Birthday cake

Yesterday was my birthday!

So I baked myself a cake (filled with wild berries) and got up early to celebrate it with Rob before he went to work :-) I got all kinds of cool presents as well!

So, now I've officially started the 30th year of my life, or like Goni my friend told me on the phone yesterday: from now on you can start saying that your next birthday is your 30th.

scary!

I also spent the day shopping with a new cool friend that I met here lately- and we get along really well (always nice to meet ppl that understand what you want to say before you opened your mouth) and then went for Sushi after work. Was a really nice day!

So! till next time!

Autumn and some arts and crafts

Autumn. My first real one as an adult (since we lived in the states). I have to admit that I like the word "Fall" much better. It describes it so well. It's cold in this country. It's still not too cold for me- but when I look outside, or when I am outside- I realize that this is only the preview for winter. It's gonna get much colder. On the bright side- we already turned on the heating a bit at home. I like living in a house with good heating. It's such a relief. So here are pictures of what I see from our bedroom window nowadays:

Look at all these nice colors.
It's a shame they predict
a very long and deadly sleep.

In a few months all these trees will be naked,
and the scenery will look like
a black and white picture
(if we're lucky enough to have snow).

***

I got an old desk from Rob's parents- to use it for studying. It was painted green and it looked hmmm lets say- not so much to my taste... Rob and I scratched it till our hands almost fell off, and then I painted it with 3 layers of bright paint. You can still see the bits of green that we couldn't take off- but only if you really look closely. Here's a picture of the finished product:

I used Mosaic squares for the decoration.

So as you can see now I have my own corner to work on and sit next to. And study.... I have to study. German is not just hard. It's complicated and stupid. I must say that until now it's my least favorite language from the 5 I ever learned... Too many rules. Tomorrow I have a private lesson with my x-German teacher, she's so nice- I asked her if she is interested in giving me some grammar lessons before I start the next course.

***

It's Rob's birthday tomorrow. I'm going to bake him a cake in the oven his mom got him for his bday. Happy birthday sweety!

Happy birthday Blog!!!

I'm such a bad blogger, I didn't even realize that on September 2nd was the anniversary of my blog. It's been a year that I've been writing it. Sometimes I feel inspired and I write things that later I like reading again. Sometimes I feel like I'm writing just to write. Sometimes I write just to update you guys on my life, which sometimes comes out nice and sometimes I feel like words are better left unsaid. Anyway just wanted to mention this day (even though I'm late by almost a month). I wish for my blog to be more interesting, and exciting, more deep and insightful, funnier and more sensitive. May I always have the muse to write in you - my blog.

27

That's it. Yesterday I turned 27. Was a normal birthday, lunch with mom and my sis and aunt and Goni (had a really good burger!!!), and went out with my friends at night (drank a whole bottle of wine almost by myself...) and got the nicest present from Rob: tickets to the Arctic Monkeys concert!!! it's gonna be in Dresden and we're gonna go together!!! I was so touched... He wanted to give me something that I wouldn't have to carry back and forth between Germany and Israel- that's brilliant!!! I loved loved loved it, and I can't wait to go...

***

Have a ticket to Germany: July 5th, dad gave me miles to use, so I only had to pay for the taxes (which are pretty much, but a lot less than a whole ticket...) so it saves me a lot of money...
Everybody keeps asking me how I feel about going there, if I can't wait, or I kinda wanna stay here a bit more, and I must say, and that's what I answer: I can't wait. I'm gonna be back in Israel on August 20th, and I hope Rob gets a ticket to come here soon after that, we're planning on spending September here.

***

Charles and Ana left on Tuesday, I went to say bye and spent the whole day in Tel-Aviv with them. Was obviously so much fun! Beach, rest, restaurant... Hope to see them again soon, wouldn't mind doing that in Spain! ;-)

Long time no write

Haven't written in a while... Tell you the truth it's been kinda eventful here- even though I've been doing practically nothing... Met most of my friends here, saw most of the family, went over most of my stuff and threw away a lot of things. Gave lots of clothes and shoes to charity. While going over my closet I realized that there's so many things in it that I'll never wear again. That when you live in the same place all the time you just keep them for that once in a season you'll wear them. When you go away for so long- you realize that you've managed with a lot less than that. You tend to keep only the things you really like and need. So that's why I threw out so much of my stuff. I still have 3 drawers to go over, and some boxes in the storage room.

Two of my best friends (the ones that are married) are pregnant. I'm not sure I'm suppose to tell anyone about it- but hey- if they're not reading this (and they better!!!) then they'll never know... When the first one told me about it- I was so happy for her. I mean- it's so weird - but I am really happy for her. Today the second one told me. And of course- I am so so so happy for her. And with that happiness I think I got a bit sad. It took me a while to realize what was making me feel this sadness. And in the car it hit me: I'm not going to be here for them while the pregnancy. I might not even be here when their babies are born. Well to be honest I will probably not be here then coz I'm gonna be studying German in Dresden at the time. And births- as you all know are usually not very planned... I don't even know if I'll be able to be here close to when the babies are gonna be born. And then I realized that I will not be around much when they grow up. I know that these are "just" friends- but they are not "just" friends to me. I feel like I'm gonna be an aunt or something, not just a friend of the kid's parents. So this is really weird for me...

We're having a girls night tonight- celebrating Goni's birthday a month and a bit late. She waited for me to be here, and for the others to have some time to be alone with us on a private celebration. I invited them over here to my house- coz my mom's not here for a week, and my sis agreed happily to go spend the weekend with her boyfriend.

I still feel like I have to shake this weird feeling off of me.

Exhausted...

What a week! Woke up at 6:00AM everyday - it's so hard to get used to that... Took the metro for an hour every day to school (I change the lines twice every morning coz this way I usually have a seat on it- the line leaving from here is already full when I get on it- even though its only the 3rd stop!) Chinese ppl i tell ya... They love being crowded... They will just stand waiting for the train wherever they got to the platform from the stairs. They never walk on the platform towards the beginning of the train- and this way the first cars are usually a bit emptier. How stupid of them. School itself is actually really nice, I've made friends with a Spanish girl already, and the rest of the ppl in class are really nice. We're actually from all over the world: France, Switzerland, Indonesia, Russia, Spain, Colombia, Burundi, Canada, Sweden (originally from Iran and Hong Kong), Saudi Arabia... Really all over the world... I understand most of what they say in Chinese in class- maybe even more than the rest of the students - vocabulary wise, but the characters... I hate them!!! Why do I have to learn how to write the stupid things????? Wouldn't mind recognizing some but... Hate writing them. Really.

was a really busy week. There wasn't even one day that I came straight home from school. On Monday I decided to be the good housewife and cook a nice dinner for the both of us- celebrating the first day of school and first day at work. On Tuesday went to take Rob's passport from the visa place and then went to the market to buy some clothes. It was amazing: as soon as I stepped in the building I immediately remembered all the words I need to know in Chinese in order to buy in the market. All the colors names in Chinese came back to me, and all the other words that are very helpful when shopping... The market was crowded as usual, lots of ppl, lots of really ugly clothes- I really had to dig in to find something nice, the smells, the noise... But its still a nice experience...
on Thursday I went to the visa place again- this time for me- to get me the students visa (got all the papers from uni for that) and then went to a deli in a really fancy hotel with Lia the Spanish girl, to buy some nice (and very expensive) cheese...

yesterday was Rob's birthday. So on Wednesday I got him an i-pod as a present, and yesterday I prepared a little celebration for him when he got home from work: I made a pile of blueberry pancakes (don't have an oven- couldn't bake) and I decorated them with gummies and ice cream. I hung balloons in the house, lit up two candles (couldn't find birthday candles here) and put the present on the bed. It was really nice... We went for a foot massage in the evening and then went to a hot pot restaurant (its a restaurant where you sit next to a table that has a hole in it- to put a big pot in the middle - on fire. There's soup in the pot and you order all kinds of raw food like meet and vegetables to put in the soup and fish it out- so you can eat the soup or just the cooked food).

I'm really enjoying my first real weekend in a long time. I haven't been working in a while- so this week it was hard to get used to waking up everyday and having something to do. Its fun being a student again though. Kinda weird after more than 2 years that I wasn't a student.

today we're planning on going to eat dumplings in a restaurant I got a recommendation to. And tonight I'd really love to go out... Haven't gone out in Shanghai since I got here- and I really miss going out here... This city actually has a lot to offer...