anyway, our host stays right in d city and is very convenient to go anywhere. we are staying in a little house in the backyard of their apartment. d little house is self contained with everything needed for a stay (just missing a stove otherwise it's a full studio apartment)!

karen & maarten, our hosts, chatted with us over tea and helped us booked tickets to Anne Frank House. then we can skip d queue n head straight into d house. they were saying how long d queues are at some museums and how we can skip d queuing up for tickets!

there's a whole lot of museums here but i think we have quite enough from the Maurithaus in Den Haag. so we'll see if we get into any museums here.

i'm looking forward to see d Red Light District n all d leaning buildings though! it should be pretty interesting!

written by  wangyng on April 16, 2008 from Amsterdam, Netherlands
from the travel blog: Hello Europe!!
tagged Amsterdam and Netherlands
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but i do like d Dutch people. they are nice n friendly in general and very humorous. d house leans left, right, front and even backwards! very cool althou sometimes i wonder if they will just collapse 1 day!

uneven houses/building

look at the windows & d door, it's all crooked!

the cafe building leans!

there's lotsa museums here to visit but we didnt go to any (except Anne Frank House which i will talk about in a bit). we were still overloaded with Flemmish paintings from the Maurithaus in Den Haag.

at Museumplein - the red & white statue says "I AMSTERDAM"

Rijks Museum - houses some important works of Vemeer

the infamous red light district is definitely worth a visit! it's 1 of d highlights of my time here. there's women in windows all the way in the streets! 1 transsexual or transvestic opened d door of d window which freaked us out a little. but all he did was shouted 'Ni Hao' to us. quite interesting experience i would say.

Red Light District

d other place that left deep impression on me is d Anne Frank House. it was quite amazing to actually see d description right before your eyes! for some weird reason, i feel really sad in the house and felt like crying when u see her words n how she lived in d small house. very very depressing place but unbelievable.

Anne Frank statue near d Anne Frank House

i thik that sums up Amsterdam. d town of Bremen musicians is next! but before that, here's more photos i took in Amsterdam.

nice cute door bells... maybe i should get 1 for Singapore...

fridge magnets! look closely...

Amsterdam at night

The Christmas Shop - it sells all things Xmas through the year!

at Museumplein - the red & white statue says "I AMSTERDAM"

bed we sleep in is in attic

view fr d attic

Rooftop at our host's apartment

we were surprised when we reached her home. the family occupies the top 3 floors in a 4-storey building/house (including a little roof top garden). and she actually gave us the whole of d top floor for our stay! d bed is in d attic accessible thru d top floor. can really feel d art teachers in them at their home. lots of stuff were made by themselves: lights stand, little ornaments, photo frames, paintings, etc. all were nicely done! very cool!

o yes, i must mention d dinner. Simone cooked us dinner in like 10 min! i was most impressed! she is like a magician at work! cutting, cooking, seasoning all at d same time. d result is a chicken fillet with cheese n tomato n a huge bowl of salad! absolutely delicious!! Dietrich welcomed us with sparkling wine n d 4 of us chatted over dinner. her daughter Afra came home shortly after n immediately invited us to join her for a night out with her best friends the next evening.

our welcome dinner that Simone whipped out in 10min!

all these gestures bring a lot of warmth to a traveller, this is like a royal treatment! i was really touched. after dinner me n eve was juz sitting by a window, admiring d view n feeling touched n grateful with d treatment. it really does feel like home...

me, Simone, Dietrich

anyway, d town centre in Bremen is very small. a day to spend in d town centre is more than enough. like most Europeans cities, there's a market square (Marktplatz) where most activities happens. d Town Hall, Cathedral and Parliament r d main sights there.

market square in Bremen (Marktplatz)

n of cos d Bremen Town Musicians r everywhere! books, souvenirs, n different versions of d musicians statues. of cos i need to do d touristy thing n take photos with d original statue!

The Bremen Musicians! it's a belief that if u hold the leg of d donkey n make a wish, it will come true.

Simone told us about this 'thing' that starts playing a sound from 1 of d musicians each time u put in a coin. we really wanna see n play with it. we asked d tourist info centre who pointed it out on d map where this 'thing' is suppose to be. until this point we still dunno what this 'thing' looks like. i guess i was expecting it to look like a vending machine or something like that. we walked around d town centre for 30min trying to find it. no luck. we asked some1 at another tourist centre who pointed us a different area from d 1st. we circled that new area again. still no luck. Eve decided to asked a lady at 1 of d shop in d church. thanks to her specific directions, we finally found this 'thing'!! it looks nothing like what i imagined! have a look!

u put coin into this little slit on this manhole looking thing, and u can hear d sounds of d 4 musicians!

putting d coin in to hear d musicians!

Schnoor

a lane in Schnoor

the stay in Bremen turns out to be extremely unforgettable!

statue of Roland, city protector, at market square

litted candles in 1 of d churches here

Gold Sculpture near d town centre

night view at River Weser

after leaving Bremen, i was thinking to myself, no more home cooked dinner. i was sooooo wrong! there's a feast waiting for us at Seth's place. Seth is an art director. he works on TVC, films, and prints as well. and he loves cooking! he told us he put a huge chicken in d oven before he came to fetch us at d train station. so yes, we have a fantastic welcome dinner once again! (gosh i love d food in Germany already!!)

Hamburg's welcome dinner

Seth will be sooo busy this few days. his 2 kids are staying with him for d week cos their mum is working in India for a week. so he has to look after d kids n us... plus a dog. i dont envy him! :P my impression that all kids are hyperactive is sooo right. d 10min ride earlier from train station to his home involves a lot of talking n looking at hats, glasses, clothes, gloves, n anything they can get their hands on. i'm thinking d next few days here will b quite interesting...

Seth's ride

Seth with kids & Eve with dog - sweet family pic aint it? hehe...

anyway, here's what we saw/did during our stay in Hamburg:

the Port
we walked to d port n went on a boat cruise.

view of the harbour fr the boat

Rathaus (TownHall)
d Rathaus is beautiful! both exterior n interior are really nice. d sculptures, d fountain, d pillars... i'll let d photos speak

Rathaus - meaning townhall

inside Rathaus

STRIKE!

smokers on strike against Banning of smoking in public area

cooking
yes we cooked here. i made curry once again (Europeans seems to love curry a lot!) n eve made stirfry vege. it was cool cos d kids helped prepare d vege. but they didnt get to eat them cos they had to go to bed. Seth like d curry a lot cos it's really spicy! i like it better than d last time i made it too. i give myself 85% this time.. :D

kids helping Eve with cooking

Seth enjoying our dinner

St Michelis Church
yes, we went up yet another church tower. this seems to be our favourite sport now! haha...

view from top of St Michelis

St Nikolai
from 1 side, this gothic church looks perfectly intact but it was destroyed during WW2. only d tower remains and part of d other walls. it is now a memorial more than anything.

St Nikolai

St Nikolai - a different view

statue "Angel on Earth" at St Nikolai

statue "The Ordeal" at St Nikolai

note on "The Ordeal"

Chilehaus
i wasnt really impressed w this building until i saw d shape of it n learnt about d history. this ship-like building is build of more than 4.8 millions bricks. it is 1 of d building that survived WW2 unscathed n is considered an important architect of d city.

ChileHaus

on our last night in Hamburg, Seth cooked white asparagus with Hollandaise sauce n potato. this dish is usually eaten in Spring (which is now) n it is a very typical German dish. this is actually d 1st time i ate (n saw) white asparagus. it doesnt really have a lot of taste but d Hollandaise made it yummy! i think i like d sauce more!

Chef Seth at work!

we went to d red light district in Hamburg as well, d Reeperbahn. i think after u've seen d red light district in Amsterdam, everywhere else is considered tamed...

will be heading to Berlin tomorrow. kind of dreading d train ride cos d German trains are ALWAYS packed! 1st class or 2nd class, they're always packed! plus it's friday tomorrow... i dont have a good feeling about it...

written by  wangyng on April 24, 2008 from Hamburg, Germany
from the travel blog: Hello Europe!!
tagged Germany and Hamburg
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1stly, i wanna say i really really HATE the train system in Germany. it totally SUCKS! we got 1st class ticket for d train. we didnt know it was a MUST to reserve a seat (u have to pay like extra 20euros to do that). so it turned out that these "expensive Premium" seats are all reserved! i ended up with no seats in d 1st class cabins! d 2nd class cabins aint any better either. there's loads of people standing around. it was horrendous! i ended up sitting near d luggage area with a number of passengers with d same problem. d trains staff was sooo f!!!ing rude i couldnt believe it! she was telling a passenger who was sitting on d floor of d luggage area to go away n not sit there cos it was blocking her way to reach other cabins! i was thinking 'then get us all seats u f!!!ing b!tch!' gosh this is sooooo f!!!ed up! after paying a shit load of $ for d 'premium' seats, i sat on d floor of d luggage compartment for d 2 hours journey.

obviously i wasnt too happy when i reached Berlin. i was so hoping to quickly meet our host at d station n head to his place so i can recover fr d horrid train ride. we waited. no1. we called. no answer. we sent an sms.... after 30 min, our kind host sent an sms n told us he cant host us anymore cos of work emergency n we shd go to a hostel. we didnt looked up any hostels previously cos he was telling us no problem staying with him. so we were there at d train station,tired, with no host, no internet access n no idea which area to go for hostel. managed to get d tourist centre to give us a list but still dunno where to start. we called our Hamburg host Seth for help. cos we remembered him saying he has a really gd friend who lives in Berlin who got him on CS(CouchSurfing). so we sat in McDonalds while trying to decide on d hostels & waiting for Seth to call us back.

after about 2 hours of sitting in McD, i walked around d huge train station trying to find internet access. when i got back to McD, Eve was saying Seth's friend Britta just came and is buying food! n that she says she will try to help us sort something out. by d time she got back fr buying food, she said she found a couch for us. we were totally impressed! but our host is working late n heading to her brother's housewarming party later so we should go to d party n meet him there. wow! from having no place to stay to being invited to a party! i was speechless!

we accepted d invite to d party. Britta was gonna get some much needed sleep before heading to d party. we decided to spend a little time walking around town n meet Britta when she heads to party.

so our 1st night in Berlin ended in spending a few hours in Hakersher Markt, eating an Asian dinner at a cheap Wok place, going to d party filled with tattoos, dreadlocks, alcohol & smoke, finally eating our accidental life-saver host, then heading home at 3am in d morning!

this is d most eventful day on this trip to date. what an experience!

so today we took it easy n just went to supermarket n spent some time walking ard city.

cant wait to see what else Berlin has to offer!

we went to soooo many places... where do i start... hmm...

Tiergarten was d 1st place we went to. it is a huge garden with a huge memorial in d middle of d park.

Victory Memorial at Tier Garden

along 1 of d rivers

Brandenburger Tor at sunset

Brandenburger Tor

the Holocaust War Memorial is really big. it has a gloomy n depressing feel especially during d evening when we were there. d shadows played a huge part in how it looks. walking thru d blocks, i cant help but feel solemn n low.

Holocaust

Holocaust again

we went to yet another depressing place, the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp.

entrance to Sachsenhausen - Nazi's concerntration camp

ok i need to talk about my host Johannes.

Johannes the pizzaman!

ok i think i will stop here for now cos it's turning out to be an extremely long entry. more later...

written by  wangyng on April 29, 2008 from Berlin, Germany
from the travel blog: Hello Europe!!
tagged Germany and Berlin
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moving on... we visited Checkpoint Charlie, where d entrance to US's territory from Germany and vice versa. there's this guy dressed in the military uniform near d checkpoint, he has all the 15 ORIGINAL stamps from d WWII. u can have all these stamps in your passport for 10 Euros or something near that amount. of cos i didnt get it! not many people got it cos it cost too much! i saw an American couple getting their passports stamped just before we left d checkpoint.

Checkpoint Charlie

officer at Checkpoint Charlie who can give u all 15 original stamps of the checkpoint for €10

a little further down d checkpoint, there's a long marking on d ground where d berlin wall used to be. it's running across d road fr each side of d pavement. it's hard to imagine how d wall affected d people of berlin...

marking of the Berlin Wall's location

of cos we passed by the huge square where the German Cathedral n d Concert Hall is. we didnt go in thou...

German Cathedral n concert hall

and of cos d Rathaus... we cant miss it! it's huge and very RED!

Rathaus in Berlin

Berliner Dom is next! we didnt actually had plans to go inside this church for a look. but it looked soooo grand outside n d photos looked really good, we decided to go in. it was a good thing we did cos it was really beautiful inside! it feels like a palace!

Berliner Dom

ceiling of Berliner Dom

altar of Berliner Dom

view from top of Berliner Dom

then there is this Fernsehturm, d highest building in berlin. my host johannes keeps saying it's d talest building in the world. i think he was being sarcastic... or not???

Fernsehturm - d highest building in Berlin (not very tall at all!)

d Topography of Terror is another place dat's really depressing. it is a really long stretch of exhibits of Secret Services/Police n d victims n how they were treated, etc. very effective to make u feel upset n uncomfortable there.

Topography of Terror

Reichstag - the parliment building

Reichstag roof - view fr right outside the glass rooftop

inside view of Reichstag - parliment building

we cant leave Berlin without visiting East Side Gallery of cos.

East Side Gallery - me vandalising!

so that mark d ending of our berlin visit! there's just soo much more to see. d clash of past n present, u can really feel it here! amazing!

our farewell breakfast for Johannes

so here's to future visits to Berlin!! n to our new found friendship!!

toast to us all!

Dresden is a 3-4 hour quick stop before we head to Czech Republic. it's a beautiful little town that everyone says we should absolutely stop by... so we did... it is indeed a beautiful small town... d kind i like cos it's so small n u can reach everywhere by walking... so am gonna let d pictures speak...

fields of flowers - taken on train

Dandelion - i cant believe i took this! postcard quality!

Frauenkirche from afar

Frauenkirche - rebuilt after destruction in WW II

Fu¨rstenzug (Procession of The Dukes) - important people for Dresden

The Hofkirche - yet another church i saw

The Sächsische Staatsoper Dresden - it should look even better at night!

Zwinger Palace

houses along the river - taken during train ride, near Czech border