Category: life

Last weekend, I was at La Citta Dell’Utopia for a very interesting guided tour about excessive packaging (By the way, La Citta is sort of like a community centre, and I knew about this place because of their annual soup festival and I also used to do yoga here)

Anyway, as it was a Saturday Cart didn’t want to get up as he wanted to savour his non working day (by sleeping), but I really wanted to go, so I went alone. Which was too bad for him, because it was and I had a very nice day.

We went to 3 different places – a non packaged shop, a regular supermarket, back to La Citta to make shampoo and conditioner/Masque using things you could find in the kitchen and finally to a freecycle shop which is like a 2nd hand shop but is non profit (It is an AMAZING shop by the way. SO many things there. Thrifters will LOVE it)

(I might blog about the freecycle shop in the future, just that I didn’t take any pictures as I left early … ehm … X Factor Italia was on and I didn’t want to miss it)

Anyway, I wanted to share with you one of the shops that we went to, which I liked immensely. This shop is called “Negozio Leggero“.

This is one of the 4 owners of the Rome branch by the way, explaining to us, how the shop works – they obtain their stock in bulk, without individual packaging. And customers bring their own containers, jars, cans and bags. This way, you don’t have unnecessary packaging to throw away.

Like if you bought a pack of tea, you throw away the plastic wrapping, and then throw away the individual sachets cover, and then throw away the box when you are done with it. And that’s just for one item. Just imagine how much trash you’d have to take out at the end of the week for a regular family.

Anyway, I really like the shop you reduce wastage here. But mostly because of the lack of packaging, the items are cheaper (even if most of them are organic which is known to be costly) The housewife side of me is always looking for good deals.

There are a lot of interesting things to be found here. Ranging from food :

You could bring your own bottles and choose your own wine.

And you could pick your own flour, rice or tea or biscuits … (This really reminds me of my childhood days when I could go to a mom and pop shop and ask for 50 cents of grated coconut or 1 dollars worth of biscuits)

Apart from food items, there are also other items, such as toiletries :

(I smelled the white tea shower by the way and it smells so heavenly!)

Something that caught my eye was these toothbrushes with exchangeable heads. I like that you could just buy one handle and then change the heads when it’s exhausted. Makes more sense no? And probably more cost effective.

And there were some cosmetics that I might be interested to try out once I’ve used up all of my current mekap (Which will take a bit of time)

I also saw this :

If you don’t know what it is, err … never mind. But for those who do, I’ve been interested in this for a long while now. It’s just that it looks very daunting to put on, and I worry about accidentally dirtying myself. But one day … when I’m braver …

Moving on! There are also detergents for the house – for the floor, the windows, clothes, softener … While I was looking at this, happened to be a lady who brought her own jug to buy a detergent (As a sidenote, there are some supermarkets in Italy which does the same thing)

And this was interesting too! I was staring at it for a few seconds, wondering why a date would be under the toiletries segment when one of the girl in our group explained excitedly how fantastic these are at cleaning her laundry.

They are actually “Soap Nuts” which has a natural chemical which is good for washing and cleaning purposes. Because it is completely plant based, it’s organic, hypoallergenic and biodegradable. I was reading online how it can be used for other purposes too, not only for laundry.

My eyes got caught by these. And in the end, I got for myself some burger mix, some chocolate and some bar of soap.

100g yields 2 fat patties by the way, just add 100ml of water. For about 1.20 euro, I think that’s quite a good deal. I still like Kio Ene veggie burger by the way, but this could be an alternative.

All in all, I had a very nice time here, and looking forward to going there again the next time we need to do grocery shopping 🙂

Negozio Leggero – La Spesa Della Spina

• Via Chiabrera 80
• Click here for website

Sidenote : Just out of curiosity, is there a shop like this in the country where you are at? If so, please let me know in the comment box below 🙂

And so, on the second day that Cart was away, I thought that I’d spend some time with my friend. The original plan was to spend some time at some bancarelle perhaps in the center. But we found out later that there was a violent rioting going on. We didn’t want to risk being in the crossfire, so we pretty much just hanged out in her neighbourhood.

Anyway, when I reached home close to 7pm, and as I parked my car, I stepped out and I noticed that there was a bit of liquid running across the road.

“Odd” I thought to myself, “It didn’t rain the entire day. There must be a broken water pipe somewhere” And I promptly walked to the apartment.

About an hour later, I got a call from my in-laws who happened to be in the area (they had a friend living in the apartment across us, to whom they visit regularly) and my MIL urgently told me to go down.

And that’s when I saw this which shocked me.

It wasn’t a lot of liquid. But considering that it didn’t rain the entire day, and that the level of liquid was getting higher on the tyres of my car worried me. MIL adviced me to park the car up higher grounds and which I did, hurriedly. There were a number of people already who had the same idea as I had.

When I found an empty spot, it was a bit of walk back home, more than usual. Nevertheless, I crossed my fingers.

At about 10.30pm, the level increased to this :

And then at about 2.30am, the entire road was covered.

Funnily enough, I was thinking, “This is rather cool!” And yet, was feeling worried at the same time. Don’t go any higher please!

And then in the morning at about 7am, this was what I saw. You could hardly see the zebra at all! And our walking path looks like the start of a swimming pool.

I’m glad that I moved my car (Cart’s car was parked in a relatively safe spot behind) And I was really hoping that it doesn’t go any higher. I mean, reading about the news of the flooding in Venezia was alarming enough, and also of Ponte Milvio as well as Fatebenefratelli which are both in Rome but I never expected that my neighbourhood would be hit too.

I took a walk outside to check out the situation. There are some areas which I couldn’t even traverse in my rain-boots. It was that high!

And there were a few roads which were closed due to the … ahem … ponding. You could just imagine the traffic situation with cars conglomerating together, honking impatiently, wondering where to turn to exit to.

Thankfully, in the afternoon, the water started to recede and by after lunch time, all the flooding went away. Leaving only traces of muddy sediments.

What an eventful day! Funny thing is when I picked Cart up at the airport last evening, he quipped, “Oh no! I missed it!”

The funny bit is that Cart has to be out of Rome again next week. And I’m trying not to get paranoid 😐

Yesterday, we stopped having daylight savings time and we went back an hour. This always confuses my inner clock.

Hipster Marina in a scarf complete with the quintessential smartphone

So when I woke up yesterday, thinking that it was 7 am, alarmed at how it was rather bright outside, (I try to wake up before sunrise) momentarily confused when I saw that it was only 6 am on my phone.

And then when getting out of the house, everything feels strange. It’s like, my brain is telling me that it’s this o’clock. But my heart is saying this isn’t right. Going out for lunch, for example. I normally get hungry by noon, thus I kept thinking to myself, “Why are we eating so much later than usual?”

Pizza with pomodoro secco is pure happiness

And while Autumn is absolutely beautiful with the leaves starting to turn yellow and red and brown, the bad thing about it is how the days start to get so short. I detest how DUSK starts to be around 5 pm now! I don’t know if I will ever get used to this.

I’m not sure even why we have DST. It seems so much more of an inconvenience twice a year.

Sidenote : I find it interesting now that I have my Nexus, I hardly carry my pnp camera with me anymore.

I don’t normally like graffiti. But sometimes, there are some which I appreciate.

The ones that are artistic :

The ones that makes a point :

The ones that are creative :

The ones that beautify :

But not this one. This is a huge-ass writing on the floor next to our common citofono.

Translated, it says “Me and you forever. I love you my little one.”

Personally, if I were that girl, I wouldn’t find it romantic. Instead, I’d find it stalkerish and creepy.

1. It is super ugly
2. It vandalises public property
3. Not creative nor effort given at all
4. Did I mention that it is ugly?

Whatever happened to romanticism like writing a poem or a love letter (girls love those and keep them forever!) or singing a song or bringing little gifts or flowers?

I’m sorry, but this little romeo wannabe is an idiota.

Hi everyone! Gosh, I wanted to post this last Friday, but was so busy running around Rome. Did you know that there is an English library here? To be honest, I didn’t feel like I was in Rome at all when I stepped inside.

Anyway, here’s the continuation and the last installation for My family in Rome series 🙂

Sunday

As my family didn’t seem to be content from roaming around the week before, we agreed on going back to the open flea market in Porta Portese. So early in the morning, we dumped Cart (who’s not a morning person) and went on our own.

Because the roads there were closed for the open market, I couldn’t drive there directly (not that I would like to anyway as parking would be a nightmare) so I parked close to the nearest tram station and we took the number 8 to Porta Portese and we started roaming around.

The first stall that we saw was one that sold African items. My mum seemed transfixed looking at the colourful fabric decoration and bags. She even got for herself this traditional outfit and then valiantly started to bargain with the shop owner – a rather big and strong man. She’s very brave!

Either she has a lucky face or she’s very good at it (maybe both) and she got a really good deal in the end! I never tried to bargain myself … it’s just not in me, I guess 😛

Later on, we went to a stall selling clothes at a cheap price. It was a mix of new and used items, and my mum got some tops for herself, at less than 5 euro each. You’ll get to see her modelling it towards the end of the day 🙂

We must have taken such a long time, because from this point onwards, Nazry decided to split up to go to the other side, so that he could look at the more rare and unusual things while I sticked around to babysit my parents 😛

To be honest, it’s was infuriating then, seeing how my parent’s just got excited like little children in a candy shop. No, really. My dad kept wandering off, looking around at wallets, and belts, and bags and sandals (which he could get in a pasar malam in Singapore)

While my mum keeps buying scarves and tshirts. I could see it in their eyes, their inner monologue saying, “I want this! I want that!”

But reflecting back, it’s sort of cute when I think about it now. It’s nice to see your loved ones still have a child-like quality (as opposed to being completely jaded)

(If you’re wondering why I added this picture of a giraffe stool. I like giraffe prints and would like to collect more if I could)

As the time got close to the afternoon, we decided prior to regroup. It wasn’t easy to find each other in all the crowd and I was relieved when we managed to see each other in the end. Thank goodness for technology! I have no idea how tourists managed to go like this 20 years ago.

Anyway, he got for himself several old and rare postcards. And we were in a heavy discussion if they were actual photographs or paintings to look like Rome during the 60s. I forgot to take a picture of them though.

As we were hungry, I was wondering what we could eat for lunch. Maybe pasta? Cart should have been up, so he could cook us lunch! But we happened to be driving along the way, we did a quick stop to buy some kebabs.

The servers must have been glad to see us because immediately they sprang energetically when the four of us stepped in. Hehe.

Some Italian lesson! Pollo means chicken. Agnello means lamb. Vitello means veal. Manzo means beef and Pesce means fish. Some important words to know when you’re going to Italy :p

(Actually I think the most important phrase is Dov’e’ il bagno? Where is the toilet?)

Oh! As a sidenote, all these while when we’ve been eating out, my parents has been buying a little bit more extra … or saving the leftovers for breakfast! For me, after living in Rome for a while, it takes a little getting used to, eating savory things for breakfast all over again!

When we reached home, all of us had a lovely and easy lunch together. Cart had his falafel kebab, my mum and dad had a kebab each, my brother had a kebab plate.

And of course for dessert, I stopped by Cecere prior. One of my favourite pastry shop. I cannot go without my cream puff and maritozzo! 🙂

After lunch, we rested for a while, and then I had the tough decision of where to head to afterwards.

Do we go to Villa Adriana? Or perhaps somewhere out of Rome. Such a hard decision! But in the end, I decided to go to Ostia Antica. This is a place about 20 minutes drive from where we live and is somewhere that I’ve always wanted to go to.

Strangely, in all our years living here, we’ve never been there before (both Cart and I) so it should be interesting. Moreoever it was closer so we could spend more time there and less time commuting.

It took us about 15 minutes driving there and we reached a charming looking area. One of the thing that caught our eye was a castle. Thus we made a stop to explore.

To get inside, we had to enter a Piazza. And I think it’s so lovely here. So idyllic and tranquil, it feels like I’m transported back in time. It makes a wonderful location for wedding photoshoots I think.

Look at how fairy tale-ish the area looks like. This could even be a spot where you could do a role play for “The elves and the shoemaker”

And just by chance, indeed there was a wedding going on! There is a church right at the end. And there were loads of people wearing fancy outfits going in the church. I was raring to enter the place to have a better look, but the rest of the family didn’t seem to have a busybody bone like me 😛

And here is the castle! While it looked rather modest, it is so charming and lovely. I would have loved to enter and see what it looked like inside!

Unfortunately, it was locked and opened for tour walks during wednesdays only. Oh well! Perhaps we’d be luckier the next time 🙂

And here is a random tri-coloured Roman cat – happy to get a cuddle.

After walking in the piazza, we then headed to the Ostia Antica Archeological site. It costs about 8 euro per person to enter. Kind of expensive, but it was something amazing to be seen.

The first thing you’ll see is this crackly road. Have you ever seen this sort of road before? Maybe in postcards?

Now I finally see the real thing! By the way, this used to be a solid road, but throughout the years, it eroded to look like this infamous scale-like road.

As Ostia Antia was relatively close to the sea, thus it became a place where a lot of trading and marketing was involved which attracted people to call it home and became a community.

Here are some of the things that we saw. Isn’t it impressive how well preserved the buildings are Considering that these are about 2 thousand years old – Older than the colosseum!

This was a thermal bath

If I’m not wrong, this was the housing area

This was the arena where wrestling was done

This was where the capitol building was

This was the communal water fountain

This is the remains of a temple

And this is the auditorium

And here is a random gecko

It’s so beautiful in here. Seriously breathtaking. Everywhere you go, is like a high fashion photoshoot location. See, even my dad looks modelesque here, even without trying.

It was nice to see everyone looking so interested and excited going around the area. Just look at how excited my mum looks as she goes climbing around this auditorium. She even imagined that she was a queen, giving her speech on top of this podium. Hehe.

As you can see, there were so much to see and roam and explore. It’s nice that we could walk in and out and up and down the builds.

And see the still intact mosaics

As a sidenote, there were a few interesting plantlife to be seen, apart from acorns and figs, Cart managed to sniff out (literally) wild rucola! It’s a strong and distinct smell.

After about an hour and a half roaming around the place, it was close to the closing time. But we only managed to walk through half of the area! Gosh, we walked quite a bit and yet didn’t see everything!

But oh well! I’d love to come back here again. Maybe next time, I’d find more photographer friends and we could have a high fashion photoshoot here 😛

By the way, the tops that we are both wearing, costs less than 5 euro each. This pink top I’m wearing is a Mickey and Minnie Disney shirt, and I love it! I love bancarelle! Maybe I should write a blog post on the good ones in Rome 🙂

Random cat pics we spotted in the area! Gee, what a sour faced puss.

And a confused kitty.

Anyway, to end the day, and finally had a quick stop at the supermarket for some groceries for dinner. And at the same time, I guess my family could get some last minute keepsakes.

Nazry actually went crazy on buying coffee. He got for himself TWO large coffee makers, the 12 cups size cafettiere and 16 packs of coffee. Enough for him to last a year. Maybe even two! But It’s actually cheaper to get them in Italy. I remember when we were in Singapore, it costs almost 10 dollars for a quality pack of coffee.

I saw this for sale and thought that it could be interesting to eat. I didn’t like it too much though. Chilli and chocolate tastes a bit odd to me. I prefer the orange and chocolate combination.

Monday

Oh gosh. It’s their final day here. How did time pass by so quickly? It seems like I just blink an eye and a week just gone by.

Anyway, Cart took the day off to send them to the airport. And today, we pretty much just relaxed around the house, my family got their luggage ready and then we had a simple lunch at home.

As a finale, the last place that they visit, I took them to see Laghetto Eur. It’s not really a touristy place, but personally, I enjoy visiting this area anyway.

The passeggiata del Giappone is a big park surrounding a lake. Here you could see a lot of parents taking their children for a stroll, couples picnicking, buff men canoeing … And every now and then, there will be a bazaar or an event here.

I myself go jogging here regularly and I see familiar faces almost every time. It’s a nice place to go to for people watching.

Anyway, we walked to one end of the lake to see the ducks. While it was normal for the random person to throw small pieces of bread to the birds, there happened to be a guy who brought two black bin bags full of bread.

Soon, one corner of the lake was filled with floating bread. It looked so dirty-ish (although the birds and fishes and turtles will probably eat them all in the end) I think we were all just amazed at seeing all those wastage.

We continued walking and going for a stroll …

I just find it very relaxing just to be walking here. It’s not crowded and you could think better here. Maybe it’s just me?

At length, we walked to the other side of the lake … And there’s a McDougals here! I was joking if they wanted to eat here. Surprisingly, they thought that it was a good idea and went ahead! Ehm. Me and my big mouth!

Anyway, there wasn’t that much difference between here and the one in Singapore. The menu might be slightly different (like the McItaly)but the regulars like the Fillet-o-fish is the same.

(Meat isn’t halal here, but the fries and seafood are fried in vegetable oil if you trust to eat them)

Anyway, it’s a little bit different here cos I feel it’s slightly more posh. Something about a gazebo and a view of the lake makes it seems more high class, somehow 🙂

Oh, I just remembered, that my dad wanted a cappuccino (which is a breakfast drink). It was already late afternoon, so the man at the counter looked at me in surprise and I just shrugged my shoulders. The things I have to endure for my parents :p

Anyway, after our drinks, we then continued walking and of course … camwhored!

One.

Two.

Three!

Hahaha!

And then we walked to Giolitti which was at the other end of the lake. It’s a well known gelateria and there are a number of branches here in Rome. The servers all wear spiffy looking uniforms with vests and a bow tie.

There are a different range of gelato. And you could even have 3 flavours in one cone if you liked.

But I was more in the mood for frappe. Which is basically milkshake – part ice cream and part milk. I love frappes!

The only thing is, when tasting it, while it’s not bad, I think that the frappe that we had isn’t as nice as the one that we had in Millenium though. There are better gelateria in Rome.

Oh! As a sidenote, this is another top my mum got from a bancarella. Less than 4 euro, but she’s rocking the look! 🙂

After we had our dose of ice cream, then we went back home where we changed to our Baju Kurong. And by chance, each of us had a green baju kurong (even though they are in different shades) Cart still kept his and we went to have a quick photoshoot while it was still daylight.

As the day was still within the 30 days of Hari Raya, I guess it’s a family hari raya photo!

Don’t we all look so spiffy? I love this picture. But what would make it more complete is if my sister and other brother was here. Hopefully the next time 🙂

And then soon after that, it was time for us to head to the airport. And we played tetris with the luggage, trying to fit the bags at the back of Cart’s car.

While they were trying to fit the luggage, my mum took a chance to pose on my scooter. Haha!

AND! This is probably the last picture I have of my scooter with my left mirror intact. Someone STOLE my mirror! Unscrewed it right off! Urgh! Such a pain trying to do a safety check while on the road … I want to beat up the person who stole my mirror!

Ahem. Anyway, I really didn’t want my family to go. It really felt like the days just passed by so quickly. It’s like they didn’t even stayed here. It’s like, I blinked my eyes and they were gone. It’s so unfair! (Inserts an Aerosmith song)

By the way, we found out that both my parent’s didn’t maximize their luggage weight. They could have had more than 10kg to bring back to Singapore. Bring a bigger bag next time. Hehehe.

So while we were waiting for the plane, we stopped by at some duty free shops where I spotted this interesting looking speaker. This one, I definitely wont throw things at it!

We then stopped at a bar for a drink. And we chatted about their experiences here, their feelings and hopes. I was already feeling quite sad. Sigh! Oh! I just remembered, my mum was asking “Will you miss me?” Because I was a little heartbroken, I replied, “No!” even though I was. And she hugged me tightly and responded, “Well, I’ll miss you!”

(Sad emo Marina)

Anyway, this is the last coffee that they had in Rome.

And then it was time for them to board the plane. So we took a final picture together …

And this is the last scene of what I saw … my mum waving goodbye to us … 🙁

I do hope that they had a nice vacation and stay. And hopefully it will not be the last. I miss them already and hopefully will seem them soon, be it here or in Singapore.

And that’s the end of the series! Hope that you enjoyed reading so far as much as I enjoyed writing it out …

If you managed to read till the end, thanks for enduring close to 3k words today … here’s a kopi for you! You deserve it! Hehehe!