Monthly Archives: May 2008

Blondie in a bus

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My beloved husband brings constant joy to me, sometimes coincidently. The best ones are these thought bubbles or, as one of my friend calls them, brain farts. Following ones are from the nine hours bus trip through the Slovakian Tatra mountains, from Prague to Banska Bystrica.

- Are we in Serbia yet, Sasi wondered on Slovak Republic border.

- I think we have left Czechoslovakia already, he announced a bit later. (Yes honey, 15 years ago…)

- Who were the people living here before, Vikings? Sasi wondered after seeing a medieval castle ruins on a hilltop.

I love him to pieces, but History and Geography are just not his strengths.

Well, some Slovaks themselves managed to give us a laugh too. In some small town in the midst of the countryside there was this Indian food restaurant, with normal curries and so in the menu. The name of the place was imaginatively Indian Restaurant – and the logo was a head of Native American, a Sioux chief I think. Infallible logic indeed.

The foothills of Tatra were amazingly beautiful. I strongly suggest you should go and see Slovakian countryside before its too touristic. In there, you can feel what Europe must have been several centuries ago – big wild forests with all kind of animals. It was easy to imagine the roots of the folk stories in there: after a really gloomy and dark forest, there was this one tiny tiny cottage in the middle of the forest, light just in one of the windows. – Knock knock, who is there? – It is just me, grandma, I have a basket of fruits to you…

We really enjoyed our time in Slovakia. Sasi will tell you more about it, since while I have been writing this, there has been fireworks outside blinking together with lightnings. We are in a really cool town in Transylvania, Romania, and I will vanish now to the Sibiu night.

Maiku

Knut the Ice Bear

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KnutieI have written so many short articles of the famous German ice bear Knut that I just had to go and visit him while we were in Berlin.

Knut is no longer baby bear but rather a big bad boy, two years old and teenager. But cute and adorable he was still, I just loved to see him play with the water. Splash! He swam and dived, and on a while he came up to the rocks to eat lettuce and apples – since when ice bears have been vegetarians??

I know I am a bit crazy with animals, but I loved the Berlin Zoo. It is amazing that most of the animals are not behind huge fences so you really feel to be close to them. My dream job would be to work in there. Maybe I should consider to change career.

Oh, and the conversation of the day:

- Look, Maiku look, there is giraffe in there, Sasi got exited.

- No hon, it is the golden angel of the nearby church tower.

Maiku

Ps. more pics from the zoo and Germany on our Flickr.

Sauerkraut crisis

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I wish it was so easy to write perfectly blog notes like Maiku does. I am really energetic and loving this trip but, there is always a but. Things often go on our trip so fast and I end up not having the time to write a single word.

Let me picture to you our amazing life nowadays. We sleep some hours per night on somebody’s couch in some city and then we wake up go visit the places and the must see things, and the day always end walking around town. And of course the best part for me is trying the local delicacies and meals.

Our German experience, it all started after we left the lovely Peggy that treated us like kings in Paris. We decided to get to Köln and, since our budget is so low nowadays, we opted for a night bus with Eurolines. God that was spooky, we left late night and were expecting a comfortable trip but things didn’t go that well, it was loud and full and uncomfortable and, on the top, we got there at 5 am in the morning. It was a national holiday day after the local football team had just qualified to the highest level after decades of waiting. Helsinki reincarnated with it’s drunken crowds (difference was red and white team shirts, not blue and white). It felt so like home.

My favorite thing in Germany was the food – but I don’t mean that awful Sauerkraut (sour cabbage). I wanted to taste it but the waiter brought me a huge bowl. Yuck! Never again. But the blood and liver sausages were amazing… This dish called Heaven and Earth is a must to try. Then one not to forget was The Chocolate museum in Köln. That was something but not that fascinating since it was all show off of new machines and equipments and not the old fashioned ways like I expected.

I was shocked to see how organized Germany is, and how big is the difference between East and West Berlin. The influence of the wall still exist. Anyhow, I fell in love with East Berlin: it was cool, hip, colorful, full of graffiti and cool people, young and hip while the West was modern, empty and executive people type.

Sasi

Maiku continues: Sasi is right about the difference between East and West. I was really surprised to see that, or to put it better, to feel that. It is not so much in the physical geography but in peoples minds. And young people are proud of their Eastern heritage.

There was cool bars and pubs, clubs, designer shops and all kind of artists, musicians and so on. On the top of that, we had really cool host who was able to show us around to the best, sort of underground places. Am amazed to say, but I loved East Berlin.

Maiku

PS: Check out our top picks from some hints about Germany and how to get around while saving money by using this Mitfahren-website.

A dream of a queen

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I will tell you a story of a girl. Her name was Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna, but she is better known as:

We have been many times in Paris, both of us, so we didn’t bother us too much of sightseeing. One was still not experienced by both of us: le grand palais de Versailles. Boiling hot was the sun on our skins in the gardens, and the bushes whispered of ancient secrets of lovers playing hide and seek under their shadows.

After the lazy mid-day, most of the tourist queues had vanished and we entered the palace itself. Not too much need to say about it, pompouse monument of power and masculinity as it is. Much of gold and other glossy surfaces. But of course, we just had to try a small valse in the Hall of Mirrors, much to amuse for Japanese tourists.

However, Marie Antoinette’s estates were more than I could ever have imagined. The place somehow managed still build a sad picture of the queen. Her garden with artificial rivers and grottos and especially the imaginary Medieval country village Hameau were just a fairytale land escape from the court.

Marie was just 14 when she married Louis-Auguste, 15. As youngest daughter of Archduchess Maria Theresia of Austria, her destiny was doomed to be a play chip in the international politics. She was considered to be more like royal property than human being. As she moved to France, she didn’t have friends, she didn’t even speak the language.

She was desperately trying to please everyone, had she been neglected by her own mother in her childhood. Also, she didn’t get too much attention from her husband, who was more interested about technical gadgets and books. Nerdee, we might say. King was thought to be impotent, but as it turned out, he just didn’t know what to do in bed. Not before Marie’s brother, Emperor Joseph II of Austria, came to visit. After talking to king himself, Joseph was convinced that his majesty’s erection was satisfactory, but it didn’t stay long enough to ejaculate, since he had know idea what to do with it! Joseph obviously gave some tips, since Marie had her first child next year – after seven years of marriage.

Loathed by most of the court, bitched by her mother in her letters, being bored of the royal court duties and without real love she obviously escaped to her own imaginary world. She had problems with addiction of gambling, she organized wild parties and went hunting with her gang, a few closest friends. When deadly handsome and intelligent Swedish count Axel von Fersen came to the court, it is easy to imagine that she would have fallen on him. There is no real prove that they would have had an affair, but the rumours were that her second son, Louis Charles whom she called “mon chou d’amor”, would actually been Fersen’s.

Von Fersen was an adventurer and womanizer with a mistress in several countries, but eventually he had a close relationship with both Marie and the king. He tried to save them on several occasions in the unfortunate future.

Count wanted his wars though, and meanwhile unhappy Marie concentrated on her fairytale village. She build there 12 houses, of which 9 still exists (its bloody amazing that they didn’t destroy Versailles and Marie’s estates during the revolution – or maybe they had more respect on buildings than humans).

We were in the village almost on sunset. It was eerie quiet and empty, and it was easy to imagine young queen on the rowing boat trips on the lake, making out with the Swede in the Temple of Love dressed as milkmaid or shepardess. She had her own theater even, where she used to sing and have role in plays.

She was a sort of misunderstood blondie of her own time, a bit like Britney Spears – too young to handle the fame and money, used by others – the difference being that Britney didn’t come to her senses after having children unlike Marie.

I somehow felt she had enchanted us since when we tried to leave, we noticed the gates had locked and we were alone in her estates. Surrounded by a wall and a trench, it seemed we have to overnight there with thousands of frogs croaking ear-breakingly. I tried to assure Sasi to kiss one of them just to see what would happen. He refused, coward.

Finally, we managed to find a small, open gate next to pigsty of the village. The charm faded and we were soon back on a busy French highway hitch-hiking our way back to train station, me wondering if it would be time to see that Sofia Coppola film. Is it any good?

Fairytale-teller Maiku

PS. She never said that cake thing.

Loosing the grave

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When you say Cote d’Azur, you usually think of sun, beach, party and fun but for me it was money, nice yachts, and luxury. We were in Monaco and I was dreaming of living there, we were in Nice and I dreamt of living there, and then we went to Cannes (well, you know the red carpet is all what there is to see there).

Anyhow, south of France was awesome until 18.30 on that day, when we were supposed to take a bus from Le Cannet to Aix En Provence. But, to our surprise, the driver said that we should have bought tickets before – we hadn’t since the tourist office (two of them, in fact) said we buy them from the bus. Well that basically changed our trip, since we got really fed up. So we decided to take an overnight train from Cannes to Paris and ended up here on the next morning.

We have been hosted by a real nice Lebanese family in a little town out of Paris. Now, we have been in Paris for a week or so and its been fun for both of us and relaxing, me seeing my friends that took most of our time, and then going to many interesting places and some days taking it easy.

One of our amazing visits was when we went to Cimetrie du Pere Lachaise , Maiku’s favorite dead hangout zone. We visited Jim Morrison (whom Maiku loves but I didn’t know who he was), Moliere, Lafontaine and my dear Edith Piaf. Well yes, if you cant see stars when they are alive, visit their graves later.

So while hanging out in Pere Lachaise we met this old French lady. Her first words where: “I have lost my husband’s grave”. In fact, I want to dedicate this post to Mme Di Stefano. This 85 year old lady didn’t remember the place of her husband grave. She had been sick for a while and couldn’t come to put flowers or clean the grave, since “it has shifted place”. Well Maiku made a great effort finding Mr. Di Stefano. It was found, and we saw that the Madame had made inscription to the stone ready for her self too. And then, this fragile lady burst in tears, and she told us the story of the old lovebirds that have been separated by death after 50 years of marriage. Very sad and true how lonely we are when we loose a partner.

a bientot et bisous from Paris

Sasi