London Calling

Over St. Patrick's Day weekend, I headed to London for the ECIS (European Council of International Schools) Technology Conference. I had sent a proposal for a break out session presentation in the Fall, had my proposal accepted in January and was set to present over this weekend. The conference was held at ACS Schools Cobham campus, south of London.

3/4 of our Tech Team at ACS-
Stephen, Director of Tech (left); Tammy- Upper School Tech and Math; and me!
Our missing 1/4 is taking the picture.

I've shared all my presentation information on my CoETaIL blog so you can check out everything I shared with the links I've included. My presentation was well received and I'm excited to be able to add this to my resume.

We spent Friday night of the conference at an English winery, with a "Splash Mountain" type ride, of course, minus the splash but with the added benefit of a glass of wine as soon as you finished the tour.

Once the conference ended, I headed into the city of London to enjoy what it has to offer. I bought a ticket to The Lion King in advance since I had never seen it. I made myself resist seeing Wicked for the 6th time, though I can't say I won't ever let that happen. The Lion King was a good show and the performance was fun. But, the stars of that show are the costumes. The hyenas were amazing and the ingenuity that was behind the all of the costumes and the design of the masks that moved with the performers to give a more realistic profile at times was incredible.

Waiting for The Lion King!

On Sunday, St. Patrick's Day, I decided to wander about London's famous sites and do my part for my cousin's 2nd grade son who sent me "Flat Alex" a few weeks ago.

Flat Alex visiting the Queen!

Later, I met up with my friend Stephanie, who I also met at the Boston job fair, just like Stella and Peg from my trip to Zurich. Stephanie teaches at TASIS- England and took me to a cute little place with American brunch items on the menu! Eggs benedict. YUM! Then we wandered about a bit, passing bits of the parade and through the festival in Trafalgar Square. Since it was a tad rainy, we settled on having a beer to celebrate the day. Then I had to rush off to Heathrow to head back to Milan. This work thing always seems to interfere with my travel plans! : P

One of the floats for the parade, Puca, a giant inflatable dragon

Why, yes, I am dressed like a pineapple.

This week is a four day work week leading up to Spring Break. My Savannah friends, Janet and Sheila, are coming to spend the time with me here in Italy. I'm excited to share my Italian life with them! We're planning on visiting Lake Como, Verona, Venice and then Sheila and I will explore Slovenia for a few days.

La bella vita!

Swiss Miss

This March I was happy to add country #17 to my "Where I've Traveled" list- Switzerland! Funny that it is so close to Milan, yet took me so long to get across the border!

See the double towered church on the right?
The next picture is from  the top of the first tower.

What a beautiful country! It was so stereotypical Swiss that it looks like it is straight out of a fairy tale. There were clocks everywhere and plenty of chocolate.

View from the Grossmunster tower...
climbing up and down this tower left us a little shaky!

Kate and I toured an interesting church with stained glass windows designed by artist Marc Chagall. So different from any stained glass I've seen previously. Check out the link to see some images of the glass.

We wandered the city of Zurich and had a traditional Swiss lunch of sliced veal in a mushroom gravy with hash browns. Yum! I bought some cool coral colored sunglasses since the sun surprised us and showed itself during the chilly weekend.

The real reason for traveling to Zurich was to see the Avett Brothers concert on Saturday night. What an experience that was! The venue couldn't have held more than 300 people so we were able to get up close to the stage. Those guys are pretty talented playing multiple instruments at one time and many different instruments throughout the night.

Scott, left, and Seth, right

I shot a little bit of video during the Avett Brothers show and it turned out decent enough to edit together. So, if you love Seth and Scott, or have never heard of them, take a listen. 

I also got to see my friend, Stella, that I met in Boston at the job fair in 2011 and meet Peg, who was also at the fair that year. We didn't meet then, but we've been following each other's travels on Facebook for quite a while. They both teach at the American International School of Bucharest in Romania.

post-concert cocktails!

The only downfall to Zurich was the cost!! It was pretty pricey and the money looks crazy!

Swiss francs- photo courtesy of Peg!

Ah, Svizzera! I can't wait to see you again!

Sensory Overload.

Those are the only words I feel accurately describe the feeling you get while traveling in Morocco.

In fact, I took lots of video because it never felt like the pictures were doing justice for the entire experience. Hopefully, I'll eventually edit together a few of the clips and be able to give you the sights and sounds of our journey. I'm still waiting for the video that also has smell because I feel that even the video might not cover the whole deal.

But, I want to use some of my favorite pictures to show you the beauty of Morocco.

This is Jemaa El Fna (spelled in a variety of ways, depending on where you look), the main square in the medina of Marrakech. Up front, you see plenty of wagons where they serve freshly squeezed orange juice. Towards the mosque in the back you can see the pop-up food stands starting to appear for the nightly food service. 

Yes, it is always busy. And, no, we didn't eat at those food stands. While the travel guides report that the food itself is safe, the cutlery and dishes aren't cleaned by the necessary standards.

Inside the souks, or shops that are like little garages stuffed full of as many things as possible. The souks are generally organized by similar items, though this seems not to be the case in this location. In Sex and the City 2, Carrie buys shoes for everyone while they were in Abu Dhabi. In reality, that scene was filmed in the souks of Marrakech.

Inside the Bahia Palace, we found some amazing tile mosaics. This was one of my favorites. I love clean lines and repeating patterns, so all of the tile work was right up my alley!

After spending two days in Marrakech, we hired a private tour guide to take us to a few places around Morocco. Our first stop was Casablanca, an urban jungle filled with loads of traffic and cars that honk the instant the light turns green! The city itself is just okay, but the world's third largest mosque is located here and that made the trip totally worth it. 

This is the Hassan II Mosque, third only in size to the one in Mecca and the one in Medina, both in Saudi Arabia. In Morocco, non-Muslims are generally not allowed in mosques, with the exception of this mosque in Casablanca and one other mosque elsewhere in Morocco. This mosque was built by former king, Hassan II, beginning in 1987. It only took 6 years to build, but 10,000 workers worked in round the clock shifts to speed up the completion. 

This mosque is capable of holding 25,000 people at one time and almost all of the materials used to build the mosque came directly from Morocco. 

This is the interior of the mosque. The ceiling of the mosque slides open when the weather is nice to allow for ventilation, since there is no air conditioning in the building! Yowser! I bet it gets hot in there in the summer, especially if it rains! 

Another shot of the exterior. I'm totally loving the geometry!

Our tour guide, Mohamed, who was amazing by the way, stopped along the road on our way to Casablanca. I took this picture, which has turned out to be one of my favorites from the trip.

On the second day leaving Marrakech, we made a quick stop at the Jardin Marjorelle. This is a small garden that was owned by Yves Saint-Laurent and houses a memorial to him. His ashes are either somehow buried in the memorial or were scattered in the garden. I've heard both things, but don't know what's the truth! 

Jardin Marjorelle

Then we headed towards the Ouzoud Cascades and other parts of the geologic park. 

Here's my foot right next to the footprint of a dinosaur...fossilized from about a zillion years ago. This place is called Iouaridene and I must admit, I'm a bit of a skeptic. 

But, the valleys and mountains here were pretty spectacular, so it was well worth the bumpy ride out into what was seemingly the middle of nowhere. 

I caught this picture somewhere along our journey on this day.

The cascades themselves were also amazing. Kate and I hiked down a somewhat steep and muddy trail with a local guide and crossed some surely soon-to-break bridges to get to the base of the falls. Then we joined Mohamed for lunch at a cafe overlooking the falls. The sun started shining just at the right time to catch some images of afternoon rainbows and monkeys trying to steal our lunch. 

Ouzoud Cascades. WOW!

ruh-roh!

While we were driving around Morocco, I was fascinated by the small towns we'd drive through. There's more donkeys and bicycles than cars, and it reckons an era long gone. But, the old certainly mixes with the new. I love this picture of the people on the donkey, getting ready to pass the cell phone and Internet store, Inwi.

the old and the new

On our final full day in Morocco, we went to Essaouira, a town on the western coast. 

Now I can officially say that I've seen both sides of the Atlantic. 

Along the way, we stopped at a women's cooperative where nuts from the Argan tree are processed into fabulous cosmetic products. Heard of Moroccan oil in the US? A tiny bottle will cost you several of your hard earned dollars, and the oil itself is not pure.

 At this shop, we were shown how every part of the nut is used and then tried out the various products.

Here the women are grinding the nuts down to be used for oils, creams, and even edible products. 

Here's to our trip on the Marrakech Express!!

Lost????

Written about 10 days ago...

Hey there, fearless followers! I haven't written since December because, well, nothing happens in January, right?

I want to share a few pictures from my time at home.

The Lynes' boys- Hudson is such a chunk!

Being back in Savannah was so nice- no real plans or agenda. Just time to relax!

Having some snacks and beverages with some great friends!

Now that I'm back in Italy, January's been pretty slow. A few of us have been trying out plenty of restaurants here and I've been enjoying seeing more of the city.

This week was setting up to be a really long week, as next week is White Week, a week for everyone to go skiing. But, thankfully, Mother Nature had different plans and we've enjoyed two snow days. Looking at the weather outside, I'd better plan on going to work tomorrow!

Off to Morocco next week! (This girl ain't got a clue how to ski!)

Best Books of 2012

At Christmas last year my mom bought me a Kindle. I was so excited to use it to read books I wouldn't be able to find in print in English here in Italy.

I joined Shelfari and started reading right away. I set a goal for myself on the site to read 50 books in 2012. In October, I had met that goal and I increased it to 60. I really like to finish things, so I was really motivated by the goal I had set. It sounds funny to say, but I am so proud of myself for meeting this goal.

So, during 2012, I read 60 books. #61 is underway now.

And I wanted to share some of my favorite books I read this year.

The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls

This is quite a story. Walls' memoir grabs you from the beginning and keeps you turning the pages. I loved the story and hated the life that the Walls children were forced to live growing up. As a teacher, I found the story to be an inside window into the lives some of our students are forced to lead.




The Daughter of Siena by Marina Fiorato

I loved this book. I wasn't sure if I would enjoy it since it was set in the 1700s, but with the twists and turns in the plot, there were surprises in every page.




Hunger Games (Book 1) by Suzanne Collins

Ok, I must admit, this was so addicting. Started it one night and couldn't put it down. Loved the storyline, with an element of societal control flashing back to The Giver and 1984. Even though the ending was predictable, I enjoyed every minute of it!




The Divorce Party by Laura Dave

So fun! A few great twists along the way to keep you interested.








The White Masai by Corinne Hoffman

Great book! True story of a Swiss woman's love affair with a Masai warrior in Kenya. Read it in 24 hours- couldn't put it down!



Stephanie Plum Series by Janet Evanovich
Ten Big Ones

So, I'm up to number 15 of these books, but number ten has been my favorite! Stephanie and Lula's adventures are a sure fire way to laugh so hard you'll cry.


Suggestions for books to read in 2013? Leave your favorite books in the comments!

#lucky?

The other day someone mentioned how lucky I was...

cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by JD Hancock:
http://flickr.com/photos/jdhancock/7175331883/

Lucky to live in Italy? Travel around Europe so regularly?

I've been thinking about this for a few days now. 

I don't think the life I currently live has much to do with luck. 

The life I live is possible because of the choices I made and the hard work that led up to it. 

Lucky to have these opportunities? Perhaps. But only because I worked hard to make them happen. 

“I'm a greater believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.” 
― Thomas Jefferson

Christmas Cheer!

sunrise at school last week

There was one long weekend left before the Christmas break and I wanted to get another taste of the Christmas markets. Last year, I spend several days in Munich checking out the markets there. This year, I flew back to Munich, but spent my days in nearby cities- Nuremberg and Salzburg.

Nuremberg was a nice mix of old and new. There was an old European feel, with a modern vibe and shops. It was cold, and somewhat windy. I didn't get a chance to see much of the historic elements that Nuremberg is known for...perhaps another time around.

church in Nuremberg

market goodies

I also went to Salzburg, Austria. It's just a train ride away from Munich. It was really cold in Salzburg. And it snowed the entire time I was there. Which was beautiful and annoying all at the same time! I'd like to go back to Salzburg when the temperatures are warmer and do the whole "Sound of Music" sightseeing thing. It seems like a beautiful city, but I was just too cold to try and really see the sights.

Salzburg markets

from a square looking up at the castle

Today, it's been snowing here in Opera and we were lucky enough to have a snow day! It's almost three o'clock and I'm still in my pajamas! I love it! Just the kind of day you're supposed to have with the weather the way it is! Soup's on the stove and I've been having a film fest! 

I'm back in the US in one week!

The trees looked so nice this morning!