nessie

Going to hunt for Nessie tomorrow. Meanwhile we are just chilling about and I am waiting for Eugene to finish up all his combat rations he brought over from France before heading out to wander about Edinburgh for another day.

"Dépêche-toi lah Eugene!!!"

sweden: a taste of scandivania 2

My third day in Stockholm was alot more productive. We headed out early and we went to the City Hall first thing in the morning. Unlike Singapore's City Hall which is more or less of (yet another) shopping area, Stockholm's version is the place where the government congregates for parliament meetings. Unfortunately the hall was closed due to (once again) the proximity to Christmas, so we had to make do with the external sights.

city hall

from the inside

frolicking with the city hall babe by the river.. =P

Seizing the morning's initiative, we pressed on to some Viking museum in the city centre since it was kinda cold to be lingering out in the open. I can't remember the name of the museum now because it was not very memorable: It was just a small exhibition situated at the basement of a building; The actual museum was undergoing renovation works and so what we saw was just a token display of what they had to offer, i.e., forgettable stuff. Oh well, c'est la vie, n'est pas?

picture depicting the barbarism of the Vikings

And so we made our way to the Royal Palace again. This time, it was not to go into the palace, but rather to stay out at the foyer to watch the changing of the guards. Since it was a Sunday, the guard changing ceremony would be the whole works instead of the simplified weekday version, and I planned my visit exactly to coincide with this. Apparently I was not the only onw, as although the weather was pretty cold, a large crowd had already gathered by the time I arrived, and I had to jostle for space amongst the limited "alongside" gallery.

Military band music was the sure sign that the ceremony was about to take place, and sure enough as soon as the band marched in, the Royal guards took up their places in the parade square as well. I shall not go into the details of the changing of the guard, but let's just say that I was treated to a 1-hour extravaganza of band music, precision drills and a marchpast at the end to top it off.

After our little sojourn at the palace, we took a cruise to Skansten, an open-air museum (notice my penchant for staying outdoors when the weather is really cold) depicting life in Sweden in the 1800s. It was pretty unique, but most of the exhibits were closed due to the cold, plus once it got dark around 1530hrs the park was not so tour-able anymore. And so we headed off for an early dinner. =)

on the way to Skansten

first views of the park

overview of Skansten

typical Swedish house circa 1890

same house circa 1950

winter wasteland

For dinner we decided to give ourselves a treat and so we headed to Tennstoppet, one of the restaurants recommended by the hostel for dinner. After all, it was our Christmas dinner! We had a starter to share and I had veal liver with bacon strips for my main. Apparently this was a Swedish specialty (I had enough of meatballs by this time), and so I gave it a go.

The starter was a herring sampler set, and so we had a go at 6 varieties of herring. The serving plate was so huge that the waiter had to join another table to our existing one to accommodate the it! There was herring in tomato sauce, herring in olive oil, herring with onions and spicy cheese, etc. There were so many different types of herring that I cannot remember all their names! And the servings were so huge that by the time I was done with it I found it quite impossible to start on my main.

But I had already ordered my food. And I am not one for wasting food, so I ate up my entire main course and totally stuffed myself silly. And so when I saw the bill I thought I was seeing things - 520SEK which translates to about €55! Crazily expensive dinner! But what was spent cannot be unspent and the dinner was good which sort of makes the bill that bit easier to digest (no pun intended). =)

herring herring and more herring

my main course (pictures in the screen may look smaller than their actual size.. =P)

Swedish lager

random night shot of the city centre

My last day in Stockholm was just spent walking. Yep, you read that right: Walking. Eugene joined in the mini-hike with us as he had just arrived in Stockholm the night before. Our goal was the Swedish radio tower which I read would have great panoramic views of Stockholm city and its environs. The walk was not really that far, but somehow the trip to the tower took us 1.5hours. And (as expected) the tower closed due to Christmas! Damn, this Christmas thing was really getting irritating! =D So we all trudged back and as for me and Letch, we had to catch our bus to the airport for our flight to London, and so we said our goodbyes and headed off to the bus station.

the three of us

me at the foot of the tower

The past 4 days had been a great start to my Noël trip; What would the next 10 days bring? =)

sweden: a taste of scandivania 1

Yep.. And so I went to Sweden. Always wanted to visit the Nordic countries and what better time than during Christmas? I originally wanted to go to Lapland, the home of Father Christmas (whoever he is), but the temperature there is -40°C now, so I decided on somewhere more tropical - Stockholm.The Christmas holidays actually started on 22 Dec, but I decided to take 2 days off school and fly to Stockholm on the 20th. Turned out to be quite a good decision, as an increasing amount of the shops/attractions were closed earlier and earlier closer to Christmas day.

Had to catch my flight to Stockholm from Paris Orly only at 2105hrs at night, so we (Letch and me) took the opportunity to tour about Montmartre, the "hometown" of Amélie Poulain. Train to Paris got delayed by 2 hours due to some technical difficulties, so in the end I only had about 4 hours to kill. Started out by visiting Sacré-Coeur, the most well-known bascilica in Paris. The hike up was rather short and the view up was pretty thanks to the clear skies. The bascilica, like many of the other churches in Europe, was in typical roman arhitecture and I found it nothing much interesting, save for a rather huge crucified sculpture of Jesus inside. What I found interesting, was Montmartre and all of its sleazy offerings. So many sex shops on one street that I thought that I was in Amsterdam! And of course, if we are talking about old-town sleaze, Moulin Rouge comes to mind, and that is where the world class cabaret is located - Right in the heart of Montmartre! Lovely. Topped my lovely afternoon there with a meal at le café des deux moulins, the café where Amélie worked at in the movie.

le Sacré-Coeur

nice views from up there

quaint metro stations at Montmartre

XXX

voulez-vous couchez avec moi ce soir? =P

Flight to Stockholm was fortunately undelayed (unlike the TGV this morning) and I got to Stockholm on time. First impressions were very good with the excellent first class airport (Arlanda) and the high tech trains. "Wow", I thought, "So this is Scandivania!" Very impressive. My feelings were further confirmed when I got to my hostel, the City Backpackers, which is one of the most modern, secure and centrally located hostels which I have ever stayed in.

grand welcome at the airport

the arlanda express connecting train to the city

inside

entrance to City Backpackers

Day one was spent wandering about the city. But first up, we stopped by the System Bolarget. For those who do not know what it is, it is Sweden's alcoholic monopoly. To put it bluntly, no other shop other than the System Bolarget is allowed to sell beverages with more than 3.5% alcohol volume. It was first set up in 1955 to curb excessive drinking but now, it is just another alcoholic supermarket check-out. Whereas there only used to be one System Bolarget serving the whole of Sweden, now there are numerous shops dotted all across the country. Kinda like NTUC huh? =P Anyway, I got myself a bottle of Absolut Citron. Not surprisingly, as Absolut is a Swedish brand and of course I had to get myself something Swedish!

That day we had quite a spot of sun (as can be seen from the preceding photo), so we took the opportunity to walk about outdoors. Went to Gamla Stan (Old Town) and the Stockholms slott (Royal Palace) to soak in the sights. Stockholm's really pretty!!! The architecture's so Swedish-utilitarian chic! Everything looks so new, clean and proper, unlike most of Europe. =P Then there is the sea view. As Stockholm is made out of many interconnected small islands, I got superb views of the Nordic "sea". Looking at the ships docked by the ports, I could only fantasize about going on a Scandivanian cruise on one of them!!! =) Needless to say, the scenery was fantastic for photowhoring, which I did pretty most of the time. =D

Rounded off the day with a visit to the Nobel museum, then we headed to Mast, a Swedish pub for some dinner. My food was really good! Yummylicious. We had something to drink after dinner, and somehow or another I managed to break my wine glass! I mean, it just came apart in the middle!!! Just tell me what's that all about! Luckily the staff did not add that to my bill. =P

alcohol overload!

a little bit of Stockholm

the royal palace

cavorting with the royal consort.. =P

Gamla Stan deserted at night

As we got back only at about 2am the previous night, we sort of slept in on the second day. Which was not really a problem actually, as I had only planned Ikea on the second day. =D Left the hostel at about 1100 (Andi will kill me for this) thinking of going to to the bay to see the ships, but I got distracted by the shopping along Drottninggatan and so we sort of skipped scenery viewing (Andi will kill me again =P). The shopping in Stockholm is great!!! So many labels and brands. I managed to find an Ording and Reda shop (used to have one in Citylink, but it closed down), and I bought a bag there for 550SEK as a Xmas present for myself. =)

A half hour train ride and a short bus ride later, we found ourselves at Ikea. Pretty surreal to me indeed, as if you have been following this blog you would have known that I'm a Ikea fan, and being at the largest Ikea store in the whole planet is pretty overwhelming. =P The store was just soooo huge! Went in first to the restaurant to get food, and was pleased to find out that food was a lot cheaper than other Ikea stores elsewhere. Who says that everything has to be more expensive in Sweden? =P After filling up we walked about the store. The aisle goes around in circles, and I cannot remember how many times we went round and round! o_O

Last stop for the day was the Absolut Ice Bar. Other than the bartenders, everything inside it is ice: From the tables, to the chairs and of course, the glasses! The original one was built in the Ice Hotel in Lapland, but nowadays there are Ice Bars all around the world like London and Tokyo. Oh well, it was still a treat to be in one. =) The temperature inside is set at a constant -5°C, which necessiated the wearing of special eskimo-like robes. And of course with limits on refridgeration, there was a maximum capacity of 30 people in the bar at any one time. Luckily for us, we had made a reservation earlier on in the day so there was no need to wait. It was pretty cool (pun intended) inside with the glow of the ice blocks and we basically just chilled out with our drinks, speaking of which I got the house special which cost me a not-so-cool 160SEK.

ominous looking Ikea (it was foggy)

much nicer inside

comfort food

icy cold display

the Absolut Ice Bar Stockholm

one drink too many..

joyeux noël

have yourself a mao-rry christmas this year!!!

god dag

Greeting from Sweden! So far its been amazing here.. Everything's very pretty, the city's alot more vibrant than Grenoble and I daresay Paris even, and the best thing of all is that surprisingly it is warmer than in Grenoble! o_O

Updates with photos later on.. =)

Ikealand

Leaving tomorrow morning for Ikealand. =)

A+

300

SPARTA!!!!

discipline

"The essence of sports is that while you're doing it, nothing else matters, but after you stop, there is a place, generally not very important, where you would put it."

- Roger Bannister, the man to first run a mile under 4 minutes

How I wish that I could do likewise for my studies as well.. =\

skiing @ les 2 alpes

And so I went skiing today.

Ok so I lied. Actually I went to move heavy pieces of metal through vast distances of snow wearing heavy and clunky boots. Or so it seemed like what I was doing most of the time! =P Just read on to learn more about it..

Awoke today morning at 6am to meet the rest and to take the bus organised by the École de Glisse (EGUG), with whom a couple of us Singaporeans had signed up for a day ski class. Destination? Les 2 Alpes, a ski resort situated in the Oiseans area. The rendezvous point was already swarming with people when I got there and was made worse by the fact that there was little, if not at all, crowd control. I mean, people just haphazardly loading up and boarding buses! There was no indication of bus detail, number of buses, or even the destination. Little did I know at that point of time that this would be just the tip of the iceberg.

After the initial hysteria, the journey there was pretty uneventful and I managed to catch some much needed shuteye. However all that changed when we reached the resort..

As soon as the buses docked by the roadside, it was another unloading and changing into ski gear frenzy. Everybody seemed to be possessed at the speed they were changing at! Or was it due to the cold? Hmm.. Anyway, people left as soon as they got changed, and soon we were about the only people left. I remember the EGUG girl on our bus telling us to meet at the caisse centrale (central cashier) for those taking the ski lessons, but how the hell does she expect us first-timers to the resort to know where it was? So there we were, like stranded ducklings without mother duck feeling cold and lost and just about as pathetic as anyone can get at a ski resort.

first views of the resort

Luckily Andi took the initiative and the good thing was that after about like half an hour of wandering about, he found the caisse centrale. Bad thing was, the caisse centrale was like a kilometre away. If you have not worn ski boots before, let me tell you that they are about the most bitchiest things to walk in. Firstly they constrain your lower calf, so walking becomes a waddle (which later on becomes a shuffle). Secondly, they are the clunkiest and about the heaviest footwear you can get in the market; In fact, I think that it can be used as a torture device!!! Damn. Add these to the fact that we were all carrying our ski equipment and personal effects and you will see why I being a kilometre away from the rendezvous point was a bad thing.

Anyhow, we got to the rendezvous point but to our dismay our EGUG "Starting Glisse" group had already left! To be frank, I was rather disappointed with the handling of the entire affair. There was minimal communication over the conduct of ski lessons, an almost non-existent EGUG group to act as people herders, as well as insufficient dissemination of information. Not to say that I need somebody to mother over me, but having paid €21 for ski lessons, I expected at least a minimal level of control and organisation. The entire morning's proceedings really left a sour taste in my mouth.

Faced with this separation from the group, we had no choice but to head out to the ski slopes on our own, which was not really a good idea as none of us had any extensive experience with skiing. Haha. However after lugging around our freaking heavy ski stuff already for the better part of the day, we were all determined to have some ski action. So with absolutely no instruction and just a sense of foolish bravery and humour, we took to the pistes.

Heh but before we could ski, we had to clip in to our skis. The binding system is familiar to me as it is essentially the same system as SPDs, but with skis it is like 1000 times more difficult due to the slippery surface: Before you can clip in, you are already sliding down the slope!!! Haha. This caused alot of frustration in me as time and time again I had to balance whilst trying my best to become one with my skis. I still cannot figure out how to do it without looking like an utter idiot. =P

finally all geared up to ski

andi..

michelle as well

me skiing

In my earlier blog post I wrote that I would probably fall alot, and through this process I would learn how to ski. Well, I was wrong. Not that I didn't fall alot, but rather I was wrong about learning to ski even after falling numerous times! Even at negligible gradient type runs, I had trouble controlling my speed and direction. At times it was plain scary to say the least! Sometimes my skis would seem to take on lives of their own and decide to go in separate directions, ending in the inevitable ending of me crashing. Or they would just become speed demons and I would be hurtling through the snow, feeling both exhilarated from the surge of adrenalin and being terrified of not knowing how to stop/change direction (just ask June about this.. =P). In any case skiing was generally not very successful for me, and I was extremely lucky not to have broken anything or caused any serious casualties. Would have been awful otherwise.

Since I could not really ski, I decided to do something else starting with "s" after lunch. No its not snowboarding, but rather sightseeing! There were cable cars to bring skiers up to the top of the mountains (3650m) and so we used that to get up. Wow the views were simply out of this world! White white and more white.. Everything seemed so surreal up there. And then there were the skiers who were just moving gracefully through the snow: In our cable car they looked like little insects gliding through a white ocean! The pictures which I took really does injustice to the magnificent view up there.. =)

going up..

with Pieter, a pro snowboarder whom we met on the way up

me and June

the rest

at the top

simply white

the real ski runs

chairlifts

After about an hour of sightseeing, we headed back to our debutant slopes and I skied for about another 2 hours. It was literally a slippery slope for me as no matter how much I wanted to ski properly, I just could not do it without the proper knowledge in skiing. And that made me a very dangerous person to contend with on the slopes: I was a disaster waiting to happen on skis! Haha. But luckily there were zero KIA, MIA and WIA at the end of the day.

So that just about ended my first experience of skiing in France. Good or bad, I just can't say, since I pretty much have close to zero prior experience to compare it with. But one thing's for sure: I certainly won't be in a hurry to head back to the ski slopes!!! =D

at the end of the day..

dead tired