...end apr...
with my exchange at ebs almost coming to an end, it seems only appropriate to do some sort of sum up of the past 3 months here in the small town of oestrich-winkel, germany.
the atmosphere these days are nothing short of depressing, with everyone confirming their departure dates, some who have already left, some stuck here coz of passport issues, but everyone with something in common – the reluctance to leave.
maybe its coz we cant bear to part with the idyllic and laid back lifestyle we have somehow managed to get accustomed to (imagine waiting for buses which comes once every hour, or travelling 45 minutes just to get to the nearest city)
or maybe it’s the nice view of the rhine river we wake up to every morning.
or maybe, its really the thought of having to part with this bunch of people whom you have lived, ate, played, gossiped, partied, bitched, confided in, this past few months.
albeit short, the friendship forged was genuine. and maybe, this is the reason why everyone is doing everything we can now, to spend more time together, before all this come to an end.
my friends
before i came, i fervently prayed and hoped that i would meet some nice people. i imagined that i will hang out with some exchange students at the local pub, chat about things like where we come from, and why we came for exchange, ya-da, ya-da, and that’s about how far it will go. i never imagined that we’ll become so close that we would confide in each other, travel together, share our thoughts and insecurities and do all those silly things we do.
blurry shot taken @ bogarts
mathilde, my dear flatmate who bakes the best cakes in the world, drinks hot chocolate every morning, and cannot live without a microwave. she’s the best flatmate anyone can ask for, and im glad to have her as mine for the past 4 months!
the girls! huifen, me, caroline and mathilde
caroline – I love her so much because she is so cool and everything a person could ask for in a fren! she plays soccer like a boy and can probably beat any guy at a game of arm wrestling with all the training she does for her fire fighting work! iI cannot wait to attend her engagement party in june!
caroline and me!
in our dirty hattenheim kitchen
charly (caroline's sister came to visit!)
clement – the beer-guzzling french. he has more frens visiting him den any of us here, and he’s a real nice and considerate fren, always giving us lifts in his car. real fun and crazy guy to hang out with!
getting trashed by clement!
dan challenging clement, the record holder
romain – the bike crazy french. not only is he crazy, he’s really good at it too. an avid mountain biker, he just got himself an internship in munich and will be there for while.
hong – the youngest of us all, but also possibly the most intelligent too. of course, he’ll more likely be remembered as the guy who is ALWAYS on the phone with his gf back in hongkong. and I am not exaggerating by saying always, coz the only time they are not talking is when she is sleeping!
david – hong’s flatmate and everyone’s knut! he ma-roons, sleeps and eats frozen pizzas for dinners. but he’s a really just a nice and funny guy who cannot stop swearing.
david with griff
nathalie comes over for dinner!
johnson – yinghao’s flatmate from hongkong! better known for his famous honey glazed chicken wings, which is well, worth the wait (:
johnson!
sin cheow/yin long/kelvin – the 2 nus students from malaysia and a nice and soft-spoken guy from hongkong. great and really nice people who we hung out with occasionally since they stayed quite a distance away from us.
sin cheow
yin long
great people like sandra, mark and fredrick
@ the international night with emmanuelle, elodie, lorraine
axelle, the french-chinese from paris
with charly
a typical night at home!
my school
my timetable is very slack. just in case you haven’t noticed. i spend more time at home/travelling than in school. but that’s really because for some of the courses i am taking, all i need to do is go for 2 classes and ta-dah, i get 3 ects (which translates to 0.5 CU in smu) so yes. wat I am saying is that its NOT my fault you don’t get to read about my school life as much. because there isn’t much to talk about.
international night @ schloss
presenting....the singapore/malaysia fried rice! - took me 5 hours to cook!
elodie making crepes for the south of france table!
still, i guess im lucky to have interacted with local germans through project work and classes – although i don’t think that the germans in ebs are very representative of the general population, since this is a private school and most of them are rich kids who stay in nice apartments, drive nice cars, are well-travelled and always well-dressed.
presentation for b2b marketing class
the carpark
hattenheim flat 5 has become some sort of a gathering place for everyone in this block. besides the fact that we make it cool (ha!), its also really because we have the biggest kitchen here. we even have a designated spot on the window sill, where we would put on camera for our group shots.
as for my room, its nice and spacious and i like the big wardrobe i have which allows me to be neat. from my window, i get a fantastic view of the rhine river and its beautiful. the morning which i woke up to a snow covered vineyard is one of the most unforgettable sights i have ever seen.
view from my room - sharp contrast to wat we saw when we first came in jan!
we had countless of them. from the random drinking sessions in our kitchen, to the chinese new year party at sin cheow’s place, asian dinner at the italian restaurant near burg campus, fredrick and johnson’s birthday celebration and marijsa’s birthday at her place.
hong and mathilde demonstrate their culinary skills
notice that the angle for all our kitchen shots are the same!
my neighbourhood
we live in the small town of hattenheim, a part of the rheingau (rhine district), which is in the state of hesse, germany. it's famous for its wine, especially the rheingau riesling, and come summer, u see people from all of the area coming here just for the wine. they will sit along the rhine, sipping the sparkling wine and enjoying the scenic beauty of this place.
the pretty vineyards
flooded road due to rising water level
(:
rewe, the one which we frequent the most, and where all our ja! products come from.
plus, directly opposite rewe, is the cheaper alternative which we sometimes get our stuff from.
aldi, nearest to the burg campus, sells cheap imitations of well-know brands. heh. cheap biscuits available!
plus!
our neighbouring towns include oestrich, winkel, eltville, hallgarten, rudesheim, geisenheim, just to name a few.
on the streets which is famous for the apfelwein (apple wine)
cycling trip to geisenheim
