Liebster Award, round two!

My week turned really good when I saw that I got nominated for a second Liebster award (see first here)! This one came from my friend Cynthia from adventurings, who writes about her expat adventures in small town Czech Republic. I really do enjoy these kind of chain blogger awards because they allow us to get to know the bloggers on a more fun level!

Let’s get straight to Cynthia’s questions!

1. If I handed you a plane (or rail) ticket to anywhere in the world for one week, where would you go?

Oooh so many places to choose from! I would have to go with Africa. To me, going on an African safari is the ultimate destination as I’ve been obsessed with all things animal ever since I can remember. I would LOVE to see the Great Migration in person someday!

2. Your favorite book you’ve read in the past year & why you loved it so much?

I read a lot of books last year, but unfortunately, a lot of them weren’t too good. Note to self: stop browsing the $2 Kindle books section. Of the good ones I read, it’s a tough battle. But seeing how I read four Tana French books last year (some were re-reads), I’d have to say that she was my favorite author of the year and my favorite new book was Broken Harbor.

It’s Gone Girl-esque in that the root of the story is about a perfect marriage gone wrong. But what Tana French does better than anyone else is the building (and tearing apart) of relationships. Her literary prose is beautiful to the point where I find myself in awe of how the English language can create such beautiful sentences and highlighting way too many passages.

I’ve been thinking about doing a books post for a while, and I think the time may have come so I can gush over her some more. Stay tuned!

3. What does your “default outfit” look like? (aka, if I stopped by your house or met you for coffee on any given day, what might you be dressed in?)

Right now, since I’m in blazing hot Southeast Asia, you’ll see me wearing a blue polka dot dress that I bought in Thailand for only US$3. If the weather is a little cooler, I’ll most likely be wearing black leggings (yes, I’m one of those people who wear leggings as pants) with a longer tank (at least I have the decency to cover my bum).

4. What item do you miss the most from home (that can be bought at a store) and wish it could be shipped to you posthaste?

I thought about this for a while, and I can honestly say that I don’t miss anything that much from back home (I mean… I miss my hair straigtener, but I’d just rather buy a new one abroad than spend money shipping mine in). If I had to pick something, I’d say it’d be our huge Berkey water filter so that we can have clean drinking water in areas where tap water is not safe to drink. Buying bottled water gets expensive and annoying!

5. The mountains or the beach?

No hesitation: the beach. I’m definitely a beach girl at heart. Every time I’m near water, I just feel a million times happier.

6. What’s a strange quirk of yours?

Okay, I was totally going to say that I don’t have any, but then I started typing, and realized I have a lot. Here’s just one:

I hate wearing pants indoors (and jeans are the WORST). If I wore pants out, I have to take them off immediately when I get home. Like literally the first thing I do. So actually back to Question 3, if you just randomly came by, I probably won’t be wearing pants. But I’ll get decent to answer the door.

7. Would you like to move back to the town you grew up in someday?

I grew up in a couple of different towns, so I have a couple of answers!

I spent the ages of 0-6 in Beijing, China. While I do like Beijing (mainly because all my mom’s side of the family live there), I wouldn’t live there long term. The air is just too bad. But I probably wouldn’t mind living there for a month of two during the course of our travels.

And after China, I lived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (on the US East Coast) until I was 11. I have really fun memories of my time there, but as I have no family or friends there anymore, I have no emotional ties to the city. I don’t even have a huge urge to visit, but it could be fun to see it through tourists’ eyes someday.

8. What inspires you most, creatively?

I get writer’s block a lot (notice recent slowing down of postings). I find that instead of forcing myself to stare at a computer screen and come up with words, it’s better to just step away and let the words come to me. I’m a firm believer of “blogging about life” instead of “living to blog”, so just doing things I enjoy inspires me to share it with you. Also, reading other people’s writing, whether that be other blogs or really good books, will usually re-motivate me and inspire me to write better.

9. What do your travel plans for the rest of 2015 look like?

We’re currently in Singapore right now, and will be spending the month of March on Boracay (CAN’T WAIT! I need some beach!!). After that, we are headed to China to see my mom’s side of the family (cross my fingers that I get the visa)! After China, our plans are wide open, but maybe Bali? D would like to go to India too.

10. What’s a place you’ve been that you love that is totally underrated or off the tourist radar?

Hmmm I actually have to think about this because we’re not really off-the-beaten-track type travelers. We mainly visit well known cities and popular tourist attractions. If I had to pick one, I would say it’s Montevideo, Uruguay, just because I don’t really know of a lot of people who’ve been there or are planning to go there.

I really loved the city a lot and have some wonderful stories. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t recommend it as a good value destination. It was surprisingly expensive (we’re talking about US$13 meals on average) for not a whole lot of extraordinary things to see.

The rules of the Liebster is to pass the award onto other bloggers deserving of recognition. So I’d like to nominate some new friends: Marcella from What a Wonderful World, Michelle from Mishfish13, and Rachel from Trailing Rachel.

My questions:

1. What is your favorite recent destination or experience?
2. What is your biggest travel fear?
3. What is one thing you must bring with you when you travel (excluding necessary items like electronics/clothes. Like for me, this is my teddy bear).
4. Hostels, hotels, or AirBnb rentals?
5. If how much you earn is not an issue, what is your ideal job?
6. Who is your favorite author? Also, recommend a book (I need some better reading material).
7. How old were you when you flew on your first plane and where did you go?
8. Name one guilty pleasure.
9. If you could only eat one dish for the rest of the year (and calories/health is not a concern), what would it be?
10. And because my mind seems to be on food, here’s another food question: What is the most expensive meal you’ve eaten? Was it good?

Have fun, ladies!