First time going home again

I am sitting at the lounge of Hamburg airport right now, drinking a cappuccino and eating cake, while waiting for my flight back to Düsseldorf. This is actually the first time that I sit down at rest. 

Just a quick shot of my current location ;-)

I haven’t been blogging for a while, since I’ve been over-occupied with work and my new apartment. In between working late the last 10 days, I have painted my apartment last weekend. It took only half day (while a great part was spent on covering the floor, the doors, etc.). It was exhausting and my whole body ached the next day, but I had two nice helpers J The next day I went back and “corrected” some things, since I’m very precise and detected every little spot that was not painted well enough for my taste. Finally, to round of the renovation weekend, I mopped the floor on my knees, since I had no stick. The only time this week I had time to visit my apartment was yesterday after 8pm. I planned on cleaning, but just ended up dropping some things off and had dinner with some new friends.

The plan for today is to have Japanese lunch first after landing (I’ve been craving sashimi for weeks!), then go furniture shopping, and packing my stuff. I guess I will be busy with packing all weekend. Apart from that, I might have to work in the restaurant, meet up with some close friends and spend some quality time with my family. On Monday, the moving company will come and I have to leave at around the same time with my car to open the door in Hamburg for them. It’s a pretty long ride for one person (423km to be exact). Nevertheless, I am excited that things are going according to my plan.  For the rest of the week, a handyman will come and fix some things, on Saturday my washing machine will arrive and from then on I will just need some smaller furniture and accessories – I can’t wait to design my apartment according to my own style.

Working the past days have been very busy due to the January closing and I got back at the B very late every day.. the latest I left work was 9.45pm, I belive. But I think its well-worth it and part of the learning process. I had a little chat with my boss yesterday before I left for my “long weekend” and everything seems to be just fine (so far). I’m glad about the short feedback and feel motivated to start having my own responsibilities. We also took pictures last week for a colleague who is leaving the company and I was actually just sitting at my desk working and then they asked me to join them. So I have a group picture with my closest colleagues, which I can now hang above my bed .. ;-) I also got a single shot taken, which I will share with you.

Friday morning at work

No further news so far .. It is pretty cold up here and it has been snowing for a whole day last week, so I’m happy to be able to bring my UGGs and ear warmers and all the warm stuff back to Hamburg next week. And I will show you a first glimpse of my apartment .. my previous tenant had one single purple wall in the room and it was badly painted, it made the room look smaller and I wanted that wall white. So I (or more my friend) painted it white – I took care of the corners and the sockets .. I believe it took three layers to let the color disappear.  So here the before shot:

No purple wall for me (sorry, Sarah)!

Anyway, it’s almost time for boarding and I need to do some Ikea research as well, so this is it for now. Have a nice weekend!

First busy week ahead

Last week was pretty low-key, since my boss was on holidays and she didn’t leave me with many tasks to do. I had some introductory meetings with colleagues from other areas and departments to get to know them better, their work field and also to understand the business better. I went to have a look at a crystal lamp, which I’m now bidding on online, since the store price is much higher than what I saw on eBay. It’s really nice and would fit perfectly into my new apartment. However, since I’ve seen it gone away for half price online, I also only want to pay a little bit more than that. 

On Friday evening I went out to an Asian party to celebrate the Chinese New Year and I was quite disappointed. The location was small, the crowd more non-Asian and the atmosphere was missing. But after some drinks, I went dancing and it got more entertaining. In the end I was back at the B at 5.30am in the morning, in bed by 6 and got up at 8.30am to go to Schwerin to visit a friend. Besides the very nasty weather – it was non-stop raining and very windy, it was very nice and relaxing. We went sightseeing despite the bad weather conditions, got a private tour of the Schwerin cathedral for an hour (very interesting!) and made a quick stop at the castle. The city center is very cute and the city itself is partly rebuild after Hamburg, which made it more special. 

Schwerin Caste

Schwerin market square (reminded me of Tallinn town hall square)

Furthermore, Schwerin is surrounded picturesque lakes, of which my friend literally lives at. Unfortunately, I could not enjoy the view due to the constant rain, but I’ll be back in the summer for sure. :) It’s just an hour away from Hamburg and the ideal weekend trip to the beach! We didn’t (or more couldn’t) do that much (outside), just had a typical Mecklenburg-Vorpommern meal (for me very German), but it was delicious! I have never ordered non-Chinese duck before, but since it was a specialty of the province, I had to. I also never had “Klöße” before – some kind of German dumplings made of potatoes, but I really finished the whole plate (except for the decoration and the duck skin). Yum! 

Crispy Mecklenburg farmer's duck filled with with dried fruit, apple red cabbage and home-made potato Klöße

We spent the rest of the Saturday evening at home having cake, chai tea latte with chocolate, watching DVD and chatting until 2pm at night (despite the lack of sleep the night before). On Sunday, we had a long late breakfast, went for a very short walk along the beach (a must – even though it was still raining) and made pasta with salmon, before I had to leave again. It was the perfect girl’s weekend!

DVD "Atonement" with wine and chocolates

A must-picture at the beach (with my friend's apartment in the background)

The whole day today I was sooo tired, although I should have been relaxed, but maybe I was just too long outside in the weekend in the nasty weather. But this week is going to be very busy. My boss is back and it’s our monthly closing. Today I already spent 11hours at work and it’s just the beginning. Therefore, this is it for now. I intended to blog more often, but I’m so tired after work that I don’t feel like blogging at all. I think I just have to get used to work life. I hope the pictures make up for it though. ;-)

Have a fabulous week!