Weird German Music

I'm not one to make rash, abrasive and critical judgement on music but I think something needs to be said about the weird German music I keep getting exposed to.

During Urban Art Forms in Austria, hoards of festival crowds flocked to the stage for Deichkind. If you thought the Japanese were leaders in the odd, quirky and confusing - think again! Germans may be able to give them a run for their money. This music video is full of "what the fuck" goodness - just like their live set.

During Melt festival, I encountered an artist called Rummelsnuff. When I asked my friend what type of music he plays, the reply was, "Very special music". He is an old security guard turned into a hit sensation. He is very buff, very bald, very gay and very popular.

I don't get it.

Trip 37: Urban Art Forms Festival & Graz, Austria

Trip date: Thursday July 5 - Sunday July 8, 2012

With Canada's population density and short summers, it's no surprise that music festivals in Canada cannot generate the crowd and present the same quality of artists that can be done in Europe. We have a lot of heart in Canada and festivals back home are equally about the festival community as they are the music. However, I am taking advantage of my year abroad to attend the Urban Art Forms festival - the entire set list of this festival is equivalent to every drum and bass DJ coming to Calgary in the next 3 years.

All in attendance: Jason and Kristen

The festival is held this year next to the Schwarzlsee Lake in Graz, Austria's second biggest city after Vienna. It is such a luxury to board a night train and then take a short 15 minute bus ride to the festival ground. Good tunes and good dancing started on that night train from Zurich to Graz and did not stop until the ride home. No need to drive 10+ hours like back home - festivals are all rail/bus accessible!

Jason and I waited in the hot and humid line up to get in after arriving to the site. The most apparent difference between this festival and the festivals I have been to back home is the lack of people in outrageous costumes. But what this festival lacks in costumes, it makes up in alcohol consumption.

All shady spots by the lake were already taken by the time Jason and I arrived inside. We managed to find 4 French guys from Bordeaux and became good friends, good neighbours and most importantly, good dancing partners.

Festivals are usually held in the boonies in Canada so it felt really crazy to be able to take a 10 minute bus into town for shopping and supplies. Common to all German speaking countries, water here at the festival was more expensive than beer.

Highlights include:

• Blistering hot days spent snoozing by the lake
• Working plumbing bathrooms and free showers
• Incredible line up of artist
• Hospitality stage
• Yelling HELGA throughout the festival
• Chilling out by the Beach Stage
• Sunrise at the Minimal Stage
• Knowing enough German to make good acquaintances and enough French to make friends 
• Jason and I surviving on a diet of olives, pickles and energy drinks
  
  
  

Lowlights include:

• Pushing through the Drum and Bass stage which was indoors and an excruciating +45°C
• Insane Austrian heat

We even had time to visit Graz after the festival. We had 12 hours from the end of the festival until our night train (taking us directly to work, boo). Cool fact: Arnold Schwarzenegger is from Graz. In our post festival haze, Jason and I could do little more than eat copious amount of food at an "Asian" restaurant (eating our weight in Chinese stir fry and miso soup) and wander around the old town.

Graz is incredibly ornate but this is no surprise since ornate buildings seem to be the Austrian way. We walked up to the Schlossberg -  a castle with a great city view. Graz also has a lot of unique contemporary architecture including its Kunsthaus and Mur River Wooden Bridge.

Feeling pretty dazed, Jason and I decided to kill time by watching a movie. Choosing a simple movie is key when watching it dubbed in a language that you only sort of know. We chose The Amazing Spiderman which was the perfect level of understanding for A2 German. They also have crazy North American soda pop sizes too.

And then it was a long night train ride until arriving in Zurich on Monday morning and then setting off to work.

Trip 36: La Côte d'Azur, France

Trip date: Thursday June 7 - Sunday June 10, 2012

Enough of these city breaks - let's take an actual vacation. Where better than the French Rivera where language for me is no problem and our biggest responsibilities are to eat as much as we can (olives, duck, fruits, French pastries and maybe even scary cheese) and enjoy the Mediterranean sea.

Cities visited: Marseilles, Hyères, Porquerolles, Nice

All in attendance: Jason and Kristen

Jason and I flew into Marseilles on Wednesday night. What was eerie was being the only people from the airport to take the shuttle to the train station and off to Marseille. I guess it was because it was a weekday. We receive several stern warnings from our colleague Paul, who is from Marseille, about dangerous communities and crime in the city. We were lucky that in our dazed and lost wandering to our hostel, we avoided all of this.

MARSEILLE

We stayed at Hello Marseille hostel and shared a double bed in a dorm for a steep 20 euro. I can already see many hot sweaty hostel nights ahead because all we had this night was an un-moving fan and even in June, sleeping in would've been an impossibility. Hello Marseille is by le Vieux Port. There was lots of construction going on but we managed to find a cozy cafe to take a coffee + brownie to fuel us for the day ahead.

We walked through the old town (cue: narrow streets) and stopped inside Cathédrale La Major (also called by its shorter name Marseille Cathedral or its crazy long name Cathédrale Sainte-Marie-Majeure de Marseille). Feeling lazy and overheated, we took a bus from this church to see Marseille's basilica  Notre-Dame de la Garde which overlooks the city on a tall hill.

You get a great view of the the city from above and a great view of the gold Jesus on top of the Notre-Dame. You can see Château d'If which is a church on an island not too far from the mainland. Inside the basilica is a bit unique because small models of ships and boats hang from its grand ceilings. It's also bright and colourful inside, not scary and foreboding like Gothic style cathedrals can be.

We left Marseille to go to Hyères, another town on the French Riviera taking the 18:38 train. We ended up missing our connection and having to take a bus into the center of Hyères where we set off to find out hotel without any maps or any clue.

HYÈRES

Hyères consist of a small town on the main land and a few islands (Îles d'Hyères). We attempted to find a hostel, campground or a Couchsurfing host but found no success. We ended up staying at Etap Hotel De Hyères, a hotel not to far from the old town for 24.50 euros each in a private double room. A room fitted with a television, private shower and AC - what luxury!!!

We took it easy the first night we arrived and settled down to an evening of fancy oven fired pizza and 2 euro wine while watching fear propaganda on CNN and Fight Club dubbed in French.

The next morning we woke up and found out we missed all early bus connections down to the port to take us to the islands. While waiting for the next bus connection, Jason and I wandered through the beautifully commercialized old town (shops and shops and more shops) and paid too much for fancy tea in a small cafe. Two islands are of interest in this area, Porquerolles and Port-Cros. Paul told us that Port-Cros has as astounding fish population which got us really fixated on the idea of snorkling. It is, however, much father than Porquerolles and when push finally came to shove, we ended up just going to the large island of Porquerolles for the day.

We rented bikes - and something I am not proud of but probably needs to be stated is that I really don't know how to ride a bike. Having never owned one (and never learned as a child) I can't really do more than really offbalanced straight peddling and dangerous and questionable turns. Wipe-outs and embarrassment in front of posh French vacationers ensue.

Cue: lazy days on beaches, reading books in the shade, snorkeling with over priced plastic equipment.

Snorkeling here was nice, a few fish here and there but probably nothing thrilling for anyone who's done it before.

We took the ferry back and then the bus and settled down for a share-no-expense fancy french dinner. I ordered duck and it was so tasty that I am certain that I will think of it many times in the upcoming future when I am eating greasy fast-food back in Canada.

MARSEILLE II

We were brainwashed by the over zealous hostel worker in Marseille about les Calanques - an impossible beautiful bay with limestone cliffs right near the university in Marseille. A few seconds on google was all it took to convince Jason and I that it was absolutely necessary to go back.

We woke up early and went back to Marseille, dropped our bags in a left luggage locker and off we went on a bus towards the University. We followed the small crowd who got off at the University parking lot and it was just a short walk before we could see the edge of beautiful light grey cliffs and impossibly blue water.

A whole day of picnicking and lying around in the shade. We should've brought shoes or watershoes because the cliffs were pretty rocky. Jason did more snorkeling while I ate olives, snoozed along the bay and read Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman.

NICE II

See my previous visit to Nice

We didn't stay the night in Marseille but got our stuff from left luggage and took the train to Nice. We both went in February for carnival so it was a revisit to a town we love instead of visiting a new city (such as Cannes). We spent the last night and last day of our trip in the Nice food market (buying lots of fancy sugars, dried tomatoes and crazy colour mustards), eating mussels and relaxing by the water. Cozy shisha bars on rainy French days.

This trip was the first one all year that truly felt like a relaxing vacation.

Things I liked:

• Beautiful weather, beautiful food, beautiful sights and relaxation

Things to do when I come back:

•  Go to Nimes, Cannes and Port-Cros

Trip 35: Faulhorn

Trip date: Saturday June 2, 2012

One of the most quintessential hikes in Switzerland in the Interlaken region is the hike from Schynige Platte to Faulhorn to First. Stunning views of the Eiger mountain and the Interlaken's other mountains as well as rich green valleys and beautiful Swiss scenery are on the itinerary. This hike has been on my agenda for months and months and here in the early week of June, during Eric's visit to Switzerland, I decided to attempt it.

All in attendance: Kristen and Eric

We took our gleis7 pass to Interlaken on Friday night as stayed at the Happy Inn Lodge for 27 CHF. We woke up early, took a fancy and nostalgic (but slooooow) train up from Wilderswil to Schynige Platte (17 CHF).

Here there was a big sign which said the path from Schynige Platte to Faulhorn to First is still closed due to the winter snow. The train station employees told us that it needed one more week for everything to melt. Armed with our ego and disregard for negativity, we set off.

We did some side treks including up to Oberberghorn which is off the main path and offers you a good view. About 1.30 hours in, the snow started to set in and we were stomping out way through to Faulhorn.

We passed a few people who had turned back and even though the weather was warm and the views were stunning, eventually the snow became too treacherous and we lost the trail markers.

To get our hiking fill though, we decided to hike from Schynige Platte back down to Interlaken - Cue: Steep hill of death.

We will come back before the year is done and attempt this beautiful hike once more!!

Trip 34: Istanbul, Türkiye

Trip date: Saturday May 26 - Monday May 28, 2012

A complete turn around from all these Turkish small towns I visited - 13.5 million people call İstanbul home. It is a crossroads place where part of the city is in Asia and part is in Europe. Here there is an overwhelming amount of people everywhere at every given moment. If you want to see a modern Muslim cosmopolitan city - look no further than here!

All in attendance: David and Kristen!

We arrived in Istanbul quite late and walked to our hostel near the Blue Mosque/Sultan Ahmed Mosque and Hagia Sophia. We stayed at Mavi Guesthouse. We have ran into so much luck throughout our entire Greece/Turkey trip with barely full hostel rooms and sweet private room upgrades. So upon our arrival, the empty 4 person dorm seemed so much more appealing than the 22 person dorm so we just forked over the extra costs just for some space and good night sleep.

The next morning, we had arranged to meet Eric and a few of his friends from Dresden who were visiting Istanbul as well. They were friends with two people, Felix and Katja, who were doing an internship there. We took the very posh modern tram to Taxim Square but a slight misunderstanding between groups moved the plans to meet up to after dinner.

David and I walked along the busy shopping street called Istiklal Street. We happened upon the S. Antonio di Padova Catholic Church and countinues our way through the infinite maze of small shops and busy locals. The biggest surprise is just how crowded the city is - by no means what I would expect in China but there is rarely a time where you are alone on a street in central Istanbul. The streets, shops, parks and bridges are always heavily populated with cats and people.

Passing the Galata Tower, we arrived at the Galata bridge where there are Turkish fisherman there 24 hours a day! We peaked into the fish market and the fancy fish restaurants (here you can buy a great fish sandwich I'm told by the gold and black boats, we didn't and I do regret it). Across the bridge is the New Mosque/Yeni Cami and our first stop for a peak inside one of Istanbul's many Mosque.

A complete beautiful prelude to every mosque we were to see. Stunning and ridiculously un-crowded! Going to this mosque made me wish we had the time to visit the other less popularly visited mosques in the city.

We also happened upon a really nice artist studio off of the side streets. I really wish we had the money to spend on some of these paintings and sketches!

I got some over sweetened spun sugar on a stick and we went into Hagia Sophia. The biggest drag here is that information pamphlets and maps of the museum are only given to those which purchase the audio tour. This is common for most of the sites we visited in Istanbul. No matter, we will just soak up the atmosphere. The colours, the magnitude of the domed roof, the paintings and the grand atmosphere were astonishing.

Off we went across the park toward the Blue Mosque and slipped off our shoes and hid our shoulders and knees. Inside, you are shuttled like cattle and it is very noisy (from all the tourist) and near uncomfortably crowded (crowded like the streets of Venice crowded). Here we had very little time to soak up the atmosphere. Tranquility was at an all time zero.

We then went to the spice market in Istanbul. Contemplated all the different types of spices and teas as well as other knick knacks and touristy souvenirs. The haning metal and glass lamps they sell are extremely beautiful and if a 45L backpack permitted it, I would've taken one all the way home to Canada. We left with some nuts - nuts here are delicious - and munched on cashews, pistachios and other delights for the rest of our day. All the side streets around the spice market have goods to sell as well. They are really specialize stores (we went into a 2 floor store devoted completely for buttons!) and I felt comfortable haggling for the first time in my life.

David and I lounge lazily in this one giant park (special because there is a lack of green space in central Istanbul) for the better park of the afternoon where we people-watched cute Muslim couples and big family picnics. We watched old turkish men climb trees and play backgammon. We watched parents take cheesey pictures of their children. We also watched people taking pictures of us!

That night we met up with Eric and his friends and listened to some jazz music and hopped between a few cute and comfortable bars before returning to our hostel room (which was no longer fully private) to sleep.

Morning included a hostel breakfast and a day which began at Topkapi Palace. It is a bit steep to go inside ($$) but the previous day we took a look into the gift shops for photos of what the palace looked like. Beautiful mosaics, a parade of colour and a high recommendation from Felix and Katja were enough to sell us on this place. It was also bittersweet pleasant because a torrential downpour of rain occurred while we were there which chased away a lot of tourist (or immobilized them under dry cover) while two Canadians paraded about without care.

Off we went to the Grand Bazaar where I got a "handmade" backgammon set. David got a few scarves for some friends and we wandered the seemingly endless rows of shops and stalls; a parade of "where are you from" and "hello my friend" in our wake. Prices here were not necessarily better than the ones we saw in other parts of Turkey. Product selection, however, was much higher.

After we grew tired of the markets, we boarded a boat to take us all the way to Kadıköy - the Asian side of Istanbul. Here, everything is even cheaper! We got more nuts and sat in a coffee shop and played backgammon on my new set with the blurry rules that I could remember. Cue: scoffing Turkish men who knew we were doing it wrong.

That night we met up with Eric and his friends again and took a boat way up to a further district of Istanbul. Here was also very crowded and we bought kompir for dinner - crazy large backed potato with anything you could want inside. Something curious about Istanbul is that you can bring food you bought elsewhere into a different restaurant and sit down as long as you order something else.

We spent the rest of the night at Felix and Katja's apartment on their deck eating delicious snacks and enjoying the view. We took a taxi back to our hostel (met an over zealous taxi driver who got our spirits all worked up) and just like that, my time in Istanbul was up.

Things to do next time:

• Eat those fish sandwiches by Galata Bridge
• Go to a Hamam
• Buy a Turkish hanging Lamp
• See Whirling Dervishes 
• See other mosque in Istanbul
• Go to the Prince's Islands
• Spend at least a week here!

Things I learned:

• People are infinitely curious about David and I - especially when we tell them we're from the same country
• The corn vendors are selling non-sweet corn
• 13.5 million people is a lot

Things I loved:

• Ridiculously large döners!
• Turkish lentil soups and Turkish nuts
• Visiting a crowded and lively city