Milano

i'm racing against the clock... my internet time clock to see if i can post a few pics tonight from my visit to the Milan city center.

First of all... Dave, here's your sign:


A typical street in the downtown Milan area, complete with vespa:


The Duomo, second largest church in the world. An overwhelming sight when you walk into the piazza and it comes into view:


La Galleria... Prada on one side, Louis Vuitton on the other... and on one of the opposite corners... probably the most expensive McDonald's in the world:


Finally, a cool shot in the moonlight. Such a romantic place:


Milano is magnifico!!

Schloss Neuschwanstein

Schloss means "castle" or something like that, and if you look closely enough you can see the "Schwan" (pronounced schvan for swans) buried in the name. Schwans have a significant place in German history, particularly the "his story" surrounding King Ludwig (pronounced Ludvig) II.

I was blessed to have the opportunity to visit two of the prettiest castles in Europe... at least in my opinion... and one of them was his. It's true I've not visited many castles yet, so that may not be saying much, but considering the fact that Disney's Cinderella castle was inspired by one of these two, I can't be far off base in proclaiming it's beauty.

My co-worker friend, Sue Kriegel, and I made our way to Füssen, Germany at the base of the Alps and here's just a "peak" at what we beheld.

First of all, I loved this sign by the lake in this little Alpine town. Alpseebad - yes, I see the need to see the Alps very badly.


We wondered why all the tourists were lining the street and looking up the path into the mountains. Soon we discovered, it was the Bavarian Cows On Parade...



And if you're up for a really short video clip, you can hear how loud these giant cow bells are. It's cool!


King Ludwig II's castle is the Cinderella one, but first, here's a view of his parents' little castle below. Rather impressive, imo.


And now for the unveiling of the beauty found midway up in the German Alps...



I especially liked the funny faces of the gargoyles on the side of the castle.


It was a great place to visit, and I have many more pics, so hit me up if you want to see more. We took a harrowing bus ride up the mountain that caused Sue to keep her eyes wide shut, and we took an enchanting ride back down the mountain in a horse-drawn carriage. We ended the day with a delightful dinner in the quaint town below, and in honor of my daughter, I took my first pic of my food in Europe... just b/c it looked so pretty. Apricot cream with blackberry sauce. Germans know how to do dessert!


I hope you, whoever you are, might be able to come visit while I'm in Germany this year. I would love to take you to see the Cinderella castle as well.

Germany at first glance

On the way to my hotel in Ottobeuren, a tiny town outside of Memmingen, where GameStop Germany is located, I came across this... and all I could think of was all the guys on my IT team back home. Here's your sign:

The translation is something like: Fire Hazard when running through the... well you can figure out the rest.

Here's my sweet hotel: the Park Hotel Maximilian


Here's a view of the path into the forest outside my hotel window. It gets really dark in there even in the middle of a sunny day. No wonder they call it the Black Forest in Germany.


Ottobeuren: A typical tiny town in Bavaria


Here's a Bavarian May Pole with symbols to tell travelers of old the amenities the town has to offer:


The church in Ottobeuren is a beautiful landmark that many tourists come to visit:


The artwork inside the church is a bit overdone, but some of it is truly beautiful:


This was one of my favorite spottings within my first few days:

Make Warcraft, Not War

I arrived in Memmingen, Germany and soon made my way to the GameStop headquarters here. It looked something like a bunker, bringing to mind WWII.

And speaking of wars, I discovered a couple of war torn Warcraft characters inside, and felt I had to share them for my guildies who might be perusing this site. Whitewolf says it's me and him IRL...

Arrogant American in Europe

Not that I was meaning to be arrogant in any way, but having landed in Frankfort at 8am, after a 10 hour flight across the Atlantic, I found myself in the train station... the Deutsche Bahn... standing before the DB kiosk with an email in my hand that told me I could print my prepaid train ticket here.

Just one small problem. The screen was in German... und ich verstehe ein bischen Deutsch... and I was stuck guessing at the buttons to push on the touch screen. After several failed attempts, I joined the long line of people going into the ticket office.

The guy there did me a big favor. Instead of printing my ticket for me, he sent me back to the kiosk with a quick drawing of which buttons to push, including an indication of color and everything. He told me to touch the flags to get it in English.

"Okay," I thought as I walked back toward a kiosk, "I'd seen these flags on the screen and thought they would change the language, but they'd all been other languages." There had been no American flag!! But as I surveyed the screen once again, suddenly it hit me... and I felt like a dumb, and somewhat arrogant, American. I had expected there to be an American flag for English. It only makes sense right?

But no, here I am in Europe and it wasn't until I reviewed the flags again that I realized... Britain! Of course! The English speaking country in Europe is Britain, so naturally it is the British flag that will get you the English version of the screen. Duh!



Good thing I paid attention in elementary school when learning all those flags of the world. I wonder if Canadians would expect the maple leaf on the white background to signify English for them? Of course, it could always mean French as well. /wink

Touché

During our fabulous 4-day weekend, we got into a discussion on the use, or should I say misuse, of the word "Touché". It must be something gamers have in common, because both my son Mark, and my "2nd son" Josh, use this term extensively. They use it anytime someone makes a point, and sometimes even when no point is made at all. Example incoming...

Marty, my husband, and I tried to explain that it is meant to be used when you make a good point about something, but then someone has a witty or clever comeback that causes you to reconsider your side of the argument or debate, and you grant them that their point is valid, though in sharp contrast to your own... Touché!!

Mark and Josh countered our arguments with the fact that the word "touché" is a French fencing term indicating that your opponent has "touched" you with the tip of his sword, scoring a point. They both proclaimed their own "touché" in making this argument against us. Hmmmm *raises eyebrow*

Yet the best use of the word all weekend came when we went to see the movie Star Trek. James Kirk's character is about to make a space jump with Hikaru Sulu in order to take out the Romulan mining rig that is boring a hole into Vulcan, when Kirk asks him what hand-to-hand combat training he has had. Sulu answers "Fencing," to which Josh and his friend Nate, both sitting on either side of Sharayah, respond by leaning forward, looking at each other, and proclaiming "Touché!!"

*shakes head*

A Fabulous Four-Day Weekend

It was the weekend before my first trip to Europe. Sharayah came in Thursday evening... always a highlight in my life. Mark had joined us for lunch on Friday at Pei Wei's... a family tradition. Then while he went off to work, and Marty went off to an ArtLoveMagic exhibit, Sharayah and I enjoyed Olive Garden (always a fav girls' nite out place) and Public Enemies. While waiting for the movie to open, we walked the parking lot in the dark teaching each other phrases in German, French, Russian, and Hindi. Language is such an interesting study.

And then on Saturday, the Canadians arrived... icing on the cake! Josh "Whitewolf" Alexander and Nate "Dawg" Clow became part of our family for a fabulous 4-day weekend, though they were only here for 3 days of it.

I gave them the GameStop Grande Tour and then we all went out for dinner Brazilian-style at Boi Na Braza. We enjoyed all the cuts of meat brought by skewer to our table. We had pineapple drinks, cheese bread puffs, and fried bananas to top it off, as well as the cheesecake, creme brulee and Italian ice cream for dessert. Back at our apt, we played a wild game of Mow (doubt that is spelled correctly), a version of Uno played with regular cards. Marty's short term memory challenge was the hilarious highlight of the game.

Sunday we started with the traditional Starbucks visit and then worship at our favorite Rock Pointe Church. Josh & Nate seemed to like it. That was followed by lunch at Red, Hot, and Blue and then an afternoon at Six Flags. It was so crowded that we could only squeeze in the Batman and Titan rollercoaster rides. At a discount ticket price of $25, I'd say each of those rides were still worth $12.50 each. Woohoo!! We had dinner at Wendy's followed by a deep space adventure via Star Trek at the dollar theater. For anyone reading this who hasn't seen it yet, or maybe even if you have... Capt. Kirk is the image of my son Mark... the smirking grin, the smartass remarks, the adorable good-looks... yeah, that's my son on screen. I love it.

Monday we took the Canadian boys for some California Pizza Kitchen goodness and then hung out at the house watching Big Bang Theory, talking about the One who Created it all... via some kind of "Big Bang" (reference Louie Giglio's Indescribable talk)... and played a little Wii Resort. Then it was off to the airport and sadness at the thought of not getting to see my "second" son (Josh, aka WW) for a long time.

We hit up Grandy's to satisfy Sharayah's craving for those yummy rolls and visited my parents once again before we were all flying out... Sharayah to Denver Tuesday morning and me to Germany Tuesday afternoon. Marty had to stay behind. I missed him as soon as I walked on the plane... but considering what his friend Estevan was facing, it was a God-thing that he was there to see him through.