A weekend in Riga

Mr. Bear and I decided to take a quick weekend break and take a weekend cruise to Riga in Lithuania. We both figured we could use a break (me from school and him from work) and explore our Baltic meighbor.

 To be honest, I didn't know a lot about Latvia but a day spent in the country's capital gave me an idea of the country's history.

The city is known for its Art Noveau center and has been recognized by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. While the squares in the old town was almost empty, we had the opportunity to explore this proud city.

Latvia has a sad but proud history; the country has been occupied by one country after the other. Our visit to its National Museum took us through a quick tour of what the Latvian people had gone through just during the 20th century. The country was signed off as part of a 10-year pact between Germany and the Soviet Union and was assigned to the Soviet Union.

The Latvian culture and tradition is a mixed of Baltic and Russian influences. While the official language is Latvian, majority of Riga's population speaks both Latvian and Russian. We found it this out the hard way when we needed to buy some medicine for motion sickness (the sea was quite choppy when we travelled).

A Week in Riva del Sole, Italy

Chapter 1: Rome to Grosetto

We started planning this trip in the summer.

Mr. Bear's parents have decided to celebrate the father-in-law's birthday abroad and invited the whole family to Italy. As lovers of traveling and beaches, we readily agreed and booked our flights.

We left Sweden when Autumn began: leaves have turned beautiful shades of red and orange and the air chillier. With the promise of a week's extended summer, we were welcomed by this wonderful site from the plane

We mistakenly booked our flights to land and leave from Rome but the hotel, located in Grosetto, was actually closer to the Pisa airport. This meant an hour and a half's travel time from the airport to our hotel. Since most family members (except for the birthday celebrant) were not morning people, we were tired by the time we got to the hotel.

However, the lovely lobby greeted us with its cool Italian design which revived our spirits and instilled in us new excitement for this family holiday.

The hotel lobby at Riva del Sole

While Riva del Sole has a really nice hotel, our family decided to go the more "traditional" way.

In the  60s, Swedish trade unions started buying land and small apartments in Italy, Spain, and other holiday countries in Europe. By owning small cottages and apartments themselves, the trade unions were able to give discounts to its members, allowing them to go on an affordable holiday in places where a regular worker could not afford otherwise.

Going the Swedish way, we rented a two-bedroom apartment a few meters from the beach.

Beers with an amazing beach view

The hotel had plenty of amenities to offer its guests. Aside from the regular resort amenities such as a pool, a restaurant, a spa, and a gift shop, Riva del Sole also offers evening entertainment for all its guests. What makes this special is that there are nights dedicated to kids, allowing them to enjoy early evening festivities with dancing, magic, and games.

 

 

 Chapter 2: Sienna

We decided to swing by Sienna on a day trip just to see the famed city. A 3-hour bus ride from Grosetto, the journey on the way offered plenty of wonderful views of the Tuscan landscape.

Italian pastries. How does one choose?

Piazza del Campo by night

The view from the room we rented for the night

Seriously Sweden

"You ought to start taking your life a bit more seriously," a friend told me after talking to her about some *career* options I had waiting for me.

I was taken aback by her advice. It felt like she didn't know me at all. And from a fellow expat whom ought to have known that I actually took rebuilding a life here. But there's the rub: how do you build a life at 30 when everyone else is settling down with theirs?

 It seems like all that I have been doing here in Sweden is studying. Three years have passed since I moved here and during that time, I have always gone to some sort of class or enrolled in some kind of course. In between these were spurts of odd jobs that tided me over for a couple of months and some freelance jobs that have kept my bank account from running completely dry.

Then there was SFI (svenska för invandrare) which I hated but passed with outstanding remarks, there was SAS (svenska som andraspråk) which I hated even more and barely passed (because I was rolling my eyes at everything, the teacher, the classmates, the lessons, the classrooms), and then there was yrkesvenska which helped a bit with my confidence in speaking Swedish.

Then there were the handful of odd jobs, internships, and government programs designed to help people like me find work in Sweden. Three years of hearing the same positive encouragement has really made me doubt whether or not Sweden is indeed friendly to immigrants or if it is just an image they would want to project to the rest of the world. They say that language is key to Swedish society. I must have the wrong sort of key, then as there are hardly any doors opening for me at the moment. Yes, there are some opportunities that came, jobs for immigrants like me who need to start from the bottom before climbing up the Swedish social ladder.

I've worked as a babysitter, a tutor, a dog walker, a caretaker for the elderly, a freelance copywriter, a translator, an intern at an editorial bureau, and now, a part-time language teacher. I have worn many hats in three years in the hopes of getting a foot in the door but not one has fit right just yet. And still I hope that the right opportunity will come and I'd don that hat and never take it off for a long, long time.

Whoops

Geddemmit, I forgot I had a blog. :|

So this is what happens when one gets sucked into the suburban life.

The Bride That Never Wanted to Be

It's been a year since I got engaged and we've done zero planning so far. Sure, I turned into a suburban housewife the moment I entered our apartment. That transformation, somehow, skipped the bride phase and the having a dream wedding bit.

I'll be honest: I never saw myself getting married, I really didn't. I cannot for the life of me remember considering marriage let alone imagining my own wedding. In college, we had Marriage and Theology as a subject. Yes, a whole three-unit subject dedicated on what it means to be Catholic and married. I did pretty badly. While most of the class had their wedding destinations and budgets ready, I could hardly name three kinds of flowers most commonly used in weddings. Suffice to say, I barely passed the subject. I was the only one who almost failed, actually.

 The Bride

In some way, I wish I wanted to get married. Planning a wedding and all the annoying little details like who's seated with whom makes me want to abandon the effort altogether. I still cannot identify wedding flowers, cuts of wedding gowns, nor could I comprehend the fact that we have to shell out thousands of pesos for seemingly simple things (kamusta naman ang make-up artist na 10k). There are tickets to be bought and suppliers to be booked. There are gowns to be chosen and photographers to reserve.



Maybe I don't get it.

Maybe I was one of the women who were born without a dream wedding in mind. From what I gather, weddings are supposed to be a celebration of a couple's commitnment to each other. Said couple would make their vows in front of their friends and family; it's about sharing an important milestone in the couple's life. It is because of this reason that I believe that such a beautiful poignant event could stand alone in itself without so much props or fireworks. I really don't understand why there is the need to smother everything with overworked details and trappings of motiffs and flowers.

What IS the Size of an Average Man? (It's not what you're thinking.)

Since moving to Sweden, I've spent some time getting to know myself a bit better. I've learned basic Swedish and can engage in small talk with a stranger in IKEA, I know how to walk in snow without falling every couple of meters, and I know that I could commit myself to lady-like tasks in the morning and pound a bottle of vodka (blueberry) at night.

My latest attempt at lady-like hobbies did not go as well as I thought it would. I tried my hand at crocheting. The stitches are simple enough and anyone who has ever survived Home Economics class could finish a granny cozy or a doily. Then came this hat pattern that claimed to:

 Average male

Hat should look like this.

I followed the instructions and this is what I got:

Average-sized man which is an oompa-loompa? A midget? A ghost?

Does anyone out there know how to crochet?

How to Get That Musty/Mold Smell Out of Your Hair

Esmi te Bear and I went to Skanör and spent a week with his 95-year old grandmother. While the place as cozy as you would imagine, the only drawback was that the house smelled of mold; it being badly planned out aside from being ancient. Since we stayed for a week, the house's moldy scent clung on to our skin, hair, and basically onto every thing we brought with us to our house.

I have long hair, so you could imagine how badly it would smell with a week's worth of mold. In spite of the washing and the scalp-scrubbing, the scent would never leave my hair during our stay there.

Today, thankfully, I got the scent away! I was really scared that I would go to school smelling eau de geriatric. To anyone who gets in the same predicament as I did, here's how to remove the smell of must and mold from your hair.

Hair:

1. Mix about 1 tablespoon of vinegar with a basin of water.
2. Soak hair in water.
3. Rinse hair with the vinegar solution and lather. Leave in hair for about three minutes.
4. Wash out the solution with a lot of cold water. Your hair may smell faintly of pickles but it will shine like the sun thanks to the vinegar's cleansing components.

Good news: my hair smells tons better now. Bad news: I really REALLY want chicken pork adobo. NAO.