Updating soon!

Through some twist of fate I'm in Puerto Rico now, wtf. British Airways' cabin crew went on strike so I'm not going to London this spring ): Some other time lah.

Major blog backlog, including

- Rest of Europe trip

- the Great Blizzard of '10

- Maxwell's Laws of electrodynamics

- Fun on Chatroulette

- Puerto Rico

Phew, finally done. Now for..

MORE WORK WTF LIFE SUCKS LOL

It's okay, spring break's in two days (:

Winter 2009 - Munich, Part 2: CASTLE OMG, and Lots of Food.

Jan 11th, still in Munich (5d/4n here!)

There were tons of things to do in and around munich - local attractions along with day trips to nearby places of interest, like the Nazi detention centres or other more, uh, scenic places. I'd already decided to visit Neuschwanstein Castle (noi-schwan-stine), the one which Disney's most famous castle is modeled after.

It took a two-hour train ride and a 45-min bus ride to even get *near* the castle, so we left pretty early, around 8am or so.
Tadahhh!! Amazing, isn't it?





..

..
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Nah I'm kidding, that was the 2nd, "kelefe" castle nearby Neuschwanstein - Hohenschwangau Castle.
Here it is, as seen from waaaay below.

Guided tours for both castles cost us 17 Euros a piece (#^%&).
Here we are outside the crap castle.
View from the terrace outside the crap castle. Zoom in; notice the ungodly number of trees on the mountain.

And here's my only photo inside either castle:
Whoooaaaaa. Buggers didn't let me take photos -_-" We got this weird tour guide (bald-ish old guy in the pic) whom, in his introduction, said something like "I'm working under the Royal Family themselves, not the government, so I accept tips *laugh*"

Insert Cricket sounds.

The inside of the castle was pretty freaking amazing though. In the olden days, royalty received shitloads of really fkg intricate gifts and stuff. Beautiful hand-carved wooden furniture, giant gold and silver centerpieces, and marble statues; Think of any object and stud it with about 200 assorted jewels, and you've got a castle ornament. Yay.

Back outside, a certain building caught our eyes...
It's got the deer head and the building's even in the right colours! Ahaha.


Getting up to Neuschwanstein took a half-hour walk up a mountain road. It was either that or pay 5 euros a piece to take a horse carriage up. All four were kiam, woohoo. Was a nice walk anyway, with horse-shit every seventy paces or so. Also, had cheap pizza for lunch at some restaurant up there.
Check out the trees we saw on the way up! Awesome isn't it? I returned to Cornell two weeks later to find our trees even more covered -_-

Back view of the epic castle:
Okay, then we- ..... waaaaiiiiit a minute.
WTF?!?! Unnecessary much? Okay, turns out the reigning monarch at the time, Ludwig II of Bavaria, also known was Mad King Ludwig, was a really castle geek. As in, he really *REALLY* liked his goddamn castles.

"By 1885, the king was 14 million marks in debt, had borrowed heavily from his family, and rather than economizing, as his financial ministers advised him, he undertook new opulence and new designs without pause. He demanded that loans be sought from all of Europe’s royalty, and remained aloof from matters of state."

So yeah, he was kind of batshit crazy. I think he had like a dozen castles around Bavaria (the state Munich's in).

In the end, his cabinet declared him mentally ill and deposed him of his title. Mmmhmmmm.

Here's me in front of Neuschwanstein with a fail expression.
And the front gates:


... And again, no photos inside -_-

Take my word for it when I say it was pretty damn awesome. Insanely expensive-looking ornaments: a shield with 150 noble families' coats of arms on it, marble thingies here and there, a funky square piano, crazy sculptures etc. The rooms themselves were similarly magnificent.

This room (pic from google) supposedly has the best acoustics in Germany; once a year some amazing music event is held there, sold out a year in advance.
There were a shitload of rooms I tell you -_-

Nutty king went and installed secret passageways here and there; there was a room with a fkg ROCK CAVERN AND WATERFALL, with a secret door hidden in the rock wall wtf. His bedroom had like stars and other astronomical stuff around the ceiling, with a moveable aperture at the top to let moonlight in. NUTJOB I TELL YOU but I'm buying this castle when I'm 30 and rich.

Oh yeah the crappier castle had like a secret route that connected the king's and queen's chambers -_- pervy old monarchs.

Souvenir shop had lotsa castle-related souvenirs and them some. They had some really nice posters of the castle; four to be exact, and I couldn't decide which to get, so I took them all.
Uhhuh. Shut it, I'm Asian, cheap and proud.

Here are some googled photos of the castle that make me wonder where the photographers were standing:
That's a fiiiine castle, yup. Gonna buy it I swear.

Anyways we went back after that, another few hours grrr.

There was a huge bunch of Aussies in another hotel from various unis across Australia doing some overseas-experience program thingy, where they pay their unis a crapton of money so they can go for holidays that count towards their course credit. Uhhuh. The girl in our group was good friend with one of them, so we all went beer hall-hopping, after "pregaming" at the Wombats bar during happy hour (1-euro beers :D).

Had beer and pretzels at the first hall (Lowenbraun), then dinner at the next, the Weisses Brauhaus. DINNER WAS AWESOME.
ZOOM IN. ZOOM, I TELL YOU. Crispy pork knuckle with another wonderful potato dumpling, plus some salad on the side. OM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM. One of the best meals I'd had so far. Delicious.

Next was Hofbrauhaus (the one we'd visited the day before on our walking tour).
German musicians! So much fun. These two old ladies just got up and started dancing in the middle of the hall. Laura grabbed her friend and danced up and down the aisle in her barmaid outfit lol. The real barmaids were amused and offered us giant pretzels for a coupla Euro.

The bunch of us had an epic amount of beer.
Don't really like wheat beer though.
Epic amount of beer -_- Put my drink-downing skills to good use lol.

The four of us left early cause we had stuff to do the next day.. but we were still hungry.

Ozzy'd shown us the McDonalds with the most sales (per square metre) in the world on our walking tour, and it was right in between Hofbrauhaus and Wombats.
Rosti burger? Hmmmmm. It was expensive and looked huge, so I passed on it this time (Rob went at it though).

Had a McRib - spare ribs smothered in some special barbeque sauce. Not bad.


And that's it for Munich day three! Stay tuned for curried sausage, a giant pendulum and an outdoor club skating rink.

Zoom in on this one, it's really cool :D This is called a stereographic projection, and it's basically a 360-degree (plus up and down) view around the camera, worked on by a funky math function involving polar coordinates. *cough*

Calvin and Hobbes are real! D'aawwwwwwwwwww. Some dad got someone to custom-make a Hobbes doll for his kid. So cuuuuute.

Here's a moonbow, made by refraction of blah blah blah blah blah moon instead of sun.

Expenditure:
Train tickets, 20 (ARGH)
Tour tickets, 17 (ARRRGGGHH)
Lunch, 4
Haribo Cola Gummies, 1.5
Happy hour beer, 1
Beer + Pretzel, 4.5
Pork Knuckle, 11
Hofbrauhaus, 3.6
McD's, 3.7

Total: 66.3 Euro = RM300
Wow. Luckily next year's gonna be cheap; staying in a low-price apartment to compensate my spending through the years lol.

Prelim Season :D

Note: Incoming colourful language.

Well it's 3.30am Monday morning, and I'm about to go to bed. Here's my schedule for tomorrow:

1. WAKE THE FUCK UP.
2. Study networks stuff in physics class
3. Take networks prelim.
4. Skip math lecture to study physics.
5. Get hw back + more physics in math section.
6. lunch with the bunch
7. Call Gannett Health Services about contact lens and orthotics
8. Study physics
9. Do CS (java) assignment that's due at midnight.
10. Dinner
11. Physics
12. Physics
13. PHYSIIIICCCCCSS!?!?!?!!
14. Possible all-nighter.

Did I mention there's a physics prelim on Tuesday that I started studying for hella late?

IT'S FUCKING HARD. ................ (that's what she said)

Gnight folks.
Smile with llamas.
lol
Sleep.

Winter 2009 - Munich, Part 1: Land of Meat and Beer

Jan 10th
After leaving Monkey in Interlaken, I went on ahead to Munich, Germany - holy land of beer and meat.
Really starting to get used to these trains. They're wonderfully fast and punctual; screw you lah KTM.
Seems more likely that I'm going from JB to Singapore than from Switzerland to Germany, wth?

Arriving in Munich in the evening, I head straight for the Wombats Hotel, an Australian chain of hostels with branches around Europe. Could hear Aussie accents the moment I stepped inside lol. Was cheap, only 18 euros a night!

Passed the lounge on the way up; I must say it's pretty damn cool. An indoor garden-thing, complete with beanbags, hammocks, and other comfy types of furniture.
So colourful.

I put my stuff down and went for dinner. Asked the receptionist to recommend a place to eat, and he said something along the lines of "go out, turn left and walk straight for a bit and you'll see it!"

Should've said "walk straight... for about 15 mins." =__= I was so confused lol. Wombats made this brilliant tourist guide thingy, one side was a map with points of interest, restaurants and clubs all marked out, and the other side had descriptions of everything. Fantastic little map, more than I needed for my 5 days in Munich.

The restaurant where I had my dinner was the "Augustiner Brauhaus", a branch of one of the six main beer halls in munich (this one being Augustiner lols).
Clockwise from top-left: Bread pudding ("Leberknodel"), some pork thing which you can't see in the pic, fried onion things, and some meat thingy, all in a wonderful mushroom-meaty sauce. Can't remember details ==" it was very, very good though. A bit too rich for me, felt full so fast -_-


THE NEXT DAAAAYYY (11th Jan)

Wombats provides "free" walking tours around the city; only caveat is that you have to tip the guy or you're a douche lol. So we got this.. portugese/african/british/super rojak mix guy who looked plain british-black, and he took a bunch of us around the city.
I forget where this is, but it had some cool.. snack bar.. thing.

Then he took us to a cathedral. There's a story about the cathedral architect who supposedly made a pact with the devil. Basically the T&C were that the devil would make sure construction went smoothly, as long as there were no windows, cause windows are like super holy right. When it was finally done, there were craptons of windows on each side of the building, so the devil was pissed and tried the ol' claim-thine-soul thing.

HOWEVER architect showed him that, from the spot where they made the deal, there were no windows! From that point of view, the cathedral's supporting pillars perfectly blocked every window on the left and right!
(apparently, the huge-ass window at the back was installed later lol)

Can't see windows right? But yet it's not dark. Oooooo. So yeah devil was pissed that an architect pwned him and he stamped his foot on the ground in anger:
US 11 btw

NEEEXT, the glockenspiel on Marienplatz.

Basically it's some weird chime concert with freaky tin clockwork robots. Wasn't too impressive. Some jousting, some dancing coopers. When the bubonic plague hit, a shitload of people died all over the place, and they were still afraid to come out of their homes even after the plague let up. The esteemed government (and wine corporations, cause wine was stored in barrels in those days) then went: "I know, let's make the coopers dance around on one leg all around town to show people it's safe!" thereby making the wonderful job of barrel-making even more exhilaratingly embarrassing.
Virgin Mary statue right next to the Glockenspiel. The four things (two from this angle) surrounding its base are meant to ward off misfortune; the lion for war, serpent for heresy, cockatrice for disease, and dragon for famine.

He took us to a butchershop where we had wonderful Bratwurst in a bun and some wheat beer. I don't really like wheat beer ==" Oh btw, they've got no open-bottle laws here, so everyone just walks around with beer in hand, I shit you not. Riding a bike with an open bottle is considered drinking-and-driving though.
FRESH MEEAAATT.

They pinch a long bratwurst in a small round bread roll, and it looks pretty comical. Here's a pic i snagged off google:
Really good though! The best way to cook bratwurst is to first boil it in beer and onions, then grill it :D I award this three-and-a-half noms. OM NOM NOM NOM.

Joke from the tour guide:
"There are four types of 'Aussies' in Munich. First there's you guys and residents who hail from down under. Next, Austrians are Aussies too. Anyone from East Germany is an Ossy, because 'East' is 'Ost' in German. Finally.. there's me! The name's Ozzy. "
... lol.

Was an incredibly energetic guide, bouncing all the way ==" Quite possibly high on something. Very knowledgeable though, told us LOADS about the history of Munich, most of which I've already forgotten. Quite a bit about the famous Beer Hall Putsch, where Hitler tried to start a revolution, and other Nazi-ish things. He showed us places like sports shops and touristy places that were once Nazi offices. Apparently Munich's really good at burying all the dark history lol.

Here's one of other six famous beer halls in Munich, and possibly the most famous one: Hofbrauhaus:
Empty in the day, of course. Beer here is pretty amazing. At night, all three floors of this building are filled with people, drinking beer 0.5L or 1.0L (a "stein") at a time. The standard price for beer in Munich is 3.1 euros for a half-litre. Touristy places charge way more though lol.

Also, if you throw up (which is pretty common), there's a 10-euro fee added to your bill. Hofbrauhaus presents an alternative though: an auto-flushing puke basin in the men's room with a huge drain. Puke there for free!
Fruit stall somewhere! Lots of these. He ended the tour on a famous street were the Nazis marched and headed off against the police. There was a memorial for the police and bystanders who were killed in the march.

Next to that place, shopping district!
Lol. Bought a new belt cause my old one broke ): was a pretty pricey one too! Dammit.
There were a few roadside pastry shops with tasty-looking snacks. Chocolate croissant... mmmmmmmm. Not stingy with the chocolate filling! Croissants are delicious, chocolate ones more so. THREE NOMS. NOM NOM NOM.

Finally, dinner at Augustiner again. Cheap and delicious, mmmm. Ate with the three Aussies I met on the tour (two were from my room). They're starting their second year at U.Syd reading law and economics. Wonder if terry/ter-yi/turkey'll meet them one day. FB!

Anyway the three of us ordered the same dish: Brewmaster's platter.
Three brewmaster's platters in one huge dish. GIGANTIC I TELL YOU. Ball thingy's a potato dumpling, like 10cm in diameter.

My share. Crispy Pork Knuckle was DELICIOUS. Even better than at "El Cerdo" in Malaysia, if you've tried it. Cabbage, fantastic duck, more pork filet things that were tasty and tender, plus a wonderfully fluffy potato dumpling of the most perfect consistency imaginable.
FIVE(+0.5) NOMS DAMMIT. OM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM.

That's all for now! Next: Disneyland Castle?!

Expenditure:
Sandwich and coke on the train, 7CHF
Dinner, first night, 15 Euros
Bratwurst an Beer, 4 Euro
Tour, overtipped cause no change ==", 10 Euro
Belt, 20 Euro. Took an hour to find a nice one that wasn't crazy expensive. Cheap di lah.
Groceries (snacks for the next day), 5 Euro
Dinner, 15 Euro
Beer, 2.3 Euro
Total: 7CHF + 71.3 Euro = RM22.08 + RM329 = RM351.08 .. will stop posting these numbers eventually ==" Heartache. Well, expected to spend 25Euros a day on food; Food's below my budget, but shit like my belt and the tour is what killed it. Siiiigh.

Courses I've Taken

Fall '09
Math 1120, Calculus II
Math 2210, Linear Algebra
Psych 1101, Introduction to Psychology
Astro 1103, Nature of the Universe
Engl 1111, FWS: Thinking Across Cultures (Food and Writing)
Econ 3010, Microeconomics

Spring '10
CS 1110, Introduction to Java
Econ 2040, Networks
Econ 3580, Behavioral Economics
Phys 2217, Honors Electricity & Magnetism
Math 2220, Multivariable Calculus
PE 1331-01, Beginner Snowboarding (:

*This list will be on the sidebar

*will post about Munich in a coupla hours