The Housing Hunt

It's three days before my first day as a "grown-up", and I am lying on a hostel bed recuperating from the frenzy of the past two days. It's not even 8am yet, plus I was the only person in a 2-person dorm last night, so I am guaranteed up to 7 hours of privacy before someone takes the lower bunk. Thankfully this hostel comes with air conditioning, plus I can get wi-fi on my laptop (poor quality, but still free), so there is little incentive to leave anytime soon. Breakfast, maybe - though with an unintentional holiday habit of semi-starving myself till dinnertime, I coIuld probably aim for just a late lunch.

6:20am arrival at JFK two days ago, and two days of frantic Craigslist searches, emails, and viewings. Talk about getting right into the roll of things! Luckily this time around, Manhattan isn't such an unfamiliar place, and once I get to the neighbourhoods I like, I know exactly where to make my "tea = wi-fi" equation come true.

I am largely limited in housing options by my budget, so to live within a reasonable commute from Grand Central, I would have to share an apartment with other people. Alternatively, I could head up to Harlem or Washington Heights/Inwood and get a studio or one bedroom apartment. Living alone would be nice - I would certainly feel like I've "graduated from student housing" - but do I really want to live up north? I rather like lower Manhattan, and considering I will spend 3.5 hours a day on trains to get to and from work, I would at least like to be near my favourite eateries and cafes when I'm home.

Personally, I have no problem sharing an apartment with others for the most part. On the other hand, I will be disappointing everyone that expected me to have an open couch, since, you know, C is going to be in Noo Yawk, and of course she'd be obliged to house every casual acquaintance that wants to save some $$$ in the Big Apple. I have benefited from warm hospitality from friends in various places, and I do want to "pay it forward" - but only to the people that are worth it, when circumstances permit. Call me selfish if you will - in this sense, shared housing is actually a blessing!

We shall see where I wind up eventually. Goodbye for now while I enjoy some peace and quiet before another day in the city!

Mountain Times

So my previous declaration of one post per hour was clearly not thought out - getting a computer was way more difficult than planned. I also fell asleep waiting for the plane to arrive.

I am finally in Waterloo...en route to Toronto. (house hunting). Anyways, as I sit here in relative comfort on the greyhound, I can't help but think of looooong climbs up the sides of a mountain...which pretty much describes my whole Grenoble experience.

Grenoble is this charming little city in the Alps, and the residence J was staying at was literally on the mountain. Not quite at the top, but definitely close!! Really, the only way to get there was to hike up. The first few times of doing this definitely winded me, but I like to think I got better at the hike towards the end of my stay. The best part though? The view at the top!! Especually at night, you are rewarded with this amazing view of the city, surrounding mountains, and at night, twinkling lights from all the little towns and villages in the mountains. Lovely!!

Well, to be fair, the view had to be amazing...the residences were pretty bad. Though if you thought of it like camping, then the residences are pretty good, so I just stuck to that mindset for the 3 days I was there. Overall my stay in Grenoble was relaxing in terms of tourist schedules, but after walking countless kilometers, seeing as many attractions as humanly possible for a week, it was a lovely relaxing time with good food, company, and scenery. Also, considering how Paris went, I am glad I got the chance to recuperate!!

- S

9 hours and counting...

I've been terrible at updating - however, I am at the mercy of available Wifi, where Grenoble and Paris were seriously lacking in free wifi. Though I could have used an available computer, I spent most of my time enjoying the surroundings.

Right now, I am trying to pass away hour 9 at the Porto airport. I should have been home by now, but after getting to the airport at 8:30 am for a 11:35 flight, we were told we would be delayed until 16:45. Then at around 15:00, the departure time changed to 23:00 on all the info screens. I am not impressed. Part of the frustation is there is no one to get information from - there are 2 secured zones in the OPO airport. Once in the first zone, you are past the check-in counter, and they don't want to let you out of security. However, my departure gate is in the second zone, past passport control. Passport control won't let me past because the plane isn't here - so I can't get to the gate to ask any available sunwing staff about the delay. Frustrating.

I guess I can pass the time by blogging. I think my goal will be one blog per hour I am stuck in this bloody place. By the end of today, if we are not delayed again, I will have been in this airport for a whooping 15 hours - time that could have been spent in comfort back at the hostel, exploring the city, or anywhere but here.

Anyways. My last week was spent in Paris - Grenoble - Paris - Madrid - Porto. The recurring theme this week is definitely transportation problems...but that's enough for now. I will talk about delayed trains, lost railpasses, and night busses maybe in another hour.

- S

Midnight Train

So not quite a midnight train, but I took an overnight train to Paris from Madrid. The day I spent in Madrid was terrible, something like 39 degrees celsius. The train, in constrast was nice and cool and air conditioned...

Seats were big and spacious, food was good, but the best part was the view. My favorite realization was when we crossed into France in the morning, and I realized that there were wild poppies at the side of the tracks.

Something I found odd though was that there were no announcements on the train, ever. Not that they would have helped me much...but in the end, our train was almost 1.5 hours late. I had budgeted 1.5 hours to transfer to another train in Paris...and by the time I got to the station, my train had left 30 minutes ago. *sigh* I was not impressed.

I knew that there was another train in 45 minutes, so I hurried to a ticket counter in order to buy a new ticket. Little did I expect that I would spend an hour in line waiting...and since it was almost lunch time, many of the ticket counters were closing in front of my eyes despite the growing lineups. I was not impressed. Thankfully, my new ticket had not cost me anything because of my train pass, the downside being it was a local train instead of the high speed train I had originally paid for. I was originally scheduled to get into Grenoble for 12:55, and finally made it at 8:20pm, after two additional trains and a transfer.

During this fiasco in Paris, I ended up spending some time at all three train stations, Lyon, Austerlitz, and Bercy. In all I spent roughly 3 hours in Paris - I was not impressed at all. It was hot, smelly, crowded, and not very pretty at all. From what I have seen, Paris is definitely overrated. We will see if this weekend's trip to Paris for 3 days changes my mind...hopefully!

- S

Beaching and Om Nom Noms!

No trip to Barcelona is complete without a trip to the beach!!

After sleeping in a bit, checking out of the hostel, we promptly headed to the beach. For some reason we didn't have the foresight to put bathing suits under our clothes, but we were perfectly content wading in the water getting splashed by the waves.

First of all...the water and the beach were sparkly!!! Black and gold flecks in the water coated us in sparkles, it was very pretty!! We spent a good couple hours catching sea shells and just enjoying the cool water in the 27+ heat. I think we got many odd looks...as everyone else was in swimsuits or tanning on the beach, while two obvious tourists are making a scene playing in the water fully clothed.

For the rest of the day, we basically got lost and wandered around. Really we were in search of the cathedral all day, and took many hours to find it. It didn't help that we kept running into these churches, thinking it was the cathedral, only to realize that despite being built before 1353, the lovely church we were in was not the cathedral. We did eventually find the real thing though.

Otherwise, the things I remember most is what we ate =) H and I have a tendency to just eat our way through attractions, and today was no acceptions. Here's a sample:

- croissants at the Sagrada
- Gelato whenever we wanted. Kiwi gelato, yum!
- went to the food market in the afternoon. We easily walked that place 4 or 5 times looking at all the food....we had mango/kiwi juice, sangria, chorizo, cheese, a cracker, chicken something that starts with an e, couchettes, and dragonfruit, yum! Honestly, the fact that the market was closing down as we got there is probably what prevented us from buying even more food...
- Back to the Harbour, where we had paella, lamb steak and fries, salad, and whiskey cake, with wine and sangria of course
- grabbing tiny, very very strong coffees without sugar


Then trudging back to the bus for the overnight back to Madrid. What an intense trip, I'll have to calculate how many kilometers we walked that day! My overall impression of Barcelona is very very touristy. Lovely and charming in its own way, but not what you think of when you think of classic Spain!

Currently I am writing this in Grenoble. More on my adventures, like missing my train, later.

- S

Bustling Barcelona

If there is absolutely anything I should have learnt in High School, it's that H and I are crazy tourists.

Reminiscent of all the band trips we took together, we headed to Barcelona on a midnight bus from sunny Madird. Considering how much we paid for round trips, the bus was excellent! On a Thursday night the bus was infused with an excited tourist atmosphere. After dozing for the next 7 hours, we pulled into a deserted Barcelona bus station. Then after wandering in a very large square looking for the metro, we eventually gave up and walked to the hostel. Little did we know that getting lost and wandering in circles would be the theme of our adventures..

Stop 1: Gaudi's Sagrada Familia. This was simply stunning - Gaudi's design of the church will not be completed until approximately 2030. His vision is such a unique and breathtaking meld of fantasy, mathematics, beauty, color, imagination, and whimsy. I promise I will post pictures later. The highlight - a 2 euro lift to the top of the bell towers, where we walked down. Not only did it reward us with amazing views of the city in all four directions, it also brought up close to many of the fantastic sculptures on the church. Barcelona - finish the Sagrada, and I will be back! I can safely say that there is absolutely nothing in this world that comes close to the Sagrada architecturally.

Next, entranced with Gaudi's work, we headed to Parc Guelle, to visit the museum. In 30+ heat, STUFFED with tourists, we took a good 1 - 2 hours just trying to find the museum we already had paid tickets to. Overall, the Parc reminded me of Wooville - Dr. Suess' city for his funny creatures. Unforgetable!

3pm - Siesta time =D Best, nap, ever!

Dinner was sangria and tapas, surrounded again by tourists on the harbour, then leisurely making our way back to the hostel....but not before stopping to take lots of pictures of course.

Barcelona, <3 <3!

- S

Churros and Chocolate

Palace gardens, accordions, an egytian temple, Spanish guitars, churros, chocolate, gelato and shopping. Wow, Madrid!!!

Just...lovely. First off, the palace and it's gardens are lovely, shady, and full of dogs! The dogs, wow!!! They all look like purebreds, and many breeds I have only seen in pictures. They sure love their dogs here!! After running into various asian tour groups around the palace, I stopped to read for an hour in the palace gardens,lovely!! Afterwards, did you know there is an Egyptian temple in Madrid? With a reflecting pool and everything? It was quite amusing to see. And then...the shopping.

Wow, Madrid and the shopping!! If I didn't have to carry everything on my back for 9 more days...I would have ran into all those lovely lovely stores with the lovely lovely sale signs. Shows, jewelry, hats, bags, whatever you want they have them. Including these terribly annoying squeaker things - you put it in your mouth, and then you make this awful annoying high pitched squeaks.

In the Plaza del Sol, there are still remnants of the protest. Part of tent city stil exists, with protesters stubbornly camping out. Bur for the most part, the tourists hglave taken over the square. And in the evenings, wow!! The lights, the crowds, the excitement in the air. Definitely a fun place to be, but I would get tired of it after a bit, prefering peace and quiet and a good movie at home sometimes. However, in this bustling atmospurrs H and I had churros and chocolate!!!!! Om nom nom!!!!

The chocolate was incredibly rich, and even though I dislike dark chocolate, it was fantastic. The churros were to die for, but after 3 of them you start to feel the grease settle...but nothing some late night gelato can't cure =)

Oh yeah, I should mention one of the best parts of travelling with my friend H from home...we like to eat. =)

Midnight bus to Barcelona, more on my adventures later!!

- S