Dali, Ferrari, Slugs and Milka - what a week!

When I last posted, it was following a huge weekend away at Legoland. The week that followed luckily included a public holiday in Bavaria so I didn’t have to work a full week. Which I was grateful for as I was quite tired after our time away. But we did try to make use of the holiday, heading out to the Deutsches Museum to meet up with Michael’s friend Peter (another Australian xpat). Unfortunately we mis-timed our visit, and Peter had his work phone on him, so we just didn’t get in to see him, his 3 beautiful daughters or the Museum. So instead we headed back to our flat, and made ourselves some lunch and I fit in some study in the afternoon.

That weekend however, we made up for our sluggish day by attending the Dali Exhibit in Munich. It was a massive collection of Dali’s works, including the entire collection he created for illustrations in Alice in Wonderland. It was beautiful to observe, however there was a bit too much of his random sketches which got a bit boring after a while. I am all for observing the greatness created by an artist, but I don’t think every page of a sketch pad needs to be framed and hung. The gallery was quite stuffy and I ended up just wanting to get out. However, after a brief break in the beautiful courtyard of the gallery, we headed into the second gallery which was smaller and only contained Dali’s block etching prints, and these were so colourful and beautiful that it made up for the end of the first gallery. There was an entire wall just devoted to his horse themed images and they were all stunning.

Following this we went in search of our Oktoberfest outfits – it is less than a month away and I don’t want to leave it till the last minute! I found a beautiful blue and white checked dirndl (a little bit Dorothy – Wizard of Oz style) with a red apron and beautiful decorations on the front, and a cute little white blouse. It wasn’t easy to choose either with gorgeous colourful creations available everywhere! Michael tried on Lederhosen and they looked fantastic on him, but he is holding out for a pair that have the shoulder straps as well. He could only find shorts that fit him without the straps.

That night we also decided to try another local restaurant. While it is the trend here to eat out most nights, we have been trying to cook all our meals at home for several reasons but mainly because – A) so we can monitor what we eat, it’s very easy to eat unhealthily here as its all tasty but fatty, and B) it’s cheap to eat out but adds up day by day. I also quite enjoy cooking so it hasn’t been a problem other than we have a TINY kitchen. But we do aim to eat out once a week to experience the culture and lifestyle here. We ate around the corner at a lovely little restaurant called the Golden Twenties, mostly Italian themed food but I ordered a seared tuna dish and Michael had a rack of lamb. Both meals were incredible and we enjoyed every single mouthful!

Michael has also taken the opportunity to try every single local beer in the lead up to Oktoberfest so he can decide which tent he wants to sit in. This has resulted in him buying a special Oktoberfest release of Paulaner beer in a backpack last weekend while doing the grocery shopping. I scored the backpack!

Work this week has finally seen me settle into the swing of things a little bit more, and I’ve felt a lot more in control. The students are all now responding to me a bit more, they understand my English a little more and I can use more German when I get stunned looks from the children. I also understand them when they speak to me, and I can reply rather than just say ‘Ja’ or ‘Nein’ or shrug my shoulders and say ‘Ich weiß es nicht’ (I don’t know). Strangely enough, it is so much harder to understand the students’ german as they speak so quickly and more often than not, speak with a stutter so I struggle to catch exactly what has been said, or make sense of it quickly. I encounter the same sorts of learning disabilities here, lisps and speech difficulties, as I did in Australia and it only differs by the language that they speak. I am getting my head around it and I am more able to judge what they are trying to say. 

I have introduced a lot more of my teaching methods, and I have taught my class the Banana dance, a favourite of mine. They simply love it and beg to do it every morning. I also get pleads for my colour song (our current theme is colour and shape) and my goodmorning song. This all happens during morning circle time, which I have run on my own all week as I was the only teacher in the room till 10am each day. So I am very proud of how I survived this week! In the week to come I am scheduled to work the 9 till 5.30 shifts every day which means I will be present for morning circle but I will be with my co-worker. I hope she will be impressed with how far I have come as she has been on holidays for two weeks. I am also looking forward to showing off some of the projects I have done with the kids for our shape and colour unit, including a shape print painting and circle pizzas! The students achieving these projects, some are just 3 years old, so I'm proud of the results!

One of my favourite things to do with my students though is go outside to the playground. In fact, just the fact that we are allowed to take students outside the confines of the building is huge. In Australia we had to have full permission from parents if we wanted to do anything slightly different from the norm. Here, students study a theme each month or so, and a short excursion is encouraged for each theme. Yesterday the Panda Bear group went to the zoo for the morning. Just because they could. They just took the train! But I get to take my students out for walks in the Englischer Gartens or to the local Spielplatz when ever I want. This week, we went to both locations. The walk through the Englischer Garten was beautiful…. Until we came across the biggest wandering path of slugs, a good half of which had already been squished by bikes. They were disgusting! And imagine trying to get 15 students to walk in a single line weaving through a good 100m or so of squished and alive slugs. It was not fun!

But  do also love walking from the school to the playground, and have my students compare their knowledge on the types of cars we see on the road. Because you see, here, every second car is either a Porsche, a Ferrari, a Bugatti, a BMW, an Audi etc etc. And the kids know more than I do! It is just common knowledge and a daily sight for them. Me, I’m drooling at all the pretty cars just parked along the road!

This week has been a rollercoaster of emotions for me. For the last few weeks, we have been desperately trying to locate a long term apartment for us to live in for the next 2 or so years, as we must vacate our current place before next weekend. We struggled at first as places were going so fast – we would apply to view somewhere only to be told it was already rented by someone who was willing to take it without seeing it. And that seemed to be the case for every apartment. Michael did eventually get to see two apartments, and we decided to apply for one. While we were waiting for news about it, all of a sudden, we spotted a beautiful apartment online. We knew it would be snapped up quickly so we asked if we could be considered for it – without viewing it first! It was a risk we were willing to take as the photos really looked fantastic. 

After waiting with baited breath, and having a few ups and downs regarding our ability to make payments (my salary isn’t huge) we finally received word on Thursday evening that the apartment was ours! We get the keys on Monday and we move in during the week. Seeing as I have to work Monday through Saturday this coming week, we are thankful for 4 days in which Michael can take one suitcase full of our belongings at a time on the train to the new apartment. He then finally gets to go for a bike ride on Saturday – but I will leave that for another post when I can explain what he actually got up to. For now, I am excitedly preparing our belongings for the move, and planning a trip to Ikea for the following weekend as I know I will need a few items. The apartment itself is fully furnished and it has just been renovated – to the point that there are still apparently items from the renovation being stored in the basement downstairs. Our monthly rent includes electricity, utilities, internet, and a carpark. We have a pretty good sized kitchen (huge for German standards) and a washing machine and dishwasher! I will post photos of it once we move in!

So last of all, I feel the need to tell you about today. Today we went for a wander to the Viktualien Markets near Marienplatz, which is full of fresh produce, seafood and meats, bakeries and cheese shops, and they also have a large variety of gifty shops that sell hanging decorations made from grasses and seeds. They are very beautiful and they seem to be an important part of culture here. It is expected that people hang them either inside their house or on their front door as a lot say ‘Wilkommen’. Quite a few are made with lavender so they smell nice too. It’s the kind of thing I would like to send home as gifts, but alas, I don’t think customs would let me. But we wandered through to see just what was there (if I would do my fresh produce shopping there in future) and also to look for a particular breadroll. I don’t know if I have explained this yet, but I am engaged in a search for the most delicious breadroll I have ever tasted in my life. I tried it at work a few weeks ago and have been unable to find out what it is called or where to buy it. I suspect I now know it is called a müesliknopf but I am yet to find the exact one I tried. I had one today which was similar but it was too sweet. I will continue my search and report back.

However, this walk around the markets was then followed by a visit to Milka Welt (Milka World). Now, growing up, as a small girl, my family used to buy me Milka chocolate. I know it used to be available in Big W, but I have not seen it for many years in Aus. I’m not sure if it was just because my family knew the brand from living in Austria/Germany, or if it was a popular brand for many. But the iconic purple cow is something I grew up with. And when we came to Europe for our honeymoon, I was so happy to see Milka again. So I’m sure you can imagine just how *udderly* excited I was heading into Milka Welt today. It was a huge shop just full of Milka products, and all cheaper than the grocery store prices. They even had plush purple cows, lunchboxes, picnic blankets, towels – everything! So of course we posed for pics with the cow, and we bought some chocolate. I managed to not buy a cow – just. As I write this in fact, we have already opened up our first block and it is very delicious. 

So, here’s what you can look forward to in my next post…

Photos and news from our new home! Details of Michael’s bike riding adventures! And possibly my trip to Ikea Munich!

LEGOLAND!!!!

I did promise photos and stories from our first mini vacation, so here they are.

Last weekend, as a belated birthday celebration for Michael and as a 'finishing first week of work' treat, we organised a weekend away in Günzburg. We got a great deal where by we got a night's accommodation in a hotel (a good one at that) including breakfast, and a 2 day ticket each to enter Legoland. We thought it was great, from the fact that we were on our first break, right down to the fact that we got to be kids again for a weekend! It wasn't quite up there with Disneyland Tokyo, but it was bigger, and we still had an absolute ball!

Day 1:
We left Munich at 10am, as we had to wait for the printers to open so we could print our tickets. We caught a train to Günzburg and then a shuttle bus took us the rest of the way - straight to the theme park before 1pm. We stored our little suitcase in a locker and then got down to business - Lunch! However, we took our lunch seriously, plotting our two days of adventures using the park map (in German!).

So this was the first sign that we were close to the park - up on the hill of the highway offramp for Legoland, we saw the bricks and started to get excited!

And we had finally arrived. Don't know who was more excited, Michael or me!










So in the end, our plan of attack was to divide the park into two halves. There were 9 lands in the park. For any one who has been to Disneyland, you will know that one day is not nearly enough to get through 5 lands. So we were going to do our best to see 9 lands in 2 days and do every ride possible. Luckily the park was open till 10 on Saturday night.

So, we decided to do the right side of the park on day 1. This started with Lego X-Treme land, Land Der Piraten, Land Der Abenteuer (adventure), Reich Der Pharaonen (Kingdom of the Pharoahs), Imagination Land, and in the end, we also tackled Miniland.

We were very impressed by this lego sculpture - No real sense of scale here for you, but it was very tall. I think I would have come up to his moustache.

So this was the first ride, in Lego X-treme land. It was an awesome rollercoaster, with some great sculptures.

This was one said sculpture.

This was not us - clearly. We were still in line waiting....

Us after the ride - I think we enjoyed it!

We then went on a techno version of the teacups ride, before lining up to visit Legoland Atlantis. This was not a ride, but rather a very beautifully built aquarium. It started with a video movie of the lost city of Atlantis and how the lego men were trying to find it. Once inside the aquarium, the fish were swimming all around the lego men and the ruins of Atlantis. It was really pretty.




The lego men had different things they were doing, some in submarines, others in scuba suits drilling, and one was just bathing with a big scrubbing brush.

And then there was this guy!

Here you can see some of the Atlantis ruins, and the bathing guy with the scrub brush in the background!

Even I got involved in the action!

Finally through X-treme land, we headed up into Pirate land. It was amazing what they had built, but it was definitely only for kids (or big kids who were young at heart), or for those who had brought their togs. We had to be careful watching the various attractions because we could get wet if we stood still for too long. They even had a waterbomb site complete with catapults!

Seeing as we had seen all we could see in Pirate Land, we made our way to Land of Adventure. Here there was plenty for us to see and do. We started with a safari tour. We couldn't help but admire the work that had gone into the animal sculptures. There are times when you find it hard to believe its made of lego!

This guy wouldn't stop looking at us while we were queuing.

Finally in my Safari ride! I think I wore appropriate pants!

Ah - My favourites!

This one was for Carlie!

Again - so clever with the sculpting.

Like all amusement parks, you had your photo taken on every ride... this one though was great because you were already laughing at the buffalo wearing glasses!

This sculpture was very clever.

Some of the sculptures were electronic, and had moving parts. This elephant raised his trunk (and head) and sprayed water at you as you drove past!

We skipped over the other cool ride in the Land of Adventure (because Michael didn't want to get wet!) and we went up to the Kingdom of Pharaohs. Time for a little posing we thought!

We did go on the main ride here, and it was awesome - but perhaps not worth the 80 minute wait. It did involve riding through the tombs and shooting at various things with your laser gun. Of course when the scores came up at the end, Michael did beat me - but only because he plays computer games - like all the time. I was not that far behind him actually!

But I couldn't help but sit and take a break afterwards on the camel's back!

From the Pharaoh land, we could see the observation tower going up and down. We were excited about going on it, but that was being reserved for day 2.

So then of course it was time to stop for afternoon tea. I had an ice cream, but Michael was pretty keen to try something he had seen in Pirate Land.

A waffle on a stick covered in chocolate! He enjoyed it very much!

We then headed to see a performance in the Arena - from the Chinese National Circus. This was absolutely spell binding. They were incredibly talented and flexible and strong. We sat in awe for nearly an hour.

So, strangely enough, after all that, it was nearly 7pm. We were going to save Miniland for day 2 and have dinner in the park and wait for the fireworks at 10pm.

We changed our minds and we were glad we did. We did mini land which took over an hour as we stopped to admire every single mini village. This started with the Star Wars section where Michael was very excited to pose with Yoda!

The real cities started with Holland.

I spotted this in Holland and couldn't help but laugh. They really did make a set up of a dog pulling a girl too hard!

When we got to Berlin, we found this structure. The Reichstag building. It was the most impressive piece of work.

The design and construction took builders 1858 hours to complete and they used over 1 million lego bricks. It weighs over a tonne and occupies an area of 12m2.

The detail on the front panels was most impressive.

Still in Berlin...

This was a sweet scene.

And the detail was fantastic.

Again, in Berlin - the Brandenburger Tor.

Of course, everywhere there was a button or a lever, Michael had to play. There were about 4 cranes in Miniland - Michael got to operate every single one!

This was the impressive Allianz Arena. This was absolutely massive and the detail was incredible.

Again, over a million lego bricks were used, but it took 4209 hours to create. It is the largest lego building built in the world. It also saw the creation of a special translucent lego brick so that it could replicate the light changing effects of the real stadium.

In this model, there was also a live camera feed that could be operated by the public from outside, and the video would show on the large game screens inside the stadium. There were also flashes from little scale model cameras all over the stadium!

This was just amusing. Even in the lego world, graffiti is a common occurrence!

Finally in Munich - this is the Munich Airport. There were some very impressive electronics at work here, with all the planes moving about, coming in to dock, others heading out to the runway. They did everything - even load luggage - everything except take off!

We also spotted Adam and Eve!

Ah - Schloss Neuschwanstein. My favourite!

We then reached Venice - and the Rialto Bridge.

We also spotted the Bridge of Sighs.

This was the last photo we took as we left the park. This was on the left side of the park, the side we had saved for day two. This made us very excited. We could not wait for the rides the next day.







After mini land, we decided we couldn't be bothered waiting around the park for another two hours for fireworks, so we made our way to the carpark to find the shuttle bus - and just as well we did. It started to sprinkle rain as we were getting on the bus. As the doors closed, it started to absolutely bucket down. We were pleased when we got to our hotel, only got slightly wet, and we were able to eat a lovely meal of schnitzel at the fantastic restaurant in our hotel. Great end to a fantastic day.




Day 2:
Today we started with a lovely breakfast at our hotel. We then headed to Legoland via taxi and were through the gates before opening time. We headed straight for Little Asia where we queued immediately for the Flying Ninjago ride. This was the one that excited us most!

This is what it looked like while we were waiting in line. It was simple, only flew in one direction, you didn't do anything amazing.

But you did control your own seat with your wings. Michael managed to get his chair into a full orbit spin and went round several times. I only managed to rock myself, but it was still fun!

We managed to catch the dragon as he breathed fire! Well, smoke....

The next ride was in the Lego City Land. This was the only ride we did twice. It had the shortest queues yet it was the most awesome ride. It was a mechanical robot arm with a chair, you were asked how fast you wanted to go... "Schnell oder Langsam?" asked the operator. We chose schnell of course. He pressed a button on the panel and off we went! It threw us about, turned us upside down and spun us around. We loved it!

We then visited the Lego Factory. We saw how the bricks are made and how they put paint on them. We were given a special commemorative brick made right there and we also then got to make our very own lego man from a huge array of heads, bodies, legs and accessories.

this was the injector machine in progress.

Making yellow bricks.

This sign made me laugh ...

"Every year over a million new lego friends are born!"

This was the back of the printing machine, where the yellow bricks made earlier were being prepared to go into the machine to be printed.

Leaving the factory.

We headed into Land Der Ritter (Knight's Kingdom), where we went on the Caterpillar ride. This was the location of the first major clutz moment for our trip. Yet, I don't think it was really my fault. The ride - though it is for little children - flung me so hard against the lego brick on the side, I now have a massive bruise up my left ribs. Was still awesome though!

We then rode the Fire Dragon Coaster!

Again, the sculptures were amazing. The entire table and book were made from lego!

Michael found a new friend!

This was the Fire Dragon in action. Was an awesome coaster. I wish we could have taken more photos inside the castle while on the coaster itself. It has so many amazing sculptures of lego before the ride took off!

I will smite you with my mace!

So then we made our way to Imagination land where we found lots and lots of giraffes. I was very happy!

I loved this one for wearing ballet shoes!

We also found an evil bunny. He reminded me of the bunny out of Hoodwinked. He even had an evil laugh soundtrack playing as you walked past him! Freaked me out a little.

We had lunch at the Dino Grill. Very amusing restaurant.

I had a delicious meal of pasta with prawns. But could not believe the size of my meal!

Michael had a burger - but we both wished afterwards we had ordered the spare ribs, considering we were at the dino GRILL.

We then took in a 4D movie - the Legends of Chima.

My fancy 4D glasses!

Finally I talked Michael into going on the Jungle X-pedition ride in Adventure land. We did get wet, but we laughed so much during the ride, and afterwards we happily stood in the heated drying machine for 5 minutes.

This was the dinosaur who initially wet us. He spat water as the boat went past - but you think he's just a motionless sculpture at first, and you go 'awww', then suddenly he turns and spits at you! I copped the most, he spat directly in my lap so my pants were soaked! His second spit hit Michael is the side of the head!

See - innocent enough looking!

We finally made it onto the observation tower.

About to go up....

The view from the top.

We saw for miles in every direction.

There's the flying Ninjago again.

The castle....

The entrance....

We got hungry....

We saw Elvis...

Then we did the last ride - the Tret-o-Mobil.

A lovely pedal car ride past the giant giraffe!

Proof we pedalled!

This was the footballers walk of fame. There were famous heads from the soccer world and I haven't included them all, but I was surprised to see Victoria Beckham in there... sure David, but not Posh!

Funniest thing though was watching a young boy go up to her statue and fondle her nipples!

We did love the bathroom signs where ever we went in the park!

And this statue of lego kids trying to jump the fence at the entrance.

Michael liked this statue of the plumber.

So at the end of the two day adventure, we said good bye to the lego head gates, and made our way home.


We had such a great time and were really grateful for the two days which allowed us to spread our time and try every ride.

Goodbye LegoLand!