Back to blogging

I have been neglecting my blog ever since I left poland 3 months ago, but have decided to return to it.

And what a 3 months it has been!

So how can I sum up 3 months in one post... Without a doubt I can say that becoming an au pair is one of, if not the best thing Ive ever done. Ive had such an amazing time here, my host family is so great, and the little girl, Callia, has been so much fun.

I am living in a little village called Perroy, and it is about 15min drive from Geneva city. Perroy is absolutely gorgeous, it has a very typical french feel to it, and it is set on the mountainside by a huge lake, so the views are breathtaking.

Like I said in my last post, we are very close to france (10 mins) and so everything here is french. I dont even know why it's called switzerland, it might as well be france. The language spoken here is french, which at times has been a little challenging! The food is also french and Ive eaten some pretty good stuff, standouts being cheese fondue with crusty bread and wine, and a raclette - melted cheese with potatoes, bread, grilled mushrooms and onions. (Yes, they love their cheese here!)

I also learnt how to make a swiss apple and cinnamon tart.. delish!

Although its been a great experience, I must say 3 months is enough for me. I will miss it here a lot but I am ready to leave - I have missed my family and friends too much, as well as having only me to be responsible for. (selfish I know :p)

So I only have a week left here. This time next saturday I will be on my way to poland where I will be spending a week with my grandparents (I have missed them!!) and then Im off to london, paris & ibiza with friends so Im super excited about this.

Here are a few of the 10000 pics I have from my time here.. as always, photos dont do it justice!

And as the french say, Au Revoir! Goodbye:)

Goodbye Poland... I'll miss you!!

As excited as I am to go to Switzerland, I am also really sad to be leaving poland. The homesickness which I felt when I first arrived is long gone, and now I really feel at home here.

I leave to go to Switzerland tomorrow afternoon. I am catching a bus which will be going through Czech, Germany & France, and arriving in Geneva midday sunday. So a pretty long journey but without doubt it will be the most interesting and beautiful bus ride I've ever had!

I will be living with a family who have a 4 year old daughter. Basically my job will be spending the day with the little girl while her parents are at work. I have been told by her mother that she loves the water, and that she will be dragging me there everyday. Sounds like a pretty good job to me!

The town where they live is bordering onto France, so I will be experiencing a lot of the french culture as well as the swiss. In fact, the main language they speak in that town is french.

Words cannot describe how excited I am!

As most of my friends know, I have not had a mobile phone for 7 MONTHS!!! Yes, how on earth did I survive without a phone? Thats the question I got many times. But I did survive, so it can be done!

Well today I finally bought myself a phone. Its a pink samsung. Its prettyyyy! Pink camera, pink ipod.. now a pink phone!

My last day in poland was spent with my grandparents. We had a really nice bbq. Spring in europe is just so beautiful I cannot describe it, and photos really don't do it justice.

Let me know what you think.. do you prefer this over the spring back in australia?

Exciting News!

What a very exciting day I had today!

First of all, my ASOS order arrived, and I absolutely LOVE everything that I bought. The swimsuit which I posted in a few posts below is just gorgeous, so much prettier in real life and I cannot wait to wear it!

Diamondsinchampagne, you asked about the lace dress, well it fits perfectly and it is very flattering. I love it! You should buy it too :)

Secondly, I can proudly say that I got a job today! And not just any job. I got a job working as an au pair in Switzerland. For those who don't know, an au pair is someone who is hired by a family to look after their children and help out around the house. So kind of like a nanny, but without any qualifications. Au pairs also live with the family, eat with them, and travel with them. Basically, they are treated as part of the family.

I cannot describe how excited I am, this will be such an experience and I cannot wait to see beautiful Switzerland!

Happy Easter!!

Happy Easter everyone! Hope you all had a lovely one just like I did.

I spent my easter with family, absolutely stuffing ourselves with good food! I seriously have to starve myself for a week after this weekends efforts!

I baked a cake, here's a pic;

Bottom was a chocolate sponge, then a layer of sugared coconut, next grated apple, then a vanilla sponge, and on top of that an icing made out of melted halva which I love. It was really yummy :) and apart from this cake we made 6 other cakes for easter! So you can imagine how much I've been eating.

Over the easter weekend I had my 2 gorgeous cousins over. The youngest, Gabriella, who is 3, is so cute, and all she wanted to do all weekend was play princess's with me.

Here are a few things I bought from ASOS.com over the weekend. The swimsuit will be motivation for me to get into shape!

I will most likely go back to job hunting this week. Like I said to a friend earlier, I wish the job would just come find me...

Goodbye long hair!

Yes, that's right, my hair is now short. Very short.

Today I took out my extensions. I really didn't want to, but I had just had enough of them. They became so knotted and when I brushed them after I washed my hair I would literally be pulling out huge chunks of hair! And not only then, but bits of hair would be constantly falling out everywhere and I just had enough.

I loved having longer hair and now I feel so bald :(

I know that as soon as I get a job I will be running to find a hair extensions place around here. Or maybe I should keep my hair short, but go blonde? After all, that is my natural colour.

What do you think?

For months now I have been loving the spring/summer 09 Balmain collection. In particular, I am in love with the jacket below, but really, at a $16,500 price tag, who could afford that?! But I love it SO much, I have been looking for a cheap copy but no luck.

Do you know where I could find a copy? I would love you forever.

Wrocław

Today my grandparents and I went to Wrocław for half the day, basically so they could show me around where everything is and how to get everywhere, in case I got a job in the area.

Wrocław is one of the biggest cities in poland. From our town, Trzebnica, it's about a 15-20 minute drive, but today we took the bus, which took about twice as long to get there with all it's stops.

In Wrocław, the tram system is still well in use, so we also took a tram to get to a few parts of the city. Wrocław is a huge city, much, much bigger than Sydney, and so there's no way you could walk everywhere!

Today was so warm, I took my jacket off and was walking around in a top and a cardigan, yay!

Here are a few photos of a part of Wrocław which is called 'Rynek'. It's very colourful and there's plenty of cafes, restaurants and bars.

I also managed to squeeze a little bit of shopping into the day. (ok I lied, I spent A LOT of the day shopping lol). And while I was looking at clothes, I also kept my eye open for shops which were looking to hire people. There were quite a few, but they all had signs in the window saying to either email your CV to them or leave it instore with them, and I haven't even finished writing my resume yet. I must say though, I was pretty intimidated by all the polish shops and their polish employees. And I am naturally quite shy, so that doesn't help. However, every job ad says that knowing english is a huge advantage, so that's great for me!

Here are a few of the clothes I bought today, all from H&M.

In the afternoon, I took my grandparents to dinner. (Dinner in poland is eaten early, about 3-4 in the afternoon). We went to this really nice polish restaurant, I ate mushroom soup for entre, roast pork with gnocchi and beetroot salad for main, and as usual, malibu and coke for my drink =)

The mushroom soup was served in a really nice crusty bread roll, it was so yummy!

ps. Oh and you can now comment my blog without having an account, so comment away!

Food Glorious Food!

Since I have been in polska, the most exercise I have done is gone for a walk. I don't wanna join the gym cos I don't wanna pay for it (was great having a free gym at work back in sydney!) and I don't want to go for walks every day because I'm too lazy.

So, not exercising + eating yummy polish food all day every day = FAT monika!!

Polish food is so yummy- it's good, fat, wholesome food. A typical polish dinner is a big fat oily pork snitzel and creamy mash potato. And dessert, oh my goodness! Endless cakes, pastries, donuts, cookies, crepes.. everything!

Last friday, my babcia (grandma) and I spent the day making a traditional polish food, pierogi. Pierogi are dumplings, filled with any type of filling you like. The traditional way to fill them is using really creamy mash potato with a little ricotta cheese through it. Other fillings are mushroom, cabbage, chicken, mince meat, as well as sweet fillings such as apple, strawberries, blueberries.

We made pierogi with mash potato, and some with cabbage and mushroom. The best way to eat them is with a creamy white sauce and bits of fried onion and bacon.

Babcia also taught me how to make polish chicken soup, as well as 'chrusty', which are these really thin deep fried bits of dough covered in icing sugar. SO GOOD!

Yesterday I started writing my CV in polish and today I plan to finish it off. Then when that's done I will start looking for work. I am getting a little bored to be honest, it's great to sleep in but I need to be doing something during the days (other than eating!).

Well, babcia just made some chicken, mushroom and cheese crepes, so I'm off!

First few days

So I found my blog!

As I already told some of my friends, I had created this blog while I was still in Sydney and when I arrived in Poland earlier this week, I realised that I had forgotten my blog site. I knew it was called Sydney to Europe, but I had forgotten the address and who my blog host even was. Several attempts at searching for it in google gave me nothing either.

But I tried my luck and logged into blogspot, which is my host, and it worked! So now, I have found my blog, and I can post pics and give you regular (If you're lucky) updates on what I am up to in this new life of mine.

So what have I been up to? Well it's been 4 days since I have arrived in Trzebnica (a small town about 20 mins away from the city Wroclaw) but it feels more like 4 weeks. I have been getting up early and falling asleep early too, as my sleeping patterns are all over the place. But I am slowly getting used to the time difference now.

Now I knew it would be cold, but I was not expecting this cold! It is absolutely freezing. It even started snowing yesterday, and today is the first day of spring!

Besides sleeping, eating, and enjoying not having to work, all I have done is some shopping here and there and visiting family.

The best is yet to come ;) Especially when summer arrives!

Monika x