Friday, October 9, 2009

Do You Ever Get a Hankerin' for Some...

CHA-LUP-AS (say what, did the Blazers just score 100 points?)

Well, Hailey and I did, as I'm sure you have too. There was only one problem, we are in Austria(WHOAAA!) and they don't know anything about Mexican food. Except this one place called Taco's Lopez, it is pretty authentic, but I don't think they have Mom's reciepe. So, we set out to find the ingeredenits. Should be easy right? There was only one problem, were were still in Austria (WHOAAA!). So our mission was that much harder, it sent us all over Vienna. First things first, finding cream of chicken soup. This actually proved to be simple, not because any grocery store here had it, but because I heard rumors of a British/American foodstore in the 4th district (Pop-tarts? Yes please!), and they had delicious Campbell's soup.
The thing that proved most difficult was trying to find these peppers you see in the picture. They definitly aren't the same thing we use at home, but they had a good spice to them so I'll give them a break. Tortillias were pretty easy to find too (someone in our group even tracked down "Mission" brand, sweet). Sourcream is everywhere, but it a little different than what we have at home and that gave us the most worry. Cheese too, was kind of a struggle but we managed to grab some cheddar which was clutch. When everything was combined, it looked pretty close to what it looks like at home. Here is a picture of me doing what I do best, normally to my Mom's chagrin :To increase the interactivity of this blog I decided to make an awesome vid showcasing my talents behind the camera. You may find it boring, but I think Hailey really put a lot into this role and it shows. Subtle- yet effective stuff. A tour-de-force. Oh, and the song is by Girls. Hope I don't get sued. We just happened to be listening to it at the time.

They turned out really good. Not really too different from home. Wanna see something goofy? Look how many clocks my host Mom has in the kitchen, I think she collects them, they go off all the time, and for the first like week I was there I always thought someone was at the door.

Gratz-ee!


Oh my god, what is that? Are Aliens attacking the southern Austrian city of Graz?? Well...no, not exactly. This UFO-y building is the Kunsthaus Graz. A center for modern art in Austria. And yes, everyone is aware that it looks like an Alien spaceship, it was even dubbed "the friendly alien" by its designers.
Graz was the European capital of culture for the year 2003, and they built a lot of weird stuff for it. It is easy to see why they chose a place like Graz though, as the city is adventerous to put a big blob of a building in its historic downtown. Artist there don't seem to mind taking chances. Such as this stained glass window in a local church:
On first glance it may seem like any other church window depicting the passion of Christ, but this one is a little different. See if you can figure out why. Go ahead. I'll just wait here...
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See it yet? Well, if you look to the right of Jesus' shoulder, there are two very (in)famous tormentors. This window shows Hitler and Mussolini watching Jesus get whipped! As you can imagine it created quite a stir on its debut, but it remains today.

The last cool thing we saw in Graz was the armory, supposedly the biggest medieval weaponry! Sadly they won't let you take pictures, but let me assure you it was intense. There were enough weapons and armor to fit an army of 5,000 men. Luckily with the wonders of the internet I have tracked down an informative video about the armory for you all to enjoy:

Mammoth


Nothing else needs to be said.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Video Blog



Here is the first video blog. Whoop

Special Guest Blog Post from Ljubljana

Kellen has formally allowed me, Hailey, to write an official blog post for him. So HELLO MCMINNVILLE WOOOO. We are currently in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, home of the famed DRAGON BRIDGE. Many come from the four corners of the globe to visit the famed DRAGON BRIDGE. Not only are the four FAMED dragons the protectors of the city, they also... apparently... can detect when a virgin walks across the bridge, so beware.


Image may be less tilty than it appears

In all seriousness, though, the Ljubljanian people love this bridge. The green dragon is not only the beloved mascot of their football club(Ed Note: (thats me, Kellen) while it is true that "the Dragons", is the nickname for NK Olimpija Ljubljana, and the lovable green dragon indeed, adorns their crest, it is perhaps more notable for being the name of the club's notorious Ultra group and as well as their hooligan Firm) , it is also the city's symbol. So you see adorable cartoon dragons on posters telling the citizens to keep the area clean. In addition, every single Slovenia person Kellen and I have met has told us that we must see the famed DRAGON BRIDGE. McMinnville clearly needs to become sister cities with Ljubljana so we can take advantage of the famed DRAGON BRIDGE by building one of our own, over Cozine or Baker Creek, let's step it up.

Badass Art in Vienna #3 (In a Series) Special Prague Edition

I DON'T THINK BENEDICT COULD DO THIS!! POPES SLAYING GOBLINS??? SWEET!!