a foggy day in Friesing

I did not type a dyslexic misspelling of “Firenze.” Freising is a beautiful town near Munich where fewer people speak English. This worked out really well for someone like me whose knowledge of the local language is things like “Hi, my name is,” “God bless you,” and uselessly “Do you speak German?” Thanks to Sylvia and Ben – and their phonetic pronunciations – I did learn two options for the word “brewery.”

I’d never been to Germany (airports aside) before, and Freising was a nice first impression. It’s built between around two hills. Atop one hill is elegant St. Georg Cathedral; incidentally Freising is the current pope’s hometown. Like a good catholic boy, I stopped in to briefly admire it, but atop the other hill was the goal of my real pilgrimage: What claims to be the world’s oldest brewery.

Hence the importance of the words “brewhaus” (Sylvia) and “brawerie” (Ben).

Hofbrauhaus Freising was officially established in 1160 but first started brewing over a millennia ago. The church was an easy find to me (belltower!) but the brewery took a little discussion with the locals. Sadly I did not get a tour because it was nine in the morning on a Wednesday, but I did go to the biergarten next door. They only open at ten, but the staff was kind enough to let me sit there and drink beer for an hour when they realized I did not want directions to a coffeehouse. Practice, in this case a millenium’s worth, does make perfect. The beer was spectacular. They enjoyed my singing the American songs on their radio and seemed to adore that I knew the words to “Du Bist Nicht Allein” when it came on. Music aside, we chatted in broken English and even more broken German. Around ten, they served me a hearty breakfast of wienerschnitzel while the regulars walked in for their morning brews (not coffee). I would have gladly stayed late into the afternoon, but I had a plane to catch.

So without knowing the German language, I sped through Freising, visited the two prominent sites, and made my international flight. I would dominate The Amazing Race if it involved drinking.

no longer stateside

So despite comfortably cuddling with my crazy, wonderful ex-puppy Bella, I didn’t get much sleep the night before my flight building. Very different from the eve of leaving for undergrad. Not sentimental or anxious. The excitement just started building. Isn’t it funny the way you view places you’re leaving and arriving the same way? You notice everything... the buildings, anything on the road, the color of the sky. I looked fondly on my once-small-town, now suburban, soon-to-be-harbor-side neighborhood.

My mother took the afternoon off work and my father the morning to see me off. We got to Dulles Airport with enough time to spare between check-in and boarding for the three of us to have a late lunch at Harry’s Tap Room. Nothing compared to the real place but not bad for airport food.

After that and a teary-eyed farewell, which was nowhere near the waterpark of them leaving me at Tulane for the first time, I went through the security checkpoint and waved ciao. I got a chance to talk on the phone with Adrian, fresh out of class and excited for his first non-pledge Mardi Gras.

My flight to Munich was awesome. Eight hours is nothing after you fly from Minneapolis to Tokyo. I picked “The Ultimate Gift” (so good) from the surprisingly decent movie selection. Before take off, the gentleman assigned to the window seat next to mine went off in search of his own aisle seat, so after dinner at 7:30 EST I slept until breakfast at 6:15 Europe time.

I got to Munich’s Strauss Airport for another eight hours, my layover. (Better that than rushed multiple plane changes.) I had hoped to spend a night in Amsterdam en route to Florence, but the scheduling and pricing didn’t work out. The airport was beautiful and had all sorts of expensive amenities: A gym, a spa, “gambles” (for Lauren and Chad), and a discotheque.

Sadly like Dulles to DC, Strauss is about an hour away from Munich, so there wasn’t enough time for a visit. But another town was only a fifteen-minute ride away.

aaand, I'm off!

Alright, everyone. My next entry will most likely be in and from the beautiful city of Firenze, Italia. Thank you for the phone calls and messages. I will miss you all but do my best to keep everyone up to date with all things Andrew. I usually say take care of New Orleans for me, but in this case, take care of... the United States? Ciao.

P.S. Congratulations on your engagement, Jenna and Jerry! Belated congratulations, Kara and The Dooleys' Cousin!

P.P.S. Adding those two engagements to Gisela's, that makes three wedding trips in the next one and a half years. Way to be a trendsetter, Jacque.

long weekend!

So due to some unfortunate last-minute circumstances, Mikey was unable to come visit me. Nonetheless, I'd already assured all my friends I would spend my last "free" weekend in DC being fun. The show must go on.

So my parents and I tried to catch the tail end of DC Restaurant Week, but our reservation (made in the afternoon) yielded a 10PM table. So we went to Gallery Place to watch a movie to kill time and the only movie that fit into our schedule was Alvin and the Chipmunks. Yeah, it was funny. The re-recorded classic songs, namely "The Christmas Song" and "Witch Doctor," brought me back to childhood.

Dinner at Ten Penh was great.

Saturday we went to a memorial service for my great-uncle, Sedfrey Ordonez. Usually respect falls into three categories. First, there is the respect you have for your older, wiser family members. Second is the respect you have for good people. Third is the respect you have for people who have changed the world for the better. "Lolo Sed" fits all three categories. Not many people do. He will be very missed.

The reception, of course, had more than enough delicious food. Love of good food runs in our family. There was a sort of second, more intimate, reception at my aunt's house for everyone who stuck around long enough and wanted to catch up.

I eventually left to meet my friend Jewelyn for dinner. Again with restaurant week, we went to Harry's Tap Room, which was very tasty. She brought it to my attention that we haven't seen each other for almost two years, which is insane. Hopefully that won't happen again.

"don't stop believing"

After dinner, we ended up at Carpool, which she said was "the closest to a Tulane bar you'd find in the city," and she was probably right. Her friend Greg and my friend Patrick from grade/high school both met up with us for a few drinks and some catching up. Jewelyn and I kept watching the NCAA scores looking for Tulane amidst the ridiculous number of Louisiana colleges being displayed. Perhaps it wasn't wise, but we celebrated each Tulane appearance by finishing our drinks at the time.

The next day I met the same Patrick and my friend Tony, another recent Tulane alum, at Open City for a late lunch. Good conversation, good times. It was so cold that day that we didn't really feel inspired to do anything else, so we parted ways. I was on the metro about to call Janet and tell her I couldn't meet her and Mere in time for coffee in Bethesda. But sweet serendipity, I turn around and there is Mere, delayed at the same metro station I was. So we met up for Starbucks like good twentysomethings. I followed Janet's suggestion of a "cinnamon dolce latte," which was perfect for the weather and waking me up. We talked for a while, discussing plans, aging, marriage, babies, dreams, nightmares, free will, and serendipity.

Janet and I had previously set a lunch date for Monday, and on Sunday we decided it best to invite as many people as possible. And to our surprise, almost everyone said yes. When we got to Kramers and asked the hostess for a table for eight, she basically laughed at us. (I had left it to Janet and her delightful accent to make a reservation, but they didn't fall for her charms and told us to just walk in.) We thought we might have to go elsewhere, but they opened up the mezzanine level for us, so our little brunch party sat up there alone. Very VIP.

After lunch, the St. Mary's mini-clique (Ona, Kathleen, and myself) went to go walk around The Shops at Georgetown. There are two pieces of evidence that old habits die hard. Janet, Katie, and Susan all were yanked back to their real lives by, respectively, a return to New York, grading papers, and nursing school homework. Claire and Ryanne went off to delay reality with a viewing of 27 Dresses. The three of us, unsurprisingly uninterested, just caught up on our old friends and the little twists and turns of our own private lives. Always a pleasure.

I probably won't be doing much this week except packing. It is entirely possible my next post will be coming from Florence, Italy!!!

2008 already???

So I made it my new year’s resolution to resurrect my journal from abandonment hell. It seems a lot of you faithful readers that are now finished with college now need something to help you procrastinate from your actual lives. So be it.

It only seems right to pick up from the start of this new calendar year. I promise future entries won’t be this long in terms of words or time-span.

Since Suze4Booze’s annual new year’s parties ended their four-year run with 2007 (under the correct assumption the gang wouldn’t be as available or local this year), I rang in the new year with my family for a change. My parents, Adrian, his girlfriend Monica and I went to Jaleo for their Noche Vieja.

[I think this would be an appropriate point to note that I’ve begun a new food-oriented blog “where’d ya eat?” to spare you all hunger pangs while you read about my life and to further detail all the delicious aspects for you foodies. I usually hate links in blogs, but I will make an exception for any restaurants I happen along and end up writing about.]

After enjoying the unlimited tapas, sangria, cava (Spanish equivalent of champagne), desserts, New Year’s favors, and dancing, we came home to imbibe a little more and resurrect the Marin family karaoke machine. I mean, c’mon, we’re Asian. Good times.

I went to the Italian embassy to get my visa, and I was about five minutes late of when the visa office closed. Lucky for me, the nice consulate lady who I thought would take my info and tell me to come back took a look at my passport and noted I had the same birthday as her son, right down to the year.

My mom and I met Adrian and Monica for lunch at Zorba’s Café, which was nice because it’s usually packed but even had easy parking the day after New Year’s.

We spent the afternoon at the National Gallery of Art wandering around the Edward Hopper exhibit visiting from Chicago. I got to see my favorite painting ever Nighthawks, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned before. Unlike most famous paintings, it’s surprisingly larger in real life than one might expect. The lighting and the momentum are spectacular though. I bought a print that I have yet to frame and hang.

David came to visit me for a weekend, which was awesome. Also awesome was Ryanne’s birthday falling on the same weekend, so it was one less night I had to plan. His visit was not unlike my visit to Chicago last January: Relax, eat, drink, sleep, rinse, repeat.

so happy to see Ryanne on her birthday

He got here on Friday, and we went to lunch with Mon Mon and Jon Jon at Matuba, which is my favorite Japanese restaurant in this area. Low-key but delicious. We spent the afternoon playing sports... of the video game persuasion. Wii Tennis and the NES classic “Double Dribble.” Strangely, we can understand the physics of 256-bit tennis but 8-bit basketball is too much for our college graduate minds. We met up with Ryanne, the other Visi girls, et al for happy hour at Café Citron, where we had dinner before moving on to Porter's for the actual birthday-at-midnight countdown. Ryanne and I went upstairs to the DJ, so she could ask him to play The Cupid Shuffle at midnight. And he did! And it was awesome. Even though someone forgot the steps...

Visi '03: so purty

David and I slept away about half of Saturday before having lunch with my parents at Peking Gourmet Inn. (Adrian and Monica left for New Orleans in the morning.) He and I spent the afternoon walking around Old Town and watching the Redskins not-beat the Seahawks at Murphy’s with some brews. We grabbed dinner at Warehouse Bar & Grill and met up with my longtime friend Harry Potter Patrick to go to Clyde’s for more beers and watch the Colts/Steelers game.

He left the next morning, so I spent the next few days doing what he and Patrick recommended: Beating Super Mario Galaxy on Wii. (I almost suggested David bring his but didn’t fearing I would bore and/or offend him, but to my surprise, he would’ve considering he only has a few more stars left.) Anyway, I did beat the hell out of that game. (Beating Bowser is one thing, completist that I am, getting all 120 stars is another.) But I’m not hardcore enough to go after the 121st star. At least not yet.

I also spent a night at my even longer time friend Ludovic’s house guiding him through Resident Evil 4 (for the Wii also). We got through about two thirds of the game. But for the first time in maybe a decade, it was a sleepover that actually involved sleeping. Over.

Now I’m just resting up for a visit from my other favorite Chicago boy, Mike. Perhaps I can ask Ryanne to have another birthday since I think I’ve almost forgotten how to plan a night out.

with blog as my witness:

David: forgot to mention this

David: i fully expect random ass calls from you in europe

Andrew: I don't know what the phone bill will look like.

Andrew: but I will do my best.

David: get a good phone card along with the phone

Andrew: yeah, that's my plan.

Andrew: I'm going to document you saying that.

Andrew: so when you yell at me for the time difference

Andrew: as I slur my words

Andrew: I will feel vindicated.

David: i won't care

David: only lyne has rights to bother me in the middle of the night

David: but i can extend that to you while you are in europe

Andrew: it's a deal.

a few more thousand words

the rest of 2007 in other people's pictures:

courtesy of Gisela Lopez

courtesy of Margaret Bolhous

courtesy of Jacque Peacock

courtesy of Emily Castro

courtesy of Fiorella Quiroz

courtesy of Ona Balkus

worth a few thousand words

The rest of 2007 in pictures: