Post-Valentine – What is Love?

Having just come back home after a week in Tuscany celebrating Valentine’s with my one and only – I admit to be having some internal thoughts about love at the moment. I don’t usually rant on about relationships online since for me this is a personal subject, and I’m not going to go into details in this post either… however…

Having the time to spend one whole week isolated from the world apart from ‘me and him’, had its advantages. Might I add that we knew no one in Tuscany and had almost no contact at all with ‘the great net’ since we were in a small house in the Tuscan countryside where internet connection was crap lol. To be honest, I found this very restful and very conductive to spending more quality time together.

Coming back home to ‘civilization’ was like taking a sudden shower of cold water. Backtracking through all the social media tags and chat attempts was tiring, as was the realization that for most people, Valentine’s seems to be either a way of ‘showing off’ in a kind a ‘mine is better than yours attitude’, or else a way of taking a dig at some ex in a ‘look now I have a new partner and he’s much better than you’ yada yada yada… status…

Here we go again…

Seriously, first of all, how can you compare one relationship to another? Yes of course you can compare the difference between the way one partner treated you or communicated with you vs your new partner, BUT the dynamics in each and every relationship is different, as are the targets and needs of each person. Also, if you are still going on obsessively about your ex… are you really in love with your new bf/gf? Hmm…

And trying to pit your relationship against someone else’s to see whose is ‘best’? Purleaseeee how damn childish. If all you think about is whether you are ‘ahead’ in some game between you and others, than you are not really focusing on your own relationship which should be your priority right? Relationships are not a competition, plus different couples want different things. In this case, you’d better do some introspection and see whether you are REALLY in love with your partner, or whether s/he’s just someone you are with in order to not be single.

After more than five years meeting almost every day with the same person, comprising almost three years of living together, I can say I am pretty qualified at this point to realize what both me and my bae want from this relationship and what makes us happy. Doing so before the first couple of years is usually impossible, since most couples during that time are still in their ‘honey-moon period’ where they show the best aspect of their characters to each other, and not their WHOLE self, and where lust often blinds them to hard truths. This is why it is so important not to rush into things. Then again, I’ve known couples who were together for ten years, then as soon as they purchased a home and started to live together, broke up within one month (true story). Living day after day together is, I think, an essential part of a relationship, not to mention being a ‘growing up’ period. 

I am very proud of the way me and my soul mate have grown up and evolved together as a couple. My feelings for my partner have matured and grown with time, as we have faced various adversities and problems together, from the every day stuff like fixing leaky plumbing or facing financial challenges, to the serious issues such as loosing loved ones and health problems. Three years ago, I believed we already knew what we were getting into and that we each knew each other as well as could be, however now, today, I know that wasn’t true, and that a couple cannot be really said to be one unit, until some time has passed and they have truly learnt what it means to share one world together.

Phew that was some rant! This is what comes out of having no internet for seven days! Lol, jokes apart – during this week, I fully realized that I am really happy to be at this point in my life, and that I want nothing more from my love-life, except for it to remain exactly as it is.

Just perfect.

Mini-break in Sicily – Day 4 – Mount Etna!

My short mini-break ended with a bang – in more ways than one.

First of all, we had planned this day to be the climax of the trip. We had booked a Jeep ride up Mount Etna, and were very fortunate in that, even though generally such a tour caters for 6-8 people, since it was December there wasn’t a high demand at this time of year, and the private tour was just that – private, meaning that we were to be the only two people with the guide!

That was very fortunate considering the fact that in the middle of the night, I had woken up suffering from sciatica. My back was really killing me and I had seriously thought about not going up Mount Etna at all. My condition was so chronic that my whole left side, starting from my lower back down to my left leg, was totally frozen and very painful. I could hardly walk. Which is why being alone with the guide helped a lot, as he could keep a slower pace, while also helping my boyfriend aid me walk.

As you’ve probably realized, even though I was feeling awful, I still went up the mountain! I couldn’t miss such an opportunity which might never come again!

After we met our guide and explained my situation, we started driving up the mountain while we joked, talked, and learned about it’s history and volcanic formation. There have been various eruptions and lava flows, which created a multitude of craters, caves and rock formations over the years all around Mount Etna. In fact, on the way we stopped to admire just such a crater. The red soil, which once had been lava, was truly beautiful. The colors deepened and changed depending on how many years had gone by since the eruption. I did not know this, but the guide told us that even though during the first few years, the earth where lava flowed was arid, afterwards it actually became more fertile than normal and it led to the cultivation of certain plants and trees, which were very special. If, for example, one was to plant fruit trees, these would produce fruits much redder in color than usual, and with a particularly strong flavor and taste. There was quite a market for this kind of produce.

Afterwards, we continued our journey up Mount Etna. I could actually see the fuming craters even from far off, and I was so excited as they kept getting closer and closer! The weather was quite warm and the sun was shining, it was all so amazing and I was really glad I hadn’t cancelled the trip, even though my pain did not abate during it.

At last, we arrived at the visitor’s center which is almost at the top of the Mountain. We stopped and walked around, that is, I tried to walk while leaning on my boyfriend. The panoramic views were more than worth the pain!! I found out that our guide was also quite a spiritual person, in that he believed in the pull of the earth and that certain points of the land are special, which I do too. Mother Earth is truly a force to be reckoned with.

We also went down into a cave which had been naturally formed and excavated with the passage of the lava-flow. There are many like it around the volcano.

Lastly, the guide took us for a short walk on the other side of the mountain, through a dense and beautiful forest that had sprung up in the wake of the oldest eruption. We had to climb up some rough terrain, which was not easy for me without the use of my left leg, however I had the help of two strong burly men (my bf and the guide), so I managed wonderfully. Again, the panoramic views of the other side of the mountain, and the small villages and towns of Sicily which one could admire in the distance, were more than worth it.

In the evening, we went to eat at, I admit, one of the tastier and most delicious places I’ve been to in my life. This was an agritourism – a farm where they served very fresh, traditional and typical food of the region, all of it produced and cultivated by the family who took care of the restaurant themselves!

I am just so in love with Sicilian food! In my opinion it is the best cuisine in the world! And the portions… phew!!!

P.S My sciatica did not get any better by the way. When we got back home, I had to take a week off sick from work and stay in bed for days before I could walk without wincing.

Mini-Break in Sicily – Day 1

We were quite lucky this December as Thursday 8th and Tuesday 13th, which are Maltese national holidays, made it possible for us to take a 6-day break from work without taking too many days off. Since people don’t work during National Holidays we just needed to take Friday 9th and Monday 12th as Vacation Leave off from work and off we went for a 4-night mini break to the nearby island of Sicily!

Thanks to Ryanair the flight was only 30euro each – yes with the return flight included! And we only needed hand luggage for those few days so we didn’t even need to pay for extra luggage.

I just love Sicily. Had already visited twice, once during the first year with my boyfriend (it was our first holiday together) and the second time was just last June! Thing is flights there are so cheap and there is so much to see and experience that I never tire of going there to relax and explore!

We usually take the flight to the Airport in Trapani and stay in the Western side of Sicily. This time we took a flight to the Airport of Catania on the Eastern part of the island instead so we visited an entirely different region.

The flight from Malta only took 35 minutes – yes we are THAT close! We arrived in the afternoon and there was enough time to visit the Christmas market in Catania itself before heading to the self catering apartment we had rented in the historical city of Noto, which is approximately an hour away by car from Catania.

I admit, the Christmas open market was smaller than I thought it would be, yet its charm was that everything was handmade and so very cute and original! Loved those stalls!

After a quick trip to a local supermarket for milk, cereal and other needful things, off we went to discover our new apartment which we had only seen in photos. Needless to be said we were charmed – wouldn’t you be? Look at my pics!

That night we decided on a quite eve in. We wanted to enjoy some time alone plus the excitement had tired us out. We cooked some burgers and chips and cuddled while planning what to do on day Number 2… not to mention enjoying that big TV!

More about Day 2 in a future post!

Different but Exciting!

So, here I am again on the brink of another adventure. In another two hours I will be on a plane off to the Italian island of Sicily for a much needed break. Goodbye stressful everyday life, hello sunny beach, ancient ruins, beautiful nature reserves and mysterious mystic monasteries!

This holiday will be a bit different from the ones I usually enjoy with my other half. This is because, for once, it will be a SUMMER holiday. Usually we tend to travel more during Autumn/Winter because, let’s face it, travelling and accomodation rates are cheaper at that time of the year. This will also be the first time I will be swimming abroad! Sure, it will still be the Mediterranean sea… and yet, I still feel as excited as a ten year old!

Yes, we still plan on visiting cultural sites (I just love walking amidst hundred year old ruins) BUT the apartment I booked is located just up the road from two major beaches – so we will definitely be using that swimwear too!

That’s another first by the way – usually my bf books for everything (no need for any feminists here to get on their high horses yet – we DO split the costs ofc). However THIS time the flight to Sicily itself + the apartment we are staying in were found and booked by me, as this was a birthday gift for my bf. His bday was last May, but it was nice giving him the printed bookings in his bday card and telling him we had another travelling adventure to look forward to this year. The next one, I admit, will be bigger and better – we’ll be going for a ten-day trip to Scotland next September.

Four holidays abroad in 1 year – not bad for someone who has just bought and re-furbished a house if I may say so! *feels proud of her monetary-management skills*

Ok, no more patting myself on the back! To be sure, my bf/bae has gifted me with a number of voyages to unknown (for me) countries too, so I just took a leaf out of his book, so to speak.

Anyways, I plan on sunbathing, swimming, taking lots of pics, sampling the local food/drinks, and generally rocking it all the way! It’s not the first time we went to Sicily, in fact our first holiday togather, 4 years ago, was in Sicily. Ahh the memories… well the only thing better than having amazing memories is making new ones! So… on we go!

By the way – the pics I pasted on here are from our first trip to Sicily – obviously it’s Winter too haha, so I bet the next photos I take will be quite more colorful!

 

Am I becoming Boring? :-(

Right now, the primary objective of my life seems to be that of building our nest.

Nest-building can be lots of fun, particularly if you share your thoughts, ideas, exploration of different stores, and purchases, with a willing and enthusiastic partner. Unfortunately, my loving and erstwhile adorable boyfriend, doesn’t seem to be that much into it. Again and again I try to involve him, but he only seems interested in taking breaks and wandering behind me in shops, as though I was dragging him along with an invisible leash.

Terrible analogy. I love the guy to bits, and I admit part of me understands why he cannot be bothered with hours of searching on ebay for curtain fabric, but it really has to be done right?

Are all straight men like that or am I doing something wrong?

Anyways, I admit lately I’m a bit of a broken record. As soon as I start taking care of something, I hardly think about anything else. Right now it’s curtains. I’m trying to find curtains for every balcony and window in our house – which is like 14 different ones. I measured all the apertures with and without rods (and here he did help me, after I asked for like 4 times), read a number of sites on different curtain styles, meandered through (it seems) HUNDREDS of websites searching for particular colors and textures, and still found NOTHING.

Gods, why are curtains so expensive? Why is it so expensive to buy the material and get a seamstress to work on it? I do not know how to sew unfortunately, so I have two alternatives. Either buy ready-made curtains or find a seamstress. Ready made curtains are expensive and obviously you have to settle for whatever you find which fits your windows/balcony doors. Purchasing fabrics yourself gives you a far bigger range, but is obviously more expensive. You must also wait more for the finished product since the seamstress would still have to work on it.

As such, I think at this point I’m going to see what ready-made curtains I find. The problem is that apparently no one has the colors needed. Another issue is that the height of the curtains I’m finding ready-made is not the height I need, so I will still  need to find someone to do alterations. At the moment I’m hoping to find a store which does its own alterations, and move on from there.

Stressssssssssssssss…

Godsssss, can’t believe I’m spending so much time and energy thinking about curtains!!! I wish I could just toss it all to hell and sit down with my PS3. Am I the most boring person ever?

WHAT HAVE I BECOME?!?!?!

Gozo – The Good, the Bad, and the Overpriced

Last Friday was a public feast in Malta, and as we had planned some time ago, me, my friends, and of course my bf, decided to spend three nights (starting Thursday evening) relaxing togather in a rustic farmhouse on the island of Gozo.

For those who are not aware of it, Malta is actually made up of three main islands, Malta, Gozo and Comino, and most Maltese view Gozo not only as a sister-island, but also as a place for them to relax and spend their holidays. The island of Gozo itself has a specific market to cater for young people, couples and families who are looking for cheap or un-expensive accomodation and services, so it is kind of a win-win situation.

Gozo is beautiful. The flora and fauna are exactly like those of Malta, however it is a cleaner, less traffic-polluted and greener version of Malta. It is also more sparsely populated, so even though it is much smaller than the main island, one can visit beaches which are more beautiful, more scenic picnic locations, not to mention eat fresher food.

On the other hand, unfortunately, many natives of the island, being aware of the fact that not only people from different countries, but Maltese people themselves, love to visit Gozo for short weekend-breaks, for these reasons, tend to over-do it. The farmhouse we stayed in this weekend was very beautiful, the kitchen was very well stocked with all needed utensils and everything was very clean. The pool was a bit small, but that was ok since not all of us swam anyways as the weather is still not warm enough for everyone.

The issues started to crop up when it came to money. First of all, when my bf booked a couple of months ago, the browser suddenly got stuck as he was clicking the booking dates section and the wrong dates were booked. He called the owner of the farmhouse immediately, since we could not make it on those dates, not to mention the fact that the price was a lot more expensive than the dates we truly wanted to go in. The owner refused to cancel the booking, even though this was a genuine mistake due to the browser not working properly. In the end and after a week of trying to come to some sort of terms, the owner let us change the dates instead of cancelling them, however we still had to go three weeks before the dates we had actually wanted, due to the rates (which is why half of the people could not use the pool). Apart from that, there was a 100-euro damage protection money charge, and that was fine. The thing is, when we arrived to the farmhouse four days ago, the owner seemed convinced that we had NOT yet paid the damage-money, which, he stated, was 300 euros. OFC we had already payed… and he had told us it was 100 euros and not 300! Thank all the gods my boyfriend had saved the email and banking proof of our payment, and since we had our laptop with us, we could show that as proof. So, not only was the owner unhelpful when it came to booking, but he also tried to rob us…

Moving on, the farmhouse was not cheap and due to the booking mistake, we also ended up paying more than we bargained for, for different dates. Moreover, when we arrived we realized that while in the living room and kitchen downstairs, electricity and water heating worked normally, in the bedrooms and corridors upstairs, apart from the main ceiling bulbs, other electricity outlets like bedside lights, electricity plug-ins, and other outlets where one could plug things like hair-dryers, etc, did not work! That is, they did not work for free. You had to put two euros in a slot for these to work, and they would only work for a limited amount of time, and not for the whole hour. Same thing with the water heaters in the showers!! Unbelievable!

Currently there’s been an issue mentioned on the media that Gozitans were becoming irritated because tourism in Gozo was diminishing due to low cost airlines, as people from Malta were preferring to go to Italy, Spain, France, UK, or other locations, instead of going to Gozo. Well, I can well understand that!! A couple of years ago I went for a long weekend break in Sicily for just 30 euros, including the return flight!! We found a really good and non-expensive hotel and the whole thing (minus the rental car) was as expensive as four days in Gozo would have been!

So, would I prefer to spend the same amount of money to go somewhere I have already been to four or five times each year starting from my childhood, or another country where I could explore new places and where water heating was included in the accomodation price…? I don’t need to tell you my answer do I??

Breaking the Office with Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

It was another irritatingly stifling day at the office. Issues kept being thrown at me one after the other, until I felt like I was on the brink of exploding. My bitchy (not to mention wanna-be poshy but actually totally chav) room-mate (I refuse to use the work collegue, since she comes in late, leaves early, and hardly actually DOES anything) was her usual hypocritical self, and I didn’t even have anything to eat during lunch time.

So, I grabbed my copy of ‘Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children’ and headed off to some alone-time in the sun during my 15-minute long office break. There was actually hardly any sun at all. It was one of those strange days when the air is chilly, the sky is in semi-darkness, and the sunshine keeps playing peek-a-boo with the romantically-fantastic clouds.

I had read ‘Miss Peregrine…’ before, however since I’ve just bought its sequel ‘Hollow City’, I’ve decided to re-read it before moving on to it.

I must say that the presentation of the novel itself must have attracted quite a number of readers. I know that it attracted me. I don’t usually go for books with pictures in them, but the black and white daguerreotypes really caught my attention. Perhaps that was the main reason why out of a myriad of other interesting-sounding books, I actually bought this one.

That being said, the plot is quite original and interesting, giving a take on WW2 from a supernatural angle. Not that it goes into much detail about the war itself (thank all the Gods), however it IS portrayed to the extent as to how it touches the lives of many of the characters involved.

The characters are believable, though not particularly deep, and the baddies are… well… baddies. They could have been more fully-fledged and the ‘monster’ part seemed a bit childish to be honest, however later on in the book we are given an explanation about that, and I hope that this will be more in detail in the second book.

I read this book months before it was announced that Tim Burton was to make a movie out of it – and you can imagine my euphoria. It’s just PERFECT for his style. Hope he makes it more ‘creepy’ and less ‘children’s movie’.

We have a long wait though, since production is to start in mid-2015, and MAYBE the film will be out by 2016.

The only sure thing is that they have cast Eva Green as Miss Peregrine, and while I had imagined her as being older, I really think she’s PERFECT for the part!!