the long awaited return!

eeek. i didn't realize i havent posted in almost two months! my life is chaotic. good chaotic. its structured but far from being normal and routinely. do you ever look at someone's workspace and you can't seem to understand how they find anything under piles of papers, post-it notes, and folders? but the owner of said workspace knows exactly where everything this? if you take out workspace and replace it with life, and replace piles of papers/post-it notes/folders with job, bills, everyday occurrences, then thats my life. everything seems to be in piles of mess, but to me, i have it all under control.


in two months time, i quit my retail job, i accepted and started a welcome.back.to.corporate.america job, escaped for ten days to the wonderful countries of greece and italy, got in a car accident, and returned to philly for quite the adventurous halloween. oh- i also booked a trip to san francisco for mid-january! phew. its been an extraordinary 60 days.


lets start back from the beginning. quitting retail and going back to corporate america. i completely missed having a desk job. i missed checking my work emails, i missed sitting in front of the computer surfing the web, most importantly, i missed the high of doing actual work. im coming into my job very nicely. my boss is really great to work for, and im getting the hang of things. its completely different from what i was so used to doing, but i like it. i can tell in my disposition that im in a happier place. it really changes things when you work for a company where there employees actually like what theyre doing and like the company.

europe vacay= AMAZING. i dont even know how to describe my experience other than breathtakingly wonderful. of all the places i have travelled to, greece is hands down my favorite destination. i have always wanted to go to greece and walk along the white-washed buildings and sidewalks and to actually be there, and it being tangible, it was like a dream. every time i flip through my pictures, i can picture that moment the picture was taken and its like me going to my happy place.

i recently got back from a trip to my favorite city, philadelphia! i was able to catch up and see so many friends. on the way there, i got into a little accident. my first real accident. it somewhat affected my mood for the rest of the weekend, but i still had a great time. i missed being in philly so much. i love the familiarity and knowing where to go, where to eat, where to see your friends. my good friend came down from ithaca, who i have an absolutely fun time with no matter what, and we had a very adventurous halloween! from getting ready, being nuts at the bar, to smashing bottles, to calling the po-po, it was a great way to end the month of october before all the holiday season craziness begins.

i do have a quite a few things to look forward to in the upcoming months. im going to go home to florida for thanksgiving. we will be driving down with einy and meeting my parents and the rest of my family once we get there. i have no idea what i will be doing for christmas, but i know, i absolutely cannot take off work :/ one thing that sucks about starting a new job, no vacation time yet. but come january, i will be heading out west for one of the best reunions in san francisco!!

this year has flown by ridiculously fast. i feel like i have changed so much and had to make some tough decisions. i honestly wouldn't have changed a thing! (well, maybe my single status)

*** edit: i dont think my recap did any justice to how wonderful my europe trip truly was. i found this email broken down by day i wrote to jenn, when i returned from my trip***

Day 1:Arrive in Athens after a 9hr plane ride where only 2 hrs of sleep was used. Metro from airport to hotel, walk 200meters, sweating and lugging luggage up the metro stairs and through cobble streets.Check in to hotel, quick change and head to lunch and visit the Acropolis. Acropolis is the area that is composed of the Parthenon (the building where my default facebook pic), the Temple of Zeus, an amphitheater, and all of these other structures. Breathtaking!!!!! In complete awe of the views of Athens and to actually see the remains of the structures. Go back to hotel and shower (finally!) and head out to dinner. Stroll around the different city squares and drink Mythos beer. They sold their beers in so many different stands in stores and throughout the streets, and it was 500ml and only 1.50Euros!!

Day 2:Visit other parts of the Acropolis that we missed, see the port of Athens, visit the the 2004 Olympic games stadium, and visit the Olympic stadium that was used hundreds of years ago. Visiting the 2004 Olympic games stadium was really really depressing. It was not kept up and there was graffiti all over. It was desolate and bare and the buildings still remained by everything that was white was either an old yellow or a gray color. I couldn't believe all the money that was put into the construction of the area was just gone to waste and no one uses the facilities anymore.

Day 3:Fly from Athens to Santorini. It was a 30 min. flight and I had never been so excited to leave Athens! Athens is def. a place where you only need a day, and that's more than plenty. Santorini is one of the Greek islands made up of small regions, Oia, Ia, Fira, Firastefania and the East side of the region is the beaches and vineyards. We stayed in Fira which is the city capital. We arrived around lunchtime and walked around Fira and took the bus to Oia which is the northern part of Santorini, where every guide book tells you this is the place to watch the sunset and its a must-see/do. Also, Oia is the place where whenever you see pictures of Santorini with the white buildings/sidewalks and blue roofs. We sat on this old fort structure, and sat up on the edge and watched the sunset for over 2 hrs! It was really pretty and there were so many people crowded around to watch the sunset. It was also pretty breathtaking to be on the edge of the island basically and looking at all of the different towns of Santorini and all the white buildings and surrounding islands.

Day 4:One of my top favorite days of the trip. We did a 6 hour boat ride around the island of Santorini. We started the day by climbing down over 600 steps of Fira to get down to the port, where this is where all the donkeys are kept and there is donkey poo everywhere! I gagged a few times going down, lol. But once we got down to the port, we went on our boat ride, and the first stop was a volcano. We hiked/sprinted up to the top, (our tour guide was insane!! and hot, lol) and my legs were seriously sore 2 days after that. But once we finally got to the top, there were panoramic views of santorini and the other islands. I can't even tell you how beautiful it was. We really lucked out the entire trip because everyday was sunny and the blue skies and the blue seas were a blue color I never saw before. So, after the volcano, we went to the thermal springs. We couldn't really dock at the thermal springs because of all of the rocks, so they anchored the boat, and you jumped off the boat into the Aegean Sea!!!!! I was nervous at first bc the guide kept repeating as a precaution that it was really deep (duh) and that you had to swim to the thermal springs. So I jumped in and swam and it was wonderful! The thermal springs was nice, it was a a gold/brown/red color and really rocky. We swam back to the boat and headed to another island. Here we ate lunch and swam again in the Aegean Sea. This was really neat because you're basically in the middle of the water with mountains surrounding you. Also, there aren't like sand or like walking areas to get into the water. You basically have to jump/swim in from the boat/dock. When we got back to Fira, instead of walking back up the 600+ stairs, you can either take a donkey up or a cable car. So, when else would you ever ride a donkey??? So we took the donkey up which was pretty frightening and scary at the same time. The donkeys would turn the curb right next to the edge of the cliff, which was the terrifying part and the fact that you're going so high up!

Day 5:We sadly left Santorini and flew into Rome. From Rome we caught a train to Florence. Once we arrive in Florence, we went to all of the different Piazzas (squares).

Day 6:We went to the Academia Museum to see Michaelangelo's David. We walked around the rest of Florence and that afternoon we did a tour. This is my second favorite part of the trip. We did a 5 hour tour in the Tuscany hillside and went to the Chianti region. Here is where we went to an old fort that turned into a castle and was a winery and an olive oil maker. The tour was really fun and the tour guide of the winery was one of the inhabitants of the castle. We tasted a few different wines and had a few appetizers and tasted their olive oil too. It was beautiful being in the Tuscany hillside and seeing all of the different vineyards and olive trees.

Day 7:We left Florence and took the train back to Rome. Once settled into our hotel, we walked all over the city and stumbled upon most of the sites without even meaning to go there. So we saw the spanish steps, the trevi fountain, the pantheon and other sites

Day 8:We did a semi-private group tour of the vatican and saw the sistine chapel, then we went to the coliseum and then the roman forum and all that jazz.

Day 9:We were all wearing thin, and was at our end of all the sightseeing, and slept in, had a lunch, came back to the hotel, slept some more then, went back out to dinner.

Day 10:Flew home!

As I reread this, I got so nostalgic of the trip. I think an international travel once a year is defnitely a must. Next on my list, Prague, Vienna, Barcelona!