Omnibus Blog 1: Winter, Soccer, Xmas Markets

The weather in Rhineland doesn't change gradually or gently – it simply slaps you in the face. All summer and into early September we had warm, sunny days that never dipped blow 20 degrees. Then one day we woke up there was a chill in the air and the mercury never climbed out of the teens since. Summer was over, and autumn had come.

Something similar happened the other day. All of a sudden I could smell winter in the air. I've started wearing my toque again, lip chap is now being liberally applied, and the thick winter scarf is in regular use, likely for the duration of the wet and cloudy season the locals call winter.

The upside is we only had to wait a couple more months for the Christmas markets to open. Now the city squares smell of grilled sausages and spiced, hot wine. If you can deal with the sudden chill in the air, this is a great time of year to be in Central Europe. 


Christmas Markets

It is never too early for Christmas carols. Well, no, unless it's a store, than it's in the service of commerce and not Yuletide cheer. Anyway, the same can be said of Christmas markets. They're arrival is more than welcome as long is Christmas is close enough for me not to get angry about being told to buy shit.

Germany's Christmas markets pick up sometime on or about the first week of advent (it's also still a religious holiday here). This it meant that Kata's mother and brother missed out on the markets when they visited the Dorf and Cologne a couple of weekends ago. There was still plenty to do, we wandered the Dorf and visited a few sites in Cologne as well, including a Cologne-style brewery.

The next weekend, Kata and I dropped into Cologne again to visit its Old Christmas Market. These markets are pursuing the same thing as their corporate brethren in the department stores of North America. There's no shortage of vendors in the selling their schnick schnack, there's a fantastically convivial and festive spirit to Germany's Christmas markets.

Some of the markets have very similar knick-knacks for sale whose labels would inform you that they didn't come from some rustic german village, but a tin-roofed factory in Bangladesh.

The Old Market in Cologne has enough stalls with lovely handmade or uniquely German items that you can come away with nice gifts without feeling like a 10-year-old Bangladeshi girl made any of them.

Shopping was one reason. The other reason was eating and drinking. We sipped on some hot wine and tried some of the snacks. There was Flammkuchen, which is like a German pizza, made with sour cream, onions, bacon and cheese. It's good. 

The second snack seemed like a head-scratcher to us. 

I usually avoid falling back on stereotypes but there are some you can apply to Germans, like their fanatical love for potatoes and apples. The bakeries are rammed with apple cakes and tarts. If the national drink is beer, the national non-alcoholic drink is apple juice mixed with sparkling water: Apfelshorle. And the potatoes come with every dish you order here.

So when we saw dozens of Germans dipping deep-fried potato pancakes into apple sauce, we're not surprised but we didn't think the combination worked. We tried them. Those Germans are right, the reibekuchen, as it's called, is pretty damn good.

And lo, the moon rises above the Allianz Arena.

A Soccer (Football) Match in Munich

I don't usually delve into work to much in this space because, well, advertising in real life is not as exciting as Mad Men would have you believe. 

But I'm making an exception, because the Allianz international team at my agency was rewarded for a year of toil with a trip to a soccer game at the Allianz Arena in Munich. It was a nice treat to see Bayern Munich play and defeat some Greek team whose name I couldn't pronounce. I also can't pronounce Bayern either, but that's neither here nor there.

It was also an interesting experience because – again I'm leaning on stereotypes here – soccer games usually mean soccer hooligans (stereotype number one), yet Germans seem so well behaved (stereotype number two). I didn't know which stereotype I was going to witness.

This was a Champions League game, which meant no alcoholic beer was being sold, just the non-alcoholic swill. I was tempted to have one glass, but they also don't accept cash in the stadium. You pay a man 10€ to fill up a card with more money, then use that card to pay for everything. Then at the end of the match you must return the card to get your 10€ back. So no beer for me.

Every soccer team has its fan songs and the Bayern fans have theirs. I didn't understand them. I didn't even understand their German dialect. What I did understand was the banter between the stadium announcer and the chanting crowd. The announcer would state who scored a goal and crowd would say "Danke!"

So, between the soccer hooligans or the good behaviour, I guess you can figure out which stereotype I witnessed at this soccer match.

Toronto doesn't need bike lanes, it needs respect

Cyclists ignoring red lights and running them, screaming angrily as they pass the cyclists obeying the red light. Drivers too excited about their parallel parking job to look before opening doors in front of passing cyclists. Drivers taking rolling right turns without checking their blind spots, risking this.

These are just a few dangers I encountered while cycling the streets of Toronto. You quickly learn that cycling in Toronto isn't an exercise in road safety as much as it is playing the odds: the more time you spent on the roads, the more likely you will get into an accident.

And I did get into an accident when an idiot opened a door right in front of me, sending me sideways and forwards over my handle bar onto the street.

The easy argument is demanding more bike lanes, not just the painted lines that drivers tend to ignore, but the fancy lanes with the curb that separates the cars' lane from bike lanes.

"European cities," the Fancy Bike Lane People chant like a mantra, "is the perfect place for bicyclists. We should be more like them."

They're wrong. And that isn't my usual "Europe Does Things Better Than North America" contrarian rant. It's because they are actually wrong. Toronto's streets doesn't need more bike lanes, they need more respect. 

On paper, Europe is not the Bicycle Utopia people say it is. Some streets are made of cobblestone, making them unpleasant to ride on. The bike lanes are often no more than painted lines on a busy street. Even in cities like Amsterdam – where paying rent and owning a car would be like putting all your money into a blender and setting the blender on fire – the streets are jammed with cars. (I know there are really nice cycling cities in Denmark and elsewhere in the Netherlands, but bear with me).

Simply put, building city infrastructure for bikes does not make that city bicycle-friendly, people's attitudes do. In most European cities, drivers check blind spots for bicycles because that's what you do if you don't want to hurt someone. They definitely do not go into psycho mode at the site of a cyclist on the street and drive as close as possible to them without making car-to-person contact.

Conversely, European bicyclists obey red lights with alarming frequency. This allows traffic going the other way can pass through the intersection unimpeded, without having to stop abruptly or do this.

Cyclists also don't scream obscenities at you if you happen to obey red lights or scream obscenities cars that pass them too closely (driver here often give cyclists a wide berth, even veering into the opposing lane).

And! On busier streets, bike lanes have been laid down with different coloured bricks on the sidewalks. If a pedestrian ahead of you is in the bike lane, you ring your bell and they get out of the bike lane and return to the walking lane. 

In essence, drivers understand that cyclists belong on the road and cede some territory to them. Cyclists respect the fact that cars are four-wheeled death machines that kill people everyday, so understand they are not entitled to ignore the laws of the road.

Fancy bike lanes are never going to solve the Toronto's car and bike woes. Infrastructure simply does not change minds. People – drivers and cyclists – need to change their minds about who belongs on the road and show each other a little respect. That's how you build a bike friendly city.

To Trier, and Luxembourg, and Back Again

Inside the Porta Nigra.

At 2000 years, Trier is Germany's oldest city. It was the Roman capital of northwestern Europe. An electorate on the Holy Roman Empire. The birthplace of Karl Marx. It sits in one of Germany's wine regions.

And I never would have thought of visiting the city if it wasn't one of the closest stops on the Bane's European farewell tour that was not sold out.


Bye Bye Bane

Seeing this band before they call it quits would be coming full circle for me. I saw them when I was still in high school at one of London's local dives. Fast forward a few years to Budapest, where, for some strange reason, the Hungarians are crazy hardcore kids who become a lively bunch whenever Bane comes to town. The band responds in kind and plays there often, so I managed to catch them again twice while I was living there.

Budapest is also the final stop on the farewell tour, but we couldn't fly down to Budapest that close to our Canadian trip, so I looked at the tour dates and a map. The show in Cologne was sold out, but I found another nearby city with a show on a weekend and started booking.

We checked into our hotel in Trier on Friday evening, then cleaned up and had a drink before walking to the venue.

Everything on a map is farther away then it seems, but this feeling is magnified when you're on foot and in a hurry to get somewhere. We walked through the old town past the Porta Nigra, down a few quiet streets, then down the wrong side of another street before we asked for directions. At this point, it was getting late and we were worried we might miss the show.

The venue was a monastery that was turned into a Napoleonic barracks that was turned into warehouse that is now a youth art centre covered with graffiti and hardcore, punk, and metal concert posters. My kind of place!

We walked through the front doors, into the courtyard and couldn't hear any signs of a band in progress: no loud, angry vocals and no snap from a snare drum. Had we missed it already? Are the Germans that punctual?

We found an entrance, near a group of hip-looking, teenaged smokers and found out the concert space was downstairs, in a bunker.

No better way to see Bane, than in a bunker.

The show itself was fantastic, as you would expect from Bane. Kata, who is no hardcore fan, at least noted she liked the hardcore scene's ethos. The band played an encore and left the stage, then to our surprise, almost everyone left. The place emptied in minutes, leaving a few stragglers chatting with the lead singer by the stage. 

Kata convinced me to go chat with the lead singer, which I nervously did. As someone who sometimes feels too old for this sort of music and these concerts (we were among the oldest people in the crowd), it's a nice feeling to talk hardcore with someone a little older than me (Bane has been playing since 1995).


Touring Trier

If Friday night was the Night of Bane, then Saturday was the Day of Trier. We had a delicious, overpriced breakfast at the hotel, put on some layers of clothes for the autumn chill and went out the see the city we had rushed past on our way to the concert the night before.

Trier was once the capital of Rome's northwestern European provinces, so they naturally built some nice things that are luckily still standing today. Emperor Constantine's old throne room is now an impressive, and beautifully austere, Protestant church: the Constantine Basilica. There is no overly Catholic ostentation here, no tacky gilded wood or gold plating all over the place, just incredible, ancient engineering to say 'Whoa' at.

Inside the Constantine Basilica

Not to be outdone by the Protestants, the Catholics have their own monument nearby: a Cathedral. It's Gothic, ostentatiously Catholic, with a lovely, quiet cloister attached. Its claim to fame is its prized relic: the Tunic of Jesus. You cannot see it of course. It's in a gold box locked behind a door near the altar. But you can look at the door, which is about as exciting as it sounds.

Is it an organ? Or is it a spaceship?

We took this opportunity to walk about the Old Town, eat some frites, and do some clothes shopping for Kata. Trier is a small city, and a touristic one, but its Old Town is thankfully doesn't feel so touristic. There are no unending streets of bars, like the Dorf, and very few so-old-they're-clearly-fake buildings, like Cologne. Trier's centre has discovered a comfortable balance, so you get the sense that locals also do their shopping and other things in the old town.

We visited the Porta Nigra, the Roman city's old main gate. Apparently the limestone from a local quarry turns black from bacteria in the air. It was likely meant to be a nice colour, then became a scary, ominous shade years later. Oh! They made it into a church too, so it was probably a scary place to pray, which might fit with the whole medieval Catholic Church vibe back then.

We also walked along the Moselle River and came upon the old Imperial Baths later in the evening.

The Porta Nigra

Eat like a Trierer... Trierian... like you're from Trier

If you're a tourist in Germany, you're going to be accustomed to roaming pretty old towns and eating traditional German meals, which typically include sausages, potatoes, and pickled cabbage, washed down with beer. This is great stuff, but sometimes you need a break with some lighter fare (not always a long break, because I ate that stuff the next day).

Thankfully, this is a corner of Germany that makes some fine wine. Ignoring the beer halls, we found a wine tavern, and let the local wine flow and devoured a platter of smoked fish, local cured meats, cheeses, and, yes, salad.

This is not a meal that epic nights begin with. It wasn't really instagram-worthy either (and the platter would not have fit the frame) it's just great, local food that doesn't leave you laying in bed trying to sleep feeling like a beached whale. 


To Luxembourg, or not to Luxembourg

The next morning we awoke and thought about what we had seen and what was left to see. There was a Roman museum we had not visited, but the town would be deserted, since in Germany most businesses are closed on Sundays by law. 

Was it is worthwhile sticking around?

We thought about leaving. This is not such a difficult thing for us to do. We had weekend flex passes, which gave us unlimited travel on the local rail lines. We looked at a schedule and decided to go to Luxembourg. We never would have came to Trier if it weren't for a hardcore concert and we're not likely coming back to the area, so why not take an afternoon to discover a country that wouldn't normally be a destination for us?

It was a foggy, chilly walk to the train station and we wondered if it was a good idea to travel. Why not go back to bed? The foggy train ride into L-Bourg didn't reassure us much. 

When we got to Luxembourg we noticed a few things right away. It didn't feel like Germany, which is a nice feeling sometimes. The signs were in French, so I could read them. It was foggy and cloudy, but we were used to that. And the tourist office is closed on Sundays, so no city maps were available.

Undeterred, we followed the signs into the city by guess work and came upon the old town.


What's the deal about Luxembourg?

Today, Luxembourg is known for being a little corporate tax haven, but years before that it was known for being an impregnable fortress.

The now-destroyed walls of the fortress surround the old town, which sits atop of a cliff that overlooks two rivers that cut deep gorges through the city. Down below, there are other city quarters next to the rivers. Tall brick and stone arch bridges span over these river gorges.

If we had visited the city in the middle of the summer, we'd be impressed, but during the autumn, once the sun came out, the city was breathtaking.

Along the wall.

Now on the casemates, just as the sun finally comes out.

The city is not cheap (those corporate tax savings got to be spent somehow). Desperately hungry for lunch, we walked into one restaurant. It was like one of those movie scenes where the hero walks into a biker bar and everyone stops talking and stare at them when they enter, only instead of bikers at this Luxembourg eatery, it was all seniors staring at us. 

So, we left quickly and Kata managed to find a nice cafe – it felt like a tidy ruin pub with a fresh coat of paint – where we had a nice lunch, and I had a couple of frosty, tasty Belgian beers.

Seeing the Luxembourg was one of those pleasant surprises that never would have been possible if I hadn't dragged us down to a remote corner of Germany for a hardcore show. So, I guess we have hardcore music to thank for this awesome trip. 

Thanks, hardcore!

Thanks, hardcore!

If you go:

Eat and drink and be merry at Weinstube Kesselstatt in Trier. It's casual, so you have to order everything at the bar. Think that's not romantic? Well, it is if you're a gentleman and get off your butt to bring your lady some food and drink.

In Luxembourg, you can eat like a German retiree at the fancy schmancy French bistros in the Old Town, or you can go to Konrad Cafe. Good food, Belgian beer on tap, nice ruin pub feel in the basement.

This Year's Good Decision

Just me and the barges along the River Rhine.

Do you like loud bar noises all through the night? How about streets strewn with broken bottles and puke? Drunks everywhere, peeing in doorways and shouting German at passers-by? Then I humbly recommend renting a flat in Dusseldorf's Altstadt.

A 21-year-old me might have loved it here, but not the 33-year-old me who needs beauty rest and likes reading a book in the evenings.

Its only advantage, aside from the central location, is its proximity to the Rhine River. Every morning I walked to work along the river and every evening I returned home along this route.

In the mornings, it's just you and the fog and the river barges. In the evening, weather depending, it's you and the runners and the dog walkers and the tourists and the homeless afternoon drinkers with the fog and the river barges.

I did this all throughout the Rhenish 'winter,' which is really just a cold, windy and rainy day that lasts until the spring. 

Stepping onto a stuffy tram and subway car in the middle of winter so you can be dropped off in front of your office for a day of indoor office stuff is one of life's truly soul crushing experiences. It's a relief to shake your legs and step outside with just your two feet and a heart beat (and the appropriate amount of clothing) and walk along one of Europe's mightiest rivers to the office. 

When we finally fled the Altstadt to less rowdier environs, I joined the soul crushees on the tram to the office. That only lasted a few months before I bought a Dutch Cruiser for Kata's birthday, and nifty street beast for myself.

I have mastered the bike commute to work, once again. But the real thrill has been taking out our bikes for pedalling adventures in the Dorf's neighbourhood, which inevitably means cruising along the Rhine.

This has been a turning point for me. 

I once lamented the lack of hills, now I'm happy for the flat bike-riding terrain. We hated the long monotonous smooth distances when we were walking, like on our trip to Zons, but we relish it now with our bikes. We resented shelling out wads of Euros for train trips for distant locales in our corner of Germany. Now, we boldly attempt to reach them on our own – not always succeeding, but then we just boldly look for a closer destination.

Beer and Flammkuchen in Benrath

When I moved into my apartment in Baldwin Village in Toronto, I pulled boxes and furniture from my parents' basement in London. I also raided the garage for my old bicycle.

As a student in London, I would ride to campus, shooting along the bike trails along the Thames River. The bike was left hanging from the garage ceiling when I moved out.

Living in Toronto without your own transportation means contending with Toronto's public transit system. A system that is likely the most soul-crushing of all transit systems, and I have encountered a few of them.

When I took the bike out on the streets of T.O. for the first time, my immediate reaction was "Why didn't I do this before!" The less immediate reaction was a love for the city began to grow where there was a lot of cynicism before.

Riding a bike in Toronto allows you to forgo public transit most of the time. You ride to work, zig zagging up and down side streets you never would have discovered without the bike. 

In Toronto, I discovered the city with the bike and loved the city more because I discovered more. Staying off Toronto's subway and tram system definitely helped my outlook too.

We point out to friends and family that the a posh little town, but it's a nice place to live... and then we trail off. The bikes have allowed us to get out and discover more of the town, and a lot more of its surroundings. Given time, we might learn to love the Dorf. Maybe.

One of many suspension bridges along the Rhine.

Voting From Afar

The Gregorians had it all wrong when they put the beginning of the new year in January. September truly feels like the first month of the year. By then, vacations are over, along with the fiscal year for some businesses (like ad agencies), school begins, and people slowly shake off the summer laziness. 

By now, a month into the 'New Year,' life has picked up where it left off before the summer. At work, I'm juggling several projects with looming deadlines. Money must be saved and preparations made for the coming Canada trip. There's an urgency to drink patio beers and partake in outdoor activities before winter becomes a reality.

In the midst of this, a Canadian election is scheduled for October 19, and there is one thing I wanted to ensure I made time for.

Casting my Voting as an Expat

As a someone who has lived outside of Canada for less than five years, I am happily still able to vote. I applied for my voting kit (which meant simply sending a scan of my passport and my address to Elections Canada) and cast my vote today (by mail).

It's an interesting process. I didn't tick a box for a candidate; I write in the name of the candidate. Then I put the ballot into a little envelope. Then I took that little envelope and put it into another envelope, which I signed and dated. Then I put it into another envelope, which is the mailing envelope. It felt more like putting together a lickable Matryoshka doll than voting. 

Nevertheless, I miss voting in person, not for the ease of it – although licking my way through the voting kit was a little weird. It's a comforting ritual to walk in the polling station, mark an X beside my candidate, and drop it into the ballot box. 

Elections Canada made this process very easy for me, but it's startling to see that only 6,000 Canadians out of maybe 2.8 million living outside of Canada cast a vote. 

It's startling, but somewhat understandable. I didn't know I could vote from abroad, and I've always made a point of voting, but a similar ignorance might keeps expats away. Or a perception that it's difficult (which it isn't). Or old fashioned indifference (not unlikely).

Exercising my right this way might not last long. A court struck down Canadian citizens' right to vote if they've been living elsewhere for over five years. The court's decision was rooted in the argument that expat's votes would upset the social contract between the government and current residents in Canada. 

I understand that argument, but to me that means the system should be tweaked just a bit. 

My Parliamentary Expat Reform Bill

My suggestion? Expats should get our own Member of Parliament. Just because we've been away for a while doesn't mean we don't have ties to Canada (property, investments, family, citizenship) or that we never intend to return.

Having our own MP would attract more voters and bring a different perspective. We're copywriters in Germany, teachers in Indonesia, and hockey players in the United States. Where we live shouldn't invalidate us from making an informed decision – we are still Canadian citizens, after all.

Recently, Prime Minister Harper has proposed more changes. Mostly, it would make it difficult to vote from afar. Rather than emailing a scan of my passport, I would have to get someone to vouch for me that I am from the riding that I intend to vote in. 

There is a pattern here. In the last election, mysterious robocalls sent voters to the wrong polling stations. A new law that should have countered this instead instituted rigorous identification procedures for voting. The stated purpose was stopping people from voting more than once, but it merely succeeded in making it more difficult for students, pensioners, and the homeless to vote. Budget cuts to Elections Canada and for voting advocacy have not helped either.

This obfuscation of the democratic process is shameful enough, but it's not the only problem. Voter turnout was only around 60% in Canada. 

It's so disheartening to see people throw away their vote by not voting. yes, the country's and the world's problems can seem so daunting that our vote seems like it won't make a difference. But it's also so ridiculously easy (for now) that there's no reason why we all shouldn't give it a shot.

Sissi 2012-2015

The Long Short (Probably Happy) Life of Sissi

Sissi on her house.

Sissi was a hamster. She was suspicious of strangers. She hated being touched by people. She had three different homes and four different owners in her life.

Despite all of that, she lived three years – three lifetimes for a Siberian hamster – and most of it was good.

Kata inherited Sissi from her ex, so the pet-to-owner relationship started off awkwardly. Sissi's cage sat beside Kata's desk, so while she was freelancing they spent a lot of time together. Gradually, they came around and developed an understanding.

Sissi moved in with me when Kata left to Berlin for work. I don't think she liked me in the beginning. When I came over to Kata's place, she'd squeak at me and keep me awake in the night, digging in her wood shavings and shimmying on the bars of her cage.

I put her in my front hall, where her nocturnal shenanigans would not disturb me. I also refused to get attached, since she was over a year old at the time – an old lady in hamster years. Kata would ask after her and I would worry about having to tell her that Sissi died.

She didn't die, so I didn't have to follow through on any strange plans of burying her in Karoly Kert at night. Like all good roommate arrangements, we gave each other space. She had her room, I had mine. I would only take her out to put her in her hamster ball while I cleaned the cage. As time went by, we developed a rhythm, I'd feed her and talk to her (I was told you're supposed to do that) and she would do her usual hamster-y things. 

Then I left Budapest. 

Once more Sissi was passed on, this time to Monica, who wanted a pet. I walked Sissi in her cage to Monica's place. She cried and screeched the whole way down Vaci utca. I kept it together, mostly.

Once again, Sissi somehow lived beyond expectations. Monica and her spent a year together – until last night – which was likely the most stable and comfortable Sissi had been since leaving Kata's flat. For a short life, it was a long one, and likely a happy one.

Kata freelancing alongside Sissi.
Drawing by Kata Varga.

Dorfy Day Trip: A German Castle

The Castle at Kaiserwerth, or what's left of it.

Let's talk a bit about castles. There used to be one downriver from the Dorf. It's a ruin now, thanks to the Napoleonic troops who blew it up to deny the German states any fortification that would have helped them retake the Rhineland. 

But in its hey day, after it was built by Frederick Barbarossa, it had the distinction of being one of his key castles on the Rhine. It guarded the Rhine River and exacted tolls from boats passing by. It's good business for the castle owner: you just sit and wait for the next boat to float by.

And! It was easy to reach. It is just sitting on a bike path, upriver from Düsseldorf – a cool 45-minute bike away. 

When you put in perspective, it's incredible that a stone building has survived in some shape or form for 1000 years. Yet, it's a common sight, even in Hungary, where they were built with a different purpose in mind. 

Picture this: It's year 1285 and you're a Hungarian peasant going about your business, when that business is interrupted by thousands of Mongol horsemen burning and killing as they go. 

Your only hope as a peasant without a horse is to hide behind a high wall, like that of a castle. But there are no castles close to you, so you're dead now. 

When the Mongol hordes came tearing into Hungary, they found a flat, nearly defenceless land, perfect for their mounted warriors. Other than a Hungarian army of knights and infantry, which they handily defeated with their mounted cavalry, there was nothing to stop them.

The Hungarians – who centuries before, like the Mongols, lived on horseback and rode to Europe from Central Asia – noticed that cities and fortresses with high stone walls survived the onslaught. Anticipating a Mongol return, they built castles all over the land and waited. 

The Mongols returned, but they couldn't breach the castles with horses and arrows. The Hungarians waited and watched them ride past, then attacked and defeated the Mongols. 

SIDE NOTE!! The Hungarian word for waiting and castle is var, and I'm certain that there's a connection between the two. In Germany, which didn't have to wait for terrifyingly apocalyptic Mongol invasions to come to them, large prosperous towns grew around their castles. It's no coincidence that burg is the German word for castle and town, think Magdeburg or Salzburg.

Where was I... oh yes, Hungary! All seemed fine for about 400 years or so when the Hungarians lost the Battle of Mohacs to the massive Ottoman Turk army. The survivors retreated to their castles and awaited the onslaught.

The Ottomans – 300,000 of them – moved northwest, fighting a long, grinding 70-year war, assaulting castle after castle. Some withstood the assaults, like Eger, but many fell one at a time. 

What's amazing is that most of these castles survived the Turkish invasion and would have survived today if the Austrians hadn't blown most of them after 1848, to avoid giving Hungarian revolutionaries any place to attack them from. You can't wait out everything, I guess.

Visegrad

This castle was where the first King of Hungary held court. This one was built after the first Mongol invasion. It survived that whole time, commanding a beautiful view of the Danube below, until it was destroyed by the Austrians.

Visegrad's Reconstructed Main Hall

Incredible view from up top.

If you happen to take the train between Prague and Budapest,
you will be able to Visegrad from the Slovakia side of the Danube. 

Eger

I've written about Eger before here, which, in my biased opinion, is worth reading. 

After we climbed the castle, drank Bull's Blood!

 Pannonhalma

Pannonhalma, which I mentioned in the past, managed to resist the Mongols, and the Turks, and the Austrians (well, kind of), and the communists. Not bad for a bunch of learned monks.

Fülek

I probably used the wrong umlaut thing over the 'u', but we came across this Hungarian castle on a road trip in Slovakia. The Mongols never managed to breach this castle either, but the Turks took it. 

Some Random Castle

Kata and I saw this one on a highway coach in Slovakia. I don't know it's name, so... that's about it. 

Random castle sighting in Slovakia.

The Coming Gloom

It's the gloomiest time of year for Canadians and sun-loving Dorfers, literally, if not figuratively.

The first Monday of September is Canada's last bank holiday of the summer, and the unofficial end of cottages, sun tans, and patios. If you get any of those in afterwards, it feels like a gift – the fact Toronto's baseball team, the Blue Jays, are on the verge of making the playoffs makes it that much more special.

With the planned August trip to Canada postponed until Christmas, we'll be missing out on the meaningful Canadian baseball and the nihilistic patio binges that occur when we all notice the sun is setting sooner.

The Dorf is no different. There are no late summer bank holidays to tell us when the summer ends and the fall begins, but the weather has become decidedly more gloomy. The sun is setting after 9pm, as it should in these higher latitudes and I'm scorning the rain, rather than being happy with watered plants.

Fall is coming. It's going to wet and grey and it's going to feel like it will last the rest of our lives, until May. Then it will be all good again. 

Until then, here's some older shots of the Dorf in all its grey and gloomy glory!

Apocalypse Dorf

Rheinturm in the Mist

Ships passing in the fog.

The calm, grey waters of the Hafen

Dorfy Day Trips - Intro and Zons

A visiting friend asked us what there was to do in the Dorf. I almost began but stopped myself – we were already drinking alt bier in one the Altstadt's brewhouses. What else was there to do in the Dorf? 

Now, to be fair, I was only in the city for two months at that point. I now know there are some fantastic art museums. The promenade along the Rhine is lined with bars and gets plenty of afternoon sun. If you're into shopping, there's fancy, pricey Königsallee.

I try to look at the positives of the Dorf. It's a tremendously liveable city, it's safe and has a great transit system. The winters are mild and the summers are sunny, sometimes.

I'm hard on the Dorf because I unfairly compare it to Budapest and Berlin, cities where I have spent a great deal of time. Plain, old liveability aside, Dusseldorf's serious draw is the amount of stuff there is to see around it. 

Castles, medieval towns, Roman ruins, forests, palaces, Gothic cathedrals, coal mines, yes, coal mines are worth visiting here.

In an effort to redeem myself in the eyes of any grumpy Dorfers, I will be posting about the Dorfy Day Trips I've been able to enjoy because I live in an okay city in a pretty cool neighbourhood of Europe.


Zons

This is a walled town that made its living on extracting tolls on boats passing up and down the Rhine. This was the only game in town, and was a good business until the river shifted east – yes, it does that. The river was now a few hundred yards away, making toll collection a little more challenging.

The town pretty much died, and this is where the story should end, but Zons has taken on a second life as a well-preserved walled medieval town. It's close enough for Kata and I to drop by for an afternoon, eat flammkuchen (German-style thin crust pizza with creme fräiche instead of tomato sauce) and drink riesling on a patio that overlooks the plain where the river used to be (which is kind of sad when you think about it) and eat ice cream as we wander the streets.

It's a pretty place and sadly, because I was probably too engrossed in my ice cream, I only snapped photos of a door and a window. Oh, well. It's close, so we might return.

A door in Zons.

A window in Zons.

If you go:
For fantastic flammkuchen, a great local riesling, and a patio with a pretty view, go to Torschenke in the old town. A shout out to Jill for recommending this spot.