| new blog |
[Nov. 3rd, 2008|04:38 pm] |
|
If anyone still checks this thing, I've started a new blog: lauren-christina.blogspot.com. So far there's one post, about my trip to Thailand. Should be more to come. |
|
|
| Turkey |
[Jan. 13th, 2008|06:55 pm] |
So I've been thinking that I should write something about Turkey for whoever still reads this thing, but I haven't gotten around to it. Also, I don't quite know what to say. People ask me about it, and I respond with, "What exactly do you want me to talk about?" But I will try. Pictures are on facebook, and so they might be a little more descriptive.
The trip was the first time I'd ever flown alone. And it was a little scary. I was convinced I was going to be stuck in Detroit for the night, but they held the plane for some people and I made it to Germany. Then I couldn't find people who spoke English or knew what was going on in the Dusseldorf airport, so that was scary too. But I made it, and so did my luggage, so that was impressive. The trip home was relatively uneventful. Thankfully. But I still find flying alone to be stressful.
I got to Turkey the day after my parents moved there. We stayed at the Hilton until the last 2 days I was there. I wish we could have moved into the apartment sooner. Their place is really nice and has a fabulous view! And of course, it's much roomier. But I think we were the entertainment for the employees, as we often brought strange things in and out.
I think most of my time was spent eating. I really miss my doner kebabs. Why don't Americans eat more lamb? I was also a huge fan of the pide. And really almost every meal I had was delicious.
I spent a lot of time helping my parents with shopping and errand kind of things. But it was all very interesting. You can actually communicate some things pretty well without speaking the same language. It's kind of amazing. But other times you end up having the telephone man come back the next day instead of turning the thing on. Still not sure what happened there.
All the people there seemed so friendly and hospitable. I loved that.
Ankara (the city I was in) is very westernized. There are definitely lots of little cultural differences, but I think people assume Turkey is much different culturally than it is. I'm not sure that sentence made sense. But I occasionally found myself forgeting what country I was in. I felt very comfortable and at home there, except for the weather.
But I got to see snow, and I built my first snowman out of actual snow! So that was super exciting!
Driving is interesting, as traffic laws are really more like guidelines. Only my dad actually drove, but I think I understand how it works: If no one is coming, go ahead and turn left on red. If you want to park in the road, go for it. Then of course, you can drive in two lanes to get past all those cars that just parked in the road. Or really for no reason at all. And honk your horn whenever possible.
I got to hang out with Wendi some, and that was awesome! We went to see folk dancing and we went shopping and we spent New Year's with some of her friends. So much fun! Oh, and we made cookies and learned how to blanch almonds. It's not as exciting as it sounds.
I am a huge fan of Turkish pop music. I watched a lot of music videos at the hotel. I like watching foreign tv. And I like figuring out the commercials, which actually convinced me to buy some of those round things with chocolate in the middle. I am a nerd. We went to see Enchanted on Christmas (in English, with Turkish subtitles). You pick your seat when you buy the ticket. And there's a random intermission.
I didn't get to go anywhere else in the country, but I'm hoping to go back in May and see the family and some new places. So hopefully I will find a job that doesn't make me start as soon as I graduate. I wish I could just travel the world all the time, but something tells me I need a job to afford to travel. So I'm looking for a job in a fun place that gives enough vacation/holidays to go somewhere every once in awhile. I have a phone interview Tuesday, so we'll see how that goes.
But for now it's back to life in Gainesville. Back to classes and homework and errands and life. But I have an awesome schedule. At least for now, I might be working a few hours a week soon (for the people I interned for, but for actual money). This is my last semester, so I've had this mentality of having lots of fun and doing all the things I won't be able to do all the time when I have a full time job and stuff. But not only have I gotten a little behind on some stuff, I think I've just kinda worn myself out. So now I want to start sleeping more than 6 hours a night. But I really do want to have a lot of fun this semester. And if I still have long weekends after this job thing gets figured out, I want to make some road trips and stuff like that. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Nov. 18th, 2007|12:32 am] |
football games and gameday atmosphere and basketball games make me not want to graduate. i'm going to miss days like today a lot.
however, i'm sure the amount of studying and working on projects i have to do tomorrow will be enough to make me want to be done asap... |
|
|
| change |
[Oct. 8th, 2007|11:45 pm] |
for anyone who doesn't know, my parents are moving to turkey. in either december or january. i'm hoping december, so i can go over there for christmas break, but that's probably pretty selfish of me. anyways, my parents are going to turkey for 2 years. it's pretty crazy. and exciting. i plan to do some visiting, or maybe meeting them in europe or somewhere. yay travel. hehe. and they'll be in the same city as my friend wendi, so i'm hoping to see her too. and they get cool stuff that boeing's paying for. actually, i'm a tad jealous. but i get to "babysit" that little two-seat convertible while their gone. oh yeah. :-)
i talked to my advisor today to make sure one of my classes counts toward graduation, and it does, so i really am graduating in may (assuming i don't fail any classes). so that's good. i'm starting some job applications. i think i may move to washington dc. or possibly los angeles. or atlanta. we'll see. i'm excited. until recently i was super scared of leaving uf/gainesville, but now i'm getting bored with school, and i'm just really ready for something completely different.
maybe i just don't want to be the only one standing still. my family is moving the the other side of the world. i've got some friends who recently moved overseas or who might after this year. i've got friends getting married and having kids. (sidenote: i'm really glad that's not me right now.) it just seems like this is a season for change. and i might not feel this way in a couple months when everything hits me, but right now i'm actually not scared of it. |
|
|
| life... |
[Sep. 17th, 2007|12:11 am] |
i think i'm coming down with senioritis. i'm in this weird place right now where i'm just so tired of school but i'm not yet ready to move on. i'm tired of studying and tests and stupid professors who don't respond to emails or phone calls. and as much as i love life here, i feel like i'm getting in such a rut. but i'm so scared of leaving, of joining the real world, of being a responsible adult. and i'm just not sure what i want to do with "the rest of my life." although i've decided i'm going to stop worrying about what to do with my life. i'm just going to try to figure out what to do for the next year or two.
lately i feel like i have a lot of friends who know me really well, and yet none of them truly understand me. maybe i'm just in a weird mood.
i <3 gator football. |
|
|
| la Republica Dominicana |
[Aug. 20th, 2007|08:59 pm] |
so i figure i'll make an entry about my vacation to the dr last week. if you don't want to read it, fine, because if i see you i'll probably tell you all about it anyways. lol. oh, and there are a few pics on facebook.
so we left last sunday really early in the morning. flew to atl. met up with my aunt and uncle there. flew to puerto plata. short trip, less than 3 hrs from atl, which seems super short considering my last two trips were to europe. so anyway, got there, had the taxi stop by a supermercado on the way to the hotel (the only supermercado that was like what we consider a supermarket), got to the hotel in cabarete, got our room keys, took pictures of the place, hung out at the pool, went out to dinner, etc.
monday morning my dad and i ventured out to find a couple supermercados for breakfast and later lunch stuff. lol. it was actually fun to walk around the place. in the afternoon we planned some tours with iguana mama for wed, thurs, and fri (more- much, much more- on that later). then we went out to dinner. and watched csi miami with subtitles or latin american idol or something. tv was the general evening activity. law and order with subtitles was also good. and one night my mom and i watched beerfest dubbed in spanish. that was interesting. moving on...
tuesday morning we just layed out by the beach and did some swimming in the pool. in the afternoon my parents and i went to see the cabarete caves. to get there we got to venture off the main street and go down a road with lots of the locals, which was neat. we got to go in some caves. with flashlights. unlike in the states, they let you touch the stalagtite things, have no railings or anything, and let you go swimming in one of the caves. the water was cold. but it was a cool experience. since it was the slow season for tourism there, we got our own tour, so we had some fun talking with the guide. in the evening we went to dinner at a restaurant on that same road that had typical dominican food. it was awesome.
wednesday we went on a catamaran snorkling trip thing. so much fun. it was beautiful out! did some snorking, watched the crew play steel drums, danced on the boat, drank some rum punch, got a bit of a sunburn. good times.
thursday. wow. ok, so my mom had been talking for months about this cascading thing she saw on the internet. but somehow, she ended up backing out, and my dad and i went. and we didn't really know exactly what we had signed up for. lol. so we drive up into the mountains. it's me, my dad, some guy from scotland who's in the royal british navy, a guy from austria and his son, and five guides. we got some wetsuits and helmets. drove a little further. first you have to go down the side of the mountain. and this is a steep, wet, slippery mountain. after i fell down twice the guides learned that they had to help me a lot. lol. so then we climb around on rocks and such. there were three big waterfalls, like 40 feet high, that we jumped off of. one of them had a big rock you had to jump out to avoid hitting. as i said before, you can do things there they don't do in the sates. the jumping was fun. the climbing and hiking were hard. the guides were pretty much all helping me the whole time. and they were talking about me. in spanish. i couldn't understand what they were saying. but i understand the words mujer and muchacha, and i was the only female out there. lol. then at the end, we had to climb back up the steep, wet, slippery mountain. i was basically being dragged up by one of the guides. seriously. there were times i was wondering if i was going to make it up to the top. then my dad and i and the austrians got on donkeys to go up the rest of the way. i was so glad we paid extra for the donkeys. while i was on my donkey, one of the guides, geraldome, the one who pulled me up the mountain, was talking to me some, in english. he found a guava and gave it to me, which was tasty. then, in spanish, he asked me if i had a boyfriend, told me i was beautiful, and said he needs a girlfriend and he gets cold at night. hahaha. so yeah, i got asked out by a dominican. it was somewhat flattering, but i declined.
friday we hiked up mount isabel de torres in puerto plata. as if thursday wasn't a hike up a mountain. my legs were already so sore. but anyway. the hike. the hike we went on because we thought my aunt and uncle would enjoy it. by the way, my aunt and uncle were complaining the whole trip. about the heat (it felt cooler than fl), the occasional loss of electricity, blah, blah, blah. anyways, my uncle starts not feeling well and is slowing us down. we had two guides. the new guide, carlos, took me and my parents on, while the other guide, junior, stayed with my aunt and uncle. carlos got us lost and had us climbing up this steep thing, holding onto roots. then junior yelled at him, and we had to go back down that steep part. oh well. we eventually made it to the top. it was like a 4 hour hike or something. got some lunch at the restaurant on top. at some poing junior ran up and bought some water, and went back down to jane and phil. eventually they made it to the top and got some lunch too. aparently my uncle thought he was going to die of heat stroke on the mountain. craziness. so we looked around a little, took pictures of the statue that looks like the one in rio, and took the cable car down (since we did the half day hike, thankfully).
hmm... saturday we just hung around the beach and the pool and whatnot. it was pretty much a lazy day. but a good one. in the evening we got some rain, the outskirts of the hurricane a ways south of the DR (we were on the north side of the island). but you wouldn't have known it was from a hurricane if it hadn't been on the news.
sunday we unfortunately had to leave. or fortunately if you talk to my aunt and uncle. probably sounds like we were at two different places.
i really wished we'd had some more time there. i would have liked to see some of puerto plata (besides the mountain) and some other surrounding areas. oh well. such is life.
back to gville tomorrow. my week and a half of summer is about up. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Aug. 7th, 2007|09:28 pm] |
i figure it's time for another random update on my life.
i've started moving into my new apartment cuz jenn got her key early. i get my key tomorrow, so i'll be moving the rest of the stuff over and cleaning this apartment so i won't have to pay any fees. and hopefully getting pretty much all moved in. it's annoying, and yet kind of exciting. my bedroom will be bigger, my bathroom and closet will be smaller. things like that.
i just took my final for financial accounting. i really don't know how well i did. all i care about at this point is that i'm done.
so i've been working at this internship all summer. you know, 28 hours a week for no money so i can put something on my resume and get a job when i graduate. well, my professor/advisor that's supposed to give me credit isn't responding to me or my manager. so basically i don't know what i have to turn it in or when or where to turn it in. and the semester ends friday. so i'm pretty much screwed. i'm just hoping it's something that can be adjusted later since i really don't think there's anything i can do about it. but on the plus side, i'm only going into work all day thurs and fri afternoon and then i'm done.
i have a new camera! temporarily, kind of. i get to use it this week to play with it. and then next week so we have good pics of the dr. and then i have to give it back to my mom until i earn the rest of my points. but for now, i'm happy. and it's cute and pink. hehe.
i'm super excited about vacation next week, and pretty excited about the beginning of the fall semester too.
i think i need to make a list of things to do before i graduate. hmm... |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jul. 8th, 2007|08:53 pm] |
from time to time i feel the need to write something. let's see if i can think of anything exciting since my last meaningless update. probably not.
i went to niceville for a few days a couple weeks ago. it wasn't too bad because i wasn't there long. kendra came with me and provided some company. i got to see my parents, play with danny, act obnoxious at tgi friday's, go to a party at kacy's house, go to the beach, and see pirates 3. yeah, that's about it. somewhat fun, but i'm glad it was short.
i came back here for summer b kickoff stuff with gcl. handed out some free raspberry white tea (it's what pepsi gave us for free), made some phone calls, went to a game night, helped freshmen find their classes, played frisbee in the rain... the usual. fun, but somewhat exhausting. i'm really bad with meeting new people. seriously. it stresses me out.
besides going to work and class, last week involved fireworks on the 3rd (why are gville fireworks on the 3rd?) and tubing down the itchetucknee on the 4th. cool stuff, except for the rainy weather and such. oh well.
we had no new people at homegroup last week, which was rather disappointing. i'm trying not to get discouraged by it though. God is in control of the future of flu. and there's always fall. we have gotten to know one girl, lauren, who seems pretty awesome. (although when people say her name i always want to turn around.) and we've met a few people at church who might come sometime. we'll see.
friday night i went to gatornights and saw blades of glory again and watched some theatre strike force. yay free entertainment. and saturday we went to lake wauburg and did some kayaking. it was beautiful and a lot of fun. why don't we do that more often?
i've been living off of coke vanilla zero lately. (as i am still trying to get this camera from my mom.) i learned today that chipotle has fountain coke zero, but i had already ordered a water. next time...
i think i'm turning into too much of an introvert. i don't know what my problem is. but lately a lot of times i just don't want to do things with people. maybe it's from living alone. or maybe it's from hanging out with the same people all the time. or maybe it's just because i'm more busy. i don't know.
as much fun as it has been having the apartment to myself, sometimes i really miss jenn. i need someone who understands my laziness to complain to. haha. but seriously, i miss it.
5 more weeks of interning and financial accounting. then i get to go to the dominican republic for a week! i am so excited! hehe. and then in the fall, i don't have to be at class until 10:40! it's going to be so great. and it's going to be so fun hanging out with people who have been gone for the summer.
but i don't mean to complain. life's not bad. |
|
|
| random update |
[Jun. 24th, 2007|01:11 am] |
so i'm now 21. which is exciting because i can now legally buy alcoholic beverages. woohoo. but it depresses me when people tell me i'm an adult.
i got a B on my first financial accounting exam. i'm happy with that.
the summer is halfway over. cool. i guess.
i'm going to niceville tomorrow thru wednesday and kendra's coming with me. and i'm excited about kick-off stuff starting thursday. and i'm just so glad i don't have class and work this week. i need the break.
i got asked if i was my boss's wife on friday. awkward. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Jun. 8th, 2007|06:51 pm] |
so, apparently now livejournal tells you when people have birthdays and lets you send messages... seems somewhat like facebook... i'm scared.
anyway...
i'm in a really good mood right now because it's friday, i spent like 2 hours at work eating pizza and talking to my coworkers, i now have everything for my xmen costume for the superhero party tomorrow, and i got caught in a thunderstorm. yeah, strange, but i really enjoy a good thunderstorm sometimes.
moving on...
last weekend i went to niceville for angela's wedding. i really wasn't that excited about it. but it turned out to be a pretty fun weekend. i had a ton of fun at the wedding reception, eating and dancing and seeing people i haven't seen in years. good times. and saturday night i got to hang out with erica and her fiance and their families and stuff.
it's weird having friends who are married/engaged. i've been to a few weddings this year and last year for my friends, but it's really strange when it becomes someone you've known for like 10 years. but i guess i'm getting to that point in life. sometimes i worry i'm turning into a bitter old woman. and i'm not even 21! (not for 11 days, that is...)
in other news, my car got towed from my own apartment wednesday night. yeah, so when we switched tow companies, we got the little things that hang from the rear view mirror instead of the sticky things. at first i thought this was a good idea, as it won't leave nasty residue on my windshield. then it started falling down all the time when i make a turn or something. and so i'd have to hang it back up a lot. and then wednesday night i aparently didn't notice it had fallen. so i walk out to my car at 7:40 thurs morning to go to work, and it's not there. so i'm freaking out. i find the number for the tow company, but the guy on the phone can't tell me if it's there. so i call z and wake him up and have him take me to the tow company place. (i'm so glad he answered his phone and took me out there! i don't know what i'd have done otherwise!) so we get there, and it's closed. eventually the lady shows up, and i have to pay $75 to get my car back, and i'm 30 minutes late to work. so i now have tacky masking tape on my parking pass thingy so it'll stay up. ghetto.
ok, i guess that's it for now. i'm going to go watch scrubs because i've pretty much become an addict. |
|
|
| navigation |
| [ |
viewing |
| |
most recent entries |
] |
| [ |
go |
| |
earlier |
] |
| |
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1){kind=small}
crazychica22's journal