Signs and Wonders, Jena Edition

A collection of interesting things I've seen around Jena:

Lichtenhain Feuerwehr (volunteer fire department) mural

Commemorative plaque at Jena West train station for the Holocaust victims who departed on trains from there

Walpurgisnacht witch effigy burning at the top of Kunitzburg

Graffiti of Pikachu as Totoro

Warning: bat house! (Old house in the woods transformed into bat sanctuary)

Driveway entrance passed while hiking up Am Herrenberg

Vegalize it.. food truck

"American-style table dance bar"

Napoleonstein commemorating Napoleon's Jena victory in 1806

Land of Yaks

Tibet is a beautiful place, and the blue skies when we arrived at the Lhasa airport were a welcome sight after days of Beijing's "blue" grey skies. (Above, a sign leaving the airport that pictures all the great Communist party leaders, past and current.)

The Potala Palace is Lhasa's most noteworthy building, and while I was initially excited to do a tour inside it, the tour process for our English-speaking group was going to be a massive pain in the butt, so a coworker and I escaped in search of noodles instead. We wandered through some public park areas and through the main streets of downtown, which are quite cheery during the day, despite all the police and military presence.

After a few days of acclimation, we headed to our field station at Nam Co, which is at an elevation of ~4720m (15,000+ feet) (and everything liquid-like in a bottle you bring up from Lhasa WILL explode as soon as you open it). We first headed over a nearby pass, which is often visited by tourists and pilgrims and covered in prayer flages, to the point that they just look like trash.

North of Nam Co, a local pub/restaurant/hang out for workers on nearby construction projects.

Yaks were everywhere, including this prettiest lady of the bunch (disclaimer: possibly not a lady).

Rock cairn by the shore of Nam Co, or Holy Lake

 Bridge out over a glacier-fed stream.. not a problem for our professional drivers and land cruisers.

Tibet.. alas that I only had 2 weeks.

Beijing Blue(s)

A catch-up post from the summer.. I was in Beijing for a few days en route to Tibet, and the skies were varying shades of grey the whole time.

Some highlights: a tourist market with lots of unique things to eat (including freshly deep-fried scorpions)..

Some street posters depicting information about Chinese socialist values..

A nice park near the Forbidden City, with these trees wrapped in plastic wrap (presumably to protect them from something? Or keep them moist??)

 Lotus flowers in the park

 Lotus + pagoda + boats + bridge

Looking into the Forbidden City from the park next to it. Note the illusion of it disappearing into the distance, thanks to the smog.

 And the value of clear translation, from the restroom in said park:

Praha, Gateway to Eastern Europe

I must say, Prague is a pretty cool city. All the buildings look like something out of a fairy tale, and the population is international and cosmopolitan. A very compelling advertisement for Eastern Europe.

My bro came to visit, and we kicked off the week with a few days in the Czech Republic, which was better than I anticipated. It's hard to explain the feeling, but for some reason I felt more at ease there than I do some days in Germany...

We checked out all the major tourist and sight-seeing attractions: the St. Charles Bridge (which got progressively more and more choked with pedestrians as the day wore on), the Mala Strana neighborhood, Petrin Hill, and Prague Castle.

 

On the eastern side of the river, we visited the Old Town, the under-construction Astronomical Clock in the Rathaus, and the old Jewish Quarters.

We ate some Trdlo confections, sampled beers, and I was very excited to have company that wanted to eat at vegan restaurants, so we tried out Vegan's Prague and Estrella, which were both awesome veggie places. (We didn't go to the above-pictured Hard Rock Cafe, I just thought it was a hilarious juxtaposition of Old Town architecture and new-world kitsch.)

And for extra touristy fun, we checked out a black light theater production (Afrikania) and zorbing on the Vltava. Nice weather, nice city, nice price, 5 stars.

Berlin is a Male

Berlino is the Italian version of Berlin's name, and I wondered how one can tell whether a city is male or female. Putting this question to the test over a weekend trip, I got a few clues. (All-night-döner, the omnipresent 24/7 corner Spätis, and ashtrays built into the walls in club bathrooms are just a few ideas that come to mind.) But I also saw some interesting and/or nice things.

An old, abandoned amusement park, complete with a small train system around the border; not sure what this weird spider-looking pavilion was, but maybe part of a ride.

The Insel with water access and festival-type foods

Flower wreaths in Treptower Park commemorating Soviet efforts to free Berlin in WWII

(I happened to be there May 10, the day after Victory Day)

Soviet soldier rescuing a German child and crushing a swastika

Abandoned train cars and old train station... exactly the post-industrial, apocalyptic look I'd hope for in Berlin

Reichstag German parliament building

The popular tourist spot, Brandenburg Tor

Hotel Adlon, where Michael Jackson infamously held his baby over the balcony 

(on the far right, actual room just out of the picture)

Fashion for the large (or exxxxtreeeemmmmeeely large) man

Ashtray built into the bathroom stall wall

The Namesake-city of Jena, Louisiana

.. but pronounced differently. Jena, Germany (YAY-nuh) was the site of a major Napoleonic victory and thus served as the namesake city for several other Jenas across the world, including Jena, Louisiana (JEAN-uh).

View towards the south of Jena from the commemorative Napoleonstein

I've been in Jena since the end of January this year, and I've thus far enjoyed the "small city" life, a.k.a. 100,000 person university-town. Some of the highlights of the area include great hiking in the surrounding hills, the Saale River cutting through town, being able to walk everywhere interesting in under 20 minutes, and the Old Town/Markt area in the center of town.

Following: some landscape views from around town.

Saale, "warm" winter weather

Saale, same spot, "cold" winter weather (the ducks don't care either way)

Old water tower on the outskirts of Jena

Erlkoenig statue

Market square, with some random person

View from the plateau in southwest of Jena

Springtime at the Strand22 bar on the Saale, with rentable swan boat

View from the swan

Balloon above the southwest hills

City view from the northwest hills

The Things You Take for Granted

A short list of things you take for granted living the States that are simply not a given in Germany:

• No Netflix, Amazon prime, or Pandora: You might be able to access shows and movies on Netflix or Amazon, but your content will be limited by geography. There's a German Amazon, but your American account won't transfer over any gift card funds or stuff like that. Also, Pandora is right out. You'll need a smart DNS or VPN to get around the limitations.
• Unlimited texting/calling with your phone plan: You'll probably have to pay per text or call-minute. Although plus-points for the high availability of no-contract phone service. It's been over 10 years since "long-distance calls" were a thing in the US, with calls between different area codes and states becoming irrelevant as everyone got cell phones. Well, in Europe it's a concept that's still around for calls between countries with different country codes. Suck it up, buttercup, and just use WhatsApp to contact your international friends instead.
• Using credit cards: There are a lot of cash-only places, and even in shops where you can use your debit card, sometimes you feel a little judged for holding up the line if you have to type in your PIN. With that said, my debit card is a touchless "contactless" one, so you don't even have to put it in a chip reader, just kind of waft it by a scanner, which is neat.
• Coffee sizes: are not sufficient by American standards. I have a moka-pot Bialetti-style coffee pot in my apartment whose box says it's a 3-cup pot.. but I would struggle to call it a one-cup pot. Maybe this is because it's more espresso-style coffee, but maybe it's just because I think a solid cup of coffee is one that could make a dent in a pint glass. As it is, I fill up a cup with equal parts milk and coffee to make it a reasonable cup. The presence of teeny tiny coffee mugs in my pre-stocked apartment makes me think it's not a one-off thing.
• Everything's just a little inconvenient: Opening a bank account is a pain.. you'd think they want your business, but not exactly. (N26 for online banking is the best.. although it means I have to withdraw money from certain shops, which is awkward and weird.) Apartment-hunting with German contracts is ridiculous, and what you get in the end sucks. If you want to engage in online shopping and have a package delivered to your apartment... just don't. Someone has to be there to receive it, and if it doesn't fit in your mailbox, you're SOL. (I have stuff delivered to my office, although that's probably against the norm / rules.) German fridges are generally tiny, so you have to go shopping more frequently. No Uber.

But there are of course good things to balance out the inconvenient.. like public transit that runs all night long, even if it only runs once an hour. No fear of getting shot walking around late at night. Pedestrian and bike-friendly cities. And so forth.. but that's not the subject of this post.