Karolina's adventures

Göteborg

2011-07-28T20:15:00.003+02:00

FINALLYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!! We are back in Göteborg!!! Well, for a bit more than 1 month now...
Anyway, we left Hamburg on the 21st June. I must say that I dropped a tear or two when we were driving out of the city....It's been almost 4 years so I guess one gets used to certain things.
I drove almost the whole way since Alex was super tired and slept most of the time. We swapped somewhere in Skåne.
The day after got the keys to our flat. Then meeting the moving company and starting to move in. The whole day....wow....looooong.

A trip to Ikea during the weekend.

A trip to several furniture stores to get a kitchen table, chairs, couch etc....

Succeeded!!!

After one month we've got pretty much all in place.
OK, besides a few lamps, fan above the stove and so on.

Life is fine. Although of course there are some things, small ones, which I or Alex miss. Well I guess he misses A LOT his Volkspark with bike park. Damn it! I promised him hills and a lot of downhill tracks around GBG and so far...hmmm not much. We need to find something!

I miss actually Budnikowsky - I know I know...some time ago I would say that I would never miss anything from Germany. But still...this shop had everything! Incl. Bio veggie spreads for Alex...

I miss some stuff from the fitness place in HH. Not much, just some of these cool cross training machines.

And of course I miss HH friends!!!! We need to meet soon!!!!

But of course I'm happy to be home in GBG, with my friends, nature etc.

I'm not sure how often and if at all I would continue with this blog.
We will see how many adventures we will experience now.

Summer and "winter" in Spain

2011-05-07T21:39:00.021+02:00

Long time no hear...
Easter was in Spain, in Pyrenees. We went to visit Txell and Thomas, stayed one day in Mataro, went to Tossa, then on Good Friday we went to Queralbs for hiking to Nuria.
It was a really great time and we had fun, although when we left HH it was 25C and sun, and in Pyrenees in the best case we had 13C...
Anyway, here is some evidence:

When we arrived to our apartment in Queralbs, we decided first to have a shorter hike to one famous waterfall...The hike was nice and not demanding. Ended up with late lunch incl. our pasta salad (which lasted forever!!!):

After the hike we went around Queralbs. A super cozy little village, with a specific architecture for Pyrenees region. Really nice although tiny.

In the evening we had BBQ (OK it got super late) and played cards. Fun!

The next day we woke up early to start hiking to Nuria. It was POURING!!! So we decided to sleep 1 hr more and see what happens... And it got better!!! We had a good weather until 2/3 of the hike... Then it started raining and even snowing. In Nuria we had 1,5C.... Spain, huh? ;) No comments...

After lunch in Nuria we took train down and wanted to visit a nearby village. And then Txell noticed that she lost her super duper hi-tech smartphone.... Thank God Alex sort of had a memory of where it could be. So in rush they went uphill with the train, train personnel helped to spot the phone and get it to the train station, it was a lot of stress but at the end everything turned out fine. Txell got her phone, they managed to come back with the last train. The day was saved! :)

In the evening we did "beer hiding" (as Easter tradition of egg hiding) - Txell and me hid 12 beers for Alex and Thomas. And wow! they found all but one!!! After more than 1 hr or so...But still.

And the grill masters:

Great day!!!

Then Sunday we left. First with a short stop in Ripoll. Then off to the airport. It was such nice holidays!!! we had really fun, despite the weather!!!
Monday we had a day off in HH. Enjoying sun.

This weekend we have Alex's dad here. So there are some outdoor activities, including a BBQ with friends today.

Nice sunny time

2011-04-15T20:52:00.007+02:00

Spring is really here!! Well it's been around 15C or more (ok in the morning colder) the whole week.
Last weekend on Sunday we biked towards Poppenbuttel via Alsterwaldweg. Forest, channels with people on kayaks, canoes, boats etc. There were many people biking as well. It's a very nice area, it feels like you are in the middle of country side, and not in HH. I used the bike which Alex got me from RO. It was great!

Otherwise our life is turning around planning to go back to Sweden, looking for flats, taking part in bidding, not getting the apartments...etc etc...
Time is running fast so we are getting a bit more pressure now.

Next week it's already Easter. And a trip to Barcelona for us :)

Spring!

2011-03-27T18:49:00.008+02:00

Wow....so much has happened since I blogged last time... I mean in the world. First the war in Libya. Or actually first riots in Egypt - where at least they succeeded that Mubarak gave up. In Libya it doesn't seem to go so fast though. Then tsunami, Earthquake and nuclear catastrophy in Japan. Poor people...It's awful what happens in the World, especially when Mother Nature "gets angry"..

Otherwise things here are OK. Most of the time is filled in by work and daily activities, following hemnet website and checking apartments for sale in GBG, bidding, not getting the flat... :( OK, there is still some time left until we go back to Sweden but time is running fast... Hope soon an apartment can be bought.

This weekend we had a wonderful weather. SUN!!! OK, a bit cold, expecially when it was windy, but still spring is almost here. Actually in the South of Germany they had already 18C. Yesterday we biked to Elbe and had a long walk there. And a bit crazy photo session ;-)

Well Alex kind of succeeded this picture of me:

However, I'm not so good (or half blind) ;-)

Then in the evening we celebrated the Earth Hour - switched off lights and all devices from power, had candles on and played "Memory". Actually quite fun and a different Sat night.

Today we went to Lubeck. Had some marcepan (of course), walked around, took some pictures. A nice town (before I've only been at the train station, or at the small airport near Lubeck) with the typical Hansiatic architecture.

Ähm....the what?!!? ;-)

Now Monday tomorrow. In one week 2 days in Sweden, which may get a longer stay depending if there is any chance to see (and buy!) an apartment.

Waiting for spring

2011-02-25T21:01:00.009+01:00

March is in few days. That means spring is coming. Hopefully. I mean it hasn't been so bad - sunny pretty much for the whole week but so damn cold!!! Arctic air.
Today finally some plus degrees.
Last week I was almost the whole week in Istanbul. Some days of work and then Friday off and spending Fri and Sat with Filip. Friday we had sun and +17C!!!! Sooooo nice!

See yourselves - water front 500m from Filip's place:

We had really fun. On Thu evening we went to hamam. Love it!
Friday there was a dinner out with a Spanish connection, then some beers in one club. Nice but we got home at 05.30 so Sat was a bit sloooow.
Anyway, first we had some kind of brunch:

Then off to the European side. Since I have already seen most of the "musts" we just took it easy. Walked a lot. My God! - we were walking for over 1 hr to get some kumpir!!!
We stopped often to have Cay. Chilled out. Discovered many small and cozy streets. This city is amazing!

I was leaving very early on Sunday - got up 0445! So the whole day (again) I was tired. But at least had pretty much the whole day at home. Alex arrived 4 hours after me - from Sthlm. He had -20C and snow... Then in the evening a colleague from Romania came home for a beer. Nice.

Work wise it is ok. Although the international gang is getting smaller again :( Oh well, part of the expat life... The negative part.

Next week - a trip to Sweden.

Cold

2011-01-31T15:38:00.002+01:00

It is not really cold outside. I just got cold... Was away quite much with work - first Sweden, then the week after Romania. Got back to the office full of coughing and sneezing people and got cold. Or flue. Bläh.
It feels weird to have one day of work. Hope tomorrow will be better so I can go to work.
Nothing else happens really. GBG was nice, then I had a leadership training for 2 days (part1). Looking forward part 2 and 3 :)
Romania - this time Lugoj. Small town. Nice plant. Cushions - so totally different from everyday seatbelts.

January has passed with warmer temperatures than Dec. And almost no snow...
Well, in the beginning of Jan it was quite bad. I even got into a car accident - I mean a truck tried to change the lane and hit my car. Bleee! Now we are still in discussions with their insurance company about the cost of repair and all of that. Neverending story ;) But hopefully it will be solved soon so my Beetle can be fixed.

Otherwise things are fine. Focusing more and more on going back to Swe.

Oh yeah - last night I baked filmjölksbröd - a bread with the special kind of yougurt-milk (Swedish thing). I had to improvise to make the "filmjölk", and also didn't have the right bread baking form but I succeeded :) Mums!

New Year

2011-01-06T20:48:00.011+01:00

My God! Already 6th Jan!! And such a long break in updates...
So much has happened that I don't know where to start ;-)
Well, December passed by fast. I had only 10 working days here in Germany. Then 5 days of holidays in Göteborg (incl. Petra's & Magnus daughter's baptism), meeting friends, looking for apartments, the usual stuff ;)
GBG looked more less like that:

Trip back to HH was already a bit of an adventure, since my plane got cancelled! Technical problems they said..So got rerouted via Frankfurt and was in HH on Sun evening instead of noon. Oh well.

Then my business trip to Tallinn. There was so much snow over there! Work was fine. In the evening we went out for a dinner and saw a local Xmas market. They had glögg! :)

On the way back to HH, I made it to Copenhagen first. Was supposed to fly back to HH around 21.00. At 21.10 they said 23.10. OK...a bit of reading, eating smth, fine. Boarding started before 23. As soon as I sat down I fell asleep. Woke up after ca 45 min ready to get out of the plane but the pilot actually announced that we had to go back to the terminal, since HH airport is closing at 24. What?!!? We never took off!! So the adventure started. First lining up to get a voucher for a taxi and hotel in CPH, together with many complaining Germans. Then lining up for a cab together with 10000 other travellers whose flights got cancelled. Crap weather, midnight, tired.
Shared cab with 2 other guys. As soon as we got to the hotel we went straight away to the computers to buy train tickets to HH for the day after (at the airport they couldn't guarantee that we would get seats to HH for Saturday). Waiting for ages for ticket print-outs since there were many people getting rooms and only 1 poor guy in the reception.
Went to bed after 02. Got up early. Nice thing - Danish breakfast! Mums!!!!
Met a funny guy from Uruguay who was also going to HH so we had a bit of fun with one German and the Uruguay guy.

Got back to the apartment in HH on Sat at 16. Yoohoo! Now repacking and leaving to Poland on Sun afternoon... Didn't even manage to do laundry.

Trip to Poland - only 3 hrs delay. Peanuts! I was so immune that actually had fun and time passed by fast. Met a Mexican guy who was going to visit some friends in Poland. It was fun to teach him a bit of Polish :) And have some tea with 3 other Poles.

Few days in Gdynia passed quite fast. Filip arrived on Thu night and on Fri we took off to celebrate Xmas. Xmas was nice, a bit chaos, presents, lots of snow.
And tons of food!

Then went to Romania. Spent night before flight in a hotel opposite from the airport in Poznan. Didn't want to risk to miss the flight early in the morning.
Flight was a bit delayed to Munich. So I had to run in Munich to catch my flight to Bucharest. Puh! Hardly made it! But did it! :) However, my luggage didn't make it :(
I got it anyway the day after. And funny - the guys who came with the bags made a meeting point at MacDonald's - so all people from Brasov and nearby could come to pick the bags up... There were so many people!!! Amazing!!
We had fun in BV, stayed at Alex dad's place. We were in the city, went to some pub for quizz. Then we went to Sibiu before New Year's eve and visited Alex' friends. And New Year's Eve celebration was in a village outside of Sibiu.
A different kind of party that we were used to ;) But anyway funny to see how people celebrated.

Trip back went fine. Well we had two different flights but we cmae home safe and fine. With all luggage.
Now the first week at work has passed. Happy New Year to all of you!!! Hope it's gonna be a great one!!

Winter

2010-12-04T16:47:00.002+01:00

Yes, winter arrived early this year. When I went to pick up my winter clothes from the cellar it felt so weird - I had a feeling that I just placed them in there! (which is sort of true since I left them in the cellar in April or so..). Anyway, so we have winter again. It snowed quite much in HH the past days. But now it is supposed to get a bit warmer - whatever that means ;-)

Xmas fever has also started. I gave a try with Xmas gift shopping but didn't succeed really. It shouldn't be so difficult to get 1 present (in my family we draw lots so actually each person gets a present for only 1 person), but since Alex won't be with us this year I also have to get a present from his side. On top of that there are some kids in the family so actually there is no "one-gift-project"... Oh well. I will be still in Sweden next week so I hope I can find nice presents there.
Otherwise...don't know - airports? ;-)

I have only 4 days left at work here in HH :-/ Next week 3 days + weekend in Göteborg. Then 2 days in HH and 3 days in Tallinn with work. Then flying to Gdynia.
Xmas as usually at my grandmom's place, and then flying to Romania to spend rest of my holidays with Alex.

Well now it is time to join some friends at Xmas market in Altona. Some gluhwein to warm up will be nice :)

November

2010-11-21T18:34:00.002+01:00

Last week of Nov will start. My God! Time is passing by so fast! On the other hand, those months are not so exciting so maybe better they finish quickly ;-)
Eternal greyness is here. Mixed with full darkness, 100% moisture (that is rain). Misery! Candles at home are helping a bit :)
During the week I was 3 days in Brasov. We had 20C and sun (OK, those temperatures are not normal for this season) but it was soooo nice! Felt like late summer or early fall. Of course Romanians love to have it warm indoors so radiators were on! I thought I would faint in the hotel room but managed to cool down a room a bit.
Every time I go to Romania, I discover new stuff ;) This time I got really positively surprised by driving culture. Something is maybe changing over there. I mean people don't drive so crazy, and there was quite ok culture on the roads. Of course there were some stupid people as well but only few. And the new road between Bucharest and Brasov is also nice! (around "plotesti") ;-)
Can't wait for indoor smoking prohibition in public places...
Anyway, it feels always nice to go to BV :-)

I got back, only 2 days of work here, and the weekend. Met with Monica and we went to the Arandas to see the new baby girl. Cute!
I also managed to find some of my (and Alex') winter clothes in the cellar. Good to be prepared!

The coming week - a short business trip to France, so again a shorter week here. Then just 2 weekend in HH and off to Göteborg! Can't wait! I was "forced" to take out all my holidays before the end of the year so it's gonna be almost 5 days in GBG :) Then just 1 week at work and off for Xmas holidays. Nice! But there will be quite much pressure at work before that...
Xmas as usually with the family. Our traditional drawing lots who is getting a present for whom has taken place. Puh not easy! ;-) After Xmas - flying to Romania for new year's eve.

Halloween party

2010-11-05T20:43:00.008+01:00

Last Friday we had a party at home - of course with a theme of Halloween. Alex asked all the guys to dress up but at the end only few people had some outfits.
Anyway we had really fun, as usual too much food and drinks (so we need to organize another party ;-)
Miguel came for one day to our company so it was fun to get some updates from him at the party. We also had Thomas there - too bad Txell couldn't be with us.

Alex and Thomas:

Our pumpkin that Alex made:

Playing beer pong:

Skype with Melody late at night (at our place):

The weekend was quite calm. But I managed to get some fall shoes and also color my hair so something achieved :)
On Sunday we had a very long brunch at some Swedish/German couple's place. It was nice and cozy. And good to be inside when the weather was so crappy...
The whole week was fine although a bit difficult to handle time change - dark dark dark, and lots of rain the whole week. Sooo bad! Hope we can have some sun this weekend.
Tomorrow we may go to WEFUNK radio party in Schanze (depending on the moods); otherwise taking it easy I guess. Maybe a bit of biking as well.

Weekend in Gdynia

2010-10-24T18:09:00.006+02:00

This weekend I'm at my parents' place in Gdynia. Came on Fri evening and actually staying until Monday. Magda with her boys came as well so it was a full house those 2 days :) Nice! We had a really good time together, nice dinner with family, walk at the waterfront in Gdynia. Max is such a cute little boy!
Here with his mom:

Family at the beach:

Tomorrow - another massage session. I've got to fix my back. And flight back to HH in the afternoon. Of course the trip is like a big project but cheap flights - what to do...

In the middle of fall

2010-10-17T20:14:00.002+02:00

Forgot to say last time - Robyn's concert last Sunday was soooooo great!!! She is so cool and talented and a great performer! We had so much fun! Of course not so many Germans were dancing but we did a lot. Met also a very interesting man around 70 year old who goes often to different concerts. Amazing!
This weekend was also nice, with sun but not such high temperatures. Fall is here. We spent time with friends, had dinner (again) i L'Orient (a lebanese restaurant nearby) - which was as ususally nice. Then Handan, Hamid, Alex and me went to our gym for a party. I know...a strange concept to have club in a fitness place but we just went to experience it once. Nothing special, a lot of Untz Untz Untz music; on one floor with "black music" is started OK but then turned to too much salsa and so on. Cool but not for such a long time! Especially when there are 3 couples dancing!!!!
Today we met again with some friends for fika. Nice, relaxing and fun.
Usch Monday tomorrow. Not looking forward. Next weekend - a family weekend in Poland. Alex will be off to Romania.

Hiking

2010-10-03T19:17:00.007+02:00

October is here. What happened to September?! ;)
In the week I had to do my car's service. So the mechanic guy showed me what has to be replaced and fixed: shock absorbers (they broke when he wanted to change them!), brake pads and discs were the major highlights. I assumed the price would be around 600EUR. It ended up at a bit over 1000EUR!!!!!! OMG!! So freaking expensive!!! So now I seriously consider getting rid of the car...OK, I didn't have to give it to VW/Skoda workshop but generally it is super expensive to own a car.

Weekend is almost over. Why?????
Today we went hiking in Harburger Berge. At least some nice nature and a bit of a hill :)
I expected more wild trails but we tried to go off from the main hiking "roads" or riding paths. It felt so good to have my hiking boots again!
It smelled mushrooms in the woods but we didn't find any good ones...

This week there will be some action at work, also a trip to France. And next weekend we will go to Robyn's concert on Sunday! Yuppi!!

Hmmm....

2010-09-26T18:52:00.002+02:00

Such a long break in updating this blog... Many reasons - mainly I think being lazy, but also not so much happened since my vacations. Work work work. Fall has arrived earlier than anybody expected. It starts to be dark when you get up, and also around 19.30. I don't want it! I know - each year the same story. But I didn't get enough of summer!!!! Actually it feels that summer was sort of 5 months ago. So weird!
Anyway, what happened since last time - Alex came back home. Now focus is on finding a job in Sweden. On top of that he has a broken sternum (chest bone) so he has to take it easy for 5 more weeks.
I don't have anything broken ;)
The weather doesn't really help my bones though... (Karolina, 68 years old ;-)

Last weekend we had a late birthday celebration (Alex). It was fun! Although so much alcohol is left that I think we need a new party at home. Maybe Halloween? ;)

This weekend my parents and Filip came to visit. So nice! We had an obligatory shopping round downtown. Shopping project was successful for everybody but me. How hard can it be to find a pair of shoes?!?! ;) In the evening we had a dinner in a very nice restaurant at Fischmarkt (Kasematten) http://www.river-kasematten.de/. Fish was perfect! A plan to go out later on was not really an option since Filip's plane was quite early today.
The eternal greyness on Sunday has been awful! Rain rain rain. Blä!

A new week is coming. Hope it will be a good one. I cannot believe that we almost have October. Scary!

After holidays

2010-08-20T18:36:00.011+02:00

So - 3 weeks in total and now back to the reality. Well, sort of back - still haven't got a real kick for work ;)
5 days in Göteborg were so nice. When I arrived on Saturday - there was a heavy rain downtown, however in Åkered where Petra and Magnus live - sun and amazingly warm! So we even went to swim! Later on a grill and nice evening sitting outside in the garden.
Sunday - rain rain rain. We went to town since Petra promised Theo to get a ride on the "GBG-wheel". So we did it.

Then one of the biggest events during this stay was that Petra and Magnus got a little baby girl (while I was staying at their place!). Big congrats to the proud parents!!

I spent some time with Tania and Dan and we had also a nice dinner at "Hos Pelle" with Fredrik and Ylva.

It feels (as usually) great to be home. I think it's time to be back :)

After GBG, back to HH, laundry and repacking the suitcase. Off to Malaga together with Monica to visit Handan and Hamid.
Now we are talking real vacations!
It was warm and sunny and totally relaxing.

We ate good food (mainly seafood), drank good wine, swam a lot in the sea, played beachvolley, read books, yeah - total relax!
Also lots of talking about Iran, politics, religion and life. God! Sometimes we were so serious ;)

At the pool:

A view from the terrace:

Dinner on the terrace:

From the beach:

Handan and Hamid's place is cozy and nice. Next time we have to stay longer.

Today Alex is coming back to HH. Tomorrow I guess IKEA visit - we need another wardrobe to get place with all our clothes. Oh well...

Holidays in France (2)

2010-07-25T18:08:00.026+02:00

After few days on the idyllic Ile de Re we went to the South. Well, at least south of Bordeaux - to Mimizan-Plage at the Atlantic coast.
We stayed at a B&B 150m from the beach. The owners were really nice people and each morning we got our petit breakfast in the garden.
There was also Helga - a mini greyhound dog. Or rather a poppy. She was sooo cool and friendly.
The beach was perfect. Well, the waves were sometimes really big so it was a bit tough for Alex to practice surfing. But he didn't give up :)
Each evening I had a portion of seafood, fish or moules marineres. Lovely! And chilled white wine to that.
We read our books, jumped over waves in the ocean, biked around, ate well and listened to some outdoor concerts in the town each evening.

We saw also a flower iceland at the lake close to Mimizan.

We had 3 days of a perfect weather, and the day we were leaving it started to rain. Perfect timing!! :)

From Mimizan we drove up North again. Our destination was Vouvray area - we stayed in Rochecorbon. I was in that region in 1994 so it was nice to visit some Chateaus and drink good Vouvray wine again.
Our landlord gave us a perfect introduction to what places to see so we visited 2 castles - one in Chenonceaux and one in Amboise. In Amboise there was Leonardo da Vinci's grave (by the way, French people pronounced his name in such a French way that you would almost believe that Leonardo was French ;), and we also visited his house where his studies were in Chat. du Clos Luce.

The view from our room:

La Loire in the evening:

At the entrance to Chateau:

Amboise:

I'm a bit obsessed with photographing those:

We also went to Tours, mainly to have dinners there. A very nice downtown, and so many restaurants around! It was a hard choice where to eat.

Our last stop was Vernou-sur-Brenne. Just on the other side of Vouvray.
The village was very small, but there were many wine caves - as on the map :)

And our B&B:

The last day was just a drive to Paris, returning the car and getting ready for take off.
The holidays were perfect!!! Maybe a bit too much baguette, jams and marmelades for breakfast, also quite weak coffees but what does it matter?...
We had fun and met so many nice people. Alex was doing great with his French.
Next time hope we can visit Provance, Marseiile and the surroundings.
Now back to work - it's gonna be hard. But maybe there will be some days in Göteborg in August. And for sure 4 days in Malaga.

Holidays in France (1)

2010-07-25T17:01:00.015+02:00

They started 2 weeks ago, and now are over. It's good to document at least some parts of these vacations.
Met with Alex at CDG in Paris. Such a great moment to see him after 1 month break! We got our rental car - not Citroen 2 which we booked, but Skoda Fabia - still ok since it was 4 door car :)
First place we visited was Alex' relatives' in Coulommiers, not far from Paris. A cute little town, famous from their Coulommiers cheese (a sort of camembert, but with a milder taste. Mums!).
We stayed there 2 nights. Visited town, read books in the garden, did some jogging in the forest. Nice! There was quite mch practice for me (or rather listening) of Romanian again :)

Our next destination was Nantes - to visit Alex' cousin Adina, her son Gabriel and boyfriend Gustavo. On the way to Nantes we had an obligatory visit to Le Mans. We spent there few hours, and Alex was in the 7th heaven since there was also a race of some old cars. I think he took 200 pics in Le Mans. I won't place many pics here - but be sure - they are all saved on our laptops.

From Le Mans we went to Nantes. We stayed there for 3 nights. Spent a lot of time with Adina, went to see Pornichet at the coast and Guerande - a little cozy town, famous for gourmet salt manufacturing.
Gabriel - Adina's and Gustavo's son is the happiest kid I've met. He is so cool and so full of energy and he moves all the time. So much energy!!! I think he will be a climber since he climbed on everything he could.

At the beach in Pornichet we had the first Moules dish. I continued with this dish quite many times afterwards as well :)

And in Guerande we had super delicious crepes. Mums!

After those few great days, we went to Ile de Re. I was a bit afraid that we would have a bad weather - when we were in Nantes, the last day was so rainy, but when we arrived to La Rochelle and then to Ile de Re, the sun was there :) Puh!
We stayed for lunch in La Rochelle, a town before the bridge to Ile de Re. Cozy town. Many tourists though. It started to feel like vacations.
ile de Re was soooo beautiful. Most of the houses white with pastel colors of shades and window finishing. And there were flowers all over.
Here the entrance to our B&B.

We rented bikes for 2 days and biked totally 40kms or so. We went to St. Martin - a very nice and cozy town. We also visited La Flotte and Loix. We stayed some hours at le Bois Plage. The only disadvantage was that we didn't take any UV cream when we biked so we sort of burned our faces and shoulders on the first day. Afterwards factor 50 was in use.

Salt collection on the way to Loix.

Summer is here!

2010-07-04T21:21:00.005+02:00

It's been over a week now that we have a wonderful summer weather in Hamburg. It reminds me summer 4 years ago, when I came here as a trainee, for the 1st time.
Some days were super hot 36C or so... I mean, it is fine when you are at a beach but not in the office where the temperature gets around 30C..

This weekend Monica and I went to St. Peter-Ording - 2hrs drive from HH. A really nice place. Kind of feels like Denmark ;) So it was my swimming in the sea premiere this year! It felt so great in the water!!!

Germany gets to the semi-final...No comment. I think this team is really good, or super focus and somehow it works, but the whole paranoia in the country is just too much. In a way I'm glad I will be away for the final. Actually I hope it will be Holland-Spain in the final. But so far whatever I hoped for didn't come true..

Elections in Poland. Today the 2nd round Komorowski-Kaczynski. It looks good so far (Komorowski) but the final scores are ready tomorrow...I hope it will be fine!!

Just few more days and holidays!!!! Whoohoo! On Friday - France! Can't wait.

Football fever

2010-06-13T21:37:00.002+02:00

So, it has started. World Championship in Football. Strange - it is my 2nd one in Germany. I was here for 6 months in 2006 and so I am here now...
Things that got changed - there are German flags all over; cars have 2 or 4 flags plus ome of them have "socks" on the car mirrors - looking as flags. OMG!
On top of that - there is those "trumpet" sounds all over and some kind of fireworks applied already now - at the first game for Germany. I don't know what's gonna happen in case they win... But maybe not my problem - maybe I'll be on holidays by then :)

The past week was very warm and humid. It was hard to breathe ;) But this weekend was a bit cool and cloudy. Alex came on Fri evening and yesterday we celebrated Monica's birthday. First a dinner at a new (for us) Italian restaurant in Altona (Cuore Mio), then some cuba libres in a bar while watching USA - England. We supported the US (for Dennis who was with us), actually England didn't really perform.
Today it was a lazy day...

The week hopefully will pass fast. On Fri - flight to Gdansk. Cool cause Filip will also come.

And then 3 weeks more and holidays! Can't wait!

June?!

2010-06-05T20:36:00.002+02:00

So...only one blog in May... But that's what happens when you are away for 3 weekends in a row. After GBG, it was turn for Budapest. 24th May was a day off so I had a long weekend in BUD. It was 26C and sun - so different than the weather in HH. We walked in the city, went to Margaret's island - on Danube. Man made island - probably a popular place for Party's people during communist times. Now a sort of recreational place, with a track for running - ca 5 km long. Tennis courts, swimming pools, quite ok. We also went around the Parliament building and did some shopping downtown.

The weekend after was Sthlm and Kristin's and Kicos wedding. We stayed in a flat in Solna - arranged by Christer's sister. Alex arrived late on Fri. On Sat we went a bit around Gamla Stan and had a lunch downtown. Then quickly shower and change and went to the church. On the way there it started raining. Crap. But then during the party it got better so the night was nice. The party was really nice, with many beautiful speaches, a great atmosphere and a perfect band playing good songs. Nice!!! And my new heels were also good and didn't cause many problems ;-)
Sunday was a bit tough. Alex had to leave already at 5 AM to the airport. He landed in BUD by the time, I left to downtown Sthlm. A bit of shopping and lunch and then plane to Poland for a workshop. The week was a bit tough, and also the weather in Wroclaw sucked. Rain and 11C :-(

Now it's a great weekend in HH. Summer is here! At least for now :)
We just had a nice BBQ in the park.
Only 1 month and I have holidays!!

Long weekend in GBG and Fjällbacka

2010-05-16T19:37:00.014+02:00

I was really hoping today that the volcano ashes would make some problems again and I would have to stay in GBG... Wishful thinking ;-)
I went on Thu before noon and came back today on Sun.
The agenda was quite tight but I managed with everything (well almost). On Thu I went t Jenny's and Iba's, we had a late lunch, talked for hours, it was great. I borrowed Tania's bike and biked like 5 years ago to work in Lindholmen. Except so much has changed!! There are so many new houses, buildings at Chalmers campus, etc. Amazing! And it felt so cool to bike there again.
In the evening - dinner with Dan and Leif. I picked a place and it didn't turn out to be any hit. But food was ok and wine as well :) Later on some beers at Jazzå.
Friday - a bit of shopping before noon. The day was sooooo nice!! Sunny and warm. After getting whatever was needed, I went over to Petra's and Magnus' place - we made some grill, many old friends came over. It was so nice to meet everybody again and spent some quality time. Mats - the BBQ master did also a perfect job! :)

The only sad part of this evening was that Alex didn't make it from Budapest...He was supposed to land around 8pm, but called at 7pm to say that due to some accident on a highway in Hungary he missed the flight :(( The good part was that he managed to get a place on a flight on Sat morning. So he arrived (together with rain though) on Sat around 10am.
We had breakfast and Alex and I went to visit Tania and Jan in Fjällbacka. The trip was a bit pain in the ... ue to rain. Soooo much of it!
But when we arrived to Fjällbacka it stopped so perfect timing ;-)
We had some coffee and went for a walk in Veddö - Jan was the guide.

After this walk, we went "downtown" to have some refreshments. We decided that we would stay over night in F-backa and drive in the morning to the airport.
We were sitting for ca 1hr in a café at the pier. So relaxing and beautiful.

Then we went home and had a dinner with fish, potatoes, cheese and an apple pie. Mums!!!
A short digestion walk at 23.30 :)

This morning Alex dropped me off at the airport - my flight was at noon and his after 8pm. So we had a short fika at Landvetter and then he went downtown and as I heard met a friend of ours in Borås. Wow!
This was such a great weekend. I really didn't want to leave. And we are for sure ready to go back (well for me going back, for Alex starting a new chapter in his life) :)

Time comes for everybody...

2010-04-30T21:19:00.002+02:00

This blog won't be so happy... Last night our lovely dog Figa left us and went to the dog heaven :´(
It is amazing that she lived 17 years. But age wins with everyone and she got some cancer which normally could be cured on younger dogs but not in her case.
Anyway, she has lived a beautiful life and was a loved member of the family. Actually she was Filip´s present for the 1st confirmation but it was our parents who mostly took care of her. Thank you for that!
We will miss her. Sleep well Figa.

Some reflections...

2010-04-18T18:26:00.002+02:00

What a week... First the news about this crash of the plane with Polish delegation (incl. the President and his wife) going to celebrate Katyn-incidents 70 years ago. Since I'm not in Poland, I guess it didn't get so much to me, but according to my parents the whole week all TV channels reported nothing but news related to the accident.
Then suddenly Europe gets paralyzed by the volcano eruption on Iceland. I heard some comments from people getting angry at Iceland (like they chose to have this eruption!?). I even saw somewhere this joke:

"WTF Iceland?!? Why did you send us volcanic ash ? Our airspace has shut down. Iceland: What? It's what you asked for isn't it ? Britain: NO! Cash! Cash you dyslexic fuck. CASH! not ASH. Iceland: woooops... There is no C in our alphabet, sorry!"

So, now after 3 days or so, the German and Dutch airlines start making some tests to check whether it is true that planes cannot really fly when there are the ashes in the air. Hmmm... Again some doubts and suspicions raise upp that the airlines try to save some money...I hope not and I hope they know what they are doing. Anyway, I'm glad I don't have to fly anywhere the next weeks.

This weekend we had a great weather! Sunny and today it was really warm. Hope we can start BBQing soon. I finally cleaned my car! It is blue again! :) It's been few months ago it was cleaned the last time and after this heavy winter, it was time to remove salt and sand leftovers. The usual cleaning place was totally occuppied so Monica (who also had to clean her car) and I went to the nearby gasoline station. OK, vacuum cleaners cost 1€ but I think the washer is same same. Glad, we have done it!
Then we went to the park, met Handan and Hamid there. Nice and it felt like summer. Now back home, sitting on the balcony in the sun and blogging here :)

Easter, April, sun, spring! Also the Polish tragedy...

2010-04-11T17:29:00.014+02:00

Again - some delay with updates... But I´ve been away a lot recently.
First - Easter in Madrid. I went already on the 1st April - flying via Paris (CDG!). I arrived to Filip´s place and after 1 hour met with Txell and Thomas at Gran Via.
We decided to have some snack - meaning tapas nearby and then wait for Alex to arrive.
I think we´ve got the cheapest tapas and beer ever! 7€ for 6 beers and bunch of yummi tapas!
Then we went to a cerveceria next to Filip´s place and waited for Alex. Afterwards some cheese and jamon together.
The next day we met half way between their hotel and Filip´s flat and we followed the "green path" which Txell´s guidebook suggested take.
A lot of small and cozy streets. Nice old pharmacy - as on the pics.

After walking for some time, we decided to have lunch (Spanish time - around 15.00) in a really cool and famous place. It was sooooo good. We ate so much that we could hardly walk ;-)
That´s the place:

Then again, walking around Plaza Mayor and the neighborhood.
We watched also a Good Friday procession - there were quite many that day around the city.
Afterwards we went to the Egyptian Temple to watch the sunset. Overthere we met also with Txell´s and Thomas´ friends - a Catalan-Irish couple.

Then we had a tapas dinner at Casa Granada - a place recommended by our friend Ralph who was supposed to be there at 23. It turned out he meant at 11.00 next day. Anyway the food was nice! Just a bit odd place to find...

The day after we did a bit of shopping and went to the Park close to el Prado museum. Then Alex and I were supposed to meet Ralph. At the end we succeeded ;) And we also went to the Reina Sophia Museum - Contemporary Art Museum.
Pity cause that day we had quite much rain...

At night Txell and I went to the church - for Easter mass, and then we had a dinner together with Ralph and his girlfriend. Again around 23.00. Not bad, huh?

After the dinner we went to some "underground" bars to listen to flamenco singers/players. A bar totally covered in smoke, with Gitanos singing and playing guitar. Unique.

Morning after was a bit hard... But we managed to get to the market in La Latina. Met other friends of Txell and strolled around La Latina district, incl. lunch at a nice vegeterian place.
Afterwards we just laid in sun, and then walked with Ralph around some parks.

We also participated in an international pillow fight - well only two friends of Ralph showed up with their pillows and we took the advantage of it ;)
(at Cervantes, Don Quijote memorial).

We had very nice holidays and we have to repeat it again. I´m also glad we managed to meet with Filip who came back home to Madrid on Sunday night.

After returning to HH, I had one day at work and then went to work to our plant in Hungary. And spent the weekend in Budapest. We had 19C everyday - it felt like summer.

Saturday was a bit sad due to the news about the plane crash with the Polish President, his wife and over 90 representatives from the government, army, church, sport, etc. May they rest in peace.

Winter winter and suddenly...almost summer!

2010-03-28T19:19:00.004+02:00

Yes it is true. We had 0C one day and +15C the other one. Crazy!!! Last week, I think on Tue, it was +21C. But now the weather seems to be more like it should be in March/April...
Last weekend Alex came home. On Saturday first we celebrated Naroz (Persian New Year) with Handan and Hamid. Well...celebrated is maybe too much to say but Alex read about it on Wikipedia and prepared the needed dishes/things that should be present on the table during the celebration. After that we went for a farewell party to Jenny's&Johan's place. It was their and Kazuhiro's party. Manye friends there, really nice. Although a sad reason for a party - we are getting a smaller group here :(
On Sunday we went for a couple of hours to Guillem's and Sveta's place since Guillem prepared a goodbye paella for Kazuhiro.
It was such a nice day. Paella was also great! :)

Then the evening came, Alex got a ride back to the airport. The week was work, some fitness (too little), ordering some stuff on internet and still not receiving that. Short day on Friday since I went to Poland for this weekend.
It was very nice, my mom's brother with his daughter visited also. Cool! We had some fun, little bit chaotic since I had some necessary points on my agenda as well ;) Went also with my mom to a fitness place and after 1 hr on step I can feel all my muscles now - me, who thought I was so fit!!! Have to start taking some sport passes again and not only those cardio machines...

New week - it will be a short one. On Thu going to Madrid! Yuppi!

Cozy weekend

2010-03-10T20:53:00.003+01:00

On Fri evening Tania arrived to Hamburg (after few years of me nagging she finally came to visit - great opportunity since she was going for some research EU meeting in Munich afterwards). We started preparing dinner - homemade pizza (ok the dough was ready) and in the meantime Alex arrived - with flowers for both of us. Ooooohhh ;)
We had a very nice dinner, with a good wine :)
Saturday, due to my early waking up, I went quickly to the gym, and left two sleeping heads at home. It took me while to walk to the gym since we got a LOT of snow during the night (and imagine that it was already so nice and dry and no snow until Fri night).
Anyway, the day was beautiful with sun and not so cold. So we had breakfast and aferwards went downtown. After some shopping we met Handan and Hamid for fika, and then continued with shopping. Some H&M Sonia Rykiel stuff got home :)
In the evening we went to Marrakesh - in Altona. Some friends joined and it was very very nice. On the way back home I thought I would freeze. Soooo cold!!!

Sunday was again a very nice day so we decided to go a bit to the nature - which means we went to Elbe and had a walk along the river. Short fika on the way, and we showed Tania "Alte Schwede" - a huge rock which was a gift from Swe to Germany. Don't ask me why this present...
You can see the rock behind us on the picture:

Alex left in the evening and Tania and I had a calm Sunday evening.
It was a very nice weekend and more such ones (to all of you who would like to visit - do it!).

Now sitting with the calender and doing planning for the upcoming weekends.

Göteborg

2010-03-03T19:12:00.000+01:00

Last weekend and a bit more I was in Göteborg. Ohhhh sooo nice!
I went already on Thu and worked on Friday from there. On Fri afternoon I met Dan and Leif and we went for a dinner to Tranquilo. I must say that food was nothing special. Service was a bit bitter (OK Dan liked the waitress but that didn't help ;-). We had to leave the table around 19.30 cause it was reserved for someone else.
So after walking around Saluhallen we decided to check out Soho. It was good. Quite empty (downstairs) and not so loud so we could talk. After some wine glasses we got tired (oh yeah, we are not the youngest ones).
Saturday was a "busy" day. First quick breakfast and then off downtown for fika with Christina and Gunilla. It was so much fun to see them again!!! We sat and talked for few hours!! It was soooo nice. Then I went to help Petra and Magnus with unpacking their stuff in the new house.
When I arrived there were still our friends who helped with moving so I even managed to meet "my" dentist Calle ;-) Petra's mom prepared lunch - fish dish with potatoes, mussels, shrimps. Mums!!! And an apple cake with vanille sauce. Mums again!
It was fun to have lunch together and P&M big kitchen table had space for everybody. By the way - the new kitchen is great!
When everybody left, we started unpacking. My responsibility was a sprit cupboard. My God! So much alcohol! And sooooo many wine glasses! Not mentioning Petra's old inherited servis.
When our blood sugar got low we went downtown for dinner. So cool cause we managed to get place in a palestinian restaurant. Leif joined us as well. It almost felt like old, good times :) Good company, nice place, good food and wine. But after dinner we went home.
Sunday was a short round in the city in some shops and then off to the airport. 1 hour delay in Amsterdam though due to strong wind. Oh well. Part of travelling "pleasure" ;-(

Anyway, I want to be back to GBG!!! Hope next year latest!!!

Weekend in Gdynia

2010-02-21T20:02:00.002+01:00

This weekend was with my parents in Gdynia. On Fri evening we went out for sushi for dinner. Yum!! Then we got some good wines and had a glass at home. Saturday was my health-treatment day: massage which I need to heal my slipped disc. Then we went to my cousin and together with her and her little boy we went out for a dinner. Nice place with some typical Kashubian dishes. Although my pierogi with wild svine meet were a bit too big and heavy ;)
It was a very nice evening.
Today we had a walk in the forest. My parents live 50m from a forest and right now there is like almost 1m of snow all over. Amazing!!! And I though we had snow in HH... this is nothing! The walk was good! It would be great to go cross country skiing although now the snow is a bit too hard and icy...
Then lunch and off to the airport.
1hr delay but it was bearable. The flight lasts 50 min, then the bus from the airport to HH almost 1,5hr..Hmmm..
Tomorrow Monday and the new week. Good it is a short one. Thu evening - Göteborg!

Catalan fish dish

2010-02-15T20:33:00.008+01:00

Finally we made it!! Guillem was always so proud of this special dish and we decided to make it on Saturday. Alex arrived on Fri evening. Saturdays started with doing groceries for dinner. We started cooking around 15.00. Guillem came home with 2 kg of mussels, 2 kg of different fish. Monica brought I think 2 kg of shrimps and even more fish. MY GOD! The whole kitchen was like a fish market ;)
We had to support the chef so some white wines got opened, incl. Hungarian dry Tokaj which was sooooo good. Handan got the job to fry the fish. I got a task to clean a squid (oh yeah I forgot - there was also this big squid). It was a tough job to clean it but I made it!!! :) Below turning the squid inside out - like a sock ;-)

Kazuhiro joined as well (with mums chocolate from Spain). Dennis and Aga missed the whole cooking session but they joined for dinner.

We had to make some breaks during cooking (especially when onion with tomatoes sauce steamed for ca 2 hrs!!!). During breaks we ate mussels in tomatoe sauce which Monica made, I ate half of the squid, we had some good bread. Everything yummi!!!

Fish:

Crowd in the little kitchen:

Seafood after frying:

Handan in action:

When the main dishes were done, Handan made Monica's cake. Soooo good. Together with dark chocolate it was great.
We had also a good speed of wine drinking. I can count 9 empty bottles of wine and one half opened. Hmmm... that explains headache of some of us on Sunday ;-)

Mums cake!

Dinner was great; from time to time filled with some Bregovic or gypsy music ;-)

Sunday was nice and sunny and we went to celebrate our Swedish friends' daughter birthday. A different kind of party with many kids around ;-)
So it was a nice Valentine's day.
My apartment still smells some fish. I hope I cleaned everything and there are no leftovers anywhere...

Budapest (2)

2010-02-14T20:34:00.011+01:00

Time passes by fast...when you check out the blog ;-) So I need to make update about 2 weekends. In the beginning of Feb I was again in Budapest. I was hoping for a better weather than last time but nope sorry - even more snow. But it wasn't so cold this time. On Saturday we went to a big park close to People's square (I think this is the right name...). There is a castle in the park and also some kind of "fair" - many stands with people selling everything! And there were many people over there. Despite the crappy weather.

On Saturday evening we were invited to Alex's colleague's place for dinner. It's a pair actually from Hamburg who work now in Budapest. We had a nice dinner with some good white wine.
Sunday was lazy but we went for a walk to the castle again. But this time saw more of the whole area.
I'm actually looking forward to seeing this city in spring. I guess I'm "done" with winter ;-)

Winter winter.... #4??

2010-02-03T19:56:00.003+01:00

The most common topic of conversations nowadays: WINTER.
This year I think winter will finish in April. Anybody taking bets?
And I'm sooooo tired of it! Don't get me wrong - I love snow but in the mountains. While skiing. Not in a big city, snowing, melting, snowing, freezing, ice skating on sidewalks and streets, breaking legs, bike, sliding car, "blask" etc etc.
Anyway, on Sunday Handan, Hamid and I were brave and walked to Alster (in half melting, half freezing conditions). The weather was bad but it was good to get some fresh air.
Alster - man-made lake - pride of all Hamburgers - was totally frozen so there were thousands people walking around.

After the walk, we had fika somewhere nearby and then had to walk back... I was exhausted when I got home in the evening ;-)

Anyway, the coming week - again trip to Budapest. Hope landing and leaving will go smoother than last time. Meaning - no fog or snow storms. Pleeeeeaaaase!!!

Weekend in Budapest

2010-01-18T20:01:00.009+01:00

I went to visit Alex in Budapest this weekend. Since he is going to be there for a while I better get used to some travels to the land of "Bratanki" (Polish expression - somehow Poles and Hungarians are supposed to be buddies).
Anyway, the first impression of the city - airport's location sucks! ;-) It is placed in a valley which apparently often has a bad weather. So was the case on Fri evening - we couldn't land due to a heavy fog (we were cruising above the city for 1,5hr - around 10-111PM!!!). There was already a risk that we would have to land in another city which I just didn't want to hear about!!
Anyway we got to Alex' place around 1AM...Oh well. The house he lives in is nice in a very quiet and cosy area.
Saturday - we did some sightseeing in the city, had fika, returned Alex' rental car etc.
Actually I didn't have any tight agenda when it comes to MUST see. Since there is going to be more times over there...
I like the bridges in that city! Actually it is a nice city, with old and great architecture. The Parliament building is very nice, especially with the lights in the evening.

In the evening we met with Alex' colleague and had dinner together in a local restaurant. Nice. Except maybe the fact that all restaurants and public places smell a bit like eternal "frying action". Really!

Sunday, after sleeping in, we went for brunch. And since it was in a huge mall, we decided to go to the movie theater to see anything which wasn't dubbed ;-) And we saw a great movie called The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Really nice!!

That's how the weekend passed. I was leaving really early this morning and we had "only" 1hr delay. Due to only one de-icing machine at the airport.
We will see how the next trips will be.

Christmas and New Year

2010-01-03T19:11:00.017+01:00

Happy New Year to all of you!!! All the best!
2 weeks passed too fast!!! But it was a great holidays. First Xmas in Poland. We left HH with -11C, arrived to Gdynia and it was -14 and a lot of snow!!!

Then it melted when we went over to my grandmom's place... Xmas was nice. We saw Megi's little boy Maks. So cute! A lot of good food (too much!) and fun.
We left back to HH on the 27th Dec. Arrived home, had some burritos for dinner (no food at home) and on the 28th we left to Txell and Thomas to Barcelona.
What a change! After winter in the North we had pretty much +20C and sun everyday. Sooooo great!!!
We met with Monica on the 2nd day and had dinner in Mataro.

Txell was working until the 30th so we went with Thomas to BCN. There were many tourists all over but it wasn't sooo crowded.
We walked along La Ramblas, had some tapas, went to the beach and enjoyed the surroundings.

On the 31st the weather was still beautiful. But we spent most of the time in the kitchen cause we had to prepare some food for the party at night. Thomas and Alex made also some soup so we had nice dinner on the 1st Jan. I prepared two pies.
We left around 9pm to Txell's friends' place in BCN. The party was with her friends from the University. We had a lot of fun, dancing, talking, eating great food, eating grapes (Spanish tradition for the last seconds before midnight), etc. We were supposed to go to some disco around 02am but at the end we stayed until 04 at the party and then left to Mataro.
Here are the two handsome guys at the party ;-)

We got up at 13.30 on the 1st Jan. Well, we went to bed at 05 so it is not so bad...
After "breakfast" we took a walk to the beach in Mataro. Soooooo beautiful!!!
The weather was great and the air was fresh. The beach looks so nice.

Then in the evening we ate the soup that Thomas and Alex made, and later on we watched a movie. The day was short but very nice.

We got up early on our last day, packed and left to Barcelona. First Parc Guell and then lunch close to the harbor in BCN. Lunch was a menu with paella as a main dish. We ate so much that we were still full at 10 pm when we landed in HH.

Now the first day of work this year is waiting. Hope this year will be great, full of challenges and great moments. Wish the same to all of you!

Merry Christmas! God Jul! Wesolych Swiat!

2009-12-17T20:19:00.004+01:00

So it is time again...
This year has passed by (almost) really fast! Or is it so I say every year???
Anyway, the first snow has come to HH today!! It actually looks much nicer and feels cozier with the snow. Lighter and more winter-ish. I just hope that Alex will land with no delays tomorrow and that we can fly without problems on Monday.
Looking forward to those holidays.

Wish you a really great and peaceful Xmas, spend in a nice atmosphere. And a great start into New Year!!! Hopefully it will be one full of adventures and challenges.

Lussekatter

2009-12-06T16:11:00.003+01:00

The 2nd Sunday in Advent and I still haven't found my Xmas candle holder... It has disappeared!! Or rather I think Alex brought it once down to the cellar but I cannot find it!!! Oh well... next week hopefully.
Since I was in GBG last weekend I wanted desparately to bake lussebullar - saffran buns which are absolutely yummi!!! So yesterday, Handan and I did it! Normally I find baking any bread, cakes etc which have to have yeast in, a huge challenge. Cause the dough never really grew. But this time I succeeded!!! Whoohoo! They are great! One thing is though that they didn't become as yellow as they should. I probably should have listed to Handan and somehow crushed or put saffran into warm water first. But they taste great! I'm so so happy!

Before baking we went a bit around shops in Eppendorf. It was raining and windy - such crappy weather!!

Only 2 weeks of work and I have holidays! Hope it will go fast. Although - a new year, one year older K. Oh well.. ;-)

The end of November

2009-11-30T21:56:00.002+01:00

Yesterday was the 1st Sunday of Advent. I cannot believe that it is only 3.5 weeks until Xmas!!! Last year I had holidays already from ca 10th Dec... Time is just flying pass so fast!!
Anyway, this weekend I was in Göteborg. It was as ususal very nice and cosy (do you spell it with "s" or "z" - I always mixed it). A bit of shopping, fika, brunch (I just love Le Petit Café in Haga!!!), meeting friends. A dinner at a new place called Familjen. Fish was really nice!
I had an obligatory kanelbulle and also had one lussekatt. Mums!!! I got some inspiration to bake them here. Although I think there are some problems with certain ingredients...
I also managed to meet Kristin (who was on the way back from her weekend in Amsterdam) at Schipol!!! Soooo cool to see her again!!!
This week seems to be quite cold. Or probably normal actually for December. It is just that I got used to those +9C for a while now ;-)
I guess there will be some going out to Xmas markets soon. I miss glögg but I guess German gluhwein will have to do. Wanted to buy some glögg at the airport but got to know that it is not allowed to buy alcohol within the EU!!! What?!?! Since when??? I need to get updated about those regulations I guess...

1 week in Istanbul

2009-11-19T20:21:00.017+01:00

I went to Istanbul to give ergonomics training to my colleagues in our plant close to Ist. And since there were many people we had to split the training into 2 groups. It was in a way good cause I could also spend the weekend in Ist. And it was actually the 1st time I had time to see the city. Or at least some parts of it...

Alex arrived on Fri evening and afterwards we met with two of my colleagues. We went a bit around Bagdat stret - a long shopping and eating paradise ;-) Well, we just had dinner.

Saturday morning we went a bit around Uskudar district - close to our hotel. It is in the Asian side of Istanbul. It was nice and warm. Felt like late summer in a way.

Then we met with my colleague who comes from Istanbul and she showed us a bit around. Alex actually has been few times in Ist so he has seen quite much and the most of historical places.
We took a boat to the European side and went to see Sophia church and Sultanahmet Mosque. Both are so beautiful!!!

On the way we stopped at Spicy Bazaar and afterwards we went to Grand Bazaar. Which is huuuuuuge!!!

We had a late lunch in a famous "köfte" restaurant. Yummi!

In the evening we were quite tired so we didn't do much..

Alex left on Sunday morning. I decided to visit Topkapi Palace. Which is quite big so it took me few hours to walk around there.
Again it was a beautiful day.

Afterwards I went around and had some fish lunch at the waterfront.
Saw some interesting architecture as well:

I didn't get to see some other important places. And neither Taksim - a huge and one of the most famous streets in Ist. Oh well... next time :)

My dad is in HH this weekend. Maybe we'll have dinner or brunch with some friends.
And next weekend - Göteborg!!! :-)

Halloween party and November

2009-11-05T20:23:00.008+01:00

Last weekend we had a Halloween party at Dennis' and Aga's place. Originally the plan was to get together and help them getting rid of alcohol which they had since wedding and what Miguel left there.
Then we proposed a dress up party since it was Halloween!
I wanted to be Pippi Långstrump but I couldn't find a wig (ok I didn't even have time to look for one) and then I got panick so it ended up with what you see on the pictures. That is half witch - the eye got stuck on a wrong spot first so you can hardly see it maybe..
People were really cool dressed!
And it was so much fun!!

Then the rest of the weekend was calm and quite relaxing.
Alex left to Hungary on Sunday - to work there for some while.
The whole week now it has been a typical November weather. Usch!! Rain and cold and windy. Crap!

But next week I get to travel with work to Istanbul!!

Göteborg gang in HH

2009-10-20T20:20:00.006+02:00

Last weekend my dear friends from GBG visited us in HH. Finally!!! ;-)
The reason was good - Marcus Berg - a football player from IFK GBG plays now for HSV. So with some help of work colleagues I got the tickets and we all went to the game on Saturday. The game sucked, especially when compared with another game Barca-Valencia on TV the same night.
Anyway, Petra, Magnus, Fredrik and Tommy came on Sat before noon. After some coffee we went downtown and strawled around. Had some lunch, did a bit of window shopping; then home, eat burritos and go to the game. Together with some other 70.000 people!

After the game we went together with Guillem and Dennis to see that Barca game in the usual bar.
When we got home, we realized that we needed to pump the matraces. The big one we fixed in the cellar. It was fun to get it in the elevator together with Fredrik, Alex and me.

The problem was that this matrace was loosing air so Magnus had to pump in at 4 AM!!! I think he woke up half of the building ;-)

Sunday - I woke up at 9, while the others at 10.30!!! We had late breakfast and then again went to the city. We went to Landungsbrucke and then walked along Elbe. The day was so beautiful!!!

We had some coffee at the "Coffee roasting café", then walked to St. Nicolas church remainings, had lunch at Gröninger with their good beer, and we finished with a walk at Alster. Then got some local döner for dinner at home.

The weekend passed fast but it was so much fun! Tack att ni kom!!

Today Alex changed the tryes in my car so I'm ready for winter (NOT!!!). Hope this week will pass fast. On Sunday Miguel is coming (our crazy Mexican friend from our company) so looking forward that!

China - part 2

2009-10-11T19:42:00.016+02:00

We stayed only 1 night in Guilin (the city is not that spectacular), went to one park/garden and then left to a much nicer Yangshou (where everybody else went).

The nature around Yangshou is beautiful - the funny looking hills covered with trees, rivers and rce fields. We took a "bamboo" raft trip on Li River, rented bikes and biked to Moon Hill and chilled out on the roof of our hostel.

From Yangshou and Guilin we went up North again - to Xi'An and Terracota Warriors. From +34 degrees to rain and cold :(
But the Warriors are impressive. We also stayed in a traditional looking hostel.

When we arrived back to XiAn we had a plan of visiting the muslim quarter but there was no way we could get hold on any taxi or bus or whatever means of transportation! We walked for over 1 hour in the rain and at the end took this "riksha" which was a rip of but still took us faster to a dumpling restaurant. Unfortunately we only had time to get our stuff from the hostel and go to the airport to catch the flight back to Beijing.

Back to Beijing felt nice. For Filip it sort of felt like coming back home :)
In the morning we went to the Forbidden City, then to some markets to get some presents, glasses, Chucks (which I never got due to "high" prices), etc.

That was my last day in Beijing. The day after I took off. Due to the fact that I got some awful cold the trip back home wasn't so nice. The pressure in my ears was killing me :( But thanks God I didn't catch anything what could put me in the quarantine in China. The trip was great and full of surprises. Still many places to be seen. Some other time. Just hope that people will start taking care of the external environment - otherwise there is not much to be seen over there...

China - part 1

2009-10-11T18:49:00.018+02:00

I don't know how I can manage to update this blog after two weeks in China. The good thing is that I kept a paper version of blog - the old school diary. But it is too much to write here so I'm just gonna write a little and place only some pictures (out of 700 or 800 which I have...). To see more pics - check out on Facebook.

Two weeks passed fast but there was so much impressions and experiences. Amazing country! Amazing culture and less amazing land of copies at present. Friendly people. Good food. Pollution. Trees are really not green. A combination of 100 different scents/smells on the streets. Bikes and super expensive cars on the streets. 1,5 billion people on holidays at the same time. I hate crowds!!!!

Trip started at Filip's place in Beijing. All the musts have been done: Lama Temple, Temple of Heaven, Tiananmen (almost totally closed due to the 60th's year celebration of the Republic), the Great Wall, markets, Forbidden City etc. I'm a bit disappointed cause I didn't eat Beijing duck - oh well...
After a few days in Beijing, I had an "appetizer" of Chinese turists who had holidays. Plus the celebrations of 60 years of the Republic didn't make the things easier. Crowds all over, closed areas etc.
I had a few days with Filip's friend Mathias who was also at Filip's place. We went to Lama Temple, Temple of Heaven, visited some hutongs - old, genuine districts with small streets, the Great Wall.

Then we took a night train to Shanghai (on soft chairs, 10 hrs long trip). Check out the crowd at Beijing train station (Chinese people started their national holidays):

We stayed at a very nice hostel - Blue Mountain Hostel. The first day wasn't so nice due to the weather. It was pouring rain so much that our new umbrellas which we got there didn't resist. We met Ola and Kuba (Filip's friends from Gdynia) there. Shanghi is cool but Lonely Planet tips couldn't be seen due to the fact that Shanghai is Expo 2010 host and right now there is a lot of construction places all over and no access for people. Great...

A very nice and cozy district - within the French Quarter:

From Shanghai Filip and I went to Guilin in the South.
Took Maglev (magnetic train with speed of 400 km/hr) to the airport:

Long weekend in Brasov; Altes Land & apples

2009-09-21T21:20:00.012+02:00

This will be a short summary of the last 2 weekends. One week ago I went to Brasov. Alex was there on holidays (driving) and I flew on Fri and came back on Mon evening. It was a super nice weekend. The weather was great - around 28C, sunny and warm. We stayed both in Alex's apartment (as you can see on the pic we were "camping" - since we didn't manage to camp together this summer, this was something to compensate ;-) and at Alex's dad's place.

We walked around the city, went to one spot on the hill close to Tampa to see the city from above:

We took care of Alex's dad's animals, chopped wood for grill (guess who cut a finger??) and also had a grill evening with Paul and his girlfriend.
The apples and grapes from Gelu's garden are super yummi!!!

On top of that, we went jogging around Tampa and met one Swedish guy from my ex-plant in Brasov!!! It was a surprise to see a jogging person there who happened to be someone familiar...
I also met Alex's grandpa who invited me (Alex was a driver this evening) for some home made cherry liquor. Mums!

This past weekend we went biking in Altes Land (on the other side of Elbe; sort of behind Airbus plant). I've been planning to do it for a while now and since this weekend we had such a great weather, we decided to go there on Saturday. The trip got delayed by some hours since we had a little unplanned event - namely both of us left the apartment thinking that the other one had house keys... Oh well. Hausmeister doesn't exist on Saturday so we had to call some key-emergency. A guy came after 45min, it took him 5 sec to open the door. Don't ask about the bill...

Anyway, we went to Altes Land and biked around apple fields. So many apples!!!!!! Other fruit too but it is really amazing!!! At the end of the trip I really wanted to have a good apple pie but didn't get one which was so good. I guess someone needs to teach people how to make a good apple pie. Having such good and many apples...

Sat evening we had home made pasta dinner at Sandra's & Hans'. It was great!! At the end we were playing cards and stayed here until 04AM!!! Wow!! Sunday was a bit slow, as you can imagine ;-)

I thought I would manage to have another post in August

2009-09-07T20:29:00.002+02:00

I don't get it - how come I cannot get more than 3 posts per month. I mean, of course I understand - if I don't write anything, I won't have it. But still... I think I'm sort of loosing it - to make some updates here. Or there is nothing really to write about. Plus, there is so much that one (or I) is active in: FB, blog, skyping with family and friends, etc etc. It got sort of too much ;-) Another thing is that it is different when you get to new places, new thing happen, new impressions and experiences. But now nothing new has really happened. Daily life. Work. Gym. Meeting some friends. Computer in the evening (but not blogging!). Sleep. Get up. Work. Etc...

This weekend I went however to Hafencity - a new growing area in HH, in the old industry/harbor? part of the city. Nice and fresh. Sort of like the whole Bo01 in Malmö or new Lindholmen buildings in GBG. But ok, in HH there is more infrastructure, cafés, restaurants. Quite nice.
The rest of the weekend - gym, a bit of cleaning, meeting Guillem with Nadia in the playground, painting (ok, yes, that's sort of new or going back to painting again, I think it is my fall-mood getting started).
The weather was almost like in fall. But today it is supposed to be ca 27C and sun!! Wow!

On Fri I'm off to Romania. Back on Mon evening. It's been 1 year since I was there last time. So high time!! :-) Hope the weather will be still nice.
So I can again post some pictures on that blog ;)

Weekend in Gdynia

2009-08-23T20:02:00.003+02:00

I just got back home after weekend in Gdynia. Alex and I went to visit my parents. Alex went already on Thu afternoon - with a flight from Dortmund. So he had 1 day alone with my parents. They went in the evening to a Mozart concert in Gdansk, walked in Oliwa Park - which is super nice! And then went to Sopot. So they had a nice evening. I arrived on Fri late afternoon. We went home, had dinner, some good wine and chatted the whole evening. Since Alex walked the whole day in full sun and over 30C in Gdansk, he was quite tired at night - so we just stayed at home.
On Saturday I had an idea of going to Hel (nice expression, isn't it? ;-). For those of you who don't know where/what Hel is - a small fisherman town at the end of penninsula - between the Baltic Sea and Gdansk Bay. A really nice place and what is even nicer, is that there are ships and catamarans between Gdynia and Hel in summer time. So we took a bus to downtown Gdynia and we got stuck in a traffic jam due to some road constructions!!!! Then we ran to this boat and guess what??? We missed it with like 2 minutes!!!! Grrrrrr!!!! And the other trips were sold out!!! Turists all over!!! So we stayed in Gdynia, walked around, had some fika at the beach and enjoyed a great weather. Later on we went to help my dad with some stuff at our summer cottage. Geez!!! I haven't been there for like 10 years or so!! It felt so nostaligc.... suddenly I recalled all the great parties over there. Great memories ;-) The evening we spent between watching the World Championship in Athletics and zapping to Sopot Festival. Nice performance of Oceana girl!! Cool music!!
Today Alex flew quite early from Gdansk back to Dortmund. My flight was later in the afternoon and the trip went somehow very smoothly and fast. From door to door 4 hours (incl. the flight, bus from Lubeck airport, subway in HH and walking home). Not bad, huh?
Warm and nice. Still summer in the air. I love it!

Friday grill

2009-08-08T20:40:00.004+02:00

Oh amazing weather this weekend in HH!!!! Yesterday we had BBQ in a little park in Eimsbuttel. The whole day the temp. was above 30C and the evening was great!!! Sooooo warm!!
We had some good sausages, veggies, HALOUMI cheese (I found it in Germany!!!!); rose and white wine, etc. Water melon as a dessert. Yummi!!!
Today it was a bit hard day; headache and slow pace.... ;-)

Holidays Swe/Norway

2009-08-08T19:57:00.008+02:00

Last Wed I got back from my vacations. I had fantastic 12 days in Sweden and Norway. I flew to Kiruna, met Tania's friend Anna, got a rented car and waited for Tania and her friend Lisa who were supposed to be back from the climbing a glacier course.
Anyway, due to the fact that I had a very short time to change planes in CPH, my bagpack didn't make it to Kiruna!!!! So we had to stay over night there (instead of heading towards Lofoten). The good thing - the girls were more than happy to take shower and refresh a bit. The day after - trip to the airport, picking up my bagpack (sleeping mat didn't make it!!!), meeting some other friends who just came from Göteborg (!), grocery shopping and finally taking off towards Lofoten. Short stop at some friend's place in Abisko, getting maps, tips what to visit etc.

The first night we spent at a beach near Korsnes. In the morning - super fast "bath" in the sea. It was so cold that we had to go out after 2 min in order not to "loose" our feet.... But nice!!!

First hiking trip up the mountains after breakfast. Beautiful.

Fika and then going to take a ferry from Skutvik to Svolvaer. Lofoten here we come!!!

We slept at some quiet places, far away from people. Oatmeal with blueberry soup for breakfast was delicious. Landscapes unforgettable!!!

Here a small village Å:

It was light the whole 24hrs. The sun went down but around 2 it was already up again. A bit hard to sleep in a tent...
From Egkum:

We skipped the whales. Too far to drive.
Instead we enjoyed tons of blueberries and "hjortron" (I think cloudberry in Engl.). Amazing!!!!

We had a really great week, full of adventures. Especially paddling sea kayaks; having a great weather on the way to some islands, then it turned to be a storm. Tough trip back but we made it!!!

Afterwards taking a night train from Kiruna to Göteborg. Then 3 days there. So nice!!!

Now work and counting days until my next holidays at the end of Sept.... ;-)

Birthday

2009-07-19T13:47:00.006+02:00

Originally the idea was to have a grill or picnic in the park... But since it rained a bit on Fri, during the day, we had a small party at home. The evening was perfect!! Most of the time we were at the balcony. Thank you all for a really great time!!! Your company, presents, flowers, cake :-)

Chilled out weekend

2009-07-12T19:09:00.006+02:00

It feels bad to update this blog only during weekends. I should probably be more politically or culturally active but I really have no time during the weekdays...
Last week there was Balett-week in HH. I REALLY wanted to go and see some of the performance but the only one I could get the tickets for, had only poor-visibility seats left. Monica and I decided to skip it and then after checking the website we noticed that we could buy the tickets for some Russian Balett for September. So we did it!!! Yuppi!!!

As some of you know I'm planning to visit Filip in China at the end of September. But again, there is a "project" - visa. Both Alex and I tried to call the Chinese consulate at least 15 times but without any success.. So after sending them email I got to know their opening times. I wrote this kind of "giving the right" letter and asked Alex to go and leave my visa application on Friday. And guess what?! After checking the date of my departure they concluded: Come back in August. WHAT?!?! Oh well, I guess I will try to fix it again in 10 days or so.

The whole weekend was relaxed and nice. I wanted to go the Miniature World - a city made of miniatures - people who saw it said it was great! But we somehow didn't make it... We were in Schanze and discovered a new restaurant, actually owned by a famous German cook. I think the service still needs improvements; the same when it comes to food. But it is a cool place. And their chocolate cake and apple pie are great!!

Today Alex left around 12, and I went with Sandra, Hans and their friend Claudia to St. Pauli for a "fischbrötchen". Mums!!! It was a very nice place, Brucken 10; interior design done by a famous HH-artist. Check it out:

Afterwards we walked a bit around St.Pauli - went to see the shop of this artist who decorated Brucke 10.

Sandra really wanted to have the chocolate cake from the place we went to yesterday. So we did that. And the apple pie was also yummi!!!

A very nice day. Finished now with a lot of rain :(

Heat

2009-07-05T21:19:00.002+02:00

Last weekend we had a nice grill with the friends. However, the weather wasn't so nice as you can see below:

Anyway we spent the whole day in this playground.

And then the whole week we had summer. The average temp. was around 28C. Amazing!!! sooo hard to sit at work... I had big plans to go to the coast during this weekend. And guess what? Saturday there was no sun at all and the last thing I wanted to do was swimming in the sea. Anyway we were with Handan and Hamid in Laboe - next to Kiel. A really nice place. Would have been even better if the weather had been nicer. Oh well. Pictures will follow later on.

Today I went to a park and wanted to get a bit of tan. Well, I sort of burned my legs. Hmmm... didn't expect it.

In 3 weeks I have vacations!!! Yuppi! Gotta check the weather forecast in the Northern Norway.

Tomorrow a new week. Hopefully not so hot.

Glad Midsommar!!! Happy Midsummer!

2009-06-18T21:27:00.003+02:00

Last year we went to Denmark. This year...there are no plans. But at least I have to eat some herring tomorrow. I can skip snaps though ;-)
Anyway, to all of you in Sweden - glad midsommar och helan går! Enjoy! and drink one shot for me ;-)

The crisis is over?

2009-06-13T17:41:00.005+02:00

Last week we got to know at work that now each department would get 50 pcs garbage plastic bags. We stopped getting them when the crisis started. So now there is a sign that the crisis is over! ;-) Whoohoo!!!

Apart from that, on Friday we went with some friends to my work colleague's band concert. Somewhere out in the... OK, it was in Harburg so at least we saw the district on the other side of Elbe. The concert was ok, some funk, jazz, pop fusion.

Afterwards we went home with Monica and Kazuhiro. It was Monica's birthday with Monica's cake. Sooooo yummi!!!

The weekend was calm. We watched a Kusturica movie together with Guillem on Sat. "Jagoda in a Supermarket" - watch it if you like his movies.

Today we had fika with our neighbors. The lady can speak Swedish cause she lived and studied 4 years in Göteborg. Puh!! Nice to speak Swedish instead of German :-D

Last weekend - summer! this weekend - fall...

2009-06-07T20:19:00.005+02:00

Last weekend it was a long one - we had Monday off. The weather was amazing! On Mon it was around 27 degrees so we got a bit of sun tan.
We also grilled at Alster. It was so windy though that the whole grilling took like 10 minutes :-)
Here some evidence:

Later during the week I went to our plant in Poland. It was a good trip although staying in that little village wasn't so exciting after work...

This weekend we didn't do so much. IKEA on the Swedish National Day (coincidence!) and DVD evening with Handan and Hamid. Also brunch with some friends on Sunday.
I made asparagus risotto tonight. Just imagine that 3/4 of the ingredients were missing or wrong! But it turned out quite good anyway ;-)
Tomorrow Monday - again...

I love May!!

2009-05-28T20:56:00.007+02:00

Why? Cause there are so many days off! ;-) Last weekend we had 4 days off and I went to Göteborg already on Wed noon. OK, first I went to visit my homeplant in Vårgårda and eventually I was in GBG around 6 PM but still...
It was really nice to spend so many days over there. I managed to meet all friends, walk around the city and just enjoy it.
Quite lucky with the weather as well. It only rained a bit twice!
On Thu I went with Tania and Petra to Botaniska (together with many other people) - beautiful to see all trees, bushes and flowers blooming!
Here a Mummin from flowers for you:

After the walk, Tania and I decided to make a dinner with dessert - she made a rhubarb (?) pie. Yummi!!!!! However, visually it wasn't really like it should be:

In the evening we went to the movies and saw a French movie made in the West coast in Sweden!!! The movie wasn't soooo great but the pictures and landscape definitely!

Friday I managed to have fika with Calle, then some shopping and then dinner with Dan and Leif. Nice! On Saturday I also managed to meet Jenny and later on we had grill at Dan's place. Good to be with friends!!

This weekend is again a long one - Monday is off!!! Miguel came from Mexico due to some issues at work and it is great to have him here. Hopefully there will be some going-out activity during the weekend. Looking forward!

I don't get it...

2009-05-17T14:19:00.002+02:00

I was never a "schlager" person. Eurovision Song Contest is not my thing either. But don't get me wrong, I saw some of them loooong time ago. So after some years break I figured out why not watching it this year. So Handan and Alex and I got pizza, had some wine and grapes and sat in front of Handan's big plasma tv :-) So the thing started. Wow! A hysterical presenters (was he American or just had the accent???) were just the beginning. I've never heard the Swedish contribution and the song was ok but somehow didn't feel like a song for ESC...Anyway, the songs were either depressing and super serious or totally crazy with disco-kitch-"glitter"-hysteri touch.
So we started to have some favorites - mostly the performers who had some oriental (or national) influences. Portugal was cool, Armenia, Azerbaijan (ok he lives in Sve right?), Turkey, but I must say even the song (maybe not the people on the stage) from Germany was good. So we had our favorites and got surprised whe when we heard all the votes. OK, we didn't get so shocked by countries giving votes to their neighbors (sooooo typical ESC procedure!!!!) but still Norway??? Was it so good and catchy??? Well, the song was nice and ok but I don't really get why it won...
Oh well.
I saw this year's ESC. It won't be again next year ;-)

Now rainy Sunday in HH. Usch! Need to get those rubber boots I've been planning to buy for the past 5 years or so...

Valborg - 1st May weekend

2009-05-04T21:27:00.010+02:00

Oooohhh! It was so great to have a long weekend!!!
We started on Thursday evening with a dinner at Sandra's & Hans'. Sandra made so-called Käsespätzle - kind of pasta with tons of cheese and salad with pumpkin oil. We had some wine and later on we played Uno for a few hours. Girls against boys. And we won!!! :-) Hahaha it was fun to see Alex and Hans angry!

On Friday Alex and I went to Laboe - close to Kiel. A kind of summer spot at the coast. Very nice actually! There were so many people sunbathing, eating ice cream, fish sandwiches (I had one - mums!), etc.
Alex made a "tribute" to Russians in Egypt - dawaj krakadil! ;-)

Friday evening we met with Johan and Jenny (and little Amanda) and Dennis & Aga in Othmarsen. We had dinner at Block House - sitting outside since it was so nice and warm. Later on we got tiramisu at another restaurant and went to J&J place for some tea.

Saturday was kind of like every other Saturday.. gym, a bit of cleaning, then some grocery shopping. There was Osterstrasse fest this weekend with the kitch selling, live music, beer gardens, sausage, crepes, lotteries, etc etc. We met again Jenny and Johan and walked around. Then Guillem joined us with Nadia (they are back after 3 months spening in Barcelona!!). It was great to see him again!!

Then in the evening Alex went with Guillem to watch Barca game and I stayed at home and watched a dvd.

Sunday was rainy!!!! :-( (good for nature ;-) ).
We went for coffee and then biked to see Edgar Degas' exhibition at the Art Museum in HH. It was very nice, especially all the ballerinas sketches and paintings.
Now I'm inspired again for painting. But I guess it will take some time for me to do the "kick-off" ;-)

Again goodbye

2009-04-23T21:30:00.003+02:00

This time we said Bye to a colleague from Japan. Hiroko was in our plant only 5 months but still it is weird we have to organize some "good-bye"-get-together. We went for a dinner in Little Italy close to our place. Nice. The evening was nice and warm so we sat outside.
On the picture from the right: Sandra, Dennis, Kazuhiro, Alex, Hiroko, me, Handan.

The last week was really nice. Christer visited us last Fri until Sun, then we had one colleague from work staying at our place 2 nights. Oh yeah! - we got a big inflatable comfortable matrace!!! So now all of you can come and have a king size bed in the guest room!!! (ok the guest room has a touch of a storage room but still! ;-)

Finally got sumer tyres in my car!!!! Whoohoo!

Friday tomorrow. It is supposed to be 23 degrees and sun during the weekend! Yuppi!!! Looking forward!

Easter in Poland and summer in Hamburg

2009-04-15T21:29:00.013+02:00

We spent Easter holidays in Poland. I decided to show Alex my home town and Tri-city so we left already on Wednesday to Gdynia. On the way to Gdynia we stopped at Gosia's place (my study-time friend) in Lebork.
Thursday was planned for Gdansk and Sopot. We went with my dad to Gdansk quite early and walked around the Old Town. As you can see yourselves it looked quite nice, huh? (ok despite some rain maybe).

We have visited Solidarity Museum and went the Gdansk Shipyard gate. Nice, but as usually a bit touching...
Later on we had super cheap lunch with my dad and then went to Sopot.
We went to Molo of course. The weather got really nice so it was great just to have a bit of summer feeling in Sopot.

One funny twisted house on the walking street in Sopot.

We got back home in the evening and after having a dinner we went with Filip out into some bars in Gdynia. We met Filip's friends, had some beers and shots and had a bit of hangover the day after ;-)

We went to Gdynia to some cafes at the beach. As you can see the weather was still perfect so we spent some hours with coffee in the sun.

We had some fresh pressed juices in Gdynia. Super healthy!

On Saturday we drove to my grandmom's place. I drove my Bubbla, with Alex and Filip as passengers.
Easter was all about eating, taking care of our old dogs, having walks in the park and taking it easy.
This is our blessed food from the church (typical Polish tradition).

And me being a kid again ;-)

It was really nice to have some days off. Trip back went fine and the same evening we met Txell and Thomas (our friends who moved back to Spain but visited Thomas' parents in HH).
Now we still enjoy summer weather and looking forward to the weekend. Christer will visit us!

Some while ago

2009-03-31T21:03:00.002+02:00

I've realized that I don't update this blog so often. But one thing is that not so much is happening nowadays or I simply don't have energy or motivation.
But OK, a little bit has happened since I wrote here last time. Not this past weekend but the weekend before I went to Göteborg. It was great being there and spending some time with la familja and other friends. I also worked in Vårgårda and had some talks about the future. We'll see...
It was good to have a bit more than just a weekend in Götet and more time to do stuff.
This past weekend we celebrated Cyril's birthday and he had his good-bye party as well. Another friend has left...
It is fun to work abroad and meet many cool people who become your friends but then everybody is leaving and this is sad. Part of this life I guess... Anyway the good thing is that Cyril will work in Germany and promised to visit us quite often.
Well at least he has time to do it until the end of June. Afterwards noone knows where he can visit us.
We helped him with packing stuff and moving to some storage room. I got a flashback of my last years in Götet - when I had all my things in the storage room... It was hard.

Next week is already Easter!! Time is passing by so fast!! I think I'll take Wednesday off so we can drive to Gdynia and later on to my grandma and family. Looking forward to some days in Gdynia.

But still one week to go. Hope the sleeping habits will be back. Time change to summer time is still hurting ;-)

Århus

2009-03-15T19:01:00.004+01:00

During the weekend we went to Århus. Filip was there together with some friends and we decided to meet them. The drive is only 3,5 hrs so not too bad. We met with Filip and Olivier on Fri evening, ate a bit and had some drinks. All of us agreed that in Denmark drinks don't have so much alcohol... And so much more expensive than Germany!!! I have already forgotten that...
Anyway, we just had a "soft" evening to spare the energy for Saturday.
On Sat we did some shopping, went around the town and didn't do anything too demanding.

Here, the three amigos waiting for me to get out of a Danish design shop :-)

We saw a duck couple trying to get to one restaurant. While we were convincing them not to get there since they may become a dinner, one waiter came out and told us that this is normal. Those ducks just come everyday to get some food! Since, the restaurant is at the channel they don't have a long way for dinner :-)

After 1 hr power nap we went out to eat and to have some drinks. There is this quite cool bar called Fidel's - opposite from our hotel so we spent some time over there. We met some other international guys from Filip's company and for once talks around the table weren't about seatbelts, but wind turbines :-)

We stayed out quite long and this morning I had to get up really early to meet with Ulrika (my one year roommate from the US times) and her family. It's been more than 5 years since we met last time!! We had brunch together and talked a lot about updates. Later on Filip and Olivier joined us, we had a walk and drove back home in the afternoon.
The weekend was nice, too bad no spring weather in Århus. Contrary to HH ;-)

Nothing really...

2009-02-28T16:25:00.002+01:00

Last weekend (BTW - the last weekend of Carnival) we went out!! WOW! This is something...considering that it's been a long time we were out in a club, dancing and having a drink or two ;-) We met in a bar in Schanze with Monica, Alex and Kazuhiro, then Cyril joined us as well. After a bit of food and some drinks we decided to look for a place to dance. We were lazy so we decided to stay in Schanze area (lots of bars and pubs). But as we are quite "demanding" we always found something which wasn't 100% good ;-) (I guess we are too old and comfortable hahaha) - this was too crowded, over there music sucked, the last place - too much smoke, etc etc. At the end Cyril who was tired after partying on Fri night, went home. We decided to go to Bar Nour which turned to be OK. No smoking, quite ok music and a spot to dance. Since Monica stayed in HH over night and Kazu stayed at our place, on Sunday morning we had a breakfast out. The rest of Sunday was lazy and the only activity for me was a bit of fitness in the evening, after I drove Alex to the airport...

Nothing special happened during the week. Work varies, due to the car industry situation nowadays. There are different signals coming every week, mostly info about how many people and where will have to be laid off...Tough times, no fun...

But now we have weekend again. Today we are supposed to have multi-culti dinner at Monica's place. Since Monica, Kazu, Raul and family live in Elmshorn, they already met at the market in the middle of the day. We, Hamburg-people, are a bit less organized or there is simply other stuff which we have to take care of (like Dennis - looking for a new car; Alex - driving now from Poland) so we are planning to go there in the evening. Right now my feta-aubergine-tomatoe-pie is in the oven. Mums!

Tomorrow I hope we will finally go to see Matisse's exhibition in the city. There is also Degas' exhibition but maybe too much to have both of them in the same day.

Filip, Magda and I have plans to go skiing. But so far many options and nothing decided. If we make it, it will be starting from the next weekend. Ohhh it would be great!!!! We'll see...

Weekend in Prague

2009-02-16T20:58:00.010+01:00

On Friday the 13th I flew to Prague. I worried a bit since in the morning there was quite heavy snow storm in HH (until noon). So I was sure that if I manage to fly there will be delays etc. But thanks God the snow melted and there were no issues...
When I got off the airport-bus it turned out that Alex was already somewhere in Prague and we met him with Ales in front of the door. Good time planning! ;-)
Friday evening we spent on talking talking talking, had some beers and a bite of food. Lisa and Ales have a really nice apartment right behind the castle. On Saturday after breakfast Alex and I went to the city. We started with a monastery's square and Miniaure museum. Cool! Amazing stuff!!! Check out the camels made on a needle.

Afterwards we went towards the castle. It was a sunny but cold day but still nice to explore Prague in winter.

Then from the castle we took stairs to the Charles Bridge. Some renovations are going on but it was no problem to walk on the bridge since it wasn't sooooo crowded.

Then we went to the Old Town's Square, had a fika and walked around on the small cute streets. Waiting for Ales and Lisa to join us after their "buying-furniture-project".

When they joined us we had a late lunch in a quite nice restaurant (Duck's feet or something like that). Here you can see Ales "teaching" Estelle to drink beer ;-)

Then we walked a bit more and headed towards home.

We had some wines and ordered "Mexican" food. There was quite much talking about work but we tried to avoid the subject ;-)

On Sunday we went to the castle, saw the guard changing at midday. Then had coffee in a really cosy café close to the castle.

Then unfortunately we had to walk back home since Alex wanted to drive early to Poland and I had my flight in the afternoon.
The weekend was great! Thanks Lisa and Ales!
On the way back we had some delay due to snow chaos (both Alex when driving and me flying). And as usual, as they always say when you land with Lufthansa, this time was the same: Goodbye, Take care und Aufwiedersehen! Grrrrr!! ;-)))

Long time...

2009-02-10T20:43:00.002+01:00

It's been a while since I wrote something here. Sorry for that. But I just kind of didn't have a big motivation. Plus nothing exciting really happened in my life ;-) During the last few weeks I went to Göteborg though. It was nice to be with la familja again. And I saw Petra's new house. Really nice in a calm area. Great!!! Theo is a big boy now. And he talks a lot!!! so cute!!
We had dinner at Fredrik's place. It felt like good old times. The same with Sunday walk in Botaniska with Tania and Petra and Theo. Great!!

Last weekend Alex came home. Finally! After 1 month... On Saturday we had cheese and wine evening at Handan's. We were supposed to be around 14 people so Handan got quite a lot of different kinds of cheese and so much wine!! At the end we were around 10 and some people had dinner before so there is a lot of cheese and wine left. Until next time ;-)

This week winter returned. Bläääääh!!! Today it's been raining & snowing the whole day. The weather is so bad and annoying that if I could only emigrate somewhere warm today I would do it right away! I thought spring was coming... yeah right...

This weekend Alex and I are going to visit Ales, Lisa and little Estelle in Prague. It will be nice to change the environment for 2 days. And since it's been a long time since I was in Prague, I'm looking forward to it. So I can show you some pictures afterwards.

Phenomenon in Eimsbuttel

2009-01-18T13:18:00.003+01:00

There is a bakery/cafe/boulangerie in Eimsbuttel which is a real phenomenon. It's "Kleine Konditorei" (http://www.kleine-konditorei.com) - there is one of them on Osterstrasse, 5 min walk from my place, and another, smaller one closer to my previous place. It is one of the most popular places for fika with my friends. And sometimes even for breakfasts. The amazing thing is that this place is ALWAYS full of people! I mean Germans love sweets, cookies and Brötchen and Kuchen etc but there are actually quite many bakeries at Osterstr. and around Eimsbuttel. But whenever you go to "Kleine" there is always a line to buy stuff and also people having fika inside. I still wonder how the other places can handle this competition.
Anyway, "Kleine" has great bread and Brötchen and pastry. Mums!!!! The only drawback is that their coffee is not so good (strong) but maybe I can ask them once to improve it ;-)

Yesterday (Sat.) I met with Monica and we went for a little shopping, then we visited Sveta and Guillem and we stayed there 6 hours or so!! Wow! It was a nice afternoon/evening, we ate twice (once when we came, then later on in the evening), had a good Rioja, played with Nadia, saw a lot of pictures, etc.

Today I had plans to wash my car, but guess what??? I started raining a lot so the cleaning activity has to wait until the next weekend... I hope I can see anything through the windshields ;-)

Andalucia

2009-01-08T21:15:00.016+01:00

From the 27th dec until 3rd Jan we were in Marbella. Or rather stayed in Costa Bella thanks to our friend Ralph. We flew from Berlin to Malaga, then rented a Fiat and drove to Costa Bella.
The first day was pretty much sleeping in and then visiting Marbella. Rainy as you can see.

The next day we decided to visit Sevilla. Wow! The traffic to get into the city!!! We lost probably 1 hr just there... Still raining but we don't give up. A nice city, we also saw some sculptures of A.Rodin which were spread around the city. We had some tapas, walked around, took pictures and then drove back to Marbella.

I didn't see any flamenco performance but the signs of that you can see around the city.

The third day was an attempt to go to Gibraltar.

Guess who didn't take the passport!!! Well we have completely ignored the fact that it is a British territory. Alex had at least his ID, I had my Swedish driver's license which works....in Schengen! Oh well...I got so angry that they didn't let us in that we never got back ;-) Anyway, it was cloudy and windy and grey so we went to Tarifa instead. And that was the greatest choice!!!
Tarifa is a beautiful small surfing town. So chilled and nice. And it was soooo sunny when we got there!!! The beach was great! Really windy - check out the sand movement on the last picture.

From the beach we went to the old part of town. So nice! Many small narrow streets, all houses white, so cozy and magic in a way.

The next day was the New Year's eve. We went to Malaga, walked around, had some coffee and then we met Ralph and his two friends who came to Marbella for New Year's eve party. After staying in Malaga until late evening, we went home, and were supposed to leave at 21.30 for a dinner, then to some clubs. If you see the time on the clock below you can see that things turned to be a bit different...We left home around 23. Got to one restaurant in Marbella's harbor and got our food right before midnight. Not bad! Then champagne and then some clubs around harbor. It was nice. But different than usual celebration.
Here you can see Alex and Ralph in one bar in Malaga. And getting ready at home.

On New Year's day I woke up the 1st one and went up on the terrace to lay down in the sun and read my book. Sunny day, +20 degrees, beautiful. Then Alex and I had a long walk on the beach. The beach was so crowded. I guess everybody wanted to cure the hangover with fresh air and the breeze from the sea.

Then we had a lunch at the terrace. Gregor (Ralph's friend) made a Bayerish breakfast. I think we all needed some calories after the previous night.

Then we walked with Ralph along the beach to a nearby restaurant to have some shrimps and later on to pick up our rental car which we left in Marbella.

The last day we went to Ronda. It is only ca 50 km from Marbella but you have to cross the mountains to get there. And the road made me sick. Well almost....but my stomach was turned upside down ;-) This town is famous for bull fighting, however we were not interested in that. The old part is nice, the entrance bridge majestic.

The trip was great and we enjoyed it a lot! Mosaics, narrow streets, white towns, beaches and the waves. Good food, good company, good wine ;-)
The "only" "problem" was when Alex's car didn't start on Sat. night when we got back to Berlin. But the battery problem is solved now and the car is now in HH.

Happy New Year!!! and a short update

2009-01-05T19:31:00.010+01:00

Wish all of you all the best in the New Year!!! Hope it will be a good one with successes, fun and prosperity.

I'm back to HH after adventures. Despite no plans for my holidays exactly 1 month ago, this period turned to be great!
As I wrote last time, Filip and I went to Egypt.
Here are some pictures from that trip:

Our hotel (you cannot see the swimming pool but it was down there)

From the boat on a snorkling trip. Check out the name of the island - PARADISE! And there is only one palm tree.... Oh well...

Filip at the second snorkling spot (I was too cold at that time)

Our boat and the driver

Returning to Hurghada

Hurghada shopping mall. Amazing entrance with two Santas dancing to some Arab music. You could buy anything in there...

Filip and I in the new downtown of Hurghada

Our "survival" kit. Thanks to that bottle we never got any problems with stomachs.

We spent Christmas traditionally at my grandmom's place. It was nice to be there, we managed also to have one water pipe evening which turned out to be quite funny. Anyway I will put some pictures later on (they are on Alex' computer so far).

On the 27th Alex and I drove to Berlin to take off to Malaga. We spent 1 week in Marbella (thanks to Ralph we stayed at his place). The weather wasn't like in Egypt but it was also nice. We visited Sevilla, almost Gibraltar (guess who forgot the passport??? and why the Great Britain doesn't accept Swedish ID (driver's license that is)??), a beautiful Tarifa (bottoms up for that one, after the bitter mood after Gibraltar), Malaga, Marbella, Ronda. Good food, good wines, good company and an amazing weather on the 1st Jan!!!
Again you will have to wait for pictures though.
We had a little bit of problems when we got back to Berlin - Alex car didn't start so we had to rent a car and arrived to HH at 03.30 on Sat night...So Alex got a new battery and went to Berlin today and managed to start the car!! Puh...

Jalla Jalla.... and Merry Christmas

2008-12-22T22:30:00.002+01:00

The trip to Egypt was great!! Well...ok, it was good. Nice, sun, warm, the sea, relaxing time. A bit short - 4,5 days but still worth it. Filip and I went to Hurghada. The town itself is not so exciting (there are kind of two downtowns - an old one with many shops, mess, dirt, huge traffic, people draging you into the shops. And the new one - fancy, clean, fresh, quiet, cool). Our hotel was kind of in between those two areas. Close to a small beach (pictures later). The majority of tourists in our hotel were Russians. Amazing - almost each Egyptian guy spoke Russian fluently!
We went on one boat trip to Giftun Island and then snorkling - beautiful!!!! I got a bit stuck in a coral reef but managed to get out of there. A bit scary though...
What more? Talking to some locals, playing beach volley, swimming, reading books.
Too bad the trip was so short. I promise to add some pictures after Xmas.

Yesterday we came to Gdynia. And tomorrow going to grandmom's place.
I wish all of you very Merry Christmas, relaxing time with your families and loved ones. Also party wild on New Year's Eve ;-)
And hope the new year 2009 will be good, prosperous, and full of new exciting challenges and adventures.

Xmas tree

2008-12-10T17:30:00.003+01:00

I didn't manage to get a real one, and also a pity when all the needles fall down. So I got a little tree with soft needles. And bought some ribbon and an ornament. And here you can see the effect :-)

What more has happened?
Well, finally today I bought a trip to Egypt! I'll go with Filip on Sunday! Yuppi!! Ok, it will be only 5 days but better than nothing.
And since I was in the booking fever I also got tickets for flight for Xmas to Poland.

Yesterday Sandra and I went to the movies and saw Woody Allen's "Vicky Cristina Barcelona". It was a good one and with the great action city! :-)

Vacations

2008-12-07T18:56:00.003+01:00

So I have started my vacations. Incredible. Since it seems that I'm not going to Göteborg this coming week, and I will stay in Hamburg I need to come up with some activities to do.
Gym and training of course. It may be nicer to do it during the day - not so many people and a better air quality ;-)
Then I plan to go to some museums - so far I've just been to the Art museum and it was also a long time ago...
I may also start a new painting, since the last one was I think more than 1 year ago. Shame!!
Of course I have some books to read.
And then I hope to meet some friends when they are done with work.

Yesterday we met with some friends at Altona Xmas market. We had some gluhwein and schmalzkuchen (so unhealthy and so good!). It was nice that almost everybody was there.

Enjoy the work week! ;-)

Xmas feber started...

2008-12-01T19:36:00.007+01:00

The first Advent candle is lit. I cannot believe that we have December already...
After a crazy and tough week there was quite a relaxed weekend. Alex arrived on Friday evening, then he went to our neighbor to give him some birthday present (we were invited over but I didn't have the energy). On Saturday we decided to do some Xmas shopping. I guess 1 mln other people decided to do the same thing. There were so many people downtown!!! Anyway, we got most of the stuff and were home quite early.
Then we watched Kung fu Panda on DVD, ate something and gave each other Xmas presents :-)
Afterwards we went to one bar in Schanze to celebrate our Japanese colleague's birthday. Cyril managed to fix the present in a form of Autoliv F1 T-shirt. Kazuhiro was sooooo happy!!!
Here you can see the Xmas market in front of the Rathaus in Hamburg:

Here is the happy Latin population (left - Mexicans; right - Catalans: Raul and his wife):

Here the purchase-logistics-connection:
Jenny, Johan, Alex and Miguel ("dos")

Here: Dennis, happy Kazuhiro, Cyril, Karo, Mathias and his girlfriend in the back

And here also with Vengatesh (an Indian colleague who left the next day back to India). Plus you can see Kazu's Autoliv T-shirt :-)

Sunday was just a lazy day...When Alex left I went to the gym, then looked for some trips somewhere warm. Still no plans for the next weeks...Hope Filip will have some news this week and we can book a trip.

Oh yeah - some news: my Mac is "almost" ready now. Hope I can pick it up tomorrow and that everything will be working fine. After almost the whole month being "dead".

Crisis, winter, ages ago...

2008-11-25T20:41:00.002+01:00

Sorry for not updating you with the stuff from here. But the thing is that my 1 year old MacBook died!!!! More than 2 weeks ago it just froze, some strange noise was coming from the loudspeaker (I swear it sounded like there were crickets inside) and then everything got blue. That's it. So after trying all possible options to get the laptop alive, I gave up and went to Mac store (or a store which sells Apple things). And then the problem started...Those guys never had such a case! They told me that the hard disk crashed (I'm lucky with the warranty). And now they laptio has been there for ca 10 days and my data is still being transferred from the crashed disk to some device in order to ne then transferred to the new HD. This is insane!!! Takes ages!!!

Beside the laptop problem, in the meantime I went to Poland to celebrate my grandmom's birthday. Filip came to HH and we flew together. Last Friday. We were supposed to pick up Alex from the airport in Poznan but his plane from Stuttgart never took off... There were no other flights to Poznan and the earliest he could arrive would be Saturday at 6PM...Great!!! So poor him, he had to stay in Niefern.
Grandmom was quite surprised to see us (we managed to tease her a bit that we wouldn't come). There were many relatives whom I have never met before so it was quite funny. Especially when we tried to figure out who was who. At the end I drew the Family Tree or rather a graph with all of them and other relatives so we all know in the future who is who :-)

It was really cold in Poland and snowing quite much. Usch! Winter is here... Now it is just few months and we have spring ;-)

Now I just have less than 2 weeks left at work and then I'm on holidays. Due to the car industry crisis, we have to use all our holidays until the end of the year. Too bad I don't really have plans for December. Filip, Dan and I are thinking of some trip to a warm country, or maybe Filip and I will go skiing. But it is all "maybe"..

This crisis is some kind of paranoia. But hopefully we will all survive. Somehow.

Göteborg...after 3 months...

2008-11-10T19:35:00.002+01:00

It's been 3 months since I went to Göteborg last time! That's why I went there last weekend, to spend time with my la familja, get updated and have some good time.
On the plane on Friday I already got cold, so now I'm trying to heal it somehow. Got to Tania's place and we talked a little. Saturday we spent downtown, walking around, having lunch, doing a bit shopping. In the evening we were invited for a dinner at Dan's place. The dinner was great (I still need the recepy for the dessert!). Then we had some drinks and dancing and our typical "karaoke" (with the remote control as microphones) started ;-) Dan's neighbors joined our party as well. Then...Petra disappeared. She decided to take the bus and she left so soon. Magnus had to leave earlier as well. So at the end we were 4 and at 01.30 we decided it was time to go out. And we went for 80's party in Röda Sten (http://www.rodasten.com/). I think we were the oldest ones. And the only ones who weren't dressed like in the 80's... Anyway we had fun. Then we had a small after-party at Dan's again, and we got home at 05.00. Not bad! (as for us "pensionaires"). Sunday was grey, windy and rainy. Bläh!
Tania and I managed to go to Bengans to look for some CDs. Then fika with Calle and Handan, and then flight back to Hamburg. Sunday passed so fast...

Some reflections...

2008-11-03T20:09:00.002+01:00

I just feel like I have to write about it. Already now in the beginning I have to say to all my Germans friends that I don't mean anything bad, and hope you won't get me wrong. It is just some observations that one (I) makes while living in a foreign country. And I bet I would make this kind of observations anywhere I would live.
So there is the thing: this is not the first time that I see how unflexible and short-sighted German people are (I mean NOT all of them! I don't want to generalize here). I just got back home from the gym (I will write some stories about this gym some other time - the topic for one complete blog, I'm telling you). And while stepping there on this cardio machine (which I most of the time do), I look at people around. And since around 19-20 o'clock this place is usually full, some people have to stand at the wall or walk around the place to get a free machine. So I see one girl who is waiting, and another one who comes some minutes after her. And the machine next to me gets free. So the girl number 2 who walked around saw this free machine (and I swear she had no clue that there was this girl number 1 in line) and she approached it at the same time as the girl 1 did it (with an angry face expression). So girl 1 tells girl 2 that she was waiting longer. OK, fine, girl 2 makes no issues and looks for something else.
Girl 1 gets on the machine, and starts to plug in her headset. Which apparently doesn't work! (I mean the connection in the machine doesn't work). So what she does is that she gets down and starts looking for some other machine...
My God!!! How about next time trying first your headset (without making fuzz that I was the 1 st one in the line) and in case it doesn't work, letting the other person use the machine??!?!?!
This is so typical! There is the "rule" first goes first. But there is absolutely no flexibility and no proactiveness to take this rule somehow softer!
It is just one example of the kind of behavior that I also observed at work. We have rules and we have to obey them but how about sometimes making life easier (I'm not talking about breaking serious rules), just be a bit human and proactive and FLEXIBLE! Life will be easier, I swear.
A similar behavior can sometimes be on a highway. Some guys driving like crazy, flashing you with the long (full) lights, overtaking and in 1 minute breaking since there are other 5 cars on the left lane. Get a break!! ave a look first on the situation ahead instead of stresing everybody.
Puh! OK, I just had to le it out from me...
Again, please don't take it as an offending issue. I get angry at stuff in Poland or Sweden, or Romania for that matter... But since now I'm here I'm just sharing the experiences.

Otherwise, grey and 100% moisture (=light rain). Bläh!
But at least now I got the complete set of winter tyres.

I-lands problem...as it is called in Swedish

2008-11-02T09:33:00.009+01:00

Why so? (in Swedish it is Industrialized-countries problem). Well last week at work we got to know that we have to use all our holidays until the end of this year... Due to cancelled orders from our customers (car manufacturers) we need some savings. Plus if there are no orders - there is no work for us. So now I have a "problem" since I'm off from work on the 6th of Dec already!!!! I mean it is nice with holidays, don't get me wrong, but would be better to have some plans. If I had known about it earlier, I would have bought a ticket to Mexico, Argentina or whatever - for almost the whole month! But now it is a bit too late. So I'm asking around some friends and maybe Dan and I will go to Egypt. If we manage to find some cheap last minute trip. Anybody else who would like to join?
Then back to Hamburg, then Poland, Xmas, and then Marbella. Should be nice!

All Saints weekend has been quite calm and quiet. Alex arrived on Friday - he came by car cause he was supposed to change the tyres - for the winter ones. On Saturday he went with Sandra and Hans downtown to get some electrinic gadgets (GPS and some presents for his dad), while I went to gym. Then we met in the city for fika. In the afternoon Alex started to change my tyres first. Everything went fine until....the 4th wheel, which just had some different nut and couldn't be unscrewed! So now I have 3 winter tyres and one summer one left. So I guess I have to go to some car workshop on Tuesday or so. Puh!
A neighbor of ours was also changing the tyres yesterday so it looked like "winter-tyre-picknick" ;-) Except the weather wasn't so nice...

This morning Alex started to change his tyres...and guess what? The rims don't fit in!! :-( So he has to look for some other ones and try to change them with someone in Stuttgart. Crap! Anyway, I managed to take a photo of (what I thought) him changing the tyres.

So now he left to Stuttgart.
Next week is Göteborg for me :-)

First complete weekend at home

2008-10-26T14:11:00.004+01:00

On Friday we went to the movie theatre. To Abaton - one of the few original language cinemas in Hamburg, which are left. Alex and Hans and Sandra met earlier on Friday (guess who's got his new laptop - to know more check out Sandra's blog: http://www.millischeckl.com/).

They bought the tickets for Coen's new movie "Burn after reading". The movie was great!!! Later on we went for a drink to a bar (which was bar and hair dresser in one) and we got kicked out at 22.00! :-( Well, it's a hair saloon, right?
So we went further to "Elbe" near Handan's place. And got new Cuba Libres.
Saturday started with some gym, Alex's ironing session, groceries' shopping, fika with some friends, cake baking - for a dinner at Handan's.
Here you can see the whole group (Alex took picture).

Pedro came from Wolfsburg and stayed at our place. It was nice to see hime again. The weaher was sooooo great on Saturday!
In the evening we went for a dinner to Handan. It was nice!
Today the weather is crap. Raining, grey, bläh. Alex left to Stuttgart and Pedro back to Wolfsburg.

Weekend in Berlin

2008-10-19T21:41:00.012+02:00

On Friday evening I went to Berlin. During the train journey I got some sms from Magda saying that Filip is stuck in STAU 50 km from Berlin, and Alex' plane got redirected and he is stuck in Amsterdam. What?! I somehow felt it was a joke... (and it was that!). Anyway, I met with Magda and Sebi at the central station, then taxi and we went to the apartment which we rented. Of course Filip and Alex were already there, with some beers :-)
That's the view from our apartment:

Around 22.00 we got hungry so we went out to have a look around Potsdamer Plats and our street - Charlottenstr. We found some "diner" and got some food. Then back to the apartment and get some sleep to be fresh for Saturday.
On Sat. first we had some breakfast near our place. Then we decided to take the double decker tourist bus around Berlin.

We started at Checkpoint Charlie and got off at Brandenburger Tor.

The day was beautiful and warm. From the Tor we went to the Jewish memorial place. Although it is a memorial place and one should be serious and respectful, you cannot help hiding behind the stones in this "labirynth" and scaring each other...
I really like this place. I mean as a memorial and architecture-interesting place.

Then we went went back to the bus and got off at Kurfurstendamm. We walked on the shopping street and had some tapas in KaDeWe.
Then headed to the apartment, bought some wines and food for breakfast.
At night we had dinner at Vapiano (which I must say is not as good as here in Hamburg). We were close to Sony Centrum with all "spacy" buildings and we finished the evening with some drinks (they had a rasberry mojito!).

Sunday we didn't do much. Coffee, walk around our quarter, then walked to Hauptbanhof were we all splitted into different directions.
Thank you guys for the weekend! It was nice!!!

Goodbye weekend with Miguel and Melody..and other stuff

2008-10-11T12:17:00.015+02:00

Last weekend was crazy! We planned to spend it with Miguel, Melody and Katia, and we booked minigolf dor Saturday. First I met with Sandra to buy some presents for the leaving family. Then we met Alex and Hans and had a fika, and in the meantime I received a call from Tunesian consulate that I need to deliver some papers to get the visa. And I had 30 min to fix it!!!!! So I drove with Hans to some bike shop to borrow their fax and I sent those papers. Sandra prepared the presents, and later on we went to minigolf.

After minigolf we went to Marrakech - a Marrocan restaurant in Altona. When we were booking the tables we said: we will be smth between 8 and 25 people. And guess what?! - at the end we WERE 25!!!
Dennis joined with his American family - 9 people! And then the Catalan connection came as well.
It was loud, food was great, wine even better (thanks Cyril for the choice, and Alex for the extra 3 bottles!). It was really really nice.

Then we decided to go to one bar to watch Barcelona soccer game. Well...some people watched it, while we were standing outside and having some beers and other stuff from Pedro's "Car bar". We had really good laughs! And although it was cold, late (we had to get up at 5.00 to go to the airport), it was great to be together with Miguel for the last time (until we go to Mexico and party together again).

We were at home at 2 and had to get up at 5. Alex and I flew to Romania. I was sleeping almost the whole way....
The week was intensive - plant visits in Romania and Turkey.
I got back Thursday night.
Yesterday Monica, Handan, Sandra and Hans and I went to see "Opera meets Kuba" in a Hamburg Filharmony. It was nice and different with this combination... Here you can see some more info and pictures - Sandra's blog:
http://www.millischeckl.com/

Today laundry, fika and Kumpir (baked potatoe place) in Schanze. Now packing again for the next trip tomorrow. So, again a short weekend. And next weekend probably Berlin.

The last wedding this year...I hope ;-)

2008-09-30T22:01:00.009+02:00

Again it has been a while I gave you some update. Last weekend I was in Romania. It was nice being in Brasov again, although I forgot how tough the whole trip is. On the way to Bucharest, my plane from Dusseldorf got delayed by 2 hrs! "The crew didn't arrive" was the answer. And when they arrived from Prague, it turned out that the pilot couldn't fly any more since he flew for too many hours that day. Great! So we had to wait for another pilot. I was tired but somehow couldn't sleep on the plane...
We arrived at 00.30 instead of 22.00. Bleeeee
Taxi journey was also a bit unpleasant. Rain and quite many trucks; we arrived around 03.00 to Brasov and I had to wake up Bernd to let me in his apartment. And then I couldn't sleep... Bernd went to work around 8 and I had a meeting at 10 but cannot say that I was totally relaxed and awake. Anyway, Alex arrived later on Friday (after I spent some time downtown) and we went to his dad's place. Nice dinner, some chatt and going to bed.
The day after we met Paul and his girlfriend for lunch (before the wedding). Then we took cab to the groom's house. Cause that's the tradition. The family and some close friends were there. Some music, cakes, food and drinks. Afterwards all of us drove to the godfather's place for some blessing....or whatever they did there. We, the guests were waiting outside, freezing!!! It was damn cold.
Here are the guys/friends Alex used to work with: Paul and Vlad with their girls.

Anyway, after freezing for some while we went to the church. Oh yeah - bride's dad is Hungarian and they live in a town Sfantu Georghie (for sure wrong spelling) 30 km from Brasov. It is a Hugarian town pretty much - quite big minority (or majority) lives there.
So the church service was Hungarian and Romanian mixture.
After the church (I swear the temp. inside was around +5 degrees!!!) we got back to the cars and headed for the restaurant where the wedding party took place.
Well, it is certainly a different tradition than in Sweden or in Poland.
First - people dance almost all the time! Second - there is WAY too much food!!
We started with a champagne and a starter - some ham, cheese, bread, etc. We had some cognac which I drank fast since I had to defrost ;-) And then....a dance! It is cool - people just start dancing and having fun so fast. Anyway, after an hour or two we got the first dish - some fish and potatoes and sallad. I thought this was the main and kind of final dish...but no no.
And then dancing again.
Here - Jo and Paul.

The couple in their Walz.

And after some time we got the second dish - famous polenta (mămăligă) and sarmale (cabbage rolls with mince). Mums! But NOT after already so much food...

Then dancing and partying again...

The party finished around 4AM and since Alex and I were not going to Brasov we had to take a taxi to his dad's place. So we got one and as soon as we entered it, I kind of fell asleep. Kind of...cause you can't really sleep on that road ;-) Anyway, I woke up when the taxi stopped and I heard a question which road to take. And somehow we ended up on a sandy, field road in the middle of a corn or whatever field at 04.30 AM. OK.... holes in the road were so deep that I thought we would just loose all the wheels and would have to carry the car. And at the end...we got lost! I mean this road was some road to a farm or whatever. Hmm...ok, now turning back - and we managed to take a wrong sandy field road!!! My God!!! I thought I was having a bad dream and didn't even want to make a mess and yiel. Too tired as well. So at the end we made it back to the asfalt road (that I have no clue why we left at all) and we were at Gelu's place at 5 AM. I hit the bed directly.

Sunday was the departure day. We had breakfast, the weather was beautiful (as usual when I'm leaving Brasov).
A girlfriend of a friend of mine (Carina) and I took the same taxi to the airport. We left in a good time - 4 hours before the plane departure. Normally this trip shouldn't take more than 2,5 hrs. Normally...
As soon as we got out of Brasov and left the first curvy mountain road and got to Predeal we got STOP.
So I could make this picture:

HUUUUUUGE traffic jam!!! We moved super slowly and had no clue how big this line really is. We heard on the radio that there was this traffic due to the end of some folklore festival in Bran (where Dracula's castle is). My God!!! On the distance between Brasov and Sinaia which normally would take us maybe 50 min, this time it took us almost 3,5 hours!!!! We got a bit of panic. Called Lufthansa, got checked in and prayed for making it to the airport. Our taxi driver tried to make his best. And he really did but we really drove more than "Romanian" style ;-) We overtook like 10 cars standing in that line. As soon there was some car movement we accelerated and built a third lane. Between the cars in our line and those which were coming from the opposite direction. Hmmm...quite akward. After Sinaia on a kind of straight road we drove 150km/hr, just blinking with the full (long) lights so cars would let us go. I think people just hated us, showed us the finger and I was thinking of making a sign that we are REALLY in hurry to the airport. Anyway, sweaty and full of adrenaline we made it!!!! The plane got delay of 50 min and that saved us!! amazing!!! Then we just missed the plane in Munich but that's no problem - they rebook you for the next one 45 min later. Once I got on that plane I just fell asleep. I think adrenaline dropped totally.

Now on Sunday a new trip to Brasov for work. Hope this time it will go smoother.
Friday is a day off - German national day so a relaxing weekend is ahead.

Oktoberfest (or Wisn' as it is called...)

2008-09-21T20:38:00.007+02:00

Time is flying by and I just noticed that it's been 2 weeks since I wrote last time. I try to update this blog at least each weekend but the thing is that not so much happened last weekend. Beside that I fixed some stuff at home, spent half a day with Monica and Raul, watched the movie "Sex and the city", packed and left for a business trip on Sunday late afternoon.
Then I was gone for almost the whole week and on Friday evening I flew for Oktoberfest to Munich.
Alex and Hans picked me up with Hans' rented Mercedes. My God! Monster! I think it was the new S-klass (have to confirm that though) - there was so much space on the back seat that I could almost stretch my whole body and easily sleep. The car almost could make coffee ;-)
Anyway, we met with Sandra and her friend Susi (in whose apartment Alex and I stayed the whole weekend), Hans' friend Björn was there as well. We chatted for a while, had some beers and wine and went to bed.
On Saturday, first we returned this monster car, got some food and then had breakfast in quite a big group. Then Sandra, Hans and Susi put on their traditional Bayerish outfits and we got ready for Okt.fest (which over there is actually called Wisn' or Wissen?). The place is like a fair with lots of food, beers, roller coasters, and other rides, etc. There were quite many people but it wasn't soooo crowded.

We were lucky and managed to get a table in one place. Ordered 1 liter beers (and radler which is like alsterwasser in Hamburg = beer+sprite). Having good time and enjoying the atmosphere.
Here a traditional hat:

And some beers:

But since this table was booked from 15.00 we had to go out to a beer garden which would be OK if it were a bit warmer....so after another beer we tried to find some free table indoors - forget it!
So the evening finished up in a typical Bayern restaurant with some good food and ...."interesting" bil. For a kind of apfelschorle, they charged us 7euro!!! Separate for juice and water! WHAT?!

On Sunday we had breakfast and then went to English Garden for a walk. And a giant brezel. Mums!!!

Now back to HH. And the new week is ahead. With my dad's visit here, and going to Romania on Thu evening. Till the next time!

And the pictures from our bachelorette party

2008-09-08T20:11:00.005+02:00

As I promised there would be some pictures from our picnic on Sunday. We surprised Agnieszka at home, gave her a little present and then went by S-bahn to Rissen. We found a beautiful spot at a small lake. We had lunch over there, with 2 bottles of wine. And Melody's peanutbutter cake in a form of.....tja...well, something which belongs to guys ;-)
After the lunch we biked further to "wild" animal park where we said hi to wild pigs, deers, some birds, etc. It was a really nice and relaxing day and Agnieszka seemed to be happy.

The happy trio (Handan, Monica and Sandra) waiting for Agnieszka in front of the house.

Agnieszka and a deer:

And the happy bunch:

Weddings, bachelor (-ette) parties...

2008-09-06T21:01:00.004+02:00

Last weekend I went with Alex to his cousin's wedding in Aachen (kloster) and wedding party in Vaals in Holland. As it seems to be a rule we had a fantastic weather! The ceremony was both in German and Romanian, also mixture of protestant and ortodox styles. I don't have so many pictures but on the attached one you can see Paula and Thorsten.

The first night we spent at Paula's & Thorten's place in Aachen. The second night we got to know that we would stay at Alex's aunt's place in Eupen (Belgium). Fine but we had to wait until everybody left and said goodbye and so on in order to drive home. So it took a while.... Totally tired and after driving around Germany-Holland-Belgium in the middle of the night (or early morning) we got home and collapsed in the beds (well I did it).
Then in the morning (ok it was 12.30 but it felt like early morning) the rest of the family came to the house and crashed in the living room where we were sleeping on a matrace in the middle of the room. Everybody was walking around and talking loudly and harding noticing we were sleeping there :-) It felt like Kusturica's movie. I swear. I just got a laughter attack when Alex started playing some Balkan kind of music from his mobile phone.
Anyway, it was fun and nice to meet Alex family.

This weekend is a weekend of bachelor party for Dennis and bachelorette for Agnieszka. The guys are still partying and they had a really full and advanced agenda.
We will go with the girls for a picnic somewhere in the nature tomorrow. So some pictures will follow. Hope wetter.de is right about the weather forecast. Cause for today they said sun and no rain. And guess what....???

Nothing really....

2008-08-28T22:07:00.003+02:00

It's been a while since I wrote last time. Sorry!! But nothing really happened... Well last weekend Alex and Filip came to HH. It was nice! Well apart from weather on Saturday. It was pour-raining the whole day and around +13. Summer...
We went out on Friday and met with some friends in Schanze.
Then on Saturday we met with most of the international bunch and we had dinner at Bok (Asian food, yummi!).
During the day the guys did some shopping (can you believe - I almost got nothing!).
Then on Sunday Alex got very eager to iron his shirts, and my for that matter. The day before he brought the ironing board from the cellar (Thomas left it for him) and the picture was some model (?) in bikini.
The thing was that as soon as he started ironing, this bikini started to disappear due to the heat.
Great! ;-)
Both Filip and Alex (and Thomas as well) think that this is a perfect motivation for guys to iron. You bet! Even some of my shirts got ironed. My God! Guys are so simple... ;-)

Tomorrow I'm flying to Köln, Alex will pick me up and we will go to the Belgian side to Alex' aunt's place. On Saturday there is a wedding of his cousin - in Holland. In a castle! Cool!
I'll write more after the weekend.
Have a good one!

Short vacations

2008-08-18T19:44:00.013+02:00

I went to visit Alex close to Stuttgart more than a week ago. I went on Friday night and stayed until Monday morning. I had big plans of travelling around Schwarzwald but we weren't so close to it, and all the highways around Stuttgart seemed to be under construction. So instead we visited Stuggart (picture below - you can see some International Art-Bear Exhibition), which is much smaller than Hamburg and not so exciting but still OK.

After visiting the city we drove a bit around and found a really nice spot with grape plantation.

The day after we visited a "kloster" (it is monastery in Engl, right?), which is under UNESCO protection, and later on we went to see a barock castle in Ludwigsburg.
Monastery was cool; the castle little bit too much (as baroc style usually is).

Then on Monday I went to Göteborg. It was a nice, relaxing week. Too bad "la familja" was working. But we spent time together in the evenings. I also met Leif and Jenny with little Oumar. On Tuesday we went to see Miss Li and Moneybrother concerts. M-brother didn't seem so happy and willing to perform, which is a pity. The weather was also a typical GBG-weather. Fredrik and Tinna joined us, and we had dinner in a Turkish restaurant. Nice!

Then on Friday we had "kräftskiva" at Leif's place. My God!!! Yummi!!!! We ate so much crayfish and shrimps!! Had wine and snaps. It was sooooo delicious! Tack Leif!

On Saturday the whole familja went to the coast. First we had lunch close to Kungsbacka (kill me - but I don't remember the name! :-/) It was so nice to be with all of them. And the smallest one - Theo loves olives! Check out the picture! (Aparently he also loves sardines or sardelles - fantastic, huh?).

We also went to swim in the sea. Well...it was Tania and Dan who jumped from the cliffs. The water was cold. I'm a "chicken".

Now I'm back to Hamburg. A new week has started. Have a good one!

New place

2008-08-03T20:51:00.010+02:00

Wow! today I can say that the new apartment starts to remind a real place to live and function in. The move took few days; packing and preparing, then Alex, Handan and I moved most of the stuff. Then the whole multi-culti gang helped on the 22nd July.
Then there was a short break when we went to Magda's and Sebastian's wedding. It was beautiful and the party was great! Thanks guys! On top of that we had a wonderful weather so the whole party we were out on the terrace. When I get some pictures you can be sure they will appear here.

(as promised here are some pics):

From the Church:

And the couple at the wedding reception:

I also got some pictures from Megi, one from the wedding, one from karaoke night:

Last Friday I returned the keys to the old place, this weekend we went to IKEA and bought some new lamps and other stuff which was missing in the new flat. Otherwise the weekend was good. We went out with one Mexican colleague on Friday - back home at 4 AM. Then on Saturday we had some beers with two friends - Hans and Sandra (I took care of their rabbit and cat when they were away on vacations 2 weeks ago). Today Alex and I fixed some more stuff in the flat and then he left to Stuttgart.

Here are some pics from the new apartment:

Living room

Bedroom

Guestroom (so everybody who will visit can have her/his room!!)

Kitchen

Alex who was fixing the connection for washing machine

More pictures later on.
Tomorrow a new week is starting. On Friday I'll go to Stuttgart to see a little bit of Schwarzwald and then next Monday - to Göteborg for 1 week!! Yuppi!!!

Packing and moving weekend...

2008-07-20T20:02:00.002+02:00

Amazing!! I somehow got some free internet connection, at least I can use google and update you what has been happening here.
So it has started - the moving out project. Wow...two days of packing and moving stuff. Alex arrived on Fri evening. By that time Handan helped me with packing kitchen stuff and we were really efficient! On Saturday I continued packing the boxes and Alex was moving them to the other apartment. Then Handan and I were unpacking some stuff. It went quite smoothly with the 3 of us. Then in the evening we went to Gröninger - a beer cellar where they brew their own beer. Yummi! We were celebrated my birthday with some friends. Nice!!!
On Sunday Alex and I moved the rest of the stuff before the final move on Tuesday (the heavy stuff: closets, bed, soffa, washing machine etc). Then he left back to Stuttgart and I cleaned the apartment, windows etc. Again with Handan's help - it went to fast!!
This week will be short since I'm going to Poland on Thu evening. Magda's wedding!! Well we'll probably arrive there around 2 AM so I hope to sleep in as long as possible to be "fresh" for the wedding.
And I saw that the weather will be sunny and around +30 degrees. Yuppi!!!! I can have my summer dress on!!! :-D
Well, right now it is +14, like in fall!!!
Have a good start of the week!

Katia 1 year

2008-07-13T16:20:00.007+02:00

Yesterday we celebrated Katia's 1st year (Miguel's and Melody's daughter). We went to the same place where Pedro had his goodbye-grill. I decided to bike and it took me 50 min. Not bad. And it was all the way against wind. We had a mixed weather with sun and rain. So from time to time we had to hide under the trees, covering all the food. But still the grill was great, so was the b.day carrot cake. Yummi!!

Katia got lots of presents, we even succeeded to get different stuff; there were only 2 duplicates (but still the toys varied). Pedro and Paula came from Wolfsburg - she will be going back to Brasil in 3 days so it was a kind of goodbye for her as well :-(

Alex was driving back from Austria but due to 4 heavy traffic jams he couldn't make it on time. He arrived super tired after 8 PM...And he was supposed to drive to Stuttgart today. But I managed to convince him to fly. This way we could meet with the guys for brunch today, which was very nice.

Tomorrow is Monday (again...). But the great news is that Kristin will arrive and stay in Hamburg for some weeks. And she will stay at my place. Alex is in Stuttgart so it's gonna be nice to spend some time with Kristin - we haven't seen each other for 1 year now so lots to talk about.

Finally over...

2008-06-30T21:06:00.003+02:00

...EM I mean. Football's mania. Punkt slut. I can only tell you that I was reaaaaaaallly glad that Spain won. The Germans were just too convinced they would win.... Already the game against Turkey was so so, and I was hoping that Turkey and Russia would meet in the final (European Championship, huh?). But OK, Spain won, they played better That's it.
We were 15 people watching the game at Handan's place; kind of equally divided into those cheering for Spain and those cheering for Germany (yeah well we had those as well ;-)
Anyway, we were probably the only ones screaming when Spain won. Handan is probably hated by her neighbors now ;-)
Here are some pictures of the gang (from the right: Johan and below Jenny - a Swedish couple; Roseline - Sweden; her French colleague; Sveta (Guillem's wife); Sandra (German); Guillem and Alex).

Here you can also see (from the left): Miguel (Mex) and Hans (Austria).

On Saturday evening we went to some friends' birthday party. There were 80 people!!!! The party was perfectly organized (Germans...). And it was very nice. We were out in the garden the whole evening. Well almost the whole one. Afterwards Alex was supposed to be a DJ with some funk music and the music was great, just not for dancing. So Monica (from Barcelona) who wanted to have some salsa wasn't so happy ;-) Anyway, at the end we managed to find somewhere Shakira, Gypsy Kings so people could dance. The trip back took over 1 hr. God we were tired!!! At 03.30 at home - it was getting light...
Sunday was little bit hard but a nap in the afternoon helped.
Now the new week has started. Alex left for Romania today and will be back in 2 weeks more less. Next week I'll start preparing a bit for moving. At least start packing a little... Hope we can manage to move before Magda's wedding.
All of you who read this - have a good week!

Vacations and Midsummer in Denmark

2008-06-22T21:46:00.012+02:00

Wow...it's been ages I wrote anyting here...Sorry sorry sorry!
But I have good reasons I guess. I was away for 1 week on holidays at Mallorca and then Alex and I went over to Filip's to Denmark.
But from the beginning - I went with my cousin Magda to Mallorca over 1 week ago. Alex gave me a ride to Berlin Tegel and then I met Megi and we flew in the evening. Of course a little bit of delays, arrived to Palma and then over 1 hr in a mini bus to Cala d' Or. We were staying in some hotel apartments, really close to the beach. But we were really surprised when we woke up on Saturday morning cause it was a bit cold and super cloudy! WHAT?!?! Anyway we went to te beach and waited for some sun. It appeared in the afternoon. But we didn't swim the first day cause it was too cold.
The next days we spent pretty much sun bathing, swimming, reading books, and deciding which UV sun block to use ;-)

And of course watching football games in the nearby pub in the evenings. The pub owner was surprised when he was asking each evening which team we cheered for. Max. confusion I guess: once Sweden, once Poland, once Romania and Holland. Hahahah.
Anyway, time passed by fast and we were soon back to Berlin again. Milka and Sebastian came to pick up Magda from the airport so we had coffee together and later on I took train to HH.
On Friday I went to work for half a day and then Alex picked me up and we drove to Denmark.
Filip lives now in Ringköbing on the West coast. Close to the surfing, sailing and wake boarding paradise.
Oh yeah! And it is aparently the happiest town in the world!!! (according to whichever source....and ok, there are 17000 people living there). I really wonder which are these indicators... ;-)
On Friday we had dinner together with all his corridor roomates. Some drinks in the evening - despite all it was Swedish Midsummer on Friday!
On Saturday we went to the beach so the guys could try wake boarding (on a cable). Kind of ski lift principle. I didn't try cause it felt way to cold just looking at them.

Then we went to the nearby town and to the beach. They also have some Sand sculpture festival now so you can see some of the pictures.

Global warming effects

2008-06-02T21:24:00.002+02:00

Thanks to that we have summer and +30 every day. I like when it is sunny and warm but those temperatures and sun everyday for almost 2 months now is a bit too much...I know, global warming is not the only contribution but I think we all should do something to be more environmental friendly and care more.
I was in Göteborg last weekend. Went on Friday morning, had some meetings at our company in Vårgårda, then got a haircut in Götet (somehow I think it is too short). Then I went to Tania's place, had some rosé wine (Tania - Peñascal is SPANISH!!! - trust me!!! I drank this wine a lot when I was in Luleå, dating a Spanish guy!!!). By the way, I think the price in Spain is around 3euro/bottle). Then we went to Hammarkullen - every year there is a carnival - lots of people from all over the world who live in this area, lots of exotic food, and music. We went though to see a very Swedish guy - Jens Lekman. The concert wasn't probably the best of his life but we had fun. Later on we went downtown, met Dan and had some food and drinks. We also decided to go to the coast Saturday morning, with picnic, coffee and kanelbullar (ok it was some pistage cake - yummi as well!). And guess what?? People were already swimming in the sea!! So did Tania and Dan (I forgot my bikini!!! Grrrr....). They claimed the water was warm.
After geting roasted in the sun (of course with protective creams UV 10 at least) we went home and decided to have BBQ at Dan's place in the evening. Tok-Jörgen with family came as well. And Fredrik joined us later on. The meat, sallad and potatoes were great!! And it was good Tania and I walked back to her place. I needed it after the grill.
Sunday was as usual too short. And I had to take the earlier flight :-(
I met Dan and Magnus at Röda Sten, we had coffee and cake, chatted a bit and then I had to leave.
But I was lucky with no flight delays, and also met Cyril (the French friend from Hamburg) at Kastrup so it was fun to go back to HH together. Alex picked us up so we were at home quite fast.
The temperature in the apartment was +27. In the evening... no comments.
New week has started. Have a good one everybody!
Oh yeah - I made it possible to write comments now. So - there you go! Be my guest!

Friends start leaving...

2008-05-25T17:15:00.000+02:00

It is getting sad in the multi-culti environment here... Yesterday Txell & Thomas had their Farewell party. This will be their last week in Hamburg, next weekend they move to Barcelona (both of them will be working at our company there). It's been almost 3 years for Txell in Hamburg; for Thomas this will be a new adventure. We will miss you guys!!!
I will add some pictures from their party soon.
I will take over their apartment at the end of June. So soon we have to start packing and preparing for the move. And probably there will be another party in this flat. This time - a house warming one :-)

Pedro (Brasil) will also leave next week. His contract is over and he will start working at VW in Wolfsburg. Pity that Paula (his girl) will go back to Brasil. But Pedro promised to come to HH almost every weekend so we are not going to loose him forever :-)
Here are some photos from the big grill they organized last week.
Of course Pedro with his "thumbs-up", glad gang, and the youngest beer-lover - Katia.

I cannot believe it is already the end of May... Work is OK, little bit hysterical the last week but still OK.
Meg and I still plan to have some holidays in Portugal in June. Hope we will manage to book something this week. It would be great with short vacations.
Next week I'm going to Sweden, will work at ALS on Friday and stay over the weekend in GBG. Yuppi!!!

Summer is here!

2008-05-12T18:59:00.001+02:00

We've had summer here for over 2 weeks now... This past weekend we had a long weekend (Pingst). We were so lucky with summer weather! Filip came from Denmark and on Friday we had dinner at home with Txell and Monica. Then we went out to Repeerbahn and met with Thomas. The whole weekend was Hafengeburtstag (I've never experienced any harbor b.day in Gdynia or Göteborg) and there were many people out. On Saturday we went dowtown and afterwards biked to St. Pauli to see some of the celebrations. But due to the heat we didn't manage to see much. In the evening we went to one of the beach clubs at Elbe to celebrate Miguel's (2) birthday. Oh yeah - this is another invention here - those beach clubs at Elbe - a little bit "wanna-be" from Hamburgers side..since there is no real sea here, they've decided to import sand, make some bars, place sun chairs and make a few clubs at the river. Well...little bit funny idea but somehow it works. The evening was nice, Miguel was happy and we had fun.

On Sunday we went to the beach at Elbe. Again...beach and beach... but it was nice and warm. Too bad you can't swim in Elbe...anyway water is still too cold... In the evening we did nothing. Just ate a dinner and chatted...
Monday was nice, we went to Alster and laid on the grass. Filip was leaving back to Denmark around 4 PM. I'm writing this blog now and Alex is taking a nap. Poor him, suffering of the heat ;-)
Until the next time...

Long weekend in Göteborg

2008-05-06T18:48:00.000+02:00

On Thu May 1st, Alex and I went to Göteborg. We drove his car since we had to pick up some cases of beer at the Bordershop in Puttgarten (this was a real adventure!). Anyway, not so far from Hamburg we already got stuck in a STAU due to a motorcycle accident - so already one hour longer trip...Later on we got to the Bordershop - for those who have never heard the word - it is "cheap alcohol paradise". 90% of people are Swedish. And funny - you can buy Swedish beer which has been transported from Swe to Germany, and then you transport it back to Sweden again. I thought that those 10 cases of beer which we had to get were a lot, but no way! People were loading trailers with alcohol. We looked like losers ;-)
Anyway, after shopping, we took the boat to Denmark. We left HH with sun and +18 degrees, we got to Malmö and it was pouring rain and cold in Sweden :-(
We arrived to Dan's place and went out to Götas for a good pizza together with Dan, Magnus, Fredrik and Tommy. Alex got the first introduction to IFK :-D
On Friday we went to Marstrand (Bohuslän in a pill). It was sunny and nice. We walked around the island for some hours, had obligatory fika with kanelbulle. Mums!

Then driving back to GBG and preparing for grill at the Willquists'. We were quite many since Tania had over her sister with family. Below you can see some pictures from the grill. Theo was so sweet! And cool in his sunglasses, huh?

On Saturday it was time to visit the city. We went around from Haga, Vasaplatsen to Götaplatsen with Poseidon, then Kronhusbodarna and Trägårds.

I had some intentions to buy new shoes but didn't succeed :-( Alex liked the city very much. In the evening we had dinner with Christer (he was also working in Brasov when we were there).

Later on we met Dan for one beer.
Sunday - packing, breakfast and coffee with Dan & Magnus and taking off.

I really didn't want to leave :-((((( It is home over there! And the weather was soooo nice on Sunday (not for driving some hours).
The trip went well until we got to the boat. As soon as we got out of it, there was again STAU in Germany. Grrrr!! And then again before HH. So again the trip took 9,5h... And I know people managed in 7 hrs or so...
Anyway, we had a very nice weekend. The weather was great. Some quality time with my "la familja". I miss it...