The Adventures of Hans the Gnome & Jess the Giant

Hans saw some Picasso art in #barcelona today! #roaminggnomie #gosmelltheflowers #hans

Hans makes a reappearance in Barcelona #barcelona #roaminggnomie #hans

Dang Straßbourg, you be gorgeous!! #europe #beautiful #church

Clearly I've fallen off the face of the earth... So here is a little situation that actually happened and turned out fairly anti-climatically. In the newest adventures in Munich I've decided to start a "things Germans don't do" or "things Germans rarely do."When someone thinks about it things would come to mind like, eat veggie, drink in small quantities, etc. But no I have gone against social boundaries and shown new things that Germans don't do... Case and point. I've been living in Germany for six months now and have yet to find Dr. Pepper (one of my favourite pops). The other day I was standing on the sbahn platform waiting with the masses for my train. Suddenly, a man walked past me holding a can of my beloved Dr. Pepper... Seeing my chance I ran down the platform behind the guy yelling "Entschhuldigung! Entschdigung!" (Which means excuse me) The guy wasn't turning around, and the whole platform was watching me fail epically at getting his attention... So I lurched forward and grabbed his shoulder, THAT made him turn around... So in my best German I said "wo haben Sie dass gekreigt?!" (Meaning where did you get that?!) The response was underwhelming.. The guy just stared and said "...uhhhhh what??" So I of course asked in English and he responded that he had found it in a department store close by... Defeated I walked away after saying thank you for the tip of where the dr. Pepper was... Moral of the story, assuming everyone speaks German

Before I moved to Munich I lived in the lovely city of Calgary... NOW the thing that really sucked the big one about Calgary is the transit. Yes it's a very spread out city and yes it's always cold... but in my mind that's no excuse for buses to always be at least five minutes late, or five minutes early. Since living in Munich, where there is probably one of the best transit systems in the world, I will have the hardest time putting up with horrible Canadian transit... anywhere! I've turned into the impatient German (not that I was really that patient before...) These are the thoughts that go through my mind while I wait for a train, or U-Bahn (subway), or bus, or any of the other transit... "The train is exactly on time? It said it was going to be here in three minutes and it was here in exactly three minutes... why wasn't it early?!" OR... perhaps the bus is ten seconds late... "WHY CAN'T I SEE THE BUS?! I should have just walked... would have been faster, SO late!" OR... like many times, if I just miss a train... WHAT?! I have to wait FIVE minutes for the next train?! That is UNACCEPTABLE! Why would I want to wait that long?! Why isn't there one in one minute?! Why am I being put at such an inconvenience?! The train is also not running from about 3:15-4AM... WHAT IF I NEED TO GO SOMEWHERE AT 3:30!? This will not be good upon my return to the Great White North... scary times are ahead!!

Who I had breakfast with #dinos #breakfastfriends

Clearly I've fallen off of keeping up with these posts!! And the worst part is that I haven't even been busy! I've just been watching TV series on Watchever (German version of Netflix!). But I'm back now! Annnnd maybe better than ever! A few weeks ago Hans and I went to the Egyptian Museum here in Munich... Or in German Ägyptischen Museum... Anywhooo, they have a ton of cool things in the museum, but no actual mummies exposed! Which was a little big disappointing. They do however have a "copy" of the book of the dead that I spent a good time reading. And while reading it I started thinking, "what if this is all wrong? What if someone just guessed what the hieroglyphs said and we're totally totally wrong??!" For example, they create an alphabet based off of how many times characters are used and yadayada, but what if we're wrong about it?! What if they Egyptians are looking down at us right now and saying "maaaannnn they're not even close! That was a comic strip!" This is the way I like to see it anyway... BUT this photo is one of the "mistakes" I found on the wall. They have the writings posted in German and then in English beside it... In this case the Germans are clearly trying to turn English into the word combining language that German is haha! Tooooo funny!

#planking is still cool right? She doesn't care, she's bringing it back! #childhood #coolkid #retro

WHAT IS WITH THE LIMITED FREE WIFI?! So. I was recently stuck in the Warsaw airport for six hours... Then delayed another hour and a half... I'm just going to make a mega first world problem here...but why is the free wifi only good for half an hour?! And why do the scanners never work?! (You have to scan your boarding pass to get an access code and password) I basically went into meltdown mode because I couldn't get the Internet to work! (Really really sad I know) Honestly though... I almost turned into a psychotic beast! They were announcing that the flight was delayed and I came extremely close to turning into the Hulk, snapping and screaming THEN GIVE ME MORE WIFI!! AS LONG AS I HAVE WIFI I'LL BE HAPPY! (At this point I had also been delaying eating because I'm too cheap to pay for the food annnnnnnd I get food on the plane! I was also putting off napping because I was trying to get onto Canada time) Instead, I walked around to each "free wifi scanner"... None were working and this added to the Hulk rage. When I finally got Internet I attempted to text/message everyone and anyone who would respond! "HUMAN CONTACT PLEASE! SOMEONE MUST KNOW THE AGONY I AM IN NOT HAVING ANY INTERNET!!!!" It's amazing how quickly a half hour can go by... Few people answered.

I love this shirt. #austria #kangaroosareanogohere

SO. Last weekend I ventured to Vienna, with Julianne, for her last weekend in Europe (continental Europe that is!). We were there for preeetttttyyy much 30 hours! But it was a blast! (Despite it pouring rain all of Sunday). Saturday we both arrived (I got in a few hours before her annnnd naturally just sat and read my book in the train station). We then ventured to the hostel and attempted to find the "downtown core". Not knowing the city is a pretty bad way to try and find the downtown. We ventured around for probably 45 minutes attempting to find food... We finally found a typical J&J spot (pub looking place). Only to walk in and find out they didn't have a food menu! However the lovely Scotsman owner (who had actually the thickest accent even when he said something in German) pointed us in the direction of a pub with good food! We returned to the Scotsman's pub after eating and when we went to leave couldn't reaaaallly figure out which way we had to go (we had basically walked in circles for 45 minutes before...) standing outside of the pub we were trying to decide which was to go... One thought one way and the other thought another way... Thankfully, the nicest guy in the world was walking by and asked if he could help us! When he told us which way to go we pretty much ignored his existence and both said "I TOLD YOU!!" Thanked him quickly and ended up back in the hostel faster than we would have otherwise! The next day we went to see Schönbrunn palace (which was amazing). When we stepped back outside it was raining cats and dogs but we decided to venture around the Christmas market that was outside of the palace. Next up was St. Peter's Cathedral. And very much like the Rathaus here in Munich, it looks like it was drawn and it's just a screen that you'll run into. Again like the Rathaus, it's not fake. Inside is giant and the architecture is amazing. After that we ventured to find a place to eat (annnnnnd also let my feet dry a bit, for anyone who was wondering, moccasins do not fair well in rain). The train station was next, we hopped onto the train and made it home (for me) and onto her next stop (Julianne). Overall Vienna will need to be visited again.

This week in people caught sleeping in train stations a man who literally fell asleep on the street! This guy was asleep on the ground and he's leaning against the window of the train station!! His neck probably really hurt when he woke up!

I then birdied my head and beelined it out of there… (A whole, probably, twenty feet.. The bar is super super super small). Germans are undoubtably graceful and don’t fall off of ledges… Hoooohum.

Hans on his first voyage.. Aka at the Deutches Museum #germany #gosmelltheroses #museums

So... After looking after and living with two toddlers and two six year olds for three months, I've come fl realize that the statement that toddlers are like drunk people is very very true. Forget everything about your personal space with them (like drunk people) because they'll invade it no matter who you are... Boobs are punched and kicked, hair is pulled annnnd sitting on you no matter what position you're in also occurs. This is just the beginning. It's not only that they're loud, fall over over nothing and run into things. These kids are actually mini drunk people! (Without the booze!). Let's start with the volume level... Always ridiculously high... Annnnnbd there's no controlling it (or what they say). Toddlers also feel the need to announce things that are extremely obvious... Example, the other day I was reading a book to the toddlers about a monkey who can't find his mum. The book itself is called Monkey Puzzle and I read it about once a day. Now, as I was reading the book the other day, Conrad pointed out that the book was about a monkey (louder than anyone has ever declared it) to which I said, "yes Conrad it's about a monkey..." I turned the page and continued to read and again, he pointed out it was about a monkey. The next book we read was called "Desser, the Best Cat Ever" (a horribly sad book so I don't recommend it). About three quarters through the book Conrad said "THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT A CAT". Again I told him he was correct annnnd he proceeded to tell me multiple times. When it happened the second time I really realized (yes I realize that is redundant) that toddlers truly are tiny drunk people and they're just going to continue to point out obvious things, speak at decibels that rival fighter jets and they're going to fall over wherever they're currently standing. Ohhhhh well. But seriously my job rocks because it's hilarious dealing with them and their odd remarks.

I know it's art, but to me this one kind of looks like a chalkboard someone only half erased... #art

On today's adventure I went to the Pinakothek der Moderne, or in English... The Modern Art Museum! And then proceeded to go to the Museum Brandhorst to continue my exposure to art! Pinakothek der Moderne was filled with "modern" art. Apparently modern art has a lot to do with rugs, they were literally everywhere! (The entire third floor of the museum is dedicated to Moroccan rugs!) NOW the best part about Munich is that on Sundays the museums are only 1euro, as I've already said. Today I entered the premises of Pinakothek der Moderne (after getting seriously, seriously lost... And I mean seriously, I turned around about five times because I repeatedly went the wrong direction on the new street) and immediately paid. When you pay you're given a little clip to put onto your shirt to prove that you've paid. Today as I was walking into the first chunk of the exhibit, literally about to put the pin on, a security lady comes over and accuses me of not paying!! When I showed her the pin she barely even apologized! But that made me think... It's 1euro... Are they really freaking out about 1euro?! The rest of the museum was super cool! They have a ton of Andy Warhol stuff and are paired with another museum (that's literally around the corner) called Museum Brandhorst! Brandhorst has a huge Andy Warhol display on right now called "Reading Andy Warhol". Unfortunately I don't have any pictures from it because they weren't allowed. The security guard again explained to me that I wasn't allowed to take a picture, as I did... WHOOPS!