYCLE!

Kult Fabrik

Kult Fabrik. In English, Cult Factory. I've been hearing about this club for weeks. So after some great dinner last Friday, Mario, Reuben, Ming Feng and I decided to find out whats so special about Ostbahnhof's Kultfabrik. FYI, this is only my 2nd time in a club in Munich. First was at Nacht Gallerie when Kat's friends visited 2 weeks ago. Throughout exchange, others were only in Berlin, Muenster and Vienna. Yeah, my nightlife is mostly restricted to only beers and wine among small group of friends.

The moment we exited the S-Bahn station, we could see a large stream of young people heading towards a similar direction. There is even a sign for it. So much for spending 5 minutes to find directions to Kultfabrik in the Net before we left.


It's unfortunate that I didn't bring my camera on that day, as my camera is bigger than the size of my palm.
From that exact directory I saw at the entrance, I realised how huge is this place. It's like a city itself! Like a Studentenstadt of clubs! Wait a minute.. when I explore around the place, there are actually seperate club management where ticketing system are different for different clubs. I expected it to be an MoS city.

We didn't have the mood to club that night so just hanged loose around bars that were ample there. Kolsch beer which is only served in Cologne is amazingly served here as well. Best of all there is a Kebab store in the middle of all the neon lights around. Price? Same as the average Munich price, 3 Euros. We were also lucky to watch a free boxing match between a German and a Russian. Surprisingly, the German won.

For the highlight of the night, we went to number 23 from the directory above. Great place. Although the entry costs 10 Euros each, the bouncer was nice enough to let one of us in to check out the place inside before we decide to enter. I decided to enter to see the inside for myself. Well, the rest is history.

It was a great and enjoyable time in KultFabrik. I won't talk about the places especially number 23 in details, one have see the place themself. Actually, let's just say, you'll hate me for not bringing my camera on that day.

Finally a gathering

Great food by Jeremy(Grace's boyfriend who is visiting her for 3 weeks), great gathering in Studentenstadt, great time. Nothing much to blog about this. Just that is high time that the huge group of exchange kakis meet together. Finally the Studentenstadt kakis got to meet the Dulferstrasse kakis. Looking forward to next week's barbecue!

Click here for the photos

Apart of this, I finally updated 3 posts of my June trips!
My awesomo cycling trip in Switzerland
Muenster revisited
Berlin Trip

Finally, back to normalcy in blogging.

I'm back

Ahh..Yes, it's been more than 2 weeks away from this blog. A great holiday indeed.

I dare say the period of my absence here was the most eventful part during this exchange. Many trips once again. Concerts. More clubbing. More alcohol consumption. Shelf full with empty bottles. Reminisced the good ol' days in Muenster last year. More mileage on the Autobahn. Shattering speed records with a 1.3 liter car. Completed my itenary of Germany after Berlin. Forget about Hamburg. Rediscovered Munich in the right perspective. Many friendships bounded closer. More walls being torned down. Rediscovering myself even more through friends here. Learnt new recipes to cook. Started having programming lab in school. Henry gone to Barca. My longer hair is getting hideous. Gained weight. 2 sides of my pocket became lighter. Right side, because of less money. Left side, my Nokia 6280 has gone crazy, so I had to change to my old spare small Sony Ericson handphone.

No wonder I didn't have time to blog.

I found from sitemeter.com that I had almost 200 visits the past 2 weeks of my absence. I may brag about this, but that means 200 dissapointments for the past 2 weeks. But, I'll take the chance to appreciate the visits by various places recently(very surprising!) like, Germany, Malaysia, Singapore, US sometimes(California), Italy!, Australia(Perth, Sydney and Melbourne), United Kingdom!, and once, Thailand! Thank you. Thank you. These visits are like continuous support for me in keeping me motivated in the blogging culture, which something I hated last year. **Those attention seeking bastards.** =)

The question is... will I update these events as backdated post? Only time will tell..

Today, we went to Germany's Legoland.

Just click on the picture to link to the photo gallery.

29.50 Euros entry to this amusement park which is 1.5 hours away from Munich. Mediciore rides. No, the rides/rollercoaster are not made of Lego bricks! But great presentation of anything they could produce from Lego bricks. Clearly, the smartest and most innovative toy company in the world. Still manage to sell their overpriced toy, that is made of cheap materials to adults and old people, like me who bought a 60 Euro Lego Batmobile.

How am I gonna bring this big box back home? I haven't thought about it yet. =)