I just moved into a new place with my friend Sarah Waite and my room is finally all set up! I got some fancy new furniture and as usual have plastered the walls with tons of awesomeness. I also have my own bathroom for the first time ever, and I have to say it is pretty spiffy as well.
bathroom
I had to do the bathroom glamour shot.
window in my room
awesome comfy bed
wall collage
I can’t deal with blank walls. So, this is my solution! A collage of awesomeness.
close-up
my bling rack
I friggin love this jewelry rack.
closet and desk
The drawer that my laptop is sitting on closes up and hides away.
shelves
work space
Complete with robot coin bank, box camera, flask, and jewel encrusted tortoise.
How You Say, dresser & TV
Yes, a corner of my room seems to be dedicated to street artist and friend How You Say. The TV’s sole use is for playing Nintendo games and watching movies.
yay!
I love my room! It really feels like my space for once. Plus, I just love living in a HOUSE and not an apartment.
<3
It has come to my attention that I have been severely neglecting my blog! I have been traveling since September 29th, and it is now one month later! This marks the half way point of my journey. I have been posting all of my pictures on Facebook, so most of my readers will have already seen them on there. But I figured I could use my blog to share some amusing details. A few pictures too of course 
We’ll start from the beginning: a very very long series of flights to Seoul, South Korea! I had the opportunity to start my trip there because my friend Diana (who I am traveling with) had been there for a year teaching English, and her contract had just finished so she was free to show me around. It was totally worth the plane ticket and the entire day I lost in order to travel there.
Some things I noticed while in Korea:
-Most people don’t speak English, but most everyone is ridiculously nice. Except old ladies, they tend to glare at you and elbow you out of their way.
-There is street food everywhere. Such delicacies as silk worm larvae, octopus tentacles, delicious delicious mandu, and the infamous french-fry-covered-hot-dog-on-a-stick can be found on nearly every corner
-The abundance of American companies is crazy. Of course I expected to see McDonald’s, but TGI Fridays? Outback Steakhouse? REALLY GUYS???
Diana eating kimchi jjigae and bibimbap
-The traditional food is amazing. My personal favorite was Bibimbap, a mixture of veggies, rice, fried egg, & chili sauce. Kimchi (fermented cabbage?) took some getting used to, but I think I could learn to love it if given the chance.
-Korea was the beginning of my realization that some things are universal. These things are: Doner Kebab, and H&M. THEY ARE LITERALLY EVERYWHERE.
So I saw some pretty rad things in Seoul. Some palaces and touristy things like that. But the best part of being in Seoul with someone who had lived there for a whole year is the epic party adventures we had. We would go bar hopping with all Diana’s friends and literally be out until the subway re-opened at 6am the next morning. Bars don’t close there until the last person leaves! Also, DRINKING IN KOREA IS SO CHEAP!!! We’d go to a bar, pay like 5000 won (approx $4) to get in, and as ladies we would drink FOOOORRRR FREEEEEE the entire time we were there. Not to mention the Soju that is consumed during “pre-bar drinking”.
I am so glad I took the extra time and money to go to Seoul. It was such a great time. It’s a safe city with friendly people, great nightlife, and incredibly easy public transportation. What more could you ask for?
Side note: I did managed to lose my vintage Burberry overcoat somewhere on the street there, so I hope some old homeless Korean dude is sporting it proudly.
Please visit my Flickr album here for a few more pictures from Seoul!
My mother’s mother’s father was from a town called Palena in the region of Abruzzo. We weren’t originally planning to go there, but the opportunity presented itself and we decided it would be a once in a lifetime chance for my mom to see the town her grandfather lived in. Nobody seemed to have heard of it so we basically punched it into the GPS and let it lead us. It took us WAY UP into the mountains and through some little towns and we saw some of the most breathtaking views from the entire trip. We eventually got to the town and my mom was able to gather a few remembrances to bring back home for relatives that will never get to see the place. Here are some pictures from on the way there, and from in the town.
This is one of my favorite shots from the whole trip. Someone stuck a flower into the bench.
Still to come: Pompeii, the Amalfi coast, and Gaeta!
My family on my dad’s side is all from a city called Ceccano. Three years ago I went there to see the cemetery and the (now empty) house of my great grandmother. I went back there again, this time with my whole family. I’m sure my dad appreciated seeing the city even more than I did.
On our way there, we ran into this herd of goats in the middle of the road (not literally. no goats were injured in the making of this photograph). The sheep/goat herder was pretty much ignoring the fact that we needed to get past… that is, until he recognized/remembered my uncle (not a Bartoli, but also coincidentally from Ceccano). Then he decided to get the livestock out of the way for us. Thanks smelly sheep herder guy!
Nobody is buried underground in Italy. Everyone is in these fancy marble above-ground structures, some stacked on top of each other. If you spend enough cash you can get your own tomb/chapel type of room for all your relatives. My grandmother’s parents are in this red one.
These are the parents of my grandfather. Italian women keep their last name, hence Olmetti instead of Bartoli. Another thing about their graves is that every single one has a picture of the deceased. That, to me, is the most interesting part.
I couldn’t resist a shot of discarded rotting flowers.
Then we went to see my grandmother’s parents’ old house. I remembered which one was their house because there are gnomes on either side of the gate.
Great grandparents’ names are still on the mailbox.
I failed to make a post this past Sunday! My reason is legit though. I was pretty tired from a weekend trip to Tucson and Bisbee for some thrifting and some adventure!
We went to Tucson first but didn’t really find much at their various vintage stores. A lot of the shops I usually go to were closed for summer or something. We did however grab some drinks at the Surly Wench and eat the most bizarre mix of foods ever at The Grill: tater tots, Captain Crunch, and hummus.
We stayed at the Hotel Congress, which is a pretty rad place. Dudes with names like Bill or Bob (OK I can’t remember his name) work there and they tell you places to get food and Bloody Marys at 6am on a Sunday that are NOT The Grill.
Then we were all like, “Eff you, Tucson. Let’s go somewhere even smaller and more dependent on tourism”. So off to Bisbee we went. Their thrift stores and vintage shops were significantly more thrifty and vintagey, though I still didn’t buy anything. I considered getting a stereo viewer and some photos for it, but they are really pretty common and all the ones I found were priced at like $30! We stumbled into a museum (that we thought was an antique store) and some ancient old dude told us the entire history of the town. I’m not sure if I can trust his information though… Anyway, all I got was some ice cream and candied almonds… and I was pretty satisfied with that.
Hey, look! Pictures!
Check out that snazzy typeface. Why do words look so much cooler when they aren’t in english?
