Maria Szymanik

Ride for MND 08

2007-11-09T20:04:00.000Z

Check out the link under my Links to friends 'Ride for MND 08'

Get involved!!!!

xxx

Amsterdam again

2007-10-01T22:12:00.001Z

I went to Amsterdam this weekend to visit my favourite canal boat resident, Duncan. We pretty much hardly left the boat for 3 days and did little other than play cards and board games and eat, which was perfect! And i learnt how to play poker which was the highlight. I think it might be my new obsession even...

These are the cutesy geesies that glide up and down the canal hunting treats. I love them!

This is Duncan attempting to throw me overboard.

And here we are on bikes recreating our famous Red Bike Gang shot from the last visit to the 'Dam.

2007-08-24T22:16:00.001Z

My Birthday

2007-08-24T21:32:00.000Z

It was my birthday recently. Actually I was feeling a bit glum about turning a year older and not particularly in the mood for celebrations, but then I guess I am a leo and we do like to be centre of attention, so I celebrated for ummm oh about a week.

Anyways, the celebrations kicked off with Thursday night drinks and then I headed to Switzerland for the weekend to celebrate with Craig and Maesi and Julian came over from Paris too which was lovely. We had a relaxing weekend consisting of a lot of cake and chocolate, a bbq by the lake and a most fabulous swiss style brunch. The picture above is my birthday cake which Craig carried all the way from Stockholm to Luzern - it is called a Swedish Princess cake mmmmm it was delish!

Here are some pics:

Harriet, Cam, Karen:

Me and Chris:

Me and Andrew:

Yuuki and John:
Me and Jonathan:

Me and Jackie:
Me and Harriet:

Me and a bottle of Veuve, lakeside:

This is Paris - I love him!

Me and Craig:

Me and Marcel and Julian:

Ramble in the countryside - Boxhill, Surry

2007-08-22T20:45:00.000Z

Once upon a time there was a lovely sunny Saturday and three friends went on a peaceful, scenic country ramble in the delightful Surry hills..... that was the last day of Summer.

Summer has been crap in the UK this year and it is unbeliveably depressing. I shall take comfort though that I did manage to get out and ejoy the sunshine on one of the few warm, sunny days. Bryan, Di and I went on a 14km ramble from my 'Walks in the countryside near London' guide book. Well it turned into about an 18km walk as we went a little off course at the end, but it was all part of the experience I suppose.

Here is a pic of Di and Bryan, enjoying the view at the top of Boxhill:

Ah the serenity:

This is some big posh house that if we had spent £10 we could've gone into the grounds and had a nosey round the manor:

And this is a vineyard that we stumbled accross. We actually saw two wild deer - baby ones like Bambi - it was a special moment!

California

2007-07-22T20:01:00.000Z

I went to California for work for a week in June. I had delusions of working for one day and spending the rest of the week on the beach. Disappointingly I did actually have to work. The highlight was probably flying business class. I'm not sure how I'm going to go back to economy long haul - sigh.

I did manage to squeeze in a teency amount of sight seeing. One afternoon we went on a drive along the Pacific Coast Highway - we were staying in Santa Ana and drove down to Oceanside and then up as far as Long Beach. The coast line is pretty and reminded me a lot of New Zealand. We also went for a drive through Hollywood and Beverly Hills another afternoon, which was quite a novelty. I didn't see anyone I recognised but I am convinced I saw famous people - I just couldn't identify who they were!

I got quite hooked on the local TV news shows while I was there too - although it was dominated by reports on Paris Hilton as she was released from prison that week. It was all quite addictive though. Americans are great I've decided - so hyper and bouncy. I swear it is all the sugar in their diets - bottomless cherry cola is dangerous.

These are the two colleagues that I went to California with - David and Ian:

Here I am in Beverly Hills:

Some of the wildlife:

This is Laguna Beach in the OC:

THE END

Budapest

2007-05-30T21:32:00.000Z

I went to Budapest for the last May bank holiday with Jackie. It is almost a distant memory now as I haven't done anything since. Budapest is really interesting - the architecture is awesome. I've realised I have a slight obsession with bridges, especially by night when they are all lit up and picturesque.

Here is the first picture of our trip, Jackie and I arrived and thought we'd go exploring but there was a loud thunder clap and then a downpour of rain so we thought it best to go straight to the nearest pub for hungarian beer. After asking the waiter to take our photo while we clincked galsses we then read in the guide book that clinking glasses is offensive in Budapest :-(

Once the rain stopped we climbed up a kazillion steps to the fortressed castle in Buda.

There are spectactular views from Buda:

We did the obligatory touristy visit to the baths which was a fantastic relaxing way to spend an afternoon after a morning of sightseeing. We went to the baths on Margaret Island in the middle of the Danube and to the traditional Szechenyi Baths in City Park. It was lovely and relaxing and I didn't want to leave. I think I am in need of another holiday - where to go next?

Eurovision Song Contest 2007

2007-05-13T19:10:00.000Z

Harriet hosted a Eurovision EVENT!!! on Saturday, it was fun! We had score sheets and a sweepstake and mini toad in the holes - awesome! I won the sweepstake with my pick of Armenia - who were in fact incredibly bad (somehow I thought Armenia's entry might be quite good as I've secretly always quite liked System of a Down....) but seems Armenia is pretty popular with its neighbours and got lots of votes from other countries. I was amazed at just how serious Eurovision is in Europe - growing up in NZ I always thought it was a bit of a joke. It is extremely political as you can only vote for other countries, not your own, even if you like the UK act the best. Poor UK, if it wasn't for Malta's vote I think it would've come last. I hear on good authority (ummmm Craig) that in Switzerland there were serious interviews with DJ Bobo to discuss how Switzerland did not make it into the finals this year and rumours of an 'eastern block' conspiracy. Love it! Anyways here are some pics of our frivolity at Harriet's:

Oh and the event was supposed to be a costume party but as I had anticipated only Harriet, Lucy and I actually wore costumes....

Harriet is a domestic goddess - oh la la:

Luke and Anna pretending they aren't there and I'm not taking a picture:

Engrossed:

Harriet with Nana Mouskouri:

Cheesecake and other random recent pictures

2007-05-09T20:20:00.000Z

Bridget, Paul and Chris came over for dinner the other week. Bridget and Chris made this fantastic cheesecake. It is Mrs Plant's recipe but slightly altered as Chris reckons cheesecake needs a base - even baked ones. It was perfect and oh so delicious!!!! mmmmmmmmmmmmm

Sleeping beauty, Clapham Common:

Chuckie's birthday drinks - Gillean and Andrew:

Me and Craig (aka Chuckie) - awww doesn't he look sweet:

Craigie in London over the bank holiday weekend:

Angel or Devil?

2007-05-07T15:07:00.000Z

It was Jackie's birthday party a few weekends ago. The theme: Heaven or Hell.

Here's Jackie and Yuuki - a devilish pair:

And here is Yuuki and me:

Yuuki and I spent the majority of the party right here - in front of the crisp and dip and more importantly the punch. There's something about a costume party that makes people in costume live out their alter ego. I was a fallen angel (here you can only see my wings but I also had a devil tail) and Yuuki was clearly a devil with those red horns. Our alter egos made us a little naughty as Yuuki spiked the punch with unnecessary additional vodka (and I egged her on) and we spent the party laughing at the neighbours as they also had a party on and we could see right into the bathroom! It was strangely compelling! Later in the evening the parties merged and it was funny to point out who did not wash their hands!

Easter road trip

2007-04-27T17:50:00.000Z

I spent Easter on a road trip from Chamonix to Turin to Genoa - and places in between. I started out in Basel, Switzerland, where Craig and Marcel met me at the airport. We drove to Montreux and had a walk along Lake Geneva and stopped for coffee - it was very peaceful by the lake:

Next we carried on to Chamonix at the foot of Mont Blanc and indulged in a fantastic 5 course meal that none of us (not even Craigie) could finish. Chamonix is a lovely ski town and oh my goodness oh my goodness the almond croissant I had there was divine! Here we are at several scenic spots en route to the mountains on the border of Switzerland and France:

Below is Mont Blanc from Chamonix:

We spent the night in Chamonix and this was the view I had out of my window when I woke up in the morning:

Next we headed through the Mont Blanc tunnel into Italy - first stop Aosta. Aosta is a lovely old town with ancient ruins that we walked around.

From Aosta we drove towards the mountains again to see the Matterhorn from the Italian side - as Craig and Marcel are used to seeing it from Switzerland. Here I am with the Matterhorn (which annoyingly was topped by a stupid blob of cloud) :

Next we headed to Torino where we spent the rest of the day and that night. Torino is by a river (actually not sure which, Criag?) , it has wide streets and grandiose architecture. We enjoyed strolling round and found a bar that served great mojitos and tasty snacks!

After Torino we wound our way to Genoa via some lovely little villages - Asti (yep as in Asti Spumante) , Alba and Barolo. Alba had great gelatti but other than that is was pretty quiet. Barolo is fantastic - the village sits on top of a hill with great views of rolling hills lined with grapevines.

Old buildings in Asti:

A Castello in Barolo:

Me in Barolo and a backdrop of vineyards

After our short visits to Asti, Alba and Barolo we then head on a winding road to Genoa - there was a cool thunder storm en route! Genoa is a port city and it has a slightly seedy element to it along the wharf, which makes it a bit edgy and exciting. It is quite hilly and has narrow dark alleys which reminded me of Venice and parts of Dubrovnik. The architecture seemed to me quite different from the other places we had visited - many of the buildings were in black and white brick which I thought looked quite interesting. I think Marcel told me the reason why the buildings are black and white but I've since forgotten :-( (Marcel?)

The next day we drove towards Milan and Craig and Marcel dropped me off at the airport - which is where the story ends for me. Back to London.

Lucerne

2007-04-27T17:27:00.000Z

We spent the day after our adventures in the snow walking about Lucerne. It is a very picturesque town in central Switzerland about 10mins from where Craig and Marcel live. Here we all are in front of the lion monument. Below we are standing on the banks of the river in the old town - you can see the wooden bridge in the background and the tower.

Whose shoes are whose now?

2007-04-23T22:04:00.000Z

Snow shoe walking

2007-04-22T19:52:00.000Z

I'm back on-line! It only took BT 4 weeks to connect our phone and broadband...

Tooting is taking some getting used to - it's a bit further out than Clapham and not half as nice eg. I saw a kid get beaten up in the supermarket the other week. On the positive side there's a lot of cheap tasty curry to be had! And I have friends nearby!

I've had some fun trips over the last month or so. In March Melissa, Alex and I went to Switzerland to visit Craig and Marcel. We had a fantastic weekend of indulgence and adventure.

It had been snowing all day when we arrived at Zurich airport, I've never seen so much snow piled up at the side of the runway. Snow = fun and Craig and Marcel had a day extravaganza of snow related madness planned for us. It started with with tobogganing, there was heaps of snow so I had high hopes of racing down the slope but I discovered heaps of snow isn't always a good thing. It was too powdery and my toboggan kept sinking into the snow. It took ages for us to get to the bottom and without any danger or speed.

Craig had a brilliant idea that we should go again but half way down we should sneakily switch to the ski slope. It was much more fun but kinda idiotic and dangerous. We had to edge down some very steep slopes and i caused a number of collisions with my inability to control my misfit toboggan.

Here is an action shot of Alex, Marcel and Craig:

Alex and Craig throwing snow balls at Melissa while I'm caught in the middle:

We were pretty pooped after our toboggan madness and went back to Craig and Marcel's apartment for a little rest before our next mad adventure - snow shoe walking!

It was with intrepidation that Melissa and I stepped into the gondola with a pair of weird snow shoes in tow. It was dusk and fast getting dark, it was cold and there was an awful lot of snow. I was scared we were going to get lost and die. From the pained expression on Melissa's face I could tell she was thinking what I was thinking. See how our wide grins mask our fear:

Much to our relief we were on a guided tour and our friendly guide had not only miners style lamps for us to wear on our heads but tasty wine for us to drink. After a short instruction (in Swiss German translated into English by Marcel) on how to put on the snow shoes and how to walk in them, we set off in single file stomping through the snow. Our aim was to reach a mountain top restaurant for a traditional Swiss meal.

Stomping out a track through powdery 1.5metre deep snow is like working out on the step machine at the gym at an advanced setting. We stomped gradually up hill for about 2 hours to the restaurant. Fortunately half way through the stomp our nice Mr guide man made us stop and appreciate the scenery while he whisked out a bottle of wine from his bag and we had a toast! It was incredibly still and silent and perfect - I felt like we had escaped to Narnia.

See how deep the snow was:

Once we reached the restaurant we were served a fantastic traditional raclette - which is tasty melted raclette cheese with potatoes and pickles, followed with a shot of schnapps. It was delicious! I really wasn't looking forward to leaving the restaurant and stepping out into the -6 degree cold again for more snow shoe walking. I was stuffed with cheese and potato and generally exhausted. Predictably I fell into the snow and couldn't get up, too tired and stuffed to haul myself out, Craig hauled me out of the snow only to fall in himself and get stuck - it was pretty funny. Happily, it was only about a 20-30min stomp to the gondola which took us back down the mountain. Snow shoe walking really was quite fantastic!

Goodbye Alfriston Road

2007-03-22T21:28:00.000Z

After almost two years in Alfriston Road and almost two and half years living in Clapham Junction I am moving to Tooting Bec.

Tonight is my last night in the flat and I'm feeling a little nostalgic. Here is a photo-montage (Anna notice the use of 'montage') and glimpse of the many fun times at Alfriston Rd. Sadly I'm missing shots of some of my favourite dossers Liz and Theo and shots of cranium craziness (cue Madness - Our House). NB check out Bridget's mouth watering masterpiece PAV-alicious!!!!

Whose shoes are whose?

2007-03-21T22:59:00.000Z

Amsterdam and other places

2007-03-19T22:21:00.000Z

March has been stupidly busy and I'm beginning to wonder what I was thinking by saying yes to everything this month.

The other week I went to Bern for work which sounded pretty exciting when I said yes but it was actually really exhausting. So hard going all the way to Bern just to pick up some files. Bern is much like the other Swiss cities I've been to (ie picturesque and super clean) except there is a weird theme of bears and baby eating - amongst other oddities:

Last week I went to Liverpool on a search which sounds kinda like the movies but really it wasn't. I had to get up far too early and we worked a 14 hour day without any breaks and then had to spend another night in Liverpool and carry on with the search the following day. I have no idea why I said yes to that. I got tired and grumpy and snappish. Liverpool has some cool architecture though - this is the Liver building at night with me in my hotel room reflected in the glass.

At the weekend I went to Amsterdam with Anna, Cam, Harriet, John and Karen to visit Duncan. Somehow the 6 of us managed to all fit on Duncan's house boat without sinking it and there were no mishaps with anyone falling over board or anything! It was heaps of fun and all my bad memories of Amsterdam have been erased and replaced with only good ones! Amsterdam was pretty and peaceful compared to London. We hired bikes and Duncan took us on a grand tour of Amsterdam - it struck me how much quieter it would be in London if there were less cars and more bikes.

Here we are on a little break from cycling (where's Anna???!!!!!):

Our official photographer:

Here we are playing a very serious game of Cranium (but not Turbo edition):

Starlet:

View of the canal from the house boat:

Today I had a stupid mock test for my QLTT which was massively depressing after such a fun weekend. On the bright side I made some new study buddies and we are geeking out with sharing notes and forming a study group and everything.

This Friday I am off to Switzerland with Melissa and Alex to visit Craig and Marcel and play in the snow. I can't wait!

Hyun-Ju's back in London!.....but just for the week.

2007-02-18T20:14:00.000Z

Jet setter Hyun-Ju was in London this week for work so Alex, Paul, Bridget, Andrew and I met her for dinner along the Thames. The view of the city from the south bank between London Bridge and Tower Bridge is one of my favourite views in London. London is so pretty at night! The filth that the daylight exposes is hidden at night time and it is just the sparkling lights reflected in the Thames that catch your eye.

We had fun catching up on Hyun-Ju's news over dinner. It was just like old times and we even had complimentary lemoncello - an Alfriston Road after dinner favourite! Here's a photo of everyone taken after the lemoncello - it's a little dark but you can see Tower Bridge in the background.

Snow!

2007-02-11T18:53:00.000Z

It snowed again this week and I was excited like a little kid! Snow had been predicted for Thursday morning so as soon as I woke up I peeked through the blinds to find it all white and pretty outside and to my delight it was still snowing! It snowed the whole way to work and kept on snowing until around 11am which was all quite exciting and fun. This is how it looked out of my bedroom window:

Check out the funny little squirrel dashing over the roof of the shed:

This is my street - to the left you can just catch a glimpse of my flatmate stepping out of the flat:

This is Clapham Common - it was fun crunching through snow:

Winter arrived in London

2007-01-28T22:04:00.000Z

Winter finally arrived in London this week. I woke up to everywhere looking all white and pretty outside my window on Tuesday morning. Annoyingly it wasn't the 'wrong kind of snow' this time so my trains were still running and I had no excuse not to go to work. I wasn't even late! It was fun crunching over fresh snow in the Common but disappointingly the fun was short lived as the snow had all melted away by the time I returned home from work. I just wish I'd taken some photos but it was a bit dark in the morning when I left home.

It was Burns night on Thursday so a few of us went out for whisky (and then a lot of other tasty drinks) and even a little poetry reading! That was fun! Friday was a struggle though....

Today I went to see an exhibition of Central Saint Martin's students work at the Oxo tower with Anna - it was fun and weirdly a little scary. We literally ran out of one exhibition room as the work looked like it was going to jump out of the screen and get us like in an episode of Scooby Doo - spooky!

Here is a photo I took from the south bank today. It wasn't an especially nice day but it is exactly how it looked through my eyes this afternoon.

New Zealand

2007-01-18T23:06:00.000Z

Here are some pictures from my NZ visit over xmas:

Bohdan and his home made pizza oven

Joe

Cal, Morgue and me

me, Rich and Sandra

Kirsten and Rich deciding who would cook dinner

Kapiti on a windswept morning.

Oriental Bay on a sunny late afternoon.

2007-01-17T22:31:00.000Z

It was one of my new years resolutions to finally set up a blog - here it is.

January commenced with jet lag and a hangover rolled into one. I returned to London from New Zealand on 29 December, in time to stay up all night on new years eve drinking champagne, which ruined any gains I'd made in recovering from jet lag. Live and learn! I hold Jackie responsible for dragging me out, despite my protests I did have heaps of fun.

Here is a picture taken from Island Bay, south coast, Wellington. It really was fantastic to be by the sea again - lovely fragrant salty air unlike any seaside I've been to in the northern hemisphere. When I get round to it, I will add some pics from my holiday in NZ - I had such a great time!

London is not at all cold this month, I should just enjoy the fact I'm not slipping over on ice like usual in January but I can't help feeling a bit worried that all those global warming warnings might be true. It really is unseasonably warm here and when I was in NZ it was unseasonably cold.

Work is work - I won't bore you with details of investment fraud but in short I am incredibly busy this month so don't expect to read of any exciting tales on here for the rest of the month!