Photo of the Week - Bright Red!

The photo of the week is from Tokyo, some bright red flowers for a Tuesday evening! Tomorrow we are off to Scotland, so I will not be posting for a while.

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Christmas in Zurich

These photos were taken over the last two weeks, the usual Christmas markets have sprung up in the usual places. The Christmas market at Bellevue is very nice, this one is new with lots of food and drink huts. For the first time, there is an ice rink and of course it is always very busy. One of the good things about Christmas markets is drinking yummy gluhwein,( mulled wine).

There are Christmas trees all over the place,  lovely lights and shop windows are all nicely decorated. At Burliplatz there is the usual candle making place, Alessio has been making candles since the end of November and enjoys the whole process. He has made around 7 candles and some of them are presents for me I think!

Anyway it is hard to believe on Friday it will be Christmas Day, it has passed quite quickly this month. On Wednesday we leave for Scotland and both of us are looking for to see the family!

Hope everyone has had a good December and is ready for Christmas!

Tokyo Temples and Shrines

Kanda Myojin Shrine

Yushima Siedo

Kanda Myojin

Bentendo Temple

Kaneiji Temple

Sensoji Temple

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Meiji Shrine

Torii Gate

I did a post about the temples and shrines in Kyoto, so now it time to do one on Tokyo. I had to do a bit of research to make sure I named the photos correctly but hopefully I did!

The first shrine was called Kanda Myojin it was a small one compared to the others. It was not so busy too, normally the other places were packed to bursting point. To this shrine the people come to pray for prosperity, it dates back 1,270 years. In the same area was the Yushima Siedo shrine dedicated to the Chinese Scholar Confucius.

In Ueno park there are lots to see and do, there we saw Bentendo Temple and Kaneiji Shrine. Kaneiji Shrine is a Buddhist temple founded in 1625. Bentendo Temple is dedicated to the Goddess of Benten, this temple is on an island on Shinobazu pond.

Sensoji Temple is the oldest in Tokyo, you enter through Thunder Gate (Kaminarimon) then you come to streets called Nakamise. There are many different types of shops and it is nice to browse around. This temple is quite large and there is lots to see and it is busy!

The last shrine we visited was called the Meiji Shrine, this shrine is amid a forested area so once you have visited it you can easily go for a walk. The shrine is dedicated to the Emperor Meiji and the Empress Shoken, it was destroyed in WWII but then rebuilt. We saw quite a few couples getting married, it was quite interesting to see the bride and groom and their outfits.

As you can imagine there are lots of temples and shrines to see in Tokyo, Sensoji Temple and Meiji Shrine are two of the main ones to visit.

Happy travelling!

Photo of the Week - Train Town

This week the photo was taken at home, Alessio and his friend Alessia made this great train set. They spend a lot of time discussing what to do and whereabouts to put the different bits. I was well pleased that they did this, it makes a change from watching TV or playing on the ipad!

The Face of Madonna

This weekend has been quite busy and the highlight would have to be the Madonna concert on Saturday evening. I have been to many concerts but I had never seen Madonna before so I was really looking forward to see her.

Her performance was suppose to start at 10pm, but actually it started at 10.20pm, everyone was getting a bit annoyed by the shouting going on but once she came on stage all was forgiven.

Anyway the back drop on the stage was a large screen and late on into the performance a number of pictures of Madonna came on. They were all very interesting and artistic looking, so I snapped away quickly as soon as they came up.

The concert was brilliant and she put on a great show, I am glad to have seen her once! I will put up another post of more photos of the concert later on.

Wishing everyone a good start to the week!

Photo of the Week - Pub Sign

This was taken in Covent Garden on our first night in London, I liked this pub sign very much, but we did not go in though. We had a great week in London, always a great city to visit!

Bern Onion Market

On Monday 23rd November I went to Berne with my lovely friend Elisa Bieg, the reason for this was to visit the onion market, in Swiss German it is called Zibelemärit. Once a year on the 4th Monday in November this traditional folk market takes place, it starts at 5am.

Everything is made out of onion and garlic, they are woven into looking braids, wreaths and some are also made into strange onion people . The kids walk around throwing confetti and bashing people on the head with plastic hammers.

To eat there are savoury cheese and onion tarts which were very nice and onion soup too. Of course there is mulled wine along with other types of drinks too. There are also other stalls with non-onions things too, such as one with Turron. There were also lots of stalls selling colourful necklaces of sweets. Each colour was a different taste, I bought three different ones. Lots of people walked around wearing at least a few of these necklaces.

I have wanted to visit this market for ages and am glad to have seen it, but I would not go again, once is enough.