Art Basel

      This past weekend, Nuno and I drove two-and-a-half hours to the Northern Canton of Switerland, Basel, or in French, Bâle. For those tennis fans out there, this is where Roger Federer is from. We went for the Art Basel weekend, where there were many exhibitions set up around the city for people to come and see contemporary art. Of course, there was a lot of art to see, which can be on one hand inspiring, but on the other hand, visually exhausting. Though the term "art" can have a wide spectrum, it is interesting the ideas behind different art pieces and the amount of work as well to make an idea come to life.

A part of a performance art piece using elements from the periodic table.

The path of a snail

The interest is more the people in the reflection of course

I enjoyed this artist: Wolfgang Stiller

Photo fun in a mirror maze

In the middle of the Art Basel building

At the center of the city

Hey! Do not jump in! Oh wait you are just a statue....

Mystery Dinner

One of the main characters

       Have you ever wanted to travel back in time and put yourself in the middle of the Renaissance in Rome? That is where I was transported to when I participated in a mystery dinner recently. From the start the characters are in full costume and immerse you into their world. The story has twists and turns, and for me hard to keep up with rapid french, "Italian" accents, and of course subtle jokes. During the whole dinner they react with you, as you keep wondering who was the killer and why. At the end, there where three great responses and the one chosen won tickets to come again. The professional actors also came out after the whole show in normal clothes to speak to the audience and answer questions. The only thing that would have made the night even better, is well of course the food, which sadly was beautiful looking, but not the greatest. So, yes, it was more about the show, which was interesting and kept the audience on their toes.

Chatting with one of the characters

He did not know about cameras

A disguise?

The guys...

The gals...

Is he the killer?

Our table was the Fellini family

Lucerne

Lake Lucerne

     On a long weekend a while back, Nuno and I visited Lucerne, a city about three-and-a-half hour train ride from Geneva. I have heard before visiting that Lucerne is beautiful, but sadly, the weather was rainy, cold, and at night it snowed. This prevented the gorgeous views of the mountains, since most of them were blocked with the clouds. But of course as a Chung, I tend to focus on the food and in that respect we had a good time. The best this I ate was homemade ravioli stuffed with freshly-made mozerella cheese. Purchasing highlight: purple-colored pencil lead, yeah never going back to gray. We were also able to visit a local museum where we saw mostly work from Picasso. We ended up taking a walking tour, which sadly ended up being too cold to complete. I hope to return in better weather though it still was a nice trip overall.

The Carving of the Dying Lion

Façade of the local buildings

Multitasking

Entrance to the train station

Inside the Alps Museum