I do NOT have a good feeling about this!

Baking over here in Berlin has been challenging. For starters, my apartment did not come equipped with any measuring cups or spoons. Also, the standard ingredients needed when baking are not as "standard" as you might assume. For instance, vanilla is apparently a powder, not a liquid! ...and when I tried to find baking powder, the helpful grocery assistant led me to the refrigerated section and handed me a one-inch cube, which on examination seemed to be a dryer form of shortening (I was never brave enough to test it out).

Then there's the oven. Not only is the temperature measured in centigrade - easy enough to overcome, thanks to the internet. But it's also a fan-assisted oven. So even after converting, I have to use my "judgment" (something auditors are all to familiar with) and reduce the temperature to account for the efficiency of the fan.

During the first half of my time here, my only baking venture was pumpkin bread. And that was only because I had brought the spices and canned pumpkin with me from the States. I only had to add flour, eggs, and water. Even that was a challenge as I used a cheaply purchased measuring cup for liters and converted to cups.

Coming back after Christmas, I thought I'd taken adequate corrective measures. I came back armed with good ol' American measuring cups and spoons along with vanilla, baking powder and baking soda. Surely this would solve my baking issues (no smart remarks from the peanut gallery need be added here!).

Embolded by last week's success with the sugar cookies, I wanted to satisfy my long-unfulfilled craving for good, chewy, oatmeal cookies this weekend. And what better brain food to give my team for the big week ahead. Pretty simple, one of your basic cookie recipes, and the only new ingredient it required was brown sugar - no problem. HA! The grocery store's baking aisle revealed nothing that looked like brown sugar as I know it. The only "brauner zucker" was granulated in crystals - like white sugar. Oh well, how different can it be? Tonight, as I began to mix together the cookies (BTW, creaming butter and sugar - not so easy without a mixer!), I quickly googled "granulated brown sugar" to see if there was a difference in proportions. I didn't exactly find an answer. The only thing I found were sites saying explicitly do not substitute granulated brown sugar for regular because it didn't have the same moisture... hmm... Despite the warnings, I decided to go ahead and hope for the best. I was craving these cookies! My first tray didn't turn out so well.....

....Flatter than a pancake is a pretty accurate description! How obnoxiously frustrating. These cookies didn't seem to lack any moisture. I started experiementing with adding flour and tweaking the oven temp and only cooking a couple cookies at a time. In between each new iteration, Berlin citizens may have seen a girl hanging outside her 15th floor apartment window shaking a cookie sheet in the cold air to cool it down quickly (these cookies are becoming more trouble than they're worth!). *sigh* After several tries and reviewing the recipe a couple times (yep, I put the right portions in), I finally arrived at a decent-looking cookie. It won't win any contests, but at least it's edible.

One thing I'm looking forward to about coming home: baking on my home turf!

Movie Recommendation

I just finished watching "The Lives of Others," the 2007 Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Language Film and it was excellent. It's set in East Berlin in the mid-80's and is a portrayal of life and government in the GDR. The basic plot is a Stasi agent starts monitoring the life of an artist for suspicious behaviour. But the longer he observes, the more he starts questioning his life and loyalties. It's gripping and a tear-jerker at moments, and especially interesting because I recognized a few of the Berlin landmarks. Here's a New Yorker article describing the movie. As a disclaimer, it's rated R, so viewer beware.

Speaking of movies, the Berlin Film Festival, Berlinale, was in town a couple weeks ago. For 2 weeks the city was overrun by film makers, actors and viewers. I didn't run into anyone famous, but a couple of my friends saw the Rolling Stones (who performed on the opening night... when we were in Istanbul), and Scarlett Johanson. The offices of the Berlinale are in the PwC building, so the sleepy building was bustling with activity during the festival. The ticketing process for the films was rather confusing. Tickets went on sale 3 days ahead of time, and were frequently sold out within a day. A group of us did manage to get tickets for one film, "To Verdener" (or "Worlds Apart"). It was a Danish film about a family of Jehovah's Witnesses. The oldest girl falls in love with an atheist and it's about her struggle between family, faith and love. It was a touching movie and I liked more than I expected. Even Rens admitted he enjoyed it!

Web 2.0

Can someone explain to me what Web 2.0 is? I've talked with a couple people in GP and they've tried to describe it to me, but I'm not getting it. Here's what I think I know:
-The "2.0" doesn't mean its update technology... it's more a different way of using the existing technology.
-It's somehow about content superceding form.
-The difference from the orginal web has something to do with user manipulated content and interaction (like facebook, wikis, or SecondLife).

That's about all I know. I don't know what it looks like or how I'll know when I see it (maybe I already have).

There's a creative clip about it on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gmP4nk0EOE

Just wanted to share one of the interesting topics we've been talking about.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

What a great time to do a little something extra for the people you care about! Yesterday Kirsten recruited me to help make cookies for our class. It didn't take much convincing, anything involving cooking or baking and I'm there! We also recruited Ozlem to help because she loves doing things for people and has the biggest kitchen. Mike, who sits near us, overheard enough of our conversations to know we're up to something, but couldn't figure out exactly what and it was killing him. Of course, I can't keep a secret to save my life, so whenever he asks me I just have to smile and look away (don't ever entrust me with State secrets).

Kirsten and I dashed home during lunch to mix up the batter so it would have enough time to chill. Then last night we gathered at Ozlem's. She first fed us and provided us with Turkish coffee to fortify us for the evening.

Thankfully the untried sugar cookie recipe turned out brilliantly (thank you Simply Recipes, my favorite food blog) and the cookies were really easy to roll and cut.
We had to improvise a little along the way, like using a wine bottle as our rolling pin, or using jam instead of food coloring for the icing.

Once the baking was well underway, Kirsten and I started on the decorating.

For me, I'm always happy to decorate the first 2 or 3... then I get impatient and just want them all to be done and creativity goes out the door.
Of course, there's one easy way to cut down on the number of cookies to decorate....
...but I was good and stuck with it until the end. Ozlem helped us with our final decorating push after all the baking was finished.
In the end, they turned out quite well and we had a so much fun making them!

Valentine's Day isn't the huge commercial event that it is in the US, but many people do celebrate by spending extra time together.

"I have loved you with an everlasting love." ~ Jer 31:3

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!!

Istanbul (...not Constantinople)

Ozlem organized a fantastic trip for us to her home in Instanbul this past weekend. Almost everyone in the group came on the trip and several spouses came as well, so there were about 25 of us. Having everyone together, in and of itself, meant we were going to have a blast.
We experienced true Turkish hospitality (they're practically obsessive about it). Every restaurant had food on the table practically before you had taken a seat! On Friday evening we had dinner at a traditional kabob place, and then on Saturday at another traditional Turkish restaurant - such wonderful food and different spices and combinations that we're used to in the western culture. Sunday afternoon after a boat tour on the Bosphorus, Ozlem took us to a casual fish restaurant where we enjoyed some of the fresh catch.
Saturday was the main sightseeing day. We saw Topkapi Palace which was home to all of the sultans and twice the size of the Vatican. Within the palace, we also toured the Harem. On the tour they emphasize how beneficial it was for girls to be in the Harem because they received good educations and then had better marriage prospects.... not sure I buy it completely. We also visited the Blue Mosque, the most famous mosque in the city, and the Haghia Sophia which had been a Christian church until the Turks conquered the city and turned it into a mosque. The day finished up in the Grand Bazaar where we practiced our haggling skills (or got ripped off, as the case may be). I bought a couple scarves and some beautiful, hand-painted bowls.
Istanbul is a huge city! It has about 10 million people and is (I was told) 150 kms wide. Everything is pretty crowded and tight and traffic was a beast no matter what time of day it was. You also have to be pretty savvy with the taxi drivers because they'll rip you off in a heart beat. The city, especially along the water, has quite a Mediterranean feel to it with the brightly colored houses overlooking the water. It was cold and rainy the whole weekend, so I'd love to go back some day and experience it during the summer. I've posted a bunch of pictures so you can get a feel for the city.
The only down side to the trip was that air flights between Berlin and Istanbul are not too frequent, so our return trip didn't leave Istanbul until 3:30am, putting us in our beds around 6:00am. It was rather hard to drag myself into work my 9 and work for the day. But thankfully I think I've caught up now.
Another hightlight of the trip is that it was my first time in ASIA! Most of the time we stayed on the European side of the city, but Sunday night we crashed at Ozlem's house before our flight and she lives on the Asian side. So I've now added another continent to my list.

Robbed!

It turns out Berlin isn't as safe as it seemed. Last Sunday afternoon, three people in my apartment building discovered they had been robbed - two of them were friends from Genesis Park. The burglar was pretty thorough taking computers, cameras, cell phones, Blackberries and jewelry. We were all pretty shocked because it has seemed like such a safe area. Unfortunately, that complacency meant that most of us never locked the deadbolt of our door. Since the deadbolt wasn't locked, the apartment's insurance carrier isn't going to cover any of the losses. It's unknown whether the burglar actually had a key, or jimmied the lock.

Finding that out last week was unsettling and pretty freaky. But yesterday, it got worse.... I couldn't find my iPod Shuffle or my Blackberry. I don't use either of those items too frequently here, and it had been over a week since I remembered using them. They weren't in the cabinet where I always kept them and I immediately wondered, "could they have been stolen too? Surely not!" But after turning my apartment completely upside down (and there aren't too many places to look) I decided I had been robbed too! It must have happened last Sunday when I was at church. I'm very puzzled why they didn't take my computer and camera too, but I'm thankful at least that I still have the electronics I use all the time. So I reported the robbery to the apartment and visited the local police station to file a report (more for insurance purposes than anything else). By God's grace, I'm remarkably calm about the event - I was more freaked out last week - so that's a huge blessing!

Look out, Kasey Kahne!

On Friday evening the Berlin Tax partners invited our GP class to go Karting, which is their favorite hobby. It's essentially the same as what we call Go Karting. With the prior class, they split into two teams, GP and Tax, and thoroughly whooped the GP class. This time, whether from a belated sense of fairness or because we're 3x the size of the prior class, they split the teams based on individual racing times. We each had 10 minutes to get the feel for the track and then we were split into 10 teams of 3 people and raced for the next hour, swapping out drivers every 10 to 15 minutes. While my team didn't exactly win (though we did beat out 3 other teams), we had Kirsten's husband, Sascha, as our pit crew. The Tax partners were really friendly and fun to hang out with and it was great to connect with some of the people from the Berlin office. After the race, they then took us out to a traditional German dinner at a restaurant in one of the really pretty, historic parts of Berlin (Gendarmenmarkt). I've posted a few other pictures from the evening. It was a great outing and I'm ready to go again!

Barcelona

I left my family a day before their departure and went with the group early last Saturday morning as we headed for a 3-day retreat. We stayed in a 400 yr-old villa outside of Barcelona. Some of the required events for the weekend included the team all cooking a dinner together, eating one of the breakfasts in complete silence, and doing one activity as an entire group. We also had more specific tasks, like plan for the Eurofirms Human Capital Leaders conference at GP in a week and brainstorm new ideas for the GP website. But overall, it was a very low-key weekend. It was a perfect chance to get away from rainy Berlin, reconnect with people in the other strategic project groups, and enjoy some relaxation time with each other. The last day of our trip, on our way back to the airport, we took a quick detour into Barcelona to see La Sagrada Familia church, eat lunch on La Rambla, and see the Port of Barcelona. I've posted a number of pictures of the trip so that you can have a better idea of where we stayed and what we did.

The Inside Scoop

Guest blogger: Julie Apple

10 little known facts about the filming of The Sound of Music, starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer

1) Also considered for the leading male role were the famous actors Walter Matthau, Sean Connery, and Yul Brynner
2) Gretl was not able to swim…. So in the scene where the children fell into the lake, Maria was supposed to catch her. During take two, however, they fell on opposite sides of the boat and Gretl was left on her own... bobbing under a few times. A nearby crew member had to jump in and rescued the sinking youngster. When the director announced that they were going to do a take three, the poor, terrified Gretl threw up on the spot all over Louisa. Thus, a take three never happened and take two is the one that appears in the movie. Next time you watch, look out for Gretl's bobbing head.
3) There were actually two gazebos that were used for the filming of “Sixteen Going on Seventeen,” one for the outside shots and another, larger one for the inside scenes.
4) During the filming of “Sixteen Going on Seventeen,” Liesl's slippers had no tread. So when she leaped onto the bench, she disastrously slipped and flew right through the window. Despite a sprained ankle, they filmed the scene anyway. Consequently, if you look closely while watching the scene, you’ll notice that Liesl’s ankle is wrapped up with an ace bandage. (This detail has been edited out of the DVD version.)
5) The gazebo scene between Maria and the Captain where they sang “Something Good” was filmed in the dark because Julie and Chris could not keep from laughing at the strange, raspberry sounds coming from the archaic lighting fixtures. After many unsuccessful tries at taping the scene with the lights on, Chris proposed that they do the scene with the lights off so that no one would be able to tell if they were laughing.
6) Two separate palaces were used for the filming of the Von Trapp estate. One was used for the front and back of the building itself and another one was used for the backyard gardens and lake.
7) The singing voice of the Captain did not belong to Christopher Plummer.
8) In the song “So Long, Farewell!” when Kurt miraculously hits the high note in his solo, it is not his voice that is used. It’s actually a female’s voice!
9) Only the outdoor and the wedding scenes were actually filmed in Austria. Everything else was recorded back in Hollywood.
10) In the final scene, where the whole Von Trapp family climbed up the mountains, the Captain was directed to carry Gretl on his back. Chris, however, refused to do so saying “I will not carry that fat girl!!!” As a result, a skinnier stand-in was required.

The Hills Are Alive

True confession: The Sound of Music is my favorite movie. Now granted, when Julie and Steve were in their hey-day of acting, I did grow a bit weary of it after seeing 14 different stage versions of the play. But I can still watch the film over and over and know all the songs by heart. So when Mom suggested we take a day trip to Salzburg during our weekend at Munich, I was all over the idea. While in Salzburg, we took the highly-cheesy but oh-so-entertaining SOM bus tour through the city and surrounding countryside, stopping at all the places featured in the film. Julie and I had particular fun re-enacting some of the scenes from Do-Re-Me.

I guess I should back up a bit - my family came to visit me in Germany! Mom, Dad and Julie arrived in Munich Friday morning (sadly the boys and Rachel couldn't make it over). They spent their first day fighting jet lag and seeing a bit of Munich, and then I flew down and met up with them Friday evening. On Saturday, we went into the Bavarian countryside and visited a couple of the impressive castles: Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau. Both were gorgeous! Then Sunday was the trip to Salzburg. We did get a bit of real history in while there too by touring Mozart's residence. Here are my pictures from the weekend (warning, there are lots!). I flew back to Berlin Sunday night, having seen nothing more of Munich than the train station and hotel (didn't even make it to the famous beer halls). The rest of the family drove up through Germany and arrived at my place this evening.

Here is a link to my Dad's blog where he's going to be capturing much of their adventures. I'm also hoping to persuade a couple of them to author some guest blogs on my sight this week.

Back "Home" in Berlin

Ahhhh, jet lag. It's 12:30 am Berlin-time and I'm wide, wide awake. Even though I managed, with great determination, to keep myself awake all day yesterday when I arrived, and despite all my good intentions of starting the 2nd half of the program well-rested, it's just not meant to be. Instead of vainly lying in bed, I thought I'd post photos and highlights from my trip home (that is, my other home - B'more).

I felt like I was back in college with a glorious 2-week break around Christmas! I am truly spoiled. It was great to be home for Christmas (I was singing "There's no place like home for the holidays" and "I'll be home for Christmas" on the plane back)! On Christmas Eve day, most of the family (Steve had to work) played a couple games of bowling. I solidified my status of worst bowler in the family, though I narrowly squeaked by with the title!

Rick, characteristically, was the most focused of us all:

Julie: "Did I do that?"

I got to catch up with so many friends while I was home! Here's a picture of Susan and me at her wine-tasting party.

Also, just before I came home, Becca moved out of our old apartment to a new place in Cockeysville. So last Saturday, she and I spent the day re-painting our beautiful, green wall to boring white, cleaning and scrubbing the apartment, and basically removing all traces that a fabulous duo had once lived there. It was a sad moment. But at least I got to spend good quality time with my BX ! At least we finished off the day in good style eating Cheeburger and watching a marathon of Heros episodes. I don't have any pictures, but Becca has posted a couple on facebook.

Over New Year's, I went down to Richmond and got to catch up with Kate and Marianne (college roommates). Marianne grew up in Germany and it was great for both of us to compare experiences. My poor, dear Kate got a kidney stone the day before I arrived, so we laid low for the holiday but enjoyed spending time together. We did venture out on New Year's Day for a walk through her neighborhood.

Kate, her mom and Halley, who could hardly contain her excitement:

What a lovely neighborhood:
And look, this one is for sale! just kidding :-)
Packing to come home was no fun...

No wonder my suitcase weighed a ton. Seriously, when do I think I'm going to have time to read/watch all this.
I got back yesterday morning and it was nice to come home to my apartment, though my poinsettia didn't quite make it the 2 weeks:

It had snowed while I was gone and was actually so cold that the Spree River was somewhat frozen:

Welcome back to Berlin!

And now, I'll try once again to sleep.