A garden from Eiden

Eiden, a shop I can imagine taking my sleeping bag into and staying over night in. The porcelain ware in this shop is just so pretty, it makes for a lovely atmosphere. It feels sort of other worldly when you go in there and I am never in a hurry to leave. Luckily the owners are very friendly, and I am often treated to cups of tea and a quick catch up in between spending my hard earned euros. I don't think my pictures really do it justice but they do have a nifty website (only in German though) with some photos that will give you an idea of why this place is so special. Jan and Dagmar Eiden, the owners also feature on the website photos. They make and sell porcelain cups, mugs, bowls, vases, soap dishes, the list goes on, not to mention lamps and lights. Everything is handmade in their work shop. Unbelievable! We don't have much of a garden, but to get ready for spring I bought a few hyacinth pots from Eiden and planted some bulbs. I am so looking forward to the flowers.
As you can imagine, as with anything special, Eiden's porcelain is not cheap but worth every penny if you appreciate the hard work involved and the individuality of the product.

A vase on display in the shop
Hand dotted bowls
Porcelain ceiling light - it's on the wish list!

And since I have shown you my hyacinths here, I will also show you Husband's beloved chillies. He plants them from seeds he has dried and this is the stage they are at now. These plants usually give us a yield to keep our freezer stocked for a good few months.

The babies

Enter maximum bid

I realised today that I am fast approaching my third year of life in Ulm. Nuts! I can hardly believe it. It doesn't seem like that long but if I think about it lots has happened in that time. I wonder how I can still feel so foreign after three years here. Because I am, I guess. I still get asked if I am Indian everywhere I go. That's OK, I don't mind. I do feel that I am sort of a let down in both respects. I don't really know anything about India for those Bollywood fans and I am not really fair dinkum Australian. Know what I mean? People I know, those I consider friends here, still ask me when my friends from India are coming to visit me. You mean Australia? Yes, Sydney, Australia. That is where I am from. That is what I know. I have only been to India for about six weeks in my entire existence. It seems hard for people to get over the exterior. How can I explain it? It's like cutting into a watermelon to realise that the interior is of an orange. An orange that looks like a watermelon. That's me. A Malaysian born, Australian grown, Indian looking mish mash. This can have it's upside, I guess. I get lots of 'My! Look at your big eyes' style compliments. When I think back about growing up in Australia, I guess it wasn't really much different. Lots of people would try to guess if I was from Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Fiji, India, Africa - where else do those black people live? I seem to recall that in school, and hanging out with friends I often used to forget I was different. There were times it would puzzle me when someone asked me where I was from, I would forget. Forget, that I looked different enough to prompt such a question. What do you mean where am I from? Here, like everyone else. But no, realistically, I didn't belong to that category of foreigner either. I wasn't born in Australia. But this is about Ulm. So, what have I learnt in my three years here in Ulm? What experiences have I to share?

I can start with some things I love about being here.
One of them is the distinctive change of seasons.
Flowers in Spring, red leaves in Autumn.
The proximity of where we live to Italy.
The proximity of where we live to London thanks to budget airlines.
Berlin.
The uninhibited curiousity and friendliness of small town folk - I love all the 'Guten Morgens' when I go for a walk.
I love that schnitzel is 'normal food' as opposed to 'junk food' here.
These people are serious about recycling and caring for the environment.
The bread.
No shopping on Sundays means Husband and I have a whole day to sit around staring at each other.
I can now speak a pretty good, broken version of the language.
The infamous German directness - straight faced, cuts like a knife,
nothing if not well meant.

Which brings me to the real point of this post. A friend, my German BFF (best friend forever), whom I went to visit the other day. We sat like usual, talked shop, drank espresso, ate sweets. Then he asks me to consider the possibility that people here may think I am a mail order bride. Hmmm... OK, so it wasn't as out of the blue as I have made it sound, it was in the context of what we were discussing but nevertheless, it had me wide eyed and speechless. His words were,'You know how Germans think.' They see Husband, they see you. You still look like a student. There is a clear age difference. They wonder, apparently 'How much did he pay for her?' Really? Is that what they wonder? I thought he was joking with me. My German BFF has a wicked sense of humour. But no. It seems in my third year here I have been promoted from standard foreigner, to Mail Order Bride foreigner. An unexpected title. German BFF has now been downgraded to Frenemy status (unbeknownst to him), subject to review if/when I get over this. I am already thinking of t-shirt designs. It's not nice to make people wonder. I may as well wear my status on my sleeve. What about 'He won me on E-bay' or 'I was purchased on mailorderbride.com (free delivery)'. All ideas welcome.

Bella Vista: Candle Light Dinner

While we often go to Bella Vista for a drink or for lunch I am not sure we would have booked a Candle Light dinner there. We received vouchers to this event as a gift and of course, were eager to try it. We were treated to a four course meal from a set menu and were not let down where the candle light was concerned. Very romantic. These are held in the evening once a month or perhaps even more randomly than that (check the website for dates). I will focus on the third and main course as I think it had all the components to sum up the entire evening. The Filet de boeuf Tuna Kartoffelterrine and Shii-Take. This is how this dish was described on the menu. I am not sure if this was an attempt at being different, or maybe this is the way things are done now - describing one dish using every language under the sun. Fashionable or not, I found it a little confusing. What on earth were we supposed to expect?
Well, above is what we got. All the described components were on the plate. Personally, while the beef was tasty and cooked to pink perfection, the sashimi style tuna with ginger, carrot, bean sprouts and soya sauce are all flavours I love and don't get enough of here, I could have eaten a plate of just that. Yes, you are seeing right, for some reason the tuna was topped with a wasabi coated peanut. OK, yes, they are Japanese too, but flavour wise this was a pretty unnecessary addition. It had nothing to do with the rest of the dish, except may be for adding a little colour. Is this something else I have missed? Is purely decorative garnish (think sprigs of parsley) making a comeback? It may be, because the beef was not immune to this treatment. It was topped with a long ribbon of what tasted like deep fried spring roll pastry. Again, purely an aesthetic addition. Nothing to do with the dish and unlike the wasabi peanut, it didn't really taste very good. These oddities aside the dishes, while small (we were grateful for the bread basket on our table, the gracious wait staff kept it full for us), were well presented and flavoursome. Would I go again? I don't know, at €40 per person not including wine and considering the serving sizes, it is pretty pricey by Ulm standards. Lunch is easier on the wallet and you get the spectacular daytime view.