Backpacking In Germany (12-18 August)

As this was my trip without any work attachments, excitement and anticipation should overwhelm my entire being, however, having just touched down from Zurich 5 hours before my Singapore-Frankfurt flight, I was completed exhausted.

As I arrived at the Singapore Changi Airport, I was greeted by my beautiful travelling partner and colleague, Sharen before checking in our luggage. Everything at that point of time was relatively smooth,until my first mishap.

Our first hiccup ( Or rather, MY HICCUP) was upon checking my boarding pass, my flight was to be a day later. In order to have a seat on that particular flight, I would be on hold until there was an available seat. Fortunately for us, I had a seat and we were off to Frankfurt!

Upon touching down at Frankfurt Airport, both Sharen and myself proceeded to get ourselves a train ticket to the historical Berlin. Our train was extremely punctual, in fact it was frighteningly PUNCTUAL as we were expecting the train to leave 5-10 minutes from the expected departure time. The doors closed just a few minutes upon stepping onto the 2nd class carriage. If we were too slow to get to the doors, we had to wait few more hours for the next train!

4 hours 32 minutes later, we reached our destination and proceeded to our accomodation, St. Christopher's Inn. The hostel was homely, nice and VERY CLEAN. Since this is my first backpacking trip, I was suitably happy with it and we proceeded to explore Berlin as soon as we got changed!

Our virgin steps into the city wasn't as lucky as we were frequently confused with the streets as they were all in German. The fact that the blindly hot sun constantly upon us did not help us to navigate the streets easily! One thing I did notice were the interesting graffiti strewn all over the city. The grafitti though was not like any plain, uninteresting drab that destroyed public/private property, but beautiful drawings/ paintings that not only beautify the place but truly represented Berlin for what it is.

Germany, like the Germans represented efficiency and great technology. But with great efficiency and technology (Like its Birkenstocks) , 'boring' comes to mind. But in Berlin, it was a city unique on its own with a melting pot history and new and old culture algamating into one. A city that was once the centre of major historical events such Bismarck Germany, Nazi Germany and the Cold War, the city now boasts of great nightlife, wonderful operas and caberets as well as wonderful museums!

On Day 2, we took the free tour around Berlin, the best decision we ever made! If you are ever at Berlin/Munich/Edinburgh/London or Paris, do check out Sandemans New Europe free tours. The Berlin tour was not only comprehensive and had an excellent guide, it was FREE!

On our 3rd day, our first stop was the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, located at Orienberg, just outside Berlin. Watching numerous movies and reading about concentration camps was one thing, to see the camp in our own eyes was another! The experience was certainly impactful and sad as you are reminded on how evil men could be. It is certain a place you shouldn't miss as it reminds us that history SHOULD NEVER REPEAT itself and atrocities like this should never occur onto any race or community.

The other half of the day was spent in Potsdam, a beautiful, quaint town which boasts once of the most beautiful palaces and gardens in Germany. Though it was raining throughout, it did not stop us from admiring the lush gardens, breathtaking statues and ostentatious palaces. One particular palace which stood out was the Schloss Sansoucci ( Sansoucci Palace). The summer palace, build on top of the hill had rows and rows of vineyards at the descending downwards with ornately carved statues greeting you at the base. The scenery was just stuff of legends:- I could just imagine myself passing through the gardens towards the palace on a horse- carriage. My luscious curls would be blown gently by the summer winds as I clung at the sides of my gilded gold carriage. As I were to meet my prince in waiting,I would be dressed in a beautiful baby blue corset which snugged my body tightly and a flowing tulle skirt held by various petticoats.

Well, I could only dream so much as I had to get back to Berlin before dark to enjoy Friday night out and before we departed to Dresden the next day!

Day 4: After forcing ourselves to wake up early, we were on a train to Dresden! As the Internet was down the day before, upon reaching the city, we had to hunt for a new hostel! We finally found a place. It very homely but pretty far out from the city which meant that we had to go home early just to be safe! Coincidentally, we were just in time for the Dresden Stadfest.

Like many major German cities, Dresden was not excluded from the major bombings of World War 1 and 11. Pretty sad as Germany especially Saxony area is full of history. However, with the Stadfest, history was revived with some of the citizen wearing beautiful Prussian era costumes and walked around the carnival which was filled with loads of delicious German food, theme park rides and activities galore. The bad news was that the place was raining heavily on the 1st day, spoiling our mood for some fun and sightseeing.

As darkness drew, the hostel did not look as inviting at night. Perhaps it was the narrow steps that creaked and echoed at night, blindingly dark room or even the sounds from the adjacent rooms that echoed throughout the hostel. It was just highly possible that our imaginations ran wild and perhaps an overdose of horror movies that made the place scarier that it would be. The humiliating part was that I was travelling with a friend, whereas our hostel mate was a 50 year old woman who did not seemed scared at all!

Fortunately for us, the 2nd day, a Sunday was clear and sunny, allowing us to soak in the wonderful carnival. We departed at 1455 hours from Dresden back to Frankfurt, though it was a long journey ( Approx 5 1/2 hours), the train ride was certainly breahtaking as we passed numerous small towns, castles and vineyards along the way.

Watching a play in London West End, The Lion King ( 13 March 08)

My trip to London this time round was supposed to be an uneventful one, as I would be concentrating on my upcoming exams.

Luckily I decided to take a little break with my friend, Jiayun at night to watch a musical. We chose Lion King as it had been one of the top musicals ever performed at the London West End.

I had my reservations at first; it was based on a Disney cartoon and there was seriously no secret of the plot and ending. However, I found the experience certainly mindblowing with really breathtaking sets of Pride Rock and Elephant Graveyard and their creation of the savannah and the movement of the animals.

What really blew me away were their employment of puppets such as Zazu, Pumba, cheetahs,etc. If it were up to me, I would have just thought of putting Zazu or Pumbaa into large animal suits. But instead, the producers deployed very visible puppeteers (dressed in complementary colours of the puppets they were operating) to operate their puppets. The effect was certainly amazing, as the animals were more flexible and nuanced in their acting, expressing lifelike movement of animals which would have been severely restricted if operated by humans in fully dressed animal costumes.

My favourite had to be the wildebeest stampede in which Mufasa is killed. The effect in the theater was fantastic, as seemingly thousands of wildebeests seem to be rushing straight at Simba -- and at the audience. With the clever usage of canvas scrolls, mirrors and a series of rollers, it created an illusion of thousands of racing animals driving forward.

Back to the details of the musical:- I really thought lots of research were done to create such a great affect. Inspired by Japanese Bunraku puppetry, the puppeteers were dressed in complementary colours instead of black. If full black costumes were used instead, you would have just noticed the puppeteer sticking out of nowhere in the musical. I must mention in this blog of their effective usage of shadow puppetry (Which i suspect was inspired by our very own Wayang Kulit!) to create the illusion of the giraffes walking at a distance, which of course were amazing!

The beauty of watching a musical in London was the fact that there are special theatres for each and every show. For instance, The Lion King perfomances would only be at the Lyceum Theatre whereas Les Miserables would only show at the Queen's Theatre. This would allow the creation of extensive sets and more nuanced acting as the characters were allowed to sharpen their performing skills being in a fixed place compared to a travelling group where they would have to adapt to a new theatre and the sets would be constraint by the logistics of the hall they were performing all the time.

All in all, the experience is something not to be missed and I look forward to seeing another musical again at London West End.

Portobello Market : Notting Hill (4-7 January)

Apologies for the late entry of this blog, was really busy with alot of stuff especially with my CFA ( Certificate of Financial Analyst) just around the corner
(June 2008), so soon I'll be a busy busy lady!

Since I started my travelling job in August 2006, I've always wanted to visit all the art galleries in the world, the big cities such as London, New York ( When will i get that) and Paris.

One particular place that I yearned to go was Portobello Market, Notting Hill. The market, made famous from the eponymously famous movie 'Notting Hill' starring Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant, is one of the 'must-see' tourist destinations when you drop by London. Located near Notting Hill Gate, the place is especially famous during Saturdays for antique merchandising.

Lucky for me, I was there during a Saturday, and decided to make my way to the famous location while singing along Ronan Keating's 'When you say nothing at all and 'She' from Elvis Costello. ( From the movie soundtrack)

As expected, the place was freaking amazing. They sold really fantastic stuff like the old telephones, microscopes, old navy compasses ( Where you can actually navigate the ships via the constellations at night), pretty english crockery, jewellery etc. My favourite location has to be the retro/vintage section ( Located just under the bridge at the very end of the market) where you can buy vintage clothing/accessories for just a song ( Well, not literally just a song, since no one really wants to hear my voice, but it was so cheap to buy these stuff, approx 5-10 pounds).

Not only can you get really great bargains, there were so many things to see and do. There was this stall where you can test your stress level for free (Though I think they were actually supposed to sell some science fiction books by Ron. L Hubbard, founder of Scientology), fresh fruits, amazing array of sumptous snacks from all cultures, bags,etc. And if you dont feel like flea market shopping, there are a wonderful selection commercial stores to browse from such as Accesories and Body Shop.

One thing to highlight is great range of nice vintage purses on offer though they were pretty expensive after conversion from pounds to sg dollars. Many were intricately made, with colourful beads and stitched with silk lining with the range selling from $40-100 pounds. Being the typical stingy Singaporean/Malaysian, I was hesitant to buy the purses though they were well made and nicely kept. I ended up in buying a retro slingback with gold trimmings to match my newly purchased vintage wear. I promised myself to go back to Notting Hill given any chance just to get some an amazing piece of vintage item.

I ended day by visiting the British Museum. As I have been to the Museum of Antiquities in Cairo and Lourve in Paris, the museum did not do much for me. However, if you wish to see lots of ancient relics/sculptures from all over the world. you can head down to this place. The only amusement I have is amazing the number of items taken from the acropolis (In athens) and displayed in the museum as well as the fact that many statues were decapitated and either were lost or was taken away by another museum somewhere in Europe.