[nɚdʃik] » Munich

Things, and stuffs, and projects…

Noirin — Sun, 06 May 2007 21:34:08 +0000

So much has been going on, and yet so little… My FYP demo was postponed for a week from 5th April, due to illness, but went ahead on 12th April. I was quite happy with the presentation & demo, and absolutely thrilled with the comments I got back – it was really well received. It’s so nice to have done something vaguely useful, practical – and to have a complete, functional program at the end. I’ve since, finally, completed the report, and handed it in – I found out on the Monday of the last week that the CSLL projects were due on Friday, not Thursday, but ended up handing it in on the Wednesday anyway. The sense of relief is immense!

In SCC news, we booked out a 96-seater theatre in the ~~Virgin~~ ~~UGC~~ Cineworld complex for the opening of Amazing Grace (ok, we were a bit late – we did it on Palm Sunday), and invited anyone & everyone along. Then, a few days before the event, we got bumped up to a 150-seater theatre, so Sean, Daniel & I went out to St Stephen’s Green, and handed out the extra tickets, the day before. Rosie was great – initially, I invited her; then suggested she bring Ian along… On the Saturday, she asked if it would be ok to bring Ellen too – and by the time it came to it, she had Sam as well!

I got baptised earlier the same day, by Jason & Stephen, and it was a really lovely event. My folks didn’t make it, as they were out of town (the initial plan was to do it the Sunday after Easter), but we shared some cake later on

We spent Easter with Stephen’s family – Amanda & Ian were over from Glasgow with Emily & Jodie, and it was lovely to see them, meet Ian & Jodie, and play with the girls We had a barbeque on the Saturday, which was a lot of fun, and I drove us home on the Sunday evening. It took a while, and tempers frayed a little bit towards the end, but we managed, Stephen was an excellent assistant really, and I can’t believe I drove all the way from Athlone to Dublin! I drove Lydia, Stephen & David to church on Easter Sunday too – there was much giggling in the back seat when I started off, but knowing David, I decided I just didn’t want to know what was going on… Better that way too – when we got to church, he showed me the “Easy Guide to Preparing Your Will” that he’d found in the back of the car!!

In travel news, skiing was a lot of fun – Stephen & I did a two hour private lesson on snowboards to start off with, but he got far further than I did, and really, I just wasn’t having fun with it, so for the second two days, I ditched the snowboard and stuck to skis. When we got to Garmisch, there was hardly any snow on the runs down into the valley – dad and I had been able to ski all the way back to the village when we were there last year. But that evening it started snowing, and by our first morning on the slopes, it was beautiful – champagne powder snow, and plenty of it. Zugspitze was closed, because of the snow, and the associated avalanche danger, but Hausberg was plenty to keep us going for three days. We got into a rhythm of doing a couple of runs, stopping at the Ski Bar for a drink or some food, and then doing a couple more, which kept us going nicely through the days. The hotel was just beautiful – Gasthof Drei Mohren – and I’d recommend it to anyone.

We had a day in Munich at the end, and despite the dodgy & smoky hotel room, it was lovely to be able to show Stephen the places I had frequented. I do miss Munich – I had some amazing times there, and it’s a gorgeous city. We went out to Dachau, and did the brief tour, which worked out brilliantly, as we had the docent to ourselves, and she was able to impart a lot of information that might otherwise have been missed. It was intensely frustrating to see the American kids who thought they were at Disneyland, posing for photos in the bunks and crematoria etc – but reassuring to see the Wehrmacht cadets, learning about what had gone on. Man’s inhumanity to man is almost incomprehensible, and I think seeing where such awful things were done, reading about what happened there, is something that everyone should at least consider doing at some point in their lives – these things still go on today, they’re not over, and they mustn’t be forgotten. (That said, I have been to several concentration, labour & extermination camp sites – and I’d really be quite ok with never going to another.)

I’m sure I’m missing bits in between, but the most recent trip was visiting London with Stephen. He went over for work for a few days, and I joined him after that. We stayed with Diane and Matt, had a lovely Indian, a somewhat bank’y party (with great pizza ), some OCD behaviour with a giant chocolate coin, a picnic in Leicester Square, Ben & Jerry’s, Camden Town (where Stevie bought me a kite), Harrods (with more ice cream), and a trip to the British Museum… I was so upset to find that the Reading Room of the British Library was closed, and, on asking if it would be open the next day, to learn that it wasn’t going to reopen until 2009 (although I’m not certain of the veracity of that information – it appears it may be reopened temporarily at the end of this year, for an exhibition of the Terracotta Soldiers, which we’ll just have to back for)… We did get to see some fascinating artefacts though – the Elgin Marbles, the Rosetta Stone, an Easter Island statue… It’s incredible to be able to get so close to things with such long histories, and fascinating stories attached.

We’ve had all kinds of little adventures really – kite-flying at Sandymount Strand (and hours spent untangling lines ), rock-climbing/bouldering in a park we accidentally discovered in Dalkey (thanks Lesley, for bringing us out that way – she had an interview), writing Python scripts together (what nerds are we!?), watching more TV than I ever thought possible (‘Heroes’, ‘Over There’, ‘Yes Minister’), enjoying some really good food together – growing, and living, and learning. I love that boy

Multihomed Homeless Drinking Games

Noirin — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 13:04:28 +0000

Helen and Eimear are temporarily homeless, so they’re crashing in my apartment. We had a really nice dinner in a nearby restaurant, and then returned to my place to prepare for a night out…

At some point, Helen decided it would be a good idea to play a drinking game. Steve was on Skype, so he was persuaded to join in. The game in question involved everyone sitting in a circle (Steve was given corporeal form via the iBook and a fantastic photo), taking turns to say consecutive numbers from one to twenty one. Saying two numbers in a row reversed the direction of play, and an error (wrong number, speaking out of turn, or failing to speak on one’s turn) resulted in a drink, and starting again from one.

We made it to twenty-one the first time with only a small amount of difficulty, mainly due to the fact that neither Steve nor I realised that play resumed in the original order if the counter was reset (because of an error).

Then the fun began. The person who said twenty one was given the opportunity to replace a number of their choice with any other word. I was first, replacing two with ‘yes’ – Steve’s classic answer to ‘or’ questions. This caused much hilarity later, as I was often the one saying ‘one’, and Steve was after me

The final state of the numbers was one, yes, three, seven, five, lemon, seven, eight, nine, ten, aubergine, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, six, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty one. Replacing numbers with other numbers was a particularly inspired idea

Overall, a fantastic game! I don’t think I’ve laughed that much in a very long time

Bis auf weiteres…

Noirin — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 15:56:06 +0000

I have no hot water in my apartment. Not even lukewarm. Haven’t had since Sunday. The weather has turned, it’s grey, wet, and kinda chilly (at least compared to the last few weeks). I’m somewhat less than impressed. Many thanks to Emer, who came to the rescue by letting me use her shower – it’s much appreciated hon!

Colm sent me a link to a review of his ApacheCon talk on a French developers’ website… I was delighted to notice that the article was accompanied by a photo I’d taken. I was even more delighted to notice a further six photos on the same page taken by me. I know I was snap-happy during ApacheCon, but I really do think I got some good photos, and I uploaded the decent ones to flickr so that other people could see them. I even CC licensed them, so that other people could use them without having to check with me first. I licensed them under what some may regard as fairly stringent criteria (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs), on the grounds that the CC license is just the default license, and anyone who’s actually bothered is entirely free to ask and arrange something different. Unfortunately, the author neglected to comply with the license terms, and there was no attribution that I could find, anywhere on the page – the author had simply copied my photos to his server, renamed them, and gone on his merry way. The editors have passed on my complaint to the author, and ~~hopefully it’ll be sorted soon,~~ it’s now fixed – yay! – but it’s somewhat unpleasant all the same

There’s plenty other news, but I’ll save it for a more cheerful post I expect

SQUEE!!

Noirin — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 21:37:43 +0000

Argentinian Fans, originally uploaded by NoirinP.

This photo has just been featured on the official World Cup website…

Squee, and go me!

All Things Bright And Beautiful…

Noirin — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 23:35:01 +0000

A Pretty Poppy, originally uploaded by NoirinP.

Poppies are, to my mind, some of the most beautiful flowers going. I remember all sorts of stories about them as a child – hearing that they were weeds, or even that it was illegal to grow them in Brisbane, because of the opiate connection.

I remember one summer, collecting an envelope full of seeds from the seed pods of the poppies that grew wild in our front garden, and when the time came, scattering the seeds, far and wide, in the hopes of a bumper crop of poppies the next year.

I just love how wonderfully delicate they are, how beautiful. Truly, if one were needed, poppies are a sign of the Supreme Creator.

This one was photographed outside the Bavarian Ministry of Finance. Many thanks to Colin for his tips on how to take such pretty photos

Protected: She is D-I-S-C-O!

Noirin — Sun, 11 Jun 2006 03:30:33 +0000

First Night Fever

Noirin — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 08:59:42 +0000

The World Cup kicked off yesterday, with Germany playing Costa Rica, in Munich’s own Allianz Arena. I was in work, so unfortunately by the time I got to the Fan Park, it was completely closed, due to overcrowding… Everyone had been told it would be closed at 20,000 people – according to the police yesterday, maximum capacity was 35,000, and there were 40,000 people in there!

I met Nicola & Indiana on their way out, and we headed off to find somewhere to watch it. The Bierstube, the Tutorenzimmer, and the Disco-Vorraum were all packed with people, closed because of overcrowding. Luckily, we managed to sneak in to the Bierstube – which had plenty of space free at the back, it just wasn’t being used because it had no view of the big screen

I didn’t stay long there – the smoke was killing me – but the atmosphere was amazing. It was slightly spoilt by some of the crowd, but most of them, particularly the Costa Ricans, were just having a ball(!)

We watched the end of the match in Nicola’s room, and decided to venture out afterwards, to see if the FanPark had re-opened. It had, and we spent a wee while wandering around, before adjourning to Adria, on Leopoldstrasse, for some food.

One of my colleagues had told me that Leopoldstrasse was going to be the “Partystrasse” – but it was only when we got out of the U-Bahn at Giselastrasse that I understood what that actually meant. The road – which is usually pretty busy, with cars, bikes and buses zipping along, was completely closed to vehicular traffic – enforced by the police-vans which were parked sideways across all the roads leading on to Leopoldstrasse!

It was just insane. Brilliant. The night was just that nice temperature where you’re comfortably warm but not too hot. My food was pretty good – the others had problems, but the waiter explained afterwards that trying to talk to the kitchen was just an exercise in futility, so he simply took the food and didn’t charge us for it. The atmosphere. Wow. It was incredible.

Just before we went to go home, I was taking a few photos. Two lads saw me, and wanted their photo taken I told them it’d take a moment, because the flash had to recharge – they thought I had said I was stoned! And in a way, I was. I was absolutely high on excitement, the mood, the whole thing was just amazing. My definite tip for future after-match events is Leopoldstrasse. Don’t expect too much from the food – anywhere, I imagine, is going to be overstretched with these crowds. But it’s well worth it And plus, Leopoldstrasse has Haagen Dazs (mine’s one scoop of Vanilla Caramel Brownie, with caramel sauce please ). How can it ever be bad?

I’m not at all a soccer fan – I don’t think I’ve ever seen a full match, and if I have, it certainly wasn’t without complaint! But I’m just having a ball here. I’m off soon to go find somewhere to sit in the FanPark for the England match. I just can’t wait

Visiting Hours

Noirin — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 08:30:17 +0000

Last Sunday, Rosie came over to visit. She’s the last of my family to visit, and she’s just finished up in Andrew’s, where we all went to school for most of our careers. She has another year of school left, but she’s going to do that in the Institute. (Yay points-race…)

She arrived in relatively early, and because of last-minute works on the S-Bahn prior to the World Cup, I was a bit late collecting her. We took the scenic route home from the airport, stopping off at Hauptbahnhof for a few small goodies

We didn’t have an awful lot planned, so we went back to my place, and did a brief tour of the Olympiagelande and -dorf. After that, we went to the opera, which was spectacular, but bunked off after the first act, when we realised it was about four and a half hours long.

On Monday it was in to town – the preparations for the World Cup were well underway, and we got up to some crazy things Most amusing were the Argentinian TV crew, who we met at almost every stop as we toured the inner city Photos, as usual, are/will soon be on flickr.

A few of us enjoyed dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, but the ceili at Kilian’s afterwards turned out to be a total bust, so Rosie and I ditched it.

Tuesday was the Sound of Music tour. Wow. It was amazing. It rained for most of the morning, while we were wandering around Salzburg (which, by the way, is a gorgeous city itself ), but cleared up a good bit in the late afternoon. We saw the Gazebo, the back of the house, the front of the house (they’re several miles apart ), the church in which they married, the abbey (just the outside), and the beautiful lakes and mountains in the hinterland of Salzburg. It was fabulous, spectacular, amazing. I loved it.

I woke with a cold on Wednesday, so it was a slightly subdued day. Rosie came to my English Functional Syntax class, and seemed to enjoy it. (Aha! I’ve just sneezed. I’ve been needing to do that since I woke up this morning! At last!) We just relaxed and enjoyed each other’s company, until it was time to drop her at the airport. One of the other Erasmus students was on her flight, which was kinda weird

Most of Thursday was spent in bed, dying of a cold, but I’m now more or less back to rights… Yay for grapefruits and garlic

Where the Streets Have No Name

Noirin — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 20:15:41 +0000

Where the Streets Have No Name, originally uploaded by NoirinP.

… the train station displays can be suitably vague.

On Steve’s suggestion, I undertook an exclusive U2 photoshoot today

The results can now be seen on Flickr.

Olympic Village by Night – Bungalows

Noirin — Sun, 28 May 2006 22:49:33 +0000

Olympic Village by Night – Bungalows, originally uploaded by firebirdy.
The bungalows of the Olympic Village by night – I just love the colours

This is a photo taken from the roof of my building tonight. Colm gave me his old camera, when he got a new one, and I’ve been having fun experimenting with it.

I’m particularly fond of night photography, but have found it hard to do well. For now, I’ve stuck with letting the camera choose the aperture & shutter speed, and just tried to give it the best chance possible!

Once I figured out that it was the movement involved in pressing the shutter release that was my biggest enemy, I learnt to use a 2-second delay. It’s as simple as getting the camera steady (leaning on the wall, in this case, strap securely ’round my neck!), pressing the button, and holding it still until the photo is taken. There’s always a bit of movement when you press the button, but the 2-second delay should more than allow you time to get steady again.

I’ve also revived my flickr account – so you can see the rest of my photos there – including some super-cool ones of the Olympic Stadium by night. It really is a very funky structure!