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 :)

the christmas crazy

house for tea after christmas lunch and before christmas dinner - braving the equatorial humidity head on!

(random patrons)

veggie chips at gordon grill for boxing day lunch

boxing day is over and it's been a hectic yet restful christmas. we've settled into a decent routine over the years and there's always the turkey lunch at uncle M's on christmas day. we'd dinner plans too and on boxing day we'd the family lunch at our usual haunt. a mad mad rush to be on time and appease the gramps because i had to have my hair cut! but we made it in the nick of time. went to town for the first time since coming home and ohmyword i didn't recognise anything! am pleased with the spoils though :) he's truly indulgent, and for that i'm grateful.

well, seeing how i'm safely esconed in the family fold, i think it's time for a curtain call. it's no longer the swede life, i'm no longer fending for myself in the jungle that is scandinavia. thanks for sharing the experience, i've had fun posting. it's been a good run and i'm happy to end this chapter on a high note.

so, goodbye and happy trails!

(p/s back to the old blog - email me for an invite if you're interested!)

homeward bound

in the blink of an eye, it's time to head home.

the inevitable farewells have been relatively painless, probably because i've been blessed to have friends who made an effort and there was good closure. not meaning to sound morbid, i don't know when or if we'll see each other again. sure, we're young. sure, the world's shrinking. but would we ever be at the same place at the same time again? beats me. for what it's worth, it's been an amazing 5months and i've made some stellar friendships that took me by surprise.

so in order of (dis)appearance, S was the first to go, then J and N, and after my exam, i'd a tiny farewell tea at bashment. was sneaky and scheduled my friends at hourly intervals so i'd have their undivided attention during each slot. went to bashment at A.Mc's recommendation and had coffee with him and JHD before the italians M&M arrived. and then german A. was especially touched that M came by (with napolitan visitors in tow!) because she was rushing to skavsta herself and had yet to hit the christmas markets. as a fellow female, i understand the pain. had a good time catching up and reminiscing about our time together and then M, A and i went to sneakers & stuff to have one last isabel (raspberry and daim milkshake).

fellow countryman M then sent me to arlanda and very kindly provided porter services en route. spent the night uncomfortably at the airport and took the first flight out to zurich. from zurich i took the scenic route to meet the family in st. moritz. enjoyed two blissful days of apres ski, basically steam sauna and hot tub, and great company. we'd met up with family friends in st. moritz and it was fun catching up with friends i'd not seen since leaving for stockholm. spent two days in zurich and then it was back to stockholm!

had the bonus of a home cooked dinner at casa mcfaull and the tag team of the year put together a scrumptious roast chicken meal. am most impressed by aussie hospitality and ingenuity. and we skyped J in aix and it was a real party. the gentlemen then helped me to the bus (trolley bag in 30cm fresh snow is no joke) and sneaked me on because my season pass had been kidnapped by aforementioned mule, M.

back in my room and attempting to squeeze 5months into a suitcase. people have gone through worse, i'm sure. but this' pretty darn challenging by itself. and i'm scared to go to sleep in case i don't wake up and miss my flight. eep.

see you soon!

on of the hardest moments in stocks thus far was saying bye to J. it's been on my mind for awhile and we'd a great girls' night in last night but somehow you can never really emotionally ready yourself for indefinite separation. indulge my momentary melodrama, it's admittedly uncharacteristic because i generally don't have feelings. while i'd known from the beginning that there's always the inevitable goodbye, i remained deep in denial. so today came and moot court went and as we walked to the tbana like we usually do, we talked about the weather. we talked about christmas, we talked about snowfights. we talked about pre-drinks. we talked about everything except the imminent farewell when we boarded our trains in opposite directions. we lingered at the tbana, letting train after train whizz by before finally accepting that we both had lives to get on with. she's headed home (to her surprise!) and i was headed home, too, to the brick of a PIL textbook that has only been used as a candy tray so far.

it's funny how no one mentioned the pink elephant en route to the tbana and we passed the metal ball that we used to wait for each other at in summer, before it got too cold to wait outdoors, without hiccup. but it was hard to stand on the platform (with N, who, incidentally, i'd to bid farewell to toO!) and know that it was goodbye for now.

a taste of summer

at the start of winter. i could get used to provencal vegetables! i finally got J to cook me ratatooie :) chopping veggies is an underrated therapeutic activity. loved chopping them into tiny, perfect squares. J paired the ratatooie with armenian grain that reminded me of couscous and i seared some scallops to provide a complementary sweetness to the ripe vegetables. dessert was a tub of haagen-dazs mac brittle. mhmmm :)

i can't believe it's the last time i'd be over at her beautiful loft at frids. definitely my favourite apartment in stockholm, plenty of happy memories in her cosy living room with G's candles. gosh! as i was walking back to the tbana, i was thinking of all the other treks i'd made to and fro the frids tbana. this was the first time it was in snow though! and i realised it's going to be awhile before i'm ever in that neck of the woods again. if ever!

time flies. i'm going to miss J. recurring theme as exchange winds down. bah humbug.

all group meetings

should be like this one - pot after pot of coffee and tea, bowl after bowl of christmas cookies and chocolate-covered digestives, deep meaningful conversation and glogg. (macbook tutorial optional)

we were, very obviously, imbibed with christmas spirit(s) and at our unproductive best. needless to say, it was a blast and i wish we'd more time together.

moot court tomorrow, final on thursday and then it's home free!

pad thai

in stockholm???

trust sofo to have the most authentic pad thai i've had outside thailand! it's crazy because i haven't had pad thai in ages and it was as if A was a mind reader or something. hot pad thai on a snowy evening really hits the spot. mhmmm. i'm still thinking about it :)

had a lovely quiet evening with the german power couple, S and A, and i'm really going to miss them. they're both over-achievers in their own right, extremely intimidating on paper but oh-so-affable in person. A is one of the warmest, most genuine friends i've made on erasmus and i am in constant awe of her domestic divinity. S, ever efficient and resourceful, found this gem of a thai place, whose name escapes me, i'm sorry. but ohmyword who'd have thought i'd have the most amazing pad thai in this land of bland and substandard local cuisine? ok, take that back. paul&norbert served pretty darn fantastic swedish cuisine with an international interpretation but swedish food in general leaves much to be desires. still haven't had a kolbullar (swedish meatball) since helsinking.

dinner was memorable. great food, better company and i'm touched that in spite of the all-nighters they both pulled rushing a ruleoflaw paper for today, they still made time to meet me. now that's true friendship - a rare commodity indeed in the facetious world of erasmus. heh.

generosity

this' K and he's unintentionally taught me a lot about generosity.

K's a phD student in stockholm. one night when we were chatting over dinner, i learnt how he was supporting his parents, siblings, nieces and nephews back in hyderabad. not uncommon, i know, but wow. his phD allowance gets stretched in so many different directions! such responsibility on his spindly shoulders. needless to say, we were all students on a budget but K somehow managed to be the most giving person i've met here. whenever he cooks, he cooks for himself +1. just in case someone's eating in and hungry. if there's extra, he'll have it for lunch the next day. but everytime he's cooking, he's more than happy to share. i've tried to repay him in kind, by giving him the ingredients to cook with, by sneaking sundries into his cupboard but he shrugs it off and refuses to accept anything in return. i mentioned in passing once that i missed tandoori chicken (believe me, i really wasn't hinting) and next i knew, K was cooking tandoori for me. K instituted this rule in the corridor that if there's any food lying around (and it's his), then it's common property and anybody can help themselves. how giving is that? this' one guy who shares unconditionally and thinks nothing of it. his humility is equally inspirational. he was accepted into the cambridge phD program but couldn't go because of lack of funding but not once has he lauded his intelligence over the rest of us lesser mortals.

and now K's gone! and i'm sad. i woke up to say bye (nothing budges me from sleep, so he's gotta be special) and there's a gaping absence in the kitchen :(

the first farewell

sucked monkey balls.

doesn't help that there goes one of my favourite people on erasmus, just that neither of us call it erasmus because we're both non-EU.

but as the man himself put, 'strangers to friends, then the inevitable farewell.' is the essence of exchange, isn't it.

byebye S, keep an eye on dangermouse for me.

(photo credits to N)