7/5 - berlin
1. carried 18+ kg of luggage and 4+kg of bag up to 6th floor. omg. did it again today, arms and legs aching. lots of exercise indeed
2. did a "chocolate tour" haha. went to rittersport and fassbender & rausch. much chocolate omg, it's like eating chocolate or drinking hot chocolate everyday...good thing we got stair exercise then haha.
7/6 - berlin
1. went on the city walking tour. brandenburg gate - recognize it from your photo. saw memorial of murdered jews. really good, really much thoughts. make me feel sad and like it could had been any one of us, and how would i have reacted if i were one of the non-jews. would i have turned a blind eye or actually risk my life helping those jews? i think i would turn a blind eye…. sigh.
2. went to altes museum, looked at greek and roman stuff. more naked bodies. more lusty things. found out actually in roman culture they did have "phallus cults", where they kind of worship or place the phallus first. big, and exaggerated. same as in early modern japan shunga! also same thing about man and boy relations, no man-man relations!
3. tried berlin beer for the first time. the one with the green woodruff syrup, not even just the raspberry hoho. did you try it before? it's actually interesting, very sweet and hardly any taste of beer, but i definitely got some alcohol rush. face red/ears red etc. definitely. tasted kind of like soda/sweet drinks, interesting.
4. went to schloss charlottenburg. not as nice as versailles palace, but quite interesting. the queen sophie charlotte was really into porcelain and eastern art and culture, everywhere i see chinese and japanese influence, even javanese. never knew they did trading so early on (1800s). again the garden was french influenced, with some english style now. it's kind of funny how french gardens are imported to germany lol.
5. same as french and german cathedrals.
6. so hot omg, sweating all the time
7. saw couples, korean, german. missed you a lot.
7/9 - lucerne, switzerland
1. on the way to lucerne, met malaysian family. asked them if they were singaporeans. also heard some singaporeans in lucerne, and oh so many chinese/taiwanese. i think lucerne much more popular asian destination than zurich…
2. went to mount pilatus via the silver round trip route: take a train to alpnachstad, a cogwheel railway up to pilatus - it's the steepest cogwheel railway in the world with a gradient of 48%! lots of nice views on the railway
3. did some hikes up there, but it was so freaking cold and windy and foggy because of the rain :/ and cold. wait a few minutes then the clouds/fog disperse because of strong winds and you see the view emerge. really learn to appreciate the view because it was so hard to come by and you suffer the bitter cold and winds T.T a pity about the weather though. would have wanted to do more hiking but it's ok, the view would be the same after all the effort >.> talked to some chinese briefly at lunch (to help them out with ordering) and when climbing some hiking thing to ask if there was a view. there were quite a few kids i interacted with/observed today, very cute
4. took the cable car down, more photos. really beautiful. the cows have cowbells around their neck, quite nice
5. then bus back to lucerne. walked around, quite beautiful and quaint but rain rain rain :( saw a dying lion memorial, quite sad because it's to remember the 700+ swiss mercenaries who died in vain, because the king louis retreated to safety but didn't tell them lol.
6. walked castle towers and walls. saw lots of koreans and chinese. more like a protective castle wall to protect the town than a castle per se, but it's cool. now i know how difficult it really is to attack such a protected town and scale the wall. it's really really tall, they have uphill advantage and can shoot you to death easily. omg.
7. had cheese fondue and rosti today. truly swiss i am :) reminds me of melting pot, we should try next time.
