From June to August, Germany implement a new policy to make people use public transport more, that policy is called 9-Euro Ticket. Meaning that if we buy the 9-Euro Ticket in June we can take any public transportation to whole Germany except IC, ICE (the high speed train) and Flixbus (that can go to whole Europe) for that whole month, then we need to pay another 9 Euro for July and 9 Euro for August, isn’t it great? If you need a comparison of how expensive Germany ist, for only Dortmund, I paid 72 Euro per month for my transportation card pfffff
I was told that the first weekend in June was a Katastrophe! because everyone is trying to get out of the city so all the train station was full. It didn’t stop me to go to Köln the following week with this 9 Euro Ticket though. I was a bit afraid to be honest but my way to overcome is just woke up earlier to take the train that wasn’t at rush hour, should be OK. Texted Leo, he said I was so brave to even try haha! nothing can hold Asian from a good deal!
Took RE Train at 8AM from Dortmund Hbf, arrived earlier so I still can get a sit. Indeed the train was full! but not full full full to the point you can’t breath. Here, even though every row consist of 2 on the right and 2 on the left, if you travel alone, you consumed the whole 2 seats, no one will sit next to you. Actually I can say the train was only 70% full, nothing compare to Shanghai’s full 😉 I did have to stand up when I had the interchange in Wuppertal as it was already a rush hour time, I ain’t complaint about it. But for a German this is already a full full full pffff come to Shanghai once please then you understand what is the meaning of full 😉
Arrived Köln in full piece at around 10-ish, headed to breakfast immediately 🙂
Started calmly hot chocolate, as if the sugar wasn’t enough BAM! Pancake!
Like always, we need to re-cap what was happening in our life during the time we didn’t see each other. This time they had a lot more stories to offer 🙂 starting with the struggle of getting Tracy out of Shanghai and into Germany plus their dog, Dandy! it was really such a stressful time for both of them, glad they made it! Their Standesamt wedding in Denmark and baby on the way!
None of them told me but my ears are as sharp as a knife! I heard when we ordered breakfast Leo said to Tracy “remember you cannot eat fish” owh! how I suddenly filled with joy, almost jumped from my seat but managed to be chilled. Wait until the waitress went away, directly addressed the question “Tracy, are you pregnant?” they were in shocked! it’s not that she became fat because she wasn’t look like anything close to pregnant. I explained, I heard what Leo said then Leo said “oh you are smart” haha having a 4 months pregnant sister who also cannot eat seafood made me aware of it. What best is their child will also be a girl and should arrive at the same time as my sister’s child! wohoooo this baby girl will be half Asian half German, can’t wait for both of them!
Leo is not a fan of Köln city center as it’s always full, yeah the Dome is there, what can you expect. We decided to walked around the Rhine river. Tried to get an ice cream in a shop that looks like an ice cream shop, we kind of “stealing” the seat from family of 5 but it was really keine Absicht just to find out that it wasn’t an ice cream shop and needed to head out, sorry family of 5!
We can’t take it no more with the heat and our Beine also stopped cooperating, we just need a place to sit plus additional curry wurst hahaha so far from what we wanted first, actually I was the one who wanted ice cream so bad. But Leo did his job, he won’t let me leave Köln before I had it 🙂
As Leo told me it only takes 30 mins from Köln to Düsseldorf with RE Bahn, okay! I decided to have a Ramen in Takumi’s Düsseldorf. Said goodbye to both of them plus Dandy, it was always good to meet your old friend again although by the end of the day when Leo knew he wasn’t invited to my 30th birthday he said “Marlyn are we only your third class friends?” haha! know your place fellas! #devil’s laugh
I shall hang this photo before they visited me in Dortmund otherwise they might thought they fall into fourth class friends hahaha
Thanks Leo and Tracy, until next time, which is very soon 😉