Month: December 2013

2013 wrap up

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10, 9 , 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3 ,2 ,1 HAPPY NEW YEAR!! 

Fireworks at the beach back home.

Fireworks at the beach back home.

Before I welcome 2014 into my life, I want to first say goodbye to what has been an amazing year. 2013 has been a year of challenges, from January when I was doing my professional internship in Chile, to getting everything ready to start my exchange in France, to actually arriving in Montpellier. It has been an amazing experience, and I’m so greatful to have met such lovely friends, travelled and discovered new places. But also, I have to thank all my friends and family who support me from other places, they might not be here with me but they are always in my thoughts and heart.

I also started this blog, and I want to thank everyone who has ever read any of my posts, or maybe skipped the written parts and just looked at the pictures, which is cool too 🙂

But enough of the cheesy stuff, here’s to a great 2014, to fulfilling dreams, being adventurous, travelling, laughing, loving and trying to accomplish our new year resolutions 🙂

Montpellier

Montpellier

Travelling with friends

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                     10 days travelling with 3 girl friends to 2 different countries.
That was what my vacation in November consisted of, and to add to that I also live with these girls, crazy right? That’s just how our trip worked out to be, crazy but also tiring, fun, stressful, exciting, intense and just overall amazing.

Here’s a recap in pictures of what we did during those great 10 days back in November.

Took low cost flights, packing for one of those is quite a challenge.

Most uncomfortable flight ever

Tooks as many silly pictures as we could.

Riding a bull in Marseille

Cliché pictures in London

Getting proposed at Westminster abbey

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Stealing cabs, pink of course because we are girls :p

Boys flirting with us, not the other way around of course… :p

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Photobombing

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Pretending to be football players at Old Trafford, Manchester.

Meeting Tin Tin in Brussels

Meeting Tin Tin in Brussels

Eating and drinking, all day, everyday.

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Partying with zombies and robots

Thanks to my girls for a wonderful trip!

My attempt at celebrating Diwali

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This year during my November trip, I happened to be in London for Diwali, which is a Hindu festival that takes place in fall also known as “the festival of lights”. So I figured since I was in London, a place with one of the largest indian communities, I had to celebrate it. One of the biggest indian temples outside of India is actually  in London called Swaminarayan Temple, and for the festivities there would be fireworks and food. To my advantage, my couchsurfing host was indian so  I had someone to go with. Continue reading →

Partying it up in Gent

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One of my stops in Belgium was in Gent, a place that I think I wouldn’t have visited if it wasn’t for a good Belgian friend who used to study there and wanted us to check out the party scene in town.
We had heard that it was crazy fun, bars and clubs were all close to each other, beer was cheap, and after a good night of dancing you would end the night by having Belgian fries! Sounded awesome, and it was exactly how it went down during our stay in Gent.

We got there at night by car from Antwerp, so the first order of business was meeting up with friends to pre drink.

As Gent is a student city, sororities and fraternities organize parties that go down at DSC_1054“Overpoortstraat” , a street packed with no less than 40 pubs side by side, which you can go in and out of during a night of partying. We had a great night, went to about 4 different pubs and just danced the night away, met people on the streets and had a blast thanks to our lovely Belgian friends who took us around, and opened the doors to their homes for us to stay 🙂

For obvious reasons, I don’t have pictures by night. But the next day after munching on the best pizza ever we went for a walk around town. Even though it was a rainy day (not unusual for Belgium)  I found it very charming, with good restaurants, shops and entertainment, just what a student needs :). (On the right, a picture of Overpoorstraat by day.)

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Above, a picture of the traditional sweet in Gent made of raspberry syrup, sugar and gum. It’s liquid on the inside and very (and I mean very) sweet.
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Overall, I definitely recommend a stay in Gent for a day or two, if you want to party ,Wednesdays and Thursdays are said to be the best nights at Overpoortstraat.

Travel tips: Couchsurfing for first timers.

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“You have friends all over the world, you just haven’t met them yet”

As a young adult travelling in Europe, staying in hotels is just not an option for me right now. The first thought has always been booking a hostel, they are cheap, have a fun vibe, you can meet people and they usually include breakfast. Sweet deal. But last November while travelling to England and Belgium, I decided to try Couchsurfing.

Continue reading →

Getting lost in Camden Town, London

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Camden Town in London, is hands down the coolest, busiest, quirkiest market I have visited so far. It houses hundreds of shops, restaurants, bars and clubs where you could spend hours exploring around but it wouldn’t be enough to see it all.

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Getting to Camden  is easily accessible by subway (or “the tube” as it’s called by londoners), just get off at “Camden Town station” , and make your way up on “Camden high street” ,  where you can find tons of souvenir’s shops.  From there it’s up to you , you can go to “Camden lock market” if you are looking for hand crafted jewelry, paintings, and food from all over the world, or  the Camden “Stables” where you will find crazy shops for a more alternative taste, piercings stores, sex shops, and vintage clothing. Everywhere you go surely you will find cool stuff that you may want to buy , but for me it was all about the food! Polish, Argentinean, Indian, Spanish, Greek and just about any food you crave you can find it around Camden Town.

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I got there rather late, around 3 pm and being with a group of friends made it harder to just walk  around and discover all the cool places it offers. They were all about souvenirs, but I just wanted to explore so when we lost 2 of them, it came down to either looking for them , or finding some delicious food to eat. We chose the latter option :p . So my advice would be go there with  friends that are on the same page as you in terms of what you want to do, and get there early so that you can really see all that there is to see, it is definitely worth a whole day of your London trip.

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I was so excited about everything around me that I forgot to take pictures, so I just have a few not so good pictures that I snapped. But it is one of those places you just got to check out in person 🙂