Category: Europe

The beautiful Copenhagen.

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Whoever wrote this post about the miserable Copenhagen must have hacked into my WordPress account and written an entry in my name. No one in their right mind would ever hate Copenhagen.

I mean, how could you not love it when the people there are so nice? When I desperately needed some coins to change, a shop attendant went around the department store to find someone who had some coins for me so that I could buy my metro ticket from the machine. Or the friendly guy in Baresso who did not mind when I paid him using 1000 kroner note for a 48 kroner ice-blended chocolate drink and he ended up using up all his change for that morning. And he kept assuring me it was fine and wished me a great day after that!

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A drink from my favourite coffee chain in the world.

On a beautiful day, you will be treated with a view like this right in the city centre at Nyhavn, which happened to be my favourite harbour in the world.

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Header of the Month: Waterloo Bridge.

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On Waterloo Bridge where we said our goodbyes,
the weather conditions bring tears to my eyes.
I wipe them away with a black woolly glove
And try not to notice I’ve fallen in love

On Waterloo Bridge I am trying to think:
This is nothing. you’re high on the charm and the drink.
But the juke-box inside me is playing a song
That says something different. And when was it wrong?

On Waterloo Bridge with the wind in my hair
I am tempted to skip. You’re a fool. I don’t care.
the head does its best but the heart is the boss-
I admit it before I am halfway across

– Serious Concerns by Wendy Cope

The miserable Copenhagen.

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Note: I am in the midst of writing a very happy post about London, but really have to intercept with this little ranting just because I was having a very bad day. And publishing it to the whole world to see somehow makes me feel better. Strangely.

Perhaps it was because my closest friends here have moved out. Or maybe because the guy in the ticket counter was not friendly. Or maybe because my Airbnb host here was not responding to my messages at first. Or maybe because no one helped me in the bus when I could not pick up the umbrella I dropped because of my hefty luggage. Or maybe because it rained when I had to drag my suitcase down the street to find the correct bus stop. Or maybe because nothing seemed to work in the badminton stadium, from the WiFi to my own internet. Or maybe because the TV screen in the bus had to freeze and I ended up missing my stop and had to walk all the way back in the rain. Or maybe my heart has not quite settled from saying bye to some people dearest to me in London.

But Copenhagen seems to have lost its charm to me.

The metro seemed all too crowded for my liking and the facilities did not seem to hold for the growing number of people. The rain seemed much drearier than in London even though it was rarely sunny when I was there. The people seemed a lot less friendly than how I remembered them. I am watching badminton, my favourite and most well acquainted sports in the world, but everything and everyone seemed so foreign to me.

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Notting Hill Carnival.

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I’m starting to sense a pattern here. Whenever I discover something accidentally, it is normally when I’m in a pursuit of food.

It happened again last Sunday. I was getting hungry after having a nice lie-in, and I stepped out of the flat very sure of one thing: I would like to have a hoisin duck wrap from Pret-A-Manger, a fruit smoothie and possibly a high-fibre muffin. So I set off, with the firm purpose in mind, to look for the nearest Pret-A-Manger.

But soon I got distracted by the thumping noise that seemed to come from just down the road. Since I did not know where the nearest Pret anyway, I decided to just follow the noise and see what was happening and turned back to take the tube from the station I normally go.

Except that I lost my bearing as soon as I walked a different way. When I chanced upon the street map, I seemed to have already veered pretty far from where I was supposed to go (and I still had not found the source of the noise by the way). So I decided to go to the nearest tube station shown on the map, Royal Oak. By that point in time, I was already very hungry and could not wait to see Pret.

As it turned out, Royal Oak tube station was closed for the day, and I was told to keep walking to the next tube station, Bayswater. Grumpily, I kept walking, not realising that I was walking right into the Notting Hill Carnival, the biggest street carnival in Europe!

When I finally figured out what was going on, I got really excited and decided to explore what was happening in the carnival.

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This was what made me realise there must have been something special going on.

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Changing the Guard, Buckingham Palace.

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Watching Changing the Guard at the Buckingham Palace is probably one of the most touristy things to do in London. And when I say touristy, it really felt like all the tourists in the city were gathered there to watch the men in red and tall hat march.

I only managed to will myself to do it during this trip, which is already my fourth in London. It did not even occur to me during my previous three trips to check on the days and timing of this seemingly important every-other-day occasion. It was only this time that I found it rather obligatory to have this ticked off my London to-do lists.

As it turned out, I totally underestimated the number of people who were going to be there. In my mind, I was thinking that this could not have been THAT popular anymore since everyone must have seen before? It somehow did not occur to me that London still remains one of the most visited cities in the world and all new tourists are probably keen to see this as first on their list.

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Because of this very mistaken assumption, I did not arrive there early and only turned up right before the whole ceremony started. Unsurprisingly, I was seriously lost when I got there, not knowing where I should be standing, where I should be looking. Throughout the whole time, I could not see very much what was going on (although I doubt there was much anyway) apart from hearing the marching band playing. So to make you avoid making the same mistake, this is how the Changing the Guard looks like if you don’t plan to reach there early.

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The accidental discovery of Thun.

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Sometimes the best things in life come unexpectedly. This is why I love travelling and not planning in too much detail into it. I would normally have a rough idea or two of what I want to do in a city, leaving room for surprises.

When we planned the trip to Interlaken, I did not know what we would do in the city itself apart from heading to Jungfraujoch early in the morning for the second day.

So in the afternoon, we decided to take the Thunersee Lake Cruise departing from Interlaken West. The journey itself was beautiful, cruising along beautiful mountains and cottages nestled along the slopes.

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But what was waiting at the end of the journey was equally wonderful. I had never even heard of Thun before this. When we took the train from Bern to Interlaken, I only brushed it off as one of the train stations in the middle of nowhere. However, it was actually a pretty little town with population of about 42,000 people. There were hardly any international tourists there – it seemed much more widely popular with the locals.

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Sunset from Schindellegi.

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There is something about sunsets that is entrancing – the blue sky tinted with orange streaks before turning into complete darkness. The sky is always beautiful when you see it from just about anywhere. And when you watch it from the hilltop at Schindellegi, accompanied by the fragrant smell of fresh grass and an unobstructed view of Lake Zürich, it is infinitely more charming.

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Header of the Month: Thunersee Cruise, Interlaken.

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Life is made of many beautiful moments. If you are not careful, they might just pass you by and you may not even realise it. Sometimes though you can be lucky and capture those moments in photographs.

switzcruise1 (2)And when that happens, share for the world to see, so they can all know how beautiful the world, and of course life, is.

Millefeuille at Café de la Paix, Paris.

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It is my last day here in Paris after 2 weeks of awesome family holiday (which I still have a lot to write on), and I have some time to spare before my train from Gare du Nord to London in 3 hours’ time. It is lunch time and raining – a sensible person would have taken this opportunity to go to a nice café to sit and have some proper lunch before catching the train.

Unfortunately (or fortunately in this case), I’m not a sensible person. I went to a nice café alright, but instead of having a sandwich or salad like a normal person would, I decided to have dessert for lunch.

Café de la Paix was recommended by a friend of mine and his exact words to me were: “If you have the time and money to spare, please go to café de la paix and order a millefeuille.”

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I did have the time and just enough money to choose between a salad or a millefeuille for lunch. I obviously chose the latter.

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Sound of Music re-enacted, in Salzburg.

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As we were entering Salzburg by train, my mind was already firm with a conclusion: Salzburg is my favourite city in this trip.

Never mind that we are only halfway through the trip and we still have the whole of Switzerland that we haven’t seen. But how can you not declare your undying love for a place when coming in the city by train you pass through green hills and mountains studded with small cottages? Also, this was the city where the Sound of Music was filmed, a movie that I practically grew up with. So my premature conclusion was perfectly justified, really.

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Immediately in my mind, I was humming the lyrics of ‘My Favourite Things’ from the Sound of Music.

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kitten
Bright copper kettle and warm woollen mitten
Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favourite things…

We were greeted by sunny weather and clear blue sky, a perfect weather for us to go about the city in bikes. We had places reserved for all of us with the Frauhlein Maria Bike Tour, and check out the post card view that I snapped at the start of the tour.

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Everything was perfect.

Up until the point when we saw ominous clouds approaching when we were at one of the squares.

Continue reading “Sound of Music re-enacted, in Salzburg.” →