Rather, the main aim of going into Strasbourg was to visit some French pâtisseries and get our filthy hands on some Eclairs. For some weird reason, I had this severe craving for a Chocolate Eclair (having already sated the ones for Fish and Duck) and I had ranted on and on about how I was going to eat all the Eclairs in Strasbourg.
... and lusting for chocolates and pastries and cakes and etc etc...
... and at the end of the day, the craving for Eclairs was satisfied. And the mission to consume EVERY single Chocolate Eclair in Strasbourg was complete. There was literally no more Chocolate Eclairs left in Strasbourg after we departed.
Today, (technically yesterday because its past 12 midnight) we headed out to Rothenburg, apparently one of the best preserved medieval towns in Germany. The old city center even had its city walls still intact!
But more exciting is the specialty of Rothenburg, Schneeballen! Literally Snow Ball! It was basically a huge ball shaped biscuit covered in various types of Chocolate.
Look at Jiahui so SHOCKED to see the numerous flavours to choose from...
... followed by the look of absolute indecision of which one to choose. She was actually making whining noises at this point because she couldn't decide which one to get.
We finally picked our Flavours. (Mine)
(Jiahui's)
Alas, too bad the Schneeballen actually didn't taste very good. If you're wondering what is up with the pose. Its my "瘦瘦脸" pose. I do it whenever I'm going to eat something fattening.
We continued exploring the town. The town was old but beautiful. Having both the charm of an old German town as well as the rustic feeling of a medieval town. It was as if Heidelberg and Toledo had a baby and it became Rothenburg. (This would make more sense if I had actually blogged about Spain).
I was pretty tired at the end of the day. Traveling 4 hours to get to some place just to hang out there for about 4 hours before having to travel another 4 hours home is not exactly very fun. All in all, it was still a pretty nice weekend.
The old opera house? Oh well... doesn't look that impressive. Take a picture of it since everyone's doing the same.
The cathedral? Yea... I've kinda seen the Sagrada Familia. So.. yea.. sorry. Not impressed. But yea, since I'm here, I'll take a picture of you just for posterity's sake.
There was once I even took a picture of the WRONG building because they building of note looked rather... plain.
The high point of the trip came when we scattered for lunch. We were told to meet back again at 7pm for our Apfel Wein Express.
For the next hour or so, we basically unleashed the floodgates of self control and gorged ourselves on the much missed Sushi. The best thing was that this wasn't lousy Sushi. This was Sushi as good as any you can get in Singapore. We basically ate so much that we couldn't move.
And so Jiahui and I discussed what to do for the rest of the day in Frankfurt and we basically agreed there was nothing we really wanted to do or see in this place. So we decided that this would be a Chillax day and we just wandered the city...
...and finally settled down in a cafe to have some Heise Schokolade. Over our drinks, we talked about everything under the sun until we came upon the topic of.. Ambrose. Besides talking about the people he loves/hates, Jiahui talked about how for the rest of the Exchange I would not being seeing much of Ambrose anymore. From previous posts you might have garnered some sense of how much spastic fun I have with the bugger. And so it was of course regrettable that the next time I saw Ambrose would be be simultaneously be my last time with him; during our trip to be Europapark.
That night we went aboard the Apfel Wein Express which was basically a tram that took you through a tour of Frankfurt while serving Applewine. Most. Boring. Tour. Ever. The tram had bad temperature and bad music. The view outside was dark so we couldn't see anything. And even if we could, they showed us stuff we've already seen in the afternoon. After a while the view turned from bad to worse and we were eventually going through boring looking residential districts. Its like taking a tour through Bedok and Tampines. Nice.
The Apfel Wein Expressed ended our trip to Frankfurt and we all concurred that we would only return to Frankfurt for one reason. The Lunch Buffet.
Things on my mind:
Marge Simpson Upskirt.
We headed into the tents and as expected, it just wasn't as... awesome as the one in Munich.
We quickly settled in and ordered our Beers so that we could create an alcohol-induced awesomeness to the place. And it WORKED! Though nothing could ever beat the fun I had in Munich, but when they played the Fast Food Song, it almost came close.
All would have went well until for some retarded reason, I decided to mix half of glass of Clement's wine into my 2nd mug of beer. I'm going to use something from Jiahui's blog here: Turned out to be not that smart a choice after all.
Things on my mind:
It looks like we each bought a pack but it's actually just one pack shared between the two of us because, well we needed to keep ourselves ready for the main course.
As we approached the Rathaus however, I was taken aback by the most unusual sight!
I saw a swan just walking around the square!
Recognizing the situation as an opportunity to get the closest I'll ever get to a swan, I approached the swan and stood in front of it contemplating whether or not to pet it. That's when I discovered that I was in the presence of a terrorist swan. Just as I was about to reach forward to pet the bird, it bit my shoe! Imagine my shock! The swan would carry on to terrorize other people in the square who were just trying to have their lunch.
As the search for fish drew on, we realised that the place where we got the Fish and Chips presented itself as the best choice to satisfy our cravings. And so we returned to Daniel Wischer!
Unable to decide what to order, I saw a particularly appetizing dish served to a gentleman in the nearby table. Noticing my curiosity, a friendly German (well they're all friendly) asked me if I wanted to know what that was, to which I replied in the affirmative. And so I ordered the 'Homemade Pickled Herring with Fried Potatoes.'
Can you believe that there were not one but TWO herrings on the plate????? I've never had so much fish in a single meal! And it wasn't even that expensive! The dish cost me 7.70EU. Reasonable by any standards. But the serving screamed one word: VALUE. There was too much fish for me to finish and I had to actually ask Jiahui to help me finish my food.
The red-eye train was an experience not to be forgotten. Grabbing sleep in 1 hour windows and spending the longest, coldest hour in a train station waiting for the next train to arrive.
And finally arriving the next morning in Berlin.
I think everybody was a little irritated that I wanted to take photos of them in their most unglam moment.
Our first day in Berlin was spent in Potsdam and the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. Potsdam was basically a town some 45mins out of Berlin and had a high concentration of castles to see. However, the weather still hadn't improved and so the urge to whip out our cameras were largely subdued. The pictures are so gloomy I shan't bother with any of them.
I should take this opportunity to tell you now that I have not been paying for public transport here in Germany. The Germans work on a trust system and they have conductors who exact a 40-80EU fine from you for evading fares. Somehow, for the first time, we decided to get the bus ticket here for Berlin. And the ONE time we get our ticket, we got checked by a plainsclothes conductor! YES!
Talk about VALUE.
Thankfully, by the time we reached the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, the weather improved and we spent a bit of time wandering the memorial.
By the time we left it was dark and it was time to find something to eat. That's when we came upon... CRISPY DUCK. Since Munich, Ambrose and I have been craving for ducks, so much so that we chased ducks around the pond. Since the craving for fish had already been satisfied, the craving for duck meat had risen to the top. And so, when we chanced upon this eatery that sold Crispy Duck, we had NO CHOICE but to go in for dinner. Most satisfying dinner, ever.
We returned to Berlin to get a much needed night's rest but not before visiting the Brandenburg Gate to see it by night.
The next day we toured Berlin in earnest and despite the wet and cold weather, the walking tour of Berlin was amazing and really brought the city to life. So much history. I'm not going to post too many pictures of Berlin simply because, come December, I'm going to bring my boyfriend and my girlfriend back to Berlin and they should see it for themselves rather than letting my pictures spoil the experience.
A path running all through Berlin showing where the Berlin Wall used to run.
The hotel where Michael Jackson dangled his Baby. 12,500EU per room night. Nice.
Berliner Dome.
And so the LONG weekend came to an end and we headed back to Mannheim. Despite the lousy weather, Berlin was wonderful and is definitely one of my favourite cities. But most importantly, this was the weekend, where we ate both Fish, and Duck. Say it really fast and you may Dish and Fuck.