UPDATE!! YES I AM ALIVE!!

What has been going on:

Since I have been lacking in updates, (that's what I'm know for though, right?) I thought I'd give a little rundown of some of the things that are going on.

So for work, I am still doing a variety of different smaller projects. I am finaaaally done with my door numbers project!!! I am sure you're wondering what the hell that here, so here goes.
Explaination: the embassy, which is HUGE, has around 193756253 doors. Anyway, each door needs its own number, for security reasons, and I was the lucky girl that got to make sure every door had one. So from inventing a new scheme to number theme, to wandering aimlessly looking for hidden doors, to finally making a list and putting in an order, it is DONE. (it took me so long to complete because it is probably the stupidest thing I have ever had to do. Sigh, real itnern work.) BUT I must say that I am proud because I was not the first, or second, but the THIRD intern this stupid project was passed to. and I finished it, GO ME.
Otherwise, I have been doing some projects with the GSO (Ground Services Office), which ranges from running around town looking for printer toners, to going to the airport to pick up classified packages, to writing requests and making sure everyone is happy. I still have been hanging out with the Pol/Econ crowd as well, and have thankfully gotten to do some projects and attend meetings that deal with the things I am actually interested in.

The three musketeer interns are now down to two, as Dalmira has gone back stateide already. Meanwhile at the house, we have been having issues with our front door. Once, when we arrived home from London, both Jessica's and my sets of keys would not open the door. We tried for 20 minutes, then managed to get someone from the embassy to come over to fix it. Of course, after waiting an hour, the guy shows up with a spare set that opens the door magically. He looked at us like we were complete idiots, but I swear it wasn't opening. After he opened it, our keys decided to magically start working again, too.
But it gets better. One day last week I managed to be locked INSIDE my apartment. Yes, inside. As in my stupid set of keys would not unlock the door that was locked from the outside. I was stuck for an hour or so again, late for work, and the same guys came to fix it. This time at least they also had problems opening the door (Ha! So it's NOT my fault!) and ended up taking apart the lock and getting me new keys. So far, everything has been working normally... til monday when I came home to find two random people in my apartment, apparently STILL messing with the lock. I say just get rid of the piece of crap. Problem solved :)

The past two weekends I have had visitors, First Samu and Chio, my friends from Barcelona, were here and we had a great time. I then had my friend Tejas here on his way back from India, and I think I have pretty much perfected/wornout my tour guide skills. Luckily for all of them, the weather has been wonderful. A bit chilly today, but sun sun sun. Hope it stays this nice for the rents!!

Sorry so brief. Everything else around here is going normally.. everyone at the embassy is getting into the Holiday spirit and we have a few embassy Christmas parties within the next few weeks. Tonight we are helping out at an embassy event, welcoming the media contacts and playing hostess.

xx love everyone and will try to update again (hopefully a few times) before the year is over!

Thanksgiving in London

London Pictures are posted! Check out the link of the left or click here!

Here is a very abridged recape:
Since Thursday was Thanksgiving, my roomie Jess and I made it into a long weekend by taking off Friday and going to England! (Also was able to renew our visa, so that was good.) So London was amazing- a bit cold, but we got lucky with great clear skies and even some sun! We stayed in a really nice hostel a bit outside of central London in more residential Swiss Cottage, where we slept with 17 other travelers in bunks. We enjoyed our Thanksgiving by going to a pub and hanging out with locals, eating nachos and drinking pints. We saw the palaces, the gardens, the cathedrals and the castles. We took a ride in the London Eye - the ginormous Ferris wheel that gives you breathtaking views of the entire city. We met up with Joana my Portuguese friend who was in England visiting her boyfriend Steve, and strolled around the city, checked out one of the street markets on Portabello Street in Notting Hill, and also walked through famous Harrod's department store in awe.
My favorite part about London was the face-paced, on the go, something always going on feel. Although everything is INCREDIBLY expensive (as in a pint of beer was 6.50 USD and a subway pass was like 10!!) it was well worth it. Really if the exchange weren't so horrible it wouldn't have been so bad. Going really made me realize the laid back pace of Lisbon, especially in comparison. But again, coming back felt like coming home. Have some funny stories about coming home and lokcing ourselves out of the apt that I will update about soon and I will put up some pics on here shortly :)

What's going on?

So I haven't had a good internet connection at home in forever, and have been busy with things and not blogging. Excuses, excuses yes. So here is a min-recap of the past couple weeks.

So Italy was fantastic. I went to Milan to visit my friend Federico that I met in Buenos Aires. He and his family live in a small town about an hour and a half outside of the city up in the mountains. Simply beautifulll. For the weekend, the town had a big big party to celebrate St. Martin's day, who apparently is the patron of chestnuts and wine. The whole town, all 9000 people or so, were out in the main plaza, partying, drinking wine, eating chestnuts and other delicious cheeses, hams, etc, and having a great time. It was probably around 25-30 degrees that night, but luckily I survived with the help of Fedo's sister's ski jacket.
On Sunday we headed to Bergamo, between Fedo's town and Milan, and walked around. Bergamo probably has about 300,000 people (I totally made that up), but the main plaza and the little streets with towns of designer shops and restaurants felt very Italian to me.

That evening we went into Milan and spent the night at the apartment of some of Fedo's friends. They took me to have real Italian pizza, was was amazing with fresh mozzarella, cherry tomatoes and Basil. On Monday morning, we headed to Fedo's university so he could turn in his thesis, then did a little sightseeing before heading to the airport to catch my plane home. Some highlights include seeing the Duomo, which truly is magnificent, and strolling down Milan's equivalent of Rodeo Drive, seeing Prada, Gucci and everyone else and their 14,000 EURO purses (no joke, I nearly fell over after seeing that price tag for a seemingly normal leather bag. It made the beautiful long coat next to it- with a price of a mere 800 euros, seem like suck a steal!!!) So unsurprisingly, Italians in general dressed really well and had great style, making me feel like a big bum in my puma sneakers and corduroy jacket. like when we went out of pizza, people were showing up in these designer outfits left and right- and the men as well as the women! Even all the kids at Fedo's university were dressed like they were about to hit the run way instead of to wake up at 8 am and go turn in a paper. Makes me wonder what they wear out clubbing!

So I really had quite a lovely weekend, and hope that you will check out the pics by clicking the link on the left!

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This past weekend we spent in Lisbon, and my roommate Jessica and I walked around and enjoyed the last warm days of the season, because today, to my dismay and sorrow, we awoke to a horrible drizzly gray day. Looks like our St. Martin's summer is finally over. (One of the Portuguese employees at the embassy was telling me that when the weather continues to be warm and beautiful until November (aka St martin's day Nov 11), its called the St Martin's summer). Anyway, we saw Lisbon's botanical gardens, which are pretty, cool, had a barbecue with the Marines that guard the embassy, did some shopping, and slept in!

This week is short but looking to be pretty packed- since it's Thanksgiving, we have Thursday off and are taking Friday off as well and taking off for a new adventure: LONDON! Should be thoroughly exciting,and a very different Thanksgiving for sure. Hopefully we will have regained internet at the apartment by the time I am back so I can post and blog about it. :)

Things are going by so quickly, it's crazy! And before we know it, you all (aka the fam) will be here :) Can't wait!

A Belated Weekend Update!!

This post will give a little insight into my Portugual Roadtrip from a few weekends ago.
So over the past weekend (okay two weekends ago!!) we rented a car and saw pretty much all of Portugal. I will begin by the trip we took on Thursday, Nov 1.

It was a Portuguese holiday- Dia dos todos Santos- so we decided to take a trip down south the the Algarve region. Before coming to Portugal I had been told that the Algarve was infested by English and other European tourists for its nice warm climate, beautiful beaches, and tourist accomodation. But once getting there, I could tell why. It was simply beautiful!!

Silves, Portugal

We went to various towns along the coast, first to Silves where we saw one of the most imortant Moorish Castles, and Monchique, then further south to Lagos, Portimão, and then ate dinner in Faro, the capital and third biggest city in Portugal. The water is crystal clear, surrounded by amazing cliffs and bluffs and perfect beaches. I felt like I was almost in California ;). There are lots of tourist things to do involving the beach, and during the winter also there are many golf courses, and various shops and restaurants.

Algarve, Portugal

In Faro we ate cataplana, the typical Portuguese dish from the region which contains various shelfish, vegetables and pork. Simplyyy deliciousss! We stumbled upon this random restuarant and were quite happy after a dinner of cataplana and also this baked octupus dish- baked in olive oil and tons of garlic and parsley. We drove back late thursday night to work on Friday..

Then over the weekend we took off bright and early Saturday morning and went up North. After about an hour we got off the main highway and ventured off into the little town of Batalha, where we saw this huuuuge amazing monastery from the 13th century in which famous globalizer Henry the Navigator, and his family, are buried.

Batalha, Portugal
Coimbra, Portugal

From Batalha, we continued north on a two lane highway through the countryside to the city of Coimbra. Coimbra is known for its University, which is one of the oldest still running in Europe (third oldest I believe). After a lunch of fish, potatoes, sardines for Jessica, and more Octupus (with rice this time) for Dalmira, we hopped in the car again and went to Porto.

Arriving around 4ish, we first went to across the Rio Douro to Vila Noca de Gaia, which is its own town but houses all of Porto's famous port wine houses. Along the river they are al lined up, with people milling about in front, tons of restaurants, bars and etc. We took a tour of the Cálem wine house, where for 2 euro we got to walk around in the winery and see the huge barrels, learn some about the different ports, and of course do a tasting of a white and a tawny port. From VN de Gaia, we crossed over the Dom Luis iron bridge to the Ribeira district of Porto- along the water on the other side, it also has many tourist attracts, bars, shops, and a riverfront promenade. I really liked Porto- it had such a great atmosphere, and we spent the evening along a long pedestrial street, did some shopping, ate a little dinner, and then hopped in the car again.

Porto, Portugal

From Porto, we went about another hour or two north, crossed the border into Spain, and found our little hotel in a little village across the Vigo river from Vigo, Spain. On Sunday, one of my roommates Dalmira drove the remaining hour up to Santiago de Compostela, the site of the famous pilgramage to see St. James. (Didn't join her since I had already been to the town and the cathedral when I was in Spain a few years ago). So Jessica and I took a ferry across the river to explore Vigo, which was basically shut down. But fortunately the weather was wonderfully warm and we strolled around, drank coffee at various cafes, and had a nice tapas lunch before hoppin hte the car and coming back home.

Vigo, Spain

So... this post was long awaited I'm sure -and probably not worth the wait - but I had a great time with my roommates. Portugal really is a beautiful country and it was great to rent a car and explore. I can't wait for the family to come so we can do it again! :) And make sure you check out all of the pictures HERE

ROADTRIP! New Pictures

Haven't had much time to update or write anything worth posting, but have finally uploaded some pics. check the link on the right in Albums to see our Portugal Roadtrip! :D


View Larger Map


Will explain where we went soon, promise! But check out the interactive map to get a general idea of the country :) The route selected is not the one we took but shows how much of the country we covered. We stopped off in various towns in between and had a lovely trip :)

Restaurantes e Comida

I thought instead of giving a weekend update (which is already a bit late, I know) I would write about some of the food I have been eating and some really great restaurants I have found.

First off, for my birthday last week, we went to this traditional Brazilian place called Comida de Santo, (Saint's Food) that is pretty close to our house on the edge of Bairro Alto. From outside this place wouldn't call my attention- a little whole-in-the-wall type, it appeared to be like the hundreds of other tiny little restaurants in Bairro Alto. We went early for Portuguese time, around 8pm, and were the only ones in the whole place (the whole place being no more than 1o tables or something).

The food on the other hand was AMAAAZING. The four of us each ordered a different dish and then shared. We had a shrimp dish cooked in palm oil and coconut milk, a traditional Brazilian feijoada, which is black beans and different kninds of meat (chorizo, pork, beef), a chicken dish cooked with coconut milk, mushrooms, tomatoes, and palm hearts, and dish called carne do sol, which is cured salted beef with onions, fired palm hearts, and beans. Along wiht some perfect capirinhas, we had ourselves a delicious little time :)

(the picture is from their website, showing the delish feijoada and a capirinha)

This weekend we also tried this Thai food place we had walked passed various times in Bairro Alto called Naga. I was really impressed by this place. Again we showed up early by Portuguese standards and had the place pretty much to ourselves. Like the website, the interior of the place is really nice, cool east asian decorations, very trendy, tasteful and chic. We ordered an appetizer sampler and also the typical Pad Thai and a chicken in red curry dish. The curry nearly killed me. I would say I have a high tolerance for spicy, but Thai spicy is so different from the suually green chile spice I knwo and love! Apaprently the red curry was only the second hottest, too! lol So after I tried not to die eating it and burned off all of my taste buds it was really good. :) I washed it down with a thai tea, which is tea with condensed milk on ice.. so more like a wonderful slushy! It was a little pricey, but for all the food and atmosphere I'd definitely go back.

I also had a NOT plesant dining experience this weekend. :( We went to this place on our street called Casa México, thinking we could get some margaritas and enchiladas. While I had mexican food here the other wekeend and was pleasantly surprised by how good it actually was, this place not only was not spicy/flavorful/mexican, but they also couldn't make a margarita to save their lives. Unfortunate really, especially since it was pretty pricey. But hey, two out of theree isn't that bad!

ON sunday we went to Belém to do more sightseeing and pass the day in the glorious fall weather and also had a greaaaat lunch. Dalmira found this little whole-in-the-wall place right across from the Palace that served a great (and cheap) Portuguese feijoada, or one made with white beans, cuttlefish, onions, and other seasonings. YUM YUM YUM

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Well besides eating, while that obviously takes up most of my time and energy, this weekend I also saw a very strange movie, and did some more Lisboa sightseeing and shopping with my roomates. I will post pics soon of what has been going on- just been a bit lazy with taking the camera places. :)

New Activities

Along with the whole roommate bonding thing, we decided to finally be brave and signed up for a capoeira class that meets 3m a week for a month. I was really scared to try it, especially after my roommate Dalmira was telling me that everyone int he class looked really advanced.. But we tried it out. and.....

I liked it!!!! haha.

So I am sure many of you are asking, what the hell is capoeira? Capoeira is a Brasilian martial art.. but I would describe it more as a dance or a game. In Portuguese, you say you play capoeira, because it is really an interaction between two people doing different moves, kicks, cartwheels and acrobatics that resemble a fight. While they play, the rest of the group surrounds the two, and sings and plays music. There really is a whole capoeira culture, and only by going to one lesson you could tell everyone in the group was welcoming, friendly, and like family to one another. Although I was scared shitless, I even took a mini turn in the roda (the circle) and pretended to do two things before running out. I also surprised myself by finding out I could still do a cartwheel!! Amazing since the last time I did one I must have been no more than 12 years old.

So the class was great. We started off by running a few laps, then doing about 19 gazillion jumping jacks, then practicing the kicks and sweeps. Then we broke off into two groups, the beginners and the advanced, and we tried some other moves I was not good at at all haha. I didn't learn any of the names of the moves either, (I would have been too tired and sucking for air to remember them anyway) but it was seriously an amazing workout. Today crawling out of bed was one of the hardest things, haha. Climbing the stairs today has also been quite painful, and it's only going to get worse tomorrow! So even after I made a big fuss about it, I am really glad I went. :) And I know people like Kelly who has been telling me to do it since forever are sitting there like, Ha! told you so!! So thanks, I am looking forward to learning more now!

And to finish with some crazy brasilians showing off some crazy capoeira moves ;)