Munich

Englischer Garten

I’m finally in Germany! I guess I am actually in Bavaria, which is what most Germans would say. Munich seems pretty quiet since it the weather has turned cold and Oktoberfest ended over a week ago. I thought about going to have the Oktoberfest experience, but I am no fan of crowds. I went on a free walking tour and walked around the Englischer Garten. As cold as it was, I enjoyed walking across the river, watching the surfers in the Endless Wave. In this big field, there were three guys throwing a Frisbee around with a border collie running between them. It made me miss Molly more than ever. She really was the best dog.

I could feel Fall coming around the corner in Interlaken, but the cold really hit when I got into Munich. I was really afraid of it for some reason, like it would get cold and I would just have to go home because I couldn’t handle it. Rocco was always telling me that I was overreacting, and I think he is right. It’s snowing on the grey streets of Munich right now, but I am safely inside a coffee shop with a hot cup of tea. Earlier today I went to yet another bookstore to look for a copy of “The Trouble with Physics” by Lee Smolin. Bill Bryson’s book got me on a science kick. I guess I always felt like history was my thing and I should not even give science a second thought. What I never realized something like physics is not just about solving equations but more like investigating the history of the universe. Perhaps I am only interested in the historical side of science, but I enjoy ornithology as well.

They did not have a copy of the book, but they were kind enough to order it for tomorrow. I spent a few hours wandering around Munich, specifically the Viktualien Markt. The Viktualien Markt had stands with every kind of fruit, vegetable, cheese, sausage, or pastry that you could ever desire. If I lived in Munich I think I would go there everyday.

Interlaken, Switzerland

I had never heard of Interlaken, Switzerland before this trip, but everyone I met seemed to be in love with this place. It became an inside joke with Francesca that Interlaken was the best place in all of Europe. It was raining when I arrived and I wrestled with my luggage across the park in the center of town. It was nice to have an excuse to stay in and watch The Office. The next day I took a train to Lauterbrünnen and then a cable car to Mürren. I walked around Mürren, ate some potatoes covered in melted Swiss cheese, and then hiked down to Gimmelwald. There’s a quote that says “If Heaven isn't what it's cracked up to be, send me back to Gimmelwald.” In Gimmelwald I mostly walked around taking pictures of flowers and garden gnomes. I love garden gnomes. There was a path covered in fallen leaves that led down the mountain. I followed a Swiss family on the hike, stopping occasionally to take pictures of the beautiful Swiss countryside. I think the pictures of my hike say more than anything I could write, so here they are:

Annecy, France

Arguably the best aspect of my grand tour of Europe is that I have so friends to impose myself on over here. Instead of staying in hostels, I have the first-hand insider experience of living with families and students in every country I have visited thus far. Marta invited me to Mallorca, and then took me with her family and friends on little trips all over the island. Rocco invited me to his grandparent’s house in Tuscany for a week, and I am still holding out to visit his parent’s apartment in Venice. Francesca invited me to stay with her in Geneva, and on her day off she took me to Annecy, a Savoyard town in France just outside of Geneva. Annecy, “the Venice of France” has little canals winding their way from the lake through the vieille ville. The isn’t much to do in Annecy but take pictures of the colorful house and eat a big meal of French-Savoyard food. Relying on the luck of the Irish, I ordered something off the menu. I think it was beef spare ribs? The potato tartiflette was delicious. We got a bit lost on our walk around the city, but took this great little secret path through Annecy backyards. The secret passage reminded me of the hills of Berkeley behind CZ. I used to walk up there and take any strange staircase just to see where it led. We both nodded off on the way home, but it was a nice sendoff before I traverse further into the Alpine landscapes of Switzerland. Tomorrow I am finally going to Interlaken, rain forecast be damned!

Geneva

Switzerland. Geneva is an international city of students and banks, but it also can feel very Swiss. For example, on my first day, Francesca and I went for a walk along Lake Geneva, known to the French as Lac Leman. The water was so clear that even in the middle of the bridge you could see the kelp growing up from the bottom. There were a lot of cute ducks and swans. The main tourist site in Geneva is the Jet d’Eau, a 140m fountain of water shooting up from the Lake.

Francesca and I made a lot of jokes about the coolness of the Jet d’Eau, and the general coolness of the Swiss. On the Paquis, we ran into her friends Alex and Stefano. Stefano invited us to have fondue with him and two older strangers who I later figured out were his parents. I love Italian parents, the moms are so sweet and try to practice their English, and the dads always want to know where you are from and give you advice about what to see in Europe (Italy, I guess.)

On Monday I walked around Geneva, marveled at the beautiful shops that I can’t even afford to go into, and ate some delicious chicken at Chez Ma Cousine. I got lost and was late to meet Fra in front of her university, but we still made it to a lecture on war tribunals (in French, je suis désolé). Afterward we went to a wine bar with her friends from the program and I talked to her Austrian friend Suzanne who invited me to stay with her in Graz in November. Tuesday I went to the Red Cross Museum only to find it was closed. I also saw the United Nations building. Francesca and I went to Carouge, a small town that was incorporated into Geneva. We had tea and talked about science and feminism and Iran.

La Fra

Paris - The Later Years

I wasn’t exactly in the mood to go to a cemetery, and I am not a fan of the Doors, but I still ended up in Pere Lachaise Cemetery on Thursday morning. It was cloudy and cool, and actually the perfect weather for French-cemetery wanderings. I snuck into a tour group of German teenagers, but when I realized they were a school, I felt like too much of a weirdo to follow them on their tour-de-dead people. At the newsstand outside I bought a copy of Pariscope, the events guide of the city. There was an exhibition of self-protraits by Takashi Murakami at an art gallery in the Marais district. Murakami is a strange guy, and some of his art is not appropriate for this blog, but here is some of his work with his main characters Kaikai and Kiki.

There was also a display of his cartoons, which were extremely colorful with and inordinate amount of poop references. After the exhibit I wandered around and found a French/English bookstore called I Love My Blender. If only I could read all day, but someone has to do the sightseeing.

On Friday I went on the New Europe free walking tour of the city. It was a little repetitive after the Fat Tire Bike Tour, but the tour guide was silly. If there is one quality I admire it is the ability to get silly. What is life without absurdity? I also met two girls who went to UCLA and graduated last spring, which was a nice break from Team Australia. That night I went to a party hosted by some Colombian students with the tour guide from my bike tour. It was strange, but I ate some delicious food and talked about genocide and revolution (what else does one do at a Colombian house party?).

Saturday I decided to take one last walking tour of Paris, the Montmartre tour. Saw the Moulin Rouge, Van Gogh’s home, the restaurant where Picasso traded paintings for food, the last vineyard within the city of Paris, and again Sacre Coeur. Nice bookends, however there was possibly the most annoying Australian man I have ever met. Everything he said (which was a lot) was either about the sex museum or dog poop. Even after the tour when me and the tour guide (the same one of former silliness) and some other young travelers went for drinks, we all complained about his off-color commentary. Strangest thing I have observed so far: he was married! I couldn’t even stand a two hour walking tour with this guy! Well, almost. The tour came with a free glass of wine at the end, which turned into three glasses and some snacks provided by the old bar manager whom we suspect to be a former madame. That night was Nuit Blanche, so the group of us went to a park to see some light shows and eat cotton candy. It was me, two Aussies, one girl from Davis, and the Maltese tour guide. Plus, one guy who claimed to be from Paris, but had a stronger American accent than me. I finally ate some kebab, felt sick, and went to bed.

Paris

The best way to describe my time in Paris is that I was planning to stay three days and ended up staying over a week. I arrived at the hostel, dropped off my bags, and immediately went out to explore the City of Lights. The weather was beautiful, just as Rocco had promised when he told me about Paris in the fall. I cut through the throngs of tourists at the base of Sacre Coeur to have a little picnic on the steps. I sat near a teenage French couple who were playing 90s songs on an acoustic guitar.

The next day I woke up very early because I had the naïve idea to spend the whole day in the Louvre Museum. I discovered after fours hours of crusing the ancient art, Italian and Spanish paintings (site of La Jaconda), and French royal portraiture, I could stomach no more. I was exhausted, so I hopped over the bridge to the Left Bank for lunch and a trip to Pierre Herme. Pierre Herme is a pastry –making legend, but I went for the colorful Parisian macarons. The award for strangest/best combination went to the Olive Oil and Vanilla macaron.

I ate them in the park in front of the Eiffel Tower. Before that I made a trip to the Shakespeare and Co bookstore to browse the many titles and get a copy of Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything.

Wednesday was the day I went to the Centre George Pompidou, Paris’s Museum of Modern Art. My favorite museum thus far, it was full of Picasso, Matisse, Pollock, Rothko, Duchamp (shout-out to ReadyMade!) and Otto Dix, who painted an amazing portrait of journalist Slyvia von Harden. I left for lunch at an Indian place that Anna K told me about in her list of “can’t miss” Paris. Afterward, all that was left to do was spend the afternoon reading my book in the Jardin des Plantes.

That night I went on the Fat Tire bike tour. Tons of fun, but a story for another day.