The joy of frugal socialising

Most of the time I have the impression that I don’t have enough time to socialize. I go to work, come home, take my dog for a walk, make dinner and suddenly I’m too tired for anything else so I watch a movie with my husband and then go to bed(in the fortunate case in which I don’t fall asleep during the movie). This routine doesn’t leave me much time for social activities, meeting with friends and so on.

The really interesting thing is that since I moved 300  km away from most of my friends I get to see them more often and actually get back in touch with some of them whom I haven’t seen in a long time. The trick? When I was back home we were all bored of our city (it is a small city with just a few places to see) so when we wanted to see each-other we would go out somewhere for a drink. I’m usually a cheapskate  so I don’t like paying a lot more at a restaurant or a bar for the same drink that I can buy from the supermarket so I would try my best to avoid this kind of gatherings and since we lived in the same city I said to myself that we can always get together next week or another time. There was no rush but there was also no meeting for a long time.

And now? I moved to another city. A beautiful mountain city where everybody from Romania comes at least once a year(or at least in the surrounding places if not in the city itself). This city has a lot of great views, trails for walking on the mountain, historic buildings and monuments and a very rich cultural life. There is always something happening here. Since most of my friends come here at some point during the year we make a goal out of meeting them while they are in town, showing them the city and just being together walking and talking just like we used to before we got bored of the same old places.

The problem is that we(me and my husband) are getting a little tired of the places in this city also(we could go somewhere else because there are a lot of beautiful things close by, but we don’t have a car yet and our friends want to see the main landmarks that everyone has to see when they come here) but we are glad to see our friends and we actually had the pleasure of discovering that we visited a place twice and only the third time, when we went with our wedding god-parents, we really discovered it. As in we only saw like a third of the place by ourselves be cause we didn’t think there was more to see.

I’m really grateful that since I moved here I got to reconnect with an old hischool colleague, an old college friend and I have plans to meet other  friends of mine when they come here. I am the kind of person that actually needs a dead line in order to get something done (that’s why I imposed myself to write twice a week here) and the thought that my friends are in town only for a few days and only then I can see them motivates me to get out and meet them.

This weekend was a great one for me. Saturday I had time to go to the farmer’s market, then cook and even take a little care of myself. Sunday I finally went to “Aquatic Paradise”, a big aqua park (the largest in the country) which I am fortunate enough to be in my city and to have a free subscription to (paid by my employer because I sit on a chair all they and swimming helps prevent back problems). Although I have the subscription since May 1st I only build up the courage to go this Sunday because I wasn’t pressed by time (Not now, another time. I can go there anytime I want.) and because this weekend I just couldn’t say no to my friend from work who has been asking me to go there with here for far too long.

In the end, I really enjoyed being there and I will definitely go there more often just that I needed a little something to  get me going. And the best part was that it was a free day of fun and healthy exercising outdoors.

To make  things even better Monday I was talking with a dear friend I haven’t seen in almost two years who was in town until the next day and he mentioned that he was making a soup for his cousin (at whom he was staying) and I jokingly said: Oh, wouldn’t you like to make one for us also? And to my surprise he said: Yeah, sure! Just have the ingredients ready and I’ll come by and make it.

And that’s how the idea for a wonderful evening among friends was born. He came by my house after my work with his cousin, I invited my friend from work and together with my husband we spent a beautiful evening cooking from scratch and talking and having fun. The night ended with my special ice-cream (I will post the recipe another time) and it was perfect. We all enjoyed a nice meal, I had somebody help me with cooking and we all spent a nice evening together without breaking the bank. Just the way I like it.

This is not the soup, this is a picture from a meal at a friend’s house that was kind enough to invite us to a home cooked meal when my sister visited us, on her birthday.

Trying to keep myself motivated

I first created this space more then a year ago.  I really wanted a place where I can express my opinions on different matters (I seem to have an opinion about everything) and why not, brag about the things I feel proud of.

A lot of times I wanted to talk more on a subject with someone and that person didn’t have the time or the patience to listen to me so I figured I could just write it here and whoever is interested in what I have to say can read it from here when they have the time and the pleasure.

What I regret is that I only wrote a couple of posts and then I got caught with other things and I simply forgot about it although I often wished I could write about something that bothered me or made me happy or simply stirred up my interest somehow.  So now, I make a promise to myself to write here at least twice a week, so by August 1, 2014 I will have published at least 104 articles here. I hope I don’t run out of things to say by then.

Since I first created this blog and until now, a lot of things changed in my life: I sustained my dissertation thesis, I got married, we went to Italy in our honey moon, we moved out from my husbands parents but in the same city, I got a better job in a bigger, more beautiful city and we moved here, 300 km away from our families, I got to visit Germany in a work related trip and  a month and a half ago we got a dog. These are all things that were very important and exciting to me and I wanted to share my view on them and the way I handled different situations about them and I promise myself I will do this in the future.

I want to share a lot of pictures with the rest of the world because I enjoy taking a lot of pictures when I go somewhere but I seem to forget about them afterwards so now I want to make a change and post those pictures here, tell you their story and help me remember those moments better, like in a scrapbook.

For now, here’s a summer picture of me so we can get to know me.

Growing my own salad

I am so proud of me for finally starting to grow my own salad. But I’m even more proud of how I got to grow them. Having a garden and growing vegetables is a life long dream of mine but I always thought that I can’t do that in my apartment. Then I read this article about growing letuce from old letuce heads. But I wasn’t sure how is that going to work without the plant’s roots and fortunately for me, one evening when I was at the grocery store (I shop in the late evenings because I noticed that they have sales on some of the day’s produce that are not looking so good anymore), I noticed they have salad with roots planted in a spongey stuff (like the sponge used to keep brides bouquets humid and fresh) and they were selling it for 50 Romanian bani, which means roughly 14 american cents (but more like the real equivalent of 50 cents since there are smaller salaries here). Anyway, I figured I’ll eat some of it and the rest will at least stay fresh for long because I could water the sponge and have enough moisture for the roots. After a few days I saw to my surprise that my small salad had a lot of new leaf buds and I decided to keep it and see how it’s going.  that is now the plant in the right.

The next one was the small purple one. This works out great for me. I buy a salad that I eat but it also has a root so I can keep growing it and eat more salad for the same (ridiculously small) amount of money.

What’s even cooler is that I found this one with three different types of greens so I have the chance to eat event healthier by combining the different salad types. The only problem is that I don’t know how they are called. At the store it only said “mixed salad”. Can someone help me and tell me what type of plants am I eating? I read a lot of blogs from all over the world and I saw that people there eat a lot of different greens that I haven’t even heard of. I would really like to know how are called the ones that I have.

Speaking of my small balcony garden, this is my rosemary which I planted from seeds. I think it needs more sun but the apartment is rented and the pot is bolted to the wall in a shadow place but I’m still very proud of it. 

So yesterday morning I decided to take advantage of my greens and made myself a salad for lunch.

I used some leafs from my salads and I added  onion, tomato, black beans, black olives and tuna. I came out delicious and I think it is also pretty nourishing.

 

I completed my lunch with fruits (banana, prunes and grapefruit) and I was very happy and proud of myself.

Country visit

This weekend I went with my soon-to-be husband (in less then two weeks now) and his parents to visit his grandma in the country. I enjoy these visits so much. She is a very nice old lady and she has a huge garden with lots of potential but unfortunately it is very hard for her to move around because some soreness in her knees.

I like his grandma very much because she is a very hard-working lady and still tries to do a lot of things around the house even though she can barely walk. She’s a very frugal person since before that was cool, or the word ‘frugal’ even existed. She likes to reuse things and make do with what she has. We connected since the first time we met because we think alike. C’s grandma takes great pride in having a self-sufficient household and she impresses me because she lives alone and manages to take care of her at the venerable age of 80.
I enjoy these trips because I get to relax – by working really hard around the house, since physical work is something very different from what I do daily and get away from computers, internet and civilization in general. It’s something nice to be able to breathe clean air, to smell the grass, to pull cold water out of a well and admire the nature in all it’s beauty and simplicity. Me and C. wondered like children while seeing butterflies, dragonflies, spiders, crickets, grasshoppers and other insects, not to mention all sort of birds. It is an outdoor lesson of biology. If you have kids please make time and take them to the  country. It’s something every child must experience and you can also get some well deserved time to relax and decompress.

Besides visiting his grandma and enjoying the scenery we also brought home a lot of fruits, seeds and vegetables. We brought lots of sweet grapes freshly picked from the vine, dried basil and thyme, eggplants, cherry tomatoes, hot peppers, bell papers, zucchinis, onion, garlic, sun flower seeds, pumpkins and full grown zucchini seeds – witch I want to cook using this baked pumpkin seeds recipe.

On return, I also got to try my homemaking skills and made fresh tomato and basil pasta sauce. It came out amazing and I only used what we brought from the country and some kitchen staples like olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. I can’t wait to make pasta and use this.

I like going to the country because that is closer to my dream green life. I hope I’ll be able to live on a small self-sustainable farm someday but I need to raise a little money in order to do that so in the meantime I have to settle with these visits.

Getting over the death of a loved one

It’s been three months since my grandfather passed away. I always knew I cared deeply about him and I always felt he loves me, maybe even more than his sons or his other two granddaughters. But I didn’t realize just how much I loved him and how much he really meant to me until I lost him.

In his last years my “tataia”- as I used to call him, suffered from Alzheimer’s. It would make me sad to go see him and realize over and over again he doesn’t know me anymore. Somehow, deep inside me I always hoped that this one time he would remember me and would be happy to see me. I hoped that, not for me, because although I cared for him I never knew how much I loved him, but for him because I remember how happy he was to see me each time I went to visit him. I wanted to see the same joy on his face.

It makes me so sad now to realize that I lost him, I lost somebody who loved me even more than himself. I guess all grandparents love their grandchildren but this was special. My grandfather loved me even more. It’s such a great feeling to feel such a sincere love. He was the first person I remember telling me he loves me. I’m pretty sure my father also loves me but he never told me that. Tataia used to tell me that very often and sometimes with tears in his eyes. Back then I thought he was weak for crying, but now I see that it was just the intensity of the feeling.

I cried many times thinking of him after he passed away. First I cried when my sister called me to let me know. She called me two days before to tell me he was not feeling well for the past three days. I wanted to go visit him, see him alive one last time but I was busy with my master’s thesis. I promised myself I’d  go visit him the day after tomorrow but I never got the chance. He died the night before that day. They told me he was suffering but he seemed to hold on to his life like he was waiting for something. I like to think he was waiting to see me one more time, even though he didn’t know who I was anymore.

At first I blamed my parents for not taking care of him good enough, then I felt guilty for not being able to take care of him myself, to offer him the best care I could possibly provide, like he did for me when I was a child, then I realized I just couldn’t accept he won’t be there for me anymore. I secretly hoped I would see him waking up. I couldn’t accept the reality. I blamed my father for embalming him, thinking that that was the thing that finally killed him. But he was already dead. In fact the embalming process only killed my dream of him waking up again. I dreamed of him waking up. It was very hard for me to let go.

Every time I see an old man his stature or even dressed like he used to I think of him. I listened to folk music, especially a song that has his name and my grandmother’s that he used to sing to me and I cried. I read a book about an old man dieing and I thought of him. I think about him pretty often now and I miss him. He will always have a very special place in my heart. I regret not knowing how much I really loved him and not telling him that but I know he felt it without any words being spoken.

I’m glad I had you in my life grandpa!

Hoarding as a consequence of deprivation

During the long communism years in Romania people had money but many of them were close to suffering from famine. The problem was that the communist authorities have seized farmer’s lands and turned them into a land of the state where they were forced to work and the majority of the produce went to export, as well as most of the other things that the Romanian people produced. The result was that Romania’s external debt was paid but the stores were so poorly stocked that people bought whatever they were selling (on the rare occasions when they had something to sell) in large quantities (only as large as the limit which was imposed so that more people could have access to the products).

The rule was buy as much as you can, when you can. Besides that, people managed to obtain things by bending the rules with the help of bribe or various friends who worked in a grocery store, in a butchery, etc. Everything they could get their hands on was carefully kept for darker days.

The same thing with other products like electronics, furniture, clothes, etc. Nothing was thrown away, everything was saved for a later use, for parts or for being re-purposed someday. The nice part was that back then, when new things were hard to get, they really used whatever they had, they didn’t just kept them there.

Fast forward 23 years and you will see the exact same attitude except no economical reason for it, just a trauma.

Very few people have understood that it is OK to throw away things from time to time. If something brakes they just keep it there because it may be useful for something else someday. Then they go to a store (which is overflowing with things by now) and buy some cheap replacement for the broken thing (because the don’t have the money to afford a good thing now). They imagine that if the new one brakes they can use pieces from the old broken one to repair the newer one. The problem is that most of them don’t match and they end up having multiple similar yet useless items.

If the product they bought at a certain point is still functional but it is never used, the problem is even bigger: Why should I throw this away? It works perfectly fine. But you don’t use it. But I may use it someday if… Give it to someone else who might need it. No, I paid money for that!

I have the exact same problem with my mother in law. Me and my fiance are living with his parents for now and it can get pretty crowded sometimes considering that we are four people living in a 540 feet apartment. Yet, she insists to keep all sort of unnecessary things. She had two coffee filters. She didn’t used any of them. One of them made cockroaches and we managed to convince her to let us throw it away. C., my fiance tried to use the other one. She told him it uses to much electricity and not to use it anymore. Another time we came across it again. We suggested throwing it or giving it to someone else. She said: No, you might use it someday. I’m keeping it for you so you would have something good to use (considering that it’s something very low-end I could probably buy with about one third of what I earn in a day). Or when we have guests and we need to make more coffee. We tried explaining her that she wouldn’t let us use it or that we have guests like once a month and then is just one or two people. She made a full blown tantrum (you know, like the ones two-year-olds do) and she went crying in her room with the coffee filter in her arms.

She also keeps clothes and shoes that don’t fit her anymore and many other things “just in case”. She doesn’t even know she has some of the things but she doesn’t allow us to get rid of them either. I’m sure that if she were living alone she would fill the house up with junk.

I blame it on poverty and deprivation but I would like to make her understand that it isn’t the case anymore. Do anyone else has this sort of problem?

Taking back the farmer’s market

My last two trips to the farmers market were a complete success. Well at least one of them was, the second not quite. I felt so good when I finished shopping and I had just the cloth bags I brought from home and nothing extra, except my produce ofcourse. 🙂

People were very acustomized to offering their produce in small plastic bags so I had to be very carefull to mention them that I don’t want those. At first all of them were surprised when I told them not to give me a plastic bag. It’s something they almost never hear. In the end all of them seemed happy to see a change. They mentioned people ask for a bag even if they buy a single banana.  They enjoyed my enthusiasm. They asked me if I’m an ecologist, I answered them that I’m trying to.

I returned from the farmer’s market with onions, garlic, zucchinis, potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers, apples, oranges and milk in my own bottle from which I made a very delicios homemade yogurt (my father’s receipe). I have to admit that I did something wrong. I forgot to bring a plastic box to put the cheese in it and the nice lady ended up wrapping it in, not one, but two plastic bags (like she does for everyone). I felt bad about it but it was kind of important to buy cheese then and not later. I suppose no one is perfect and I have to try harder in the future.

 

It pays to try harder

Last Saturday I went to my parents house because they were holding a charity meal in memory of my grandfather who died a month ago.

It kind of hurt me to see that they made way too much food for the number of people that they invited, knowing that a lot of it will go to waste. What’s more, all the food was served in plastic disposable plates although people sat down and ate there, it wasn’t a take your food to go thing. If that wasn’t enough, when people left they were given some of the extra food to take home in small disposable plastic bags, lots of plastic bags. Even a ceremonial gift that used to be an apple and a bagel just handed to the people without any packaging has transformed into an apple and a packed sweet snack packed in yet another small plastic bag.

Although I appreciate their gesture of holding this charity meal and respecting the tradition, I wish they would consider being more environmentally friendly. The sad thing is that everybody else does just the same thing. We were just talking that in the past people were borrowing plates from their neighbors when they were organizing  such big feasts like for weddings and charity meals in memory of loved ones who have passed away. Now everybody uses disposable plastic for everything.

When the meal was over, my parents gave me some of the leftover food to take home.  They bought a lot of bread from the bakery without any package and they wanted to put the bread for me in a plastic bag. The same thing with the olives: they bought a 2 or 3 kilo tin can but they were giving me some in a disposable plastic bag. Just thinking about all the useless packaging made me feel guilty, so I told them that I’m trying not to use plastic anymore. My father automatically told me: Why not? We HAVE plastic bags. You can take them. Isn’t it simpler to put food in them?  They rolled their eyes when they heard I don’t want to use plastic bags anymore but I stood by my belief and I just asked them to let me pack the food they  were giving me. I was able to find some good solutions using glass jars that they already had in the basement, a tin box, paper from the supermarkets flyers and my cloth bags. I was very happy because I could take home all this food that they already bought and was going to waste because they weren’t able to eat it all before it gone bad and avoid bringing more trash into my home. I got cheese, olives, bread, tomatoes, cucumbers, homemade wine, steak, salad and homemade cookies and I got it all in recyclable packaging.

Even though many people won’t understand me and might think that I’m weird for trying to give up using plastic, especially because they  don’t see how a single person can make a difference, I’ll keep trying and feeling good about myself.

I’m convinced that what I’m trying to do matters, if not for others, it sure does for me. I hope I can convince others to do the same or at least plant the zero waste seed in their minds.

Small victories

After the bad experience at the farmer’s market I decided to take it slowly and be more careful about saying what I want and not buying something I don’t want. I was very happy when I was able to go to a supermarket near my workplace and come out with just  one mango. I wanted something sweet but for all the other fruit I needed a bag to weight them, or at least a tag sticker with the price. They were selling mangoes by the piece and I saw that as an opportunity to have what I wanted without any compromise.

Another small victory was when I had vegetables that I brought from home for lunch but I wanted some meat with those. I went to the same supermarket with a plastic box (I haven’t replaced those yet because I don’t have the money for that yet and because I think that I should use what I have first) and I asked if they could give me grilled chicken liver in my box.  They immediately refused so I went to another place where they were more than happy to give me grilled chicken breast in my own box. I felt very proud of me for standing by my decision to limit the waste I bring into my home.

Because I saw Bea’s pantry from The zero waste home and I wanted jars like hers, on my next trip to a large supermarket just outside our city I bought myself the largest air tight glass jar for about 5$, which is pretty expensive here, but the thought that I’m going to have it and use it my whole life gave my courage. It looks so good in my pantry now and I can’t wait to have more of those and to be able to replace the plastic boxes. I was so encouraged by my small victories that when I got home I took a cloth bag that wasn’t very good because it wasn’t very absorbent and I transformed it in a cute bag to take with me when I go shopping.

I know that these are just baby steps and that I’m miles behind other people who live a responsible life and do a better work of taking care of the environment and of themselves than me but I’m hopeful I will progress. For now, I’m glad I’m not indifferent anymore.

Trial and error

My first attempt at zero waste shopping was a total failure. Me and my future husband decided we were going to try reducing our waste, first of all by reducing the amount of plastic we bring into our home. The first step was to make sure we had our reusable cloth bags with us when we wanted to buy something. Easier said than done. We found ourselves in the farmers market and with our bag in the car, in the parking lot. We decided we were not going to quit so we walked back to our car and took the bag. I felt so proud of myself just because I did a little bit of extra effort for something I believe in.

Back in the market I proudly asked a lady to weight me some tomatoes thinking that I would give her the bag to put them in it. When I looked up she had already placed them in a small disposable plastic bag. It really took me by surprise. I mumbled that I don’t want the bag and that she could just put them in the bag I was handing her. She did put them in there but with the plastic bag. I was so frustrated. I felt like such a looser. Then my fiancee tried to comfort me and I decided that I could use the bag the tomato lady gave me to put a salad in it since they always water the salad at the farmer’s market and they give it to me in a plastic bag anyway. At the salad stand I asked for two salads and I said that I have my own bag and she could put them in it. She said no it’s OK and very rapidly placed them in another plastic bag. P.S. How do you do with your salad? Isn’t it wet? Where do you put it?

With the plastic bag still in my hand we walked to a stand where they had strawberries to buy some for my lunch at work. I talked to C. about what quantity I should buy while the lady was kind of anxious to take my order. I ended up walking away with my strawberries in yet another plastic bag without even realizing or even asking her to use the bag I already had.

It is really alarming how rapidly people at the farmer’s market place your produce in a plastic bag now. They got so used to it. I remember that when I was young, one could not conceive to go to the farmer’s market without a stash of bags and the people there would expect you to give them your bags to fill them. Then some of the vendors started having those plastic bags but they would ask  you to pay for them while the ones that didn’t have them would raise their voice at people coming to the market empty handed and expecting the farmers to have bags. Now all stands have a pile of small plastic bags and they pack everything they sell in those, not because they think it’s more hygienic or something but because it is more comfortable for the client. It is very common now to see people walking around the market with a few of those bags in hand with different produce in them.

The bigger problem is that people in Romania don’t seem to be interested in this problem. Actually they don’t see the problem, they don’t know it exists (and those who have heard of it think that it is not their problem, it doesn’t concern or effect them or that they don’t have the power to do anything). To be honest most of the people here are so poor that they have other kind of worries (if they have enough food – and where they can  find the cheapest one (even if that isn’t really food) , if they have money to pay the bills). They care about themselves and how to survive the next day, week, etc. The fate of the earth does not concern them and I can’t say that I blame them. However I was really surprised when I told an older colleague of mine , one which has considerably more money then me (money that he deserves for the work he does) , about my experience in the market trying not to accept plastic bags and he replied: Why wouldn’t you take the plastic bag? It is free!