Things I Will Miss From Lyon

Now that it is almost time to leave this gorgeous city, I beginning to realize all the things that I will miss, that have now become party of my daily life. While there is a large list of things I will miss, theres also things that I'm super excited to get back to, either in Dubai or Charlotte. Hmm, I think I will start a series of things I'm looking forward to as well, to balance this list.

To christen this list, is something that I will miss quite a bit. In fact, I'd go as far to say that it will be the thing that I miss the most, aside from friends of course. A few minutes walk from my apartment is one of the best parks I have been to in the world. Although I have been unlucky to experience an unusually long spell of Lyon's winter, I haven't been kept away from the park. Shocking since the world thinks I'm lazy. I have been in love with this park since I first went last November, but now with the sun blazing, the trees roaring with green and the ducks crowding around the lake, the park is just getting better and better.

My friends and I have spent at least three hours of the past few days relaxing at the park, reading, playing football (soccer) and throwing our frisbee around - and knocking some people on the head with it I might add.

Last week, when couple of our out-of-town friends were in town, we decided to take a few boats out onto the lake - something we had been planning on doing since we got to Lyon months ago (seems like yesterday). We waited in line for about twenty minutes to get on a glisseur (paddle-boat) and when we finally got into one, as fate would have it, the wind picked up, toying with our tiny boats bobbing on the teal waters. After months of being bundled up and barely exercising, it was quite the workout to paddle our way across the lake but it was gorgeous outside and we enjoyed every second of it.

Over the past few months, I had been frequenting the park, whether it was to watch the deer and turtles as I listened to my podcasts or to play a quick game of football or just to read, but I had never run into crowds. I just assumed people weren't that into coming to the park everyday. I don't think I would have had I been a local. I was definitely wrong! The moment the suns rays touched the blades of grass there were thousands of people engaged in various the-sun-is-out-lets-celebrate activities. It was quite a sight to see. Despite half of Lyon lazing on the lawn, there was plenty of space to comfortably lay out or stroll through the zoo and watch the animals grinning in the pleasant warmth as well.

With only a month left, I think I'm going to spend almost every day at the wonderful Parc de la Tête d'Or. Ah, I'm going to miss it when I'm frying under the unforgiving, relentless sun of Dubai :(

View from the dessert station

As usual this blog post is quite late. I'm not getting very good at keeping up with posts as often as I should, but hey, I'm neck deep in Objective-C and Cocoa Touch (programming languages for iPhone) and I've been yearning for some free time lately.

A month ago,  I went to one of the more famous local restaurants by a very well known French chef, Paul Bocuse (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Bocuse) here in Lyon. From what I've been told, Bocuse, a local of Lyon, on becoming famous had decided to grace the people of his city with his cuisine but at a lower price and so opened a series of brasseries. The four brasseries, Nord, Sud, l'Est and l'Ouest, located in Lyon, are named so because the showcase French cuisine from different regions of France (obviously North, South, East and West).  

The L'est (French for East), a Bocuse brasserie thats located by the old train station in Brotteaux, Lyon (right at the metro stop of the same line [ligne B] for those who'd like to visit) has kept me away for most of my months here, mainly because of its over-my-student-price-range menu but also because I tend to stay away from the very French dining experiences because of my inability to succinctly explain to the chef in front of me what I would like him to do with my lamb leg.

A month ago however, my girlfriend's mom and aunt came to visit and her aunt graciously took us out for dinner to the l'Est. I was expecting the experience to be typical of a high class French establishment - noses turned up towards foreigners - but I'm happy to say it was a great experience overall. Even though we were told that the wait would be an hour or more before we got a table, we were seated in twenty minutes and had plenty of bread and wine to whet our appetites. 

The menu wasn't as vast as I expected it to be, but then again its the cuisine of a select region created by a certain chef. The lamb chops I ordered and which I waited 25 minutes for, were as succulent and overflowing with taste as I wanted it to be. The entire time though, since we were seated inches from the desert station, I could see all sorts of deserts being whipped up and carted away to be served and I couldn't wait to sink into one of those. My view from the dessert station, which the photo above doesn't do justice to, gave me an view into how efficiently managed the restaurant was. Even though the stations seemed small and the staff too few to handle the demands of the burgeoning crowd, plates of delicious looking food were produced almost every minute and bustling waiters, screaming at their counterparts as they stormed through the room with their trays held high, transfered the plates to the tables of the hungry customers at top speed.

While we were sitting there, my girlfriend's aunt and I were wondering if the plate of 'golden bars' in front of us (shown in the picture above) was butter and whether I could sneak some it off for our bread. I don't know why it slipped my mind the entire time that the French don't butter their bread (I don't think anyone in Europe does) but it took hours (yes, we were there for hours) of staring at the plate to come to the conclusion that it's biscotti of some sort.

All in all, I loved it. While French portions aren't enough to sate my ginormous appetite, I left feeling quite full and I wouldn't mind going back again (when I have a job).

And oh yea, I got the creme brulée and it was delicious as expected.

Choices

Who thought it would be so hard to pick a blog template. Well done Blogger with the wide array of choices you have provided us. I just spent around fifteen minutes flipping through the selections - theres just so much!! And why have I settled on this finally? I don't really know. Maybe because I intend to travel the world....

Something along those lines.

Relentless Winter

Since the end of December, every time I walk past the Bartholdi fountain in Place Terraux, I've wanted to take a picture of the fountain. With the harsh cold waves still gripping most of Europe, the local fountains have been frozen over, creating, in some cases wonderful photo opportunities.

In this case, the horses of the fountain have been encased in an armor of ice.

Winter Trees

New Years in Paris!

Snow Day in Lyon