Category Archives: Crazy Family

Crazy Euopean People, Crazy Family, Crazy Germans

The Annual Airport Festival

October 30, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 20 Comments

In the beginning of September (so half a century ago according to my blogging schedule) we went to the annual airport festival here in my hometown. Yes my little town has an airport, okay it might be more a very small airfield and not so much of an airport. Only small aircrafts can start and land there so there is no issue of noise complaints ever. I was actually checking out just now what kind of airfield it is but the Germans surely got their own laws and regulations which do not even translate into English so I won’t bother you with that! This airfield was a military airport back in WWII and after the war the airport was reduced in size to give way for a new city district which was built for the thousands of refugees arriving here such as my dad back in the day.

Enough of the history and categorization of this so-called airport and let’s get back to the festival. Though I have lived rather long here already before moving to Finland I had never visited this festival. I do not even know for how long this festival exists already except that it must be going on now for at least 8 years. I know that because back then my parents visited the festival as they have a friend, who is flying a glider, invited them. As this festival was right between the time MIL had left us to return to China and my parents return from their 4 month-long holiday we took this opportunity for some family time. From our home it is only 10 minutes by bicycle to the airport which made it very convenient for us to go there on both festival days. As you can imagine it was a very confusing but also exciting event for a 2 1/2-year-old boy! When he saw the first helicopter flying over our heads he went crazy, not as in crazy as everyday MIL, but happily crazy.

flug5 — One of the bit older gliders at the festival

On one side of the airfield were several food stalls and the tents of the different companies offering flights in either helicopters, gliders, gyrocopter, historical planes or different light aircrafts. You could also sign up for some parachute jumping but that is not really my thing as I might have some little fear of heights. Most surprisingly for us was that two of our friends were also at the festival and were just preparing for their parachute jump! I bet that the girl would have not jumped if she would have known back then that she was already in her first month of pregnancy. They also provided tons of entertainment for kids with several amusement rides, jumping castles and also a little track for quad driving (small quads with not so much power). In retrospect the quad driving was probably more intended to give the dads some fun while pretending to take care of their kids sitting in front of them.

flug3 — #Nathancuty loves to drive the Suzuki

The whole festival was very interesting as you could see all kind of different planes and other flying vehicles. They also had the Antonow AN-2 flying around which is the biggest operational single-engine biplane. We had plans to take a little tour with a light aircraft but the waiting list was a bit too much for us with its 2-3 hours of waiting time. So in order to let Nathan enjoy his time there we let him have some rounds in the amusement rides. We had the before-mentioned quad ride for him but he clearly did not really care about as he kind of looked depressed in the pictures.

For us it was a nice experience to go to this airport festival. We learned a few things about the different planes, Nathan had lots of fun, it is nearby and best of all the entrance is for free. Next year we will definitely go again and then we will sign up early enough for a flight in one of the planes!

I have never seen a gyrocopter before in my life

Have you visited something like an airport festival before?

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Crazy Family, Mom in Law, Our cute son

The Arche Warder

September 26, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 15 Comments

Over the past years we have visited a few zoos in China, Finland and in Germany. We visit especially often the local zoo here in my hometown. Not that we are so fascinated by it but it is a nice little family tour and it is for free for us. Yes, for free as I receive each year from my brother a family card for the zoo so we can go whenever we want there and pay no entrance fee. Anyhow this summer we noticed that it would be nice to go to some new place and this is how I found out about the Arche Warder (Ark Warder). For one it is just 15 minutes away from us by car (I really wonder why I never heard about it before!) and it is more than just a normal zoo.

warder17 — Oh no the goats are coming, run for your life!

This zoo is so different as they are specialized on old breeds of livestock which are not used anymore these days and hence are endangered. Some of the animals are even as rare as the Siberian Tiger! Sure it might not be as exciting as other zoos for some people but for us it is a great place, especially with kids. Right when you enter some goats and sheep are coming and waiting to get some attention from the humans. Have you ever patted a sheep? They are sooo fluffy! Also so many animals had still some young ones around, just imagine some piglets running crazily around and making their cute sounds. My wife and Nathan loved particularly one certain baby goat which was so tiny, they tried their best to give it some food but the evil grown ups pushed always in between. Near the entrance is also a wooden cow and you can test your skill in milking it (okay only water coming out but what you expect of a fake cow!!). Lets just say that my wife and my dear mother-in-law did not manage to get any drop out, not even after I explained how to do it properly.

warder8 — The zoo has a wonderful layout with much nature around

I believe that the animals have a rather good life there. Not just because they get fed all the time what they need but because they have also huge enclosures . Arche Warder is aiming at protecting these old livestock breeds by having breeding projects and don’t just present the animals like in normal zoos. The whole atmosphere was very nice as also the staff busy with cleaning and feeding greeted each person passing by. At the pig enclosures they had a funny feature, an information board where you could press a button and they would “imitate” the sound of the certain pig breed. It is incredible how many different breeds there are and how huge some of them can become. It is in general just surprising how many old livestock breeds exists and how they changed during the decades. Also the information you get there from the staff is great, who would have thought that Pekin Ducks are excellent pets who can build up the same kind of bond with humans what usually only dogs achieve.

You can also support the zoo and have your name then engraved in a wooden pole in a designated area visible for any visitor going around. I would love to support them but this has to wait for some later years as we still have some plans going on at the moment. Right now I hope that we can go there this year again together with my parents. Perhaps they are better in milking the cow than MIL…

More Information about Arche Warder you can also find here on their webpage which has even a page in English

When I reach that size I will also just sleep whole day

This one should get its horns checked out…

Welcome to Jurrasic Park, ehm I mean Arche Warder

Have you visited a park/ zoo which is aiming in protecting old livestock breeds?

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Crazy Euopean People, Crazy Family, Crazy Germans, Our cute son

A Weekend In The Middle Ages

September 18, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 30 Comments

Ever since we visited the big renaissance fair near my home town back in 2015 we wanted to get dressed up as well for these events. The very same year we got ourselves some clothes and equipment which we tested out last autumn. This year we went once again to the big medieval market near my hometown but it was such a rainy day that we did not enjoy it entirely. However we had another very very big renaissance fair in sight this year in Hamburg Öjendorf.

What is so special about this renaissance fair? Well it is just huge. Last year I wrote how big the market was we visited near my hometown but it is just dwarfed by this one in Hamburg. Huge is not even enough to explain it. The whole festival area was 30 hectares big, over 100 military camps with over 1500 people within them, over 200 market stalls, 5 music stages, a knight’s tournament arena with 10.000 seats and and and. For this event we got ourselves tickets not only for one day but for the whole weekend in orderto be able to see everything and with the hope to have at least one dry day. Yes, we bought the weekend ticket mainly because of the terrible weather this summer as the renaissance fair this May was kind of ruined by the rainstorms.

Right from the beginning we were overwhelmed by the size of the whole area. In fact you could not never see half of the area due to the layout and the amount of people there. I think I don’t need to mention anymore how differently people are dressing up for these events as you have everything there from knights over normal peasants to even unicorns…Nathan himself went once again as a monk and gained a lot of attention. The festival area had also many little stations for children with stacked straw bales fo them to go crazy. Nathan just loved it but he was still too small to climb up, yet alone to jump down from them. Surprisingly there were each time some kids helping him up and down non-stop so he was able to enjoy it nearly as much as the bigger children.

mpso6 — #Nathancuty just loved the handoperated wooden ferris wheel

I must say that even though we were two days there we did not see everything. Sure we managed to cover the whole area but there were different performances all over the area at different times so we missed rather many as it was a bit hard to go around and watch Nathan all the time. The biggest performances we missed once again this year which were the Pest Procession and the fire show during the night hours. One day we will manage to see those performances as the pictures I have seen about them are just stunning. We only need to figure out how to do it as we clearly can’t go with Nathan as it is just too late when they start. I am just glad that dear mother-in-law had just left us few days before this event. You can just imagine how crazy this weekend would have been with her there! Probably she would have been banned from the festival area in no time for trespassing the military camps or throwing her trash somewhere else than the trash bins.

As I have mention before we got ourselves the weekend ticket due to the unpredictable weather and it was a good decision as the first day we had sunshine and barely any wind with a following terrible rainstorm day. Even though the weather was so bad on the second day we still stayed for more than five hours there before starting our journey back home. Though it was a great experience I doubt we will go for another weekend like this again. It is just too exhausting in the end and my wife is not fond of doing her hairs and make-up on two days! I think it was a great end for us this season with the renaissance fairs. Next year we won’t be able to go to any but more about that at some later point this year.