as i may have mentioned, I am heading to Peru tomorrow. before you ever start (matt), NOT peru, indiana. peru, south america...just to clear up any confusion. I am definitly blessed to be able to head out into the world so soon after my last adventure, this past oct./nov. i would like to thank everyone who makes my life possible: the academy, my family who hold down the fort while i'm gone and deal with all the false emergencies, and my awesome girls, kayla, lauren, tammy, and bev, who run my store for me while i am running around the amazon jungle. so thank you. i will bring you all peruvian presents.
on this installment of "traveling city-mouse-style" i will be joined by my dear friend and former roommate, stephanie moore compson. for this blogging journey she will be referred to as "sister mouse" because before she got married, her last name was also moore, so i refer to her in present-day-time as my sister. i want to give a shout-out to her husband, lee, for letting me kidnap her for two weeks. we will bring you back a nice peruvian present too.
a little synopsis of our upcoming journey... traveling around the capital city of lima; navigating the worlds highest elevated lake, lake titicaca, on the border of peru and bolivia; staying with a local indigenous family and working on their farm; couch surfing in cusco; hiking through macchu picchu; staying at an ecolodge on the mountain top, taking a peruvian cooking class; possibly paso horseback riding across the sacred valley; and a three day excursion to an ecolodge into the amazon jungle, participating in canopy walks, caimen sighting, night jungle hikes, piranha fishing, kayaking into the mano bioshere, parrots, monkeys, snakes, and sleeping in a treefort under a mosquito net. it sounds a bit "survivorish" but i think it will be incredible!i cannot begin to imagine what the next two weeks have in store for us. sister mouse, i hope you're ready for this!! game on.
city mouse
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Friday, October 31, 2008
Sights and Sounds of Vienna
It is morning and we are getting ready to depart the beautiful city of Vienna, my favorite city thus far....very historical.....very rich in culture.....we visited museums, ate würstel, and shared some really fantastic times with our local hosts.
Time does not permit me to try to recall all of the German names for the various sites u see below....that, and the fact that it is morning and i am still a bit groggy.....so, i am just going to post a few pics here....the others in the pictures are our wonderful, hospitable hosts, Wouter and Isabella....they are awesome as!
Time does not permit me to try to recall all of the German names for the various sites u see below....that, and the fact that it is morning and i am still a bit groggy.....so, i am just going to post a few pics here....the others in the pictures are our wonderful, hospitable hosts, Wouter and Isabella....they are awesome as!
Notes of Importance...so far
1. These countries have GREAT food. I don't think we'Ve had anything yet that we have not liked.
2. However, bread is eaten at EVERY meal. And for 2 of those it is the main course. One of our hosts said that the only diet that exists here is that you just cut out bread.
3. Counrty Mouse you will appreciate this one: The restrooms here have been far superior to any other counrty I have been in... including alot of public restooms in US. There are also some interesting restooms. There is one at the Vienna Opera House that starts playing this rush of opera music when you enter the stall. There was one co-ed one, with a couple of stalls and a common wash area. And my favorite, a public toilette, costing .50, that you paid to the bathroom attendant (a man) and he escorted you to your stall. weird.
4. Matt Moore, you would love it here, all they eat is meat, potatoes, and bread.
5. I can drink beer!!! here's the lowdown. I only like dark beers, and i think i prefer wheat beers (however i will have to do some more research...)
6. I really like Vienna, however it is the most difficult to navigate city I have ever been in! Subway system is very easy to figure out....streets are a bitch!
7. Couch surfing has proven to be the superior way to travel! (unless you don't enjoy cool people and great conversation, and learning, and laughing, and saving money.)
8. MV's threshold for hanging out with me is 4 days. :-)
9. If you want to go to Berlin from Vienna, book your train ticket several days in advance or else you will be going back to Munich...which is fine too!
10. I miss you guys!
CM
2. However, bread is eaten at EVERY meal. And for 2 of those it is the main course. One of our hosts said that the only diet that exists here is that you just cut out bread.
3. Counrty Mouse you will appreciate this one: The restrooms here have been far superior to any other counrty I have been in... including alot of public restooms in US. There are also some interesting restooms. There is one at the Vienna Opera House that starts playing this rush of opera music when you enter the stall. There was one co-ed one, with a couple of stalls and a common wash area. And my favorite, a public toilette, costing .50, that you paid to the bathroom attendant (a man) and he escorted you to your stall. weird.
4. Matt Moore, you would love it here, all they eat is meat, potatoes, and bread.
5. I can drink beer!!! here's the lowdown. I only like dark beers, and i think i prefer wheat beers (however i will have to do some more research...)
6. I really like Vienna, however it is the most difficult to navigate city I have ever been in! Subway system is very easy to figure out....streets are a bitch!
7. Couch surfing has proven to be the superior way to travel! (unless you don't enjoy cool people and great conversation, and learning, and laughing, and saving money.)
8. MV's threshold for hanging out with me is 4 days. :-)
9. If you want to go to Berlin from Vienna, book your train ticket several days in advance or else you will be going back to Munich...which is fine too!
10. I miss you guys!
CM
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Ch. 3 Friends and Family
Sunday evening, Oct. 26, 2008 to Tues. afternoon, Oct. 28, 2008
Trostburg, Germany, Bavaria Region (and various local towns)
Sunday evening Mv and I met up with my dear friend, Ansgar. I met Ansgar when he was attending Purdue, and roommates with the lovely Sarah and Gabe Grant.
We took the train from Munich to Trostburg, where Ansgars family lives and stayed with them for the next 2 nights. Ansgar showed us all around the area around Trostburg. He took us to some really beautiful churches and monistaries. We had some great traditional Bavarian food. We took a ferryboat to and island on a local lake, Lake Chiemsee. It is the second largest lake in Germany. We had a really great time hanging out with him. Even though Ansgar himself hadn't really lived in Trostburg that long (because he'd been away at college), he was so knowledgable about the history of the area...and pretty much everything else he talked about. Ansgar is a cool dude. You would like him. He family was also really great, and very welcoming. When we arrived we sat down for a late sncak and visited with his dad, Joseph, his mom, Irmgardt (sp?), and his younger brother, Martin.
They were great. They made us feel right at home. They immediatly pulled out a selection of local beers for us to try (is anyone sensing a pattern here...). The Bohmanns reminded me so much of Gabe's family, espescially their beautiful house, and gorgeous yard and garden, as well as their conversation. Mrs. Bohmann has a great collection of art as well, which I particularly fancied. All in all it was a great Bavarian countryside experience, with a good friend. Denke Bohmanns!! It was good times!Stuffed with great Bavarian food,
City Mouse
Freiburg - Black Forrest - Heidegger Hütte
Our couchsurfing hosts had a wall with paper that they used to express their art....cool, huh?....so since City Mouse is an artist, she painted a picture while I was out on the porch sharing a joint that had far more tobacco than anything else....below is a picture with our cool Freiburg host Stefan....also the Black Forrest and our hike to find Heidegger`s Hut - colorful, eh???....other than that, there are pics of the city.
Ch. 2 Never Again
Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008
Dachau Concentration Camp
Dachau, Germany, near Munich
Wow. There just are no words right now for this. The best I can come up with is 'haunting'. I have thought about this over and over, and there is jsut no way for me to describe this experience. I am going to give you the link to MV's blog. I think he captured it as eloquently as possible.
http://theosproject.blogspot.com/2008/10/dachau.html
There were a few main things that really affected me. 1.The torture the Nazis inflicted on the prisoners was beyond comprehension. Especially the human experiements, as well as a thing they called pole hanging. For punishment they would tie the prisoners wrists behind their backs, then hang them from thier wrists from a hook in the ceiling for several hours while they would beat them. 2. This place was huge. It was originally constructed to hold 6000 prisoners and ended up housing 40,000. There was not enough food, so people basically starved to death.
But what really captured my heart was the expression that these prisoners were able to survive with the solidarity and brotherly love of each other. They kept each other going. Even though it is hard for me to understand why one would want to.
It is hard to understand how something like this could have happened. But as the memorial states insife the camp, NEVER AGAIN.
In memory of all who had suffered there,
CM
Dachau Concentration Camp
Dachau, Germany, near Munich
Wow. There just are no words right now for this. The best I can come up with is 'haunting'. I have thought about this over and over, and there is jsut no way for me to describe this experience. I am going to give you the link to MV's blog. I think he captured it as eloquently as possible.
http://theosproject.blogspot.com/2008/10/dachau.html
There were a few main things that really affected me. 1.The torture the Nazis inflicted on the prisoners was beyond comprehension. Especially the human experiements, as well as a thing they called pole hanging. For punishment they would tie the prisoners wrists behind their backs, then hang them from thier wrists from a hook in the ceiling for several hours while they would beat them. 2. This place was huge. It was originally constructed to hold 6000 prisoners and ended up housing 40,000. There was not enough food, so people basically starved to death.
But what really captured my heart was the expression that these prisoners were able to survive with the solidarity and brotherly love of each other. They kept each other going. Even though it is hard for me to understand why one would want to.
It is hard to understand how something like this could have happened. But as the memorial states insife the camp, NEVER AGAIN.
In memory of all who had suffered there,
CM
Das essen - Sampling some local bavarian cuisine
The food has been gut thus far.
Together with our friend Ansgar, we ate at a beautiful restaurant overlooking Germany's second largest lakes. In the background were the Alps. What a view! Das ist gut!
City Mouse ordered a pumpkin soup (temporarily satisfying here recent pumpkin fetish) and I had a Bavarian Mushroom soup. Both were excellent. Very flavorful. My soup was served with a large dumpling.
For our main courses, City Mouse had a turkey dish and I had a sampling of assorted meats. We washed it all down with a local Bavarian beer (bier). Unfortunately, we had no time for dessert, b/c we had to get going...the daylight was burning away and we had yet to catch the boat out to a little island on the lake. But this resaurant (with a rather pricey bill!) was traditional Bavarian food--and well worth it!
We sampled another traditional Bavarian restaurant. The meat we ate was Braten, with Semmelknödel (a breaded dumpling), Kartoffelknödel (potato), and of course a local German beer from the local brewery (Wochinger Urtrunk). Once again, no dessert--had to rush to the train station to catch the next ride to Vienna!
MV
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