welcome 2009!

30 December: Fishing for Him

After 2 days of blizzard in Mt Bachelor, we came back to Portland on a perfect clear day… wish we were snowboarding, but at least Akiko finally got a view of that spectacular dormant volcano.

My girlfriends sold us (Akiko and I) this trip as a “fishing” trip. In reality, I already set my eyes on a big fish. (How does a man feel when he goes fly-fishing? I wonder). My big fish is too experienced to be catch, I know, but I still love to fish for him. It is something as mysterious as why would men ever spend hours with their legs in cold water to get a fish.

Last night, for a woman night out, we decided to go fishing… for a fishermen son!

I live on a small island, not many fish there. Many of my friends claim that they know the perfect man for me, he is somewhere off-island of course. One of the tuna fishery captain that download his catch in the American Samoa’ canneries, kept me one evening telling me everything about his son. He works in an Italian restaurant in Portland. And we decided to go for him!(I love the background picture...)

“Looking for Italian food?” “Actually, we are looking for a man” “Uhm, I hope you can find him on the menu!”. Unfortunately, he was spending Xmas with his dad in California, but we had so much fun chatting with the kitchen staff. They were very thrilled as well and had as much fun as us. The waitress took a picture of us and sent it to him “there are 4 girls looking for you: one from Italy, one from Spain, one from Japan, and one from here”. Apparently he is very handsome and everybody loves him: we will come back looking for him in March! Stay tuned! Funny evening, wonderful company and great food!

31 December: Happy New Year!

When Maria announced that she will come to Corvallis for Eve New Year I was “out of my skin” (means “very very happy”)! We met with Samudra and Brian in a Chinese restaurant to drive south together. The fortune teller cookie I chose said “Your fondest dream will come true within this year” “Uf!” I though, “I only have 11 hours to realize it?!?!?!”.

What is your most profound dream anyway? 11 hours are not enough to figure it out, less to find the steps to realize it. It is not easy to narrow dreams to only a special one. But at Eve New Year, I knew: being with my best friends, and play “do you know Peter”, of course.

The theme of the party was "shine!". We borrowed some shining dresses from Biniam. I used to own that black chinese dress, but after Biniam wore it in a Halloween Party (the dress fit much better on him than on me!"

Peter who?

We wore red underwear (Italian tradition), ate 12 grapes in 12 seconds the last 12 seconds of the year (Spanish traditions –it is great to hug people and wish them happy new year with your checks filled with juicy grapes…), and woke up in the morning to see the sunrise (Japanese tradition –ok, we tried, but we did not really wake up properly… plus it was cloudy and rainy this morning you could not really see anything…). We ate ningera (Eritrean food from Biniam), and screamed “Happy New Year” in 9 different languages.

Ready with the grapes

(I am missing the first 4 countries... it starts with "Feliz Anyo Nuevo, Carajo!")

In Italy there is a saying that sleeping with somebody on New Year eve is good luck. Well, I had a full bed!!! ;-)

Last year I was so eager to start a new life that I anticipated my own New Year eve of a couple of weeks. I did not really want this year to finish, 2008 brought me many good things. I feel like 2009 is going to be quite exciting as well! Happy New Year you all!