After several days´meeting, traveling ... it comes to the last hours to leaving from Munich to Vienna.
I am now in an Internet Cafe nearby the Central Station (aka Main Station) in Munich. My dreaming train to Vienna is several hours later. After working on some emails, now I have a little time to recall what beautiful and interesting things i have seen these days. Unfotunately, the computer does not allow me to input Chinese (you, know, it´s in Germeny). I have to use English. :(
One more strange thing here is that the "Y" and the "Z" on the keyboard here are exchanged. I always press wrong ones. However, the good thing is that both the mouse and keyboard are made in China. The mouse is made by "Logitech" and keyboard is made by "Labtech".
I met one Chinese from BJ here. He is learning in a private university. I spent 2 Euro for accessing the Internet for only one hour ... he told me, 3 Euro can have 1 day access! So, talk with Asian face people when you are on travel ... they might give you a lot of tips there! Try it.
I still cannot understand the train system. You know what? We three people spent 21 Euro by taking a round-trip train to Swan Castle and back totally. George spent 37 Euro for only one person. We took the same train. Who can explain to me that? ... very curious about it.
Talking about George, it´s a miracle. I cannot believe this happened. 1) Somebody recommend Jian Shuo Wang´s log (
www.wangjianshuo.com) to him -> 2) he visited Jian Shuo´s blog site -> 3) he found my blog (
www.run2me.com) and visited it -> 4) he observed I was in Munich that days -> 5) he contacted me via BBS board and email -> 6) we got connected in MSN and made an appointment in the Central Station in Munich ... the place we have been there before -> 7) we met near the gate of the train to Swan Castle finally! It´s a miracle! I cannot believe it happened without a phone call for two persons who never know each other meeting in a place they have never been there before! but it happened in the Interget age!
Swan Castle is great! I have many pictures ... but i cannot upload it today because the computer is public. I will write something with posting photos later.
Comparaing to Swan Castle yesterday, today´s tour in downtown is another kind of experience. We hired a "taxi guide" ... who is one of the 11 taxi guide with license, who were selected from 600 candidates from acdamic.
You must also guessed out ... he is not cheap. Other than inviting him for breakfast and lunch, we paid him 300 Euro for his seven hours guiding, which means 3000 RMB (not including tickets of the places we went)! However, the price is still only 30% of their list price. He never did with this price before. The old man (55 years old) has a young girl friend from Shanghai, named Phenix Wu. Her guide is double expensive as the man. :(
But on the other hand, his guide was really professional. Without his introducing, you cannot understand the background of buildings, symbols, the history. It really gave me a lot of valuable information. Though he did not admit, but i can feel strongly that he hate America and Americans. It´s very common situation in European countries. It´s hard for a visitor if you only speak English. People here will normally not answer you even if they understand English. Iraq war brought very bad image for George Bush here.
I have to mention baravian food (Munich is the capical of State Bavaria) here. It´s simple but very good. My lunch today is veal and pork. They both taste excellent. I don´t drink ... it´s a pity. But I tried to understand why people here can drink 2 liters easily with a lunch, no answer so far, too difficult to me. :)
National Meseum here is very good. Now is the Chrismax season. We lucky met a Christian exhabit here. 70% citizens here are Christians ... they pay 7% of their tax as Christian Tax for their religion. Now I can fully understand, why people say Art is tightly combined with religions, from religions and for religions.
OK, I am leaving now. It´s around 9pm here in Munich ... 4am in Shanghai. So, I am behind you, friends. I need to have a quick dinner first, then leaving for the music heaven - Vienna.