Shortly after our Taiwan holiday we went for another family trip. This time however to an already familiar place: Ubud, Bali.
We spent a few relaxing days with my sister-in-law and her partner in a beautiful villa situated in a lush green environment, only a few minutes from the centre, from where we went to explore the whereabouts of the Monkey Forest, the rice paddies as well as the temples at Gunung Kawi and Tirta Empul.

Whereas I love to go back to Europe in summer to enjoy the long days, I also quite like to go back in winter. There is definitely less chance for sun, but it offers a welcome change from the ever same temperatures we have here in the tropics.
This year’s two-week trip was actually a busy business trip to Zurich, Geneva and Luxembourg that left a few days off work at the end. I wondered what to do and finally decided to stay in Luxembourg as this would not only minimize the travels but also allow for some new discoveries. Some of my work colleagues in Switzerland called me nuts for spending extra time in Luxembourg … and I did not really know what to expect.
However, I liked it from the beginning. It was a great change of perspective from the daily life in bustling Asia. The people are very friendly and open and due to the short distances it was easy to get around by foot. Albeit small, the town is very diverse and offers lots of history, something I am missing here in Singapore. To spice things up, we also went for a day trip to two nearby highlights. Trier, the oldest city in Germany, and Vianden, a small village with an impressive castle in the north of Luxembourg.

As a consequence, I often opted for black and white photography which was – in my opinion – a great choice as fortunately both Tianjin and Dalian offer very interesting and distinctive architecture with lots of contrasts. In comparison with other Chinese cities, they seem very European.

Tianjin is China’s third biggest city and has a rich history, impacted by foreign trade in the late 1800s. You find plenty of buildings with British, German, French, Italian or Japanese influence and it seems that the Italian concession houses the biggest cluster of old Italian architecture outside of Italy.

Dalian is China’s northernmost sea port and due to its ice-free location has ever since been a very strategic harbour town. For long, Russian or Japanese occupied the city and it was only in 1955 that it was returned to China. Still today, you see the influence of both countries and I was surprised to find that many Russian still spend their holidays there. The architecture with its old buildings and numerous squares, restaurants and even souvenirs stalls clearly show this influence.

Tianjin

Dalian

The results turned out much better than in colour and the shooting along the rugged coast line, exposed to the force of the wind, was indeed very fun. In no time, we had spent more than one hour before our cold fingers and the darkness stopped us for the day.

You see some first results below.