More walking around! (English Gardens and Schleissheim Palace Gardens)

The tree at Marienplatz

The last few weeks have been pretty quiet. We finally got our Visas sorted out and Sarah managed to trade in her (cough..old..) Virginia driver's license for a German one. That's a story for another time, but it's quite entertaining. Everyone here in Germany is pretty much done with their Christmas shopping and now they are all enjoying the Christmas markets, otherwise known as Christkindlmarkt or Weinachtsmarkt. We haven't been out to them together, but Sarah's casually strolled through a few. For a rather large, fairly liberal city, Munich has very traditional and conservative roots regarding Christmas traditions. Advent is on everyone's minds, and Advent calendars are actually sold in almost every store. You can get them in all kinds of themes and there's also a culture of those who "only use homemade" Advent calendars. These take a bit of time and effort to put together, but they're impressive.

A booth at the Viktualienmarkt, like a farmer's market, with Christmas decorations

We went out to visit the Palace at Schleißheim, but it was foggy and rainy, so it wasn't as stunning as it may normally seem. We were also duped by Google, who told us it was open for touring, but then when we got there, they were closed earlier due to Winter hours. We should have researched that a bit more thoroughly, but it was still a nice outing.

The Palace! The dirt pit in the foreground is a fountain that's been drained for winter. 

Part of the gardens of the Palace

Sarah's still job hunting. And because of that, we haven't decorated or started Christmas shopping at all! We feel a bit behind from the Germans, but we'll get there. We just want to make sure we're being smart while we're still a one income household. Coming soon will be Sarah's account of her adventures with the unemployment office, which is vastly different than it is in the USA. But that's for another time. Here are some pictures of life around Munich the last few weeks, and an album of pictures of our visit to the Palace. Thanks for checking in!!

Spelling Christesen, a
worldwide problem. 

Sarah did a bike tour with some other women and it was
tacky sweater themed. Found this at one of the
department stores here and thought, "Why not?"

From a Sunday stroll through the English Gardens

A Visit to the Bavarian State Museum

Supermoon in Munich

Since I (Sarah) am still not working, I've been exploring around the city, going to ex-pat meetups here and there, which has been a nice way to try new restaurants, cafes, and pass by some of the sights I didn't even know existed around the city. I've traveled to quite a good number of stops on each of the U-Bahn (underground train) lines, and walked around between stops as well to see what there is to see! Joe, unfortunately, doesn't have that kind of daily schedule. So this weekend we walked around a lot on Saturday so he could see some things and walk through some of the places I've been. Not just pretty buildings and historical sights, but also some of the big downtown shops and stores. We discovered that the Karstadt Sport store between Marienplatz and Karlsplatz has THE best soccer section of any of the sport shops I've walked through, and we passed through the setup for some of the upcoming Christmas markets (Christkindlmarkts or Weinnachtmarkts).

On Sunday, we decided to take advantage again of the 1€ admission specials that several of the museums offer. This time we went to the Bavarian State Museum (Bayerische Nationalmuseum), which showcases historical pieces of art and culture throughout the history of Bavaria, or Southern Germany/the Alps. They have a ridiculously large number of artifacts and their exhibits fantastic to walk through. We were there for two and a half hours and we really only made it through about half of the exhibits. It was really neat to see so many different parts of history in one museum, and so many well preserved pieces of culture.

Here's some pictures of what we saw. The lighting was not so bright there in many exhibits, to preserve color and texture of some of the older pieces I am sure, so taking pictures was not always easy (no flash photography allowed). But we got pictures of some of the exhibits and pieces that caught our eye. We'll have to head back to see the rest of the museum another time!

Here are a few pictures and here is a link to the rest of the Google album with more pictures. Enjoy!

This is a hand blown glass vase where the handles are elephants. SO much detail! 

A scale model of Munich circa...sometime in the 18th century, I think? Don't quote me on that. I don't remember. But it was pretty cool to see. Joe for scale (This model took up a whole room!)

Joe particularly enjoyed an exhibit all about medieval armor. They had a few interactive pieces too, like this metal glove and some chainmail.

These pieces of furniture were so strangely proportioned! The dresser (left) was HUGE and had so many doors, drawers, and cabinets. Meanwhile, the bed (right) was so small! All of the white on the bed frame, however, is inlaid ivory and it is so tiny and detailed. It must have been painstaking to put together!

One of the royal cabinets...I think they are made for jewelry and perfume storage. However, this one is gold, and matte blue porcelain and gold and has 176 hidden cabinets and drawers. The top part rotates around and the backside is pictured below:

We maybe had too much fun imitating statues at this museum...

Settling In

Pretty common parallel
parking situation here

There's not been much new to report here, except that we are trying to settle in and figure out how to be residents here and not just tourists. A few examples:

- We've been playing (indoor) soccer with people from Joe's work. There's a group that gets together once a week to reserve an indoor soccer court. Typically there's been about 10 people who show up, us included, and we just play 5 v. 5 soccer for about an hour and a half. It's been pretty fun and everyone seems to be around the same skill level, which is good news for us. We've gone a couple of times and really enjoyed it.

Coffee and Blueberry cake at "Zimt & Zucker"

-We've finally started discovering a few new restaurants and trying out some different things. Luckily there is a lot to try near where we live. For example, all within a block or two of our apartment, we've tried the Pho at Ha Noi bistro, pizza at Il Mulino, and Sarah even managed to try a burrito from a Chipotle-style place called "Pureburrito." A bit further out are some new döner restaurants, authentic Chinese food at Yi Nong, and quite a selection of bakeries. Sarah's first donut purchase (she has a slight donut obsession) was a powdered donut with a surprise apricot filling. Bread here is made fresh daily. In fact, if a bakery sells out before "closing time" they'll just close early! Bread is also a point of pride for the Germans, not just the pretzels, and is not worth eating if it's not fresh.

Found "Hedwig" street. Thought of Harry Potter!

- Sarah's been job hunting and meeting people through various Expat groups, since German is still a language barrier. She's met up in various outings- movies, coffee, cocktails, lunches. The main group is quite a fun gathering of ladies who are mostly moms and new moms looking to mingle and get out of the house. Maternity leave is a BIG deal here, as most Bavarians will judge you for taking anything less than a year off of work when you're on maternity leave. So there's a large pocket of parents and especially new parents who have gone from a busy work environment to having quite a bit of free time and are looking to socialize. They've been helpful both for keeping busy and for those questions about insurance and visas and boring paperwork things that we haven't figured out yet.

- We met up with some of these new Expat friends at an American bar, called "The Keg," for Halloween! We didn't really dress up much, but we had a nice night out meeting people and chatting. Halloween is not quite as big a deal here as it is in the USA. There are costumes and Halloween events, but they are only recently becoming popular. From what we've heard, "celebrating" Halloween is more about going out for a few drinks since November 1 is a state holiday and everyone has off work...

Walking around the Olympic Park on a nice Sunday afternoon

That's about it for now. We're hoping to go somewhere interesting this weekend, so perhaps there will be more to update next week :)

Lastly, smoke detectors are now legally required in Munich. Apparently that's a new policy. So we had THREE installed in our tiny apartment and we got this handy visual to help us understand fire safety...