The Hills are Alive with the Sound of my Stomach

Oh beautiful, peaceful Austria. The last stop to our Europe jaunt was this beautiful country filled with rolling hills and massive palaces.  I believe I would have enjoyed this place more if we weren't all sick and tired and sore and broke.  Everyday of sightseeing grew more and more torturous for my feet and spirit.  It even got to the point where Sepehr, our unofficial group photographer got sick of taking pictures!  Instead of his usual 200 snaps a day, he maybe only tok around 75 a day.  Woe!

To heal my pain, I ate. I ate a lot in Vienna and in Salzburg. All I can remember is popping into restaurants and bakeries and cafes and stopping for something sweet, something warm, something delicious every chance we got.  It's no wonder I gained weight when I got back to Cali!

Here, we all got a massive craving for home food, Persian food.  Oddly enough, we found one a few streets down from our hostel!  We quickly hightailed it there for a bountiful lunch.

Ten minutes after our ginormous Persian feast, we headed down the street and stopped by a bakery for some divine gelato, cappachino, and pastry.  I love how these European shops would always provide a small glass of water to go with the sweets.  They know even the sweetest of sweet tooths can't handle that much treats.

Afternoons usually entailed some sort of bread or pastry.  I had heard that Vienna was famous for their "Wurstelstands" which are little stands that sell all different forms of hot dogs and pretzels.  I ordered the standard hot dog which is a sausage embedded in a drilled baguette and infused with ketchup and mustard already in the bun.  Every bite of the hot dog has melted cheese squirting out and it was a messy but ultra delicious treat.

Nightfall brought us to the ubiquitous Falafel and Kebab stands of Europe!  Everywhere we go has these establishments which are usually opened until 5 in the morning.  Kebabs are basically this humongous slab of meat hoisted up on a stand, roasting, with the oils dripping off.  When you order a kebab, the kebab seller would use a knife and scrape off the meat so they're in thin slices. Then he puts in into either a pita or regular hamburger bun and douses it with veggies, delicious sauces.  It is the BEST late night snack ever!  Also the best breakfast, lunch or dinner ever.  I'm really itching to open these up in LA.  I think college students getting the munchies would most definitely hit these late night spots.

We usually have to end our nights with something sweet.  Late night coffee shops proved to have just the sustenance.  Here is a cone filled with berries and cream. YUm!  We also visited the famous Mozart Cafe one evening and everyone thought a cup of hot chocolate infused with a little somethin' somethin' would warm our throats up. Turns out it did, it downright nearly burnt our throats! I think hot chocolate and alcohol should never mix.  And it never will in my cup again.

In between all that eating, we visited some sights.

Is it wrong that I'm between some of the greatest minds of Vienna at the University of Vienna and all I can think about is having a hot dog from the Wurstelstand?

Apple? Why yes, don't mind if I do!

In front of the world famous Vienna Opera House, dreaming of our next meal.

The interior of this chapel in Salzberg. Our growling stomachs probably disturbed much of its peacefulness and tranquility.

Pretty building. I wonder if there are any good restaurants nearby?

This is the house where Mozart was born and raised.  Looks just like a delicious slice of lemon cake huh?

St. Peter's cemetary, one of the famous landmarks where "Sound of Music" was based off on. The entire town of Salzburg was filled with these locations and we visited a few but wasn't able to find all of them.  I never got to take my "running down the hill like Maria and her children" picture.  Pity. But no worries, that Wurstelstand hot dog more than made up for it!

Beer and Bikes! And Boys!

Leaving my tracks in Munich, Germany.

My visit to Munich, Germany would have to be the highlight of my entire trip.  It was a definite change of scenery from Paris, where everything was hectic and stressful and the people were rude and furious.  Munich was very tourist-friendly and had a mix of big city life with small-town quaintness.  It was easy to maneuver around the city and many people spoke English. In fact, there were quite a lot of young backpackers and travelers just like us all over the place.  

Any place would have been an improvement over the last hell hole but our hostel, Easy Palace, was a surprisingly nice place.  It was truly a youth hostel, with teens infiltrating the lobby and bar and dorm-styled rooms complete with bunk beds.  

I indulged in some simple things here.  Drinking beer and biking around town.  The first night, we visited a huge tourist attraction: Hofbrauhaus.  This is a huge beer hall, with picnic seats set up to look like a huge dining room.  People eat and drink with strangers and there's a loud polka band that plays jolly tunes for drunk dancers.  We, being the sissy Americans by far, loved the Radler, which is a beer mixed with lemonade drink that supposedly only "sissies" down.  I personally see nothing wrong with being a lightweight! 

Sheila and I loved the Radler so much we were fighting for it!

The next day, we embarked on a bike tour where we were led by only the best tour guide ever, Lenny!  Lenny's Bike Tour is a free tour around the city of Munich where the bikes are provided for you and all you give them is tip at the end.  I hadn't ridden a bike for a couple of, oh, years so I was a tad nervous to get on it again. But within minutes, I was riding around, carefree and reminiscent of my elementary school days.  

The bike tour led us all around Munich, showing us some of the hotspots of the city.  History fills the place. As you may recall, Munich was one of the infamous places which Hitler occupied during his reign of terror.  It was incredible to learn about all the landmarks, places and people which have been affected just by one man and his thirst for power.  We were warned that people are still very emotional over this subject and just by even discussing it in a tour group, random people may come up to us and spit on us or cuss us out.  

Some other fun places we stopped by was a HUUGE nudist park.  It was a chilly day so there were only a few nudists sunbathing but even seeing the few opened my eyes up a bit!  We ended up at the largest beer garden for lunch where we engaged in a beer chugging contest.  At first, my team was leading but towards the end of the line, the other team had these guys from Sweden that, no joke, downed the beer in about 30 seconds each!  It was ridiculous watching them.

There was also this one other lady that we met on our tour.  She was like 80 years old but still a complete wild child! She was able to out-bike, out-beer chug most of us and was such a saucy old thing.  I can only hope to be as spirited and lively as she when I get to her age. Heck, I was I was as spirited and lively as she is right now!

Biking around has made me in love with the sport.  I am truly hoping to come back from Hong Kong and invest in a nice bike.  It helps the environment, keeps me healthy and is totally fun.  If anyone out there is also enthusiastic about bikes, totally hit me up and we'll bike around together!

But as for the beer, I think I can do without. I love beer in that it's easy to drink and good to get a buzz from but oh man, that beer belly!  I'll stick to water and champagne, thank you very much.

OOh... and just so you know, the boys around Germany were soooo cute!! All of them were super eye candies.  YUM YUM YUM. They were almost as delicious as this Girly (that's really its name!) ice cream bar I had on the train ride to see the Neuschwanstein castle, the one Disneyland's castle is based upon!

Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder

I've always admired Leonardo Da Vinci.  Always have, always will.  

I confess, my love for him sprang from the movie "Ever After" with Drew Barrymore which portrayed him as a kindly, comedic old man who just happened to be the smartest and most talented guy ever alive. And he was quite the matchmaker.  It grew with the Da Vinci code which spotlighted his most famous works of art to me.  His style is uniquely his own and the fact that he invented and painted and sketched made him all the more of a Renaissance man to me.  Whenever I get asked the question, "If you could meet anyone, dead or alive?" (and I get asked that a lot more than you'd think), I always answer with an enthusiastic, "Leonardo Da Vinci!"  

But seriously, what is the big frickin' deal with the Mona Lisa? 

I know, I know. It's the seductive half smile.  It's the moony eyes that seem to follow you everywhere you turn.  It's the milky skin.  But when you put it all together, you have to admit that she's a little bit creepy-looking.

It really just proves that some things really don't live up to the hype and that everyone's perception of what if beautiful are really really different.  Thankfully, the rest of the Louvre really was amazing.  A morning truly wasn't enough time to explore the treasure trove but I did the best I could, traipsing around the museum by myself, getting lost, turning this way and then that way.  I encountered some pretty groovy things.

I think this just about covers my college tuition. And then some.

Loving the Louvre

Now the "Winged Victory of Samothrace" truly was something to stare at

Most of the paintings at the Louvre were so depressing and gloomy.  This was the first one that made me smile.

She was so close to being "Mona Lisa!"

The Louvre, inside and out, is a masterpiece. A work of art. I'd definitely go back a couple more times to finish the galleries.  And maybe just to check out Mona Lisa again and see if she improved with age.  

I kind of have a crush on the Eiffel tower

That can be the only explanation as to why, in the three days I was in Paris, I would visit the national monument three times and take countless pictures of the thing at all hours of the day and night..

Take pictures (most of them in the air) with the thing...

Climb up the stairs and take pictures inside the thing...

And take pictures of the gorgeous view the thing looks out to.

Yea, I may not have loved Paris but what I have with the Eiffel Tower? That's love.

Oh and when I say I take the pictures, I really mean Sepehr and Eddie and Nicole. Thanks guys!

No Je'taime Paris, No Je'taime!

After our Glion summer program ended, me and four brave companions, Jessica, Hagop, Sheila and Sepehr bullet-trained it to Paris, France.  

We did not have the best time getting there.  The morning we left, we were still suffering from hangovers and heartbreak (from the program ending).  

And all of us had packed too much. Each person lugged about two sizable wheeled suitcases around up Switzerland hills and through Parisian streets and lifting them onto trains and lifting them off metros and lifting them in general put everyone in an even worse mood than before.  

And the bullet-train was not as fast as a bullet (false advertisement!)  

And we were tired. 

And we were hungry. 

And Paris smelled. 

And we couldn't find our hotel.  

We had nary even stepped foot outside Paris when two of my compadres collapsed into tears and giggles right in the middle of the central train station.

When we got to the hotel, we found out that the worst wasn't over yet.  

Our hotel room is what you would call "shabby chic" without the "chic" and an extra emphasis on the "shabby."  It was rated one star and as you can tell from our genuine facial reactions to our living situation, we were trying to figure out how they got the one star.

We made the best out of our situation though.  Here I am sanitizing the knobs and switches to our room with hand wipes.

We even found it in ourselves to celebrate in our room.  Here we are clinking plastic bottles and cups of sparkling wine and missing one of our members, Jessica, who ran away from our awful hotel (just kidding, Jessica went back to Zurich to get her brother. She reunited with us in Munich later on).

And the outside of Paris was not all bad.  There were amazing monuments to check out...

Lovely parks to relax in...

Quaint flea markets to browse through...

And the world famous Champs Elysee to people watch. 

We strolled through the street a couple of times, stopping at the gorgeous and untoppable sweets shop, La Duree (Dorothy, I can't believe you never told me about this place!) and Haagen Dazs for some treats.  The macaroons from La Duree were to die for and the ice cream at Haagen Dazs were jaw dropping (and surprisingly different from what we get in the U.S. Must be the milk). 

By nightfall, we trekked back to Champs for some dancing at the fabulous gay club (though we didn't know it was one at the time), "Queen."  I personally had a really good time.  The music was divine, the guys were HOT HOT HOT but no pressure because they didn't swing my way and the dance floor was packed.  My guy friends, who got butt grazed a couple of times, might not feel the same way.  

We arrived in Paris in tears but left with smiles.  I'm still not completely as smitten with this city as many others may be but it definitely was a sight to see.

*Photos courtesy of Sepehr and especially of his "Sepehr shots."