Spring...

Spring is coming. Trees get ready to show their full potential :-) I love it!

Classical Spectacular

John and I had a marvellous evening at the Classical Spectacular in the Royal Albert Hall. Framend by incredible lights, lasers and special effects world's best classical music was presented, including Orff's "Carmina Burana" and Ravel's "Bolero", and many more.

CeBIT and sun in Hannover

Yep, we had a safe landing in Hamburg :-)
From Hamburg we drove on to Hannover where we had an interesting time at the CeBIT, which is the world's largest trade fair showcasing digital IT and telecommunications solutions. The fair ground is huge, lots to see!

I was one day at the CeBIT. At the booth of a Digital photography company I had the chance to get a picture of me taken and got a large print of it, as well as the digital image. This company works for the Messe AG and collected "Faces of the Cebit". Really nice and free :-) Okay, in return I had to sign that the Messe AG can use the image for advertising, if they wish. But oh well, that is fine for me...

The next day I met up with my father and sister as they live in Hannover. John continued to explore new technologies at the CeBIT.

I had had a wonderful sunny day with my father and my sisterat the small lake "Maschsee" in the center of Hannover.

We were enjoying the sun in beach chairs. Perfect to recover from one day at the CeBIT.

Lufthansa A320 escapes after wing-tip strike Hamburg storm 01.03.08

... and John and I will fly to Hamburg tomorrow -- wish us a better landing :-)

Freddie found a new home

After more than a year, Freddie, thr frog, found a new home in a charity shop.
We enjoyed him very much. But after sitting on our couch in the living roon all the time, we thought he needs to make some new friends.
Read
here in a previous post how we "adopted" him.

Meeting celebrities in London!

London is a great place to "meet" famous people!
Meeting R2DS and C3PO from Star Wars.,...



..and the rat named Remy who dreams of becoming a great French chef despite his family's wishes and the obvious problem of being a rat in a decidedly rodent-phobic profession.

Oktoberfest Munich ;-)

Last weekend we had a great time at the Oktoberfest Munich :-)

View from the Ferris Wheel

John, Micha and Antonia walking towards the Ferris Wheel...

Walk along the thames

John and I walked along the Thames from Tower Bridge to the Parliament. A very nice walk!
And there was some excitement at the Tower Bridge as they were shooting a movie there. The Bridge was opened only for it, smoke produced, cardboard tanks moved and police boats were speeding and stopped behind the bridge when they had all the needed footage. Was fun to watch!

Summer in London

How beautiful ... summer is here: blue sky, sun, warm temperatures at the end of April!

We visited Sophie, John and Sacha on Sunday and walked through the lovely Windsor. Birgit, a friend from Munich, was also there for a visit.

Sacha, 8 months old, was again the sweetest boy :-) John enjoys taking care of him.






Windsor is very close to Heathrow Airport, the planes fly right above the Queens' weekend castle.

Easter Sunday at the white cliffs of Dover

Easter Sunday we drove to the white cliffs of Dover at the English Channel. We walked along the entire length of the cliffs which is a 2 mile walk one way. The white cliffs are facing France which was visible. A really nice walk, also as we had beautiful weather! Along the way there were warning signs as below. But luckily we didn't fall :-)
John brushed up his driving skills for driving on the "wrong" side. He is doing a great job!

Stonehenge ... one wonder of the world!

Yesterday we drove to Stonehenge, the great and ancient stone circle which is one of the wonders of the world. Stonehenge is about one hour away from London.
What visitors see today are the substantial remnants of the last in a sequence of such monuments erected between c. 3000 BC and 1600 BC. Each monument was a circular structure, aligned with the rising of the sun at the solstice.
Just imagine building something like that with only very basic tools from about 5000 years ago. Amazing!!!!

Sacha & Lily

Yesterday we met our good friends with two of their kids Sacha and Lily. 8 weeks and 7 months old.
Very cute :-) See picture...

PAM in London

On their way to their vacation in South Africa very good friends of ours from Germany had a stop over at Heathrow Airport in London. And Heathrow is not far away from us, so we met up up for a coffee. On the pictures you see Pammi and their cute daughter Toni.

Spring is here....

Blue sky, lots of sun and cherry tree blossom: spring in London :-)

London at 8am...

It is said that it rains only in London. This is clearly not what I have experienced since living in London. Just take a look at the picture I took this morning from our flat -- blue sky and a beautiful sunset. And it has been like this since for many days :-)

New York, Monaco, Pompeii....

We just came back from wonderful - exciting - trips.
First we were in New York City for John's graduation. Yes, he is done! The graduation ceremony was very special in the chapel on the the Columbia Business School campus -- seeing John in his Columbia Blue Cap & Gown made me even more proud! On the picture you see him with his Gown.

Afterwards we had a great dinner with John's parents who flew in from Switzerland for John's graduation at our favorite chinese restaurant Shun Lee Palace in New York -- the best chinese place! Delicious!
Then we had a big graduation party with the other students. The location was with a view to the Hudson River and of course some sky scrapers-- was a great party!

From New York we flew back to London just to get some new clothes and flew on the same day to Nice, France. There John's parents picked us up at the airport who drove from Switzerland to Nice. They flew back earlier from New York to Switzerland than us to have some time to rest before picking us up in Nice.


Now our next event started -- our yearly event the International Circus Festival in Monaco.

It was our sixt year in the row that we watched the amazing performances of the world best artists.


Following Monaco we continued our journey and drove to Pompeii in Italy to travel more than two thousands years back in history..
On August 24, 79 AD, the volcano Vesuvius errupted, covering the nearby town Pompeii in ash and soot, preserving the city in its state from that fateful day.

Pompeii is an excavation site and outdoor museum of the ancient Roman settlement. This site is considered to be one of the few sites where an ancient city has been preserved in detail - eveything from jars and tables to paintings and people were frozen in time, yielding an unprecedented opportunity to see how the people lived two thousand years ago.

The picture above shows the excavation of the Temple of Apollo in Pompeii with the vesuvius in the background.

Kiki in London

Kiki's Blog continues -- finally....

After a long pause I will start again to post what is happening in my life ... and that is a lot :-) Hope you will enjoy it!

Thought the blog needs a new look & feel to represent the new city we are living in since my last post in November 2005...

John and I won yesterday the giant frog you see on the picture at the London fair. We call him Freddie the Frog. He is already part of the family and sitting on our sofa in the living room. Freddie was a big celebrity on our way home yesterday. I carried him on my back and he was sitting next to me in the London underground. The new color of my blog is dedicated to Freddie :-)

Jerry -- we miss you, too!!!!

After losing Ben nearly two months ago, Jerry was also put to sleep this evening. He also suffered from the same Virus as Ben and got sick shortly after we had lost Ben.... it is very hard to loose them both and we will miss them very much!!!!

Find more pictures of Jerry and Ben in John's blog. Click
here.

Robbie Williams comes to Germany...

... and the hopelessness to get a ticket ... both concerts in the Olympic Stadium in Munich were sold out within hours, even minutes... and that's 130.000 tickets in total.

Ben -- we miss you!!!

Today we had to put Ben to sleep. He was almost 15 years old when he got sick. He had the feline leucosis virus, which can*t be cured.
Ben, we send you many treats to wherever you might be....

Read also in John's blog about Ben. Click here