Coming home...

Well, I'm getting to make a quick trip home...

It will be a busy one with packing and moving out of the apartment that SO and I moved into oh so briefly 11 or so months ago and putting our things into storage.  It's a real mixed bag of feelings - we were only there for about 4.5 months in the end and we've paid all this rent for nothing, but it was our first place together and it's a really lovely one...

Living away from home - as I've mentioned in previous posts brings mixed blessings, the opportunity to experience a different culture and country and people - not just from a tourists point of view - but from a living it, breathing it, working it, sleeping it 'local' kind of view...  and then there's the whole missing home and family, lifestyle, regular haunts, and as a wise friend said recently just your ease of being disappears...

I'm beside myself excited to be able to be coming home to see some people and have the opportunity to sort out some of the things that we want to have with us before I come back over.  I'm also so sad not to be bringing SO with me, sad that we'll be apart for a time (even if only for a few weeks - it's the longest we'll have been apart since we've been back together), sad for him that he doesn't get to make the run home - doesn't get to catch up with people, doesn't get to see our first apartment together one last time...

So, with my excitement right up there - I head off with a slightly heavy heart on Wednesday morning to get through some heavy, hard things - with some help, hugs and support from my peeps on the home front...  Before heading back to Stockholm for this life that has somehow chosen us for the next 12 to 15 to ? months.  Wish me luck!!

Snow...

Snow...

It's such a foreign thing to us as Melbournians - I mean, I've made the 5 or so hour trek to Falls Creek and the shorter 2-3 hours to Mount Bulla for boarding a few times (albeit a couple of years ago now)...

But, living in it - day to day, walking through it to get to the train station, to work, and home again each day - that's something altogether different...

It creates a really alien landscape, beautiful, eerie, fresh and crisp...  I love the way it makes everything lighter - and here that's a really big thing.  Without it here it's very dark and grey a lot of the time...  Thankfully the days are getting longer - so the sun's up before 8am and setting after 4pm these days, the darkness - much more than the cold is a really hard thing to get used to...

It snowed yesterday, snowed and stayed for the first time in weeks - we really thought that winter seemed to be coming to an end, but yesterday it came back again - and today it was sooo beautiful...  Looking out the window this morning, the courtyard in all full of fresh snow, and the trees and street out the front all white and pretty...  And it was deep when we stepped out the front door this morning, there'd been something like 15cms overnight - and walking across the square to work it was cool that they hadn't thrown the grit in it yet that they normally do - and the path through was not from some artificial source - but was just there because people had walked there and everyone that came through just found it easier to follow in the footsteps that had come through before them...

It made me smile today, to see it all white and pretty and fresh - you kind of forget how white it is - when it's fresh like that...  After the cars come through on the roads (not so much today as they were mostly snowed in!) and the grit gets thrown down to make it easier to walk through, it's grey and then when the days are dark and grey, it's a really grey feeling...  But today, white and light and bright...

I'm glad it came today, and glad that it was such a big fall overnight and that there wasn't yet the time for it to be grey and we got to see it that way - I go home to Melbourne in a few days, just for a quick trip to pack up our apartment and put our lives into storage before heading back over here for the next 12+ months - and while I know that I'll see more snow, if not this winter (which we're no longer kidding ourselves is coming to a close) - certainly the next one but it was nice to get this fix before heading home for a couple of weeks...

I even got to make a snow angel finally (was getting worried that I'd missed my chance!!)...

Being away from home...

I fell like I've been away from home forever - with 5.5 months in South America and then only 4.5 months at home before we were away again (which has been for 6 months already, I can hardly believe it!)...

All of the travel I've done has been not entirely planned, surprising and a fabulous experience.  And, don't get me wrong I understand that I live a charmed life.  I'm a very lucky girl in very many ways, comfortable in my own skin, loved by friends, family and my partner, successful in my work, etc...

But, and of course, there was going to be a but...  I'm missing so many things, there's the apartment we set up our first home in for such a short time in Melbourne, the simple things like being able to read all of the labels in the supermarket and not having to concentrate every moment in there.  There's the aforementioned friends and family.  And there's all the events around them - I'm at an age where my friends are all at an 'Oh' birthday (that's a birthday that ends with an 0), and there are new babies being had and children passing - well just even day to day life that I'm missing out on.

It's hard - really hard, I'm the youngest (by 18 months to my oldest classmate) of my friends in the 'Oh' age bracket - and my 'Oh' birthday falls in June.  By then, I'll have missed everyone else's (I mostly already have)...  So, when there was the opportunity to celebrate with one of my Ozzie colleagues her 'Oh' birthday a week and a half or so ago, it was really important to me that she had a good one...  So, I was perhaps overwhelming (but I hope not overbearing) in my enthusiasm.  It was so nice to have something to celebrate and I guess in part make up for all the things I feel like I'm missing out on at home...

Here's some pics of the card I made for us all to sign to go with our group gift:

 

And here are the balloons we (mostly our Swedish and Norwegian colleagues) blew up all over her desk:

 

I had a lovely couple of days celebrating with her - both in the office and again on the weekend out for dinner and drinks, and raised a glass to all those friends who's 'Oh' birthdays I've missed in the last 12 months - I hope that you all had fabulous celebrations!

Christmas Holidays

Well, it feels like an eternity ago already - but I have been meaning to tell you about our holiday.  I had all very good intentions last Friday of coming home and dumping everything out onto the blog, but I was in the foulest of moods having had no sleep the night before and a not great day at work, that my negativity would have shone through above all else and made a nightmare read...

So, here I am after a weekend - that was mostly rushed and not very restful, but I'm much less - well everything than I was on Friday!!

SO and I decided around October sometime I think, that we would stay in Europe for Christmas - after all, how often do you get to be in Europe for Christmas..?  Mind you, we also said the same thing about South America last year!!  But given that we were both working and neither of us had the time or patience to be researching where to travel to, how to get there and where to stay when we did, etc so we'd book onto a tour, and let someone else do all that for us.

First, let me say that if you want a quick overview of places, not to have to worry about where to go and when, and someone else to organise your accommodation and transfers for you - a tour is definitely the way to go.  I've never done one before - except for our Inca Trail in South America last year for which we had to have a guide and therefore booked through a company - I've always just wandered around places myself, booked the accommodation and enjoyed my time doing what I wanted at my own pace...  But, having someone else do all the bookings this time around was an absolute godsend!

So, we headed off to Munich, Germany where our tour was due to begin in the early afternoon of Dec 16.  After a couple of hours delay, due to the fact that Arlanda airport in Stockholm only had enough snow ploughs to keep one of the three runways clear, and then an hour and half or so sitting on the plane while they got ready and we stood in the queue to have our wings de-iced before take off, and then getting in line for the actual take off - we arrived safely in Munich a few hours late and tired...

We were due to meet up with the tour group for an orientation tour of Munich around 2.30pm the next day and then again for a welcome drink around 6pm.  We gave the tour a miss as we'd worked really late the night before and I'd managed to let in a cold that I'd been warding off - so we had a rest.  Met some of the lovely people we shared our experience with for drinks at 6pm - had some dinner and then went back to our room for an early night before our first of many 6.30am wake up calls!!

Santa at the BMW museum in Munich:

BMW Head Office (4 cylinders):

Driving out of Munich:

Travelling via Regensburg, Germany (for a short visit) and Pilsen, Czech Replublic (only in the bus) our next stop was in Prague, Czech Republic.  A beautiful city, we got to have a night tour with a fabulous local guide John (Honza) although it was absolutely FREEZING!!  We ended up the night at a cellar with 'live music' that entailed a very lively accordion player who was trying desperately for some audience participation without too much success!! John was with us the next morning for our city tour before we boarded the bus to head off for Bratislava, Slovakia.

An angel in Prague:

And the Christmas market:

Bratislava was a fairly quick stop - a couple of hours to have a quick look at the town and wander (eat and drink) our way around yet another Christmas market (did I mention we'd been to one in Prague as well?!).  SO loved the market here because instead of the Gluwein (hot Christmas wine) we had in the Christmas markets in Cologne the month before - they served Medovina (hot mead - honey wine) which he drank so much of he was a little tipsy getting back on the bus!!  From there we headed on to Budapest, Hungary.

Another, just stunning place - we went on a dinner cruise on the Danube river and seeing all the architecture of Budapest lit up was nothing short of breathtaking - the pics don't do it justice at all!!  Then we had a full day in Budapest, including a tour of the Parliament building - apparently they ran a contest for the design of the building and were so impressed with the entries that they made not only the winning building (that houses Parliament) but the next two runners up as well!!  You'd be forgiven for thinking you were inside (or in fact looking at a palace) the building is gorgeous and absolutely amazing.  Our tour guide here was the young, but very helpful Sophie...

Hungarian Parliament Building from the Danube:

A replica - made of matchsticks, inside:

The next day bought us in to Vienna, Austria - via Györ, Hungary.  I did a (little!) shopping here in our free time that evening - but I was very excited about the end of our city tour (with lour local guide Ilse who was lovely) the next day where we got to visit the new flagship Swarovski store!!  Three levels of lots and lots of pretty sparkly things!!  Very cool!  That night we went to what was described as dinner and a Strauss concert.  Now, the dinner was supposedly in a 'palace' which while it was a very beautiful place was simply a building in Vienna's city garden, and the Strauss concert - which entertaining, was an orchestra of 13!  Perhaps a little oversold, but an enjoyable evening none-the-less.

Stauss 'concert':

The next morning (Christmas eve) we headed into Salzburg, because the Europeans mostly celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve - we headed straight into the cafe that we otherwise would have seen at the end of our city tour for some lunch and coffee and cake.  The cafe, not surprisingly wanted to shut up early and send all the staff off to enjoy Christmas eve with their families.  Then we went on to join our local guide Manfred for our city tour.  Salzburg was really interesting to look around - really pretty with it's castle up on the hill - and amazing history, going back more than a thousand years (amazing to me as an Australian who's country only has a couple of hundred years of history)...  But, we were disappointed when we finally got our free time to wander around even the Christmas market was closing up and none of the regular retailers were open so late (3pm) on Christmas eve.  This was despite Manfred and his quote of the tour "hurry up people, you're on a walking tour here, you're not on holiday"!!

The castle in Salzburg:

And Mozart's birthplace:

After a lovely dinner out we headed back to the hotel, which had the dodgiest internet connection in the world - necessitating getting fully dressed (including coats) at 3am to go down to the lobby to join in Christmas lunch in Oz over skype!!  After a couple of hours on the computer/phone back to Oz in the middle of the night we had a sleep in the next morning, skipping the tour that looked at the lower part of the alps and some of the scenery from The Sound of Music.  Oh well, Christmas lunch was worth it for the look on my grandmother's face when she could see us on screen!

Then another short (couple of hours) bus ride back to Munich for the Christmas dinner and the night, before most were flying out the next day.  We met some wonderful people - some of whom we'll definitely keep in contact with...  And special mention to our driver Attila (yes, Hungarian!) who was not only the best, safest driver we could have asked for but was also a very lovely guy on top of that!  However, the one major downfall of our tour was the tour director...

I nicknamed her Cruella (as in de Ville from 101 Dalmations) she not only fit with her shock of white hair at the front, but in her attitude.  Only ever friendly when we were on the bus, ie: when she'd decided she was tour director (never in the halls of the hotels, or the breakfast rooms, or the bars - where if she could avoiding making eye contact she absolutely did!) she was also one of those people who I'm sure just love the sound of their own voice (I know - you could be forgiven thinking that of me today, on and on and on!!).  And so, we heard inane, unimportant things 200 times over - it got so people just switched off, so immediately she'd finish telling us 20 times that we'd meet back at the bus at 2pm, that's 2pm back at the bus, back at the bus at 2pm people - someone who'd stopped listening long before that would ask - what time are we meeting?? Unbelievable!!

Anyway, we did have a great trip - it was fab to see so many places and get a feel for the history and architecture, etc...

Two weary, but happy travellers:

A rite of passage..

Well, today we went to Ikea...

Apparently it's a rite of passage here to go to Ikea - I can understand why...

It took us all day, between getting out there and the HOURS and HOURS in the store (it's over 3 levels the one we visited) and then getting home, unpacked and assembled - ALL DAY!!

But we've done it now, and we have some of the things we've been after, like a rug in the lounge, and a print for the wall, and a little bookshelf...  There was many more purchases than that, but they were the things we were mostly after...

And do now it's done - tomorrow I don't think much aside from relaxing will be done after that - but our Ikea run is done!

  

Me clowning around at the entrance - believe me, there wasn't this many smiles on the way out, it's EXHAUSTING!!

Being brave - take II

Well, we've moved 'house' and I could traipse across town on the train and then walk for 10 minutes in the snow to go back to the hairdresser's I tried last time, in order to have the owner lady do my hair...

But, there's a hairdresser every half block around where we live - surely I can find one that will be able to get it right??

So, it's been 3 months and I'm finally brave (or desperate enough) to be needing to get my hair coloured again - I've decided that today's the day and I'm heading to the salon around the corner in the hopes that they have someone who speaks perfect English...

Wish me luck...

I wouldn't have it any other way...

I had full intentions last night of writing a blog post - probably more for myself than all of you reading along about the year that was...

But, the night didn't go quite according to plan - we ended up in our dressing gowns on the bed chatting to friends and family at home and from home (but travelling in other parts of the globe) for something like 4 hours.  Skype is a wondrous thing!  We hadn't had any more concrete plans than maybe we'd head out to the park near our apartment near midnight and watch the fireworks that we'd been listening to since 4pm go off...  So, no great loss - we stayed in, warm and chatted and chatted and chatted through to the wee hours of the morning - it was a fabulous start to the year!

So, now it's 2011 - I start it sitting in our apartment in Stockholm, Looking out the window at a little snow flurry and lumps of snow falling off the buildings (thanking all that is, that I'm not standing underneath them as they fall!) pondering on the year that was...

We started it running around the plaza in Cusco, Peru - with a bunch of other crazies, all wearing yellow undies on the outside of our clothes (it's a tradition that is supposed to bring luck).  We moved on through Lima, Peru where thankfully I had some fabulous health care help after my left ear completely blocked for a week or so after our flight in.  After a small change to our travel plans we flew out to Quito, Ecuador (about the only South American stop that I wouldn't recommend to people) and on to the Galapagos Islands.  We spent an amazing few weeks there - one of which we were on a cruise of the islands, and getting up close and personal with the wildlife and the next couple (horrible to say) but mostly just counting down the time until we were due to head down to Santiago, Chile and on to home...  While we were there (our last 4 days of 5.5 months in South America) we decided we'd try driving (on the wrong side of the road) which was a great adventure, and we headed off to Val Pariso - a port town in Chile.  Then back to Santiago for a day or so, and then back to Melbourne...

Our Melbourne stint - which started with SO and I moving in together lasted only 3.5 months before we were off for more (very unexpected) travel.  A short holiday of a couple of weeks between England (SO's family and then a friend of mine) and Paris for a few days - then on to Stockholm...  Two weeks I was to be here, to help SO set up and support him through his first couple of working weeks here - and then I was to come home for the remainder of his 3 months here...  Well, for those of you who have been reading along you'll know that after 5 months we're still both here, both working and now moved from the hotel (where we lived longer than our apartment in Melbourne) into a leased apartment...

We still really have no good idea about when we'll be heading home - but for now we're enjoying the experience of living and working in a foreign environment - and the fact that we get to spend the time together.

The year ended with a whirlwind trip around Bavaria - through Munich, Pilsen, Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, Gyor, Vienna, Salzberg and back to Munich in the space of just 10 days.  It was great to get out and have a bit more of a look around Europe and we had a great time (more on this later).

So, a fairly unexpectedly adventurous year that I look back on and shake my head in amazement at where we are and how we came to be here.  But, I wouldn't have it any other way...

Here are some photos: