Ars Vini: a little bit of Switzerland in Berlin

There's one tthing about me: I LOVE cheese,no, I WORSHIP cheese!
So there's been some time I was craving for a fondue and a raclette. So I decided to look for a Swiss restaurant, and yesterday we went to try out Ars Vini.They are specialised in fondues (cheese, meat and chocolate), they have 2 venues, we went to the one in Mitte, at the angle of Templiner Strasse and Zionkirschestr.

First, the place is very nice, you feel welcome right away, the staff is very nice. If you order wine, they will advise you, make you try a few samples,... Well, as I don't drink wine I just had a vodka with orange juice.

We had the Classical Swiss Fondue, we thought we'd get 1 or 2 pots for all of us (we were 5), but no, each one gets a small pot with a "dosis" for 1 person. You get with it a small salad and bread, I also took an extra portion of potatoes. It was so delicious! A delight for my tastebuds! I'm so looking forward to have my own place for quite some time and invest in a fondue pot and a raclette grill to throw "cheese" parties at home! ^^
And the "portion" of fondue was really a lot, but with my huge appetite, I was the only one to eat it all and even helped my friends out! :D After this, a kirsch to digest a bit and we went on with chocolate fondue, served with fruits. We had almond chocolate fondue, such a delight once again, but this time we ordered for 1 person and shared between 4 of us. It was really a delicious dinner and plus we had lots of fun!

When paying, the waitress asked us if it was the first time we were coming, and with one friend, we answered at the same time: "yes, but that's not the last"! We are already planing another visit, next time I might try out the meat fondue (I also love this one - yes I love meat, potatoes and cheese, this restaurant is kind of a paradise for me).

Stockholm

This week end I went to Stockholm. It's been a long time I wanted to visit Sweden, so I took advantage of great Ryanair discounts to go to the capital for 1 week end and have a glimpse of it.
I was completely delighted! The city is of the most charming ones.

I left Berlin on Saturday early morning to Stockholm-Skatsva, where I took a bus to Stockholm city centre (80min ride). There, I met with Charlie (my host for the night) and his guest from the previous day. We first went to his flat, then I went alone to explore a bit of the city. I had no idea where to go, I found a map, spotted an island called "Old City" and decided to take the tube to there.
This island (Stockholm is composed of several islands), is really nice, full of little streets, with wonderful buildings. I walked around, visited a few churches, saw lots of beautiful places, even though I didn't know what most of them actually were. Then, I ended up in a shopping street, than in a shopping mall... the good thing in flying with Ryanair with cheap flights is that I don't take check-in luggage for a stay of max 4 days, as I'm limited to 10kilos, shopping clothes & shoes is excluded... but not earrings, and I found a very nice pair! ^^
Then, i took the tube back to where I started, stopped in a café for a good hot chocolate and brownie and went home.
At night we didn't do anything exciting, watched a movie, chatted, went to bed early,... So Stockholm night life experience will be for next time.

On Sunday morning, I went again city exploring alone, I kinda get lost from the tube station to the coach station where I would leave my luggage, but at least I would know the way later when I'll go catch my bus to the airport.
Then, I decided to go to the harbor where I'll take a boat tour later on, walked along the quays, frozen sea, freezing wind, ... I tried to find a cheap & open restaurant in the neighborhood but found nothing so I had to have lunch at Mcdonald's whereas I would have liked to try some Swedish specialty.
Then, I went for the Winter Boat Tour on an icebreaker boat. It was guided tour, so I learned quite a few interesting things about Stockholm and Sweden history, and I was crazy enough to sit outside, despite the freezing cold it was worth it, the views were just amazing. But when we took the way back to the harbor, I went inside again to get warmer with a hot chocolate. I really enjoyed this ride, Stockholm is so wonderful! I really have to go back there in Summer time and stay longer to explore more of the city and see the famous Archipelago.
Then, I headed back to the coach station, I was too cold to walk, and took a bus to the airport to get settled at the hotel, just 50 m away from the terminal. Flying back to Berlin at 6:30 on Monday morning it was the wisest choice, especially that I was going directly to work after that.

I slept at Connect Hotel, quite luxury hotel to me, I paid 55€ for a room (well you can be up to 3 persons) with no private bathroom/toilets, no TV, no nothing, but it was wonderfully quiet! I got a cocktail at the bar, had dinner and went to bed at 7:30pm. So I wasn't that tired when I woke up at 4:30 to enjoy the included breakfast.

This stay in Stockholm was really enjoyable, I now have to go back as 2 days are rather short, a nice week end away from home!

PHOTOS

==Greetings from Berlin==

Havanna, Berlin

On Saturday night, I went (finally) for the 1st time to a club in Berlin! It was Havanna, great club, with 3 floors, one with salsa only, one with bachata, merengue,... and one with rnb, black music, 90's,... There was supposed to be a 4th room with disco/dance but it was closed (I hate disco but love dance music).
It was lot of fun! My problem is that I can't dance proper salsa and it's impossible for me to go & see a guy & ask for dancing... The only man who invited me could have been my father and couldn't really dance...
So even if I love latino sounds, I spent most of my time in the underground floor, where I could dance alone on very good music. So good music, that even with hurting feet and dry throat, I had a hard time leaving the dancefloor! Yeah, I had the wonderful idea to put on new shoes! I was even surprised to hear 2 French tracks, plus good ones! I'm always surprised to hear French music abroad in non-frenchspeaking countries.
I had to abandon around 4 am, my feet hurting too much, so much that I rather stayed sitting at the bus stop for 20 more minutes than running after a bus stopping a few hundred meters away...

But well, I totally love that place, hum so now gotta find electro club! ^^

==Greetings from Berlin==

Dixit

I discovered this game during a board game evening in a bar on Friday night and just love it!

How to play it? Easy:

"One player is the storyteller for the turn. He looks at the 6 images in his hand. From one of these, he makes up a sentence and says it out loud (without showing the card to the other players).
The other players select amongst their 6 images the one that best matches the sentence made up by the storyteller.
Then, each of them gives their selected card to the storyteller, without showing it to the others. The storyteller shuffles his card with all the received cards. All pictures are shown face up, randomly, and every player has to bet upon what picture was the storyteller's.
If nobody or everybody finds the correct picture, the storyteller scores 0, and each of the other players scores 2. Otherwise the storyteller and whoever found the correct answer scores 3. Players score 1 point for every vote their own picture receives.
The game ends when the deck is empty. The greatest total wins the game." (source: Wikipedia which explains it better than I would ^^)

I wasn't that bad at it, I do love the creativ aspect, I might even buy it, it's lots of fun!

==Greetings from Berlin==