Turkey Comes to Trin Carl's Blog

Here is another expat blog, aysulove.com This woman is writing from Turkey. She has a montage of beautiful city pictures of Turkey in her cover page and she has a post called Ex-Pats the TV show.  I like how she describes herself in her blog A married girl married and living in Turkey for 3 years, sadness to happiness. Here you will hear about the struggles and high points of living in another culture, learning the new ways to cook, speak, make friends along with many more.  Now I really thought I heard it all when it comes to reality shows but here we go folks another show to add to your list.  She posts a link of where you can find the show on her page aysulove.com/2014/01/19/ex-pats-the-tv-show-2/ .

Here is another Blog from Turkey called Post Cards from Istanbul.  But the actual site can be found at pointwhitedrive.wordpress.com and the writer has a cloud list of words related to Turkey.  One phrase  caught my mind Night Life in Istanbul.  Okay readers, what do we think we'll find here? Yes, of course clubs and more clubs  One of the clubs called Quick China looks very modern and romantic, dark and cavernous.

Another day, another blog

I'm viewing more blogs. The first blog of the day is one called hagermans.blogspot.com and I found it unique.  Its about a whole a whole semi-adult family travelling.  This family is in Paraguay which is a country I know absolutely nothing about but here's what I liked about one of their post, it states that during their down time in Paraguay the mother decides to find spots on the ceiling and let my friend put my hair in dreadlocks and ate too much and twisted the dreadlocks and painted my toenails and kept twisting the dreadlocks. Isn't that just great! I can totally picture that!

Then I decided to roam the Internet some more on expatsblog and I found this one in Denmark called solli-kanani.com it struck me because it has black and white travelling pics in its cover page and I love that. She has on her blog the most beautiful cake called Marie-Antoinette buchette and its a princess cake that she devoured for her 33rd birthday in Denmark,

Happy New Year

Remembering my year in 2014

I did yoga today.  You know what yoga is; downward dog and plank's pose that goes along with stretching every muscle in your body.  But today our Teacher told us to meditate take two long breaths and along with it think of two things that happened every month this year.  Those things could have been things like successes or challenges.  "Its important to reflect and take time to give yourself achknowledement for what you have done throughout the year." she said.

This is a list of my 24 things that happened to me throughout 2014
Breath in, Breath out

1.      Went to eat at my favorite restaurant Ocean (an Asian restaurant) three times

2.      Raced some people on the side roads

3.      someone passed

4.      Zahdi came to United States

5.      spent more time outside sitting on porch people-watching

6.      bought new used car by myself including loan etc

7.      found out my brother was moving out

8.      grandma passed on, I miss her tremendously

9.      helped someone

10.  read a big gigantic book called Little Friend by Donna Tartt

11.  read another big book called The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

12.  helped a friend get a job at a hospital

13.  went to Duluth

14.  Lost my $400 damage deposit to a woman who is a bad landlord and got it back by being assertive.

15.  Went to gym 12 times in a month

16.  Did some things I planned in October

17.  Helped My mom

18.  Said some heartbreaking words to people that I regret

19.  Took some people with disabilities to countless amounts of plays and outings

20.  Got recognized

21.  Lost two jobs

22.  Gained two jobs

23.  Found out that I am somewhat stubborn

24.  Enjoyed December holiday this year more than I have in the past 15 years.

 

A List of Must Listen to Detective Murder Series

Here is a list I create of several  detective like murder series to follow that are similar to serial podcast.  A nationally recognized podcast gaining popularity in America.
http://www.ibtimes.com/pulse/when-does-next-serial-episode-come-out-10-other-crime-podcast-episodes-worth-1729472

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/
http://radiodiaries.org

Suzanne Van Rooyen comes to Trin Carl's Blog

I'm excited to inform that I will be posting interviews throughout the month. This is a chance for readers to get to know up and coming writers.

This month I'm interviewing Suzanne Van Rooyen.

Suzanne is the author of YA novels THE OTHER ME and I HEART ROBOT, and the Rainbow Award winning SCARDUST. Her work can be found Amazon or her blog suzannevanrooyen.com .

A tattooed storyteller from South Africa, Suzanne currently lives in Finland where she finds the cold, dark forests nothing if not inspiring. Although she has a Master’s degree in music, Suzanne prefers conjuring strange worlds and creating quirky characters. When she grows up, she wants to be an elf – until then, she spends her time (when not writing) rock climbing, buying far too many books, and entertaining her shiba inu, Lego.

Which writers inspire you?

So many! I think Neil Gaiman has been one of my biggest inspirations not least for how he manages to weave humor into his stories no matter how dark they are. Maggie Stiefvater is another inspiration. Her prose is always so poetic yet accessible without becoming overly purple, and she has this ability to make the magical seem so real.
Author Suzanne Van Rooyen (above) Interesting, I've heard recommendations of Neil Gaiman's work by many readers and I am hoping to pick up one of his novels soon. I myself love humor writing and enjoy works by Janet Evanovich, Tina Fey and Mindy Kaling.

How much research do you do?

It depends on the book and what the story requires. I usually end up doing a lot more research than might be evident on the final page, but I think it’s a good thing for the author to know a lot about their subject material even if they only include a small portion of it in the story.

How often do you write and do you have a special time during the day to write?

I try to write every day but life doesn’t always let me. I aim to write at least 3-4 days a week in 2-3 hour chunks. Mornings work best for me, but I also enjoy writing at night – just depends on what I’m working on. Some stories need sunshine, others need shadows ;)

Where do the your ideas come from?

A variety of places: from song lyrics, artworks, movies or TV series, other books, real life, a snippet of overheard conversation. Anything can trigger a story seed.
I love the fact that real life inspires your writing as well. Most of my own writing comes from my real life adventures, some of which are so off the wall I wonder how I even made it out of bed the next day.

What is your favourite motivational phrase?

Writing is rewriting!

Which famous person, living or dead would you like to meet and why?

Neil Gaiman. His words have had such an indelible effect on my own, I would love to meet the man behind my favorite books.

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing as far as content?

Getting started. There is nothing more intimidating than a blank page. I don’t enjoy drafting – I find it rather stressful actually. I much prefer the revision and editing process when I already have something to work with and can shape the story into the form I really want

What do you do for fun?

I enjoy reading, gaming, taking long walks with my dog, Lego, and rock climbing. I find physical exercise to be a great cure for writer’s block or writer’s angst in general, so whenever I start feeling stressed out I always try to get my heart rate up.

Bloggers, this is all the time we have today. You can get in touch with Suzanne on twitter or facebook.  Suzanne is also doing a raffle give away for a $50 Amazon Gift card and a paperback copy of A Hold on Me, Of Scions and Men, Gyre and Scardust, enter the link for your chance to win. I’m wondering what other people think about whether I should do a giveaway and what that giveaway should be. Tell me what you think in the comments below.

Are you wishing to write something?

I hope to someday write something worth plagiarizing.  -Unknown Author

Our Juicy Nukes and Crannies in Minneapolis

As I was travelling through south Minneapolis, I seen some fabulous businesses with even more bright colors than I ever thought possible.  
I was on my way to  drop off six bags of stuff from my house to Arc Value Village, a thrift store  There are hundreds of unique places to drop off used stuff and furniture items throughout Minnesota.  Those places include churches which will often go as far as picking up your old furniture.  craigslist  also allows you to post your used items online and you can leave the items near your garage and patrons with come and pick them up.  

Views as a Turbo-Body Pump Fashionista

View at Twin Lake in Robbinsdale, Minnesota










I was at the gym yesterday and I did a Body Pump class which is an aerobic strength training class.  It uses a platform, bar and weights.  We literally pumped it up to a song called What You Got by Colby O'Donis feat. Akon and another song called  Give Me love with LL Cool J feat. Seal. Our teacher challenged us to put more weights on our bars. I throught to myself I'll pass.... If I add any more weight to my bar so early in the game I'll probably wobble right over along with the bar.  

Today was even more work out with turbo class.  Turbo kick is a combination of cardio-kick boxing.  Basically jab punches, hook punches, upper cuts and shuffles.  The punching moves that can be done to the beat of the music, The song we kick-boxed to was quite invigorating, the hardest move of the body pump class was a move called burpee. The burpee is almost impossible as you get older but i have seen women as old as 50 do it.

I'm busy fighting off the calories lately from eating too many cookies some of which include ginger bread cookies, tea cakes, and lebkucken (german ginger cookies which are sold in a bag found at gingerdelights.com.)  

A Bit of Blog with my Tea

I'm reading more blogs.  Let's see this one caught my attention because it has a cartoon picture of a woman flying with an umbrella. How Mary-Poppins-like. its called quintessentially-English This writer has a blog post about reminiscing on the Friends show while she's in England. Obviously she's feeling a bit homesick but I give her credit she'd been in  England for Ten Years. 

Moving forward. Here's a blog from an expat in Norway called meganstarr.com she writes a post called 8 things to love about Minsk.  Here's a flashback from the blog listed above where the previous writer was talking about her love of the show Friends and I recall an episode in Friends where the character Phoebe was in love with a man who worked in Minsk. How coincidental! Anyway, this blog has many lovely pictures of Norway and great pictures of the people if I might add.      

Tiny Notes from Expat Blogs

More Expat blogs that I have viewed.  This one is from an Expat who has lived in India.  Her blog spot is at madamletmetellyouonething.com -Isn't that the greatest name for a blog! Well, I was intrigued right away just because I love the dialogue of a language and especially accents and this blog title was clearly the dialogue from India. I can picture the Panjabi behind it. I just finished watching the movie Fargo and I was so deeply moved by the movie and the depiction of the Minnesotan accent. (my accent)

Anyway madamletmetellyouonething.com  blog writer is currently back in the States but her post Blimey-that took long enough gives you a good indication of what her return trip from India was like not to mention that she is from Ireland but has a British accent, awesome!


I like to pick blogs to read based on whether or not they have a picture of the expat's city that they're currently residing somewhere in the cover page.  No pic of city, no visit to blog.  Well that's not always the case but here's a pretty good blog with a picture of Shanghai, China ephemeraanddetritus.com  She has a post called Tiny Notes from Hanoi.  I'm always looking for attention grabber titles in people's posts and this is definitely one of them.  Isn't the name Hanoi for a city just awesome?  It reminds me of different cities and names of people that my parents used to come tell me about as a kid after their military stay in the Philippines.


Here is another great blog from Shanghai huntingcheeseinchina.blogspot.com instead of lostincheeseland.com we've now got a blog about hunting for cheese.  Hmmm sounds great.  Well this blog has plenty of pictures. Fanstastic! I especially like the color in the pictures and specifically one that shows the outdoor market toys for children to buy in China-way cool, who doesn't love toys by the way. 

Serial Podcast made me feel despondent

 I finally finished Serial Podcast. First released in October 2014, it is a spinoff of the radio program This American Life.

 Season 1 is an investigation into a 1999 Baltimore murder.Hae Min Lee was an 18-year-old student at Woodlawn High School in Baltimore, Maryland. She was last seen at approximately 3:00 p.m. on January 13, 1999. Her corpse was discovered on February 9 in Leakin Park and identified two days later. The case was immediately treated as a homicide^. Lee's ex-boyfriend, Adnan Masud Syed, was arrested on February 28 at 6 a.m. and charged with first-degree murder 

 As the podcast drew to a close after I had been  listening to  it for the past six weeks, I was not pleasantly surprised at the ending.  Of course they wouldn't say that a couple journalists were able to find enough evidence to say that a man who was accused of murder 15 years ago was wrongfully committed.  Adnan Syed may or may not get out of prison but I  learned a few things about the case:

 1. Don't ever think that by speaking with someone whose loved one is in prison that there going to agree with you that another man is innocent.-

 (I learned this the hard way by speaking to a friend of mine about the case she ended up telling me that Adnan Syed probably did it and doesn't deserve freedom, and this accusation is based on what???)

 2. I learned that what a person does before they commit a so-called crime makes a bigger difference than what most people might think.

 3.I learned that audio podcast is a great genre and something I will definitely enjoy in the futurew

A Competition on Victory Memorial Parkway

       Last night I was patrolling Minneapolis in search of the biggest and brightest houses.  There is a strip called Victory Memorial Parkway in North Minneapolis and its here that I've always wandered if there is a contest each year on which side of houses will be brighter.  I, myself tried to determine which side is more festive and I couldn't decide.

For more beautiful light displays in United States in general visit six-residential-streets-with-amazing-christmas

End of the Year Dancin'

We're wrapping up our Zumba dance year at the YMCA and these were just some of my favorite songs that we danced too....

Wake me up When It's All Over
Ont top of the World
Summer in the City
Addicted to You
Let it Go
We're in the Money
Roar
Eye of the Tiger
Stay Gold
Boom Clap
Ani Estagea
Rumor has it
Bad
Do you believe in Magic
Can't Touch This

Dancing with Penguins

Apparently even the penguins need ear muffs in this frigid environment.  No time to scope out Saint Paul Minnesota today, I'm afraid.  I am too busy shoveling snow and wiping off the car windshield.  That's fine though there is always something to look forward too and something to see.  The weather man said we got more cold in November than we did in all of December.  

Musings on Websites I follow

I'm taking some time to recognize some popular blogs that I frequently vist for inspiration and just because there great.
I enjoy travel blogs the most because I thought I would be traveling abroad and teaching in lands far and beyond but then I realized that I may or may not have the stomach to do such things (I've traveled- take my word for it).  So then I decided to focus on my everyday life in my blog writing.  I've changed the formatting of my blog added pictures, done some crazy features and now I'm settling in on the writings that I'm currently doing.  I've learned that its easier not to limit yourself in your blog writing. 

Here is a list of places I visit on google or blogs I recently found and like:

www.expatsblog.com     This literally has a list of more than a thousand blogs that a person can go to if they want to read about expats.  It has blogs from the most popular regions of the world, including the US which to me is not really expatriot lol.

www.amazingplacestosee.com  This site has tons of great pictures and fantastic musings, you can't help but like and comment on the pictures in this blog

www.lostincheeseland.com   This site I came to like and added to my blog roll just because its about an expatriot who is in France and blogs about her experience. I also been to France so I love to read about the hidden jems in this blog.  Also there is more than 165 expatriot blogs on the above listed expatsblog.com website listing France as the most common place to visit, or live (as an American) so I had to add it.

1952tang on google.  I follow this.  My dad's been to Vietnam and thought it would be a great place to learn more things about it

http://wnwlife.com/.

Dancing through the night with Snoopy and Friends

   

I went through the area of Shakopee today (921 Shakopee Ave) and they had this display with a ferris wheel and stuffed animals sitting on this lift. It was pretty adorable. The display also had a seasaw, merry-go-round, seesaw, swings and moving train set with guess what! Additional stuffed bears on each ride.








There was also a miniture hockey game going on with charcters like Charlie Brown, Patty, Shermy, Snoopy, Violet Gray, Schroeder, Lucy Van Pelt.( Score Snoopy 2, Woodstock 2) 

Considering London Flats and American Apartments

 Otherwise after visiting London in 2011 I always wandered if we have the same compact housing and flats that are literally connected to one another in America and we do. All though these are more like apartments they are located in the city of Crystal. Some say that flats in London are one level abodes and that they tend are houses which are later split up into separate residences. Others say flats consist of one level, having no second or third floor by way of a staircase and are therefore flat!

 

 

 

 

 

It's actually in the 40's in Minnesota and I don't care what anyone says I'd rather take a rainy day than a drop in temperature. We've had three days of straight rain but at least I can go outside without scraping the ice off my windows or take a walk without falling on the ice or turn my steering wheel without feeling the gripping cold from my exposed hands. Much of the snow has melted in many of the residences near my home but watch for updates on my blog as its supposed to drop to twenty degrees Fahrenheit by Tuesday and snow is expected.