Outdoors

On Friday, we woke up very late, since Sunshine also slept in, to a brilliant morning. After a quick breakfast at home, we packed enough snacks for Sunshine and drove to the Schönbrunn Palace, which was the summer residence of the Austrian monarchy.
It was such a glorious day and we didnt want to spend it indoors. So, we skipped the palace tour and went straight to the vast palace gardens. It is so huge and divided into several sections with each section featuring a different style of landscaping. It was too vast to be covered in one day, atleast at our pace, so we did not rush ourselves. We just wandered around aimlessly soaking in the beautiful day outdoors, lazing around on park benches. Sunshine chased countless ducks and pigeons, screamed 'hosh' every time he saw a horse drawn carriage with tourists and threw stones into the fountains. He is an outdoor boy and is happy anywhere in the world as long as it is sunny and he gets to run around.

Gloriette

After spending most of the hot afternoon in the garden, we decided to walk to the monument Gloriette which is on a small hill across the palace. On the way, we stopped at a cafe and indulged ourselves again with some local delicacies both sweet and savoury. At the top of the hill, one gets a beautiful view of the Schönbrunn palace set against the backdrop of the city. We spent some time there enjoying the view and letting Sunshine explore around.

Schönbrunn Palace

We called it a day rather early as all of us were tired after all the walking around.

Gruess Gott Vienna

It was yet another long weekend in a series of long weekends here in Germany. Thursday was a holiday and we took Friday off and drove to Vienna for four days. It was about 7 hours drive with a couple of breaks. We had booked a small apartment very close to the Ringstrasse, where all the cafes and most tourists can be found.
After checking in, we headed to Stephansdom, the ancient cathedral and probably the most important landmark in Vienna. The square next to the cathedral, Stephansplatz, is lined with many cafes and all of them were brimming with patrons both local and visitors. We took a table on the terrace of one of the cafes and it was so close to the church that it was like sitting in the churchyard. The square was full of street artists and small crowds around them. Sunshine ran after the pigeons on the square while we drank our coffees and had our cakes. Vienna is a cake lovers paradise with an amazing variety of delicious cakes and pastries available in numerous cafes dotted all over the city. So much so that Mummy who is a vegetarian decided to eat cakes as long as she is in Vienna. ;) Papa, Mummy and I stuck to the most famous fare, sachertorte  while DH had a cardinalschnitte.

Stephansdom

We had a lazy walk back to the apartment through the cobbled streets and past many old and historic buildings and had frozen yoghurt on the way. That is right, we eat a lot while on vacation (and otherwise as well;)) although one would never guess that by looking at DH. After visiting so many European cities with well preserved historic buildings, we seem to take them for granted. I remember in the initial days, when we had just moved here, we would click so many snaps in front of every building and take the trouble to find out what it was. Now, we just walk past them although we still enjoy the flavour that they bring to the city.

Tick tock Triberg

My parents in law are here for visit and our initial plan for the long weekend was to go to East Switzerland. However, we decided against it as it would be too much for them right after the long flight. So, on Sunday, we headed to Triberg, the highest waterfall in Germany set in the scenic Schwarzwald aka Black Forest.

Part of the drive was through the Black Forest and therefore very scenic. It is so green and full of live on a sunny day that one can almost forget the dark, grey, dull days that one has to constantly face in Germany. I think when it comes to bad weather, Germany should be right up there with England although England seems to be more notorious.

There is a small entry fee to the waterfall - 3.50 € per person. It is a good place to take a not so difficult hike and get some good views of the fall. The fall itself is broken into several levels and is not a single big fall. There is an easy route and a difficult route available for the hike. The routes are lined with beeches, pines and other trees which I cannot name due to my extremely limited knowledge in botony. :) There are plenty of very friendly squirrels all over the place and one can buy a bag of peanuts to feed them at the ticket counter.

We took the easy route as Sunshine was there with us and had a small picnic of bulgur and gigantes plaki that we had packed. Sunshine was so happy to be outdoors on a fine day - he ran all over the place - up and down the slopes looking for squirrels. We didnt go all the way up but had a good time nonetheless.

Once we came back into the town, we bought a cuckoo clock at a shop called Elbe. The largest cuckoo clock in the world is situated right next to the shop, but it was already closed by the time we reached. We had been inside the clock a couple of times before, but it would have been interesting for Papa and Mummy.We then had a very late 'Kaffee and Kuchen' pause at a local cafe. Mummy and I had some delicious eggless sachertorte, DH had Apfelstrudel and Papa had a piece of Schwarzwaldkirschtorte which was a bit too full of liquer for his taste.

Black Forest is so nice when the weather is good. Since we travel far so often, we havent spent much time exploring Germany. Need to do this more often.

Goodbye Shanghai

The last few days in Shanghai passed by too quickly. We did some last minute shopping on Saturday at an outlet mall just outside Shanghai. It was totally not worth it. The discounts were not as high as what we were used to Germany and definitely nowhere near the hard to believe bargains that we found in USA. Nevertheless, my ever smart DH managed to find some good deals in the Armani store for us and in the Osh Kosh store for Sunshine.

People's Square

On Sunday, we decided to spend one last day with F and B and Sunshine's little friend before we left for Germany. They took us to the Shanghai zoo and Sunshine enjoyed it a lot. There was a small safari, some shows with animals, a very vast park and many many animals and birds. The kids had loads of fun running around, tugging at each other and fooling around. Good food is an essential part of any outing here and after a tiring day at the zoo, we went to a restaurant called Southern memories for dinner. It was housed in the World Expo cultural center which was shaped like a flying saucer. There is a huge balcony which goes all the way around the building and we got some awesome views after the very delicious dinner.

Shanghai Zoo

It was goodbye time and we were really sad as F and B had become our good friends in a very short time and hopefully they will visit us in Germany very soon. On Monday, we left the hotel early since we wanted to be in the airport with plenty of time to spare. It was struggling getting all our luggage into the taxi. Travelling light has never been one of our virtues and now we have a baby to boot. We left Shanghai with a very different view about China and its people. We had an amazing time and the Chinese are one of the friendliest, most hospitable people we have ever met. We would love to visit again when Sunshine is a little older so that he can also understand and learn something about this enchanting country and its culture.

Birthday time

It was birthday time yesterday. I called up my mom early in the morning and wished briefly and had a quiet rest of the day. In the evening, PS called and invited us to dinner. PS shares her birthday with my mom. :) DH, PS and a friend of hers decided to meet us at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum metro station and proceed to the next station, Century Avenue. We were planning to dine at Southern memories recommended by our friend and local cuisine expert F.

Bithday cake

I bought a cake for PS from the Century Avenue station right in front of her. Chinese desserts are an insult to my sweet tooth! Most of them have the texture of desserts but are quite tasteless. They generally don't do a very good job of baking cakes, muffins and other stuff either. Thankfully, PS's birthday cake was not half bad. The sweet lady at the bakery gave me a small card with Happy Birthday written in Chinese on it when I asked her to write it on the cake. A couple of candles and we were all set for the small party.

After getting lost in the mall and a bit of waiting time we finally managed to sit down for dinner. I let everyone order so that I can eat a bit from all dishes. It is Chinese custom that if you go out together for dinner, you share all the dishes ordered and eat directly from the dish using chopsticks. The only exception seemed to be rice or soup which you take into individual bowls and eat. DH ordered super hot crabs and prawns and a fiery chicken dish, the birthday girl ordered another chicken dish and a mutton dish, her friend ordered a vegetable dish and a pork dish. Everything was exteremely delicious and way too hot for me, so I had to eat some sweet millet which I had ordered for Sunshine after every bite. I wonder if they dont bother much about dessert because their savoury dishes are so scrumptious. At most restaurants, I saw people eating fruit for dessert - no wonder there are so few overweight people here.

Rural China

The Canal

The best way to explore China or for that matter any place in the world, is to take the help of a local friend. On Sunday, DH's colleague Y and her friend M took us to Zhujiajiao, a suburb or Shanghai so that we could experience rural China away from the glitz and glamour of Shanghai. An hour's bus ride from Shanghai, Zhujiajiao could not have been more different from Shanghai. It had many canals like Venice which were full of gondolas, boats and ferries intended at tourists, umpteen bridges and narrow streets full of small shops selling local crafts, food and clothes. After walking around a little bit, Y suggested that we have lunch.

Yummy food

I am amazed at the Chinese hospitality - Y and M are very young, probably a decade younger to us (we are getting old!)- and yet Y treated us to lunch, paying no heed to our protests. Earlier, they had even paid our busfare, as if spending the whole day to show us around and looking after Sunshine when we browsed the local shops was not enough! We had fish head, shrimps, two chicken dishes, bamboo, greens, rice, soup - too much to eat, which we know by now is the Chinese way of treating your guests well. These youngsters were extremely friendly and Sunshine also had a great time with them. We took a short boat ride in the canal which was lined with beautiful red lanterns from the spring festival. We bought a traditional Chinese outfit for Sunshine, a black bead bracelet to ward off the evil eye,a silk painting and a local snack made of peas. We wanted to buy some tea, but M offered to give us some as his hometown is very famous for good tea. Our attempts to bargain for a couple of beautiful chinese vases came to a naught and it was time to get back to the city.

After the hour long bus ride, we thanked our kind young friends and bid adieu with a promise to meet for dinner later in the week.

Temples

Jing'an Temple

On Saturday, we went temple hopping. The first stop was at the beautiful Buddhist temple Jing'an which is about 2000 years old. It was ofcourse rennovated several times, the latest in 1990s, but there are several ancient artefacts and idols in the temple. The pagodas with beautiful bronze statues all over them looked ethereal especially against the backdrop of the city skyscrapers and malls.

A short taxi ride from Jing'an took us the Jade Buddha temple - although it didn't look as royal as the Jing'an temple, it had a very old world charm about it. We were lucky enough to get there at the worship time, without actually planning it, and got to listen to some very calming chants and hymns. We wanted to try out a tea house and was led to the tea house in the temple compound by a helpful official. But as we were entering it, a monk signalled to us to not go there and we realised soon why he did that. They were charging a bomb for the tea as well as tea drinking session. It was almost closing time, so we left the place. Outside the temple, we bought a jade Buddha pendant for me and our must buy souvnier of every trip - a fridge magnet with Shanghai written on it.

The reclining Buddha at the Jade Buddha Temple

After all the spiritual rejuvenation, we decided to indulge our material selves and headed to Nanjing Road. There were several stores selling knockoffs on this street as well, replicas of brands like Ralph Lauren, Lacoste, Tommy Hilfiger etc with slightly different names and probably a different orientation of their logos. We walked into what looked like an authentic mall of children's wear, but it was difficult to say if the wares were real or fake. Besides the shopowners seemed to quote outlandish prices and were willing to bargain. So we gave that a skip as well.

We were famished after all the walking around and decided to grab a bite at a chinese restaurant. The first two places we checked out had huge waiting time, but we were third time lucky and got a place straightaway at a slightly upscale restaurant called South Beauty. DH chose a couple dishes he liked when he went dining with his team and they were delicious although the eel dish was a tad too spicy for me.

A relaxing steam bath back at the hotel and the day had come to an end.