It is the time of the year where it’s never going to get hot down the street but colder, unless of course you live in the southern hemisphere or in a tropical country where there are only 2 seasons, sunny or stormy then that’s another story.

As the year ends, the outfit gets thicker too. It’s time to pull out the bulky stuff and look bulkier. huhu!

I’m thinking of wearing this long sweatshirt/sweater with just some pretty tights but after hearing the latest from weather news that things could get nasty in the following days and seeing that the sweater doesn’t cover at least half of my thighs, I’ve decided to wear skinny jeans/jeggings with it so as not to freeze my butt off.

Just like most of you, I do buy things twice ( good thing it’s in a different color) or maybe thrice at a time if I  really like it and if the price is right. So here’s the pink version:

I know you do this too. How many tops, skirts, shoes, etc. do you have with the same style but in a different color? If it fits right and you look good, why not have more?

Off  topic:

I’m visiting a Filipina friend today because she’s giving me a new batch of  Filipino pancit canton ( noodles) which she bought in Madrid. Yey! The last time I visited her she gave me some salted eggs, noodles, shrimp paste and sardines, all Philippine made. I was in heaven because I’m that I’m cheap. Nothing is tastier than the products made in your own country when you live abroad, I swear! Must be because you grew up eating these things.

This is going to be my 3rd Christmas here and although I love seeing the snow ( we don’t have it back home except  for the frost from the freezer), I missed seeing the colorful Christmas lanterns, the never ending flicker of the Christmas lights on my mother’s mini-pine tree in the garden and the pretty lights from the neighbor’s house or front yard, hearing the carols, the fun of  celebrating family reunions and that feeling of magic that only Christmas can bring. In here, Christmas is very subdued and not as magical as I had hoped.

I know that it’s too soon to ask but what are your Christmas plans?

Here’s hoping that you’ll have lots of fun this weekend.

Ciao!

♥ Che ♥

Kaixo, everyone!

Before I start to chatter away, I would like to thank Rose of Rosie Sue’s Closet for sharing with me this award:

Thank you, Rose! Her site is filled with great buys and beautiful things which I love to oggle,do visit her sometime. Since I don’t want this award to end it’s rounds, I’m passing it to my new blogger friends:

Ces of Cuter than a Button

Jing of Ki-at Kiat

and now back to regular programming.

So as I’ve told you in my last post, we went back to Loarre. Along the way, we stopped by  other favorite places of mine to visit like this lake:

Lake Yesa ( Aragon region)

and the ghost town on top( of which I only took a photo),

and a few meters down the road, my all-time favorite ghost town.   I would’ve climbed to the top and discover this town but we’re still halfway through Loarre and so I only beg EM to stop so that I can have my picture taken with it. hihi!

Wearing: shorts- Guess, tights- Zara, sweater- Blanco, knitted vest - Promod, scarf and boots- local Spanish store

While walking on the fields, I got “bonita” shouts from three passing cars filled with  young Spanish  guys. Am I supposed to be flattered or flabbergasted? It’s because I look like a giant purple ant walking down the field. lol!

Trivia: Whenever I wear something that drapes or flaps, EM calls me ” la hormiga atomica” or the atomic ant. Whatever that is.

I think you’ve had enough of the purple outfit  and so today I’m sharing you what I wore yesterday to school. Nothing outrageous, just a subtle hint of  layering.

Wearing: boat-shaped knitted top- Zara, sleeveless turtleneck top- local Spanish store, jeans- Mango, short boots- Mustang

In school, sometimes it’s hilarious reading and pronouncing words which are new to your vision and hearing. We almost always ended up with twisted tongues! We’re a UCB ( United Colors of Benetton) group, well represented from almost over the world. I have classmates from Brazil, from some parts of Europe, Africa and one from the US.

It’s remarkable and very interesting to listen to someone who lives in a different continent, who doesn’t belong to your race( fyi, I’m the only Asian) and who doesn’t share your culture share his ideas, beliefs and dreams in one language that you’re both trying to master so that fitting in with the crowd would be a lot easier to do especially when you live in a foreign country. If you’ve tried living in a foreign country or have had foreign friends, you’ll get my drift.

Despite living here for more than two years, I’m still adjusting and trying my best to fit in. It’s quite tough especially with the language barrier because I’m still learning the ropes but I’ll get there soon.

DON’T FORGET!

Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Be informed. Read more about it here.

Peace to all and thanks for dropping by!

♥ Che ♥

PS: To get a larger view of the photos, just click it twice ( not double click).

Yesterday we went back to Loarre in the province of Huesca in the Aragon region. In there you’ll find the ruins of the Castle of Loarre constructed by the Navarre king Sancho III which was built in the 11th century. Last year when we visited the place, it snowed the night before and so the castle and it’s wall ( built in 1287) looked like this in the fog:

Yesterday,  it was still cloudy but you can see it like this :

This is how the wall looks like from the inside. The castle was built on top of a mountain.

This castle was used as a background in movie Kingdom of Heaven starring Orlando  Bloom, Liam Neeson and Eva Greene among others.

It was used as the home of Orlando Bloom’s character at the beginning and end of the film when King Richard the Lionhearted invited him back to the Crusades.

Trivia: The townspeople of Loarre were used as extras in the making of the film.

The castle measures 1,070 meters tall. Too bad, I wasn’t able to take a bird’s eye photo of the whole castle from the top but I can show you some of it’s ruins from the inside.

The top three photos were taken from the main door entrance which is of Romanesque design. The lower photo from the left leads to a patio and a small primitive chapel while the right most photo was once a residence for the noblemen which was later converted into a monastery towards the end of the 11th century.

This is the part where they store the water. There’s a well below it and yes, I wore purple and must have overdone it in the process. lol!

This is the main entrance of  The Keep, the highest part of the castle which is the hardest to reach during that time. It has 5 floors and also served as a place of refuge in times of war.

Below is the view of the countryside from the Patio of Arms.

Those small trees that you can see dotting the reddish mountains are almond trees.

The best thing that about this town aside from it’s majestic castle is that I can take home this:

The Trenza. A tasty and chewy bread made of  the choicest wheat flour, almonds, butter, etc. This photo was taken last year, yesterday I took a home another variant which is Trenza de Chocolate. Same ingredients with the original but this time with orange and chocolate bits. Yummy!

The trip was an unexpected consolation to an otherwise bad week. Problems were forgotten, lessons were learned.

On my next post, I’ll show you some nature photos and more photos of the purply outfit. Stay tuned!

Happy Sunday, everyone!

♥ Che ♥

They say black isn’t a color. It doesn’t belong to the rainbow. Yet it’ s classy, a classic, chic, elegant, it elongates the torso, it conceals what you don’t like to reveal and yeeesss, it’s SEXY!

When I have nothing to wear, black is always my fall back color even if they say it isn’t a color. One thing that I know for sure is that black is and will always be beautiful. It looks fabulous with opaque tights too!

On a side note, while everyone’s going crazy about studs, I’m buying shoes with buttons which you can see here and this:

Of course I love studs, who doesn’t like hard core glitters on their shoes. It’s just that I want a shoe with just the right amount of heel which would let me walk at least three hours without contorting my face and the studded shoes sold here right now have at least four ins. of heels which is unbearable for me to wear. If you know me by now, I would always choose comfort over the current trend. I may not be always trendy, but I can live with that.

Now leaving you with a photo of me taken by EM, he found me sexy wearing this cowl-neck, black knitted dress and so he volunteered to taking a few shots of me. Hee-haw!

Wearing:

knitted dress- no label, shoes- Spanish local brand, ring- Sfera, necklace- Misako

So what’s your fall back color? Like black? Like shoes even if it’s not too trendy but very comfortable?

Hope your week turned out well, I’ve had an emotionally filled week in a bad way. Don’t wanna rant about it here because I hate to infect you with my negative feelings. This blog is all about positivity so that the good vibes will stay here all the way. But you can always share your rants with me  if  you had a rotten week too. How’s that for a bit of sharing and healing therapy?

Have a lovely Friday, everyone! Ciao!

♥ Che ♥

PS: Rose of Roses R Red is having a give-away for her 50th post right now. Go there quick to see the eye candies that she’s giving out. You’ll love them!

Hi, everyone!

So here they are, some Spanish specialties which I’ve tasted in my trips here.

Top photos (left to right):

Cochinillo from Segovia - roasted suckling pig ( in Filipino, lechon de leche). I missed eating lechon and so I ordered this. Too bad, this came sans any garnishing. I would’ve liked it with liver sauce or even catsup but that is too Filipino,hehe! The skin is so crispy, yum!This is not recommended for the “old at heart”. You know, calories and uhurrmm.. cholesterol.

Ponche from Segovia- a dessert made of  2 layers of sponge cake layered with almond cream. The almond cream tasted like Mazapan, a chewy candy made of almonds  normally sold during the Christmas season in here.

Bottom Photos ( left to right):

Carne Guisada from Ávila- Ávila is famous for it’s ternera (veal). Instead of ordering ternera a la plancha ( which is a thin slice of veal cooked medium), I opted for this because it’s not dry and  comes with  a little bit of sauce. That black thing on the pepper isn’t dirt, it’s the charred part of some pepper because they usually roast them first and then bottle them to make it more tastier.

Sopa Castellana/ Migas de Pastor- I don’t recommend this. It’s just a soup made of chorizos, bread and topped with fried egg. EM said it tasted good but it’s too simple for my taste buds,lol!

Then I tried preparing this in the house for lunch. Preparing which means heating. hahaha!

This dish is a variation of the usual paella. This is called Paella Negra ( Black Paella, the black color comes from the squid ink instead of the usual saffron which you add to give the paella it’s yellow color. You can order this at any Paellería ( Paella restaurant) all over Spain which comes much more elaborated than the above photo.

Lastly, if you happen to drop by Barcelona or Catalonia you can order this for dessert.

This is called Crema Catalana. I call this my Spanish créme brulée.

That’s all for now. I know that this is a hunger-inducing post. Yep, for me too. Wish I was traveling again and savoring these sumptuous treats.

Sorry for not blogging regularly ( 3x a week, hihi!), I’ve been a bit busy with things lately. Big thanks and hugs to those who continually visit my blog and especially to those who leave sweet comments. I appreciate them from the bottom of my heart.

May all of us have a fantastic week ahead.

¡Besitos!

♥ Che  ♥

Hello, there!

Don’t ever think that I’ve abandoned this blog. It’s just that I’ve been feeling blue lately and the outfits that I’ve been wearing these past days couldn’t hide much the bulge and the bloat that I’m having right now.This sweater ( yep, another turtleneck) is trying hard to cover the flaws, I hope it’s working.

Nah, I think not much. Need a clearer picture?

I don’t know if those mid-rolls come from the fats or from the light shirt underneath but you can never hide the truth. heehee! Oki, so its’ that time of the month again when all those hormones are on strike.

Why is it that there’s always that time of the month where you like to eat like a glutton, pick a fight with someone you love out of nothing, get mad at some petty things and then feel sentimental all of a sudden? Do you feel and do these things too? Because these are what I usually do and feel and until now EM doesn’t have any friggin’ clue why I go ballistic at certain days of the month. I’m lucky because he’s a patient guy. At least when I’m having my moods.

Peace and love all the way!

♥ Che ♥

According to Wiki, a necropolis is a large cemetery or burial ground usually including structural tombs. The term is usually used for high burial grounds near the centers of ancient civilizations.This word was derived from Greek meaning “city of the dead”. I know it’s rather late talking about this right now because the Halloween season has already passed but since I’m terribly out of trend (haha!), here are some photos taken from our summer and winter travels. Yep, we’re that weird, we go to spooky places too.

So last summer, while visiting the vineyards in La Rioja-Alavesa, we made a detour to this 12th century Romanesque church high up in the hills.

In front of the church, you’ll find this ancient necropolis or what was left of it from centuries ago. I’m stepping on the tombs, yikes! Don’t worry all the remains have been removed and are now kept in some museum somewhere.

Then we visited some dolmens too. A dolmen (here goes the geek again…) is a Neolithic tomb or monument consisting of a large flat stone laid across upright stones. This is also called a cromlech and is found in Ireland, France, Russia, Portugal, here in Spain and even in Korea, India, Israel, Syria and Jordan.

Dolmen de La Chabola, Elvillar (La Rioja,Alavesa)

These are more than a thousand year old burial sites. A lot of artifacts have been presumably buried here but sad to say that a lot of them have also been robbed before the dolmens were discovered. This picture was taken July of this year  while the one below was from early winter of last year.

I’m wearing a thick turtleneck for this one. Below is another dolmen found from another place.

It’s quite tricky finding some of these. I think we got lost twice or thrice because they are sometimes situated on some dirt road somewhere. hehe!

I remember this one too well because EM and I got lost  and had a mild “accident” while finding this (above photo). After traveling a few kilometers, we didn’t find this and so we decided to go back. While trying to reverse the car’s direction, the tires at the back fell on a slightly deep ledge/canal. To make things worse, we forgot to bring our cell phones. EM had to walk kilometers up to the nearest police station while I stayed with the car in the freaking cold looking at  rows and rows of  hibernating grape branches. It’s winter, all of the grapes have been harvested and so what you’ll get to see are brown twigs.The wait lasted for more than 2 hrs. before 2 policemen finally hauled the car back to the main road. Now that’s what I call a true adventure.

This last one was in the town of Eguilaz. A cousin of EM was married on this place. That must have been so memorable. All dolmens in Spain are historical monuments and there a lot of them scattered around. The only thing is, you have to find them with a map.Teeheee!

Now leaving you with a super pose with the mountain of Gorbeia as the background.

This photo was taken on my first winter here.

Ciao for now, uncomplicated things to talk about on my next post.

♥ Che ♥

Ávila is a walled city with an altitude nearly twice as high as Vitoria. It measures 1,130 meters above sea level being the highest provincial city of Spain. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is the birthplace and home of  St. Therese (Sta. Teresa) of Ávila.

This is just one of the gates of the city wall. There are others in the other parts like…

this one which we entered to climb to the top. This city is bustling with activity both inside and outside of the wall. The wall is the best preserved in Spain. It was built in the 12th century and today it is 2.5 kilometers long.

When you climb towards the eastern part, you’ll see the spikes of the cathedral and while going farther down northeast you’ll see this church below. This is the Basilica of  San Vicente. Erected between the 11th and 14th century, this church is of Romanesque origin.

The view from the top is marvelous. You’ll get to see almost all of the city. Along the wall route, you’ll find approximately 2,500 battle monuments, 88 towers, 6 gates and 3 wicket gates, the apse of the cathedral and a singular bell tower.

We had a little cam whoring on the side while admiring the view.

The lower right photo is a rare photo of us together, it’s usually me or EM solo but I managed to get us a picture because the walls are pretty even. Hello, timer! We’re a perfect 10, no? EM being the number 1 and I the perfect 0 ( too round). weehehehe!

Going to another entrance near the southeastern part, you’ll see the other side of the cathedral this time. It’s best to visit the walls of Ávila wearing well- heeled and well-cushioned shoes because the steps can be tricky and uneven.

It’s hard to navigate wearing high heels, so dearest fashionistas, leave those stilletos at home if you want to get a bird’s eye view from the top. I promise you that its worth the climb.

Aside from visiting the wall of Àvila and the aqueduct of Segovia, we also visited some museums and ate some typical dishes of these cities. I’ll make a separate post of them later. In the meantime, I’m leaving you a view of Ávila from Cuatro Postes. An old shrine with a panoramic view over the city.

Wearing: top- Mango, skirt- Bershka, tights- Zara, boots & scarf- local Spanish store

Have a rad weekend, everyone!

♥ Che ♥

PS: To enlarge the photos, just click them. If you want to see more walled towns, please click here. 

¡Holaaaa! How’s your week so far?

I don’t know why I’m posting this look but this is my uniform these days.  A light turtleneck with a water proof jacket thrown in when it’s raining and v-necks with a scarf when it’s sunny and just cool.When it snows, that’s another story.

Jeans are either black or dark blue and skirts are optional with tights. The thickness of the clothes depends on the temperature scale. Today is 10-12 °C and raining. Not too bad. How boring. I know. But I don’t look too bulky and yet stay warm.

I would’ve liked to dress more “fasyon” but the weather isn’t cooperating and I’m too lazy to dig dipper into my closet. That’s how predictable I am and yes… a little boring. lol!

So what’s your uniform these days?

Curious,

♥ Che ♥

Kaixo, everyone!

Just breaking the travel mood of the posts for a while so you’ll not get bored.

The city where I live has changed it’s bus routes and you know what that means. Confusion + wrong buses taken= lots of wasted time + stress.

I’m glad that my class doesn’t start until tomorrow and so I had time to do a test ride on the new bus routes that I’ll be taking to school and back during those days when EM can’t take me.

Although this city is quite small compared to Barcelona or Madrid, I still get lost. I’ve taken the wrong bus maybe twice or thrice since last year. Heehee! Consequences? Arriving 40 minutes late in class ( good thing the class is 2 hrs.and 15 mins. long) and  taking very long walks towards home shivering ( despite wearing a thick coat) because it’s freaking cold/snowing. The only consolation is that I’ve discovered new sites and new streets.

Have you tried taking the wrong bus too? Hope it wasn’t a horrible experience.

I’m also test riding this combination of top and long skirt. The wool skirt has a high waist band and can look much better with a bling-y silver belt but since I’m a casual dresser, I ended up with this white Zara belt because I don’t have a bling-y belt inside the cabinet.

sabrina top- bazaar( Phils.) wool skirt- Massimo Dutti

I tried cropping the ugly shoes ( which is a fave of mine   ) but the resulting photo keeps on getting longer. Best to leave it as is, my computer skills are non-existent. You’ll see more of this skirt soon. Still finding the perfect black tall boots for it. Stilletos are definitely out of the question although the whole outfit would look much better wearing one.

Ciao for now!

♥ Che ♥