Pumpkin Mania!

Okay, friends - let me just be honest. I love pumpkin. I love pumpkin in a BIG way. So, right around this time of year, I couldn't be happier. Well, I didn't THINK I could be any happier... until I got invited to participate in a pumpkin cook-off at work. I had been an honorary participant in the last cook-off, which had an eggplant theme. I just got to taste everything, but didn't get to actually make anything or judge. This time, I actually got to cook, which I love to do! :) I had a few ideas for recipes, but decided to do a pumpkin roll in the end. It was really fun to see what everyone did - we had 8 dishes in all, 4 main dishes and 4 desserts. Everything from pumpkin burgers to pumpkin curry to homemade pumpkin ice cream (complete with homemade cones - holy smokes!). It was good fun and good food! There were four judges, who judged the food based on originality, presentation, and taste. I ended up winning 3rd place, which felt like a big success after being up against such amazing dishes!! :) Can't wait for the next cook-off - ingredient TBD. :)


The spread


The judges - they were required to dress up :)


Dao with her pumpkin ice cream cone


Leslie won 1st prize, which was an apron that said "sexy woman" and has a picture of a hot lady dressed only in underwear... sometimes, I shake my head and smile, thinking "this would NEVER happen at work in the US." :)

Beantown

Oh, the things we do for love! :) Sean and I have been trying to see each other about every 6 weeks to try to get through this last part of my time here in Europe. He's come here a few times, and I spent some time in Portland back in August. We are running into a vacation time problem, however, so we decided that rather than having either one of us take a whole week off again, we would just "meet in the middle" for a long weekend. The true middle between Amsterdam and Portland is somewhere in the middle of the ocean, so Boston was about the best we could do. It was a 5 hour flight for Sean and about 8 hours for me to get there. It seemed approriate to visit Boston v. New York City since it is also the city that we had talked about wanting to visit on our very first date two and a half years ago! :) It was both of our first times in the city, and we both absolutely LOVED it! :) It was kind of trippy for me - it's one of America's oldest cities, so it felt almost European, but it was full of Americans! Best of both worlds?!?

We both arrived at about the same time on Thursday afternoon. It was so great to see each other after weeks of "counting down"... we always count down the days, then the hours, until we get to see each other. Our method of counting is different though... I believe that you don't count the day that it is or the day that you are actually leaving, so I'm usually about two days less than Sean's count. :) He thinks I'm a BAD accountant! ;)

Rather than getting a hotel, we rented an apartment in a part of town that looked really cute - Beacon Hill. It was so nice to feel like we really lived there, and we checked out some shops and cute restaurants in our own 'hood.

Our first night, we ventured out on the underground system to the "North End", which is where all the Italians live. We ate at this cute restaurant called Dolce Vita, and the owner ended up being from Agrigento, one of the towns I visited in Sicily. He was SO excited to hear that I had been to his hometown, and kept kissing my hand and calling me "Bella." It was cute, and made me feel not so far away from all the great places I have been lately. The food was pretty good, but I'm becoming a bit of an Italian snob... I could tell that the bruscetta was about one day too old (usually, you use about 1 day old bread... this was older than that!) and the espresso wasn't quite right. I'm going to be in for a rude awakening in a few months! :) We spent that evening at an Irish pub, just enjoying each other's company and bad kareoke. :)

Friday we spent the day on the "Freedom Trail". It's a path that is marked with red bricks and goes all through Boston, passing by famous places like the old town hall where the Declaration of Independence was read and the cemetery where Paul Revere is buried. It was a nice little walk through my gradeschool history book. :)


Acorn street on Beacon Hill, where we stayed



The State House


Paul Revere's House on the Freedom Trail


Creepy headstones at an old graveyard


KP with the USS Constitution


View from the top of the Bunker Hill Memorial - 296 stairs! :)


Boston Commons - we loved the fall colors!

We had another nice dinner, and more nice conversation. The thing that I miss most is exactly this - having time to talk for hours... I miss this with Sean. I miss this with my friends. Everyone has tried to make an effort to keep in touch, and it has been great and has gotten me through, but I cannot wait to chat with a girlfriend for hours at a coffee shop or over a bottle of wine. These are the moments I treasure and miss.

Saturday we started the day with a trip to the JFK Memorial Library. Okay, silly me, I thought that since it was called a LIBRARY, it was a LIBRARY. Well, no, not quite. It's an amazing museum and memorial to JFK. I was once again super inspired and enlightened, and saw the "I have a dream" speech for the second weekend in a row. So glad we went. That part of history has always interested me, and it was great to learn more.

JFK Library
After that, we took the subway to Harvard, which is just outside of Boston in Cambridge. We had a nice time just walking around the beautiful campus.

Hah-vahd, dah-ling

Sean near the Business School at Harvard

Harvard by Night

For dinner that night, we went to the place where everybody knows your name, the bar that inspired Cheers. Well, they didn't know our names, but we still had a great time. :)

Yes, Sean, we HAVE to take a picture!

Sunday, my Aunt Carol & Uncle Brian drove into the city to have breakfast with us. It was really nice to get to see them, as it's been hard for me to get to see my mom's side since I moved to Portland. We had a nice visit, and then they drove us to the airport to pick up a rental car. We had done really well with planning up until Sunday... we weren't staying at a hotel, and our flights weren't leaving until that evening, so we hadn't really thought about what to do with our bags... we solved that problem by just renting a car and driving with them! We visited the beautiful town of Marblehead, and then made our way to Salem, home of the Salem Witch Trials. It's especially busy around this time of year with Halloween coming up! :) We visited the Witch History Museum and then just walked around.

Witch Memorial... 19 people were innocently hung/pressed during the Salem Witch Trials

Beautiful East Coast View

When we got back to our car to go to the airport, we had a mini-panic... there was a HUGE Harley parade blocking our car in. We took a deep breath and waited for it to be over... and waited... and waited. It finished up after about 15 minutes, and then we heaved a sigh of relief and made our way to the airport. Saying goodbye is always so hard. To be honest, the whole thing is really hard... saying hello. Saying goodbye. Trying to pretend things are normal when you only get to see each other once every 6 weeks. But, somehow, we manage.

Harley's, Harley's everywhere!

Looking forward to the next time... which isn't too far away! Sean will be here with my parents at the end of November! Can't wait to see all of the people I love most! :)

Oslo...

This past weekend, I visited another town in what is becoming one of my favorite parts of Europe: Scandinavia. This time, I went to Oslo, the capital of Norway. It's so funny... I'm in love with Scandinavia and I'm in love with Italy, and the two places couldn't be any more different. For as dirty as Italy is (which really only adds to the charm), Scandinavia is pristine; for as artistically beautiful Italy is, Scandinavia is naturally beautiful (and made me super homesick for my naturally beautiful Portland), for as boisterously expressive Italians are, Scandinavians are quietly poingnant. And the list goes on... I think I'm bi-polar (oh yes, I see you out there, agreeing with me!). Anyways, bottom line, I LOVE SCANDINAVIA!! :)

The reason I picked Oslo was simple - I found a really cheap ticket on Norwegian Air! :) But, that was about the only thing that was cheap about the weekend! I was shocked to see how expensive things are there - the 20 minute trainride from the airport to downtown was the equivalent of 40 USD, while a bottle of water was about $5. Let's not even talk about beer (I did indulge in just one!). My hotel was called "Oslo Budget Hotel", and at $110/night for pretty non-luxourious settings (had to put my own sheets on my bed), it ended up being okay. But, who cares about all this - the thing that is important is that the experience was priceless! I went alone, but totally re-charged my battery and returned with a new passion for life (see my last post).

I arrived to my hotel after midnight, and pretty much just crashed into bed (okay, folks, it's no secret that I'm not much of a partier!). I woke up pretty early, and decided to hit the road after enjoying the Scandinavian breakfast at the hotel (which was probably my best meal of the day!). I bought a city pass, because it covered all of my public transit for 24 hours plus covered a lot of the things I wanted to see. My first stop was to the neighborhood of Bygdøynes, where they have all kinds of ship museums to celebrate Norway's Viking heritage. My first stop was the Maritime Museum, where they had 3 Viking ships that had been buried with important people hundreds of years ago. One of them was almost in perfect condition - so cool to see how these vessels were put together:

Viking Burial Ship

Next was a stop to the Kon-Tiki Museum, which houses the famous Kon-Tiki boat that was used in the 1950's to try to prove that people from South America very well could have made a raft and floated to Polynesia... the man who had this hypothesis had seen similar art/architecture in both places and wanted to prove this theory... and he did!

Kon-Tiki Boat - 101 days at sea!

My last boat stop was the Fram Museum - this one holds the boat that made it both to the furthest North and furthest South points on the globe, the Fram. Pretty interesting to read about these voyages as well.

The Fram

That evening, I went to the Nobel Peace Center, which had a great exhibit called "From King to Obama"... it was super inspiring.

Digital exhibit showing all of the Nobel Peace Prize winners

I took a nice long walk along the Alna River on my way to find a spot for dinner... there was beautiful scenery all along the way, including a few small waterfalls! My pictures didn't come out great, but just so you get an idea...

I made it to bed by 10:30pm after a less-than-interesting meal (well, it was interesting in that the menu was a mix of Japanese and Italian... but I'm not sure it was planned that way!), and rested up for my next big day and the part I had been looking forward to the most - the Vigeland Sculpture Garden!

I got up early again on Sunday and made my way out the Museum. Thrifty KP realized that her 24-hour city pass hadn't expired yet, so transportation was once again free (instead of the hefty $5/ride charge that it takes to ride the trams! OUCH!). Being at the sculpture garden made my whole trip worth it for me. Vigeland was an artist that the city of Oslo built a home for on the grounds of the park, and in return for the house, he dedicated his whole life to making the park beautiful. And, beautiful it was. I spent three hours walking around, and I took pictures of most of the many sculptures. The theme is "the circle of life", and I couldn't help but feeling the emotions that the sculptures emitted come from within me as well... You'll see what I mean - check this out:

Beautiful fall weather along one of the paths in Vigeland Park

Haven't we all had a day where doing just this is the only thing that can make it all better?

I can't wait to feel this amount of joy...

Or to be with a man who feels this amount of protection over our wee one...

The monolith - which took 14 years to carve!

I also stopped at the museum, which shows how the bronze sculptures were cast and contains the clay originals.


On my way back to visit the National Gallery, I passed the Grand Hotel, which is where the Nobel Peace Prize winner stays in December when he or she accepts the award:

And then I had a traditional Norwegian meal... nothing to write home about - meatballs, boiled potatoes, and mushy peas. Hearty, but boring.

My last stop before the airport was the city hall, where the Nobel Peace Prize is presented each December 10th. This will be Obama's view when he accepts the award:

It was a quick trip, but I've definitely added Norway to my list of "must come back again someday" countries. :)

Inspired...

I've recently had two experiences that have totally inspired me, and I want to share them with you...

The first: it was simple. I read a book. It's called Three Cups of Tea, written by Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin. I found this book when I was on my way back to Amsterdam after Christmas, and, as I can't pass up English books when I can get my hands on them, I snatched it up. I've been reading a ton, but hadn't picked this one up until October. I started reading when Em got here and couldn't put it down...

The book is about one man, Greg Mortenson, who has a goal of summiting K2, a mountain in Pakistan. He doesn't quite make it to his goal, and on his way down, he gets lost and stumbles upon a small Pakistani village that has never seen a foreigner before. When Greg sees the status of the community's school, he promises that he will return to build the community a school. The book is about his courageous efforts to bring schools (55 in total at the writing of the book) to the most remote parts of Pakistan, and, more specifically, the young girls that were denied an education otherwise. This book seriously inspired me. This was just one man, risking his own life for a cause he believes in. PLEASE READ THIS BOOK!

The second: Visiting the Nobel Peace Prize Museum in Oslo (where the award is presented). Inside of the museum, there was a special exhibit called "From King to Obama", that compares and contrasts the world that existed when King received the prize in 1964 to now (Obama was announced to have received the award earlier this month - he will come to Norway to accept the award on December 10th). Seeing how far the US has come was inspiring, but what was even more inspiring was seeing how the world is looking to US - the people of the United States - to set the stage for the next generation. It's a big honor - and a big responsibility.

I was so inspired at the museum that I bought a book about all of the people that have won the Nobel Peace Prize from the very first one in 1901 to present... just flipping through it, there is everything from the man who started the Red Cross to a woman who re-forested her community in Africa. It helps one to realize... that it only takes ONE to make a difference.

Pit-wolfs in Amsterdam... and Italy!

haha - so, I keep forgetting that my sister is married, and that her new last name is Wolf! Her nickname is Pit-wolf, which I think is kind of catchy (okay, and scary at the same time!) :)
Em was here from Saturday, 3 October, until this past Monday. It was nice to have family here again... that has honestly been the hardest part about being here. I'm used to being far from home, but "hop on a plane for a weekend to see Mom & Dad" far, not "really expensive ticket plus 8 hour flight plus 6 hour time difference" far. So, spending time with family is really nice. :)

The day after Em got in, she was a very courageous girl - I had borrowed a bike for her, and she and I biked all around the city! I think it's great to see the city like a local, but Em had other thoughts... anyways, we made it home safely and with only a few minor scares. :)


Em with the bikes... brave girl! :)

While I worked on Monday, and Tuesday, Em explored Amsterdam on her own, doing the mandatory tourist things like the Van Gogh Museum and the Anne Frank House. When I got home, it was kind of nice to do "normal" things together, like baking cookies! :) I miss doing that stuff!

One batch of cookies into my mini oven-microwave thingy!

On Wednesday, I was officially on vacation, and Em and I flew to Pisa, then took the train to Florence. We stayed there for one night, and went to some of the museums that neither one of us had had a chance to see on former trips to Florence. We didn't over-do the sight-seeing, and really just had a nice time. We also spent WAY too much time and money at the market, but it is just so hard to resist... :) We began our journey to the Cinque Terre in the afternoon on Thursday - train from Florence to La Spezia (about 2 hours), then another train from La Spezia to Corniglia, the cute little town of 240 that we stayed in while we were there! :)


Pit-wolfs on the Ponte Vecchio


Yes, here comes the food! We had a nice pizza (and wine!) lunch at an amazing restaurant in Florence - One of my faves! :)

We got our exercise that day by climbing to the top of the Duomo

The Cinque Terre region created pesto, so we were both really anxious to get to try the real deal... the first night, we went to a restaurant which basically only served a few things - for an appetizer, you choose land or sea, and for pasta, you pick pesto pretty much! It was fun to interact with the guy running the shop - he definitely had an idea about how food was to be eaten, and didn't let us stray from the "proper" way! I thought his eyes were going to pop out of his head when I ordered red wine with seafood - he refused to serve it, because WHITE wine goes with seafood! What do I know?? (well, actually, I know that white wine gives me a headache, but que sera, sera, I got the white anyways!)

Pesto with a special kind of pasta from the region that is made so pesto sticks better

After loading up on pasta, we called it a night - we had a long day of hiking ahead of us! Basically, the Cinque Terre is a group of 5 small towns (Cinque Terre means "5 Lands" in Italian), that you can hike to on a trail that runs between. Em and I stayed in the middle town, Corniglia, and hiked one direction one day and the other direction the next. It was a good plan. :) The hike on the first day was pretty strenuous - we felt like we had climbed a few mountains. At the end of the hike, we were estimating how long we had hiked. My guess was about 12 miles - and I really thought so! When we looked it up, it turned out we had hiked less than 5 - it was just THAT HARD. Oh boy! It was amazingly beautiful though, and I loved every minute of it. :)

Our first view of the town right after ours, Vernazza, after about 2 hours of hiking. This was my favorite town - the colors were amazing, and it was great to be on the water! :)

After lunch in Vernazza, we hiked to the next town, Monterosso... on the way there, we started hearing thunder, so we hiked a little faster! Luckily, we just had a few raindrops, nothing serious, so that was nice. When we finally got to the town, it started raining a little, so we just passed the time with gelato (hey, there is no bad time for gelato!). :)

Monterosso

This is pretty much what the hiking was like - a real butt-kicker!

The Cinque Terre's main cash crop is wine grapes, and each town has their own kind of white wine. At one place in Monterosso, there was a place where you could do a sampling of wine from each town, so we did! :)

The Before picture... I am not posting the after! ;)

This is the town of Corniglia, where we stayed, and this was the nice view from our room. We had kind of a crappy room in Florence, so this was so refreshing. We loved the town - the people were so nice and friendly - we really felt like part of the fold there. No one spoke English, but we got by with bits and pieces of Italian and Spanish. :)

Corniglia: Population, 240 (plus 2 Pit-wolfs!)

The next day (after being fueled by a nice dinner at one of the other restaurants in Corniglia - there are 3), we hiked the other direction. These hikes were much less strenuous, which was good, because we were both sore from the day before! :)

Manarola

There is a cute trail between the two last cities, Manarola and Riomaggiore, called the Via del Amore, or Street of Love... it's named that because in the old days, men and women from the two towns would marry between villages, and they would meet here. It was cute! :)

Via del Amore

Riomaggiore

We took a neat walk in Riomaggiore to see the grapes - it was beautiful up there!

Wine grapes

We are DONE! We took the train back after walking back to Manarola for lunch! :)

I think I've mentioned that something is ALWAYS on strike in Italy... and this time it was the trains (again!) on Saturday and Sunday. We were really nervous that we weren't going to be able to get back to Pisa, so we decided to change the plan and take the train to Pisa before the strike started on Saturday evening. We were sad to leave beautiful Corniglia, but happy that we wouldn't be stuck! :)

We really lucked out with a hotel - this was our view:

Yep, that's the leaning tower of Pisa - how freaking cool! I couldn't stop looking at it!

Em with our crostini at dinner - our last dinner in Italy - sigh...

We spent Sunday in Pisa, and of course had to get the obligatory picture holding the Leaning Tower up... however, I don't think the elderly woman we asked to take our picture got that concept! Oh well, I think this is kind of funny:

Pisa is honestly not my favorite Italian city, but parts of it are quite beautiful, and we had a great day:

Our flight got delayed a few hours on the way back due to weather (and, oh, is it just LOVELY in Amsterdam now), so we didn't get back until about 10pm. Em's flight out the next morning was at 8am, so we didn't get much sleep!

It was really great to have Em here, and I'm glad she got to see where I live. Looking forward to more family time very soon - Mom & Dad come in November for Thanksgiving, Dutch-style! :)