nah, that calendar can't be right.

well, apparently tomorrow is march. and when that happened, i have NO idea.

but things have been happening around here and i thought you deserved a thorough update! so. what have i been doing (besides taking incredible trips to dublin, stockholm, and berlin and learning to cook delicious things)?!?

1. planning an excellent eurotrip with my favorite l.i.z.s for the month after school is out.  by "plannning" i mean "responding to all pertinent details with my opinions but not actually doing anything to help the process move along."  oops. sorry. but! things are being booked and the ball is rolllllling.
2. my roommate cut my hair. best haircut i've ever had.
3. i'm expecting my first official visitors next week!  planning their visit has been fun.
4. i've officially begun my running training for my 10k in milan at the end of the month and the half marathon here in trieste in may.  i bought some new shoes, have been running during my planning periods and after school, and today, the bora came back full force. that will definitely make things more unpleasant.

5. last, but certainly not least: i've officially decided (and told all the necessary authorities) that i won't be staying in trieste for another year.  in fact, i plan on moving back to the states at the end of the summer. new york city has just been calling my name and i couldn't say no any longer!

i'm super excited about the almost-totally-definite-plan of moving to NYC but i am sad to be leaving this international life i lead.  i just have to keep telling myself that it's not forever if i don't want it to be and that i can very easily go back abroad after being in the states for a bit.  i am just so indecisive right now about what i want to be doing and where i want to be doing it that i found myself half-heartedly applying for jobs that i wasn't really sure i wanted.  i also couldn't make the pro/con lists in favor of staying here. the bora is just SO cold.

i need to chill in a place that i KNOW i want to be in so that i can figure out a more long-term life plan.  i've always wanted to live in nyc and everyone i've ever met that has spent any time there at all has said, "oh yeah, you'll love it there. you should live there."  so, i'm going to. and who knows? i may never leave.

so i'm pretty happy about this decision.  i mean how could i not be?! how could moving to nyc ever be a bad decision?

BUT this comes down to the fact that i have 3.5 months left in trieste before leaving.  as much as i know that i don't want to stay here another year, i also know that i'm never going to have enough time to do all of the things that i want to do here!

so from here to the end, keep an eye out for "trieste bucket list" posts, updating you on my adventures in and around the area.

the bucket list so far
croatia (god i'm a loser, why haven't i been here yet?)
predjama castle in slovenia
mira mare (again, why have i not been here yet?)
walk the whole napoleonic trail (yet again, why not yet?!)

so, again! stay tuned.

x!

berlin: words cannot describe my obsession.

berlin is incredible. i had been told this before i went by many people -- friends from home as well as coworkers who had traveled to this amazing city but i didn't totally understand or appreciate the caliber to which it rocked until i went there for myself.

as i mentioned previously, we traveled all morning (beginning at 3am) from stockholm to reach berlin thursday morning.

we stayed in a really cool hostel in the friedrichstain area (which we learned was a hip-happening place to be).  the people (employees and guests) were interesting and friendly and the common room had an excellent vibe, thanks to the good jams they always featured like one of our new favs, freshlyground (below).

we were lucky to be able to get right into our room so that we could have a nap (after our lengthy early-morning traveling) and then we headed to the city center. we had a free historical tour, thanks to new europe free tours.  the tour was excellent!  it was a walking tour all through the city and we hit almost all of the historical sights that were on our list.  it lasted about 4 hours but we met some cool people (tour guide and other visitors) and learned a ton. see pictures below.

memorial to the murdered jews of europe: this was a really interesting memorial -- an area covered by a ton of giant concrete slabs.  the ground slopes in the middle of the space and the slabs grow taller.  you can walk through and it's a bit creepy being in the middle surrounded by all these giant concrete slabs.  the architect never announced the meaning of the memorial so there are many theories.  one i just read from the linked wikipedia page is, "a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason."

so many buildings were covered in battlewounds

amplemann! the traffic light man that east berlin is famous for

as i said before, the tour was fantastic.  berlin is full of SO MUCH history that happened not that long ago, it's incredible.  SO much happened there and the city is still rebuilding itself which is incredible.  

so on day two (friday), we decided to go on another tour offered by the same company -- this one was an alternative city tour which focused on "the last 20 years in berlin" and the developing culture since the berlin wall came down.  this, also, was a fantastic tour.  best way to see as much as possible in a small amount of time.  we had another excellent tour guide who knew a lot and answered all of K's questions (she's the art teacher and was happier than i've ever seen her during the entirety of this tour).  

street art EVERYWHERE

kunsthaus tacheles

inside tacheles

me inside of tacheles

east side gallery

after enjoying indian, lebanese, and swedish food on our trip so far, we were in serious need of thai.  lucky for us, we found this little gem called "lemongrass" just a few blocks from our hostel.  aside from making V and me very cville nostalgic, we ate excellent food.  so excellent, in fact, that we ate here 2 nights in a row.  

so, obviously, i have added berlin to my list of "places i want to live." who's in? 

x!

cronicles della mia cucina: homemade bagels!

at our favorite spot in town, they have delicious brunch bagels.  this is the only place in italy that i have ever heard of to serve bagels so obviously it is wildly popular with the IST staff members.  on sunday mornings we have been known to fill the place during brunch hours.  

however, the prices at our posta don't get along very well with our bank accounts.  maybe this was the reason, or maybe she had another, but one day, post brunch, V declared, "i want to make bagels." 

she did the necessary research, made the first batch (which was delish), and then obviously, i copied her. and now we make them frequently!  we've figured it out that each white bagel costs about 8 cents.  when wheat flour is used, however, the price increases to piu' caro 11 cents.  

the necessary materials:

and the process:

boiling before baking

flipping!

sunday-after-break bagel + spreads + glee + boxed wine feast.

round 2: wheat bagels! 

oib august 2k11: get excited for so many homemade bagels. 

you may no longer rightfully ban me from the kitchen at 16 isle plaza. 

x! 

stockholm: viking land!

we landed in sweden on tuesday night and HOLY SNOW, batman. V was afraid that we were landing on a snow-covered runway and i'm not entirely convinced that we didn't.  despite the numerous announcements of -6 degree (celcius) temperatures in stockholm during the flight, i was surprised to see all of the snow.  it was quite a transition from mild and rainy dublin. 

after a bus ride to the city center, we walked to our hostel in the snow and settled in.  wednesday was our only day in the city and none of us had done much research on what we should do while we were there. 

when we got up the next morning we set out with no real destination in mind.  knowing that we didn't want to spend much money while we were in stockholm (the city is notoriously very expensive), we just planned to wander around. 

they have 7-11! they were EVERYWHERE actually. and, of course, very very pricey.

lots of cute book shops

and lions like sae! oh frat parties, so much nostalgia.

again, we were lucky with beautiful weather. 

we walked to the old city, on the island of galma stan (did you know that stockholm is made up of a ton of tiny islands?!), to watch the changing of the guard.

this girl was a little scary.  apparently swedish law requires everyone, male and female, to serve in the army for 2 years. who knew?

this guy was tall.

the streets through galma stan were charming and full of cozy cafes and restaurants.  i relinquished leadership control and we wandered without direction and without consulting our maps.  it was so relaxing, i never knew the true joys of not having a destination or timeframe when exploring! 

we stopped at an adorable cafe/restaurant for a fika after we grew cold from our wandering.  a fika is a tranditionally swedish thing and it doesn't have a direct translation, it essentially means to get together with friends and have a coffee and a pastry.  we devoured the most incredible carrot cake i have ever tasted. my mouth is watering right now just thinking about it. we also had some asparagus soup and while that was delicious, it's not even worth mentioning compared to the carrot cake. 

we wandered some more and made it down to the water where the snow was particulary icy and K's and my footwear was exceptionally ill-suited

did you know that pippi longstocking was from sweden?! because i didn't and this made me very happy. 

after buying the obligatory postcards and stamps for mailing, we stopped in a pub that served swedish microbrews! the light was fading away and we were getting cold, see our stack of hats gloves piled on the table above.  we wrote postcards, discussed new fantasy business ventures and sipped on deliciously hoppy beers. it was heavenly. 

and then we had maybe the most amazing meal ever. swedish meatballs at what was possibly the most expensive restaurant in town.  because we are poor, we ordered one entree of the meatballs and split it in 3 - ha. they portioned it out for us so that our plates looked as such (see above).   the meatballs were served with mashed potatoes, cucumbers, and small red berries that are possibly in the blueberry family? they were maybe lingon berries? are those a thing? but omg a bite with a little bit of all 4 components was INCREDIBLE. yes i know, it was meat. it was delicious. the combo of flavors was incredible, each bite was sweet, tangy, creamy, and richly seasoned all at once. i mean it was amazing.

*swedish meatballs have been added to the "must learn how to cook" list*

after our incredible meal, we breifly stopped at the absolut ice bar - stockholm for a quick bev in a room that was the same temperature as outside (maybe warmer, actually) and then headed back to the hostel. we had only a few hours to sleep before leaving at 3am to travel to berlin! 

OMG i forgot to mention that all the men in stockholm literally look like vikings. i just finished studying the vikings with my 5th graders in trieste so, naturally, i found this hilarious. [note: upon returning to school, i told them all about this discovery and they did not find it quite as amusing as i had.]

x!

dublin (with the parents).

so we had a week off of school for "ski week" or "settimana bianca" in mid february.  i embarked upon an epic journey to dublin, stockholm, and berlin with V and K.  

stop #1 was dublin! we arrived saturday evening and met my parents (!!) and hung out in ireland until tuesday night.  i loved ireland, the people were ALL so nice and there were SO MANY redheads!! it was a nice change to feel like i blended in a bit (instead of sticking out like a sore thumb here in italy).  

we were lucky to have excellent weather for most of our trip (it rained the last day) with beautiful blue skies and warm sunshine.  our days pretty much revolved around drinking (when in rome, right?) and wandering around dublin.  i loved dublin but i definitely want to go back to ireland and tour around the countryside -- everyone we talked to said that we MUST go outside the city, but we just didn't have time on this trip.. :( luckily, my parents only had a 5.5 hour flight from the states so i know that will be an easy trip to make in the future, even from america!  

sunday early afternoon, walking over the river liffey toward the jameson distillery. hey mom! 

we went to jameson on sunday around noon.  the tour was excellent, learning how they make whiskey was actually really interesting.  having taken tours of breweries and wineries, it was interesting to be able to compare the methods that they use to make whiskey to those used to make beer and wine. 

at the end of the tour, i dutifully completed my job as "volunteer taste tester" by comparing jameson to johnnie walker scotch whiskey (black label) and jack daniels tennessee whiskey (thanks for the correction, john).  they had us compare the jameson to both and then compare the johnnie walker and the jack.  the jameson was much smoother than the johnnie walker (due to the the 3rd distillation they do at jameson).  and then jack was much sweeter than jameson (tastes like candy, YUM).  in the end, i admitted that my favorite was the jack daniels (got called out by a lady in the "crowd" for being an american) but i mean sipping it straight, i just liked the little candy kick! i think i preferred the jameson mixed with gingerale in beverage form.  

after jameson, we headed to the temple bar area to watch the 6 nations rugby match between ireland and france!  this pub had amazing mosaic work all over the place. 

an evening view of "the temple bar" in the temple bar area of dublin.  we spent a lot of time in temple bar, even though the locals (they were just all so friendly!) kept telling us it was uber touristy.  we made lots of new pub friends -- the pubs were all packed, mainly due to the 6 nations rugby tournament (i think?) in the crowded pubs, V and i repeatedly switched to speaking italian so that we could talk about all the hilariously drunk rugby fans standing around us -- that was a fun little game. 

 monday, happy valentine's day! in the morning, we went to trinity college for a tour and to see the book of kells.  the university was gorgeous; touring it made me a bit nostalgic for the uva grounds and the colleges at cambridge. the book of kells was a bit anticlimactic - good exhibit but not a ton of the actual book to see. the old library, though, was AMAZING. incredibly beautiful. 

later, we spent most of the afternoon in the guinness storehouse.  i wish we had gone a bit earlier so we could have spent more time in the gravity bar at the top, which rightfully boasts amazing 360 degree views of dublin and the nearby countryside.  you could also see the sea in the opposite direction! again, there was beautiful weather and we were able to watch the sunset from the floor-to-ceiling windows in the bar. it truly was a "lovely day for a guinness."

after guinness, we went on a bit of a hunt - one that turned out to be successful! - for a delaney's pub! this was one of the most hilarious pub experiences i have ever had.  2 local guys (who were maybe 20) befriended my parents and bought them 2 rounds of drinks.  V, K, and i were literally invisible.  the only pub experience i've ever had where john has been hit on more than i have. it was incredibly entertaining.

tuesday was a relaxing day, as it was our last in town.  and also, the weather was nasty, pouring rain (we all know how i felt about that).  on our way to the airport, our bff van driver (robby?) drove us past the samuel beckett bridge, designed by santiago calatrava. (see more pictures in better weather, taken by someone else, here)

i decided that when traveling to dublin, there could be one of two possible themes to the visit.  you may either spend time in the tourist-heavy areas to learn about and experience the history of ireland and the traditional irish culture OR you can explore and discover the more modern culture and community of dublin today.  it was hard to do both, i felt like you had to choose - which was sad :( - but all the more reason to go back and spend more time there! 

to sum up: dublin was brilliant. 

x!!

this is what happens when i try to have a social life in trieste.

Flashdance: The Musical was playing at the rosetti theatre. i went. it was hysterical in a "are you kidding me that i paid 20euro to see this?" kind of way.  now, i haven't seen the movie (i know, who am i?!) so i'm not sure of the exact plot line but i heard that it was not the same. 

veronica's rendition of the dance moves on our walk home were far superior.

a hip-happening bar "round midnight" around 11pm on a thursday evening. obviously the place to be.

venice-dublin-stockholm-berlin-milan-breathe.

just got back to trieste from a whirlwind week in 3 different countries (all places i had never been to before!) and have amazing stories to tell.

however, instead of telling them today, i immediately got to work doing laundry, writing some late postcards, making pesto hummus and homemade bagels (!), and watching the latest episode of glee.

priorities, people. for now, here's a few shots of the highlights:

the contents of my wallet: euro, dollars (they're so ugly compared to the others!), swedish krona, and my passport filled with 3 more stamps after this week!

with my parents in the jameson distillery

a leprechaun museum in temple bar! sadly, we didn't get to go :(

happy valentine's day! in the guinness gravity bar

stockholm! less-than-ideal biking conditions.

but beautiful, nontheless

berlin! inside tacheles 

so much amazing street art

east side gallery in berlin

stay tuned this week for updates from the trip as well as new installments of my culinary adventures.

x!