Tag Archives: crazy Chinese mother-in-law

Crazy Euopean People, Our cute son, Travels

The Fairytale City Prague

October 23, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 48 Comments

Recently we decided to have a little holiday somewhere nice in Europe. Okay it is not that recent anymore as I actually wanted to write about it for three weeks but some computer troubles kept me at bay. At first we wanted to go to Ireland but due to some visa difficulties for my wife we settled for the Czech Republic, or to be more precise for Prague. From Hamburg it takes only a bit over one hour to get to Prague by plane which is rather nice compared to the 8 hour nightmares to China.

Getting from the Prague Airport to the city center is fairly simple as it takes only about 40 min, first by bus and then by metro and it is super cheap with the tickets costing only about 1 Euro something per person. Our hotel was located in the New Town, now don’t get some modern ideas about this so-called New Town as it was founded in 1348! For me as a German who is used that many cities don’t have much historical substance left the city of Prague is just amazing. Everywhere you look in the city center you see historical buildings. I thought that Dresden was already incredible but Prague is on a whole different level. We stayed for three nights in Prague, giving us enough time to discover the city on our own pace. All the locations we visited were within walking distance except the Prague Castle for which we took another 5 min metro ride. For a family such as us this is just perfect as it makes getting around so easy.

Nathan developed right from the start his favorite spots in the city. For one there were those main locations where soap-bubble performers were active and another and most important place was Hamleys. I had no idea about this toy shop chain before as they don’t have any stores in Germany or Finland. Let’s just say the Hamleys store in Prague was a little wonder world (only 6.000 sqm…)for Nathan with a carousel in the middle of the shop, several slides (one going from the second floor down to the first!), many other different activities to offer, staff dressed up in some nice costumes and of course toys and more toys everywhere. I have no doubt Nathan could have spent the entire holiday there. When you are in Prague and have kids you need to visit that shop (okay, even without Nathan I would go there).

prag40 — The mighty Saint Vitus Cathedral

On our first day we went around the area of our hotel. I was rather happy that our hotel was just a few minutes away from the famous Wenceslas Square yet another tourist site. Everywhere in that area are restaurants so it was no problem at all to find a new place to eat for each day. However I must say that it was a bit odd that nearly every second restaurant is either Asian or Italian, just like Little Italy and China Town combined right there in the middle of the city. Yet I don’t want to complain as it allowed us to give in my wife’s cravings for Asian food every day and then allowing me to choose another restaurant for dinner (I never get to choose usually!). Each day we tried to visit a few main attractions in Prague so we did cover at least the Wenceslas Square, Prague Castle, the Old Town, Charles Bridge any many other place within walking distance from our hotel.

During the entire trip we wondered how this holiday would have been with MIL. For some reason wherever we go and she is with us it is just too much stress. We came to the conclusion that it must be because we do not only have to watch our for Nathan but for her as well. My wife once told me it is like having two children to look out for, with the older being mentally behind the younger one. I know sounds mean but Nathan knows the animals already better than his crazy Chinese grandmother.

prag35 — Do try some of the Trololo, I mean Trdelník which can be found all around the city

All in all I can say that Prague is a wonderful city and I can only recommend going there at least for a couple of days. The city has so much to offer from all the history, over the food and last but not least the beer. For us this was now the last trip we will take in a while due to some reasons to which I will come in some later blog post. I do hope that after 2017 we will be able to travel once again. Oh and sorry with the following flood of pictures.

I carried Nathan and his push car up these stairs just to find out afterwards that there was a road leading up on the other side

Panorama pic from the Charles Bridge towads the Prague Castle

Minecraft, sadly I wasn’t allowed to play by my wife

Have you been already to Prague or plan to go there at some point?

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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 Family, Crazy Germans, Mom in Law, Our cute son, Travels

The Wonderful City Called Dresden

July 24, 2016 CrazyChineseFamily 39 Comments

Last weekend we visited Dresden the capital city of the Free State of Saxony. It was the first time for Nathan, my wife and of course MIL to visit that part of Germany. I on the other hand had been there multiple times however I never really did see the city. The thing is I lived in East Germany, okay to be more precise in ~~Karl-Marx-Stadt~~ Chemnitz, for a couple of years as I went there to the Sports High School. During those years I visited a lot of cities but only for competitions and thus I usually never saw more than the swimming pool and the next McDonalds. So Dresden it was and I was really excited as I could visit an old friend from high school again.

Our journey started on an early Friday morning in my great home town. Before Dresden we decided to have a short stop in Chemnitz to grab some food and look at the Sportforum, the place where I lived, studied and trained for two years. In Chemnitz we had our belated lunch as we arrived after roughly 6 hours car driving fun at around 3pm there. We only stayed shortly as we wanted to arrive at the hotel in Dresden as soon as possible and to have some daylight left to see few things around the area we stayed. From Chemnitz we had another enjoyable car ride to Dresden which lasted roughly one hour. Let’s just say that such long car rides are no fun at all. While driving through the city I was already amazed how differently it looked compared to all other cities I have visited thus far in Germany. Our hotel was located in the city district Neustadt and it was the perfect location for our needs!

dresden18 — Part of the Procession of Princes which is made of Porcelain

For one my friend’s apartment was just 15 min away by walk. Then the city center itself with all the great sights was just 10 min away by tram and last but not least the district Neustadt was just amazing. To be precise Neustadt is divided into Inner Neustadt and Outer Neustadt but let’s not focus on such details. What we noticed first there was the huge amount of historical buildings just everywhere and then the huge amount of young people all around. Apparently Neustadt is known for its many students and it is a thriving hip district full of restaurants, bars, clubs and a lot of “alternative” shops. We just loved it there as it was so lively putting Helsinki and its hip district of Kallio to shame. During our first evening there we went to a nice Vietnamese restaurant and had some great dinner.

On the second day we went after breakfast to the historical city center and tried to see as many sights as possible. MIL was in awe as she had never seen anything like that before (actually I haven’t either!). It was just too bad that during our time there the famous Frauenkirche was closed. This Frauenkirche is a church which has been destroyed as so many other buildings there during WWII and reconstruction was only finished in 2005. Most interesting about the city center is that every buildings looks old there but in fact nearly all of the living houses are modern buildings with a classical facade because there was not so much left after the war so they reconstructed only the most famous sights and settled for modern buildings for the rest. They did a real good job in getting the old feeling back with these buildings as such is missing in nearly all German cities which suffered so high damage (Dresden was to 60% destroyed during the war and approx. 250.000 to 500.000 inhabitants and refugees died during the terrible bombings). Afer a small lunch with my friends we went to the Bastei. It is a rock formation just about 45 min away by car from Dresden Neustadt. The rock formation is pretty famous here but also gained some world-wide attention as it was one of the desktop screens for Windows 7. Nathan loved the bridges spanning around the rock formation so much that he didn’t even want to leave anymore! Let’s just say he was rather upset when we “forced” him to come with us to the car…

Later that day we went to my friends and had some lovely BBQ in their backyard/ inner yard. As both are vegetarian we had only a small amount of meat and the rest was all about grilled vegetables and cheese. Myself I am perfectly fine to have these days a meat free BBQ but they bought for us some meat so we couldn’t say no. When it was getting darker we walked from their home towards a bridge spanning the river Elbe to have a great view towards the historical city center. I had all my equipment ready for some great pictures but next to the bridge was some kind of music festival which resulted in annoying light and smoke disturbing the pictures.

dresden1 — Failed attempt at taking a nigh shot

In the end I can say it was a wonderful trip and I recommend for everyone visiting Germany to have at least one or two days in Dresden. It is a wonderful city with a lot of history and I think it is really a must see destination. Both MIL and my wife enjoyed the time there a lot however they were not too fond of the six-hour car ride. They were especially bored on the way back when I took over music control and listened the entire way to an audiobook as I just could not face any more K-Pop.