WANDERLUST
Konnichiwa
Hello everyone! I’m still a bit jet-lagged from my trip to Japan so this post will be short. I won’t go into much detail about my trip because there would be too much to say but I wanted to share some of my favorite photos with you.
I absolutely loved Japan and Tokyo is now one of my favorite cities in the world. Everything went great, except for the part where we missed our flight (yeah that was pretty annoying).
Random thoughts:
- Traveling light was definitely a great idea and from now on, I’ll only travel with my small carry-on suitcase.
- I loved being on a semi-media fast for 2 weeks, and I’ll be reducing any unnecessary online activity (e.g. blogging is necessary for me to reflect on a few things and share information, knowledge and opinion with you guys, but since I don’t blog for fame or fortune, there’s no reason for me to pressure myself into blogging on a daily basis, let alone to publish several posts a day – I hope you’ll understand).
- I’ll be super busy over the next weeks and will be MIA for a short while but keep on leaving comments. It may take a while before I get a chance to read and publish them but rest assured that I will read each of them.
But enough talking… Here are few of my favorite photos from our trip to Japan:
The Prada store (by Herzog & de Meuron) was amazing:
But the Comme des garçons store was the most photogenic:
The art of packing light
I can’t even tell you how excited I am right now! We’re leaving for Japan on Friday (for 2 weeks) and I’ve just finished up a big project for one of my clients, which means I’m officially on vacation (for a whole month – being my own boss is awesome). [Insert excited squeal]
The boyfriend and I decided that we’d travel light to Japan, meaning we’ll only have a small wheeled carry-on suitcase and my tote bag for personal items like clothes and travel documents plus an average size checked suitcase (also wheeled) for gifts from Canada for family and friends we’ll meet in Japan (and the unavoidable gifts and souvenirs we’ll bring back).
While the boyfriend isn’t a packrat, he doesn’t really share my enthusiasm for minimalism (yet) so it was decided that I’ll use the carry-on suitcase for my clothes only (instead of his and mine as originally planned), and he’ll get to use the bigger suitcase for his (and the gifts). It’s still better than a 3 suitcases scenario so I’ll leave him alone. :)
The only indulgence I’ll allow myself is to bring my netbook so that we can stay connected with our friends and family who are scattered all around the world. They’ll be able to follow our adventures day by day which is pretty exciting.
Here are a few smart tips I read online that I found helpful:
1. There’s no difference between packing for a week and packing for a month or longer.
2. Don’t carry around full-sized bottles of shampoo and other liquids. Unless you’re going to a secluded area far from civilization, you’ll probably be able to buy toiletries at your destination (plus most hotels provide them for free).
3. If you think something might come in handy, leave it at home. Bring it only if you know you can’t get along with it.
4. Choose clothes that can be mixed and matched easily.
5. Choose smart stuff: reversible clothing, wrinkle-free clothes, fabrics that dry quickly, things that are compact, things that can multitask, things that are collapsible, clothing and bags that fold into a pouch, you get the idea…
Easy peasy.
That’s all for now, guys. The blog won’t be updated while I’ll be away but don’t hesitate to leave a comment or send me an email at hasinafr[at]hotmail[dot]com. No reply guaranteed for the next couple of weeks but I’ll make sure I answer your emails when I come back.
À bientôt!
Strasbourg, France
I’m having a severe case of nostalgia so I thought I’d post pictures of my vacation in France (that was back in Sept. 2009, and I’ve just realized I promised you guys some pictures of France back then, so yes, they were long overdue).
I can’t even begin to describe my love for Strasbourg. It’s basically where I learned life. While I adore Paris, no city in the world makes my heart beat like it beats for Strasbourg. When you go to France, make sure you stop by Alsace! There’s so much more to France than the Eiffel Tower, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, and chic fashion boutiques. I guess you could say Alsace is a French region with a German twist.
I’m not big on touristy descriptions so the pictures have no captions but if you have any questions about a particular picture, feel free to ask. By the way, I’ll be hanging around over at my Japan blog over the next weeks as I’m getting ready for a new adventure. If you can read French -and even if you can’t (there will be lots of pictures)-, feel free to join the fun!
This is what I live for
I booked my ticket to Japan!!! Another life goal down! Can you tell I’m happy? (okay, back to work now).
Photo: aujourdhuilejapon.com
I heart French food
It’s about time I talked about my vacation in France for you guys who would like to know a little bit more about French culture. Let’s start with the food, shall we?
French food is one of the reasons why I love France so much (with the exception of butter escargots and the likes eeew). I guess this post could fall under the category “this is why I’ll never be a size 2″ haha.
Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to get a seat in Business Class this time (note to self: don’t wait until the last minute to contact your network) and had to content myself with the food they served in coach class. I think the photo speaks for itself:
The first thing we did when we got to Paris-Charles de Gaulle was buy a parisien aka jambon-beurre (ham and butter sandwich – best sandwich ever). I was starving and super tired, and needed to refuel with food before hopping on the plane to Basel (my parents live near the Swiss and the German borders).
During our stay, we ate plenty of sandwiches and other “semi-meals”:
… Like bretzel with lots of cheese (yum)
… Croque-monsieur (topped with béchamel sauce and shredded cheese)
… And moricette (a tiny sandwich made with bretzel dough)
I tried to take a picture at every meal, but forgot to take some when the food was really too mouthwatering – like when we had Flammekueche or tarte flambée in French (“Alsatian dish composed of thin bread dough rolled out in a circle or a rectangle, which is covered by crème fraîche, onions and bacon”, according to Wikipedia) and tourte au riesling. Oh well…
Here’s a picture of an actual Flammekueche:
Source : tourisme-alsace.info
You can see a twist on the Flammekueche/tarte flambée in the following picture. They call it baguette flambée, which is simply a baguette topped with crème fraîche, onions and bacon.
Our first meal at my parents’ house was simple and delicious, just the way I like it. Barbecued Weisswurst (literally “white sausage” in German), fresh veggies and fruits, can’t get any better than that.
Then it was time to visit my younger brother and his wife (and my nephew – hi Maxence!) in Besançon (near Dijon, mostly famous for its mustard). My sister-in-law took us to a renowned local pâtisserie-chocolaterie called Baud. Let’s just say I’m not safe around chocolate – especially dark chocolate.
She got us individual cakes and macarons, and if you read my old French blog, you know how much I love me some macarons.
One of the big differences between French and North American barbecue meals is that in North America, people mostly eat steaks and ribs and chicken drumsticks whereas in France, they mostly eat sausages and whatever the thing in the second picture below is called (it’s like a thick slice of bacon).
While in Besançon, my younger brother also treated us to dinner at a small restaurant called L’Annexe and owned by one of his friends. They serve mostly seafood dishes. The food was amazing, but I especially loved their tarte aux pommes (topped with vanilla icecream yum), which was much tastier than Le Paris-Beurre’s.
We also visited my youngest brother and his wife (and my nephew – hi Anthony!), and they made an excellent fondue bourguignonne (served with a watercress salad, rice, potatoes and tabouleh) :
The following dish is called Fleischnacka. It’s a traditional Alsatian dish “consisting of minced beef (or sometimes other meats) rolled in fresh noodle dough and cut into slices which are then cooked in stock” (according to Wikipedia). It’s really good with just a salad.
The day before we left, we had a big family meal and my mom made a choucroute by popular demand. If I ever get sentenced to death, I think I will request a choucroute as my last meal. Choucroute and lots of chocolate haha.
Of course, we ate a lot of cheese too…
… And I drank way too much wine… I’ll talk about that in a future post. For now, suffice it to say that I miss France already.
I’m going to leave you with this picture of a famous Alsatian restaurant in Mulhouse called Zum Saüwadala, which literally means “The little pig’s tail” in Alsatian. The sign makes me smile every time I see it. It shows 2 happy pigs wearing folk/traditional Alsatian costumes.
