Art, Boba, and More Dance

After a very late night last night (I left the graduation party around 12:30 am, and it was still in full swing), I still managed to wake up well before anyone else in the family was ready to meet, so I decided to go to a museum.

I ended up only having about a hour to spend at the Alte Pinakothek, but definitely could have spent more time. So many beautiful old paintings; here are a couple that caught my uneducated eye as I zipped through the museum.

Fra Filippo Lippi,Virgin and Child, ca. 1460/65

Raffael, The Canigiani Holy Family,ca. 1506/07

Sandro Botticelli,The Lamentation, ca. 1490/95

Today we met for boba, and unlike yesterday we remembered to take photos!

Emily, me, Jimmy, & Beth

Beth and her friend Anna

I had dinner with my college classmate Robert and his wife tonight:

Tonight's performance was the all-school show (three different levels in each of two tracks), and we were asked to not take photos or videos (there will be professional ones available later), so I'll end this post with a blurry photo of all the students on stage for bows.

Friends, Family, and a Graduation

I started off today by going to the mall. I met up with a Pokémon Go friend there for a lucky trade, then did a little shopping. When packing for this trip, I checked the weather forecast, and because Munich was going to be cool and rainy, I packed leggings that go with my ankle boots, and socks that also work with the boots. However, I did not try them on together, so when I put on my dress this morning I discovered that the tops of the socks and the bottoms of the leggings didn't meet. My ankles were cold! I also deliberately did not pack an umbrella, because my travel raincoat is enough for most days (that is, when I remember to put it in my bag). The rain was steady today, so in addition to a longer pair of socks, I also picked up a cheap umbrella.

I poked my head into a drugstore to buy some sunscreen and cough drops. At home, I like the sugar-free Ricola cough drops, but I've only been able to find two flavors, and I didn't like one of them. There were many more choices here, and they came in cute little boxes so that I don't have to deal with noisy wrappers during performances.

I had lunch with with Beth & Jimmy, and my sister Emily. We had tasty German food, but did not remember to take any photos of our schnitzels, potato salad, Kasespätzel, and pancake with apple sauce. Or of each other — I guess we were hungry!

Pedestrian underpass

For dinner, I met my high school classmate Kristy and her husband, and had more tasty German food. I opted for a salad with chicken (schnitzel-style), and a sour-cherry spritzer.

And now for the main event, the reason we're all in Munich. Today Beth graduated from Iwanson International, after three years of hard work.

Gazing Downward

Today was another train ride, this time from Prague to Munich. Instead of sharing random blurry scenery, I'm going to backtrack a little and share some sidewalk photos.

I look down at my feet a lot when I walk. Not just because I'm playing Pokémon Go on my phone — even before the development of mobile phones I had a knack for stepping off curbs or into holes and spraining my ankles. And many of the places I've visited on this trip have quaint cobblestones, which require an extra degree of caution. Sometimes this view of the world turns up (down?) interesting things.

Vienna has its own Hollywood Walk of Fame, feauturing composers, conductors, and other musicians. I didn't photograph every star I saw, so a few of these are photos I found online, but I did actually see each one in this collage in person. Maybe the next time I go to Vienna I'll look for the rest

The sidewalks in Prague are tiled in little square cobblestones in gray, white, and brown. Each building had its own pattern out front. Churches often had crosses, and Castle Square (third row on right) had this zigzag that kind of reminds me of crenellations.

Other things seen on the ground:

Verona: Original city plan

(Prague: Plaque by the Charles Bridge, marking the spot where Wenceslas Column used to stand)

Prague: Municipal House lobby

Cathedral floors

Tonight was the first of Beth's performances this weekend. Before the show, I grabbed a "döner kebab" at La Casa de Kebob, another Google Maps find. Talk about multicultural: Turkish food at a restaurant with a Spanish name in Germany. It was very tasty, and I would go back again.

Since Beth was only in the first piece tonight, she gave everyone permission to go home at intermission. Looking forward to seeing her dance again the next two nights — I haven't seen her perform in person since high school! And I'm excited to have my laptop back; will have to go back through my posts and do some editing :-)

The Big Adventure Commences

Time to dust off the travel gear! In addition to a new theme for the blog, I'm trying out a new way to post for this trip. No more schlepping my laptop from city to city; I'm typing this on a folding keyboard linked to my phone. If you can see this then it's working!

(Photo by Beth)

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Last night I took a red eye from Boston, after a couple of days spent visiting friends and taking care of some business. Since the trip from California to Europe is so long, I've taken Ralph's excellent suggestion for both this trip and the previous one, and stopped on the East Coast first. I'm still jet-lagged, but not as badly as I otherwise would be. (Mostly I'm just tired; my Fitbit says I got 4 hours 6 minutes of sleep on the plane.)
Tonight I'm hanging out at Beth's, doing laundry and charging every electronic thing I brought with me. The four USB ports in the hub I carry with me are no longer enough to charge everything at the same time, so a little planning is required.

We made a trip to the grocery store before dinner. I love the meat cases in German groceries: so many different kinds of ham and sausage to choose from!

Beth prefers the produce section :-D

The long trip home

The Munich airport was a mess. Three long lines and two shuttle rides = two hours to get to my gate.

First there was expected security line, where I got the full pat down. Next was the passport check, where the automated reader wouldn't read my passport, so I had to wait in the manual check line. Last and certainly not least was the Covid-document check line, which was a complete disaster. Multiple lines that didn't move at all for ages, then once they started moving not enough staff to man all of the lines, and passengers who hadn't read the instructions and were sent back to who knows where.

At my gate, the sole water fountain was out of order, so I had to spend 3.50€ on a plastic bottle of water. The flight back to California was long but uneventful, and I took this cool picture somewhere over Baffin Bay.

Last day

Karlstor on the second day of Pokémon Go Fest.

The Höfbräuhaus — really crowded and noisy

The Rathaus with the famous glockenspiel

After a stop in the pouring rain for a required pre-flight Covid test, I ended the day by taking Beth and some of her friends out for Thai food

City gates and Pokemon

Today was the first day of Pokémon Go Fest 2022 :-D

Karlstor

Sendlinger Tor

A "Party bike"

Had a lovely dinner with Beth at Restaurant Freisinger Hof

Deutsches Museum and wandering around town

Deutsches Museum: U-Boot U1

Deutsches Museum: Paul Hindemith's Trautonium

Viktualienmarkt maypole

I also got to visit Beth's school, and we ended the day with doner kebabs from the local shop.

The rest of the day

Surfers in the English Garden

Random statue of Chopin

The glockenspiel at the Rathaus

English Garden and a whole lot of churches

Today Beth and I went to the English Garden, one of the world's largest urban public parks.

For lunch, we could have had fish grilled on the stick,

but we opted for Kartoffelsalat, Schnitzel, and Kirschestrüdel at the Chinese Tower Beer Garden.

Siegestor

I spent the afternoon visiting a few of the many amazing churches in Munich.

St. Ludwig's

Frauenkirche

St. Michael's

Door handle

Asamkirche

St. Peter's

And the view from the top of the St. Peter's tower (306 steps!)