Long weekend in GBG and Fjällbacka

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...

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...

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...

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!

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

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

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!!!