Saentis photos

Heh.. I'm uploading my photos to Yahoo album...

Check out this link: http://sg.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/gillian_205/my_photos

Lake COnstance photo...

Eh.. I haven't blogged about it yet.. but here are some photos from the trip! :)

http://sg.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/gillian_205/album?.dir=/2f95re2

Guess who came today?

Yep! another parcel from home... Hahaha.. and guess who I found inside?

Teddy!

Can't think of a very appropriate name.. so the simplest one is 'Teddy'! Heh... My mum sent it to me with some other stuff. Thanks mummy! Hahaha... And I put teddy on this bag of 3kg orange which is sitting prettily on my table. Yeah.. I lugged that home. No choice lar... I need my fruits. It was apples and strawberries and grapes last week. Oranges this week. erm... next week will still be oranges I guess cause I don't think I can finish the 3 kg of oranges so fast.

Anyway, went on a city tour of St Gallen today. It was superb! To hear the history and visit the sites instead of just appreciating the architecture. I'll post the picts up another day.. Meanwhile, here are pics of this lake that I went to on the very first Sunday I was here.

St Gallen is situated 700m above sea level and has no lakes of her own. Even the water from the taps here is from Lake Constance which I went on Sat. (Heh.. more pictures to post up.) This lake is one of three lakes situated on the other hill across the one I am on. It is a SUPER long and ardous trek up. I had to climb probably a million steps to get there.

A nice place to relax, have a picnic in summer and stuff. And the view from the lake is wonderful. Hahaha..

Ok.. shall stop updating here.. I'm going to Saentis tomorrow early in the morning... So it's Gute Nacht from me now!

Ich kann kochen

Heh.. .a glimpse of my 'exchange' diet. Besides the 'rabbit food' (ie: Salad) which I had for the first few days, I can cook!

Oats with sausage, Pasta, a ruined sunny side up. But the eggs here have HUGE yolks!.

Half hidden french toast (aiya.. lazy to keep arranging the pics!), Heh.. one of my fav meals here... soup with bread and a fruits and veggie salad. And finally, Rosti with sausage and egg.

Anyway, I decided to cook something more 'homey' today... See my soup bubbling?

Bubble bubble, toil and trouble...

It was supposed to be a simple onion, potato and carrot soup with rice. Then i decided to throw in a tomato which I bought like 12 days ago, 2 mushrooms and a small piece of chicken. So it became a soup with quite a lot of ingredients.

See my soup!

A HUGE bowl hor~!~ Hahaha.. I should learn how to cook smaller portions. I let the soup boil for like 45 mins to one hour. Think I added too much water. Oh wells... there's always next time.

Anyway, I'm eating breakfast over here. Usually, milk with cornflakes or an apple. Then haha.. this is something I never did in Singapore. I pack my own lunch to school!

Yeah... I heard that the school's food is ex and not nice and I don't mind having sandwiches. So yep! I'll usually make a sandwich in the morning and bring it to school. So far, it's been ham and cheese, egg and ham, cheese, jam. Not to forget lettuce and the occassional tomatoes.

Heh... I have loads of food in my fridge and in the the kitchen cabinet. But I'm not cooking the next 2 nights. I'm going for chees fondue tomorrow! ahhhh... and on Thursday, there is an Asian night cookout...

Weekend ar... Hmmm.. may be taking the night train on Friday out to somewhere.. so hmmmz... we'll see. *note to self: I really should cook the stuff I've bought*

Oh.. and lastly...

What else do I like here? Strawberries! I've eaten quite huge ones... and they are not bad...

And of course... Swiss choc!!! They rock! :)

10th Day in Schweiz...

The snow is melting!!! I see green leaves!

Check out this photo...

and compare it with this one.

Take out of the same window, this was taken about a week ago.. when I woke up to snow.. See the snow covered leaves and the green leaves! Hahaha.. So... I thought.. the snow may is melting and will be gone soon. So I decided to venture out of my house in slippers and make...

Tada! A mini snowman!!! :)

I'm guessing the snow will be gone by tomorrow or Tues... unless it snows again.. Cause it's quite sunny now.. .

Went over to Germany, Lake Constance yesterday... Not a bad place.. about a one hour train ride away. Will post pictures up seperately...

More nice pictures of the view I get from the hills

Yeah.. the snow vs no snow thingee again. It's interesting how we can have a couple of days without snow, then one week of snow.. and now, no snow...

And then, here's more picts from around town...

Oh ya!!! and before I forget, I heart Fedex!!!

Heh... I was so excited to get my adaptor a few days ago that I tore the package and only took this photo after that. Hahaha...

Anyway, I was just thinking... I don't miss home as in the 'I want to go home now' thing. But I miss everyone back home. Just wishing you all would be here to share this experience with me... But no regrets lar... this place is so beautiful.

And I'm getting used to the walking, getting to the bus station before the bus arrives on schedule, trudging through the snow... hanging out with the other exchange students. I'm enjoying the experience and it's fun being with the other people. It's like besides learning German, I'm going to improve my Cantonese and Mandarin cause there are some of them from Hongkong and a girl from Taiwan.

But besides this whole fun fun thing, there is also an 'alone' side to it. Esp when you wake up early in the morning. Nothing much to do. Or it gets a bit emo when I read emails or talk to family and friends at home. But yeah.. I term it 'morning sickness'. Hahaha... but give me a couple more days/weeks and I think I'll just be fine.. hahaha...

Anyway, to end of... eye candy! :)

My housemate or 'housies' as my sis terms them. Simon from Swiss and Anders from Sweden. Heez... :) (I bet this is what you all have been waiting for right?!)

A most satisfying meal...

Heh... opted to go to Ian's place for dinner together with Clara and Gracia instead of going for the pub-crawling event. It was the closest I ever got to local food in a week... Porridge, fried egg, chicken with leek and wonderful chinese soup thanks to the chinese herbs that Ian brought. Scrumpilicious!!!

Hahaha.. walked back after tt... I think I'm getting used to walking... 'left... right... left... right...'. The air didn't feel that cold.. or maybe because I feel hot... Wahahahas.. but according to my landlord, within the next couple of days, the temperature should be in the tens already...

Still getting up at 6.30. But after Sunday, I will have to switch my clock one hour forward because of the daylight savings thingee... So... I'm going to make it official....

I am losing one hour of my life! Cause at 2am, we are all supposed to switch it back so such that we only have 23 hours on Sunday. This is so as to coincide better with the rising and setting of the sun I think. Then one fine day in October, they are supposed to switch the clock back by one hour so that there will be 25 hours in that day. But I'll probably be back home by then... unless of course, opportunity knocks.

Anyway, I think I'm going to wake up at more sane hours soon cause I'm slowly adjusting to the time here. However, waking up early has it pros... I have time to for breakfast and to pack lunch to school which is usually a ham sandwich or something. Today, I even had time to fry eggs to have a ham and egg sandwich.. Not bad...

Meanwhile, I started on German lessons three days ago. Learning a language is a new experience I guess... Like from the pronunciation to the spelling of the word, it's totally new. The good thing is German is rather similar to English. So I can guess some words here and there. Then the sentence structure is also different.

Ich hore oft musik! (I listen to music often)

Okie... Might be turning in soon.. Tchuss!

Saint Gallen

Wow!!! my third post of the day!!!

Just to showcase some pictures I took of Saint Gallen, the 6th largest town in Switzerland, a one hour train ride from Zurich.

The main tourist attraction is the cathedral with the abbey library. I haven't been into the library yet, but we walked to the cathedral and honestly, the sight of it took my breath away! Check out the pictures!!!

This was taken on Sunday before the snow came... Don't you think the sky complemented the cathedral so well?

Beautiful right? So picture perfect!

The view from the other hill - one which I took like 2 hours plus 3 hours to climb to reach this lake. But isn't it magnificent?

Can't omit UBS - Union Bank of Switzerland

Yawn.. feeling tired.. shall leave you with pictures of pretty flowers that survived winter...

Ok.. shall leave you with this.. I'll update soon... meanwhile, tag or leave me a comment!

Tchuss!

My place!!! and it's SNOWING!!!

'The hills are alive! With the Sound of Music!'

Ok... I'm not exactly in Austria. But yeah... I live up on a hill. Cause Saint Gallen is a place whereby the city centre is flanked by two hills. And I live up one of them. It's super quiet here and it is a 15 to 20 mins walk from school. Not too bad... Next time I should try to walk to SMU huh?

Welcome to my humble abode...

My place! taken when it wasn't snowing.

My room!!! Heh.. as u can see ,it's a teeny weeny bit messy.. Wahahahs... 'A leopard never changes its spots'

This is where I collapse every night... The blanket/comforter is power.. Once i'm snuggled underneath, it blocks out all cold air!!! but the pillow's a bit weird. it's the lighter blue thingee that you see there. It's as long as the width of my bed and flat.. So actually, I just fold it into half and lie on it...

And erm... my rather messy table...

Ok lar... It's quite a big room with a lot of space... but minimal furniture.... like a bed, table, a chair, bedside table and wardrobe... That's why my things are just on the table... Oh.. and in the above pic, you can see the bowl of water that I put near the heater so it won't be so dry...

Anyway, it started snowing on Sunday... and here's the view from my window.... So preeeety right? It's like so white!!! Too bad it's so far away from Christmas. If not, it would be like a white christmas...

Looks like some white Christmas postcard!

The pathway from my house.. Good thing my landlord shovelled the snow away... so that I don't have to trudge through the snow...

View of my neighbour's house...

Oh... and how could this be missing?

Me playing with snow! Hahaha.. my landlord offered to take this photo for me... but it's brrr.. cold... But the weather willl be turning warmer by next week according to Yahoo forecast!

Life in Schweiz

Heh... Let's intro a bit about Switz (or Schweiz as it is known in German).

Standard of living here is high! Hahaha.. a chicken here costs 8 Fr. Then we have to pay tax for throwing rubbish. So we have to purchase special bags for rubbish. The bags costs 2 to 5 Fr each depending on the size. Don't try cheating them cause they will not collect rubbush in any other bags. And they only collect rubbish from your place/neighbourhood on a certain day...

But they are really very environmentally friendly. Maybe cause they have to pay for the rubbish bag, so they recycle items like plastic and glass bottles. And at supermarkets, they encourage you to bring your own bags when shopping by only giving lousy plastic bags. Hahaha...

Then short shopping hours. Shops are closed by 6 on weekdays except for Thursday when it opens till about 8 I think. And Sunday, shops are closed. 'MarktPlatz' (Marketplace), the main town area is super quiet on Sunday. According to my landlord, Sunday is the time they would spend time with their families.

The busy streets of MarktPlatz on a weekday

It's a rather slow pace of life.. So i just take things easy. But now with school everyday, I just go to school, attend some orientation activities and before I know it, it's like evening liao. Then with the snow, there is also a tendency to go home earlier. But when I walked back today, it didn't feel as cold. Either I got used ot it already, or maybe it will turn warm soon.

Today I start school

Heh... I know I'm supposed to blog about a lot of things since I got my adaptor yesterday. But slowly yeah... Hahaha... Was busy catching up with the world last night!

Let's just put it on record... When I saw the Fedex man coming down my driveway with a package - my package, I WAS THE HAPPIEST GIRL ON EARTH!!! Wahahhas... I seriously think we are all too dependent on the internet... but hey!! I need it to stay in touch with everyone!!! and I was happily online for like 7 hours yesterday!

Anyway, I'll need to go back to school today for some German lessons and introduction. It's brrr... cold here. According to Yahoo's weather forecast, it's gonna be like -3 deg cel today. Hahaha... luckily I got more thermal with the package plus my power coat. Hahaha.. not that worried about the cold...

I think i shall go have breakfast then prepare for sch liao...

Quick Weather Update!

It snowed last night.. Woke up this morning to see everything white.. and snow still falling.
Hahaha.. and according to my landlord, it may even snow even in April...

But I gotta head down to town to settle my residence permit.. and also charge my laptop battery... trying to settle this earlier so I can go back earlier too!

Flying to Zurich...

So the 13 hour flight from Singapore to Zurich marked the start of what Siyi terms as the 'adventrue of your lifetime'. And yeap.. rightly so...

13 hours is suuuuuuuppppppeeeerrrr long!!! Eh.. what did I do? watched Night at the Museum, tossed and turned, slept a big here and there... The longest stretch I slept for was like 2 hours? Aching back maybe due to the packing. Then eat lor... The food was fine... and drank loads of water cause it was just so dry!


Oh... and I lurve Krisworld - the in-flight entertainment thingee.. I created my own playlists from like hundreads of CDs... From Hacken's chinese album to Shinhwa's 'State of the Art' album to old EL albums and stuff... Was drifting in and out of sleep with it playing lor...

Oh... but I had to take a bus from the gate to the plane... I thought it was only for budget airlines lor.. but noooo... we had to bus to the plane too!!!

'View' from my seat...

Oh.. just before we were about to land... I took the opportunity to take this photo when the 2 girls beside me went to the toiletten. They actually went to tour Australia, New Zealand and spent a couple of days in Singapore for like 4 and a half months! Wow!!!

Oh... and there was a bit of turbulance, but other than that, an ok flight...

Then took the train to St Gallen. Luckily we could push the trolleys from the airport to the train station and we could also push them down the escalator.. So we just had to lug it up the train. Then the one hour train to St Gallen was relatively short... But what hit me most when I reached Switz is that the place is super dog-friendly. People just bring their dogs like everywhere they go. Interesting huh?

Ehhh....

Posts and pics will be up once I get my adaptor.. so many things to see here!!!