Shoe Connoisseur

To the left is former first lady of the Philippines, Imelda Marcos. Her husband's so, so corrupted dictatorship over the Philippines ended with the People Power Revolution in 1986 and the Marcos' exile from the islands. Even though I find this time period captivating (my parents were both extremely involved in the revolution), this is not a blog about history. Its a blog about indulgences, hence Imelda Marcos, basically the world's biggest shoe-head. 

This chick had close to 2,000 pairs of extravagant shoes while her husband was in office. let me remind you that the Philippines is a third world country, meaning a good number of its people are running around WITHOUT shoes. The scariest part is that last month in Madrid when my older sister and I were talking about how many shoes Imelda Marcos had, we came to a conclusion that she didn't have all that many.

This brings me to my reason for this entry. I have recently realized that  i am addicted to shoes. i left for europe with only three pairs in my suitcase and came back with NINE! how this happened, i just don't understand. i'm supposed to be a starving college student, and the dollar is down. Luckily in Amsterdam (sneaker HEAVEN) my guy classmates would drag me and the other girls away from store windows, so i never picked up any flashy sneakers - as bad as i wanted to. but i'm pretty sure i unconsciously sacrificed meals in Spain to pick up my last couple pairs because, hey, food will only last you a couple hours but think of all the places a pair of shoes can take you. but this guilty pleasure is turning into a horrible habit because i have ishhhhhh to pay off now and i really need to cut it.. well, at least for a little bit.

*sigh* why is everything bad so good? 

In other news, it makes me smile when people complain that i don't blog enough. at least i know a few people read this nonsense. haha

Things I Miss About Amsterdam

in no particular order :)

1. Public Transportation - At times like this when i'm stranded at home and begging my brother to buy me a car for next school year, this is what I miss this the most. You have no idea how good life is when you don't have to drive everywhere. no need to worry about gas, designated drivers, traffic. just walk outside and hop on! san diego really needs to work on a tram/metro system IMMEDIATELY because i am not looking forward to walking to UTC (the mall) just to catch the bus to campus.

2. Bicycles - Not that i biked when i was there. haha. but its sooo cute seeing thousands of bikes everywhere. all the dutch people rode with such skill. they could push their kids around, carry furniture, and even hold hands. 
3. Being Legal - I don't think i really need to expand on this, but it was just very free. expensive, yes. but free nonetheless.

4. my roomie, Marcella - I fucking lucked out getting this girl as a roommate (thank you jonlee for being our mutual friend). she seriously made my trip. everything from our adventures navigating around the city without Papa Jack to just sitting around our dorm room watching sex and the city on our laptops was priceless to me. 

5. i especially miss blowing o's laying on our beds listening to the beatles.
6. The Roof - For five weeks, my classmates and I lived in a building called Funen (yeah, dutch isn't the prettiest language). it was summer vacation, so there were no other students and we pretty much had the entire building to ourselves. During the first week after a long night of beerpong we discovered that the roof had the most SPECTACULAR view. You could see the entire city from there! After awhile, I'd escape up there during sunsets (around 11pm) to write in my journal. it was so serene and so amazing. 

7. Beerpong - We played in the hallway of our apartment every school night for hours during the first half of our trip. haha. The guy on the left and 2 other guys would bring cartloads of cases home from the grocery store every couple of days, and the girl on the left prior to Amsterdam had never played beerpong in her life but was seriously a BOSS at the game. they didn't seem to sell red cups in the Netherlands so we had to play with tiny clear ones. 
8. The Red Room - Always good times in the red room. It was this room at the end of the hallway in our building used to store a vacuum, but for the 5 weeks that i lived there, i only saw the vacuum once. we did everything in there from typical amsterdam-ian activities (ahem, ahem), one on ones, a strange game night when kerri and lana came to visit, and i even locked myself in here to write papers. haha
9. The Waterhole - The most charming little pub in the city, if you ask me. Live music every night, usually 80's cover bands and 6 euro pints of beer. I was here at least twice a week with my classmates for happy hour. In the Netherlands, you have to pay 50 euro cents to just go to the bathroom (this REALLY adds up!) and we were here so often that I made a deal with the Moroccan guy in charge of the bathroom.. if he let me pee for free, i would dance with him next time. hahaha. it never happened, but i got a lot of free bathrooms!

10. The Art - not just the art, mostly the inspiration. since i've gotten back, i haven't had the urge to write or sketch anything. I found this one on the steps outside of a christian church that was shut down because the neighborhood it was located in had a bigger population of muslims, so its services were no longer being attended. makes you think, right?

everyone should study abroad at least once in their life. its worth it, i promise. 

San Leandro

I've been home for a little less than a week, but it feels like a lifetime. its weird (and inconvenient) to be in a place where i can't walk or metro to everywhere i feel like going... not that i have anywhere important to go. haha.  i only have a car when my mom's not using it and i'm too broke to go out, so i'm basically just sitting around while i'm here. exciting, yes? my friends are either taking summer school, working, or start school tomorrow so i'm left with a lot of down time to reflect and such. 

today i went through my old xanga and read some of my entries. they're mostly from the summer before junior year of high school which, until this summer, was probably my favorite summer vacation of all time. back then, life still had such a freshness to it. that summer was filled with dashboard confessional blasting in cecilia's van speeding down 880 on the way to hidden hills. it was when half of us were still unlicensed and willing to walk from our houses to mcdonald's just to get soft serve ice cream. And you could sit at the tennis courts with your best girlfriends having the same 'oprah talks' again and again without ever getting tired of it. back then, summer vacation meant time to relax... now summer vacation means time to put in extra work hours and make more money.. i'm not saying i don't do exactly the same thing (with an exception of this summer), i mean, i had two jobs last summer and was more than willingly working 14 hours a day.. but i guess what i'm trying to point out is how our priorities changed without really realizing it. i mean, i can't pinpoint for you at what point it became more important to me to work 10 hour shifts than it was to be able to take time to watch the sunset or bake a cake and other things like that. 

i guess as much as i whined about the slow pace of madrid, that was one thing they did right. they took time for all the little things in life. preparing meals, cups of coffee, strolls through the neighborhood. i mean, how often do you go to a cafe in the states that serves your coffee in glass cups? and, yea, i'll admit that this blog is a big scattered, but it went a different direction then i had originally intended. i guess what it really ended up being about was taking in that breath of fresh air every once in awhile. it helps straighten out the chaos we've [over]scheduled in to our everyday lives.

Bittersweet in Madrid

I've come full circle and i'm back in Madrid. Its cooled down to a bearable 95 degrees and i'm pretty thankful that this city moves at about 2mph because if it went as fast as the rest of the world i'd probably overheat. i spend my days with my cousin wandering the city or watching the world go by at a cafe, not to mention taking care of my sister's spoiled cat. but i can't complain. the fridge is stocked at my sister's apartment and i think this is the perfect way to end 2 months in europe.

the euro is kicking my ass. the exchange rate right now is about 1.6 Euro = 1 USD.. but Madrid is an excellent place to be this broke. the other day, i bought a can of soda for 65 euro cents. in barcelona, the same can would be 1.50.. and in Amsterdam it'd be about 5 euro. no joke. madrid is also an excellent place to be the shoe fiend that i am. for less than 10 euro i have a dangerously large collection of shoes to pick out of. but at this point its about getting souvenirs for people. sorry stoners, amsterdam was expensive so all i have for you are papers for crutches to share. haha. 

but this is without a doubt a life changing summer. its amazing the things you learn about yourself once you've been taken out of context. once you've been plucked from everything you find comfort in -- home, school, family, bests -- you start to measure yourself by your own units instead of everyone else's. its a beautiful thaaang ya'll. and after all the restlessness i was feeling in la jolla at the end of last school year, its exactly what i needed.