Me, my girl, and Barcelona.

Sat, wake up…hung over. Ethan calls saying he’s catching a ride with the other Yankees, who have to leave early because of an incident that happened, which I am not allowed to talk about here.

Drive back to Munich on the X3. I try to use the windshield wipers but the sprayers were frozen, so all the blades do are scrape gunk on the window and screeches like crazy. The window was now worse off before I started to attempt to clean it.

After parking the car back at work, Alex and I walk to the train station, hungry and a little dehydrated. Plus is freezing out even though it's not snowing. We hadve to wait about 25 minutes in the biting cold for our train to come to take us to the flughaven (airport). We hit the airport and make it past security, and hit a restaurant for some food, but after a few bites I realize it's way to early to try and eat a big meal.
Fly in around the city, great views, and the weather was perfect. Get the train to our hotel called the Eurostars Angli. I picked it because it was a little outside the city, and had the most interesting architecture and design for a hotel I have seen. The room was amazing....but after our long Friday night partying in Aschau with the Germans, we needed a nap. Wake up at like 1230am on Saturday morning. Yeah, we got in at like 6pm to the hotel and then slept til past midnight. Not to discourage us, we head into town for food. The main strip was pretty much deserted. People were selling cheap beer all over the street, very interesting. We find some food, eat, and head back home for our big day Sunday of sightseeing.




First thing we do after getting back into town is head to an Irish bar for lunch by the Sagrada Familia. We caught the end of a soccer game, which is pretty much the only sport you can see in almost any country in Europe. But the Sagrada familia was very interesting...It is over 150 years old and is still a work in progress. But the architecture was quite impressive, plus they had an area that showed the progress of the church in pictures.





Walked around and find the Arc de triomph and other sites in Barcelona. Nothing like a trusty tourist map to get you around the city! Later turned out to be pretty cool when we stumbled on the Picasso museum. They had hundreds of his pieces of art all lined up chronologically in different rooms. I won't bore you with the history, but it was pretty amazing to be that close to the artwork, so numerous and well preserved.

On to dinner, we went to a place called Taller de Tapas, a great little tapas bar near some nighttime shopping. Apparently it's a pretty good Tapas bar and I think they even had a few around the city. Nonetheless, a good bottle of wine, great food, and good atmosphere, all shared with someone who I was very happy to enjoy it with.
After dinner, we headed to one bar, then on to the next which was one of those back alley good luck finds called Guru BCN. Dark atmosphere and couches, packed with people. We finished out the night there and caught a taxi home. Well, our original plan was to take the train, but when we got to the station the bars were down, meaning it was close. So we stopped for McDonalds, and then got our taxi.


Sunday we hit the beach before heading back to the airport, and found a nice place to eat called Aqua. We were looking for another restaurant, but after that search turned up not looking so nice, we picked our favorite. The weather was just warm enough to sit outside with our jacket on, so we did, and I enjoyed some curried chicken, while Alex dined on some duck. All in all a nice two days and two nights in Barcelona...I had wanted to go to Spain as one of my trips while in Europe, and the timing was just right and everything couldn't have worked out better.




parker

RTT Munich Christmas Party...OMG.

The date was December 14th, 2007...a day that will live indefinitely. My company, RTT, does a yearly Christmas party. USA did one, which I missed obviously since I am in Munich, so we joined in with the Germans. The plan was to drive to Aschau Germany, about 60 miles east of Munich. They offered to provide transportation, a hotel to stay in, dinner, drink, and then wristbands for entrance to a club for after dinner where we can drink for free all night long. Yeah, damn. To top it off, it's at the base of a castle in Aschau.
After checking into the hotel, we head over to dinner where we drink Gluewein, a type of spiced red wine that is served hot. You can find it all over Munich around Christmas. Reijo begins the night be spilling a glass all over Curtis while trying to shake hands with someone. More to come on this topic later.


We move inside, hang our coats and find a seat. We Americans congregated together with our close friends from work, as usual. There was about 250 or so people at the dinner, which took place in a large hall, high barn style roof, decorated to the hilt, with a stage at one end for performances. It's at this point that Reijo takes another swing at some wine, again going for a greeting, but this time knocks over an entire bottle of wine that hits a glass that comes flying at Alex and I...you can see she took most of the hit in the photo below of the aftermath.

Sidenote to the wine...I spent a thursday evening at work taste testing about 10 wines with fellow employees...and I mean I really put some work in drinking this wine. We picked one, then decided on two winners, to be served at dinner, though I didn't see either on the table. Hmmm.

Dinner was a choice of duck, beef, or veggie. I of course, had the duck. Not everyday you have duck. After dinner there was a stage performance. Ludwig and Christoph, the head guys at RTT Munich, were placed in competition against each other in events from guess your employees birthdays to arm wrestling to taking shots of schnapps. All funny stuff and they were good sports and even spoke in English to the crowd, maybe to accommodate us, who knows.


After dinner, we move upstairs to enjoy two German guys playing cover songs of American bands, only they sang most of the songs were sang with incorrect lyrics. Either way it added to the whole night just perfect. We danced our asses off, did arm in arm jumping to punk music or whatever they were playing. Then Reijo got wobbly on the floor and fell over with a bunch of people and knocked over a drumset. That was our signal to move on to the club.



On the way we got involved in an epic snowball fight. The snow had been falling hard the entire time out here, and living in California I think we all decided it was necessary to take advantage of a situation where we can act like kids again. Incidents involed: Me yielding a Christmas tree and throwing it a people, Snowballs to the face, getting tackled to the icy hard ground, bodyslams into snowbanks, etc.



Get to club, and get our drinks, thanks to Alex. Apparently I don't have boobs so I can't get drinks very quickly, whooda thunk it. Hit the dance floor and got crazy when 'Jump around' by House of Pain came on. I think Alex and I sang every word as loud as we could...might of scared the Germans a little.



The night ended around 3 or 4 in the morning with our drunken walk of shame back to the hotel. Sure saturday morning was hard, but it was all worth it. Hands down probably the funnest party I've been to in awhile. I definitely want to be in Munich for the Christmas party in 2008.

Oh yeah this is evidence of Clive and Curtis drunk in an elevator...I'll work on getting the video, but basically they fell over and Curtis kept getting slammed in the leg with the door, while neither of them could regain the ability to stand...check back for the video, it's gold.

parker

Turkish Dinner...

Now this was fun...Omer had wanted to plan a dinner with the group from Munich. Bottom picture is Reijo, Curtis, Allen, Alex, Me, Tobbi, and Omer. This was also Alex's first night in town...so technically it was our first dinner in Munich together. She planned on staying for about 8 days or so, and we were able to secure the same flight back. Nothing like spending a 12 hour plane ride next to your girlfriend than some stranger you try to make awkward conversation with occasionally.


Omer also told us a lot about Turkish culture and how and why the food is made. There was a lady in the back making the flat pastry like food which we ate, which came in 5 or 6 different flavors. I forget the actual name but it was pretty good, and a special treat to be taken to a place like this.

parker

10 Days to gogogo...

My time here is coming to a close. So much to look back and reflect on.....which I will no doubt do for a long time. I'm glad I took a lot of pictures and kept this blog thing. Hell I don't know if a lot of people really read this...not too concerned. I know my Mom is always looking for updates, that's enough for me to keep doin it.

Hopefully the snow comes back this weekend. Alex arrives on Thursday, then it's off to the RTT Christmas party on Friday night. Free car, hotel, dinner, and club afterwards...all drinks free. Gonna get crazy from what people vaguely talk about last years party. Then on saturday Alex and I hop on a plan to Barcelona Spain....hey that rhymes! I'm a nerd. Two days in Spain with my girlfriend...gonna be an awesome trip.

.....and to top it off I fly back to Los Angeles on the 21st....only to have no work until the 2nd of January...woohoo! It's like Winter break from school all over again. Looking forward to the next few weeks...lots to happen, check for pictures. Peace.

parker

Modern Art Museum...

or rather, the Pinakothek der Moderne. I went there a few weekends ago with Curtis, Reijo, and Ethan, all guys from work. They also had a Max Beckman exhibit, but no one was interested in paying for that. Some pretty cool stuff and also they had things like modern IBM Thinkpads, that robotic dog that came out a few years back....the AIBO? and a bunch of other random stuff. Here's some pics. Enjoy!

Tatra T87...glorious in all it's...weirdness...Harks back to the boattail design element I was so facinated with in my thesis project at Art Center.

Marble wall...car sculpture. It was about 30 feet long.







Ingenious...I mean, a tree is a chair....now it is official.

They played some strange videos, this one showed the aftermath of some trash strewn park that probably had some kind of concert. It highlights some crazy guy going around throwing trash bags in the air.

Another video is an interview with a Holocaust survivor, who had his 5 digit number tattoo'd in his arm some 60 years ago. He tells the story, then the tattoo artist urge him to go forward with the revitalization of the number, to get it redone. He agrees, and it's almost sad just watching this whole story unfold. His number is revived, and you can see the sadness in his eyes when it's all over.

This is our fridge corner, you get good money for returning your bottles...so we do our best to maintain a nice collection.


parker

Herren Chiemsee...the Royal Palace.

Last weekend...I went to what might be my final castle in Germany, the Royal Palace of Herren Chiemsee. Herren Chiemsee translates to 'Man's Island', and is right next to Frauen Chiemsee, 'Woman's Island', which is about 1/10th the size. Insert male chauvinistic joke here. I went with Dani, a friend from work, who has been to this castle before. So driving there without getting lost was not a problem. Plus it was nice to once again be in a car, which I am slowly wondering how I will accustom myself to driving everywhere when I get back. I might actually miss the trains...sniff.

This is the third castle of Kind Ludwig II...the other being Neuschwanstein that I went to and I don't know the name of the third. Again, this castle was unfinished...maybe 20 of 80 rooms completed. And he only spent 10 days in the castle before he left and was later found face down in a shallow pool of water.

This is Berta...she was our boat who took us the 20 minutes to the island. On board you can buy pretzels, coffee, beer, and ice cream.

The Royal Palace, which is what I will be calling my next house I live in...no matter where or what neighborhood it is located in.

Random bedroom. The one I don't have a picture of took 7 years to make for the King.

Horns to drink beer out of. Take a note, I would like one of these for Christmas.

All the fountains were covered up...and the flowers and plants torn out. Not as visually entertaining as the inside.



Looking out into the water, it was grey and eery. Almost snowing, but just warm enough to fall in drops of water. Felt like I was on a set on some movie, with just a grey tarp for the backdrop as you couldn't see anything off the island.




The island might have only had 100 people on it at most. And walking back to the boat it was quiet...so quiet I may never hear quiet like this again. No animals, wind, people, cars, buildings, just silence. I actually felt like I was in 1873 or something...how did people entertain themselves back then? Oh excuse me my iPhone is ringing....

parker

First snow in Munich....

These pictures are from back in November 15th, when Munich started getting some good snow. It's so funny because I get all excited when the snow starts. Obviously living in Arizona and then Cali didn't provide me days like this to wake up to. You only see snow when you purposefully travel to it.

Shot from the South side...out my window...

Shot out the north side, in the stairwell...

Snow covered bikes....

This is on the wall of the train station I use to get to work. I see it every morning...and the character is interesting to say the least. Just one example of the street art found in Munich.