Skyfire and Our First Rugby Match...and Some Really Good Food!

22 March 2015
Kristen says...

Well, it's been another busy, sun-filled week Down Under...I've been told the outdoor fun slows down in winter (we're just entering fall now) but so far, there is no sign of that!

This week we have explored a few of the more delicious places in Canberra (because now I'm working and so have less motivation to cook every day!) One of the places we went is located less than a half mile from our house, and with desserts like this:

Chocolate mint mousse and sticky-toffy fig pudding

 I think we found a new regular.

We also went out on Friday to the oldest pub in Canberra, where I had my first-ever LLB (lemon-lime and bitters).

Yuck.

I'll stick to being the DD, thank you very much.

Besides being Canberra's oldest pub, the bar is also home to some resident rodents...

Can you spot the opossum?

 Here he is!

This is the men's bathroom, by the way. Yikes!

Last weekend we went to Skyfire, an annual fireworks display:

The next day we went to the season opener for one of the local Rugby teams, the Canberra Raiders. Neither of us had ever seen a Rugby match live before, and hadn't really watched much of the sport before arriving down here, but I think we were able to follow the game fairly well, and half the fun was listening to the commentary from the fans...

Rugby!

Our first scrum! 

The mascot

Chris and I decided the G10 Stadium is really very nice!

This sign basically says exactly how we feel right now:

Indeed :)
KF

A Trip to Thailand (Part 1)

28.I.14
Kristen says...

So, it was a pretty good week last week. Monday we celebrated the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a nice day off of work, and Wednesday afternoon we got on a plane and flew to Bangkok, Thailand for a short vacation.

Besides Hong Kong, this was the first Asian city I've ever been to, and Thailand is particularly interesting because it was never "taken over" by Imperializing European nations in the mid to late 1800s...therefore it is without many of the European aspects of other geographically close nations. For history nerds like me, that made visiting Thailand even more exciting!

If you have never been to the airport in Bangkok it is interesting to note two things. 1) It's very similar to the Seoul airport, especially where you check in for your flight and 2) It's beautifully decorated:

While we didn't know it at the time, this mural was a definite sign of what was to come...in truth, it seems that the entire city of Thailand is beautifully decorated!

Unfortunately, Bangkok is 4 hours behind Vlad, and our flight landed in Bangkok after 10:00 at night, so we were way too tired to see much of the city until early the next morning when we headed out to see some of the city.

Thankfully, Bangkok is 4 hours behind Vlad, so getting up at 6 felt like sleeping in until 10 am! :)

We stayed with a friend during our time in Thailand, and lucky for he had two other visitors staying who had been "casing" the city for over a week, and knew where to go, when to go and how to get there. Also, they're fun people! :)

So, early on our first morning in Bangkok we all got up, got ready, and went out to see some of the amazing Bangkok sights.

There are many ways to get around the city (it's very modern!) including a metro/light rail system and boat taxis. We took both to get around our first day.

On the water

Mmm, salad ;)

Yes, that is a car motor on the back of that boat! :)

There were three things I really wanted to do and see in Bangkok: The Reclining Buddha and the Monastery of Wat Pho, The Grand Palace and shopping at the weekend market.

We decided to go to Wat Pho first, assuming that it might be busier later. The first thing we saw was the GIANT Reclining Buddha:

I think this was the second-largest Buddha we've seen in the past few months.

 Once you see the Buddha you can continue through the sprawling Wat Pho complex. First, though, you have to be properly dressed:

 Since I was wearing shorts that day I had to throw on a sarong, which didn't do much for my outfit but was much more culturally appropriate, and thus much more important:

 The monastery was beautiful, and full of murals:

 Buddhas:

 Temples:

And free water for tourists! Thanks, Thailand! :)

 Seriously, I'm not sure I can adequately describe how beautiful the monasteries and temples were!

After Wat Pho we walked a few blocks away to the Grand Palace. The entire (huge) complex is surrounded by a high, white wall.

 And hilarious signs like this!

 This was a very appropriate sign, because the "tourist police" standing outside one of the side entrances tried to tell us that the Grand Palace was only open to Thai citizens until 1:00, but he would be happy to take us on a boat trip to pass the time until the palace opened...riiiiight.

 Needless to say, we said, "Thanks but no thanks" to the wily stranger and continued on to the main entrance, where we were welcomed with open arms.

 I had to don my sarong again, but the big surprise was that Chris, with his shorts, had to rent pants in order to enter the Palace. Nooooo problem:

After that, we entered the beautiful palace grounds:

 Monastery chic!

The last thing we did on our first day in Bangkok was to visit the Wat Arun...us and about a million monks!

Chris and the monks

 We were walking up to get on the boat to cross the river to the Wat, and then suddenly we were surrounded by monks! Monks get priority in Thailand (they even have reserved seats on the light rail trains) so they got to jump to the front of the line and take the first ferry across the river. Even so, we ran into them all around the Wat Arun complex, which was pretty neat!

So, incidentally, was the Wat!

Instead of being decorated with sparkly bits of glass, it was rougher-looking, made out of beautiful pottery shards:

 There were no Buddhas around (that we could see) but we did get to go up about halfway to the top of the Wat via a couple of VERY STEEP staircases:

 Which gave us beautiful city views, as expected.

Actually, we had a lot more beautiful city views in Bangkok...but that's for Part 2. :)

KF

Merry Christmas from Vladivostok!

27.12.13
Kristen says...

OK so it's a couple days after Christmas (or the day after, depending on what part of the world you are in) but still, the thought behind the expression remains--I hope all of you who read this have had a blessed week, and if you celebrate Christmas, that you enjoyed it to the fullest.

Chris and I had a pretty low-key Christmas celebration this year...in fact, it was the first we've ever spent away from our families, which was sad, but FaceTime and Google Hangouts made it a lot easier!

Christmas always starts a few days early for us because Chris' birthday is just a few days before... (and yes, like me, he turned the big 3-0!)

 We had dinner out with friends then returned home to eat cake...yum

 We had to work on the 24th (something this teacher is NOT used to!) and then were awakened at 5 by an excited dog...of course, he was not excited about what was in his stocking (dog biscuits) but by a trip outside on Christmas morning, then went back to sleep for a few hours until we were awakened again by my family opening presents in Iowa...

It takes about 2+ weeks to get mail from home to here, and the presents that had been sent for me hadn't arrived, but Chris had a few under the tree and in his e-mail inbox, so we were able to take part in the online Christmas exchange.

During that time we also got to watch the beautiful Vladivostokian sunrise:

 Later, after all the gifts were opened we got to work; we decided that we would make all the Christmas goodies we had ingredients for then take plates to the co-workers who were in town for the holiday...

Pretzels with almond bark, molasses cookies and no-bake cookies

Sugar cookies (they later were frosted, but not very well...they're much prettier in this picture!)

Oyster Crackers

 We also made some goodies to keep at home:

Mango pie

Pumpkin pie

 The baking, no-baking and frosting took quite a while, so it was after 5 before we made it out of the house to make deliveries, and due to the heavy end-of-day traffic (most Russians don't really celebrate Christmas, and most that do won't celebrate it until January 7), so our Christmas dinner of corn chowder was delayed until last night.

Not the  most exciting Christmas Day ever, but we enjoyed spending the time together and making new traditions that we can keep when we aren't able to be home for the holidays.

 Of course it was back to work yesterday and today, but next Wednesday starts the Russian New Year's holiday, a week+ break from work and school! :)

KF