hola from barca

(feeding the birds outside the notre dam in paris)

it's been a whirlwind (almost) 3 weeks and every day has been a brand new adventure. not so ambitious as to attempt to recount the trip from day 0, but in a nutshell...

paris 1: boulangerie breakfast with family B in their beautiful penthouse, followed by tour of isle st louis and cites, concluding with steak tartare lunch at my favourite brasserie and berthillion glace for dessert. can't ask for more!

seine cruise: lovely time cruising the seine on the barge, good food, great company. apart from the normandy beaches, which were so very sad, the rest of the trip was all culture and scenery. a highlight was monet's gardens in giverny. it felt like stepping right into one of his masterpieces.

paris 2: tea avec mon petit amis at fauchon, followed in quick succession by the absolute yummiest seafood platter (it was like a regular platter on crack - oh so gigantic!) at la lorraine, courtesy of family B.

tuscany: dream week roadtrippin' and winding through the vineyards big and small. fell in love with brunello wine in montalcino and ate so much fresh, home-made pasta that i don't think i can stomach anything else now. completely spoilt my palate, which is such a bad thing to happen so early on. stayed in agriturismos and one of them even had an infinity pool facing the rolling tuscan hills. talk about unforgetable! we also ended up buying 18kg of wine, olive oil (OHSOFRESH it left a subtle spicy aftertaste) and honey. which also meant that we'd to buy check-in allowance, but it was more than worth it when we saw monsieur et madame B relish the vin.

paris 3: 3 days in paris as family B's guests. good mix of my paris rituals (like breakfast at laduree, more steak tartare) and new parisien adventures courtesy of my resourceful and ever-hungry copain. he brought me to chartier and it fast became a favourite. gotta love belle epoch at its casual best.

stockholm: crazy week of nonstop catching up and revisiting my old haunts. felt surreal to be back in my stomping ground, and to have it all green! it was as if i'd blinked and suddenly it was summer. when i was back in stockholm, it felt like i'd never returned home, and the 6 months i'd spent away did not happen. everything was as i'd remembered, just sorely missing a few of the usual suspects, namely the three musketeers from down under, and mi bellas from italy. had the privilege of staying with the perfect hostesses, A (3 nights), A-san (1 night) and J.Mak (2 nights). nothing like girly h2hs just before the zz monster attacks. was so so good to hang out with them again. and then there was the inevitable goodbye, but i've J.Mak's southern french hospitality to look forward to in a week so that goodbye is still on hold.

barca: so far so good! even though i was planning on being in barca alone, a familly friend hooked me up with his abogado friend in barca, whom i met for tea and am pleased to rely on as a 'responsible adult' while i'm here. coincidentally, two of my high school girlfriends will be in barca tomorrow and we're planning to meet up. i'm a big softie at heart and having gone on my first ever friends-only trip with them (overnight train to KL right after A levels) in january 2006, and then again to bangkok in tandem with the bomb blasts (new years 2007) and another time to phuket in july 2007, to meet them on the great grad trip is going full circle. how far we have come and it's nice to have dear old friends to share the celebration with.

and speaking of celebration, while in stockholm i received a text notifying me that i have, indeed, completed my degree. plus not too shabbily at that, bragbrag, so it's great to finish on a high note, despite it taking me 7 semesters to figure out what works. this 8th semester has been my best (even better than exchange grades!) and i am very very happy. shout out to the kind seniors who sent their fantabulous notes my way. much appreciated!
so there's a not-so-short summary and maybe i'll post more later.

oh! one thing i forgot to add is that i bumped into the lovely L family in zara this morning (of all places! what are the chances? there are SO MANY in barca!) and they have invited me to join them for dinner. yay! grown up food will be a welcomed change. and who ever said i'd get lonely on my own here :)