Not Busy, Just Lazy :P

But that's not entirely true. I don't know who said it better, Fiona Apple when she sang "I've been a bad, bad girl" or The Gorillaz who sang "blah blah blah blah blah, collapse."

I've been plenty busy, except this weekend where I was ignored on Saturday (by he who will not be named) y asi que depressed on Sunday and stayed in all day. Would have eaten chocolate ice cream on a couch in my sweats, but I had no ice cream.

I am meeting new people all the time now and it's a bit overwhelming for me. The other interns are more frequent partiers than me, but I do enjoy having their company. We went out after work today for beers and fries at an Irish Pub. So good.

The girl who was interested in joining our blog has already joined another one, so doesn't look like she's joining ours.

Alda's georgeous pictures of Amsterdam (I'm sorry that it didn't work out for you. It does seem like a lovely place to live, but at least you're safe), make me want to post more pictures of my recent travels.

My absolute favorite time in Santiago was when I went the Theatro Municipalidad de Santiago to see Madam Butterfly for free because me and my parents happened to be walking past it as the right time. The theatre was beautiful where every balcony seat was it's own private section. The theater's beauty was only eclipsed by the amazing performance. French the llama! It was one of the best stage performances I have ever seen and I've seen a lot of stage performances.

I went to Valparaiso and Vina del Mar for Christmas with my parents. The best part of Valparaiso was up in the hills. We took the accensor up, but you can walk up too. They've been working for over a hundred years!

Up in the hills of Valparaiso the builldings are covered in art. The community is very bohemien and is beautiful. I would like to go there again. I think that I like it more than Santiago, but it's not as safe and is very far from the embassy. The Spanish teacher I found is living in Valparaiso. She's very nice. I met her and her family today on Skype. They seem like good people.

This is a rocky part of Vina del Mar. It's a seaside community in Chile and has very crowded beaches, especially in the summer! This is in Reneca and there are seals somewhere on those rocks. I may go again this weekend with the other interns. Not as good as Valparaiso, but still pretty lovely.

Have a good week Chicas. Ciao!

Not lazy, just busy. :D

I've been busy all week with classes since I have exams next week, but I'm blogging now! Sorry it's late.

Alda, everything looks so beautiful there! It's so unfortunate that you couldn't live there like you planned. That guy sounds like such a jerk, I'm so glad you were able to get out of there safely and that you had somewhere to go. Being in a foreign country on your own is scary, and I'm pretty sure I would've been so lost if I were in your situation. But I hope something else comes up where you can move back. It looks like you really love it there. :)

Meanwhile, I'm still here in boring old Tampa.

So, Corey came to visit last weekend. (And no, we aren't getting back together. I'd be lying if I said I was opposed to the idea, but it's for the best if we stay close friends...with some benefits.) He got here on Saturday, and being the boring nerds we are, we just sort of hung around my house and watched Doctor Who for several hours. Didn't get to play battle shots, unfortunately, but we wound up spending the night at his friend Don's house, who goes to school at USF with me. They still managed to get me drunk, though, since we watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail at about 6am. It was lovely. We had a good weekend, and he's going to be in Tampa again this weekend for Gasparilla, which is an annual pirate festival held here. I'm trying to convince him to stop by and say hello.

Also because my birthday is on Sunday!

I'm spending tomorrow at Busch Gardens, the theme park across the street from my university. I'm so excited, since my friend Melissa bought us year passes so we can go whenever we want to. :D I'll be all alone on my actual birthday, though, which is sort of unfortunate. :/ But I'll survive.

Hope you girls have a good week!

home "sweet" home

Honestly, I hate being back in Iceland.


I wanted to do a quick "thoughts from Holland" blog. I even have photos. I went to a few cities in the Netherlands those 6 days I were there (the first two I was working).

Amstersterdam was lovely, Hoofddorp was lovely, Delft was lovely, Utrecht was lovely. The country is so welcoming, I have never felt that way when visiting a country before. The people there were awesome, the atmosphere is something I wish we had here in Iceland, and in fact, everywhere. But it isn't like every other country, it's beautiful, it's open and it's free. 

On my first day (after all the trouble I went through with the au-pair thingie) I went to Amsterdam. I just thought that I couldn't be in this country and not go there. I literally walked for hours, just along the canals, Red Light District, Dam, all the "typical" places. I could do that for hours. Then I went with a friend of mine (who I was seeing for the first time, haha)... another au pair to get some coffee and chat. It was very nice.

People also ride their bikes everywhere. Literally. You're in the way if you're walking and if you're on car.

I thought the people were generally nice (except for that one lady in the train).

Other nice cities were Delft (the one I stayed in/slept in mostly):

and Utrecht, with it's deep canals and beautiful arcitecture

Have a nice weekend, girls.
Can't comment on anything you've put in since you guys didn't blog this week, lazy!! 

Alda

the Netherlands

I'm in the Netherlands right now, I really love the country so far.
The weirdest thing happened to me when I was in my flight to Holland; I was reading The Fault in Our Stars and at the same time as they were going to the airport and going to the flight to Amsterdam I was in the line for being boarded to my plane, then they were in the plane to Amsterdam at the time I was in the plane to Amsterdam. I fell asleep for some time and read then two chapters and I read the first paragraph of chapter 11, that's where John Green describes the feeling when they were flying over the Netherlands, that's the time the flight assistant says "now it's time to turn off all electrical devices." (reading it on my Kindle) I thought it was so cool.

I love the book so far, I've finished a bit more than half of it, I'll finish it tonight or at least this weekend. I have to remember to purchase new books for my Kindle before my flight back home on Monday (wait, we'll get to that later). I think I'm purchasing Paper towns. I have a connect flight in Copenhagen but I have to wait for 8 hours or more there, so I better find something to do, it's such a boring airport. Had to hang out there for 2 hours or something on my way here and it was so boring and I couldn't connect to the WiFi there (that could have made the waiting more bearable)!

Back to the other thing... I'm going back home on Monday. The guy I was working for turned out to be a not so nice person, he hit on me and tried to touch me, then when I didn't want it and showed him I felt uncomfortable, he fired me. It was okay, I would have quit any way. It was a really bad situation so I made him book my flight and just left first thing this morning. Good thing that my dad knows people that live in Delft, a city close to Hague. I'm going out with them tonight to eat some burgers and walk a bit around town.

Gonna be nice.

One thing's clear, one day I'm going to live here, maybe for a few months, maybe for many years. I love the atmosphere, I love everything here. Tomorrow I'm going to Amsterdam and probably on Sunday too. Going to make the best out of the situation, going to look at is as a "free vacation" and have FUN.


Stephanie, are you sure you're not getting back together with this boooy? :D

My financial aid is in and I have money!

And half of it went toward paying my rent for January and February. :| But I had to pay that no matter what, so yeah. I'm glad to have more than $5 in my account, though.

So, this week's been pretty good so far (mostly because of the aforementioned financial aid). I've been cleaning and working on finishing my Espeon plush for Corey. He's spending the weekend with me, so I should have an interesting post next week. :D It's so weird...my ex-boyfriend being one of my best friends. Oh well, should be an interesting weekend no matter what. We're testing out this game called Battle Shots, which, if you've never heard of it, is Battleship played with shot glasses. :)

Alda: I don't want to give away any spoilers, but a part of the book takes place in Amsterdam, but the majority of it takes place in Indianapolis, IN. I do suggest you both read it, though. I can't express how much I love it. :)

And Suddenly I Have Too Much To Say

So sorry that I missed last week. My internet connection is tentative at best, and to keep myself from throwing myself and my internet movil off a balcony I just don't bother staying on some days.

Alda: I can't believe you're going to Amsterdam so soon after Germany. You're such a jetsetter! Since you're traveling just in Europe this shouldn't apply, but just in case, make sure you don't need a visa for a layover. Working at an Embassy, I have learned a lot about travel abroad.

Stephanie: The fault in Our Stars sounds wonderful. I'm still halfway through both Paper Towns and Looking for Alaska (I should have just gotten through one whole book, lol). Have you tried looking for new people on Your Pants for the blog? I think that I will post some thing and see if anyone is interested.
Sooo, Santiago. Yeah, it's different. Many things the same, but most are different.

When I first came here I noted the abundance of tall, ugly apartment buildings like they have in Miami. I later found that this uglyness came from the balconies that aparently every apartment comes with. I have since learned to accept the ugly buildings as I've learned the confort of having a balcony. Having a balcony back home is indulgant, but here it is an accpted norm.

On Saturday I rode the metro all the way east and walked back to my apartment. There wasn't much to see. All of the interesting places are where I live and to the west. I did go to a place called Los Dominicos where there were a lot of artisans selling local goods. I would have taken a picture, but I didn't want to take out my iphone because of pick pockets and muggers. iphones cost about $2000 USD here, so almost nobody has one. Everybody has a Blackberry though. A high school girl that I work with told me that it's because texting is so expensive here and Blackberry's have their own network to send free messages over.

Since my internet connection is slow I'll only post one picture. Hopefully my new place will have a faster internet connection and I can do an entire Thoughts From Places. It's a picture of the view from outside my building. The center building is Escuela Militar, the military academy. Like so many other places it was named after General O'Higgins, Chile's hero from their independance war. An Irishman of all things. I never see any people in the front of the school, which is disappointing, but the academy is massive with an entire soccar field behind it.

Yesterday I went to the movies to see the new Sherlock Holmes (Rober Downey Jr. ~♥) but there was also a film festival going on so it was packed and I didn't want to deal with it, so I went to sulk at Starbucks. I had every intention to put on my headphones to sulk properly, but the only seat available was next to a woman and she started talking to me, first in Spanish then in English. She invited me to join a social group that meets to practice their English and Spanish. I need to check my email to see if she invited me.

I have today off because it's Martin Luther King Jr. day, a federal holiday. I think that I'll try that movie again today. I'm also looking at Spanish schools. Since I don't have to buy an apartment now, I find myself with extra money. I may as well take some classes while I'm here! I was going to ride the Metrotren, but none of the stops on the route seemed interesting. :/ I wanted to be adventurous, not bored.

'Till next blog. Ciao!

friday the 13th

is today! But I'm not supersticious at all, so no fun for me.

Stephanie, you're not making me any less excited to read The Fault in our Stars! Does it happen in Amsterdam? One more reason I have to wait for a few days to start reading it. I'm getting my credit card today so I don't know for how long I can keep putting it off. I want to have something to read on the plane on my way to Amsterdam next week. I go on Tuesday, I have to fly to Copenhagen and from there to Amsterdam. It's not really a long flight, it's probably around 1 and a half hour-2 to Copenhagen from Iceland but I have to be there of course 2 hours early and I have two hours between flights. Then it's just an hour between Denmark and Holland (I think, it's not a long distance).

So! I want to have TFiOS on my new Kindle to read on my flight!







I have so many things to do before I go to Holland, but I am too damn lazy. I don't feel like packing my bags right now, I just unpacked them. I might just have to buy new clothes down  there, haha.

Karena, put up some photos from Chile, will you? :D
I'm getting a new cable for my camera AND an iphone so I will be able to put up photos from Amsterdam next week.

SO EXCITED!

John Green, you amazing man,

How is it possible that these perfect novels come out of your brain? Looking for Alaska blew my mind with the idea of the labyrinth; An Abundance of Katherines made me look at relationships, and the complexities of it all, in a whole new way; and Paper Towns reminded me that how I envision a person is a whole different person than they really are.

The Fault in Our Stars exceeded my expectations. It made me laugh. It made me cry. It made me want to get on a plane and have an adventure in Amsterdam. Looking for Alaska is still my favorite book, but this book was brilliant and beautiful and John Green definitely didn't disappoint me.

I won't write any more, in case you guys haven't read it yet.

~*~*~*~*~*~* (lame middle school page break!)

The semester started on Monday! I've had a pretty good week, and I've really liked my classes so far. Taking three sciences and their labs isn't as bad as I thought it would be, but I also haven't gotten any homework yet. There's a guy from my ex-boyfriend's high school in four of my classes (chem, bio, and their respective labs), and I find it sort of weird how he wound up in all of those classes just by chance.

So, this week's been good. I've got three classes tomorrow, and then I get to have a relaxing weekend of sleeping in past 9:30 am and who knows what else.

Have an awesome week, girls!

P.S. YourPants is back up! Go add me as a friend, if you wish. My profile can be found here.

New year, new resolutions

Can't believe it's 2012, I think it's wonderful.

Karena, I think your Spanish will improve a lot since you're living there, there are a lot of great classes online for free too and if you try to speak it every day you're going to be fluent in no time! My personal favorite is busuu for Spanish (and German), but now I'm using livemocha for Dutch, it's pretty good too. I might make a short trip to south America next summer but I really need to earn some money so I'll probably just be for two weeks or so.

Stephanie, I'm also looking forward to reading The Fault in Our Stars, the first two chapters John Green read made me weep (haha). I'm only buying it for my Kindle for now though since I'm traveling and I can't travel with many books with me. And yes, I am definitely trying to enjoy the life to the fullest now that I have a year off! I love changing places and living abroad, it's awesome.


Since it's my first blog in a new year I think it would be appropriate to write down my resolutions for this year (yeah, I'm that person!).

1. Enjoy life. This year will be MY year, I was going trough some pretty rough stuff last year and January was definitely my low-point. Now that I have the year off (at least untill August/September).

2. Get in shape. I have gained so much weight for the last few years and I don't feel very comfortable in my body. It won't be very hard, I just have to start.

3. I'm going to learn how to cook! I'm coming back from Amsterdam and I will be able to cook!

4. I'm going to take better care of myself. Protect my soul and body. Can't tell more there, it's not really internet-appropriate.

5. Finish my goddamn portfolio for art university! I have to draw/paint about 40 GOOD pictures before April. So much pressure. I have to believe I can do it. I CAN do it, I just have to do it. I'm going to.

I know it's the typical resolutions that most people forget in the first two months, but it's something I started out with in September and I just wanted to put it down on paper so that I don't forget.

Last year I stopped biting my nails (mostly!).


Have a nice weekend, girls.
Love,
Alda.

T-Minus 3 Days Until the Spring Semester.

Also, I'm so bad at posting on time! Who knows, maybe it'll show up as Thursday again. :D

So, I'm back in Tampa. I got here on Monday afternoon, managed to catch the end of the Gator Bowl and watched the University of Florida win their football game. The past 2 years, I've been a huge fan of college football, but UF is growing on me. Maybe it's because I'm getting closer to Corey as every week is passing by. I'm just afraid that my feelings may grow too much. That would sort of be a disaster.

But I digress. I haven't been doing much since I last posted. Christmas with my family was good, and I enjoyed a few days with my cousins when they came to Florida. Espeon is nearly finished, but won't be done by the time Corey gets here either tomorrow or Saturday because I lost the pieces I cut out for its eyes and head jewel, and my leftover fabric is two hours away. So, his Christmas present is delayed yet again. It's sad, because I've been working so hard on this only to not give it to him when I wanted to.

Classes start on Monday, 10:45 AM. I'm really not looking forward to this semester.

Karena: I hope all is well in Santiago! I'm sure your Spanish is just as horrible as mine, and I even speak with a distinct Cuban accent because my Spanish professor was from Cuba. It's interesting, to say the least.

Alda: Amsterdam sounds so interesting! You're doing what I'd love to be doing right now; living all over Europe. Or, well, it seems that way. :D I want to move to England at some point, even if it's only temporary. The United States seems so boring to me after living here for my entire life.

By the way! My birthday's in just over three weeks. I'm turning 20. :) Also, TFioS comes out in four days and I'm so excited. It's being shipped to my parents' house, unfortunately, so I have to wait to read it until they send it to me. Amazon won't let me change my shipping address.

Happy New Year, girls! I'm looking forward to blogging with you two (and maybe some others to fill the gaps in days now that Your Pants is back up) throughout 2012.

Quick Post

Hello gals, happy New Year.

It's been three days since my parents left me alone here in Chile and I'm enjoying the time alone. I spent New Years Eve with a coworker from the Embassy and his family. It was nice to be around a family, even if I could only kind of understand them. I really need to improve my Spanish. I've never had this much trouble understanding the language, especially since they speak with a Castillano dialect. I'm so norteamericano and it's painfully obvious sometimes.

I'm frustrated with my Embassy work. It's going slower than I wanted it to, but it should start getting interesting this week.

Hope you both had a good holiday. It's exciting that you're moveing to Amsterdam Alda. It's the biggest port in the world so there should be a lot of cheap, high quality goods from all around the world. Totally jealous.

Ciao chicas!