Die Englischer Gartens

Today was a beautiful day in Muenchen. It must have been in the 60's today, and it actually felt pretty warm for me. Sunny, partly cloudy... all in all a wonderful day to take some pictures! So, Jake and I grabbed our cameras and made our way to the English Gardens. The leaves are still in the process of turning, so we strolled through the park, taking pictures of the people surfing, the fall colors, and some of the local fauna (a ladybug landed on my neck).

English Gardens 25-10-2009

Neuschwanstein und Wieskirche

Jake, Kevin and Me in front of Neuschwanstein

What an awesome trip! We started out at about 9:00 in the morning, and we wound our way through the German countryside for about an hour and a half. Along the way, our tour guide supplied us with the history of the castle: commissioned by King Ludwig II (who was declared insane in a parliamentary power play, only to be found dead days later under mysterious circumstances...), built as a tribute to Richard Wagner, never finished, etc. I have also heard this castle was the one that inspired the Disney castle:

(http://artemisiatridentata.wordpress.com/2009/06/09/an-inspiring-castle/).

Once we arrived, we immediately climbed the hill to the castle and started snapping some photos of the exterior. Unfortunately, the exterior would be all we could photograph, because cameras were contraband once we entered. We went on a quick tour through the castle, then made our way to the Marien Bruecke a little ways away to get some pictures of the castle from a distance. There's actually another castle, Hohenschwangau, built near Neuschwanstein by Ludwig's father. I got the feeling that Ludwig wanted to outdo his old man by building another castle so close, and on a slightly higher hilltop than the castle his dad built...

Neuschwanstein und Wieskirche

After we got back into the village, we had a great lunch at a local hotel. They served us either a pork schnitzel or rumpsteak, along with fries and spaetzle, topped off with a custard like dessert with lemon and berry sauces and some fruit. Oh. Man. It was awesome.

When we had finished eating, we all hopped back onto the bus and took a short drive to the Wieskirche. This church is a pilgrimage church, the home of the miraculous Scourged Savior statue. It was designed in the rococo style, which is very exuberant and impressive to behold. It was such a beautifully constructed church, in the middle of nowhere, really. They built it at the site where the statue's miracle was first witnessed, in the middle of an open pasture. We couldn't stay long, though, so we took a walk around the church, snapping photos, then made our way back to the bus for the ride back to Muenchen.

Die Lange Nacht der Muenchner Museen

I have an interesting experience to tell you all about: Die Lange Nacht der Muenchner Museen. It was a huge event in Muenich where almost 90 museums were opened up from 7 pm until 2 in the morning, and you could get into your choice of as many you could get to for only a 15 euro ticket. It was a pretty awesome night!

We started at the Max-Planck Museum, which had colorized prints of highly magnified objects. They turned out to be quite interesting.

The light was a little dim, hence the blurry.

Next, we caught a bus to St. Paul-Kirche. They had an amazing light show with accompanying music. It was really quite incredible.

After the church, we stopped by a Siemens exhibition with old, present day, and possible future technologies, but I forgot to take pictures. But, after Siemens, we went to the Pinakothek der Moderne, and I got plenty of pictures there!

Die Lange Nacht Der Muenchner Museen

We spent about an hour and a half at the Pinakothek der Moderne, then we tried to make it to a tower... who's name escapes me at the moment. Needless to say, we couldn't make it in there, because by this time it was about 2:30 in the morning and the Lange Nacht der Muenchner Museen had ended. Unfortunately, the U-Bahn stopped running at about 1:30 (i think) and we were quite a ways away from Stusta, so we decided to make our way to the MilchBar to pass the time until the U-Bahn started running again... at 5 in the morning. So we got some beers, hung around, and danced a little (not me of course :P). I left before the others, at about 5:20, because I had been up for close to 24 hours and was incredibly tired, but man, what a night!

It's Snowing!!

Short one today, gang! It snowed today! I got some quick footage, and I'm going to take a bunch of pictures once the snow starts to stick!

Yeah, the window was closed... It was cold out there!

Faces

Good stuff today guys! I was making breakfast today, when I realized I had inadvertently created a smiley face! Even the cheese slices helped give it a goofy, toothy grin! I'm afraid he has very bloodshot eyes though.

I call him Alfred.

I thought Alfred was pretty neat, but I guess this sign was not amused.

Yoink!

Today was interesting. I finally received my scholarship money, so I decided to celebrate by making some Tacos!! They were delicious, if a bit interesting; You see, apparently die Deutsche don't really like things spicy, so the salsa I bought was like a sweet tomato sauce. Also, I couldn't find just ground beef, but instead a ground beef/pork mixture. That actually wasn't so bad, as it turned out.

Also, when I was washing up, I had to grab the dish soap that was sitting next to one of my flatmates. As I did this, I said "Yoink!", as I usually do in situations like this. Of course, this didn't really translate all that well, so what followed was a twenty minute conversation where I tried to explain to him (in my rather imperfect German) the grammatical complexities of "Yoink". That, my friends, was a very amusing conversation:

Tshue: But wait, I wasn't using it, you were free to take it!

Me: No, I wasn't really asking for it, I was just, well, "Yoinking" it...

It got to the point where I was questioning my own knowledge of Yoinking. It's like when you repeat a word so many times that you no longer think it's even a word...