Holy Week

In Darmstadt, there is one main Catholic church called St Ludwig's and a subsidary Chapel called Josef's Kapelle. I started off attending sunday masses at St. Ludwig's at 10am. This was because St. Ludwig's church is hard to miss with its huge dome structure, standing high on a hill near the city centre. In fact it is one of the city's tourist attractions. Unfortunately, like most beautiful churches in Germany, more tourists pass through its doors than worshippers. Masses are all in German but after almost four months, following the mass became relatively easy (except maybe for the homily). Despite the few worshippers, the Catholic community here is really welcoming. On the first sunday I was there, I was browsing through the church bookstore for a German mass book so that I could follow the prayers during mass. Before long, I had a small crowd of 4 adults surrounding me, asking me questions and telling me about the catholic community here. One of the gentlemen even bought for me the German mass book and said it was a gift from the church.


St. Ludwig's Church

This was also when I found out about the Katholische Hochschulgemeinschaft (College Catholic Community) which consists of catholic students of both the university and the school of applied science, similiar to our CSS back in NUS. They have a separate sunday service at Josef's Kapelle (St. Joseph's Chapel) on sunday evenings, of which now I attend. Although I have not attended any of the other catholic activities organised by the KHG, attendance at mass was somewhat disappointing. Think of a weekday mass crowd back home in Singapore. Having a small community has its benefits too. I got to know the other catholic students and the priest-in-charge, Fr. Juergen Janik, takes the trouble to come talk to me after mass.

I attended the Palm sunday service at St. Josef and it was a really interesting experience. Firstly, the palms we used were not the regular ones we have back in Singapore but rather branches from what looked like grapevines. The service started off at the remnants of an old church about 500m away from the chapel. The old church was almost fully destroyed after the bombings and only three of its walls remained intact. It was not rebuilt after the war but serves as a reminder of the destruction that occured. After the opening reading and a short homily, we proceeded back to the chapel, holding the palms and singing hymns.

Maundy Thursday mass at St Josef was similar to the mass we have back in Singapore except for the washing of feet part. Laid behind the altar table was another long table with jugs of water and empty bowls. After the homily, the whole congregation lined up towards the altar and washed each other's hands. I guess this can only be done when the you have a small church community but I found this rather meaningful.

Good Friday service was held back at St. Ludwig's and this was the largest crowd for mass I have seen in Darmstadt so far. It was also the longest mass I have ever attended. The whole mass was sung in Latin by a choir in accapella. Even the whole Passion of Christ reading was sung in a 5-part harmony. This lasted almost half an hour. It was also interesting that all the crosses in the church were covered in purple cloths since Ash Wednesday and only revealed during the Veneration of the cross on Good Friday.

The Easter sunday service was wonderful. Joining the 30-member choir was the string quartet, a piano and the pipe organ. It really sounded like they spent months practising as the whole mass turned out to be somewhat like a mini-concert. All the pieces were again sung in Latin. This included Sanctus which I think lasted for 10mins, including a male soloist, female soloist and a piano solo! These pieces were so long such that each time they started, the older folks started to sit down.


The congregation on Easter Sunday at St. Ludwig's


The altar and the Easter candle at St. Ludwig's. If you look carefully at the main cross behind, you will notice there is no image of the crucified Christ. Usually, there is one and it looks like it has been ripped off for Easter.


The pipe organ at St. Ludwig's. After every sunday 10am mass, the organist plays a special piece to entertain the people.

chillaxing in Esslingen

Esslingen's a small town on the outskirts of Stuttgart situated within the Neckar Valley and surrounded by vineyards. Thus this area is especially famous for its wines and champaigns. A charming small town which still has most of its pre-war buildings intact; not destroyed by Allied bombings like most other German cities because it was occupied by the US soldiers.

Here was where I spent a relaxing weekend two weeks ago. No hardcore travelling or sightseeing, just chilling out with the guys. Gab studies at the FHS in Esslingen and was kind enough to accomodate me and 2 other friends, Derrick and Zhifeng, from London. Yibin interns at Mahle near Esslingen and lives down the road from Gab. Met up with Xinli who interns in Stuttgart and Siwei (who seems to be everywhere in Germany). Since it was my second time in Stuttgart, it wasn't necessary visiting the tourist sites all over again. But if you love cars, the DaimlerChrysler museum is a must see. Stuttgart is home to Mercedes Benz and Porshe but I wouldn't recommend the Porshe museum to anyone. Overall, I guess it was a pretty good time to recuperate after a really draining last week at work.


A view from on top the city wall, overlooking Esslingen; cathedral and vineyard slopes


Me and Gab with yet another typical bahnhof pict.


As you approach Esslingen by train, it's difficult to miss out this really obvious phallic symbol with an appropriate name to it! According to Gab, it's one of the chimneys coming out of a pub-district called 'Dick'; something like Chijmes in Singapore.


The long climb up to the city wall.


Zhifeng, Derrick and me with the view of the Altstadt (old part of the city) in the background


3am: Gab's kitchen - After a guy's night of poker and beer, we had a girly cookover! My beer-sausage recipe got the thumbs-up from the guys.

Snowing in March?

It was a really perfect day to snow! Ok, I'm being sarcastic. I woke up on Thu morning, the morning of my presentation, all set to put on my work pants and leather shoes and believe or not the picture below greeted me as I opened the window. Damn! I couldn't wear my pants and leather shoes for the presentation.. it was back to the usual jeans and boots. I waited 2 long months to see the first snow fall in Darmstadt and only ice rain greeted me. Of all the days, it had to snow today. However, it was only half a day of snowfall and by evening it was all gone. I'm no expert in weather but I heard that this sudden snowfall and drop in temperature is got to do with the last cold wind from the north. This also signals the beginning of spring!


Start of snowfall... 22.3.07.. 7am

Tschuss GM..

I finally have the time to sit in front of the computer and blog! I sincerely apologize to all those who have been visiting my blog, only to see nothing new. My internship is over and I now I've got all the time in the world to blog, apart from writing a report for NUS and german classes at night.

The last few weeks have been crazy, preparing for my final presentation and tying up all the loose ends for work. Then came the actual presentation which was kind of a "sweaty palms" event for me. Despite doing it in English and having another fellow intern who was presenting on his work, I was nervous as hell! It probably had to do with the fact that I did not recognise half the people in the room and to make matters worse, there were two other colleagues on net-conference from US and Sweden. My boss really had an extensive invite list for us. Thankfully, I was not fielded as many questions as my poor fellow intern who is German by the way. He had it worse because he too had to present in English and answer questions in English. On the whole, it was really a test of confidence, public speaking and an introduction to corporate bullshitting.


Apart from work, we had a couple of fun activities organised during my last 2 weeks at GM. One of it was the department soccer match. Interestingly called "Kartoffeln vs Fruity", it was a game of Germans vs foreigners. Kartoffeln means potato and it refers to the Germans. I was amazed at the response for a soccer game as about 20 guys turned up to play at a really cool indoor grass court in Mainz. Unfortunately for the Germans, my team - Fruity, had many more players and thus there was always a fresh pair of lungs and legs to come in. No surprise, we won but I admire the Germans drive, enthusiasm and they fought really hard. I guess it was a really good bonding experience for the company and it always important for collegues to go out and have fun after work. I wonder if engineers back in Singapore have such stuff...

The other activity was a bowling night for my group. This was more of a family affair as spouses and children came along. Unfortunately, they cannot bowl as well as they play soccer.


A group photo of us at the alley. Dunno why everyone's so gloomy.. prob because this is the 5th attempt by the waitress to take a photo without shaking the camera.


Fussball after bowling.. To my right is Stefan, the other intern who presented with me. He did a really good job despite it being in English.

Kölle Alaaf!

I was once again back in the old Cathedral city on the Rhine, Köln (Cologne). This time not to sightsee but to experience one of the biggest festivals in Germany - Karneval. Dating back to the riotous Roman celebrations of the cult of Bacchus (the god of drunkeness and ecstacy), it still lives up to tradition even today. It is facinating to see the whole city dressed in costumes, drinking, partying, music groups and dance troops in every corner, eating like gluttons and simple forgetting the worries of the world. Karneval begins on the 11th of Nov at 11.11pm but massive celebrations begin on the Thu before Ash Wednesday and climaxes on Rosenmontag on Mon. Traditional also a Catholic festival, it is a time for the people to enjoy the vices of life before the beginning of the holy Lentern season. Pagans celebrate it to signify the driving out of the evil spirits of winter and the welcome of spring.

Festivities start on Thu with the Women's carnival where all the women of the city become superior to the men, walking around with scissors and cutting the ties of the men. The men have no choice but to let them do it. Saturday and Sunday are filled with partying and small parades around the city. The main parade begins on Mon at 11.11am and extends for about 5 hours, snaking through Köln. This year there were about 90 official parade groups plus many other unofficial ones. As the floats and the bands past, the people shout "Kemelle" meaning sweets while the paraders throw boxes of chocoloates, sweets and roses to the crowd below.

I liked this strange looking Dragon-dance-like display

Hands outstretched for Kemelle! We came back with bags full!

My favourite band, the pirates with Jack Sparrow as the drum major.

me, as reggae-man, with the guys on Rosenmontag

Having the best view of the parade with the Bayern-man..

With all the Singaporeans from all over Europe (Germany, UK, France, Netherlands) infront of the Dom which never fails to impress me.

Partying straight for 3 nights... street parties, club hoping and meeting international drunks. I liked Csaba costume the best though.. "Badman".

A delicious Peruvian dinner suggested by Stefan.. Here with Csaba n Csilla who was so kind to give us her place for the weekend.

Aachen

Aachen Cathedral (A UNESCO World-Heritage Monument)


Stained glass backed altar of the Dom

A short trip from Koeln took us to another city, Aachen, on Saturday morning. A small city lying close to the border of Germany and France, it is renowned for its technical university and Cathedral. After visiting a quite a number of cities, Aachen seemed not different from the others. The usual sites include the Rathaus (government building), the Altstadt (the old-city), the local Braeuhaus (local brewery) and the Dom (Cathedral) which you can find in almost every German city. It was fun being with a whole bunch of Singaporeans but we all couldn't wait to get back to Koeln for more partying!

Quintessentially European...

The typical Bahnhof picture with Yucheng

The bunch of us in Aachen. It was good to meet Raj again, after meeting him for the first time in London 2 years back. Small world!

With Xinli and a nice view of Aachen and the Cathedral from a hill

All the chocolates in the world could not excite Siwei in Aachen. If you notice the clowns on display, this is a typical Karneval decoration. The clowns were believed to be the evil influence of the people during Karneval. They responsible for the vices, drinking and over-eating during this festive season. That is why they hung especially on the bars and pubs around Koeln and the neighbouring cities. These clowns will be burn on Tuesday (the day before Ash Wednesday; the start of lent) to signify getting rid of the bad influence and cleansing the people of their sins.

Bayer Birthday Blues

I just wanna thank everyone for making my birthday special this year. Although far from home, it was hardly blue. Thanks mum & dad for yet another 10kg box of goodies! Thanks for all the calls, smses, cards (even online ones)! Thank you mel and char for the package (I dunno how the mailman managed to squeeze it into my tiny mail box, luckily it's not broken!) Thanks Siwei, Yucheng and Cheong Chye for running around Koeln at 10pm to get my birthday cake. Thanks to Charles and Dave for dragging me over to Leverkusen for the Bayer-Interns-corridor party. Thanks my jazz band for surprising me with a jazzy birthday song and champaigne. I'm truly blessed.


Pre-carnival party with the Bayer interns; a really cool bunch of people. Me and Charles got our faces vandalised with the singapore flag for not having a costume.

A truly multi-national bunch

I never thought German could sound so different when spoken with a foreign accent. Here at work, it's a cacophony of accents with this truly international bunch of co-workers. Although it is tough to comprehend, it sure is comforting to note that half of my collegues have German as their 2nd or 3rd language, just like me. As such, no big vocabulary, complicated grammar structures (Mark Twain explains this well) and horrid slangs; which is great for me. Unfortunately, all speak fluent English and so there're not many chances for me to practice German! It's great to know also that no engineering department is complete without an Indian (not including me) and a Chinese. Ha ha! Since they are all only slightly older than me, it's great fun working with them. They're far from from the stereotypical boring engineers despite holding a minimum masters!


Here's part of my team: Salome from Portugal, Simone, Vincenzo from Italy and my boss Dr. Scherf. Here's taken at Vinc's 28th birthday party a couple of weeks back. Remind me to tell ya about the deadly concoction called "U-boat", which I was introduced to by some Russian girls, the next time we drink..

death of music?

Spending 2 hours travelling to work and back everyday, I am oblivious to the scenery swishing pass me and the people opposite me. Why? Plugged into my new Creative Zen Neeon 6GB.. that's why! Now, I'm not complaining about the player.. 3000 songs, easy to use menus, pretty good sound with an equaliser built in, FM radio (whenever I feel German). It's an engineering wonder! But I am worried.. I have noticed a startling difference in the way I listen to music. With 1500 (I only half filled it) songs, I am definitely spoilt for choice and so when I get bored with a certain song, I flip to the next, jumping songs, albums, genres.

Before I had this mp3 player, I was using the good old discman (without mp3 capabilities). I had no choice but to listen to whatever I had in there. So much so, I never jumped tracks, knowing full well if I did, I would have nothing else to listen to. In doing so, I was forced to listen carefully to each song, and the more I listened, the more I noticed about the musicality, the rhythms, the message the artist is trying to put a across. In the end, a song which I never liked first time round, could be my favourite song! There's so much in a song to listen to and lately, I have not been doing that. It is ironic that the mp3 player exposes you to more songs, but in the end, you appreciate less music.

Another irony here: The advertisement says: "Put a face to your music." Here, they are trying to advertise the replacable covers/skins of the player to suite the individual. The way I see it is this - When I buy albums, I like looking at the CD sleeves, with the album art, photos, writeups and lyrics - It sort of "put a face" or "put a picture" to the music I was listening to. Well, with mp3, I don't think many people look at the albums they bought this way or worst; download their music. I am guilty too. Now, is the mp3 really the death of music and artist appreciation? It's up to the individual to decide.

Switchfoot live @ Frankfurt

Last Sunday, Switchfoot performed live at Batschkapp, Frankfurt - Their "Oh! Gravity" Europe tour and it was one night to remember for me. Thinking that I would have to join a snaking queue before entering the concert (and not knowing the place), I arrived at Batschkapp an hour early... only to find that 1)No one was there 2) It was no Indoor Stadium, but rather an old shed-like building. I walked around to the side and saw a bus and a trailer hooked on to it. As i walked pass the bus, the door suddenly swung open and out came guitarist Drew Shirley and he was like "Hey man" and I was "Hey". Of course I did not really recognise him but i guessed as much he was Switchfoot. Then a couple of kids out of nowhere rushed past me to talk to him. So there I was, standing and listening to Drew as he entertained these star-struck people. But it was cool of him to hang around to chat with us anyhow.

Switchfoot Live!

Batschkapp is the type of venue I would like to perform in: Small hall with a stage at one end, bar at the other, mirrors on the side, capacity of about 300 people. As such the concert turned out to have a very personal touch.

Top:Entrance of Batschkapp Bottom:Me, Wendy & Ralph after the concert

Switchfoot was great; playing mostly songs from their new album "Oh! Gravity" (Thanks Teresa & Justin for buying me this CD for Christmas - its great to know all the songs played at the concert!) Apart from that, old favourites such as an acoustic version of Only Hope and This is your Life brought much cheer from the crowd. (I never thought there would be a mosh-pit at a Switchfoot concert) The concert ended with favourite Meant to Live and then shouts for "Zugabe" (German for encore) filled the hall. The band appeared back without frontman John Foreman - He was standing in the middle of the crowd as the band went on to play something I can't remember now. The last song was the hit Dare you to Move. I guess this concert was especially meaningful for me cause I have jammed or performed Switchfoot songs with almost all the bands I've played with: Always Marcia, IHM Band with Ajie & Julz, No signboard Seafood and MM. It was an awesome experience hearing these songs live!

Vocal controls for Jerome, John & Tim on the mixers