Miss Euro Blogger - Bursting the Bubble

Today, I was really angry with myself. Even more so: I was disappointed with myself. I pride myself on being a strong woman who doesn't take shit from people - especially men when they think they can just do or say whatever to a woman. I went for a walk today in the woods surrounding the city of Salzburg in Austria. I had some lovely Apfelstrudel and a cappuccino with a view of the fortress Hohensalzburg up on the hill in the not so far distance. When I was done, I started to make my way back towards the direction of my hotel. Lots of tourists crossed my path, which is nothing unusual in this area at this time of the year. After a few minutes, I saw a young couple that just finished talking to an old man and saying their goodbyes. It seemed as if he was giving them directions. I was in a happy mood and being polite, I smiled at the old man as I passed him. He called after me: "Young lady!" I turned around and he came closer. "I was just telling these two young ...

My husband and I decided that for this year’s summer vacation, we were not getting on a long-haul flight to visit a far away country. Instead, we decided to take a road trip. We live in Vienna, Austria, that, due to its central location in Europe is the perfect hub for European travel. Earlier this year, a friend told me how much she enjoyed her trip through the south of France a few years ago, where she was able to see the famous lavender fields. We sat down and stalked her Facebook profile to look for her photo album documenting that trip. Once we found it, the decision was clear: that’s where we want to go! We started with the planning and decided to never drive more than six hours each day in order to avoid getting tired. The entire trip was going to be two weeks with the first week focusing on hunting the lavender fields and the second week being lazy on the Cote d’Azur. Therefore, we decided to have the following set stopps along the way, where we were going to book ...

I love to eat. I enjoy healthy foods but also the occasional (or frequent) unhealthy food. I gave up meat when I was 20 years old. The nightmares from my childhood upbringing on the farm and the trips to the slaughterhouse caught up with me. I never missed meat; not even for a second. However, I still eat fish and seafood. I thought I could kill a fish or a prawn if I had to, so in my eyes, it was a fair fight. I learned to love vegetarian meals when I moved to California. Healthy eating was part of the lifestyle. Salads tasted amazing and meatless pasta dishes were creative. Plus, veggie burgers were up and coming and more and more soy meat substitutes were available at the supermarket. There was soy sausage, soy 'cold cuts' and even soy minced meat. I was in vegetarian heaven. Seafood and fish were also incredibly fresh, inexpensive and readily available. I had my food-life all figured out. Even once I moved back to Europe, I learned how to navigate around the meat-heavy ...