Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Cheese

Often when my friends are coming for a visit from France, they ask me if I want them to bring me something. Like cheese for instance, we're French after all...

But who needs French cheese if you can have Kolibrie or Moulin Rouge brie instead?

Lots and nothing

Haven't blogged in a while... I have been busy with a lot of things even if I don't have much to blog about. Some of the things I have been doing:

• Hang out with Viviana and baby Laia
• Take the train to Stockholm (and back)
• Eat a lot of lussekatter (saffran buns) and pepparkakor (cinnamon and gingerbread cookies)
• Drink some glögg (mulled wine)
• Try to fix my shower stuff, not going too well... 
• Hang out with my best friend Sophie who was here for the week-end (was GREAT!)
• A bit of Christmas shopping and Christmas planning

That kind of stuff... 

Saveur de l'année

Look what I found at my local supermarket on Sunday? Some cherry tomatoes. What's so special about cherry tomatoes you might wonder... nothing special, it's true. But check the language on the packaging. Nothing wrong with a packaging in French, it's true. But you are in Sweden and you see those tomatoes. With a packaging in French. With a sticker saying it was voted "Saveur de l'année 2011" (2011's best flavour)... well that starts to be a little surreal, right? 

Green

November is usually the month of the year I like the least. You could go as far as saying I hate it since it brings the worst out of Gothneburg and Sweden's west coast. Grey, rain and wind... most often all at the same time. Doesn't sound too good, does it? 

Well, this year has proven me wrong! We have had an exceptionally good November with temperatures above normal (7-8 degrees today compared to -1 in Mexico City!) and a lot of sun. The good weather have given a feeling of a lot of light. A consequence of the sun and light is that the grass is still very green! Almost nuclear green sometimes. Unusual but I am not complaining. 

The photo below wasn't taken in November but in July and not in Sweden but in France. At home, on holidays. But it's still green, right? And it's nice so...enjoy!

Grès

Last March, I flew quite hastily to France for sad circumstances and I spent a few day in Paris and the champagne region. A few days before that I had read on the Internet about a fashion exhibition about Madame Grès in a sculpture museum. That could sound like a strange idea but when you see the dresses below you realize why this was a genius idea. 

So while I was in Paris, I went there with my mum and my aunt and fell in love with the dresses and Madame Grès' genius... I mean look at that! The dresses below were designed between the 50's and the 70's but could just as well have been shown at fashion week this year. They are so modern...

The orange one is from spring/summer 1977, the black one I don't know. The grey one is a spring/summer 1956 (!!!) collection and the red one on the left is a autumn/winter 1961-62 piece.

Anyone need a wedding dress? Personally there are a couple here above I could think of for my wedding (just need to find a hubby first but that's another question, hehe). 

And speaking of wedding, I just froze when I saw the red dress here below, an autumn/winter 1974-75 model. Turned to mum and told her it reminded me of her own wedding dress. Not a coincidence she told me, my mum designed her dress herself and had it sewn by a seamstress; and she said she was inspired by this very dress. How cool is that? The dress was white though. :)

Fougasse

My breakfast this morning: French fougasse.

 

I was in Stockholm yesterday and today. Slept over at Vera's, we met a bit less than a year ago and quickly became good friends.

On Tuesday she asked what I usually have for breakfast and I answered tea, eggs, bread, müesli... what's in the house basically. :)

Guess how touched and flattered I felt when I came and discovered that Vera's boyfriend Patrik (whom I hadn't had the oportunity to meet yet) had baked some bread, some French bread for me! It was so good: "miam miam" as we say (like yummy in English).

Thank you Vera and Patrik!

Chanel and I

That I love fashion is everything but a mistery for people who know me. But you might not all know when it started. Well, early. Very early. The Chanel ad below came out in 1992, I was 13 then. I didn't know much about Chanel then (my mum was still wearing Guerlain at that time, she changed for No 5 much later) and I didn't understand everything but I was just fascinated... It is so aesthetic! And the music is special, almost hypnotising.

Another Chanel ad I remember well from my childhood is the one for the male perfume Egoïste (which means selfish). Again, very aesthetic, very geometric this time as well. And a staccato rythm that makes it a bit hypnotising too, according to me. What I never realized then and which I discovered in Geraldine's post today is that they are reciting verses from Le Cid from Corneille. I might be because I first studied the book a couple of years later, hehe!

And you? Do you remember these ads or other ones from your childhood?

London

So, as I told you in my previous post, I went to London the other day. I arrived on the Saturday mid-day and departed on the Tuesday again around lunchtime. 2 ½ days and a breakfast as a bonus. I was meeting my mum and my sister and we were staying at my cousin's place. 

The whole stay was about: food, culture, shopping as well as family time and of course a lot of talking! 

Here are a few pics of some of the things we saw and did.

The British Museum

The roof of the British Museum

A typical local pub where we had a Sunday lunch or Sunday roast. I had a Cumberland pie with Chips (French fries) and very green peas.  Yummy!

Big Ben at night

A building with  beautiful architecture and a well-known name on it

Tower Bridge at  dusk 

The Tower of London at dusk

Happiness in a box

A couple of days ago I was in London to spend some time with my mother, my sister and my cousin who lives there. We met a her workplace and just around the corner, there is a Ladurée mini store. I remembered reading on vogue.fr that Ladurée was to launch a special box designed by Matthew Williamson so I ran there and oh joy! There was just a couple left and I got one! Isn't it amazing? 

And look at what's inside? Pure pleasure... pistachio, coconut, apple+cinnamon, rose, salted caramel, heaven!

And I love that when the box is empty (it isn't yet, I still have two or three!) then I can use to put jewels, hairpins or stuff like that.

Happiness in a box, happiness is the box!

Espadrilles

Do you collect things? I have never collected stamps or perfume bottle or anything. Shoes possibly if that is something you can collect. I don't collect them, it's just that I like shoes a lot, buy too many pairs and have a very hard time throwing away old pairs.

But with my espadrilles you could say it's a collection. They come from St Jean de Luz where I lived the first three years of my life and where I also spent all my summer when I was a child. They have a local brand making espadrillos by hand. I bought the first two pairs two years ago. The turquoise and the pink ones. They are so comfortable I love them! I used them all summer on holidays and then at home instead of slippers. So I decided I would buy a new pair every year. So last year I bought the red ones and this year the aqua ones.

Wonder what colour it will be next year...

Fashion critic

 

I know fashion editors have criticised the Dior Spring Summer 2012 show last month - which was the first one not designed by Galliano - saying it was quite boring and lacking this sense of show that Galliano was a master of.

I personally loved the show. I was quintessentially Dior, very elegant, very timeless, very 60’s but very modern. I mean look at these sunglasses!

To me, this collection was going back to the roots, going back to Christian Dior himself. It was like taking a big breath of fresh air, trying to catch up you breathe before taking a big jump. Before they get on a new designer who will incorporate his/her aesthetics, this was a true Christian Dior collection.

 How about you, did you like the collection? And what do you think about the Dior/Galliano thing?

Autumn

November is my least favourite month of the year. In Sweden the weather is usually quite bad with lots of rain and wind (often combined). And grey, everything feels grey in November. Not really looking forward to it. October on the other hand. Now THAT is a month I like! There's something with the air feeling so light and pure, the light so clear and the colours... The colours! So vibrant! Look at this tree in my residence! The quality is quite bad since I shot the pic with my iPhone which doesn't have a flash but I didn't retouch it or did anything to the colours.

Amazing right?

Thief!

Call your girlfriend

The cover

The original

Food!

I most of the time do my grocery shopping at the supermarket closest to my home (who doesn't?). But the other day I decided to change and go to Lidl, a German rather lowcost chain store. What a good idea it turned out to be. I found lots of French food there! Not only the Maille mustard or Le Rustique camembert cheese. No, Lots of food and local dishes. 

Not too difficult to identify as French right? Now, I didn't know this brand before, you can't find it in France but I checked the packaging and every product is produced in the right region so I believe it is a brand focusing on exporting outside the hexagon and working/buying from local producers. 

But the best that day was this cheese. My sister and brother and my cousin will grasp the magicness of it.

Allez la France!

Rugby is not a common sport in Sweden so it's very seldom broadcast on TV. Over the last five years I've only seen a couple of matches of the Five nations tournament on an English channel in a pub or the final of the French championship on the French-speaking channel TV5 Monde last year.

But right now it's the world cup in New Zealand and I want to see it! Luckily the matches are shown on a channel that my friends have in their satelite package.

So today I did like last week. Woke up at 8 and went to my friends' place for a breakfast+rugby. And today, I passed by the French bakery in my neighbourhood for some baguettes and croissants. French breakfast and French rugby team.

And they won! France is qualified for the final!

Mobile again!

A good friend of mine lend me her old iPhone, thanks again V! It means I'll be able to blog from my phone again! Looking forward to more spontaneity.

Things that make me happy

- a new pair of training shoes with some red and pink
- a pink training bag (bought last June but still love it!)
- 3 hours of great training this week-end (2h on Saturday and 1h on Sunday)
- inviting two good friends to come and take part in this good thing
- giving them the chance to try zumba with me
- the fact that they liked it and liked my gym
- a gym full of people dressed in pink proving that together is strong and collecting money for a good cause and spreading some joy (and some sweat!)
- the fact that between 2007 and 2010 my gym has collected more than 500.000 SEK and has been the highest private giver every year. Hopefully we will break a new record this year!

Check out rosadygnet.se, see if you can find me on the pics and, if you live in Sweden, help us break the record and send an sms to make a gift (see on the right).

Think different

RIP Steve Jobs.

How to hurt a friend

How many of those little phrases do we say without thinking? Without thinking that we don't know everything about the others' lives, even the close ones, yes even our friends. And some of these sentences can hurt. A lot. 

I've been looking for a job for a while now and some people might wonder what the heck I do all day since I still don't have one. "How is it going with your jobhunting?" is a question I get regularly. From people I meet here and there, friends, acquaintances, people from various networks... I often wonder what kind of answer they are expecting. Or what I am supposed to answer to that. 

Let me tell you how it goes: I've been studying at one of the business school in France, around 10 years ago when all was fine and there were many jobs. When I entered the school in 1999, one of the first thing they told us was that I now belonged to the elite of the nation, France's elite, no less than that. Impressive, uh? After that I got two masters degrees, learn several languages so that I now speak 4 fluently and understand 2 other (Italian and Norwegian). I have worked for five years and I am good at what I do. I got to work with things I knew nothing about and turned out to be good at that too. I don't know everything yet (far from it) but I learn fast and I know I can do anything. 

And still, I don't have a job. I've applied for many jobs and got as an answer (when I got one since it's not always the case...) that I lack this and that, that I don't have enough experience in this, that other candidates were stronger than me... all these different ways of saying that I am not good enough. How is it possible for someone who's supposed to be France's elite? Well not good, let me tell you. It's not easy to be rejected like that all the time. It's a daily struggle to remind yourself you are good enough, that you need to be patient, remain strong and it will come.  And people asking all the time is not helping... How is it going with your jobhunting? Well obviously not well, if it was going well, I would have a job by now. So please stop asking. Or what answer am I supposed to give, what are these people expecting me to answer?

"When are you getting a boyfriend?" sometimes followed by the question "but why won't you try online dating?". Since when being single makes you less worthy that people having a boyfriend or a girlfriend. Why are you seen as a hopeless case? Because I'm over 30 now? Because it's now or never? But what if it is never... will my life be worse that my friends' one who had the chance to find their soulmates or husband or wifes or boyfriend or girlfriend when they were in their mid 20's then?  What if people are happy to be single and satisfied with their lives? Now in my case, I would like to meet someone but I also want it to be natural. I don't want to provoke it, to "evaluate" every possible single man on a website. I know some friends who met online and they are great peopkle individually and a great couple together but that's just not for me. End of story. It will come when it will come and I am not desperate until then, I have a great life and I enjoy it until then. But of course if I wish I had someone in my life sometimes. So reminding me of my being single is just not nice. That's just a silly and hurtful question. 

Which leads me to the even meaner and more hurtful question. "why don't you get a baby yourself?". Question asked by a friend a couple of days ago when talking about her own baby. Sorry but WTF??? I am single, how is the baby question even relevant? To me a baby is the fruit of love between two people and I cannot see myself having a baby alone. If I had that this friend is also one of those who pushed to try online dating, that might show you the level of "not thinking". But I have of course thought of babies, I don't have much of a choice since everyone around me is getting one. And of course I want kids but until I find the daddy, I won't have any myself. And of course I long for it, I'm 32, not 22 anymore... And this "biological clock" thing IS stressful. Meet someone, realize he's the one, move in, get engaged, get married, live your life... all this takes time before you can get to the baby step of your life and it is stressful so please stop reminding me of what I am missing. And stop making me feel I am less worthy that you, that "I cannot understand", that "I will see when it's my turn" or that life only starts to be relevant and worthy when you get babies. How about all these years before? Was your life shit then? Studip, annoying and once again hurtful.

I am far from the only one to get the baby-question although my friends, always when they are newly wed get the "WHEN" version. Now that you are married, when is the baby coming? There's not even an option there, it has to come. And fast. As a friend said, marriage is committing to each other, not promising to a baby. And how about couples trying to have babies but do not manage for some reason? I can only imagine the pain they are going through. There's a TV program starting next week in Sweden, a documentary following couples who are trying to have babies and don't manage. I hope it opens the eyes of some people, that it makes them think, that they can see this as an alternative answer to why some couples don't have babies. So that they stop being pushy and asking that stupid question.

Another friend (married this summer) told me the other day that when she gets the question, she answers "we're still practising". I thought that was genius! She says people get embarrassed and change the subject directly.

And in the same style we have the "when are you getting married?" question that some people living together for some years get. A friend of mine loves her boyfriend, loves her life but doesn't want to have kids and doesn't want to get married either. That's her choice and it shouldn't be seen as negative. I know many friends who live together, who buy flats or houses together, who move abroad together... aren't all those signs of committment not strong enough? Do they need a paper from the cityhall or the church and a church on their fingers? As of today I would like to get married (if/when I meet the right one) but that's my personal opinion and it doesn't mean everyone has to share it. 

What it means is that we are all different, we are all living our lives they way we can, you don't always choose in life, you just try to do the best of what's thrown at you. But one thing we all can do is repect the others and their decision and try to keep in mind we only see the floating part of the iceberg and that there are many things we don't know about so we should be careful about some questions. I know I have thought about it and I try to avoid asking those silly questions now. 

Edit: I hate to criticize just for the sake of it, I believe if you're gonna critique something, you should try to give an alternative, an option, something... so here's an alternative. I know some people mean well when they ask about the job hunting. Most of them, I am aware of that, it's the formulation that's awkward... Another way of asking is "how was your week?". It's easier to focus on the last few days than a longer period (since it's the "long" part that's the problem). What's more, it's the kind of question you could ask someone working, so it makes the unemployed one less different that the ones working... "Do you find any interesting job to apply to these days?" this kind of things is also fine since it's a positive and constructive question. Easier to answer to.

Home sweet home

Where I spent the first two weeks of August...

This is the first picture I took when I arrived. More to come soon from these, as you can imagine, exhausting two weeks.

Happy feet

What do you think?

Summer

Avignon, end of July 2011

Geeka & Fika

This is what I am going to do every other Thursday this autumn. Meet with my Geek Girls and blog together. You can talk and get some inspiration, get some help with you blog when you want to change the theme, put some plug-in, start a wordpress blog... anything. Or just have a cup of coffee and relax with nice people. Me like! 

If the title sounds like Chinese to you, it's normal, it's in Swedish. Geeka comes from geek as you might have understood, we took the word and made it a Swedish verb. And fika is one of my favourite Swedish word, it stands for gathering, eating a bite and having some coffee or tea. That's what we do: eat & drink, talk (a lot) and blog.

Someone like you

If by the end of the song you're not crying or at least feeling an aching stomach, then you either deaf or you have a heart of stone... 

The world's proudest sister

Do you remember when my sister was running for 80 or 90 km two or three years ago? If not you can read about it here, here and here.

Well, forget about that now. How about:

- leaving from Chamonix, all around the Montblanc through France, Italy, Switzerland and to go back to France and back to Chamonix

- 170 km

- 9700 m of positive altitude change

- max 46 hours to complete

Pretty crazy, uh? Well... 

As you can guess from the smiles on our faces, these pics are from the finish line where the world's best sister arrived after 44h and 10 min.

I am not going to write more about it. First because Gratianne will, hopefully, in a couple of days and she does that better than me [will give you the link if you're interested). And then, because it's something I shared with my parents, my brother and with her and I kind of want to keep it that way, wonderful memories that are just ours.

But one thing I can say: I am the world proudest sister!

Clin d'oeil

Tous les ans à la mi-août se passe l'un des événements les plus attendus de l'année en Suède: la parution du nouveau catalogue IKEA. Il est distribué dans toutes les boites aux lettres. C'est d'ailleurs le livre le plus imprimé au monde, encore plus que la bible: incroyable! 

J'ai donc recu le mien et en le feuilletant je suis tombée sur cette page. Une très bonne copine adore le violet, si elle pouvait, elle ne s'habillerait qu'en violet, aurait toute sa vaisselle en violet, repeindrait son appart dans les tons de mauve, lilas, parme, fuschia, etc. Bref, vous voyez le genre....

Ma DD, file chez IKEA!

Ulriksdal

Last July I went to Stockholm for two days to meet up with my mum and my aunt who were there for a whole week to see ALL the Royal Castles around Stockholm. They managed! And I saw the last one with them Ulriksdal. We went by car and it took 15 min max from the city centre. There is also a direct bus that must take no longer than 20 min + 5 min walking. A great spot to spend a sunny afternoon. Why not take a pic-nic next time?

A very nice garden and a great day!

Back to the roots

I spent the first three years of my life in this town as well as every summer when I was a child. Since then I like to go back and spend at least a day there every summer. Like a pilgrimage. 

Do you know what city I am talking about? 

(I have a lot of pictures to show you from my holidays but I shot around 1,5 Gb so I need to download them first and sort them out.)

Cuvée 2011

This *cough* *cough* was not in my luggage three weeks ago... Every year is the same. Or every time I fly back to France I should say. Every time I get home (to Sweden) with my luggage full of more things than I left with... 

I must precise. I didn't buy everything, thank god. I got some stuff from friends or family. Oh and there is one dress missing. Had to have it redone a bit. A 15€ sale from Zara.

Not much food this year, no space in the luggage. Need to learn to leave more space. But shoes and make-up as usual. And handbags. Only things I need of course. ;)

Fable du jour

La Grèce, ayant chanté
Toutes les années de prospérité
Se trouva fort dépourvue
Quand la crise fut venue :
Pas un seul petit prêt
A faible taux d'intérêt.
Elle alla crier famine
Chez l'Allemagne sa voisine
La priant de lui avancer
Quelque fonds pour subsister
Jusqu'à l'embellie nouvelle.
"Je vous paierai, lui dit-elle,
Dès les réformes faites
Intérêt et principal de la dette "
L'Allemagne n'est pas prêteuse :
C'est là son moindre défaut.
Que faisiez-vous de vos impôts ?
Dit-elle à cette emprunteuse.
- Nuit et jour à tout venant
J'embauchais des fonctionnaires à mon aise.
- Des fonctionnaires ? j'en suis fort aise.
Eh bien! payez les maintenant.

Cushions

New cushions on my soffa. Bought them in Mexico last Christmas. Do you like them? I do!

The lake

One thing I love about Gothenburg is how close to the nature you are. Take the tram for 20 min and you're either by the sea, ready to board a boat that takes you to the archipelago, or close to a lake.

Last Sunday, we opted for the lake for two friends. A bit of food, a book, sunscreen, bikini & sunglasses and here we go. When I went down the tram, I had a little walk. 

First, I passed this old house.

Passed the stable, didn't the see the horses this time though. :(

Continued and recognized these marvelous little cottages. You can book them for a wedding for instance. Anyone tempted?

Walked a bit more and finally arrived there. Our usual spot is on the peninsula that you can see on the left in the background, so that where I headed after taking the picture and being surprised on how little people there was this day. Holidays + nice weather, where were they? Eh! Only better and quieter for us.

We usually take the end end of the peninsula but there was people when we arrived (took the pic later). 

So we chose a spot a couple of meters from there. Put our blankets and towels on the ground and take off our shoes.

Suddenly a duck mommy with her babies passed by. It had to be a good spot.

So I laid down and did nothing the following 5 hours except from eating and talking with my friends and thinking how great life is.

Sweden at its best

Had a BBQ with some friends yesterday. We chose a nice little spot with a sweet view. Right?

You see the two churches in the distance? I live somewhere between the two of them. :)