frutti.gummi

I've completed one class! :D Submitted the 20 pages long seminar paper and gave the presentation this morning. Presentation wasn't very smooth coz I had to present it in a different way that I prepared for it. Nevertheless, the professor said despite my confusion with the slides, it was good overall. Hehe. I hope he's not just being nice coz can't really tell. When he replies our emails, he never addresses us by our names; it's always "Dear Student" and it's always just a few sentences. Then again, I'm surprised he remembered my name when he announces that I'll be the next speaker. Maybe I give him too much trouble. Haha. Still, there are two more papers to finish for the writing class. Just waiting for the feedback on the short paper now.

Another nice event today is it finally snowed! Well, more like flurries but it still manages to make the ground white in color. I guess that's about as much as we get here. Maybe there's more in Aachen. Shall see tomorrow. A friend also said that this year is one of the coldest in Bonn coz the temperature fell to like -8C and friends are already complaining cold. It has only been below 0C for this week. I hope it continues to be sunny and cold. I like it.

Oh, I did finally went through the materials for that class over the past weekend and I got most of my questions answered by the TA. I wasn't so 'lost' afterall. This weekend, gotta go through the past 3 weeks materials for Virtual and Augmented Reality class coz I didn't see it in the server. So I emailed the professor and he said it has been there all along and when I looked again, these new files are on the top of the list. Earlier, I just scrolled to be bottom and didn't see anything new beneath "file 9". yah, "file 10" would appear on top. silly me.

The Christmas atmosphere here is awesome! At the Weihnachtsmarkts (Christmas markets) , one can find all sorts of things for sale. All pretty pretty things. As for food, one can find a variety of meat, potatoes, pastries, candies, roasted nuts, etc etc. They're all tasty! The famous drink is Glühwein, which is warm red wine with cinnamon and some other spices. Throughout the day and night, people would stand around small tables with a drink and chat. It can be cold sometimes but we still do it. It's all the fun with shopping and eating and drinking.


Some of my personal goodies include Christ-stollen, dominosteine, half a bag of chocs from France, and a souvenier mug from Christmas market in Bonn. The stollen a traditional christmas cake in Germany. I guess it's like the English fruit cake but the taste is different all together. It has sugar dusted on top and the one I bought had marzipan filling. Yummy! There are other variety of stollen too; some contains almonds, some has rum. Dominosteine are small layers of gingerbread with jam and marzipan covered with chocolate. I think these are the best choc fillings. Hehe. And the choc pralines are so smooth and it just doesn't feel like choc at all. I could have finish the bag in a day. Also, there's all sorts of Lebkuchen. I've never really liked gingerbread but the ones here are really nice. :D

Finally went ice skating last week. The atmosphere was very nice with colorful lightings and music. It cost 4.50€ to rent the skates and it was only for two hours. I'm not sure if they impose the time limit due to high demand. There were lots of people and the ice was melting and puddles of water everywhere. I was anxious to know whether I can still skate. I had expected the worse but it turned out that I didn't entirely loose my skill. I started skating quite clumsily and tried my best not to fall. One would be very wet if one fell onto the ice. My friend's jacket and pants were soaked and the water was also dirty. By the end of the 2 hours, I was getting better though still not skating as smoothly as I did before. Still, it's quite nice :D

The door locks in my dorm are very difficult to use. You can turn the key around and around and when it reaches the end, your key is not in a vertical position that can be taken out and the door cannot be opened. So, you turn it back to a vertical position, try pushing the door but it wouldn't budge. So you turn back another half circle and try again and if it still doesn't work, turn it back another half circle and repeat until you get it to open or you reach the other end. When you reach the other end, turn back and try again and eventually you'll hear a click and the door can be opened. After fumbling with the door for a few times, I realised that if I turn the key half a cirle anti-clockwise first, I will hear a click immediately and the door can be opened. So, I made myself to remember to turn anti-clockwise every time I enter the room. The door is automatically locked when it's shut.

I don't really know how the lock works but I think there are other ways to turn the key to open the door. I know this coz whenever someone has entered my room, I couldn't get the door to open by simply turning the key half circle anti clockwise like I usually do. I kinda had to "reset" it to my style and the next time, it can be opened using my method.

And I was pretty distracted that someone entered my room that I left my keys outside the door the entire night. I didn't realised my keys were missing until I went out this morning and saw it hanging at the door.

Oh, and for the entrace door to the dorm, you had to turn the key half circle clock-wise, stop there, pull open the door, and turn the key back to vertical position to get your key out. At first, I turned the key all the way round and I couldn't get the door to open.

I really don't understand why they design door locks that have so much room to turn and it only works when it's turned half way or something.

It's only mid November and the temperature is hovering between -5C and 5C. It's not that cold for me yet since this is typical Chicago fall weather and I rarely need to wear gloves. However, I wished the fall weather of 13-18C could lasts longer.
What I dislike is the wet gloomy weather for the past 2 weeks. There are a few days in between where it was back to nice fall weather. The locals said that the winter came early this year just like how summer sprang on them. So they only have summer or winter. Hehe.

I'll be adding new photos occasionally as I take them. Just click on the Flickr box on the right when you feel like looking at pictures. Went to a huge park yesterday; walked for about 2 hours. The weather was quite nice albeit too windy sometimes. Lots of people flying kites there. The sky wasn't exactly sunny yesterday so the colors on some of the pictures are pretty dull :(

I never realised how much roommates meant to me until I started living alone. Chatting, cooking, having a meal, watching tv, cleaning; everything is just more enjoyable when you're doing it with someone. Most importantly, there's people to talk to or disturb. Hehe. I mean, really talk to; not online. Having people around also makes the place livelier. And then, there's the convenience of having "proper" meat dishes at home. I never bothered to cook them as I only eat them because I need to. Can Subway substitute them? Look at my kitchen. That's all to it. There's no kitchen counter. Behind it is the wardrobe and the entry/exit door is in green. It's a tad small but still managable.

On the first night, the quietness and stillness of the room makes it a little scary. There was no sound at all! But I did finally fell asleep due to tiredness from a long crazy week.


Been over a week now and I'm slowly getting used to this change of environment; being alone in a super quiet room. The internet is my only source of entertainment in my room and it has served me very well.Thanks to everyone who chats with me online. I really appreciate it. :)

In case you're wondering why I'm not out and about, public transportation is expensive here and I'm low on funds. I'm waiting for my student travel card from school and then I can go out!

Was lucky I managed to catch a flight to arrive here on a Friday so that I can get the keys to my room. My room has a little kitchen, a tiny bathroom, and a shared living/working/bedroom area. The best things about my room are the huge window and the mini fridge! My only complains are the super tiny shower space and the super hard bed. I do wish the floor is carpeted though. There's a small wardrobe to hang my clothes and there's plenty of shelves to put stuff.

The picture on the left is what I see when I look down from my window. The pictures below are views from my window from left to right.






Equipped with a visitor pass, I went to check out the museums. The Guggenheim Collection is awesome! It showcases feature pieces from Guggenheim musuems across the globe. There's also the Guggenheim Architecture where you see the models and design plans of Guggenheim museums which is pretty amazing. I took about 4 hours to finish them so image the floor space.
I also checked out the Kunst Museum next door which feature collections of August Macke; famous artist in the region.



By the time I finish both museums, it was already about 4:30pm and my legs were so tired! Still, I walked over to the other musuem that showcases the history of Germany. The descriptions are in German but they do have a guide book in English. I took a quick walk around the ground floor and found the setup creative and interesting. I shall go back there one of these days.

Took the train back to town and decided to visit Beethoven's house. Bonn is afterall Beethoven's hometown. Saw the original piano, the viola, original manuscripts and letters. The floor is very squeaky that I feel like it's gonna fall apart anytime. There's also the garden which is famous during spring when the flowers bloom.

The picture on the left is the alley between the house(R) and the garden(L).