Ballet

We spent the evening at the Staatstheater in Munich today. We enjoyed the "sleeping beauty". Everything was amazing, but I liked especially the costumes.

On the way home I rehearsed my "slipping into the new year" if you know what I mean ;)

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Now in a cellar in Andros

Reconstructed traditional cellar (greek katoee, κατώι) in Zaganiari. Home made wine, handheld mill, old portable stove etc! Merry christmas!

Coffee!!

This is not part of a space engineering program, it is a german coffee machine! A bit old though, the company says that if it breaks down, they will not fix it...

I'm not sure how it works but in any case I still prefer the refreshing greek frappe.

Kaffee und Kuchen irgendjemand?

p.s. It also makes tea ;)

House on the beach

One thing I love about summer is free time. And the architect of this model had a lot during his stay in this beach, and used it well.
Photo taken 6 years ago in the, back then, magnificent Piso Gialia beach in Andros. Now this beach has some real houses of far lesser design and features a loud mainstream beach bar. RIP.

Snow balls

juggling in the snow, what a wonderful feeling, juggling in the snow!!

Hope

The temperature started to rise! Hopefully the ducks in the river will survive this winter as well...

Foot firmly on Earth

Now we know that the Earth is not enough for Pit. Photo taken under the supervision of Mikołaj Kopernik in Warsaw, a few meters away from Saturn.

Tannenbaum

Do you have a Christmas tree yet?

Ho, ho, ho!

Stars on her fingers

Yes, snow flakes form hexagonal shapes. But first time we saw so many and so big perfect stars. One was caught by my pocket Nikon. This happened in Tollwood, close to the kiosk of Polish cuisine.

Stollen

I wanted to share with you the stollen I am making, and since you are so far away, I decided to post a picture while it's baking.

When trying to capture the perfect smell, I got this picture!! What does it look like to you? To me, it's something like --> this <-- data-blogger-escaped-br="">
Guten Apetit!

Sun in the Wisła

Photo taken from the Wawel (50.053231,19.933624) in Krakow, close to the Dragon's Den. Unfortunately the Dragon was on vacation or hibernation so we didn't meet.

1000 and counting! thank you!

We are very happy that our newborn blog has reached more than 1000 page views from several countries!

Ευχαριστούμε για την επίσκεψή σας (GR)
Vielen Dank für Ihren Besuch (DE)
Thanks for your visit (US)
We appreciate your visit (UK)
Vielen Dank für Ihren Besuch (AT)
Дякуємо Вам за Ваш візит (UA)
Dziękujemy za wizytę (PL)
Dank u voor uw bezoek (NL)
Hvala na posjeti (pong!) (HR)
Thank you for your visit/Merci pour votre visite (CA)
Ευχαριστούμε που μας επισκεφθήκατε (CY)
Merci pour votre visite (FR)
Vielen Dank für Ihren Besuch/Merci pour votre visite (CH)


And, although not shown in our stats, we know who you are and where you live...
Grazie per la vostra visita (IT)
Merci pour votre visite (BE)

Kostas Sotiria

Chopin year in Krakow

 

Back after some days away in magnificent Krakow. And, as promised, here it comes the first photo. This polyharmonic acoustic generator (a.k.a. piano) was spotted near Sukiennice, placed there for the celebration of Chopin year.

Several more, including a severely broken one in a plexiglass container, were placed around the city. At some bus stops Chopin kept company to the waiting and freezing passengers.

The bed below

This is the proof I promised!
This bed is found in one of the rooms of the restaurant/bar/house I mentioned in the previous post. Of course, it is one the many items you find spread all around.

Where would you like to have your cocktail tonight? In the bedroom? In the bathroom? In the living room?

In our case, we just threw our coats on the bed!

Enjoy

The peacock above

Spotted in the entrance of a very particular place.
It is a restaurant, a bar, a house... and who knows what else!
I promise to give you evidence tomorrow for the "house" part, stay tuned!

Berliner Weisse

If you ever find yourself in Berlin, and you see in the catalog something like:
"Berliner weisse gruen/rot" please don't try it! You will get the green stuff in the picture!!!
Ok, it is not that bad... But it is NOT beer!

There is only one place in the world where you can order beer eyes closed. That place is Munich.-
(Ok, Gilles maybe also in Belgium...)


Enjoy!

Marienplatz

In this picture we have:
the city hall (or else the Rathaus -> Haus of the rats!),
the two towers of Frauenkirche; the city's cathedral,
the golden statue of the Mother of Jesus and
the Christmas tree!

Please, step in for some steaming hot Glühwein!

Saint Nikolaus

St. Nikolaus Day today. Happy name day papas!
Happy name day Niko Niki e.t.c.!
Photo taken in Zaganiari... Guess the patron saint of the church. On bottom right the famous Old Zaganiari Bridge.
[Kostas still in Krakow, can't transfer beautiful snowy images to computer! Promise to do it later!]

Feuerzangenbowle

One of the very interesting drinks of the winter.
Wine on fire! :D

Christmasmarket

Ah, the Christmasmarkets!
Sitting in the cold, drinking Glühwein... So nice!!! :)

Window

Fresh snowy image!
Looking out of my window...

Maple

The snow continues...

The snow is continuing for a couple of days more.
I must admit that this is not a fresh picture, unlike the fresh weather outside!

Now view from my desk

 

 Less than 20h before departing to Krakow. See you from there.

Close up of Saturn

Saturn and its trace is engraved along with its lower orbit radius fellows and the Sun, on a central square of Warsaw. The statue of Mikołaj Kopernik supervises them.

Now in Kanningos sq.

Started smelling christmas.

Snow-white

The snow has arrived!
Time for Glühwein, Flammkuchen, Plätzchen and Lebkucken! :)

Old Shoe

This was spotted near Mistras in the Peloponnese. I just liked it. I wondered if this is related to some custom of some culture of somewhere in the world, or just someone enjoyed a prank on someother.

Sleeping beauty

Feeling tired?

Bridges to Cairo

If you want to enjoy the view of the great Nile, just buy a beverage from the guy with the cart and have a seat on the chairs on the edge of the pavement.

Detail

Beautiful detail from a traditional house in Cyclades, Greece.

Hope it's enough to cheer you up!

Liquid nitrogen is cool

This is the vent of a liquid nitrogen cooling unit in operation. In fact there is no pipe at all on the vent. The one you see consists only of ice and was formed after several hours of measurements.

Bikes

I swear I did not do anything to this picture.
It's one of the little treats you get sometimes when you have less than a second to capture the perfect frame.
Just aim and shoot! :)

Is it a bird?

Next time you find your self lost in the woods look up.
A surprising view is waiting for you.

Βερολίνο

 

Buildings like this, is one of the reasons that made me fall in love with this city.

Berlino

The n-layered central train station in Berlin.

I arrived in Berlin this September by train from Munich on the bottom layer of the train station and had to climb 4 (or was it 5?) staircases up to reach the upper-most level and catch the S-Bahn (the suburban train) to take me to Potsdam. It is the yellow train you see in the picture.

It was quite a sight to see a train passing by above your head!

I saw the light

Dedicated to those trapped in an eternally cloudy country, seeking for some sunshine...

Nothing better than the Aegean Archipelago :D

Roots of Andechs

 

I like, therefore I post. :-)

Swans in Kielce

 

Those could be seen in a central park of Kielce, Poland, where people usually have their walk. Beautiful creatures.

Now in Athens.

After rain, the demonstration in memory of the student sacrifice in struggle for democracy continues. Polytechnic is alive.heading to the American embassy.

The Bavarian lion

  

Close to the old cemetery of Nafplio (37.56609,22.811353), this romantic town of the Eastern Peloponnese and first capital of the newborn Greek state, lies this sad, sleeping or wounded lion. It is sculpted on the rock by order of Ludwig of Bavaria, father of the then King of Greece, Otto. It was made in memory of the Bavarian soldiers who died in Nafplio by typhus. Some claim that they got the disease by eating ripe cucumbers, so it is sometimes referred to as αγγουρώον instead of Ηρώον.

cookie 1. The Sculptor, Christian Siegel from Germany, was the first professor of this Art in the National Technical University of Athens (back then "Royal School of Arts", serving not only the technology but also the fine arts)

cookie 2. For our non greek-speaking friends: Ηρώον (Hero_on) is a monument erected in memory of a large group who died during in a specific war period or a specific event. Αγγουρώον (Agooro_on) is a pun of this word with the greek word for cucumber, αγγούρι.

Kostas-monk

Feel the devoutness coming out of this picture.

It is taken in Andechs monastery, just outside of Munich.
While drinking beer. And eating. A lot.

Fresh fruit in Rome

 

I guess "frutta fresca" means "φρέσκα φρούτα". It's all greek to me. ;-)

Back to the roots

Andechs-36
Originally uploaded by b_orionis

What do you think this looks like?

Munich

It sounds fitting, to actually publish a picture from Munich...
Nymphenburg Palace used to be the King's summer residence. Today, parts of it are a museum, not very extraordinary I have to say. Some other parts are not available to the public.
Nevertheless, the garden hosts plenty of beautiful birds ready to pose in front of your camera, especially the swans!

Summer close to the city

Summer nights in Athens sometimes get really hot... Those times are the ones you want to spend in Porto Rafti (37.891532,24.020881) close to the airport. Ingredients: some cans of beer, a beach-mat, beloved company. Optional: bathing suit and towel, a guitar with its guitarist (talent absolutely indifferent).

Rainbow over Kiev

Upper color is red. Just like with all rainbows! All? Not really. Good boys and girls sometimes see two rainbows simultaneously. The second is fainter than the first, concentric and bigger. AND its upper color is violet.

First Light!

Dear Friends, Dear World,

this is the place where our view of the latter will be presented to the former.

To start with, this is our photograph of star trails over Zaganiari, Andros, Greece (37.781125,24.889086), exposure time 881secs (~15mins).

We chose this photo as "first light" because it shows both a human perpective of the macrocosmos and a glimpse of mankind's presence. Also, because a fellow planet visited our photo and we noticed it only after the exposure.
Last but not least, we like it because it is awesome!

Enjoy!

Kostas - Sotiria