Tagged: friends

Albania

We flew from Hungary to Portland about a week ago and we’ve settled back into the beautiful Pacific Northwest.  When we’re away coming back it’s always striking seeing the massive amount of green trees.  And it’s nice that jetlag is never bad coming this direction.

Two weekends ago I visited a friend from UCLA named Roger and his wife Jennie in Tirana, Albania.  They just got married this past summer and were excellent hosts!  Roger and Jennie are helping grow a church and seminary in Tirana. Also, here’s the link to a video that Roger narrated that details the horrible suffering Albanians experienced under their uniquely evil dictator Enver Hoxha entitled “Prison Nation” http://www.albanianhumanrights.org/albania-prison-nation.html

Albania has also provided some inspiration for an online language-learning and translation project.  In a year or so I’m hoping to launch a website that provides language teaching online and translation services to customers around the world.  In particular, the possibility of helping residents of poor countries improve their ability to compete in the global marketplace with better English is a very appealing endeavor.  And I’ve already acquired a cool domain name:  TurboLanguages.

It had been 14 years since I had first gone out to Albania with other good friends from UCLA. Tirana has developed dramatically and I was struck by all the big towers.  Roger and I both enjoyed cappuccinos from the top of a cafe/restaurant that slowly spins around for a nice view of the city. Here’s some pictures from this awesome trip!

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Please Pray for Little Aidan

Our good friends Kalen and Melissa F's 21-month old son Aiden fell and hurt his head very badly yesterday.  The doctors in Portland have put him into a coma to reduce the brain swelling.  It must be incredibly difficult to see your child suffer. They'd appreciate your prayers for his recovery. Prayers for Aidan blog.

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Quick Update

We had a great time hosting my buddy Calvin L last week for four days.  I showed him the coolest spots in Budapest and will get some pictures up soon.  Calvin is a great travel companion and loves soaking up the culture and unique experiences.  We both love cafes but he loves them on a whole different level and was generous to treat me to a wine-tasting session his last day.

This past weekend we spent lots of time with Agi's mom and went hiking on Saturday and went on a big walk around Margaret Island after church on Sunday. We drove up today to Aunt Eva's place for the annual blowout Easter celebration with Agi's relatives.  More pictures to come there too.  Happy Easter!

I've almost finished the novel "the Sparrow" and am making my way through Tim Keller's excellent and compelling "the Reason for God."  We also saw the very funny "Meet the Parents" a few nights ago for the first time–Agi and I both loved it.  One of our favorite comedies.

Agi and I fly back to Portland on April 26th.  I'm looking forward to a quick 3-day side-trip to Albania this weekend to visit some friends and check out the ministry there I had participated in back in 1995.

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Real Food & Waffle Party

Agi just finished a remarkable book that already having a big impact on us:  "Real Food" by Nina Planck.  The author gives compelling reasons why eating processed, industrial food is literally killing modern people.  I just started reading it too and her thesis is simple: nearly all manufactured, processed food is created in a way that is bad for us and we should simply avoid it (e.g., cereal in colorful boxes and many other foods we've come to view as normal).  Instead, we can and should eat simple, natural, unprocessed food (without lots of the extra unnecessary ingredients) and eat essentially whatever we want of this "real food."  Thus, avoid "nonfat" yogurt and eat regular, "fatty" yogurt, chicken and its skin, bacon or any "non-processed" foods and lots of fruits and vegetables.  I'll write about this again when I learn more.

On Saturday Agi made up a huge batch of waffles, I made espresso with our stovetop maker and we served up a brunch to friends Brook and Kim who visited us this weekend along with my lovely sister Laurel, our friends Kalen and Melissa and my sister Melissa and her husband Mark and their kids.  It was lots of fun packing our condo out with visitors.  I like our fake gas fireplace and I fired that up for an extra-cozy feel as it rained outside.

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Halloween, Calvin & Portland

My good buddy Calvin came up to visit for three days. We took him all over the city and he and I indulged in lots of good conversation as we stopped by various cool pubs and coffee houses.  Portland doesn't disappoint–it's a fabulous city.  Not too big, very walkable, clean, friendly, sophisticated and beautiful. Agi and I have only really lived here about four months total so we're still exploring a lot.

Some highlights with Calvin (and he needs to send over some pictures he took with his phone):  Pittock Mansion, Voodoo donuts (and the amazingly tasty bacon maple donut).  Showing him our new church on Sunday, getting a parking ticket (the only low moment), walking around the Japanese Garden, hitting Hawthorne street (but missing out on visiting the intriguing "Rimsky Korsacoffee" cafe). 

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Great Weekends

Two weekends ago, my parents and younger brother came up to visit for a long weekend.  We played some tennis and my Dad helped me seriously improve my handyman skills as we got some Ikea curtains up and some car maintenance taken care of.  My sister Melissa and brother in law Mark threw a great bbq party in their huge backyard (briefly threatened by rain of course) and we got to meet a lot of their friends from church and elsewhere.  There's a good chance my parents will move up to Portland as well in a couple years.

This past weekend was filled with very fun and memorable times with good friends. I lived with Paul and Kalen in Davis for a couple years and their extremely hospitable parents hosted us at their lovely house in Weed, California, right next to Mount Shasta.  Their house has direct access to the gorgeous Lake Shastina and we had a fabulous time wakeboarding in their sweet speedboat on Sunday.  Ivy, by the way, impressed everyone by getting up on her very first try!  Her snowboarding skills paid off big time.  On Saturday we went on a very enjoyable 4-5 hour hike in the mountains and these hikes always combine great views with great conversation.

Kalen and Melissa had visited us in Budapest last year and now we're thrilled that they're probably going to move to Portland soon themselves (with their son Aiden).  Somehow, Crazy Paul was able to become a successful surgeon and he is finishing his residency up currently in Ohio.  He and his wife Renay (and new baby Madelin) will probably head out to somewhere in the Pacific NW in the next several years.  We are lobbying hard for Portland!

This past weekend was an awesome combination on many levels: it felt a cross between a college reunion, outdoor Christian retreat with lots of singing and trip to Vegas (I learned how to make mojitos).  Our batteries died on the hike on Saturday but other people brought their cameras so I'll add those in later.

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Budapest & Analogy

We're back in Budapest.  We had a smooth flight in on British Airways and I enjoyed four back-to-back films on the initial leg to London.  I never can sleep on the plane but don't mind when there's lots of movies and reading to be enjoyed.

It was nice to have a place of our own here to arrive at and there's lots of snow on the ground.  We're going to get out this afternoon and take the tram into downtown to run some errands and enjoy the city with its winter theme.

Here's an analogy I came up with recently–the similarities between Facebook Friends and books on your shelf: there's a certain amount of satisfaction you get when you buy a book you want to read, just as there is when you and someone else become "friends" on Facebook.  And you get a bit of comfort seeing a list of friends just as you might when you look at those books on your shelf.  But the (rather obvious) key is actually talking with, and meeting up with these friends, just as it is to actually read the books.

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Mimi and Fabio

Last weekend we had a fabulous visit with some adventurous friends who are currently living in Rome and will be moving to Vietnam this Summer.  Mimi is a good friend from high school and it's been a lot of fun to get back in touch the last few years.  She's been teaching at an international school in Italy the last 6-7 years and married a cool Italian guy named Fabio this past Summer.  They're moving to Saigon to teach and work for a few years and then probably head back to Italy.  Mimi is very impressive in that she is now fluent in Italian (and also Japanese and English).

We're looking forward to visiting them the end of May (Agi's 30th bday weekend!) for our first trip to Rome.  Agi and I went to Venice for our honeymoon but now we're ready for the big leagues of this huge, world-class city packed full of culture and history.  Years ago I bought Agi a book called "A Literary Companion to Rome" with famous authors' impressions of the city.  It's now on a book shelf to the right of me and I'm going to try to read this before we arrive.

Last weekend we had a lot of fun, among other things, hearing about the bitter rivalry between the Italians and the French and how much the two countries don't like each other (admittedly, Fabio says, because they're so similar.)  Who has the best food, the  most beautiful language, the best football teams, the best looking women?…  He also shared a very funny story about how he and a French guy almost got in a fight in a wedding in the U.S. because the French guy was mocking Fabio and another Italian guy (and Fabio is actually very mild mannered).

Allright–here are some pictures!

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Last Day in the Cubicle–Last Week in San Jose

Last Friday was my last day at work and I took a picture of my cubicle to help me remember where I sat for about six and a half years.  My coworkers and boss were great throughout the past week and I will definitely miss (most of) them!…

On Sat, March 24th, Christian and Alice Z hosted a great "going away" shindig for me and Ivy.  We were really touched by how many people stopped by–especially every single one of my old UCLA roommates, three of which had to drive or FLY a LONG ways to make it.  Greatly appreciated!  My UCLA friends took Ivy and I out to a great Italian dinner at "Beppo de Burnikos" (or something like that).  We sat in the cool "Pope-Themed" room in the back around a big round table with a full bust of Benedict right in the middle.  He'd rotate around as you moved the food with the "lazy susan" contraption.  (It was great as well that UCLA won the tournament basketball game that night–which we watched over at Christian & Alice's).

This past week I've been working as a contractor for my (ex) company and have been loving it.  I work about 3-4 hours a day and have been able to arrange my schedule to best fit in packing, workouts and tennis with Ivy and visiting friends.  I'd love to do this long-term and it would be a perfect complement to our internet business activities.

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