Diary of a Singaporean now living in Rome, Italy
While on our way from Calcata to Lido di Tarquinia, I spotted out this amazing sight. Probably not as impressive in the pictures, but I was definitely stupefied.
It looks as if it is raining heavily in one spot. Poor things caught in it must not have had a pleasant day. in fact, parts of Rome got flooded during the weekend.
At the same time though, it looks so cool. As if the clouds are sucking in moisture from the sea. It looked like an alien movie somewhat.
With the fasting month around the corner, I wondered where would be nice to do a day trip till I remembered a post that Natalie wrote not too long ago which made me interested in visiting it.
By chance, we had to go to Lido di Tarquinia which by chance wasn’t too far away from this place, to celebrate MILs birthday.
The place that we’re speaking of is Calcata! Not be confused with Calcutta, India. I was initially puzzled as to how Natalie could have gone to India and come back to Rome within a day.
Calcata is a charming village on top of a volcanic cliff. It is so picture postcard pretty. Even the rain clouds didn’t diminished how lovely the place looked.
Calcata reminds me somewhat of Nemi, but a little more rustic.
Did you know that in the 1930s the government condemned this area for fear that the volcanic cliff built by the ancient community would collapse. Local residents then were moved to the nearby area.
But in the 1960s the empty area was repopulated again with squatters such as hippies and artists many of them eventually purchased their homes and eventually the condemnation was reversed and now you get an interesting community there. A village run by hippies.
According to NYTimes, ‘Calcata may be the grooviest village in Italy. home to a wacky community of about 100 artists, bohemians, aging hippies and New Age types‘.
Reading that, I imagined that there will be people with long hair, bandanas over their heads, and long flowy outfits. You know, like this.
When we reached there, we first stopped by a little restaurant overlooking the cliff called L’Orchidea Salvaggia. The people running it are really friendly and I liked that there were grape vines all around us. The grapes should be ripe for the picking come October or so 🙂
I had a plate of yummy lasagna with zucchini flowers. It was so delicious! Despite it’s small size, it was extremely filling.
Cart had ravioli with creamy lemon. It was so good! Lemon surprisingly, really does go well with cream and pasta.
He also had fagiolini lessati afterwards. These beans, are quite special as instead of the typical green, these were yellow and are grown in the area.
I couldn’t help but to take a picture of the coffee cup we were drinking of. So cute!
After lunch, it was the perfect time to go a-strolling in through the village and burn of a bit of calories.
We turned by the corner …
Went through the entrance …
Walked up the slope …
And we reached the heart of Calcata.
The place does look quite hippy. While it wasn’t as obvious and in your face as I initially imagined, you can see how the atmosphere here is influenced. I saw a few lounging around with their pre-loved items, there were art galleries and bars.
This guy here is selling some bottles of juniper berries, salt and Olio di Iperico – that’s the red liquid there. Made of St John’s Wort, used for treating depression, he claims that it was matured for 40 days and is beneficial for skin maladies. Cart got a bottle for himself but when we tried it on ourselves, we found out that the skin gets really hot when you use it.
The seller looks really happy doesn’t he? 🙂
There were works going on when we were there which spoiled the view a little. Nevertheless, we took a peek inside the church.
This flyer right next to the entrance amused me a lot.
I then met this sweet tempered dog which I called, Giorgione on account on how it was breathing. It was such a calm and gentle animal.
I enjoyed walking in the area. While it was not a huge place, every passage that we went past looks so charming, especially with the flowers and vines growing all around. I’m also quite pleasantly surprised to see the amount of cats in the area. See if you could spot them in the two pictures below.
Here’s something which I thought was cute and coincidental about this black cat.
She was sitting right next to a bar called Black cat’s milkbar! An unofficial mascat! (A typo but I’m leaving it in)
Like Nemi, they are both on top of a volcano, but a big difference is how rustic Calcata is. I love how the place looks not too polished and yet so charming. I really hope that this place doesn’t get overrun with tourists like Rome is right now.
We probably spent about 2 hours or so before we had to leave for Lido di Tarquinia. And I really hope to visit this place again to soak up more of it’s atmosphere. I think that Calcata is a really charming place to be, be it for the buildings or the community animals or just the people there.
Bye for now dog!
Bye for now cat!
Bye for now Giorgione!
I love you! And I hope to see you soon!
Apart from the things that I’d like to eat while in Singapore (which hasn’t really changed since then) here are the food places that I’d like to visit while we are in Singapore. We’ll be there for only 3 weeks so I’m not sure if we’d be able to visit them all. But lets give it a shot!
In absolutely no order of merit
1. Pasarbella
I know of this place because there were a number of people mentioning this on my twitter feed some time back. To me, the name is strange because Pasar is market in Malay and bella is beautiful in Italian. So it’s sort of like a mixed baby?
Anyway, this is a place where you could get niche food products. Kind of like Eataly in Rome. If I’m not wrong, it opened just this year. I’m not sure what I’ll discover when I get there, but the pictures looks nice.
Daphne, who is a cow lover, wrote about this place in her blog recently. By the way, Le Steak is such a cute name isn’t it? Every time I hear the name, I’d keep visualising the song, “Freak out! Le steak, C’est chic“.
Prior to living in Italy, I wasn’t such a big fan of steak, but after discovering halal butcheries and cooking it for myself, I found out that I really like eating beef fillets and steaks. There is a simple, rustic taste about a good steak and I’m looking forward to try something that a chef makes.
My worry is that being a steakhouse, will there be substantial food for Cartcart, who’s a vegetarian. I only see Aglio Oglio in their menu and maybe garden salad. I don’t trust so much for mushroom soups being vegetarian, as I’m 90% sure that there is chicken stock in there.
3. Real Food
If I’m not wrong, it was Walter who mentioned this in his Instagram feed. He was showing the lovely desserts that he was having and I thought that the place looked interesting. This place serves organic and vegan food so I think that this could be a good place for a meet, regardless of what anyone’s food preference is.
Looking through the menu, the quinoa burger sounds interesting. I’d try that.
4. Original Sin Vegetarian Restaurant
I don’t remember who mentioned this, so I don’t know how it managed to get in my list. Regardless, this restaurant is another vegetarian one, but more posh and up-scale. But the thing about being posh is that, the prices are bound to be on the more expensive side.
Indeed 26 SGD for a vegetarian tandoori seems rather extravagant … but no harm trying once.
I remember Sarah mentioning this in her blog. In a hot climate such as Singapore, it’s nice to cool down with an iced dessert. And everyone loves ice cream! I also love that this place is located in Arab Street. One of my favourite places in Singapore.
We could go to Hajah Maimunah for lunch first and then head for some gelato and then after that, we can go exploring in this super charming area. If you haven’t been to this area, you should! It’s a lovely place that is reminiscent of a 1950s side of Singapore 🙂
6. Skyve Elementary Bistro and bar
A famous blogger wrote about this place a long while back and when I read it, I’m stunned and shocked. It was so unreal to me as it used to be the institution that I used to go for night classes and I had nice memories there. In fact, I blogged about it a long while back and now it’s a restaurant.
I don’t know if the food is good there. You know, how blog advertorials tend to only say positive things. Moreover, the place has a lot of meat types that I won’t eat but I’d like to go there just for the sake of nostalgic purposes and see how much things have changed there.
It’s hard for me to not think of the Swedish Chef from the Muppets show whenever thinking of Swedish Food. The irony is that Italy (where I am living) and Sweden is so much more closer than Sweden is to Singapore!
To be honest, I’m not sure how authentic the Swedish food here is, but it’ll be interesting to give it a try. Maybe the meatballs since I don’t eat the ones at Ikea.
8. Charcos
To be completely honest, number eight is actually for a Halal Japanese restaurant I stumbled on a blog. According to the author, the food here was close to what he ate while in Japan. Sadly, I don’t see it in my bookmark anymore.
So I guess I am substituting it with another steak place! It’s supposed to be good.
9. 18 Chefs
I’ve always wanted to eat here but I never seem to ever have a chance to visit. I hope that when we reach in August, we’ll finally eat there.
What attracts me to this restaurant is that the place has a crew with troubled youths and convicted criminals so that they could reintegrate into society through positive work experience and I like the philosophy of giving people who want to change, a second chance.
The head chef is the one in the middle there by the way, I’ll buy you a coffee if you could recognize the dude on the left 🙂
Friends tell me that this place looks like where you could get tools like hammers and saws. Moreover, the name is so old-school, with the Mandarin characters on top. But it’s actually a coffee shop! It’ll be interesting to see it in person and of course spending time with friends chit chatting here 🙂
On top of all these, I’d like to eat my beloved Ayam Penyet of course. And Cart is looking forward to going to Komalas at Little India. Not forgetting all the visits to my thousands of relatives in Singapore. Oh boy, I think there will be a big chance that I’ll put on weight again while in Singapore :p
Sidenote : Gordon Ramsay is in Singapore at this time of writing, challenging Singaporean Hawkers. I wonder who’d win the round.
I’m having a lot of fun with my sewing projects to the point that I’m starting to neglect a bit of housework on account of how engrossing it is! Hahaha!
Anyway for today’s bancarella, I thought that I’d introduce probably the biggest flea market in Rome – Porta Portese.
This mercato is opened every Sunday morning till about 2pm. And the easiest way to get here is probably to take the train to Trastevere and then switch to the number 8 tram.
To me, it’s interesting as the area is a regular road, but closed from traffic during market times. And here you could find a lot of things ranging from jewellery, vinyl, furniture. I even found some Milo Manara comics.
I’m not sure if it’s such a touristy place to be, but if you are ever in Rome, I think it’s something to be seen.
Anyway, I got this outfit for 1 euro. And I’m not too sure what exactly it is. Is it a skirt? Is it a top? In either case, each option is much too loose for me.
Nevertheless, I quite liked the delicate purple and blue flower prints.
So first things first, removing of all the extra tags. Jackpot. Is it a famous brand?
And I used my trusty seam ripper …
And scored for myself a free elastic band. Hahaha!
And then using a template (in Italian it is called cartamodello) from my favourite magazine, I scratched my head for a while trying to decipher it, and eventually managed to figure it out and had it traced out on a tracing paper.
The magazine claims that the edges are not included in the template, I had to make another tracing with a little bit of space on the fabric. And I learnt a new word. Gesso. That means chalk in Italian.
Here goes nothing! Again, I feel bad for cutting the outfit, it’s like destroying a completely perfect thing. So I had to strengthen my inner-self. Besides, if I messed up, it’s only 1 euro, I psycho-ed myself (please excuse the unclassy looking weights)
Snip snip snip! And here is the poor leftover!
I also made piping! This is an easy way to neaten an outfit and ironing helps to make the material flat and easier to work with.
Here goes nothing! It’s sewing time! I even put a post pad with scribbles of which stitches to use. Hahaha!
And this is what it looks like finished. The odd thing is that I followed the template for my sizing, but it turned out rather big for me. Burda! Y U TRICK ME!
The top may look simple, but it actually took a much longer time compared to my previous project on account that I had to be much more meticulous in measuring and then doing a running stitch to see that everything goes before doing the final machine sewing.
In any case, I quite adore the bunching up effect here. Cute!
Camwhore time! Hehehe!
I paired my top with a 4 euro skirt I got also from Porta Portese (H&M and it looked brand new!) bangles I got some while back, heels from Pazzion which was supposed to be my wedding shoes, a large band belt, and one of my favourite gold necklace which was a gift from my mum on my 23rd birthday.
I look like a lay-deh! So demure and coy.
My fab top is only 1 euro! Shh! Don’t tell anyone!
This is the, ‘I’m waiting for my boyfriend and he is late and I am starting to get annoyed‘ pose.
And my favourite pose of the moment :
Me channelling Victoria Beckham, all regal and sophisticated with a stare that can stop you with just one look.
Hahahaha!!! In any case, I had a lot of fun with this project and I don’t even mind wearing this ensemble out. So what do you think of the top I did 🙂
Infiorata is a decoration done on the floor made of flowers. It is usually done to celebrate a catholic event. Thanks to buzz in Rome, I knew of an infiorata which was near San Pietro.
Some petals flew by as the wind blew
It happened that it was the patron saint’s day of Rome on the 29th of June and is a public holiday, so a number of shops were closed.
In any case, when we reached there, it was already late afternoon. I was excited to see the infiorata thinking that it would be as grand as the one in Genzano. It wasn’t. Nevertheless, it was interesting to see.
While coloured rice wasn’t used, the decorations reminds me a lot of the decorations that are done during deepavali. I liked seeing the vivid hues.
I think this one used coloured salts instead of flowers.
In the end, I enjoyed looking at the demonstrations. I find it interesting that there are similar cultures between countries.
Since the beginning of June, the Mcdougals in Singapore has been selling a limited edition Hello Kitty plushie with every value meal bought. I don’t know exactly how many are distributed for each though, but I guess they are about 6 k for each branch? I may be wrong though.
Anyway, here are the pussies :
From top to bottom : The singing bone, the mcdelivery witch special and then the ugly duckling, the frog prince, the lion from the wizard of oz and little red riding hood.
To be honest, I don’t really find them special. I even saw some on someone’s dashboard while walking around in my Roman neighbourhood.
I’m not that crazy over Hello Kitty, but if I really had to make a choice of the one I like the best between this edition, I guess I’d pick the frog prince on account that I like frogs and I like green. Moreover, my mum has been trying to collect them for me and my sister – which I think is such a sweet gesture considering all the queuing madness!
It’s bound to make the most rational person all bothered and angry. Just check out this video below.
It’s interesting to see people queuing, uniting. If only this energy was used for something more worthwhile, perhaps we’d still have our National Library.
By the way, I don’t believe that Mcdougals staff has an upper hand in collecting the kitties. My mum works there and she herself couldn’t get them all.
What I really don’t support is when there are people who throws away their untouched meals in the trash straight after getting their plushies. So lets say that someone got their maximum of 4 plushies, that’s 4 burgers, 4 fries and 4 drinks all in the trash! What a horrible waste of food! I know they are unhealthy and all, but it makes so much more sense to at least offer it to someone who does want/need it.
And another sad thing is that there are a lot of people who are profiteering from this, selling the kitties at at least 4 times the original value. What’s even crazier is when sellers start to put an insane price like this :
Whether the bidders are genuine or fake so as to inflate the price, to combat this situation, I think it’s a matter of simple economics. Prices are determined by the level of demand, and if there is a sucker who’d pay that amount, till then prices will continue to be high. So we have to collectively not support these rip-offs. Less support and prices will go down.
So don’t buy pets from pet stores if you don’t support puppy mills, don’t buy ivory products if you don’t support poaching, don’t buy NDP tickets … those things are supposed to be free anyway!
But think about it, if they were really limited editions, shouldn’t they come with a serial number on each packaging? They would announce that there will only be X amount in production, and you are currently holding number Y.
Instead, you could buy them online for even less the price that Mcdougals asked for.
Somehow, I feel that this is heading towards the same path as the beanie babies phenomenon, where it started off as something that sounds valuable as a collectable, but ended with production being so high that hardly any of them are worth much now.
In the end, I don’t think that these collectibles have so much monetary value for selling in the long run. Take a look at the Hello Kitty collectibles that Mcdougals did in 2000 – it was all the rage, with probably the same amount of queuing and madness. I remember that there were people selling them online for hundreds of dollars.
13 years has passed by and you could get a set for about 25 SGD. Seems pointless. So if you’re thinking of profiteering, I’d advice you to think twice.
Hi everyone!
It has been about a year since I’ve published losing more than 10kgs. Since then, I’ve managed to keep my weight more or less quite stable since then mostly thanks to my half marathon training earlier this year.
It’s just that after the event, I started to neglect my exercises (it was exhausting after all) but still ate the same way like I was still training. Before I knew it, I started to feel this constant, uncomfortable bloating (which is also a side effect of the folic acid pills that I’m taking) and looking at the scales, I was horrified. It wasn’t such a dramatic increase, but yikes! Not good!
I really don’t want to go back as how I was before. And the easiest way to lose fats is to watch what you eat. So I downloaded myfitnesspal on my phone to track the things that I’ve been eating all these while and investigate what I’ve been doing wrong. I don’t believe in dieting, or denying yourself from what you love to eat but I do believe in eating in moderation.
(A lot of pizza huh?)
It was quite enlightening to find out that one slice of pizza is about 300 calories and on a normal day, I’d usually have 4 slices … Hmm … I see why I’ve been putting on weight 😛
Of course, I don’t think that this app is 100% accurate, but it does give you a visual idea of what you’re consuming. So this week I’ve been watching my food intake and have been trying to eat lesser processed food as possible (it’s easier when you’re a housewife and you can control what you eat) and I’m glad to see that I’m back to my regular weight in a surprisingly short time.
(Biologico means organic in Italian. I don’t really care about organic food, but this one was the house brand, and thus cheaper :P)
But it’s hard though, when you’re eating out and people keep piling on food for you to eat – the things that you don’t want to consume in the first place and get all huffy and insisting when you try to refuse. Weighing myself the next day is always in trepidation. I don’t like when my weight goes all yo-yo. Sometimes I feel like they are sabotaging my progress but I know that people means well. I just need to remember to keep calm and not react emotionally as I tend to do.
(I got this time ago, but I don’t use the recipes but I like to see the pictures … ehm! Speaking of which, is it even possible for people to watch their diet while in a Sicilian household?)
Apart from food intake, exercising and being active is also very important. I enjoy running and how good my body feels after that. As it is Summer and is getting uncomfortably warm even at 9am, so for the past few weeks I’ve been waking up at about 6am and been doing short runs almost every day. It’s very bright outside by this time as the sun rises at about 5.30. But there will hardly be any traffic and hardly anyone roaming around and thus it’s much more comfortable for me going about in the cooler temperature.
I like this routine. I’d reach home sweaty and that’s the best time to get a shower. Cold water+warm sticky body = shiokness! And after that, I can start the day proper. I’d like to continue this routine till Ramadan (less than two weeks to go!) and then pick it up again after the fasting month because I’ve decided to run for the 15km event in Singapore. I hope that I can make it! Haha! Jules said that she’d join me, so that’s such a pleasant surprise 🙂
(I also hope that the haze situation will stabilize too. Our poor Malaysian neighbours had to declare a state of emergency when the PSI level went up to 700!)
Anyway, that’s about it. Nothing much to update as I’m more or less the same as I am last year 😛
Sidenote : Daphne and I look very different now compared to the picture of us in this post and I’m very proud of her! Cart says the old us could be our cases. Haha!
Speaking of which, it’s Cart’s birthday today! Happy birthday my beloved 🙂
Cart and I were at the Auditorium Parco della Musica yesterday. It’s the same location where we watched the Pat Matheny concert a while back.
We were there yesterday as this was the location for the past three days for the Festival del Gelato. Being a gelato lover, this was something that I didn’t want to miss. As here you could find award winning creations by some the best gelato makers in the entire Italy – all in the same area.
This is a giant sized container for cherries if you were wondering, you’d see this in a lot of Italian gelateria
It’s officially Summer! And as it was rather warm in Rome, we only ventured there after 6pm when the weather was cooler. Nevertheless, there was a big conglomeration of people there. So many gelato fans! You could see lines and lines of people queuing up in front of the many booths.
It was only when we went closer was that we found that you’d have to queue up first to buy tickets. With this ticket, you get a black and white shopping bag (like what the girl is holding in the picture above) a packet of waffle-cookies, a coupon for a gelato-cocktail, a guide book, a maximum of 5 gelati sample of choice.
Tickets costs 12 euro though, and for the price of that, the size of your gelato bowl was really tiny. Moreover, with the very long lines, Cart and I both weren’t down with that, but we continued our look-see.
This was a sort of a bus where you could see people making gelato inside.
A lot of the gelato that is made in Italy uses these kind of machines to mix them together – it’s a much professional version compared to the one that Cart and I use.
This booth serves black forest gelato.
This is coffee gelato (if I’m not wrong)
This is a gelato with strawberries and passionfruit.
Peach gelato with a touch of chocolate sauce and pistacchio
White chocolate gelato with a touch of vanilla, chocolate and pistacchio.
I was joking with Cart that this was durian ice cream. He shot me this horrified look. Haha! It’s actually gelato with Sicillian oranges and a touch of chocolate. The colour is gorgeous though.
If I’m not wrong, this was a mix of cherries and pistacchio on cream gelato – making it the colours of the Italian flag.
This gorgeous looking one has chantilly cream, dulce de leche and gianduja.
Coffee with almond milk
There was also a conference hall where there were a few invited speakers who did courses on how to make gelato and others who gave tips about making gelato. We didn’t stay too long for this one because, when we reached there, the speaker was already halfway through, and we missed the bulk of the talk.
In the end, after visiting the Gelato Festival, we headed to one of our favourite, Tony Gelateria. It may not be award winning. But we both love it anyway 🙂
Less queue and only 2.50 euro 😛
Nevertheless, with the list of these gelaterie at hand, I think we’ll go around Rome for a gelato adventure at our own time 🙂
In about two months time, we’ll be heading to Singapore to celebrate Hari raya with my family. It’s been almost 5 years since I’ve last celebrated Raya there, so I’m looking forward to spending time with my family and friends. It doesn’t have the same vibe celebrating it in Rome – it’s not as festive considering that the past few years Raya was held during the summer when almost everyone is away on vacation.
Anyway, apart from celebrating Raya, I look forward as well as to exploring the new builds like the Marina Barrage, Gardens by the bay and whatntots. We haven’t even had the chance to visit Universal studios and Night Safari while we were the the last time. Hmm .. I think I should start making a list of the places to visit while in Singapore.
(That reminds me, I’m considering in joining the 15k CSC Run by The Bay. Is it safe to do a couple of weeks after a month of fasting? Any advice?)
And speaking of lists, I’ve also made a list of the restaurants that I want to visit in SG, which I think I’ll update in a future blog post 🙂
The only thing though, is getting around quickly since I’ve already had my scooter sold (That’s a really old picture of me in 2006) And everyone I know in SG has stories about how public transportation has worsened throughout the years. That’s not good. But since i’ve already a driver’s license, perhaps I should rent a car or we could just go around in bicycles as a more economical way 😛
Also, I’m sure that I’ll be facing interrogations revolving around if Cart and I are having kids anytime soon. I’ll just try to remember to remain calm, smile and simply say, “We’re trying” And if they start becoming more nosy, I’ll repeat the same phrase till they get tired and give up 😛
Sidenote : This is odd, I started this post with the intention of blogging about the running event in Singapore, and now that I’m done, I’ve gone quite off tangent from the topic.
