Making the Next Move: Part 1

This is part one of the two-part finale for this blog, and it comes with a partial wrap-up as well as a reveal.

First, to the wrap-up. It’s been an incredible two years recounting my adventures in southern Germany and its surroundings. 

Way back in my six-months-in-Munich post I gave numbers on my trips outside of Munich. Since then, I’ve visited another 12 German cities (plus 2 repeats) and 4 new countries (plus 5 repeats, although in all cases except Vienna it was to new destinations within the country). 

Most of these trips I highlighted in previous blog posts; a few I've included in the photos you'll see later on. But before I get into too much reminiscing, the reveal:

So in the spirit of continued alliteration, maybe my next blog should be From Munich to Maui or Mahalo, Maui! Or…maybe I’ll get there and see what awaits. J

Knowing we had planned to eventually move someplace warmer doesn’t making the leaving any easier, particularly since the thought had been to extend our European living experience to Spain or Portugal.

I know what you're thinking. Whining about moving to Hawaii? Really??

No, not really. It's just there are so many little things that have slowly become part of my everyday that I’ll miss. 

• The sight of men in Lederhosen and women in Dirndl or men in business suits and women in stilettos cruising along on their bikes.

• The sound of metal shutters rolling open in the mornings on many apartment windows. 

• The inconvenience of stores being closed on Sundays and holidays but the convenience of prices including taxes and fees.

• The strange paradox of a country so focused on being green but using so much paper. 

• The other paradox of the intense protection of privacy and the extreme lack of personal space in crowds or on public transportation.

At the Little American Oktoberfest with the MIWC.
I dubbed my look "Bavarican."

I feel like I've had so much time here but not nearly enough...

Tollwood is a famous summer
and winter arts festival.
Definitely the groovier side
of Munich on display.

Sometimes you walk around and
happen to look up and see oddities

And sometimes you're walking
around and happen to look
up and see awesomeness

I will definitely miss the ads here.
This one talks about finding the
right job for everyone.

Opening the truck from the back? Inefficient!
Beer delivery is about maximizing resources.

The best way to emerge from a pedestrian tunnel: in the presence of random beautiful street art

Saw one of my favorite bands--Three Days Grace--
in a hall in the artisans village area

Yup, just another Fasching Week with a guy
on the tram in a giraffe costume

Much of the usual crew from Munich Toytown Ultimate

One of my favorite sights. These sweepers
clean the streets but are small enough to
travel along the sidewalks and clean them
as well. Ingenious.

Here's me at one of my TWO trips
to Oktoberfest in 2018

No, not fake cars or a model building.
Just a huge statue of a man walking in Munich.

Nothing beats a nice hike in the Alps

December 2018 destination
Christmas market: Tallinn, Estonia

Here is the yummy lunch I was having in Tallinn
just before I realized my wallet was missing.
Thankfully found it at the help desk for the
city wall I'd climbed earlier in the day.

Another contender for favorite German city: Meersburg. It's on the Bodensee/Lake Constance.
There's a cute old town, cool castle and view across the lake to Switzerland.

Channeling Grace Jones
meets Minnie Mouse
during our second
Copa Prescadisco
tourney
October 2018

In addition to exploring Meersburg,
we visited the botanical garden
island of Mainau, in the middle
of Bodensee

Participated in my first protest since college.
Demonstrating in Munich against US policy
separating immigrant children from their parents.
Small world indeed.

Three-and-a-half years in Germany
and I'm still baffled
by things they choose
to put on pizza...

I went to London for the first time in August 2018.
Did all the touristy things despite the blistering heat. 

But this was the reason for my visit to
London--to see the new Frida Kahlo
exhibit. Amazing!!

Everything's about following rules and keeping things
orderly--except waiting in line and parking!

The second half of my visit to Kassel--to the Museum of
Sepulchral Culture--was equally wondrous.
But a different kind of grim. ;)

The first half of my visit to Kassel
was the wonder of the Grimm museum

Cranes everywhere. For everything.
Construction. Car towing. Trash and recycling bin emptying.

Larry takes a moment to ponder on one of the
black beaches of Tenerife--
our vacation spot in January 2018

Tenerife wasn't all beaches and cruises, however. We hiked
down the Masca valley from this village to the ocean.
And hiking down was reportedly only slightly easier
than hiking up!

I'm looking forward to warm weather,
but I'll miss the easy
bundle-up-and-stay-indoors excuses

   
                                                    

I will definitely miss the "experiences" that pop up, 

like this Schäfflertanz that's only performed every seven years!

It's always the people that make the place.
I'm sad to be leaving behind a couple of good friends.

When things were tough at work for a while I started writing a quote or inspirational saying each day
on the whiteboard in our office. I'm particularly proud of this one--it just popped into my head one morning.

So what's left? Next time I'll talk about prepping for the transition from the "land of laptops and Lederhosen" to the land of luaus and leis...

Bucket List: The Boundless Beauty of Budapest

The first thing I saw when I got off the bus in the inner city.

In recent posts I've talked about going further afield for bucket-list trips to the Black Forest and Prague.

Budapest has also been sitting on my bucket list for a while, but more as a place I felt I should see rather than a top-of-the-charts destination.

Well, that's certainly changed.

Debating a trip to Istanbul or Budapest recently over the long Easter weekend, Budapest won out for budget and security concerns. I could not be happier that it did!

Looking across the river from Pest into Buda
at Matthias Church and the fisherman's bastion

On Saturday I had an early-morning flight and then took the express bus from the airport to the center of the city. Although my guest house was just a five-minute walk from the stop, check-in wasn't until the afternoon, so I'd already booked myself on a free walking tour that morning.

It was the best walking tour of that type I've ever taken in terms of getting a deeper history of the city and relating things like architecture to the socio-political events of different eras.

The shoes on the Danube is a memorial to 3000+
people executed on the riverbank during
WWII. They were forced to remove their shoes
and face the water before being shot with arrows
so their bodies would fall into the river
and be washed away.

Even though I had visited Estonia (albeit only for the Christmas market and some light sightseeing) and Prague, I felt the imprint of the communist legacy more acutely in Budapest, probably due to the tour guide's very frank stories about the darker side of Hungarians and their history.

This a memorial in front of the Parliament building.
In October 1956 students gathered on the square here
waiting for politicians to address their concerns about
communism. Instead, the students were slaughtered
by snipers, sparking eventual armed revolt within the city,
which was also brutally repressed.

View from my early-evening ride
on the Budapest Eye. That's St. Stephen
in the background, the city's
largest Catholic church
and named for the country's founder.

Our tour wandered through part of Pest and then across the Danube into Buda, where we climbed up the castle hill and ended on the fisherman's bastion. While wandering through a nearby Easter market, I had a lunch of Budapest's most popular street food, then briefly checked into my room and ducked out again to do some shopping before taking a ride on the Budapest Eye, enjoying a nice dinner and resting my weary feet for the night.

Looking across the Danube from Buda into Pest

The main foyer of the
Hungarian National Museum
looks more like a cathedral

Easter morning was all about random exploring. I wandered in the area near the Parliament building, headed to the Hungarian National Museum to see their permanent exhibit on the country's history, and hit a couple more stores before grabbing lunch and resting up for my next planned activity.

That was an Urban and Street Art tour through the Jewish quarter. Although not as richly detailed in history as my tour the previous day, it was a fabulous glimpse into making the run-down and abandoned into something beautiful. And it culminated in a drink with some of my fellow tour-mates in one of the city's famous ruin bars.

There are two art groups working in Budapest
to cover exposed walls from war damage
and bring a vibrancy to these areas

Part of the inner courtyard of the Fogas ruin bar.
Tried my first palinka, which has an
extremely high alcohol content and
is, as one tour guide described,
like drinking flavored nail polish remover.

From the bar I wandered a bit more on my own, thinking about what I learned, what I was seeing around me, and comparing Budapest to other places I've visited.

Particularly in relation to Prague--which at one point was part of a shared kingdom with Hungary--Budapest seemed to have retained more of the "bohemian" vibe over the centuries.

I was genuinely sad at the thought of leaving on Monday morning. There was so much more of the city I wanted to explore. My trips in the past have usually focused on seeing as much as I can of a place under the assumption that there are so many other places in the world to see that I probably wouldn't come back.

Yet Budapest was one of the rare places where I could understand the desire to re-visit time and time again. There were so many more museums and attractions to explore. Different quarters of the city to see. And, like in Hamburg, different seasons to experience changes on and around the river.

So, as I let Larry know, I'd be happy to make Budapest home for a while should the opportunity arise in the future! 😄

Lángos, street food traditionally consisting of 
fried dough with garlic, sour cream and cheese on top

Dinner on Saturday night was at the oldest
restaurant in Pest, and of course I ordered the
goulash. It was divine!

Words to live by! And I did, in fact, come back later when
the market was open and try one of the chimney cakes
dusted in sugar and cinnamon.

Speaking of the future and new opportunities, stay tuned for my next (and final) post for this blog...

Black Forest Boondoggle?

The Black Forest has long been on my bucket list. Contrary to popular (non-German) belief, however, it’s not that close to Munich or other “major” German cities. So, for me it was relegated to a “when I have a spare weekend” status.

Why the Black Forest? Well, for me it's the idea of seeing a dense, creepy forest in the country so famous for fairy tales. A forest that got its name either from the tall dark pine trees themselves or the shadowy realm created by them and their accompanying fir and spruce trees.

The forest itself is a 160 x 50 km area that’s the origin of the Danube river (and the cake!). Today, of course, it's not the sylvan spread it was before so much of it was clear-cut. But with that kind of harvesting a rarity these days, the silviculture first explored in the 1800s means conservation efforts and timber needs are more closely aligned.

I decided to do an early spring trip when the small towns along the Black Forest Train route were less likely to be overrun with other tourists. And because the Black Forest is also the home of the cuckoo clock, and there’s a German Clock Route similar to the idea of the Fairy Tale Route, I thought I’d also try to squeeze in a last-minute cuckoo sight or two.

Call it overly ambitious and under ambitious at the same time.

The first leg of my trip was a FlixBus ride from Munich to Villingen. I’d read about the most scenic parts of the train ride and thought I’d be best served to start in the south, take the train north, and stay in the highly recommended scenic town of Gengenbach.

Mistake number one was not realizing that the FlixBus stop was not in the middle of town, but on one side of the dual township of Villingen-Schwenningen. The bus let us out in Schwenningen and, of course, the Black Forest train departed from Villingen. Once an hour.

The buses across town were also not so frequent, so I began a mad speed-walk across the two cities to get to the train. About 45 minutes into my insane march I realized I would have to run to make the train. 

Thankfully I had paused to assess my progress at a bus stop, and before I had to embarrass myself by breaking into a trot, a bus appeared and I made it to the station with minutes to spare.

Mistake number two. I took the train to Hornberg, mistakenly thinking it was one of the towns highlighted in the Cuckoo Clock Route. Adorable town nestled in the forest, with a stream and a castle ruin overlooking everything? Check. 

Hornberg Shooting Trail markers

But it was 2:30 pm on a Saturday afternoon and everything was closed, with no signs of cuckoos anywhere. Instead, Hornberg had a “shooting trail” you could follow. Hard pass. 

What I DID find in Hornberg was
entirely unexpected--a giant sequoia!

I had planned to spend a couple of hours in town casually exploring the sights. Instead, I did a quick sweep and hurried back up the hill to the station to catch the next hourly train.

Mistake number three. When I first got off the train in Hornberg I noticed I’d lost my Internet and phone service. I’m not sure why I thought they would re-emerge once I got down into the town, but it meant that when I got back up to the station, I had no access to a schedule or an online ticket.

Praising a still-papered society, I found the printed schedule at the platform and a ticket machine. But once I was on the train (still no service in that part of the woods) I remembered I needed to make a train transfer, but had no idea where or when. 

Having studied the map I had some thoughts on a course I could improvise to get me where I needed to go. Luckily I picked up phone service again just in time to avoid an unfortunate series of detours!

If you look through the window
you'll see a house with solar
panels. There were A LOT of
these along my train route.
So much for the
impenetrable forest idea!

Building decoration in Gengenbach

Gengenbach was a welcome respite from disappointment. It was just as cute as reported, full of Fachwerk houses and a lovely town hall that becomes a large advent calendar at Christmastime. 

(OK, one disappointment not to be there at the right time of year to see that.) 

The main street and square in Gengenbach

I walked around snapping pictures before checking into my room, then wandered out again for a few more pictures and food before collapsing for the evening. On Sunday I took advantage of the early-morning sun and quiet to walk the town again and relax before breakfast and the multi-hop train ride back to Munich.

Another tribute to the sun: hillside vineyards in Gengenbach

I would love to go back to the Black Forest someday, but would do a guided tour that involved driving through the heart of the forest and hitting the highlights of the towns along the way when they’re open. 

(I’ve discovered on other trips that in many small towns the stores and some attractions close around 1 or 2 pm on Saturdays, so weekday touristing is a better bet.)

That’s not to say it was not a good experience. Any time spent seeing new scenery and exploring new towns is time well spent in my book. 

But my expectations and my experience didn’t quite meet, which I guess was a good reminder of why I usually plan ahead, and a lesson in balancing the idealized with the truth of reality.

Passing Time in Prague

Ever since the early days of our German adventure--while we in Hamburg and I hadn’t started my exploratory adventures--people had been recommending Prague as a destination.

The architecture, the beauty, the people. All came highly recommended. But I had a list of conquests closer to home, so it was pushed to the “someday” part of the list.

One pocket of wonderful--this colorful synagogue
I saw on my walk from the train station to my hotel.

Well “someday” finally came recently, as I booked a weekend trip to Prague to see what this jewel of the Czech Republic had to offer. 

As I crossed the city that first afternoon, I admit I had mixed feelings. There were pockets of wonderful mixed in with what I had come to think of as “typical” European. Not unlovely by any means, but not special. 

I checked into my room (I had thought “Basement Rooms” was a reference to the relatively cheap room prices, but it turned out that my room and at least one other poor guest were literally in the basement of the hotel near the laundry room), grabbed a quick bite to eat and headed to my early afternoon walking tour of the city. 

The Powder Tower

Here is where things picked up, as our enthusiastic guide led us around the Old City, which was much more architecturally interesting and charming than what I’d seen thus far. I made a mental list of things to do later, but ended up spending time after the tour wandering the city and enjoying the atmosphere.

The next morning, I retraced my steps from the tour to grab pictures of certain places where I had wanted to linger, climbed the tower in the town hall for an expanded view of the city, headed across the river to visit a specialty Christmas shop that turned out to be on the grounds of the castle, and wandered back through a sleepy part of town that housed the Kafka museum.

By mid-afternoon it was time to get to the train station, where I settled in comfortably for an easy ride back to Munich. 

Or so I thought. 

About an hour into the trip I came back to my seat after a bathroom break and found a strange sight on my phone (having been an iPhone user till I switched to a Google Pixel 2 last year, I didn’t recognize the stricken Android robot image for what it was). 

I seriously thought someone had hacked my phone in those few minutes I was in the restroom! But a quick search on my tablet (which thankfully I had brought with me and was connected to the train’s wi-fi) revealed a system error. After following the advice in various forums to no avail, I returned to Munich and took my phone into the store the next morning for service. 

I ended up having to wait an agonizing three days for a new phone, worrying the entire time if I'd have anything other than memories to show for my trip. Because the irony was that I was in the process of uploading my photos for safekeeping when I took that bathroom break.

Indeed, while the first day and first half of the second day were okay, I lost my photos of the castle cathedral exterior, video of the beautiful bells ringing while I was up there, and some interesting scenes around town (including the infamous two figures peeing into a fountain outside the Kafka museum).

Despite the stress of the last part of my experience, I enjoyed my time in Prague, and asked myself the same questions of every city or town I visit these days: 

• Did it offer something interesting? Yes. The history of the city itself is enough, but of course the shared history of the Czech Republic and Slovakia is also fascinating.

• Was it a lovely experience? Yes. The weather was cool but comfortable and sunny, the scenery was great, the people were friendly and there was a lot to see and do.

• Did I learn something? Yes. That I should have booked more time to hit more sights! :)

I love Rothenburg so much I took a
day trip there last month to see my
parents' contribution to the town wall
after our visit in 2016

• Was it my favorite European city I’ve visited so far? No. And to be fair, it will be hard for any city to beat the charm of Rothenburg (medieval walled city with a torture museum AND a Christmas museum? c'mon!!) or the perfection of Strasbourg at Christmas. But that doesn't stop me from looking...

• Could I ever see myself living here? Actually, yes. Prague has a nice mix of modern convenience and old-world appeal. I could see us carving out a niche there. 

One more bucket-list item accomplished. So many more to go...

Munich International Women’s Club (MIWC)

When Larry and I first moved to Walnut Creek, California, I joined a women’s group. My first encounter with them was a brunch at a member’s home on the other side of town. And I mean other side (economically speaking).

While we were happily crowing over our nearly half-million-dollar quaint cottage bargain in the San Francisco Bay Area, at this brunch I was walking into a miniature palace, complete with multiple princesses.

The question of the morning was not “what do you do?” It was “do you work?” 
I finally understood the “ladies-who-lunch” concept and it was not to my particular taste.

Starkbierfest ("strong beer" festival) 2018

So, when one of my best friends recommended looking into an international women’s club while I was here, I was reluctant. But after some research I was more heartened to learn they sponsored a charity and had conversation groups and museum and hiking outings and not just brunches and golf days.

I went to a meeting on a trial basis. The guest speaker was an opera singer who used breathing exercises and vocalization practice to help us literally and figuratively find our voices as women. I was hooked.

But I started my job about six months after joining the club, so soon I could only do weekend or weeknight activities. Yet each time I come back, it’s to open arms and familiar as well as instant new friends from Germany and around the world. 

The MIWC has been a great counterbalance to my solitary wanderings, and one of the things I cherish about my time in Munich.

Gingerbread house construction
is serious business

We created these beauties for the children of our charity

The Munich transportation museum had been on my list to visit,
and with the club I attended a private tour which lent itself to
personal reminiscences of changes in Munich over time.

One hike took us to the Mittenwald area, where a geological phenomenon
causes the ground to appear in waves

This year we scored a coveted spot
in the Faschingsparade

We were a small but spirited group
styling ourselves as the International Queens

Wrapping It Up (almost)

We all make promises to ourselves that we intend to, but unfortunately can not always, keep. My intentions for the end of this blog were grander than reality allowed.

And since signs have been popping up everywhere recently, I will relent and not let it linger uncertainly, which would be a disservice to you and all the great things we've explored together here.

It also looks like there are very different adventures waiting just around the corner for me!

I'll keep you in suspense on that for now, but in a few weeks we'll hit the two-year mark on my time in Munich, and following that will be the official wrap on the blog.

Till then, I'll share stories of my recent adventures and some bucket-list trips.

Hold on, the ride's not quite over yet!

Keep Calm and Carry On

We've already entered 2019 and all I can do is look back and wonder where the time has gone. I mean, that's what we do at this time of year--reflect on what's passed and make plans to make a fresh start in the year to come.

So as part of my looking back in the last several weeks of 2018 I had several plans. I planned to do a post about the Christmas market attack in Strasbourg this past year and my experience there in 2017. 

I planned to do a post about the continuing snowball effect of "dieselgate" and how it flies under the radar in the face of all of the other late-2018 activities. 

Then, there was the Der Spiegel scandal as the ultimate irony in fake news. It, too, became yet another thing I would end up pondering offline, it seemed, until I saw a headline talking about the scandal and how it was related to the seduction of storytelling. 

It's something I understand all too well. And not just in my fiction, where it took me years to learn to let the stories tell themselves rather than try to force them along my preconceived path. 

When I was writing freelance magazine articles, I definitely kept my story's "angle" top of mind: from the interview questions I crafted right down to the modifiers I carefully selected to evoke the atmosphere I wanted to create.

For a writer it's so easy to fall in love with your idea, your words, your sense that your view is the right one--it's the kind of trap that journalist Claas-Hendrik Relotius says he fell into. He's not the first, and most likely won't be the last. 

So the MAGAs and conspiracy theorists will likely hold this up as an example of enemies outside the U.S. trying to influence American thought (and yes, the irony of this does not escape me). And though it would seem to further the idea that we can only trust ourselves and everyone else is out to get us, the truth is it will all wash away in the wake of something new. We'll shrug and move on to the next jaw-dropper, and the one after that, and so on.

Relotius doesn't cite a political agenda as his primary driver, but if he had, it would be understandable. In the past couple of years I have alternated between anger and isolation to keep my sanity. But as an attempt to be more productive I plan to embrace the madness. To talk about it, write about it, question why we think it's okay to say and behave in a way we would have never done just a few years ago.

Because even though it seems like humanity is sucking the life out of itself without regard for anything but the quick hit, I have to believe that eventually cooler heads will prevail. These last couple of years have been a series of battles, testing the limits of how disgusting we're willing to be to each other in the interests of a handful of horrible people. 

But part of my belief has to do with winning the larger war. I think people are starting to wake up and--even if it's only out of a realization of how they themselves are not cashing in on the chaos--a change is coming. A change for the better. 

We just have to hold on. For everyone's sake.