Christmas in July ...
Hi all, I announced it already ... the confused Germans, Austrians, Italians an others of this world had a Christmas Party just 2 days ago, aka “Christmas-in-July” event :)
We met at Kath’s and Nadja’s nicely decorated house, had some excellent (German) mulled wine (aka Glühwein), (American) egg-nogg, (Austrian) Christmas bickies (aka cornflakes confect and rum balls), and several other delicious snacks …
… and – the highlight of the evening, absolutely hilarious – the “Christkindl” game …
Everybody had to bring a small, wrapped present which was place on a table (under the imaginary tree ;) … then everybody drew a number … number 1 starts by choosing any present on the table an unwrapping it … then nr 2 … but nr 2 has a “second chance” … he/she can choose either the present recently unwrapped or that one from nr 1 if liked better … and so on …
Alvaro, Raf, Cristian, and Davide @ the game
You see: the higher the number, the better the chances to “trade (or steal)” your preferred present!
Alvaro & Nadja in Christmas fever
The whole game was hilarious!!! I finally went home with some cocktail mixing utensils but we had some other great presents such as a whole, fresh squid, salmon, $10, earrings, chocolate, a pumpkin, small booklets, champagne, frisbee, colorful striped "toe-socks", …
We had sooooooooooo much fun – you can’t imagine!
Came home around 3am in the morning and had to get up at 9am for a syndicate meeting on Sunday morning … you can guess how tired I was …
but IT WAS DEFINITELY WORTH IT!!!!
So, that’s all for now … have a week of work on before heading to Falls Creek for Skiing on Friday!
Keep you updated!
B.
Lucky Pot @ Vixs
Hey all,
my party weekend started yesterday with a „lucky pot“ event at Vixs awesome house in Toorak. Everyone brought a preferably homemade dish … something like a small international food festival … we ended up having “mainly a dessert buffet” …
List of foods/tastes available:
- friands from Fahad (Qatar, or actually Australian – the friands I mean ;)
- chocolate-coconut cake by Fay (Singapore)
- rice pudding & creamy chicken from Nadia and Ameel (Pakistan)
- mini-cakes, French liver patee & cheese from Vinnie (Belgium) & Verica (Australia, Serbia)
- spicy Indian rice + sauce from TT (India)
- Japanese pancakes with seadfood from Vixs (Australia)
- couldn't resist to contribute my famous Topfenpalatschinken
You can see, a very good mixture … and it tasted really great, awesome, fantastic! Love it!
Tonight we will continue partying with a “Christmas in July” event and Nadja’s … looking forward to that … will be fun!
So, need to get going and get some work done before tonight.
Cu all soon!
B.
Busy, very busy, extremly busy times ...
... times are busy right now ... this term was supposed to be a light one … don’t know how I got myself into such trouble regarding assignments … have 3! due tomorrow and yesterday I decided on extremely short notice – not that I didn’t have enough to do already – to write-up the case for today’s Negotiations class … well, it won’t get any easier if I leave the write up for the last case – and it would be due next Wednesday anyway… also, have some more assignments to be done before I leave for some winter-fun …
… we want to go skiing and snowboarding next week … well, still haven’t booked that and we are currently discussing whether to trade New Zealand’s “Treble Cone” for Victoria’s “Falls Creek” … would allow our friend Fahad to join as well … being from Bahrain/Qatar and traveling on an Indian passport, he needs a visa for New Zealand and that doesn’t work as fast as we would like … well, traveling on an EU passport Nadja and I don’t need to worry about things like a visa for NZ ;) … however, my snow gear arrived today, thanks homewards :) – so, I’m ready! whazz up, guys?
... socially busy weekend ahead ...
Friday: dinner party at Vixs (will hopefully be an extension of our private international food festival)
Saturday: "Christmas in July" party at Nadja & Kath's
will keep you updated!
off to make some x-mas bickies now ... ok, ok, you got me, going to bed now and bake cookies tomorrow ;)
B.
Beautiful Bendigo ...
Robinette and Bob took me to Bendigo last Saturday. It was planned that my friend Nadja joins but unfortunately she got the flue … get better soon, Nadja! Anyway, I had a great day … first a 1.5 hour drive through beautiful – and currently green – Victorian countryside, then the lovely, and for Australia historical, city of Bendigo.
Tram Museum, Bendigo
First I went with Robinette and her grandsons Thomas and Jack on the historical tram on an “overview” sightseeing ride, including a visit of the tram-museum. Then, after a quick lunch, we headed off to the Chinese Dragon Museum. Yeah, you won’t believe it but Bendigo, in the middle of Victoria has a Chinese history as a gold town. Every year at Easter, all the dragons from the museum (except the really, really, really big one participate in a parade). Then, after a stop at the air-castle (well, not for me, as much as I would have liked that ;) we did a quick shopping tour and both Robinette and me found a present – Robinette for the wedding of her nice and I for my friend Karen’s birthday …
Bendigo - historical building and tram
We headed back to Melbourne later that afternoon, to be back at a reasonable time to allow me to do part of my work …
Robinette and Bob:
THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! I had a great day and I’m happy to see a bit more of Victoria, finally!
Robinette with Thomas and Jack
in the Garden of the Chinese Dragon Museum
UPDATE: Forgot to mention that at our way back to Melb we saw the most beautiful rain bow(s) ever ... sometimes one going all the way through, sometimes two ... and all in the brightest colors you can imagine!
Dundenong and others ...
Hi all,
had a good weekend ...
Friday, Z hat a party at her place in Fitzroy ... it was a combined housewarming, fare-well, 4-th-July, etc. party … had a great time and was laughing all evening :) Z is leaving to meet her family in India and won't return until most of us left the country.
Saturday was a work day. Yep, even I have to work sometimes and currently it’s pretty stressful as some assignments and presentations are due soon (and I want to go skiing in 3 weeks)
Sunday I met with Vixs, Elissa and a friend of Vixs from Hong Kong and we drove up to the Dundenongs, that’s part of Melbourne’s country side. There are some really nice art shops up there, those kinds of shops where you buy presents. Before heading home we had a lovely afternoon tea in one of the Devonshire Tea Houses up there (including some awesome scones). As usual Sunday ended with “beautiful Sunday”, yesterday at Nadja’s.
So, that’s all in short – I’m off to the gym now.
Cu
B.
Time is flying ...
Not a lot is going on here at the moment (except of the time flying by) ... my courses are running fine, one is finished, 3 are still running. … have a queue of assignments to be handed in soon (including my take-home exam for Product Management) … finally finished all bidding rounds for my subjects in Rotterdam ... will do Supply Chain Management, International Financial Management, Entrepreneurship, Advanced Marketing, Sustainability, and Management Control Systems ... I know that sounds a lot but it should be a manageable workload and - best of all - in December I will have only one class a week ... that leaves me with time to travel all over Europe and dive into the "real" x-mas feeling which I was missing last Christmas (actually, I rather have it now, my friend Nadja from Munich even thinks about a "Christmas event in July" ;)
People started to leave, some of my colleagues are already done with their term through 1st half intensive subjects and left to spend some time with their families and friends at home … will have Z’s fare-well party tomorrow night and a birthday party next Friday (unfortunately will have also class that night)
Plan to go skiing/snowboarding to New Zealand end of the month … looking forward to that … we’ll go to Wanaka on the South Island …Treble Cone or TC is known as one of NZ’s best slopes…
BTW … did I tell u about the Peruvian lunch I was invited to at Alejandro’s? It was great, never really had Peruvian food before … some raw fish “cooked” in lime juice, then creamy chicken with rice and eggs and finally strawberries :) very good, extremely yummy! :)
