So long, fairwell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye

Just as the sun sets outside my office in Bonn, so too is my time setting in Germany. It is Friday, December 14th, which is my last day at work at Empirica, and soon Lydia and I will by flying off to Thailand to meet up with my brother for Christmas!

I've got mixed feelings about going right now. Leaving Germany will be hard, because Lydia and I have had such a great time here. Living in Bonn has given us the chance to explore Germany and Europe, and to go on many adventures together, which has made for one of the best times of my life. We've also made a lot of friends here, and it is going to be difficult to leave them all, especially as we were just starting to get to know them. That said, we are also incredibly excited to go to Thailand, and we are also quite excited to come home and see all of our friends and family again!

My experience of working for Empirica was also very interesting for me. The job had its ups and downs (I managed to do a fair bit, but not quite everything that I wanted to do), but it opened my eyes to a lot of things, and it gave me the experience that I simply would not be able to get in Canada. Aside from the work experience, this term gave me the kind of life experience that can only be gained through travel. I would recommend this type of co-op to anyone who is even thinking about the possibility of taking on such a work term.

I'd like to thank the readers of this blog for their time in keeping up with Lydia's and my life. I tried to keep things as 'infotaining' as possible, so I hope you enjoyed the read.

As I mentioned before, Lydia and I are now off to Thailand, and strictly due to the reason that we will be spending all of our time on having fun, I will not be able to make any blog posts while we're there;) We will, however, be returning to Canada on January 2nd, and we would be more than happy to give you all of the details on how many elephants we rode, how many cocktails we drank (if we can remember), and how many massages we had, if you would like to inquire. Feel free to drop us an email along the way as well (ty_bone@hotmail.com) to give us an update on how your holidays are going.

We miss you all, and we're looking forward to seeing you very soon!

I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year! (and for Roberto Luongo to have a speedy recovery)

That's all for this blog,

Tyrone (and Lydia)

Our house (in the middle of our street)

Less than one week to go! Before we take off though, I have to make a couple of people happy by fulfilling their request to see our place.




The yellow building seen here is the house of our landlord. Our house is down the driveway in between that building and the building that you can just see the top of (to the right of the yellow house).



The white building (that is being attached by the ivy) is our German residence.



Welcome to our very, very humble abode.



Entering the front door, you are greeted by these old and intimidating steps into our apartment. Normally, above the steps, you can see a vast array of creatures of the arachnid variety.



Turning left from the top of the steps, you will enter our kitchen/dining/games room. The tiny box on the shelf there is our stove - it's not the size of the stove that counts, it's how it cooks the food.... right???



Turning around from the table, you will see our modest kitchen.



Guess what room you will have to enter to see this poster?



That's right, the washroom!!! This picture basically includes the entire washroom. If you look close enough, you can actually see both of the walls to the next rooms on either side of this photo. The really funny thing about this washroom is seen below...



See if you can spot the following items in this picture:
* Toilette
* Sink
* Shower
* Clothes washer
* The corner of our bed


This is our wash/laundry/shower/living/bed room. Basically, the toilet is directly connected to both the bedroom and the kitchen. The only thing that divides it, is a little foldy sliding door. I've never had a shower box directly installed into a room like this before.....it's interesting to say the least. Then there's the washing machine. This thing is crazy!!!! It's tiny as hell, we have to manually connect it to the sink for it to get water, we drain it into a massive metal 'Coke' garbage can (which I then have to pick up and pour into the toilette, mid cycle before it overfills), and it has a jet engine inside it, which makes the thing jump like half a foot in the air when it starts its spin cycle..... I'm not kidding, a half a freaking foot in the air!!!




The laundry plumbing.




Our high tech drainage system. We were hoping to get sponsored by Coke-a-cola for this little setup, but we're still waiting for our cheque to be sent in the mail.


If you're wondering why we use our living room as our bedroom, when our house has two proper bedrooms, it is for this reason....



This is our bedroom v1.0, or as we like to call it - "The mold farm". We stayed in this bedroom for about two months, sleeping on this very same mattress before we noticed a little moisture issue. Those markings on the mattress are not decorative flowers from Seely, Serta, or Simmons....we were sleeping on a moldy bed (see my facial expression in this picture).



It didn't stop at the mattress either, it lined the walls beside it as well. Blaw!!!!!



Needless to say, we moved into the living room, because it seems to be the only moisture free room in the house (besides the kitchen). We have now closed off about 3/4 of the house, and we are living in the two multi-purpose rooms noted above. This is our bed, which is on the flip side of the laundry/shower/washroom in the room. The rats have the room above ours (in the ceiling), but they have recently packed away for the winter, or forever (our landlord just got rid of them with a bunch of poison)..... what a healthy place to live:)



The best part about our house is, however, our flower, Rhod Simsii....he's great!!! It's really funny, Lydia and I normally name everything anyway, but for some reason, this flower had the name "Rhod Simsii" written on it when we first got it. When Lydia and I come home for the day, we never feel like we're alone, because we always get to greet everyone else that stays at our place (in Lydia and my voice - "Hi Rhod Simsii, hi mold, hi rats!").

It's probably for the best though that we're leaving this place in a couple of days - I guess there's normally a reason why a two bedroom apartment is 250 Euros a month ($375 Canadian).



Here now, is my amazing flying tour of our house. Enjoy!

A quick update

Hello all,

Just thought I'd give a quick summary of what's been going on the past week or so....

Work is still going well. I'm mostly doing odd jobs now, since I only have 2 weeks left here at empirica, so I don't think they want to give me any large tasks. I still haven't heard if I'll get to go to any international meetings, so fingers crossed for that (the one that I was supposed to go to got pushed back until Feb). I've started to write some case studies, which is the task that Lydia has also been working on recently, which is quite funny at times, because it gives Lydia a first glimpse into my working life (which was mostly a former relative unknown).

Last weekend, Lydia and I went to a huuuuuuuuuge Christmas party at our friends Alex and Tina's (whom I met on the West Coast Trail, which I did with my dad in August). They live in Osnabruek, which is a few hours north of Bonn. I've never been to a party quite like this one before. Their house looked like a liquor store, since they had bought a ridiculous amount of alcohol for their guests at the party, with I think 10 types of beer and wine, and 27 different types of liquor! Not only that, but because Lydia and I were the token Canadians there (which was a big deal for them, because Alex and Tina, as well as their friends, all have a love affair going on with Canada), so people kept feeding us their "traditional german drinks". I completely lost track of how much I drank there, and all I can remember was that it was a lot of everything (from an egg liquor hot drink, to gluehwein (the traditional German Christmas wine), to fire tongue bowl (I have no idea about the spelling, but that's what it sounded like), which was a wine that was mixed with 80% rum, to German Absinthe, etc. etc. etc. On top of this, everyone was wearing Christmas hats, and there were tables upon tables of amazing German sausages and other food! Such a crazy fun night! Alex and Tina were also nice enough to let Lydia and I stay in their guest room, and they woke us up with a great little breakfast to settle our stomachs (and surprisingly enough, we were able to eat it).

*Update - here's a couple of pictures to commemorate the event:



The silly guy in the middle is Alex, who (along with Tina) threw this big bash.



The woman looking down on the left is Tina, the other half of the party throwing duo.




Lydia and I drinking some gluehwein with Alex and Tina's neighbors.



Later in the evening, frosty showed up! Lydia gave him such a warm welcome that he soon melted away into nothingness.



This party was so cool. Here you can see two of the many fire pits outside, along with the very cool campfire grill. Everyone at the party was supplied with Santa hats, and all the alcohol you could ever drink.....such a great night!

Next week we plan on going to Konigswinter again to see a few more sights there and visit the spa that they have there, and also to visit with our friend Saskia, who lives in Cologne.

A week after that, and we'll be basking on the beach in Thailand!

That's all for now. I'll try to post a couple of more times before we leave for Thailand (where unfortunately, I will be having too much fun to keep up with this blog, so you will have to use your imagination to see what adventures Lydia and I are getting up to.

Couch Surfing

http://www.couchsurfing.com/

For all those who are interested in budget travel, I have found the holy grail! It's called couchsurfing, and although I've only done it once now, my experience from that was so amazing, that I can easily see myself being a couch surfer for life.

Couchsurfing.com is an online community (simmilar to facebook or myspace), where you keep a profile about yourself, and can communicate with other people from around the world. The catch is that it's a community of travelers (approaching 400,000 members from 223 countries), who are willing to let you stay at their houses! Also, if you think that it's a European thing, then guess again, there are 255 members (and counting) in Victoria already!

Using the site is about as safe as you want to make it. It declares right on the main page that couchsurfing isn't a dating service, and shouldn't be abused in that way. There are various levels of security checks that you can perform on the site, giving members different security ratings based on these checks (i.e. references from other members, credit card address checks, etc.), although users aren't required to perform them. When staying with someone, or when someone wants to stay with you, you can first (if you like) check their verification level, if you want some sort of proof that they have been checked out (and that they aren't raging ax murderers).

My couchsurfing experience was in Milan with a guy named spike:
http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/ipispike

and it turned out to be one of the best travel experiences of my life!

When Lydia and I arrived in Milan, we were pretty beat from our long...long train ride. We were also a little uneasy about this whole couch surfing thing, since neither of us had used it before. Spike quickly solved both of those issues when he let us into his house, sat us down, cracked a couple of beer open for us, and made us a wonderful pasta, which he just went to the store to pick up a bunch of supplies for! We then talked for hours about just about everything (from what to do in Milan, to life in general), and he showed us a little more of his more than generous supply of Italian liquor. Spike then took us into Milan, showed us around for a while, then had to get home to study for his final exam that was in a couple of days. Lydia and I spent the next couple of hours touring around the areas of Milan that Spike suggested (see our post on Milan), then returned to Spike's house for some dinner. Spike took us to his favorite pizza place in town, then to his favorite bar in town to meet up with a bunch of his friends, who turned out being really great people as well. We all stayed out until like 3:00am in the morning, chatting with these amazing people from all around the world, who no more than a few hours before were total strangers, but who seemed at that time to be dear old friends. It was such a great night!

Things like that continued for the rest of the weekend, where Spike would guide us to all the great spots, gracing us with his company every chance he got (when he wasn't studying), and all the while treating us with so much generosity and respect.

After we left Milan, Spike, Lydia and I all promised to keep in touch, and we're now actively trying to get Spike to go to Canada for some good old fashioned moose riding;)

If only for this one experience, I owe couchsurfing.com for finding Lydia and I, what I hope to be a lifelong friend, which is truly something special. When I return to Victoria, I plan to stay an active member of the Couchsurfing community, and hopefully attend some of the meeting/parties that are planned in the area.

Around Bonn

I've talked a lot about Lydia's and my travels around Germany and Europe, but I haven't really mentioned the area around Bonn, which can be quite beautiful, so here's just a couple of shots from around the area.

One weekend, Lydia and I decided to go to Königswinter, which is a very small town, about a 30 minute tram ride outside of Bonn. It's right on the Rhine, and is incredibly beautiful, so beautiful in fact that we're planning on going again this weekend!

This is the view from the street in Königswinter just as one steps off the tram.

Probably the best thing that Königswinter is known for is its castle Drachenfels, where the legendary Siegfried (not of the Roy fame) slayed a dragon (I'll tell you a little more about that later), but this was the main reason why Lydia and I went to Königswinter. The picture above was taken of a cool painting inside the Drachenfels reptile zoo (reptiles - dragons - get it:), which also doubles as a Seigfried art show.

The reptile zoo was actually really cool. To get to it you have to go through a cave, and once you get out, you see A DRAGON!!!!!! Luckily for Lydia and I, it was made of stone; however.....




I was definitely prepared for any kind of dragon attack!




There were all sorts of snakes, alligators, crocodiles, lizards, turtles, etc in the reptile zoo. It was very hot inside for all the reptiles, but thoroughly entertaining.





You thought it was dead, but guess again...... ANACONDA pt 2 - The Search For Curley's Gold!!!

There's actually quite a few famous movie animals in this reptile zoo in Kogniswinter, and not just reptiles either....



Peetey from Dumb and Dumber lives here as well!




Godzilla!!!




After leaving the reptile zoo, which is located about half way up the mountain to the castle Drachenfels, we came an old school arcade that had a bunch of really sweet games from probably about the 50s or 60s. We didn't know what a lot of them did, so we pumped money into them to find out. In the picture above, this mystery game involved a troll giving me a fortune in German. Apparently (after translation) my 'lucky day' is Monday, which goes to show that trolls are liars, because it is impossible for Mondays to be anyone's lucky day. Damn conniving trolls!




This one was my favorite game. Not only did it not involve a troll lying to you, but it involved peeping at a bunch of scantily clad French women in their undergarments! This would have been cooler, however, if French women used razors back in those days;P

This is Schloss Drachenburg, which is Drachenfels little brother castle that was built in 1883. Apparently some rich baron built this as his little weekend getaway (which he would maybe use once a year), and then sold it away after a while at a fraction of the cost to make it. Over the years, the castle passed numerous owners. At one point I believe it was used as a Nazi youth school), and at another point, the unused castle was taken over by hippies during the 60s....seriously! Today, it is undergoing renovations, and I believe it is used solely for tourism.

Inside, you get to put on big slippers and look at all the pretty murals on the ceilings.





This castle also gives an amazing view of Bonn (see the first picture from this post), the rolling hills, Hotel Petersberg (the large white object in the hill above me, which we plan to check out this weekend as well....apparently it's very nice)...



.....the castle, the twisting Rhine, and Lydia.



You don't have to go to Disneyland Paris to see beautiful castles like this.



This is the only picture that I'll post of Drachenfels, because up close, it's not much to look at (just some stone with rebar sticking out of it). The cool part about the trip up to Drachenfels is the trip up to Drachenfels! It's a fair bit of a hike, and there's tonnes of stuff to see and do there. Also, the intrigue of Drachenfels (translating into Dragon's Rock) is also quite cool. Apparently Siegfried (a legendary German hero) hiked up this mountain (Siebengebirge) and had a great battle with a dragon who lived in a cave on this mountain. Siegfried ended up slaying this dragon, and after which, he bathed in the blood of the Dragon, which was said to make him immortal. Unfortunately for Siegfried, he had a leaf stuck to his back at the time of his blood bath, so he 'missed a spot' so to speak, leaving a small section on his shoulder still vulnerable to attack, which I believe ends up in being the downfall of Siegfried (although I'm not sure).



After we came down from Drachenfels, we stopped off and had a beer or 5 at one of the beer gardens along the mountain hike. The beer in Germany is AMAZING!

-End of Drachenfels adventure



Speaking of Dragons, however, here is a friendly little dragon fly that landed on Lydia's shoe during a picknick that we had on the university lawn in Bonn. He stayed there for about 30 minutes as we ate very cheep but delicious wine and cheese.



Another great thing about Bonn, is that it is the home of Haribo, one of Europe's largest candy manufacturers! The Haribo store (which is more like a warehouse) was by far the largest and cheapest candy store I have ever seen. Note how we used a shopping buggy to shop for our candy:)



Me and the Haribo bear.



Lydia with the Haribo bear (and in heaven I might add).



Heaven.... This is Lydia sporting the some of the loot that we came back with after the Haribo shopping spree.



This was close to 2kg of candy! And that was only part of the candy stash. I think we ended up spending around 10 Euros at the Haribo store, but we were so stocked up with candy you wouldn't even believe!



Here I am riding a hippo that was just wandering through Bonn for some reason.



Actually, this is the taxidermy museum in Bonn, which had just about every animal you could think of.....stuffed!



Wilburt never quite understood why the other monkeys would laugh at him.



The downside to Living in Germany in October is the fact that Germans don't really celebrate Halloween. It is starting to come on (mostly due to media), but it's only really celebrated by small groups of children (not like the gong show of drunken adults like it is back at home). This was the first year that I could remember where I didn't make myself a costume! Lydia and I decided to still make a jak-o-lantern though, just to stay in the spirit (and to confuse the neighbors by putting out a strange carved pumpkin in their yard).



With some mighty fine Canadian representation I might add!



After about 2 months of living at our newer German residence, we realized that there was a castle that's like a 5 minute walk from our house. Here it is.



Also, behind our house, there's a very beautiful wooded walking trail, with all sorts of monuments and cool things to look at.



Like this cool thing to look at.




The last thing I'd like to write about (at least for now) in the around Bonn post is the spas! Check this one out (the picture is a clickable link). It's called the AHR Thermen spa, and it's about an hour outside of Bonn. It has about a dozen different saunas and about the same number of hot spring pools. It was a very cool place to relax for a day. This weekend we're going to try a similar one out in Königswinter, so wish us luck with that. Spas and travels all over Europe....it's rough to be us right now;)