km 903

Hello again!
It was last year that I wrote my last blog entry so it’s time for another one.

Well … I spent Christmas in Whistler for 4 days and went skiing 3 of them. You can find some pics in the Ultimate Powder gallery. Especially Christmas Day was great for skiing, altough Whistler could make use of some more snow. I stayed at the HI hostel, which is situated directly at Alta Lake (also used to be the former name of Whistler). They provided turkey dinner on the evening of the 25th and delicious apple and pumpkin pie. I met some nice people up there and made new friends – Carolin, Arndt & Christopher (all from Germany, but on internship in Vancouver/Nanaimo/L.A.). Chris also offered me to stay at his place when I’m down in Los Angeles.

When I came back from Whistler I spent some time playing Nintendo Wii with Jacob (my 7-year old host) and had some good talks with Janet (his mom). I also went downtown Vancouver again to explore Chinatown, Granville Island and Yaletown. And I bought myself another Christmas gift – an iPod touch I also had a nice movie evening with Janet watching Saw I+II. I hadn’t seen them before as I’m not a big horror fan, but they turned out to be quite good. I also watched “21″ and Wall-E.

For New Years Eve I met with the german guys at Caro’s place where we did some “vorglühen” – I’m not sure if there’s a translation for that around 11 pm we left and met Erik (my CS buddy at Janet’s place) and went downtown, but acutally got into the new year by bus. We then went into club “Royal” next to the HI hostel on Granville street for dancing. I left around 3 am and as there was no bus I decided to walk back, which turned out to be a 2-hour & 9 km adventure across all 64 of Vancouver’s avenues

Today I just tried to relax and I’m thinking what the new year might bring. There’s so many things going wrong in so many places, so let us all make an effort to create a better place for us all.

Tomorrow I will leave Vancouver and head southwards. My first stage will take me to Aberdeen, Washington – Kurt Cobain’s birthplace. The next days I’ll then go through Portland, Coos Bay, and Eureka to Sacramento.

I get back to you when I got some stories to tell again …

In the meantime – be blessed & feel hugged,
Gergi

km 651

A blessed Christmas!

Hope you all had a good time with family and friends this evening! I’m writing these lines from the HI hostel in Whistler B.C. This was the gift to myself for this year’s Christmas: 3 days of skiing on Whistler & Blackcomb mountain.

I went skiing this day for the first time and was surprised that not all lifts were operating nor all runs were open although it is peak season and so is the price ($280 for a 3-days ski pass). I’m sure more and more runs will open the next days as it is snowing at the moment; there was not too much snow when I arrived, but it takes at least 2 – 2.5 metres of snow that you can enjoy what Whistler/Blackcomb is famous for – POWDERRUNS!!!!! The problem is that the spots for freeriding are quite stony on the ground and so it’s just ruining ones skis at the moment.

But one thing’s for sure: when there’s enough snow up here it’s one of the best freeride arenas I know! and sorry guys: no I haven’t seen the fun parks so far there are also loads of young people up here and I’m pondering about going out one day (the only problem is that the HI hostel is ca. 15 km from Whistler village).

Tomorrow I plan to get up early for the fresh tracks breakfast special up on Whistler mountain, which starts at 7.30 a.m.

Well then … so far, so good.
I’ll write some more when I’m back in Vancouver – hope to hear something from you @ home!

Feel hugged & be blessed,
Gergi

km 453

Hi there!

Just a short notice for all of you. I started my trip yesterday, leaving from Kamloops after nearly 4 months. It was a good time there. I really liked it and I’m sure I’ll go back there someday!

Kamloops @ night before I left

On the way 2 Vancouver

Well … right now I’m in Vancouver, couchsurfing again. I’m staying at Janet and her 7-year old son Jacob in the south of Vancouver. Yesterday I already helped Jacob build some sort of marble slide; was pretty funny!
There’s another couchsurfer as well – Erik from Montreal; he’s a really chilly fella, working in the software business. Tomorrow I’ll meet with some colleagues from Kamloops for a last drink downtown Vancouver, and on 23rd I’ll head up to Whistler for skiing!

Sundown over Vancouver

I’ll soon provide you with some more pics from Vancouver!

So, wish you all the best in the meantime!

Blessings,
Gergi

… ever wondered? …

Have you ever wondered why? Have you ever thought about what it really is? Do you know that kind of feeling?

This silence, tearing up your soul, clearing your thoughts, making you focus on the nothingness inherent in most of the tasks we do, the thoughts we have and the things we have.

At heart, your 10 fingers will be enough to count anything that really matters; friends god set to your side; a home with a family always there for you; emotions like love …

Isn’t it love we all are longing for? Isn’t it love we want to share with somebody? Isn’t it love determining our actions? …

This time of the year love is crucified on price tags in shopping malls and is trampled by hasty steps running for the perfect gift. Bethink that love is the only true gift; think about those you love and who love you and thank god for every single moment you could spend with them.

I wish that you have time for some pondering and enjoying the silence. You are part of my heart, be blessed and sheltered by the hand of god.

Yours,
Gergi

PS: Weili, all the best to your 26th!

Pics online!

Put some pics online in the gallery! Check it out!

Greez & blessings,
Gergi

Great weekend in Lake Louise and Calgary …

Hi there at home!

Well, I want to let you know about my last weekend which I spent at the ski races in Lake Louise and in Calgary. We (Berni, Natascha, Kristin, Katharina, Stephanie K., Marc) left on early Saturday morning (3.30 a.m.) from Kamloops and hit the road towards Lake Louise. The conditions weren’t the best, but with moderate driving it was quite okay. We encountered our first highlight in form of a moufflon along the road.

Muffloun on the way to Lake Louise

We got to our hostel at 11.15, did our lunch package and went to the race straight on, which then had already started. So we missed the later winner Peter Fill. After the race we met Berni & Natascha’s colleague Alex from Graz – she is doing her exchange semester in Calgary. We then got back to the hostel to prepare dinner for ourselves (some nice pasta with tomato sauce and vegetables and some disgusting beer, that ironically tasted better after having brushed ones teeth). For the evening we went up to the Fairmont Chateau at the lake where the prize giving ceremony and the lottery for next days starting order took place. Especially the Austrian girls were perfectly in their element and started chatting with some of the skiers and Natascha managed to obtain a book given to one of them, which she then used to collect autographs of the skiers.

Approx. at 8 p.m. we went down to the Saloon bar, where we finally all started chatting with the service team members and those view skiers who had not gone to bed among them Didier Cuche was the last one to leave the party at about 1.30 a.m. We had lots of fun with service staff members and the girls did not pay one single drink I also met Hans & Franz Knauss there and talked a bit with them, while Berni was dancing with Didier Cuche. Most of us went home at about 2 a.m. with one of the 2 cabs available in Lake Louise. Berni and Natascha stayed a bit longer to explore some parts of the hotel they finally got back at 5 a.m.

On Sunday we managed to get to the Super-G on time and we all were very proud to see the Herminator win again. The Canadians also had their fun with John Kucera becoming 2nd. Didier Cuche seemed to be motivated by the evening before and went 3rd. After the race our ways seperated – Stephanie K., Marc, Katharina and Kristin went back home to Kamloops, while Berni, Natascha, Alex and me went to Calgary. We “checked in” on the campus of Alex’ university (I stayed at the room of a cool guy from Hamburg) and had some to “cultivate” ourselves. In the evening we went to a club called “Roadhouse” which is situated downtown Calgary. We got there early around 9.30 p.m. and when we entered we met some of the Austrian skiers (Reichelt, Alster, Görgl, Scheiber, Streitberger) again. Later on Hans Knauss, Oliver Polzer and some others joined the group and we had lots of fun again that evening – especially cause the beer was really cheap ($3,50 for a bottle). I had some fun dancing there with some nice girls and in the end we went home around 3 in the morning.

The next day we just hang around in Alex’ apartment and she took us for a short tour on campus. We left in the early afternoon to pick up Stephanie at Calgary airport – she was coming back from her trip to California. The pick-up worked out perfectly and we also saw the arriving Austrian Ladies ski team. Around 3.30 p.m. we started our trip back to Kamloops (650 km). Conditions until Banff were quite okay, but got really bad afterwards. Around Lake Louise road conditions were really dangerous – several trucks and cars went off the icy street. Thanks God we ourselves had no trouble as I was driving really slow, cause we had no time pressure anyway. Around 11 p.m. we got back to Kamloops, where I passed the house of some Christmas fanatics. At 11.30 p.m. I finally had delivered all my dear colleagues to their rooms and went home myself.

Today was the last day of regular clases and I now just got my exams ahead – so wish me all the best tomorrow I’ll go skiing to Sun Peaks with some friends and in the evening there’s a final class bash at Cakturs Jack’s, where we’ll go to – hope it will be fun as well.

Pics will follow soon!

Hope you’re all fine at home!

Be blessed & feel hugged!
Gergi

Some days have passed …

Well, nothing really new in the hood

At the beginning of the week my homies visited me again, coming back from their tour through the Canadian rockies. After leaving from Kamloops the week before, they went to Lake Louise, Banff, Calgary, Edmonton, Jasper & Prince George. They had quite a lot of fun, but unfortunately just bad weather the came back on Sunday and we had a nice evening again, having some beer and chips. They left on Monday again after I had shown them around at University. This week they spent in Whistler, Seattle, and on Vancouver Island. They’ll be going back home tomorrow.

I also finished my last 2 papers, 1 of them for sports events management, comparing the Olympics of Athens and Atlanta. The other paper was a group work with Stephanie, which we did already last weekend. Stephanie also cooked and we had lunch together, which was just awesome – thanx to her Tuesday 9 of us went to see the new James Bond, which was o.k. I’d say – just too much action and no Martini Thursday I went to a ski & snowboard movie premiere with my Swedish fella Brent. The first 2 movies were rather poor, while the other 2 (Knock Out – Round 10 & Claim) were great. After the movie presentation I went for some beers to Heroes’ Thirsty Thursday with Hanna & Sophie.

Today was really relaxing – I got my skis at NO1 skate shop and in the evening I went to an event called “seeing faces, trading places”. It was an evening about studying abroad were incoming and outgoing exchange students met for some snacks and nice talks. Was quite cool …

The MOTHERSHIP and me

So what’s going on at home? Let me know!

Be blessed & feel hugged!
Gergi

Reinforcements have arrived :)

Hi there again!

Well, what happened the last days? … most of the time I was searching some resources for writing my paper for conference management which I have to turn in tomorrow – think it worked out quite well and should get a good mark On Friday I went to the movies with Stephanie K. and Marc, where we watched Role Models – pretty funny comedy with Seann William Scott & Paul Rudd. The next day Natascha and Berni returned my car which I had lent them for going to Seattle.

The highlight of the weekend for sure was, when my friends arrived on Sunday evening. My brother Willi, my cousin Hias, and my best friend Hari took a flight over to Canada and are driving around B.C. and Alberta for 2 weeks. It was really glad to see someone from home, when they arrived on Sunday. It was a feeling a bit like at home – we were sitting together, playing cards, having some Schladminger beer – oooooh yeah – and talked shit all the evening long … I really enjoyed that for the first time in 3 months.

Hari, Hias and Schladminger beer

My brother Weili

My brother also supplied me with my skiing equipment and so just some new skis are missing to hit Canada’s backcountry. And my mom cared for me as well – she enclosed my favourite cookies for me as well as some MILKA chocolate – mmmmmh & Stephanie’s mom got her some “Mozartkugeln” – yummy. But the best thing of all (besides Schladminger beer of course) was the special Styrian cheese my mum sent me – it’s the best thing ever!!!

Sunday evening we also went out for dinner at the Mexican restaurant next door to my apartment, which we better had not done it’s not to be recommended at all. After this culinary “adventure” we had some more beer and had great fun. The next day we went downtown to Starbucks for coffee after which the boys left towards Banff National Park. The rest of my day I dedicated doing the paper for conference management as Monday was off due to Canadian National Remembrance Day on Tuesday.

Tuesday morning Brent came by and we went up to Sun Peaks, where Brent tries to get a job for the winter season. There’s already some snow up there and on our way back we picked up some girls hitchhiking to Kamloops. Back in Kamloops I did some studying for todays Spanish quiz and went to the movies again to see Angelina Jolie & John Malkovich in “Changeling”, a movie based on a real-life story of the late 20s and early 30s of the last century.

The story is about the young mother Christine Collins (Jolie) whos son Matthew is kidnapped. The police of Los Angeles brings back a boy 5 months later, trying to “convince” her that it is her son, although he is not. The only person believing her seems to be the presbyterian priest Gustav Briegleb. Corrupt L.A. police tries to silence Christine by institutionalizing her into a psychiatric hospital. Briegleb manages to get her out of there while an honest police officer discoveres the crime scene of a mass murder on kids. It turns out that Matthew could have been one of the victims of the killer …

I liked the movie a lot, Angelina Jolie reaching almost her peak performance of Girl Interrupted. John Malkovich, brilliant like always (but maybe with a role that could be more extensive), and Jeffery Donovan (Police captain Jones) with a shuddering good performance make the movie a 4.5 out of 5 stars, I’d say – watch it if you got the chance!

In the meanwhile the boys already got stopped by the mounties once for speeding, but didn’t get fined – lucky them they are in Calgary at the moment, and ’cause world’s so small they already met some girl from at home there. I went to classes today and studied Spanish together with Stephanie in the afternoon. That’s also when she told me that we missed to return some kind of form at the border check-point when we left the US coming back from Seattle a month ago – this could make it a bit difficult to enter the US again … hope it works out!

Well, then … that’s it so far
Hope you are all fine at home and all the best for my mum (she needed surgery for her meniscus)!

Feel hugged, be blessed and walk on the lightened path
Gergi

gree

Meeting new friends …

Hey there again!

It’s already 5 days again since my last entry – so here’s a new one. Saturday evening I went to a party at the climbing gym as I let you know with my last entry. I was invited by Anisa & Zak, which are in my sports events management class. The party was the official end of a boulder series and so there were lots of people. First we were bouldering around a bit – Zak & Anisa are really good climbers. Around 10 p.m. the gym officially closed and we started slacklining. Surprisingly this trend sport seems to be quite new to Canada as there were quite a few people taking their first steps on a slackline. Simon (one of the owners of the gym) and Craig were pretty good on the line. We had some beer and snacks and Alejandro put up some nice tunes on the stereos; altogether it was a nice evening with lots of new faces and names of which I can’t remember the most
On Sunday I did a lot of readings for my sports events management class, basically all of them about Olympic legacies. On Monday I got back my Spanish exam; and Stephanie did a really good job teaching me: I reached 91 % of the possible marks – a perfect start into the week. I also went swimming on Monday, but wasn’t really motivated and so I did just 20 lanes. Motivation came back on Tuesday where I 60 lanes. It was also the day of Anisa’s birthday and she invited me to her birthday party on Wednesday. The rest of Tuesday I spent reading sports events management chapters, which was also the plan for Wednesday. I just wasn’t alert that my high regarded cousin PeP is only on Skype now – when I realized that it was just some sort of invisible force dragging my mouse to the call-button we ended up talking more than 2 hours …

Anisa’s birthday party in the evening was a potluck party, i.e. everybody brings along some food. I organized some greek & thai salad and went down to Kelsey’s place around 6 p.m. The party took place there ’cause Anisa’s living in the residence and we just wouldn’t have had enough space there. Anisa chose to do a pyjama party which was quite funny & her wearing a d*** hot night dress we had a lot of fun that evening and I got to know a lot of cool new people. We left from Kelsey around 10 p.m. trying to do some learning, but I just left it with the attempt.

Thursday morning we had our exam in sports events management for which I have the worst feeling of all my exams so far. Hope it’s still positive … well, if not it’s still just 20 % of my final grade. In the afternoon’s conference management class I got back my paper about an conference industry sector; I got 33.5 out of 50 possible marks, which is a C+, but I got the possibility to turn it in again for some better grade. Afterwards I went to NO1, which is a local skate & ski shop to have a look at the new LINE collection – I think I’ll get the Mothership

In the evening I went to the residence to visit Berni & Natasha and their boyfriends for having a coffee; they got free coffee every Thursday at the res. provided by a local church’s youth. I went there by car as I’m lending it to them for a week (they are going to Seattle and flying to Hawaii from there). Before they left around 11 p.m. we went for some chicken wings (I had chicken teriyaki) and some beer. We met with Stephanie & Marc and some other German & Canadian guys.

So far that’s all I can remember about the last days …
Hope you’re all fine at home.

Be blessed and feel hugged,
Gergi

Mid-terms

Hey there

This week was quite busy having 4 mid-term exams. It all started on Monday with a mid-term in community & cultural issues in tourism. As far as I can say that one went quite well. Intermitted by a Spanish class the next exam followed with marketing at 6.30 in the evening – that one I got back already on Wednesday – it’s 54 out of 65 points

On Tuesday I studied Spanish with Stephanie in the afternoon, which we also did on Wednesday just before the exam. This one turned out to be very easy and I was done within 50 minutes. In the evening I then started preparing for next days mit-term in conference management. Phil, my teacher in that class, is becoming my favourite teacher I guess – the exam wasn’t too easy, but with a bit of logic the problems were quite easy to solve.

In the evening I was invited by Berni & Natasha for “Kaiserschmarren” – yeah, good old Austrian cuisine. As you can imagine I wasn’t the only guest there: friends from Sweden, Germany and Switzerland enjoyed Berni & Natascha’s cooking as well I was also doing a bit of sports, going to the Aquatic centre on Wednesday and Friday for swimming.

After I lent my car to Berni & Natascha for the weekend (they’re getting their friends from Vancouver) I spent the rest of Friday and today for reading some chapters for next week’s sports events management mid-term and for having a good long sleep and tonight I’m going to a lil’ party at the climbing gym with Anisa, a collegue from my sports events mgmt. class.

That’s it for now,
greetings & be blessed,
Gergi