x.x's...

2011-10-02T11:54:00.001-04:00

人真的很懒，可以一个早上起来开word但是不写一个字，就这样混到午饭时间。

书果然是读得越多越觉得自己无知。毕业设计写到现在似乎有很多很多想写，但是却又不知道怎么写。柏辽兹是天才。他的浮士德解构安排上看似和歌德的很像，但到了结尾你会发现，怎么他的浮士德到最后变得完完全全不一样了呢，什么时候开始变化的，你也不知道。就这样，我一笨蛋尝试着分析柏辽兹，你说辛不辛苦。

Liszt: Am Rhein, im schönen Strome

2011-09-18T11:46:00.001-04:00

the best of Aspen

2011-08-08T21:54:00.004-04:00

7th week, 7th week! Time flies, but I'm so not ready for school, wish summer never ends.

Maroon Bells, the prettiest spot in Aspen. Elevation: 14,163ft.

海拔4317米的科罗拉多高原

Mama deer and her child were wandering outside my window watching me nap.

Renee Fleming sings Gretchen am Spinnrade by Schubert

2011-04-28T16:15:00.012-04:00

Was writing a paper on the Spinnrade scene, found this amazing video by Renee Fleming and Christoph Eschenbach. Even tho the end of the scene is quite different from Goethe's text, Schubert still did a good job interpretation Gretchen's agitation, and this video is by far the best heard.

A road trip

2011-03-31T01:50:00.010-04:00

from Nevada to California. You can see the cloud and rain in the far distance. Mother nature is amazing.

Arizona. Look at those weirdly-shaped cactus, I was in the desert for real!

Grand Canyon

Never have enough beautiful words to describe what I saw. Compare to crazy night life in Las Vegas , I much more prefer this way to spend my vacation. I belong to the nature, belong to the air that makes me feel free and happy.

La Damnation de Faust. Szene 9

2011-03-12T12:23:00.005-05:00

Berlioz's Faust is indeed more humanized, right?

across the boundary

2011-03-12T10:18:00.005-05:00

浮士德很难懂，第一部分读完了，还是不怎么理解他的哲学。

有点郁闷..
发现最近更新部落格比较勤奋，好吧，上传一段我喜欢的录像，笑一个来~

这几个丹麦人真有想象力。偶尔看到去年夏天在慕尼黑街头拍的一段录像，让我很羡慕street artist。

朋友和熟人

2011-03-04T15:45:00.010-05:00

冬天回上海时见到了恩师L先生，闲聊中谈到了中国人，美国人和欧洲人的不同。自然，很难一概而论。中国太大，南北尚有差异；欧洲有各国不同的文化；美国更是个大杂烩。先生说，他很想研究中国古典文学，因为他看不透中国人，不理解中国人。我当时狂热地想研究佛学，于是就聊开了去。

我提到了去年在德国的三个月。我的导师是瑞士德语区人，也是我去欧洲之前唯一有过长期接触的欧洲人。去了德国先在海德堡小住，住家爸爸是乐团的中提琴手，妈妈给报社写乐评，无固定工作。妈妈会因为爸爸偷懒跟我说英文而训斥我们，很可爱。后来去德国北部的音乐节，也就接触了乐团管理层的德国人，另外只就跟中国人和美国人混了，所以德语也没长进多少，此处按下不表。

德国人的stereotype是刻板，与美国人的热情奔放截然不同。德国人的礼貌是建立在距离感上的，他们对人，尤其是亚洲人非常友好，因为我们是客人，并且可能永远只是客人。但是德国人又可以跟你跟近，一旦熟悉了。德国人的诚实，认真让我感动，虽然有时候认真得会让人抓狂。美国人可以和你一拍即合，但是那种距离感却是永远无法逾越的。这距离感并不是对我一个客人才有的，而是每个人之间都有的距离感。每个人都怕触犯什么规矩，每个人都过着自己的日子，哪怕你再好的朋友都会说，"I don't wanna get into this." -- 非常直接，非常冷。

我说，欧洲人和中国人有几分相似，in terms of brotherhood，因为中国人可以有很近很近的朋友。在欧洲生活多年的L先生对我的结论有些惊讶。他说在这一点上中国人和美国人相似。在中国这些年，周围有很多朋友，但不知道谁是真正的朋友。

我明白了，那时候真的突然明白了，为什么德国人不轻易交朋友，为什么他们的Freund仅指男朋友，而朋友却称作Bekannte，熟人而已。英语中呢，friends是各种朋友的统称，不管是有过一面之交的，还是爱得死去活来的男女朋友。感叹一下，不仅为博大精深的语言，更为文化差异。

不知道什么时候可以找到适合自己的地方生活。有时会怀念澳大利亚人的热情--也许我那时还太小，没有什么事情能让我不愉快的。

还是没心没肺好。

格林童话确实是令人战栗的

2010-12-16T09:24:00.010-05:00

真的是巧。前两天才读到白雪公主的恋父情结和王子的恋尸癖，今天因为写term paper上网找资料的时候看到一条新闻，中国友谊出版社出版的《令人战栗的格林童话》因为色情内容被查封了，12月16日新华社消息：“白雪公主与父亲乱伦才招来王后的追杀；王子爱上死去的公主是因为恋尸癖……这些肆意篡改格林童话经典情节、大量颠覆了经典童话形象的内容不堪入目，对未成年人身心健康的危害也一目了然。” 事实上，格林童话并不是格林兄弟们所写，而是他们收集的民间故事，一般在农民中间流传。格林兄弟因为当时的社会政治背景，基于对德语文学做点贡献的想法，才开始编辑这些民间故事，经过几次再版后才有了现在我们读到的为儿童所写的版本；而中涉及的乱伦和性幻想也是本来故事中就有的，佛洛依德对格林童话也进行过精神分析，所谓的色情内容并不是近来被人所添加。例如小红帽中，原始版本是大灰狼让小红帽睡在他旁边，这也正是为什么大灰狼没有在半路上就先吃掉小红帽的原因；白雪公主中关于皇后戳破手指而流出的鲜血和公主的红唇是对处女的幻想；还有追杀白雪公主的是她的亲生母亲而非继母，正是因为她与自己父亲的乱伦而惹祸。格林兄弟为了删除乱伦情节才将亲生母亲改为继母。童话中其他与现在社会格格不入的内容，例如反犹太民族，性别歧视，还有大量继母角色的存在折射出当时人们对婚姻的态度，都是呈现两百年前社会的最好例证，难道我们就应该对所有童话都封杀吗？

为什么社会发展到今天这个地步，还要谈性色变？并且可以因此颠倒是非，蒙蔽不知情的人们。

recent update

2010-09-18T11:21:00.036-04:00

Going into the fourth week of school, when is my next vacation?

I can hardly believe it's been a while already since my big Europe trip. Things are pretty much the same, except for the part that I miss Salzau more and more. Just downloaded all the recordings from the summer and listened to it, wish summer never ends.

Moving back to suite now, after a year in a lousy big dorm where it smells like shit 24/7 and still didn't know my pot-headed neighbors when I moved out. Have three lovely roommates, one of which is Rach, of course, my lovely old roomie from sophomore year who now started cooking everyday to make our suite smells like yummy food all the time. The other two girls are sophomores who share a double room together. It's kinda funny to see them so happy all the time cuz it's exactly like me and rach back two years ago, while two other roommates were always staying in their rooms minding their own business -- senior year is no fun. Maybe it's just the process that everyone goes through.

Also, as what we planned, my quartet rehearses in our common room only, never hits the practice rooms anymore, especially when three of the four members live together. How nice is that.

Das Ende

2010-08-31T19:11:00.020-04:00

Aug. 27

I flew back from Vienna to New York, transferred at Munich. The last time on the Lufthansa flight this summer, I was lucky enough to be on Airbus 340 from Munich to New York, a very new kind of model with two floors where there were 5 bathrooms on the first floor. I was sitting at the second to the last row, even though there was one bathroom right behind me, I rather ran downstairs all the time like a little kids cuz it was fun. The space was big, four seats in the front rows but only three seats in the back, and I just got lucky. A truly great way to end my summer.

Aug. 28,

Finally back in reality, there's no more summer fantasy, though it was still summer. I couldn't describe how loud New York is... Had dinner with my friend in her apartment in Manhattan, I realized my alcohol tolerance has skyrocketed. We were just talking about our summers, and I still couldn't believe 90 says just passed like that.

Aug. 29,

Hurt my arms from carrying my viola, laptop bag and a 25kg suitcase down the subway at the same time, still feel sore now. Although -- I am proud of myself for the first time that I carried all these myself instead of looking around at the subway entrance and waiting for help.

p.s. I was too busy to update the blog in Aug., now I could only post some pictures. Too much happened in those 90 days, I grew, I learned, and I appreciate all what I've got in my life.

Castle is empty now, but this summer remains in my life forever.

Vienna

2010-08-31T18:35:00.026-04:00

Aug.22-27

Finally done with all the concerts, I thought it was time to go back to the states, but it turns out that my visa wouldn't be expired until 27th, so I went to Vienna. That was a 10-hour long train ride.

the most famous cake in Vienna: Sacher Torte

Stephansdom, the biggest cathedral

Vienna is the city for arts. I couldn't count how many museums I went. There are some museums that allow photography, but this is the only museum picture I took, because all the paintings are too beautiful, I tried to keep them in memory, but not in the camera.

Schloß Schönbrunn, imperial castle. I visited 22 room out of hundreds, including the room where Mozart played for the Austria emperor when he was 6 years old.

The restaurant where I had my last dinner in Europe, with my Korean sister, Sujin. It was such a good Austrian dinner which will always be in my mind.

City Hall at night. Vienna Philharmonic was on tour when I was there...so there was public screening of great concerts in front of the city hall every night. huge, huge screen.

Friday, Aug.13

2010-08-31T18:16:00.025-04:00

I was so drunk the night before, with my roomie Hannah. We finished the whole bottle of Vodka and puked until 3am. She even puked twice in the next day.

After three-hour sleep, I woke up at 7am with a horrible headache, and realized it was Friday the 13th, sighed.

Short rehearsal break at 12. I went out of the rehearsal hall, heard Misha calling my name and standing right there with roses. I couldn't figure out what was going on, I thought it was just dream -- until half of the orchestra was standing in the distance watching us. He could not have possibly flew over from New York to here, a castle in the middle of nowhere in northern Germany, to surprise me. How did he get here? How did he know where exactly I was? When did he start planning the trip? When was the last time I talked to him? So many questions popped up in my head and I had no clue.

He arrived at Hamburg airport at 7 am, rent a car, drove two hours in a totally foreign country, with a google map he printed out from home, to Salzau, the castle where I was living in. We spent 13 hours together that day, since he had to drive back to Hamburg airport at 3 am and catch a flight back home. He couldn't really function because of the non-stop travel, it was touching.

He made my most unforgeable day in this trip.

Thank you, I love you.

miscellaneous

2010-08-31T18:08:00.014-04:00

Kiel, a harbor city north of Hamburg, is the capital city of Schleswig-Holstein state. After 22 year of stay in the castle "Culture Center", Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival will move to Lübeck because of the money issue. There was a huge protest in Kiel, where the state government is, led by the festival orchestra members. I didnt go that day cuz I was sick, but still regret today...

Here are some collection of pictures from Kiel, Lübeck, Hamburg, Berlin and Wiesbaden.

Kiel

Lübeck

Wiesbaden

Mudflat walk near Danmark

Prague, Czech Republic

2010-08-28T10:23:00.012-04:00

July 3rd & 4th

We had our charter flights for the tour: Krakow to Budapest, Budapest to Prague. When everyone was on board, we were ready to go.

pictures taken from the flight deck.

Prague is too beautiful for words. Just let pictures talk

view of Prague

Budapest, Hungary

2010-07-09T12:23:00.013-04:00

July 2

We arrived in Budapest around noon, greeted by the incredible heat.

Our hotel was in city center area, great location. I asked the hotel reception where I could go for some sightseeing, and the guy's English reminds me of Levente, my Hungarian friend from college:) Dress rehearsal wouldn't start until 5pm, but the bus would leave the hotel at 3, so I decided to leave the group and go see around with two of my friends, Ma and Jennifer. Hopefully we could find the concert hall in time for rehearsal. Following will be the craziness in the next 12 hours.

There's a small mountain called Paranoma blah??? (please help me out Tamas! alone with the name of the bridge that leads to it, please) where you can see the view of the whole city, 10 minutes walking distance from my hotel. on the bottom of the small hill there's a church in a cave, very unique. Compare to the hot weather, inside of the church is heaven. We started climbing the hill, oh yes we found a short cut where there were not that many people. Half way through I was already tired from traveling around, so kinda slowed down. Ma was ahead of me. When she was nowhere to be seen but still urging me to hurry up, I was puzzled. When I went passed a turn, I realized why... A naked guy was standing right there, touching himself and showing us his thing... so me and Jennifer ran away like crazy ducks...

Anyhow, we finally went up to the top, and the view was truely amazing:)

the church in the cave

We returned to the hotel and got our instruments, time to head to the concert hall.

It took us a while to find the subway and figure out how to buy the tickets. Hungarian is not like Polish, which at least I was able to guess a little bit. Hungarian is THE most insane language in the world, no such thing like "one of", and not that many Hungarians speak English on the street. So at the ticket machine, we ended up all buying the cheapest tickets cuz we understood nothing. After having bought the tickets, we found the English flag on the machine...epic fail. Anyways, we bought the right tickets.

Time passed by but we were not able to figure out the directions in the subway, even though I was holding the map and the reception guy wrote down the station names for me. I got so nervous already because it was only 20 minutes away from the rehearsal. At that time, a hero came... a guy asked us if we needed any help, IN ENGLISH! Thank god. He said he was going to the same direction, so we could just follow him. So we went on the train, it was the opposite direction from which we thought was right. I told our life saver that we just got there from Krakow, he asked me if that was the capital city of Poland~!@#$% anyhow, we got off the train, he was nice enough to walk us to the concert hall, the Palace of Art. It was such a big hall that we had to run here and there to find the back stage. By the time we found the stage, we saw the conductor's car just stopped...We ran to the stage, thank GOD that we arrived one minute before rehearsal started.

I've been looking for a new viola, and I heard eastern european instruments are cheaper than German ones. Through a friend I contact a violin maker in Budapest, and he brought two violas for me that day. He was so nice enough to let me take the violas to backstage without writing anything down. I tried them during break and played the one I liked for Mahler Symphonie No.1. It was a little too big for me, but it was incredibly nice to try out some instrument during the short stay.

By the time we got back to the hotel after the concert, it was already 10:30pm, and we were leaving in the next morning at 8. BUT THIS IS BUDAPEST, we can't leave the beautiful city just like that! so here comes the next adventure...

I, together with other 7, took the subway up to the Parlament house. It was so beautiful, well, I suppose...because we couldn't see much at night. The river view was stoning. Across the river there were castles all over, I wanted to spend a whole night just sit there and do nothing. Maybe some beer would be great.

From there, we walked alone the river, to the south. Passed a famous bridge (again forgot the name, help me!) which was the intersession to the east side of the city. It was 12am already and those Korean girls in the group decided to go back. We kept walking, hero square was our next destiny.

the bridge I was talking about

We stopped so much just to take pictures. It was pretty pointless but I had a picture in front of the opera house, in which Mahler was the manager. Anyhow, by 1 am we were still not any close to hero square, and there's nobody to ask around. We decided to get Kebab and ice cream, then go back. At the ice cream shop, the owner speaks German, that made our life tons easier already. He told us it was not far, maybe another half hour walk. You cannot imagine how tired we were by then. So much non-stop traveling and concerts and now this crazy walk...so we asked him how much the taxi would cost. He told us a trick: only get government-owned taxis, but not private ones, cuz those private taxis smug tourrists. He also told us the difference: government-owned taxis always have a sequent phone number, like 4444, outside the car (I cant remember clearly...) At that time, a guy with a bottle of beer came up to us and asked if we needed help, IN ENGLISH! It turned out that he was going to the same direction as we were, so he could walk with us for a little bit. Then a gang of Asian kids walking at 2 am on the street, with a Hungarian guy holding a beer. How funny is that.

So we finally arrived at hero square. Jennifer suddenly said, oh I've been here three years ago...no words... I couldn't see anything there, true story. Then we took a taxi back to the hotel. and that was it...

We got back at 3 am, People at the hotel were speechless when we told them we went to hero square at this late.

I have to go back to Budapest in some other time. This trip doesn't count.

next stop Prague. Wait for it...

Krakow, Poland.

2010-07-03T18:19:00.017-04:00

June 30 - July 1

After non-sleep traveling starting

at 2 am, we finally arrived Krakow, Poland in the afternoon. I looked like shit, no kidding.

After a short nap, my roommate Yale and I decided to go out. On the tour book, it says Euros are wildly accepted in Poland, which we found out was not true at all... couldn't find any store to spend some euros, oh and nobody speaks English/German... soon on the bus, realized we took the opposite direction and again, euros are not accepted on the bus. so We got off the bus and took the other bus back to the hotel. Polish currency, Zloty, is about 0.24 Euro, I changed 1 dollar for 3 zloties in the hotel, which was enough for a bus ride to downtown area.

So we head out, this time Bing and Weijia joined us - my roommate saw them in the bus stop which was going the wrong direction. Now we have money, but didn't know how to buy a ticket -- there's no English instruction on the ticket machine. Luckily Polish is somehow a little similiar to English and German, at least we can guess some of the words, so we eventually bought the tickets, hope it was right.

Krakow is the oldest Polish city, it got quite a history. I felt pity when we cancelled the trip to Warsaw, but Krakow seems decent enough for us to spend two days browsing around. Compare to fancy German towns, this eastern European city is old enough to remind me of Shanghai in early 90s, but with a unique kind of taste, which cannot be described in words. I was amazed by the variety of fashion there. You can totally see people from communist times and those in super modern high heels with strongest make up at the same time.

We had dinner in a cute restaurant in an alley. we had plenty Pierogi, very Polish, very yummy, just like Chinese dumplings but not as good :).

We were wandering around in the main square, it was very relaxing and romantic. This Gotic clock tower is now a history museum, every hour there's a trumpet player playing something. This time we heard Mahler 5, the beginning of the trumpet solo, very nice. After dinner we had ice cream in one of the shops in the square. The Polish waitress was super cute :))) Around 11ish Yale and I went to a Polish bar, had a beer sitting outside to avoid the smoke.

The second day in Krakow.

We wanted to go to Auschwitz, the concentration camp for Jews back in WWII, but it was too far from our hotel and we missed the bus in the morning. So Yale and I went to Schindler's office instead. It was pretty depressing, but I admire Germans for facing the history and admitting what they've done.

I think I have a memory slip... have no idea what I did after the concert that night, so whatever...

update since June 18

2010-07-01T06:11:00.015-04:00

Two weeks ago I left Heidelberg, had a loooooong train ride to Kiel, transfered multiple times, followed by a half-hour long bus ride, phew...That trip crossed Germany from the south near France all the way to the most north place near Danmark.

We basically have 9-hour rehearsal everyday. The first week was pretty terrible. Food was bad, always felt tired. Now things are cool, or just say im used to it... and that's why my travel blog died...no time to update.

This is the beautiful castle I am living in right now

A Room with a View

I take a walk every morning before orchestra, with my new friend Jenn. I love the fact that I live in European countryside, in the middle of nowhere

you know when Germany lost the world cup to Spain, this would totally happen in a festival where there are both Germans and Spanish. LMAO

Tag 18-20 last days in Heidelberg

2010-06-17T08:55:00.016-04:00

Have to end my language class one week early for the music festival. After the test yesterday, I was finally done with the semester, but couldn't be happy because of the early departure. We had a substitute teacher who had taught in Hongkong University and I loved her teaching, too bad that was the only day I would be in her class. During the break, my advisor Prof. Kempf came to say goodbye to me. Thank him, our sugar daddy, for arranging such amazing activities; found viola recitals for me even tho I couldn't go to any of them...and tried to figure out train schedule to Hamburg for me.

Last sight of the beautiful city. Taken on the way to school.

Will be packing and writing a thanks note to my sweet host family for the rest of the day.

Tschüss, Heidelberg, meine lieblings Stadt.

Tag 15-17 couple hours in Speyer

2010-06-15T11:05:00.034-04:00

I am very behind my travel log, must catch up.

Tag 15, Sunday. I skipped hiking with the group but relaxed tons at home. Traveling is...tiring. The only achievement that day was the dinner I made for my host family. I've never ever made a whole dinner for myself, or my parents, not to mention for a family with 6 people. I somehow made it! So here is the menu: Tomato soup with eggs, green onion, preserved pickle; fried potato with green peppers; eggplant with beef; cold noodles with peanut butter sauce. Mostly successful, especially the crisp potato. The kids loved it and called it Chinese potato. There I found my potential in the kitchen.

Tag 16, Monday. Excursion to Speyer, a little town about 40 minutes away from Heidelberg. We went to a huge Dom of the emperor. Huge, Huge! Then we visited a Jewish church, much more down to the earth.

Tag 17, Tuesday. Movie "Goodbye, Liening" at night, came home and 8:30, then hang out with host family until 1am. I am so lucky to have such nice host parents that push me very hard to learn German. No English in the house sounds crazily impossible, but it helps. I will miss them so much when I leave Heidelberg.

Tag 14: Munich

2010-06-14T15:48:00.020-04:00

We got up at 9am, met our roommate, an American girl. I almost left my itouch on the table when I stepped out, thanks her for reminding me.

After breakfast, we went to the train station to meet up with the group. The plan was to travel with the group, but they moved too fast and we needed to slow down to enjoy a bit, so we lost the group literally five minutes later. Hooray for individualism.

Frauenkirche (Church of our Lady, or 圣母教堂) is our first stop. Christianity's greatest contribution to this world is the architecture. Standing in the middle of the church makes individual feel tiny in front of the God, so that all the cathedrals or churches are totally grandios and up there.

Glockenspiel in the City Hall everyday at noon. It is a replay of an ancient royal wedding in the past, the clock tower will strike 12 times and the puppet in the tower will dance. We were surprised to see it is actually like a real festival, so many people in that plaza everyday just to eat and drink, watch the show, relax.

It's a short film that I recorded at near the end.

After this we went back to Frauenkirche, to climb up to the top of the south tower, where you can see the whole city from different direction. Don't be shocked if I tell you I couldn't figure out where I've been from there. You might know my sense of directions by now.

view of Munich

We had lunch near Marienplatz, a restaurant in the open air. Pettitoes, potatoes and beer made my day, no more bread thank God. Beer in Bavaria is much lighter than that in Baden. Even me, with the strongest Asian glow, did not get red at all after half a liter.

very Bavarian life

Three more hours left when we finished lunch, so we started wandering around. Found a market where there were lots of unique crafts and clothing. Finally we went to Hofbräuhaus, the famous beer house in Munich. So many people were sitting there in the house and drinking beer, a bank was playing entertaining music. We sat at a table in the garden, wanted to get some beer and desert, but the waiters kept running around without stopping. Finally we figured there was nobody serving us, all the waiters said it's not their table. We sat there for a long time before finally a waiter paid his sympathy and came to us. We asked for a menu, he did what we asked and then left. By then I was very annoyed and did not want to wait for another hour, so we left. I wonder if it's German's hospitality or their way of respect to waiters?

That was the unpleasant end of the trip. Went home slightly annoyed, but still glad to have seen so many different architecture in Munich.

Tag 13: Munich

2010-06-13T03:39:00.037-04:00

The trip to Munich was a blast.

The group was going to Munich on Saturday morning at 6:30am and coming back that night. Rena and I decided to go on Friday on our own and come back with the group on Saturday since one day is surely not enough for Munich.

Not traveling with the group means we have to pay for the transportation ourselves, so we found a car pool online and went with two other strangers for 20 euro per person. Meeting new people on the trip is the greatest thing about traveling. The driver was going to Munich to visit his family and another young man is a master student from Brazil -- classic university town, almost everyone you meet is student.

German highway is speed-limit free, but unfortunately there was road construction, so I only saw the car went up to 240/km once. By the time we got to Munich it was already 6pm. We were stupid enough to misunderstood the google map instruction, so we finally got to the youth hostel at 8pm, even though it was not far from the train station at all. It was a nice and clean room with two bunk beds; bathroom and toilet (Germans separate bathroom and toilet).

After dropping our bags off at the hostel, we decided to go to Marienplatz, where the city hall is at, to find food. As soon as we got out of the subway, we were totally out of words in front of the Gothic bell tower. It was bombed during the war, so it was partially burned and got black spots everywhere. One very typical character Germans have is their punctuality. I do believe it got a history because I easily found 5 clocks on the plaza within my sight, even though I did not move a tiny bit.

pictures of the Gothic city hall, taken from night and day:

Found a neat restaurant in a small alley nearby and ordered two different Quiches with salad, very yummy but not too pricey. After dinner, we walked around Marienplatz, spotted a gipsy ensemble with violin, cello, bass, electronic piano and drum. They adopted well-known music to jazz, pop, rock, and all the players were so good. I fell in love with the violinist's playing, it was totally German-Austria style, very professional. The atmosphere was so great that so many tourists gathered together and sang along. Everyone was happy. It felt like the world was completely pure and clean, no matter what crap was going on in people's lives. It was the moment that I was fully touched by the language of music. We need neither German nor English, but we share joy with people we meet randomly on the street. That was the spirit of music, the soul of art. I cleaned my pocket, put all the coins I had in their case, as a respect to those real musicians. Real musicians are those who bring everyone happiness, but not only those who play in fancy concert halls where only rich people can afford to go.

After they were done to have a beer, Rena and I both bought their CD as souvenir, and left. Funnily, we met them in the subway, so we started talking. I told them I am a musician from New York, and they invited me to play with them. It would be the highlight of my summer adventure if I could...

Here are the musicians:

The next on the list was Königplatz (King plaza), which was built in 19th century in memory of Otto of Greece, and was used in the Third Reich as a field for the Nazi Party's mass rallies. The greatness about Munich is that you can see almost every kind of architecture within a few blocks away. Königplatz is an example. The moment we got there, so many beautiful Italian movies came into my mind: Malena, Cinema Paradiso, Life is beautiful, ect. The old and yellowish picture; the open space; not too-breath-taking or freakishly tall buildings...The atmosphere is not so nervous anymore. The buildings themselves are typical German, grave and solemn, not at all elegant as Italian, but it was completely a different experience compare to the city hall. So we sat there for hours just chill, until some lights on the plaza were turned off. The last thing we planned was to hit a bar since it was the first day of World Cup, though by the time we realized it was already 2am. We went to take the subway back to Marienplatz, but found no bar open. We must be crazy to try to find a drink at that late, and who said it's never too late for Munich's night life.

Königplatz:

We headed back, sadly found only two drunk dudes in the subway and so we went up to the ground to stop a taxi. We felt wrong with the way the driver was going, even though he said he knew the place. It turns out that he was wrong. He stopped at some completely unknown place for 14.7 euro and we started to getting angry. We asked him several times if he spoke English but apparently not, so we had to deal with broken German. Finally he figured out where our hostel is, and said he would go back to Marienplatz and then start charging again. We agreed. Somehow he did not go back to Marienplatz but directly brought us to the hostel, and charged us 16 euro.

It was not fair to charge us 16 euro because we did not know how far it really was, so we started to bargain, which was the fun part. The driver was not happy neither cuz he drove so much for nothing, but it was really his fault...finally we agreed on 15 euro since he said it's the flat rate from where we got on. We were tired and so gave up.

Got back to the room at 4am, and we had other two roommates in sleep.

To be continued...

Tag 12

2010-06-10T19:41:00.011-04:00

Magic flute tonight. It was too hot in the theater that I was not able to enjoy. That again proved the fact that AC does not exist in Germany. The opera is more like a circus, very entertaining. I can't say I totally loved it but I realized that opera to Germans are pretty much like pop music to us.

German chocolate is too delicious. There's no way I can go back to Hershey's a few months later.

Tag 11

2010-06-09T15:32:00.005-04:00

Went to beer garden today, tried all different kinds of beer. Dark beer is really amazing, it just proved it again.

Two little kids fought at the dinner, one cried. It's still very funny to see kids fight. Later the big brother played water games with them, using the water pipe to wet everywhere. I said I wish to have sibling. The big brother said, "you can rent one of them for 10 euro a day, but double the price if you return before the day ends."

It seems to me that Germans have better life than Americans. No tuition to pay, health insured. they appear happier even tho typical stereotyped German is always "miserable". I wanna be happy no matter how crappy the world is. Sometimes we just need a little sunshine and faith in ourselves.

Tag 10

2010-06-08T17:31:00.005-04:00

Preparing for a quiz. Can't believe I am still in school.

My host dad got me a 200-year old viola from Hamburg for zero rent. I want money money money to buy a good viola. ahhhh.

Tag 9

2010-06-07T17:35:00.007-04:00

Rode a bike to a concert tonight, very beautiful scenery alone the river, but boring concert. Slept thru the whole second half.

Found "Friends" on TV -- in German! haha I can just understand as much as the first time watching it in Englsih, so I've got hope.

Tag 8

2010-06-06T11:14:00.007-04:00

Woke up at noon again, looking terrible with the pimples on the face, and kinda pale. People say those who travel too much would never look hot, I guess it will be my destiny.

It's a free day so I practiced the whole afternoon, but soon got depressed -- cannot believe how horrifying I just played. So much music to learn in this two weeks, and I am not in shape at all.

At the dinner, the two younger boys were playing with their Dad. They took their mum's puff powder and tried to put makeup on him, everyone was laughing ass off. That made me think of years ago when I made a pony tail over my Dad's head and made him walk out. ah homesick. After dinner, they decided to go out for a picnic and walk the dog, but it started raining while we were driving. So we ended up going to an ice cream shop. Kids were happy.

I love this happy family.

Tag 7

2010-06-05T18:23:00.001-04:00

Watched Haydn's Creation.

In a bar now.

Tag 6 - a conversation

2010-06-05T09:26:00.016-04:00

So I woke up with hangover today, still cannot get over with the conversation with a French guy last night. He studies economics and politics, took a few classes about China. I was half awake after couple drinks, so I cannot remember all about the conversation.

(I couldn't remember his name, so just call him F)
F: Cindy, I have a question for you. What do you think about Taiwan? Do you think it's part of China?
me: These are two questions, but yes it is part of China.
F: Oh really? but they have different government and laws.
me: (I already started to hate this conversation) Well it's their decision but we do not prove it.
F: and they have their own currency.
me: So is Hongkong and Macau.
F: but that's different story. Hongkong is...
me: (I stopped him) You are right, the difference is, Hongkong and Macau were colonies, but Taiwan is the historical problem between two parties within the country.
F: I know it's because Jiang Jieshi fled to Taiwan after the liberation.
me: Yes, but neither Jiang Jieshi nor Mao Zedong wanted to split the country completely. The focus was Jiang Jieshi wanted to remain his power in Taiwan, and it was the leaders after him that decided to be independent.
F: hm interesting, that's not what we've learned in the west. Everybody supports Taiwan to be independent.
me: Oh really? haha who? you or Obama? or French president?
F: They all do. America has been selling weapons to Taiwan.
me: Well, this is not official support. Can Obama stand out and say, "I think Taiwan is a country" out loud in public? No country in the world wants to see a unified and strong China standing in the far east to be their "threat", which is just imagination based on western philosophy.
F: (silence)

After a while
F: So what about Tibet? Why did China kill so many people in Tibet?
me: First of all, Tibet is part of China, so your question was incorrect.
F: oh, as you wish, why did the government kill so many people?
me: Throughout the history, any government would kill rebelling people, just look at your own country.
F: I heard a speech from Hu Jingtao, he said Tibet has been part of China since 1200s.
me: Yes 1279 in Yuan dynasty, could you remind me what France was doing at that time?
F: So he admitted Tibet was not part of China before that.
me: Why don't we all go back to be monkeys, then?
F: Well I mean if it wasn't part of the country before, then if they wanted to be independent, it's reasonable.
me: How to define China as a country? In the history, there were so many countries scattered around just as Europe now. Those countries had different language, currency, custom, etc., and to tell you what, all the Chinese instruments we have now are all from minority tribes, none of them is from Han. As time passed by, those countries became one big China, and that's why we have 56 tribes.
F: 90 percent of which are Han. Isn't that unreasonable?
me: Yuan and Qing dynasty were the two eras when China was ruled by minorities, and the result was them being hanized. We have brilliant culture and civilization to have an impact on others.
F: but now it's different. China started to go to Africa, it's a sign that China wants to become new colonist.
me: Incorrect. We help Africa to build railways but get resource in return. It's win-win situation. Just look at our 5000 years of history, we've never invaded any other country.
F: No no, how about Genghis Khan?
me: Genghis Khan had been to Europe, the furthest he went was Austria. Yes his troop robbed quite a bit, and according to some article I've read, 80 percent of the world population has Genghis Khan's blood. Even so, he did not stay there and make Europe as China's colony. Oh and please keep in mind, Genghis Khan is Mongolian, Mongolia tribe is the one with more aggressiveness and cannot represent the other 90 percent or more Chinese.
F: hm very interesting.
me: Yes please stop using your own mentality to look at us. Bullying others is not in our blood; trying to rule the world is just not our philosophy.
F: (Silence)

I hate politics, but I love history. sigh wish I have learned more.

Tag 6: Heidelberg Castle

2010-06-04T19:59:00.007-04:00

Heidelberg castle is the landmark of the city, the weather was perfect when we were there, and very nice to just stand from the top of the castle to over look the entire city. We had the audio guide for everyone, but most of us went for English one, which disappointed Franz, our Sugar Daddy, a lot. Inside the castle it was so beautiful and breath-taking that I abandoned the audio guide after maybe 10 minutes -- such a bad tourist.

The earliest castle structure was built before AD 1214 and later expanded into 2 castles circa 1294; however, the upper castle was destroyed in a lightning in 1537, and the expanded castle was damaged in wars and fires.

Got home at 7pm, I was exhausted from all the walking. My host brother brought me to a party with his friends at night. I had lots of fun meeting new people, even though I got lost in translation quite often.

I decided to make a Chinese meal for my host family, hmmm wish I have learned something before.

Tag 5

2010-06-03T17:53:00.009-04:00

Went to Mannheim today for Parsifal, Wagner's opera. The opera was 6 hours long with pauses. Production was great, actually unbelievable when it came out at 1957, think about it.

It's German's official holiday today, trains and buses are not running in regular time, so I almost got lost in the train station when trying to find the way home at midnight. Germans are very friendly, the stereotype of never-smile-Germans are just wrong. I asked one person but ended up getting help from three others, who also were very patient to listen to my broken German. Later they kept reminding me which station to get off.

Still have homework. Guten Nacht.

Tag 4

2010-06-02T12:19:00.012-04:00

No internet last night, but I was too tired to update anyway.

John, Elyse and I had the most interesting cultural experience: "A gay man, a black gal and a Chinese have lunch together in a Chinese restaurant in Germany, speaking random Gerglish." --quoted John. We cracked up for this most bizarre category. The Chinese tried to speak Chinese to the waiter but got a shocking look in response -- the waiter does not speak Chinese. Finally we got the food we wanted, using Gerglishness.

We had a two-hour long historical tour this afternoon. We went to a former German president's birth place, two catholic churches, and University Museum which was a student prison before WWI, for those who behaved badly. I almost fell asleep while visiting a church. I am skipping a concert and a party tonight to get some sleep.

Okay, will write more tomorrow.

Tag 2

2010-05-31T11:50:00.025-04:00

It's been a successful day.

A Bard kid lives in the same neighborhood as me. Her host mum took us to the train station in the morning and got the tickets for us. I tried to read from the screen but had no idea what she was doing and what the screen responded. Due to the road repair, I cannot take a direct bus to downtown, but have to take train and switch to tram, which was called Straßebahn in German (literally street train). It took us about half an hour to get to downtown, and a ten-minute walk to school. It is a rainy day, and surprisingly cold.

We had individual interviews following a short orientation. The interview was to decide which level of class each of us should be in. While we were waiting in the room, I had an interesting experience with a French student who does not speak English at all, not even Gerglish. Out of all those Americans sitting there, she asked me if I speak French, of course she left with disappointment. After a while, she came back and asked me for the WiFi password. This time she directly spoke French to me, but somehow I figured what she wanted. Then I typed in the password for her, while we were talking to each other in different languages, and got completely clueless.

After the interview, we were divided into two groups to have a tour in downtown. The highlight was the Mensa. Mensa is like public cafeteria for students. Basically as long as you look young enough, you can eat in the Mensa. The food is pretty good, they sell by weight (78 cents for 100 grams, good deal huh?) As I remember from what I've read, the reason why Mensa is so cheap is that German government is paying part of the meal. It is one of the privileges of being student here. Isn't it more communistic than a communistic country like China? I am still angry about being refused to get student discount from Shanghai Science and Technology Museum only because I was already 19 years old, even though I was still in high school.

The tour was about one hour or so, then we were dismissed for a free afternoon. John, Elyse and I decided to explore the city together. A few things needed to be done: lunch, get a cellphone, get a week or month pass for public transportation, then maybe some coffee. We were being very indecisive about what to do first, but we all agreed to try to speak German to people. Especially when my school messed up my nationality (Bard told the language school here that I am Korean), I should totally pretend that I do not speak either English or Chinese. That leaves no room to speak any language except for German.

We went into a cellphone store. I told the salesman that I wondered if my U.S. phone would work in here, and I was actually proud of my German. He looked at my phone, and responded in English that this kind of phone would not work. This failure told me that I should never reveal any personal information that would tell people what language I can speak.

Then lunch. Elyse did not want to get Mensa food, so we were checking out every single restaurant on the main street. By then we had already walked back and fourth three times on that street. We finally stopped in front of a fast food place, the menu looks pretty neat but not too pricey. Three of us ordered exactly the same thing: Curry sausage and french fries and beer, very typical German food. Germans are very eco-friendly. All the trash bins are categorized carefully: plastic, paper, food depots... even in households. We all saved our beer bottles, since every empty bottle can be recycled in any store that sells beer for 1 euro.

Then we went to the department store, just to browse around and be excited to see the German words we can read. Things are very expensive in Germany. Most all skin care cost twice as much as that in the states.

We wandered along the downtown area, and saw a Kiosk, where you can buy transportation tickets. A week pass costs 19 euro and a month pass is 57. I am thinking about riding a bike along the river to school next week when it's sunny, also to save money. So I asked for a student week pass, which cost 16 euro. I handed my Bard ID over but the salesman did not look at it, and I got the ticket right away! When my classmate went to buy it, the salesman said the foreign student ID is not valid, they only accept ID from German schools... I guess I just got lucky again.

We were all tired at that point, so we went to a cafe to chill. We were looking for those which offer free WiFi so that I could get my host family's address from my email, just in case I could not find the way home.

As soon as we sat down, I started to hear other people talking. It dawned on me that after two days here, the language already started sounding friendly, not like the first clueless day, anything was like people yelling at each other in a Nazi way. Imagine when you are in New York subway and always hear conversations in some other language. You will probably not be bothered, because you do not understand anyway, it will just sounded like bird language to you probably. However, you will totally pay attention to conversations in English not because you are a creeper, but because you know the language well enough to crab the conversation naturally.

At about 5 o'clock, I decided to go home. It took me a while to figure out the direction. Yeah as you might know, I am not very good at remembering directions. The tram brought me back to the train station, I was happy about not being lost. At the train station, I was so lost by just looking at the train schedule. One stereotype about German is, of course, punctuality. The train schedule shows precisely the minute in each hour, and other things that I was not able to figure out...anyway, we could never expect that to happen in New York subway. Then I asked other people about the schedule, and was surprised to understand all they said to me.

When I arrived home, the big brother Jacob opened the door for me and asked me how my day was. I managed to describe a little bit for him. Host mum prepared a nice dinner for me. We had pancakes with bacon and cheese, and very yummy salad. After dinner I played with the youngest boy and Tango.

Zhuoran, a friend from middle school, came to Heidelberg to visit me. He just finished his study in UK and is going back to China tomorrow. He lives about 5 minutes away from my host family. I told my host mum that I was going to visit after dinner, so she asked the two boys to take me there. The youngest Tommy was sitting on a bike, (not exactly a bike, but I don't know the name of it in any language. It was like a board with a back support and three wheels on the bottom, so he can ride it by stepping backward the ground or just go with the dog.) and holding Tango's robe, The other boy was grabbing the robe tightly for Tommy's safety and kept yelling at him that he went too fast. Zhuoran was amused when seeing me coming with two little boys and a curious dog.

I came back after the visit. Blog, skype, bed.

Bis Morgen!

Tag 1

2010-05-30T15:53:00.041-04:00

"Tag" in German means "day", so it is very obvious that I am starting my travel log here for my 90 days of summer adventure.

After the 10 very relaxing post-final days, I finally hit the road on May 29 with great excitement. The subway in New York City was again messed up, so I had to get off earlier and take a shuttle to air train with my giant suitcase and instrument. When I was looking at the subway map, a German couple came to me and asked me how to get to the airport, so we ended up exploring together and finally made ourselves to the airport in time.

It was my first time flying with Lufthansa. Compare to other international flights, their seats are more crowded, but the good thing was they can be adjusted backward a little more, so I got to relax my back and neck during the flight. Seven-hour flight was not bad at all -- just a little bit more than the one from New York to Vancouver. I gained some triumph moment by trying to speak simple German to the air attendants when they were serving me.

I was badly jet lagged when arriving at Frankfurt airport at 5 am on May 30, and I waited for the rest of the group to arrive at 9 am, then we left for Heidelberg. I started napping as soon as I got on the shuttle, so I missed the speed-limit-free German highway.

We were already in Heidelberg when I woke up. My host family lives in the far east side of the city, so I was the last one on the shuttle to be dropped off. We drove along the Neckar River, which flows across the city. On the other side of the river are mountains, in which there are picturesque castles. It is a city that located "Zwischen Berg und Tal" (from the title of the first movement of Hindemith's Der Schwanendreher, meaning "between rivers and mountains"), too beautiful for words. It is said that Heidelberg is the only German city that was not bombed during WWII, because the allies pilots soon turned back when they saw the beauty from up in the air.

Finally the shuttle dropped me off in front of a three-floor house and left. I tried to drag both my suitcase, viola, handbag up the stairs at the same time, failed unsurprisingly. A little boy about 5 or 6 years old ran out and started speaking German to me. I could not understand a word but started to wondering if that was the right house, so I spoke "Gerglish" to him -- half English half German, and I successfully confused the poor thing. After a while another little boy ran out, asked me to go in -- yes I finally understood his German. Then my host parents came out and helped me with the luggage.

It is a cozy house. The guest room is about twice the size of my dorm room, with two big windows on two sides of the room. I have my own bathroom and toilet. "Tango" is the name of their dog, a black, half husky. My favorite animal.

Soon I was invited to have breakfast. I met two little boys Tony and Tommy, who welcomed me at the first place. While I was chatting with them and trying my best to understand, another boy came. Thomas is about my age, looks like a dancer. He started playing with the two boys. I thought he is the another brother, but turned out that he is their family friend, who is an English teacher in town. He is a Canadian who speaks German and French, and also is learning Spanish and Japanese. Later, another elder boy ran into the room wearing the football suit. I could not remember his name and I could not help wondering how many more boys are hiding in the closet. And actually, there are more: the eldest Jacob, and two girls who had moved out.

My host Dad is a violist from local theater, he later brought me to their afternoon opera show. The opera house was being rebuilt, so the government built a huge tent for all the opera shows until 2012. It is really surprising how much music is soaked in all level of the society. Even in a tent, shows are always sold out; and keep in mind Heidelberg is a tiny town. Anyway, the one they played today was Salome. I watched it last year, so I was basically following my memory, otherwise the language would been too hard for me to understand. It was a great performance overall, but the "seven veil" part was a little off to me. They changed the dance to another scene while the music was still the same. The end was good, John's head was not cut off because it was a live show, but they somehow made him remain conscious to make out with Salome. The was quite a recreation. ha.

Then I had dinner and tea with the happy family. I learned that Tony had leukemia last year and was almost hopeless until one of his brothers saved him with his bone marrow.

so...This is my first day in Europe...ever in my life!

So-called Hometown

2009-01-26T08:45:00.035-05:00

去过很多美丽的地方，赞美过很多叹为观止的景观，而却从没有一座城市让我如此迷恋。这种清秀内敛，美丽而不张扬的味道，就叫作“家”。