Venice, Italy

We finally made it to wonderful Venice, Italy. As you already know there are no cars allowed in this island and everyone moves via boats or gondolas. Below you can see the view from our boat going toward Venice:

We went straight into St. Mark's square and I could not believe all the beauty around us. I could not comprehend that little old me was actually there!!! If there is one thing I have learned this year is that anything is possible. The first thing that catches your eye in the plaza is St. Mark's Basilica which was completed on 1105. The walls where all covered in gold leaves inside the Basilica:
Here we are on the Basilica's balcony overlooking the square.

Out of no where a blast of fog came into Venice and even though it got colder (yupi!!..not) it really gave us an interesting view of the city. At least it did not flood like it has in the past. The fog let us take these amazing pictures of Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute and St. Mark's Campanile.

The most famous part about this city is off course the Gondolas!! Here we are in a gondola ride (i thought it was going to tip over but we survived) and a view of the "streets":

There where 6 people per gondola (we managed to make an all Spanish speaking gondola in which the girls where asking the gondolier lots of questions), except one that only had a couple on it. I said to Orlando "I wonder what's going on?". It turns out that the guy proposed to his girlfriend right there!!!! The gondolas are the 10th best place in the world to propose. If you are wondering the 1st place to propose is in Table Mountain in Cape Town, South Africa (reference: http://www.thisisthelife.com/en/ultimate-places-to-propose/index.htm). Later in the day we found out that a second couple in our tour had gotten engaged in the Rialto Bridge. Go Venice!!! Needless to say everyone was happy that night wishing the couples the best in their new lives together.

Note: A few blocks from our hotel Orlando saw a sign that had a Puerto Rico flag and said "Clases de salsa todos los sabados" (salsa class every Saturday). I guess our musical impact has reached many corners of the world.

Innsbruck, Austria

On our way to Austria (Dec. 29, 2006) the tour bus crossed through the Alps and the views where amazing as you can see from the picture above. We also had a chance to see the Neuschwanstein Castle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuschwanstein) in Germany. You can see it from the road (the yellow box is not actually there).
A few people had never seen snow before and they got out of the bus and started a snow fight!!! As for me I thought I would escape snow this year but it seems to follow me everywhere :-(.
Here we are on the road toward the castle:

As you can see the castle was huge and we had to go up the mountain in a horse carriage in order to get to it. The castle employees where trying to get as many people as possible inside the carriage so I ended up almost on the lap of the carriage driver..lucky me?!?!?! I think he smelled worse than the horses!!!! But it was worth it!!!

Here we are in front of the castle's main entrance.
The castle was very impressive inside (sorry you can't take pictures in the inside). It was full of paintings, mosaics, murals and very elaborate wood carvings. There was one room that had paintings and sculptures everywhere with more than 1,000 white swans. We where like why are they so many swans? At the end of the tour I asked the guide "Where was the queen of this castle?" (she was never mentioned). The guide replied: "The only queen was the king", hahaha no wonder, the king was gay!!! That explains all the extravagances!!!

Once we arrived in Innsbruck I was impressed by the view of this huge town in the middle of the Alps as you can see below:
Here is a picture of The Golden Roof. It's balcony was used by royalty to watch events in the square below since 1500 and it looks like new!!!
Iddya in the streets (I'm not actually dancing if you where wondering)

Check out one of the cool buildings all around town:

For a parting thought here is Orlando in his signature pose:

Munich, Germany

On our way to Munich we stopped in a little town next to the Rhine River called St. Goar (Dec. 27, 2006). The area was actually very nice, I was too sleepy in the morning to take a picture but thanks to the Internet here we where:
That night we went to this white whine tasting inside of a cave!!!! The wine was good but it was cold!!!! Here we are (for some reason I have bunch of pictures of use drinking but hey what can I do about it now?):

We saw this very interesting Jägermeister dispenser at the hotel bar and a giant beer stein (it keeps your beer cold). Go German engineering!!!

Once we finally got to Munich Orlando and I went exploring around the city and he found a street in his honor as you can see:

Here are some nice artsy pictures of the city. This is the town hall:

Here is the Frauenkirche (Cathedral of Our Lady) which is the most famous building in the city center and it's more than 500 years old!!!

There was also really good shopping (as you can see form the bag that I am carrying):

Here we are in one the biggest beer halls in Germany, Hofbrauhaus established in 1589. Basically it was this huge open hall with a bunch of pick nick tables full of people, even people who did not know each other!!! You just talked to whom ever was next to you, raised you glass and said cheers. Those are one full liter of beer!!!! This was definitely a very interesting way of spending our 3rd wedding anniversary.

I have to give it up for the band that was playing they really contributed to the atmosphere. I love their clothes!!!

Reggeaton sighting (if you have no idea what this kind of music is then check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reggeaton - yes someone actually took the time to research this stuff) - On our way back to the hotel Orlando and I where waiting for a street light to change when suddenly an SUV passes by with a Daddy Yankee song blasting from his rolled down windows. We just stared at each other and started laughing hysterically. I don't remember what song it was but it was one of the early ones completely in Spanish. To our surprise this was not the only time we would have such an encounter, more to come on that in later blogs.

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

In order to get to our European tour we spent X-mas day in an airplane!!! We where like Merry X-mas now grab your stuff and let's go to the train station. Actually this was the longest X-mas day ever since we left Japan on the 25th and arrived in England around 9pm the same day!!! So we actually had 1.5 days of X-mas!! Crazy huh? I was kind of bummed because it was our first X-mas away from home. We had spent X-mas eve with friends at an Irish bar a few block away. The bar had some live music (like the soundtrack from Braveheart) and I was thinking that this is truly a first for me, where are the guitars, sticks, maracas and "panderetas"? Where are the "trovadores" (typical singers) and everyone singing along (mostly out of tune) traditional Puerto Rican songs? I was somewhat sad but the excitement of our upcoming trip made me feel better.

Once we arrived in London we realized that everything was closed!!! There was no public transportation!!! We had forgotten that it was still Christmas day!!! So we just chilled at the hotel bar that night. The next day we went to the tour's meeting spot and realized that we had already seen all this people the day before in the same bar we where in, apparently there was absolutely nothing open. We where soon off to Amsterdam in the motor coach that would be home for the next 2 weeks.

Once we arrived in Amsterdam (Dec. 26, 2006), we went on a boat cruise around the city canals. There where lots of little floating houses around the canal (which people where having X-mas parties in) which remeinded me of "La Parguera" in Puerto Rico.

The best part was that it was open bar.

So we proceeded to meet a few a people by sharing some "cheers". The funniest thing was that there where 3 Japanese guys sitting in a corner. That would soon change since one of the girls from South Africa asked Orlando how to say cheers in Japanese which is "Kompai". She proceeded to get them some drinks and started saying Kompai and proceeded to drink up. The issue is that she kept doing it!!! I went over and introduced myself and after about 10 minutes ran out of Japanese phrases but I don't think they cared because by that time they where all really drunk, but I still participate in the Kompai moments.

After everyone was "happy" from the cruise we went to the red light district of Amsterdam. In all honesty I did not know what to expect. It was basically "coffee shops", "ladies of the night" behind glass windows, bars and pizza parlors in succession. For the record we did not go into any of the shops, we just stared at the decadence it that place. You are not supposed to take pictures but here I am in front of a "coffee shop":

The next day we walked around Amsterdam. The city looked completely different during the day!!! It actually has some pretty cool sights. Here is a good view of the city, and Orlando looks nice too:


Here is Orlando in Dam Square the middle of the city.

Here I am inside a huge Dutch wooden clog:

I followed my friend Miriam's advice (she studied history and has been all over Europe) and visited Ann Frank's House. It was quite impressive to see how they lived in such a small place. You could go up to all the rooms and see the infamous book case that covered the entrance to the rear annex. They managed to stay alive thanks to the Mr. Frank's coworkers who gave them food and supplies. To the right you can see a picture of Anne Frank's house.

Afterwards we went to see the Van Gogh Museum. They had a pretty impressive collection of paintings and memorabilia from his life. In general Amsterdam had a little bit of everything to offer.

Europe

We are back from Europe!!!! This year Orlando and I decided to do something different since we are in the other side of world so finally we put our foots down and went to Europe for 2 weeks!!! It was great!!!! we are completely exhausted after using every type of transportation available (high speed trains, airplanes, ferries, taxis, motor coach, subways and 1 horse carriage) to visit 10 cities and 7 countries in 14 days!!! After a while I would wake up and ask "Where are we?". I will be processing the more than 1000 pictures we took over the next few weeks and writing down some anecdotes about the trip but for now this was our general impression of Europe.

A. Good things

1. Big food portions - since we usually order about 3 or 4 entrees in Japan in order to be full, it was a relief to be able to order just one thing and be stuffed (especially in Italy).

Here I am eating some pizza in front of the Roman Coliseum:

2. Being able to communicate - for the most part everyone would speak English and in Italy we just spoke Spanish and they would answer back in Italian and everyone was happy.

3. Normal clothes sizes - finally no more 1, 0 and 00 sized pants!!!

4. The history - we went from visiting Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines in Japan back to good old catholic churches.

The best part was the Basilica of San Pedro by far, here is Orlando inside:

5. 7% of the French

B. Annoying things (according to our tour guide "It's not wrong, it's just different" but still)

1. Paying for using the bathroom

2. Paying for ketchup and any other type of sauce - we did not notice this until the end when we checked the receipt!!!

3. The use of different currencies - England and Switzerland should just join the European union so we would not have to be changing from Pounds to Franks to Euros (so annoying!!!)

4. Using 20 cent and 2 cent coins - why? what's wrong with the 1 cent or 10 cent coins?

5. 93% of the French.

C. People

We took a tour around Europe with about 50 people ages 18-35. It was very much like a senior trip except you can't call your parents if you run out of money!!! There where people from everywhere the majority was from Australia and the others where from Brazil, South Africa, Canada and even 3 from Puerto Rico!!! We where not the only ones!!!! I was sooooo happy to be part of an actual group that you can't even image, plus it was good having a little bit of home so far away. We where called a little bit of everything, some of the people in the tour group called us the Puerto Rican express, others the Puerto Rican posse or Team Puerto Rico which where all good. Here we are in from of the Eiffel Tower:

Everyone was from different walks of life. A few people where still in college, some where engineers, teaches, soldiers, accountants and a doctor (one of my new PR buddies). Here we are with some of our new friends hanging out in Switzerland:

My absolute favorite picture of the whole trip is this one we took in Paris:

I know we where not the only ones that took a trip during X-mas so please let us know how your vactions went!!!

FELIZ NAVIDAD

FELIZ NAVIDAD A TODOS

MERRY X-MAS EVERYBODY

I know everyone must be packing right now to go home or on super adventure trip for Christmas so I decided to publish the X-mas post as soon as possible. I hope everyone has a really good time with their family and friends, and don't eat too much!!! I was thinking this year brought a lot of change not only for Orlan and I but for many of our friends. Some people had kids, others moved and some got married all in a really short amount of time, just one year!!!!! So congratulations to everyone!!!! I'm sure the new year will bring more crazy adventures for everyone.

If your going to Puerto Rico or anywhere tropical take a few minutes to admire the beautiful view and take a nice picture like this one:

P.S. We will be gone for 2 weeks and I won't be updated the Blog so if you want to stare at the same pictures and read the same stories then that's fine, but you have been warned.
2nd P.S. - The pictures are from last year at my In-laws place in Ponce, PR. Everyone here is Buddhist (there are X-mas decorations in the shops but it's like a Hallmark Holiday) and mainly celebrate the New Year.

Mitaki Temple

On Sunday Erin decided to stop taking Aly (our friend who has been here working from Michigan for 5 weeks) shopping or to the arcade (seriously we spend 3 hours in the photo booth last time) and go to the Mitaki Buddhist Temple near by Hiroshima. It turn out to be a great idea because even though it's officially winter it still looks like fall!!! I had been to the temple before but the "fall" colors made everything look 10 times more scenic. Here are a series of "artsy" pictures that I took:

These statues are called "Jizu" and they where all over the temple's surroundings. According to http://www.wikipedia.com/ Jizo is a Buddist enlightened being who provides Salvation from suffering and is the guardian of deceased children, expectant mothers, firemen, travelers, and pilgrims.These statues can sometimes be seen wearing tiny children's clothing or bibs, or with toys, put there by grieving parents to help their lost ones and hoping that Jizō would specially protect them. Sometimes the offerings are put there by parents to thank Jizō for saving their children from a serious illness. Jizō's features are also commonly made more babylike in order to resemble the children he protects.

This is "Iddya in the fall":

Here is "Iddya in the Bambu Forest" like in the movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

We decided to climb up the small mountain to see the view from the city. Once we got there I was very desapointed to find a giant electrical tower instead of a nice look our place, but it had the funniest sign I have even seen:

Japanese Party

This Friday I went to my first Japanese Work Party. It was extremely well organized with presentations and lots entertainment. The good part was you could eat and drink anything you wanted for 3 hours!! All Right!!! Here is a picture of the people who work with me.





The funniest part about the night was that the most quite guy in the whole office came out of his shell and sang a Kareoke song. Gues which one is the before and after in the pictures to the right. After his very interesting song I actually stood up and read a message from one of the managers in the office could not attend. No one wanted to read the message out loud (it was in english), offcourse who ended up reading it? Me !!! So what if there 70 people who had no idea who I was since I only started working 1 month ago.?!?!?! Little did they know that as the daughter of an ex-politician, I love making speaches and jump to the chance of making any presentations. At the end everyone congratulated me and I was like "ok so I can read....great" no big deal.
After the party there was an actual bus that took everyone to the Kareoke hall. This place was huge it had 7 stories full of Kareoke rooms!!! The best part is the video I took:

Here is our "out of his shell guy"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0DAarhNBoE
And now one of the guys who sang very well
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nsy8Rqjs1bw


If your wondering I did sing a few songs, but I stayed away from the ones in Spanish so I would not bucher them and give everyone a bad impression about Latin music.

View from the car

Hello everyone I just wanted to share one of the nice vews of the city I see on the way to work.

Japanese Test

There are no nice pictures this week because I did a crazy thing; I took a Japanese Proficiency test and spend the weekend inside studying!!! The first few weeks that I was here I was hanging out with my Catalan friend Nuria and accompanied her to the post office in order to learn where the post office was. It turns out she was applying for the Japanese test and I decided to apply also. Why not? So that was 5 months ago and I did not realize what the test required until 1 week ago when I found a website with review material for the test. The review for the test was 40 pages long with 15 of them just vocabulary words!!!!! I literally started laughing hysterically and saying to myself WHAT HAVE I GOTTEN MYSELF INTO!!!!!
After I got over my freak out I decided to research the requirements for the test. It turns out that you're supposed to have 150 hours of class, learn 120 kanji characters and know 800 words…Why am I so lucky? I calculated that I've taken about 60-70 hours of class since I have been here and know some kanji (the first things you learn are the exit, parking, entrance and the sign for woman to be able to go to the right bathroom). I tried to do the "college thing" and lock myself up all day and study, but there was something missing...all my study buddies from college (shot out to the INQU Posse, I know a few of you read this blog because of the dots in the map, leave me a comment to know your alive!!!).
The day of the test I woke up early, sharpened my #2 pencils, met some friends at the station and got on the train to the test center. I was very surprised at the amount of people from all over the world who where taking the test. Once the proctor started reading the instructions of the test out loud and that's when I realized I was in big trouble. I did not understand one word of what he was saying!!! He could have been talking in Russian and it would have made no difference!!! In the words of Grey's Anatomy – SERIOUSLY!!! I had a sudden urge to just get my stuff and go home but I'm a disaster figuring out the trains without Orlando so I just stayed.
The first part of the test involved matching a bunch of Kanji to their meaning. The whole time I was thinking does this have 3 lines next to the square? Maybe it was 3 lines next to the cross? I really wish I knew what the hell this sentence is talking about because it can be 2 different characters!!!! Anyways that did not go so well but I think I got a few.
I was feeling pretty good until the next part, listening. The speaker started blurring out various conversations and asking a question about it. The only problem was I could not even tell what the subject of the conversation was, it just all sounded like one really big never ending word. I would try to write down the few words that I could recognize but by that time the next conversation was already being played. So for 25 minutes I randomly colored circles...lots of fun. I was completely demoralized by the time the last section of the test came around, grammar and reading comprehension. Since I'm basically reading like a kid in kinder garden (something like: A-ri-ga-to) I did not even finish "reading" the whole thing. In a nut shell there is no way I'm passing this test and if I do I should start playing the Lottery.
The moral of the story is: Don't sign up for random tests without knowing what they really are, especially in a language with 3 alphabets, that conjugates adjectives (why do you need a whole new word just to say "it was cold" or "it will be cold"?) and has 3 ways of saying everything – casual (at home), polite (shows respect) and formal (at work).

PS - A nice community of bloggers has developed in the past few months, come and join us it's fun!!! If you want to see a few of my friends' blog just click the links on the right hand of the page and enjoy!!!! Caution: Some of them are in Spanish but you can look at the pretty pictures for kicks.