Happy Holidays with the Family

December 20th 2009

So we’ve had a very wonderful last few months. We spent October and November travelling around France, meeting up with friends and getting used to life with a puppy. We had such a fantastic time! I never would have thought that I would be so fascinated by that country. We ate, we drank wine, we ate and we ate some more. We made sure to taste as many local specialties as we could. Food is such an important part of travelling, and definetely an important part of mine and Jonathan’s lives. Most of what we do is related to food.

After France, we briefly hopped into Monaco, then back into France, and then into Italia! Jonathan settled in very quickly, because he speaks Italian. I understand Italian more than I thought I would, but people generally don’t understand me. I just need to practise and it will come. So far we’ve been welcomed to Italy and feel very good there. The people are very nice and fun!

I had to go back to Canada to apply for my work-holiday visa for Italy. I decided to take the opportunity to surprise my parents. My sister and her husdand picked me up from the airport, and took me home for dinner. I stayed in the car while they went into the house. Then, my sister said she forgot a bottle of wine she brought in the car. She came to get me. When we walked into the house, my parents still in the kitchen, she said “how about a little something from Italy” and I walked into the kitchen, with a bottle of Italian wine in my hand. Seeing the look on my parents’ faces was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen.

I spent a wonderful 3 weeks in Canada, while Jonny and Nomade were frolicking in Italy. Jonny met a woman from Montréal who runs a hotel, and got a bunch of tips from her on what we should do. He made friends with workers from the tourist information office in Pistoia, who gave him ideas on where we should work. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to be in the Wombat alone, but at least he had the puppy to keep him company.

Once I made it back to Italy, we had to go apply for a residence permit for me. The law is that any foreigner staying in Italy for more than 90 days needs to apply for residency. This is a bit silly because if you stay as a tourist you likely won’t have a home, but still need a residency permit. It’s kind of hard to apply for residency when you don’t have a residence! Anyway, a nice lady called Mariana from a social aid office helped us sort everything out. Now we have to show up at the police station on the 29th of December because they have to take my fingerprints. It cuts our Christmas holiday a bit short, but at least it’ll force us to get our ass in gear and get some jobs!

We’re only staying in Italy for 6 months, but we still plan to get an apartment. I’m looking forward to settling for a little while. The plan is to try a bunch of things and see what we like. We still have no clue where we’ll end up next year, or what we’ll be doing, so it’s important for us to take this time to get inspired and find what we want to do in life!

Now we’re eating cookies, drinking eggnog, playing cards, walking Nomade in the snow, and having a great time. We’re happy campers!

Happy holidays to all!

MC

Sabred Champagne and Family Fun!

7 October 2009

We have had a fantastic time in Luxembourg. We are planning to leave tomorrow and head West to pick up our puppy. We will take a few weeks to enjoy France. Our friend Laurent has given us tips on where to go without having to pay for toll highways. It’ll be nice to take the country roads, and really get to see France. When we crossed Europe to Luxembourg in July, we did it in such a hurry and stuck to the biggest motorways, and we didn’t get to see much. Now, we’ll get lost in the middle of nowhere, have great wine, great food, and meet nice people. We plan to ask farmers’ permission to stay on their lots, or stay at petrol stops.

So, here are some highlights of our time in Luxembourg:

We went to Jonny’s parents’ friend’s friend’s farm/estate in France to have dinner. We had a traditional 7 course meal. Well, let’s start at the beginning. First, we went to his wine cave to see his amazing collection. Then, the owner came and sabred a bottle of champagne. I was amazed!! Then, (after 2 sabred bottles) we headed to the restaurant. First, we had a sort of paté de campagne. Then, Foie gras with truffles, and another paté with onions. THEN we had panned foie gras on a bed of apples with amazing sauce topped with salted green apple shreds. THEN we had carpaccio with balsamic vinegar rocket salad, grape tomatoes and roasted peppers, THEN we had apple sorbet served in Calbadoce, THEN we had magret de canard served with carrot mash, potatoes cooked in Lorraine style, and garden salad. THEN, we were all exploding, so we didn’t have the dégustation of desserts, but instead a flambéed cake. Seriously, one of the best experiences of my life. Each course was accompanied with the appropriate wine. I can’t imagine eating this way everyday. But I realize now, how much I love food, I love wine and I love eating. One amazing thing is that absolutely everything we ate cam FROM THE FARM! That’s the way it should be! It makes such a difference to eat food on the spot. It’s so much more flavourful... Anyway, I love French food very much.

Another fun time:

Jonny’s mom’s birthday was on the 1st. Jonny and I prepared a big fondue dinner for the family. We made different salads, vegetable platters, many sauces, the soup for the fondue and tiramisu. Jonny’s sister surprised Jonny’s mom and showed up for the evening from Strasbourg. We had a great time, and sang folk songs from Québec until the wee hours of the night

Now we’ve been packing like crazy. I cleaned the Wombat. First I emptied everything and cleaned for 2 days straight. It’s like new! Now, we had to sort through everything, and clean that, and repack the Wombat. We have lots of spare room, and are happy about that. We’ve set up everything for little Nomade, who is doing very well (we’ve heard from Laurent and Amandine). Tomorrow we shoudl finish up.

I found I have a skill at sewing. I’ve always liked it, but haven’t done it that much. This week, I made my own patterns and made things for Nomade. I made her a stuffed animal and some baseballs. I love sewing! It’s so relaxing and I feel great about myself once I’ve made something! woohoo!

Apart from that, we are happy and healthy and looking forward to head south. The weather is getting pretty bad here...

MC

Hello Luxembourg

22 September 2009

Here we are, in Luxembourg.

We have been here for a week or so, spending time with Jonathan’s family. We’re relaxing, enjoying the GORGEOUS weather and fixing up the Wombat.

We are still having battery problems after all this time and effort (and money) spent on the Wombat. In Islamabad, we decided to buy 2 new batteries because the one we bought in India wasn’t cutting it. We thought having two identical batteries would fix our problem, but it didn’t...Well, we’re not sure if it did...This time the problem is structural. Meaning that one of the cells from our battery leaked acid all over the place. We were in Canada for one month, and so could not attend to the problem right away. Result: Bucket loads of corrosion.

Jonny has been sanding down the rust and repainting the area where the batteries go. Now we have to battery shopping...again... We were planning on reworking the electrical system in the Wombat anyway, but this is just more work that we don’t need! We’re thinking of installing a third battery. We are power hungry.

Meanwhile, I began sanding the battery racks when Jonathan’s mother interrupted me and told me that Jonathan’s dad could take them to work and sandblast them. SCORE! So I moved on. I began reorganizing the seat/single bed in the back. We are going set it so that we can half unfold the bed for our puppy. I have made a list of what we need for little Nomade, and I’m trying to recycle as much as we can. Here is the list of things we have to buy/find/make:

Buy:

2 tarp lined blankets to protect our cushions (this will be the bottom of Nomade’s area)

a kong (a rubber toy for her to gnaw on)

a rope toy

a basket (to make her a bed, I hope I can find one...)

a crate (we’ll wait until she’s a bit bigger)

a leash and collar

Find:

a couple of towels to make sure she’s comfy

an old pillow for her basket

2 doggy bowls

Make:

a doll/toy for her to love and keep her company. I will make it out of old jeans, or old bathing suits. It’ll likely be in the shape of a kitty cat.

I think that’s all we need for little Nomade to hit the road with us. I called Laurent and Amandine the other day and they said she was growing up nicely. She opened her eyes the other day, and Gitane is being a very good mother. I’m looking forward to picking her up in a few weeks. This is my first puppy ever (and Jonathan’s!) I’m sure we’ll do a good job.

Other things that need to be done in the Wombat is hardcore cleaning! I’ll wait for Jonny to be done the batteries, and I’ll empty everything out. Now emptying everything out of a car does not sounds very challenging, but this is also our house, and contains our life. (Click here to get an idea of how much stuff is in the Wombat) I will wash everything and give away what we don’t need. There’s a great recycling centre in Luxembourg where you bring the things you don’t need and people are free to take them home. We just went there to drop off a whole lot of stuff, and i picked up a few things!: a French/Italian dictionary and a red ceramic flower pot to replant our Basil plant. I plan to reorganize everything so that all we have “loose” in the wombat is our 2 suitcases and my guitar. Before we also had 2 big boxes, camera bags, computer bags, an extra car battery, a large hand torch, etc etc. I want to reduce it so that we only have to move our suitcases from the back to the front seats in the evening, and so that Nomade will have the most room possible. Also, I’m FINALLY starting to learn that in life, less is more.

When you have tons of stuff, you have tons of stuff to worry about. There’s only one thing in life that people can’t dammage/steal/ruin for you, your memories! As long as I have photos and my journals, I’m happy :) Of course there are a some things we can’t (or don’t want to) live without, but I’m doing my best to live with the bear minimum, aka à la Jonathan!

I’m having a lot of fun in Luxembourg. We are eating amazing food everyday, drinking fantastic wine, and enjoying the company of family. Some highlights: Jonny’s mom won a club golf tournament over the weekend! We are all very happy. We went to Metz with Jonny’s dad to have a look around and were quite pleased. Jonny’s brother’s girlfriend Anja brought over her pet snake Josette for us to play with (as seen in the photo above). I had a blast!

Our plans are still to head to Sicily but I’m having some visa woes. I have until November 24th to figure things out. I think I’ll find something to study down South. Either in the south of France or the South of Italy. We want to stay warm :)

So that’s all for now. Yesterday marked the one year anniversary that we left our jobs in Australia. So much has happened since then, and I’m terribly happy to live the way I do.

Marie-Claude