Vivian in Europe: September 2011

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Vivian Goes to Lucerne

On Wednesday, I took the train from Bern to Lucerne, a tourist town in central Switzerland. It is a lakeside town surrounded by mountains. It has a nice Old Town with architecture that has something like fresco paintings on the walls. The Old Town is very cool but they had stores like Foot Locker. That was the last store I expected to see. They have this really awesome bridge called the Kapellbrücke that is built from timber and spans the the length of the river. It's like the icon of Lucerne. Another icon is this sculpture of a dying lion on the side of a mountain that is to commemorate the members of the Swiss army who died during the French Revolution. Overall, Lucerne is a pretty cool place to visit, especially if you take a cable car up to any of the surrounding mountains (too expensive for me). Like Bern, it's not very big and you can walk around the city in a few hours.

Kapellbrücke

Kapellbrücke and Water Tower

Old Town

I think this is the biggest church in Lucerne

Lion Monument

Old Medieval Walls

Cuckoo Clocks

Kapellbrücke -- this picture was taken by a random tourist.. I handed him my camera to take the picture but he took several pictures of me with his own camera first... I don't know whether to be creeped out or flattered.

Vivian Goes to Bern

On Tuesday morning, I flew to Geneva and took a train to Bern where I spent the night. Bern is quite an underrated city. It has a very nice Old Town filled with cobblestone streets and magnificent architecture. It is a nice fusion between Italian, German, and French. I’m not sure why, but Bern has a large underground. There’s an entire mall built completely underground. In the Old Town, there are a lot of cellars/basements underneath the stores that they turned into more stores. It’s pretty cool thought. Bern is built on top of a hill and is actually surrounded by the Aare River so it basically has a moat, which is AWESOME. The river is very beautiful. One thing that Bern is very famous for is the Bear Pit, which no longer really a pit because of animal-rights activists groups. They have four bears in there, a mom, a dad, and two boys. The dad is separated from the other three though because apparently, he would kill the little ones. Overall, I really liked Bern, much more than I like Amsterdam and Brussels. I definitely recommend visiting it if you have the chance but the city is pretty small so a day here is more than enough.

One of the older buildings in the newer part of Bern

Church

Too foggy to see the Alps

For lazy people who don't want to walk

Swiss Government Buildng

Plaza in front of the Swiss Gov't Building

Front of the Swiss Gov't Building

Streets in the Old Town -- they have a thing for arches

On every block, there's a random fountain in the middle of the street

YUM

Zeitglockenturm

Bern's Biggest Church

They love bears

Aare River

Cellar store

Bear Pit

Baby bear born 2 years ago

View of Aare from the top of the Bear Pit

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Vivian Goes to Brussels

My friends in Norway wondered why I was going to Belgium because people generally don’t visit there. It is not a very popular tourist spot compared to all the other European countries. I had actually forgotten why I wanted to go other than it wasn’t too expensive getting there and that it was convenient to go from Amsterdam. Yesterday, however, I was reminded of why I ever decided to go in the first place. Two things: Belgian chocolate and Belgian waffles. Yes, my stomach led me to Belgium. The chocolate shops are amazing. Once you step inside, it is like you’re floating on Cloud Nine. And then you look at the prices and you fall back down to Earth… Unfortunately, due to the strict weight limitations of carry-on baggage for RyanAir, I was only able to buy 2 kilos of chocolate, 1 kilo of which I had to hide on my person so I wouldn’t get charged €40. Belgian waffles are amazing and I mean real Belgian waffles, which are very different from the so-called Belgian waffles found everywhere else in the world. I don’t know what the other differences are but I can surely taste it. Waffles were expensive as well, costing about €2 each. I spent more money on chocolate and waffles in one day than I did on food, transportation, etc. in 2.5 days in Amsterdam. Brussels is quite an expensive city, mainly because it is the capital of Europe, home to the EU. This means that Brussels is extremely diverse. I really cannot tell you what a Belgian person looks like. They all look so different. They’re not very good-looking either, especially compared to Norwegians. People here smoke way too much and they sure love their fries. On every block, you can find at least one French fries stand or shop. It is scary how much French fries they consume. While their fries are good, I don’t think they’re any better the fries we have in America and they charge at least €0.50 for sauce. You can’t even free ketchup in McDonalds. It’s absurd I tell you.

Brussels is not very pretty. There are a few really amazing places, such as the King’s Palace, the Grand Place, and the Atomium but overall, there is not much that is spectacular about the city. It is quite dirty and crowded. You would think that since it is the European capital, they would spend more money and put more effort into beautifying the city but no.

Overall, my impression of Brussels is that it has some nice, distinguishing qualities, but there are so many better places in Europe to visit. It is not a city I would visit again. I might visit Belgium to go to Brugge and/or Ghent but it is unlikely. Not to mention, there is a language barrier since most people speak French and/or Flemish and no English. Luckily, I had someone to help me translate. Otherwise, I would’ve been screwed. There is just nothing really special about this place other than Belgian waffles and Belgian chocolate but I recommend just googling recipes for authentic Belgian waffles and spending some extra money to buy Godiva chocolate, which actually is not much cheaper here.