Top reasons why I love living in California

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- Sunday is like a normal week day, everything is open!
- Listening to the radio is like listening to my favorite CD's;
- Our song (first kiss & wedding) is always being played on the radio;
- Summer is not so hot, winter is not so cold;
- Clothes and electronic devices cost 50% less than in Italy, 70% less than in Brazil;
- I get to learn new English words and improve my 3rd language;
- I am finally understanding why in all movies Halloween and Thanksgiving are so special for Americans;
- I am a Software engineer living in Silicon Valley, I know I said that before, but this is really cool;
- I go to classes in Stanford and in the UC.
- California way of life is not stressful nor chaotic.
- I take 30 minutes to go to the beach ( and 4 hours to go to the mountains =/)
- The nature around here is priceless!
- I get to say: I live in California! :D

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New Like Me

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Check out this new blog I'm doing with some friends who also are expatriates:
www.newlike.com

I hope you enjoy it :D

Long time no see uh? heheheeh. I've been lazy to write here lately. Besides I couldn't switch on my home laptop for a while... stupid ME dropped beer on it!!!! And I wasn't even drunk... But the good news is, it's alive and running now ;)

Well... the news is: both university courses finished and I got A in both! So happy! Now I've already started the second class for UC PM certificate... these classes are on Saturday, almost 8 hours! but it's worth it, I'm finally learning how to use Microsoft Project, nice indeed!

Life in California is getting better and better. Now that the weekdays classes are over, I'm having more time for fun and to myself. I was finally able to do my laundry before my underwear finished, hehehe. We didn't travel lately... even if it's summer we've been a little laaaaaZY. Today we were supposed to go to the lovely Brazilian restaurant in Santa Cruz, or to Sanfran for a festival Roberto invited us... but ended up we didn't do neither. The weather wasn't so nice in any other city, but even if it was sunny in San Jose I didn't put my foot outside today. Well at least I cleaned the bathrooms urght!

Ah, I got a nice one. I went to zumba classes with Vivi and LOVED it, it's so fun! it's very similar to body Jam in Brazil, but it's only latin and kind of hip hop songs. Really fun. I wish I could move my hips like the other girls do... but well practice leads to perfection, and in this case also to loosing weight! good GOOD! :D

We've been to 2 nice concerts in the past weeks: Coldplay and The Fray. Both were really nice, but I just have one thing to say: concerts here are completely different from anywhere else I've ever been. Probably because they are so used to go to concerts here, people are really relaxed. So relaxed that they don't even sing... but that's probably because they don't know the songs. You see many families with small kids, so it gave me the impression that it's a normal family program... they go even if they don't know the band... just go there with all the kids, put their blankets in the lawn and do a nice picnic while the band plays. Different isn't it?


Today's new word: bumping uglies!!!!

Studying and Having fun!

It's been more than a week I don't write in my blog... but that is for a good reason: After my classes started I have no time for myself during the week, and on weekends I've been away traveling and having fun :)

So, the classes: I'm enjoying both of the Project Management courses I'm taking. The one in Stanford is lighter and easier... but the one in university of California is REALLY good! The instructor is great he knows everything about project management, and he is not just a theory guy, he worked for 30 years, so that's how good he knows his stuff. He gives us very realistic examples which makes it easier for us to understand.

I didn't start yoga classes... there is no time for that now, but I did start tennis classes, and I'm enjoying it. It's a pity I lost the first class, and i had to miss the last class to go to Coldplay concert, but it's ok... I will try to follow up with the rest of the girls.

We had a wonderful time in the past 2 weekends. Friday 3rd of July was holiday here, so we had a barbecue in our complex, it was fun, Vivi and I bought food for a whole army, hehehe, so it was a it expensive but we had food for 3 days after that :). The day after Rafa, Fernando, Andriana and I went to LA!!! So much fun! we went to Disneyland on Saturday, then we slept in LA, and had a little walk on Hollywood Blvd Sunday morning and then we headed to Universal Studios: SUPA COOL! :)



Last weekend, we had a Friday dinner in our house , Robi came too, it was nice but I had this huge headache, so I wasn't the nicest person on earth... hehehe But I did had fun after the medicine started making effect.
On Saturday we went cycling in Santa Cruz, and by mistake we found a great Brazilian restaurant Roberto knew about: loved it. I'm thinking of going there periodically... Santa cruz is just half an hour away, and you can enjoy the beach after having a feijoada! We rode our bikes until Capitola, easy and nice ride.
On Sunday we went to have breakfast in Palo Alto, a cute place which I don't remember the name... something Italian :). After that we went to Sanfran and did more than 20 miles on our bikes, from Robi's house to Tiburon, it was wonderful. I even felt from my bike (I'm not very good on using my brakes yet, hehehe) , so this week I have a very ugly hurt in my elbow: urght!






This morning we went to do our California ID's, I can't wait too see them!!!! :D


Today's new word: potty!

What could I ask more?

It's hard to express how happy I am these days... really life is being so good to me that I can't fit in my own body anymore :) .

Think about it: I'm a software engineer, living in silicon valley, having tuesday classes in USC, Thursdays classes in Stanford, I already have some good friends around here. Ok I don't work for Apple or Google but I do like my job and that is what counts isn't it? Speaking of Apple, I actually have a MacBook Air now, which , by the way, I bought in craiglist for a REALLY good price... Ain't I the coolest person??? I almost becoming a californian... I even do tennis classes on Monday and someone here told that it is a super californian thing... I just have to work on my english speaking + californian accent, hehe.

Then... besides all this California thing. I married the love of my life (and had the most wonderful wedding party), who fortunately aims the same things I do for life, who works in the same company as I do, getting then all this travel advantages together, who get along with me even with all my strange woman psychology, and who I can see from far loves me more than anything.

I always dreamed about the day I would be able to live abroad and go to Brazil every once and while to see my family, friends and have some of that wonderful brazilian life... and guess what? This year this will probably happen: I was in Brazil until february, I'm coming back there in September for Rafa's and his nephew birthday and I will probably be there for Christmas as well... what can I ask more???? Yeah getting rich would be fine... but that can wait, and it depends only from our effort.

I know this is a very selfish post... but really I'm so happy that i can't get enough of thanking God, our parents and also our employers for all this great things that are happening to me. THANK YOU!

Ah! By the way: today is Thursday and tomorrow is holiday here... :D :D :D

Today's new word:

Potluck

Fu**ing s**t we got a fine!!!!

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It was quite a stupid parking fine... but the main thing is that we didn't understand the sign! It was written: Permit Parking 6pm to 2am, and we understood that we were permitted to park between those hours (it was 7:30pm), but NO, no no. What the sign meat was that to park in that place between 6pm to 2am, you NEED a permission!!! And there you go, we got a fine and need to pay for it on-line now.

Next news is: We don't have money in our credit cards! Can you believe that? on Saturday we bought our bikes, and these exceeded the credit card limit, so we won't be able to use it until next month. Was the limit very low or the prices of the bikes very high? hehehehe.

This comes to the next thing: I GOT A WONDERFUL BIKE!!!!!!! Really it was love at first sight! I loved it ! The price was reasonable, it is a good violet/white bike, really it is wonderful! It has only one gear, but I don't mind because probably this is the main reason why it is so light! I can't carry it with one finger if I want! It is super coool!

Mine is white, Rafa's is black:


Yesterday (Sunday) we went to do the Los Gatos trail, which is a bike trail that goes from our city to near the office, It was awesome, we will sure do it a couple of days a week, it is 9 miles (about 14km), have nice views of trees, lakes, people, animals... it is a really nice ride, and I'm really glad we can come to the office by bike sometimes, it must be relaxing...

On Friday we went to celebrate Lucie's birthday at the Beauty Bar, a bar where you can do you manicure while drinking and enjoying friends... a very nice idea :) It was really fun with all the caipirinhas and long islands... hehehe. By the way, I have to pay drinks for the girls in the office now, they kept paying it for me on Friday!! Next time ;). After that we slept at Luis house... which is REALLY nice! I loved it, it is a studio, but it is in a nice place, and very nicely decorated... loved it! Luis took us to the twin peaks and to have the best hamburger of the city... Yummi!!!

So, another week starting... many plans for this week: Stanford classes beginning, University of California classes beginning (PMI), tennis classes beginning (all IF my credit card starts to work), and also hopefully yoga classes... NICE!

Thoughts:
- I NEED to get used to the automatic car... Argh, not easy at all to forget completely about the gears.
- Everyone says to me that things cost last here but... the supermarket cost MUCH more!!!
- How can i say fermento/lievito in english? My crostata was crappy without it!!
- It is true that people here are nice all they time. They talk to you in the supermarket, they compliment you when you go inside a store, they smile, say good morning to strangers... wonderful.
- Living 10 minutes from the office... another life!!!! Quite office? even better!!
- I thought we would get bored at the beginning... but NO! Actually we are "going out" every night, I still couldn't make ANY dinner in our new house.
- Actually I AM SHY!! When I don't know anyone well enough, I discovered I become that little 10 years old girl afraid to talk to people.
- TOO many things to see and to do! Not so many vacation days left.


San Francisco:
We began our journey on Saturday... We had to meet Robi at his house at 1pm... so we got up late, had late breakfast, video chat with my parents, video chat with Rafa parents and... Oh we are late! hehehe as usual. Got to Sanfran at 2pm... hehe. Robi is SO thin! I don't know if he has been exercising or not eating at all, but i found him thinner and taller! strange isn't it? From his house we went directly to the Washington square where the North Beach annual festival was. It was nice, good weather, young people, music, beer (it took us 1 hous to get our beers though). Then Luis arrived! And he looks like the same, except from the beard. It was so nice meeting all them.. here!

After the festival we went to Roberto's house again and... guess what? I slept! AS USUAL! heheheh, Rafa end Robi went to the supermarket to buy food for the dinner, and I stood there, sleeping for 3 hours!!!! Good... otherwise I wouldn't make it to go out after. We had Italian dinner in Roberto's wonderful place and went to the Marina after that. In and out to many clubs... it was nice but we didn't find THE club... the best one was the first we got in with live music and drunk people... but they couldn't find "patata" and it was the first so we left.

The morning after we went to have brunch at Pac Heights... a fancy place of San Francisco, it was nice. After that we went to pick Luis up at his house and here started the the most beautiful part of the weekend: Golden Gate, Marine County, Light House, Cliff house.... wow, all these places where wonderful! The sun, the nature, the beaches!!! LOVED IT!!!

I guess you can see that from the picture...


After all that we went to have dinner at a Mexican restaurant in Missions... it was good: Good company, good food. After that we came back to San Jose, and here we are starting a new week.

Our tourist guys! Thank yoooooooou!!

First impressions

The flight was almost a torture... we didn't know we could do on-line check-in even if we had luggages... so we got the most horrible places inside the plane. We watched 3 films each though... and this helped a lot.
When we got to San Francisco it was 16:30pm, and the sun was high in the sky. But for our body it was 1:30 am, so we where both walking like zombies, our eyes where red, really red, and our body was begging for a sleep. We passed by the office to take our apartment key, got home at 6, took a shower and at 7 we where already in bed.

I woke up at 1am... trick from the timezone, as I couldn't get back to sleep I took all my clothes out from my bags and put it in my new wardrobe... which has plenty of space!! gooooood! At 2 i got back to bed, and slept until this morning, so i guess my body is now used to the 9 hours time difference.

This morning we Came to the office early: 8am. It was amazing, 10 minutes drive and here we are! great! We also took our car this morning. At the end is not the pontiac as we where told, but a Nissan Versus, not very beautiful but it seems a nice car. Anyway they said we will change it every month, so we will get to try many different cars... nice :)

This apartment is cool, it is quite big... it wasn't very very clean... we have carpet all over!!! poor Rafa and his not breathing nose! I will try at least to keep clean :) We also have a second room... you know, when you live with someone that plays the guitar you need it!!! And for anyone who will come to visit us: you will have your own room! ieiii! Ah.. it will probably be Robi's room most of the time :)
The complex where we are living is nice... it has a swimming pool, an actual parking place for us and also for visitors. After work we are going to the supermarket because right now we don't even have shampoos!!! :D

The office seems great, full of young people from all over the world, everyone is friendly, I'm really glad the we will be working here for sometime now, I needed and really wanted a change. There is a fridge full of good stuff, orange juice, milk, waffers, begals, kellogs, chocolates... I need to keep attention not to become a whale!! :) Besides that, today at lunch we noticed that the portions here are HUGE!!! really, every plate is enormous! After lunch we went to a grossery store and an ice cream place... and Dear God.. everything is soooooo american! (duhhh) hehehe. I mean, the cakes are machine made, the ice cream are not only ice cream, but with chocolate, candies, cookies and every kinds of things inside it... Welcome to America, where everything is huge and extra sweet! :)

I can't wait to get to go to San Francisco meet Robi and go to the North Beach Festival, and see the Golden Gate, the piers, the pubs and everything Sanfran (and Robi) has to offer :)

Friday it is! iuhulll!

:)

Stanford in my Curriculummmmmmmmmmmm

Stanford University

You have registered for these courses:
* Project Management: A Introductory Hands-on Course (BUS 196)

Instructor: Vincent ***
Units: 1
Grade Option: Letter
Course Drop Deadline: July 8

Course Location: Bldg. Hewlett Teaching Center , Rm 102
Map Link: http://campus-map.stanford.edu/index.cfm?ID=04-510
Class Times: Thursdays at 7:00 - 8:50 pm
Class Dates: June 25 to July 23

Ihullllll!!! :D :D :D

We've got the tickets!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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11JUN09 BRITISH AIRWAYS

From: MILAN LINATE, ITALY
Departs: 1130

To: LONDON HEATHROW, UNITED KINGDOM
Arrives: 1230

From: LONDON HEATHROW, UNITED KINGDOM
Departs: 1350

To: SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Arrives: 1640

Robi, Fer, Jaime, Luis, Gustavo, Maria and everyone... WE ARE COMING!!!!!!!

NEW NEWS!

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Interview with Consulate fixed to June 3!!!
Thank's God! :)

Will this ever finish?

The 5 weeks time expired yesterday... and guess what? The consulate didn't give us any news. :(

Still delayed...

Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!! This Visa process is driving me nuts. It seems that the process started to be studied by the American Consulate in Milan today, so the 5 weeks processing time starts from TODAY!!!!!! AND if something is wrong in the papers... guess what? they start everything AGAIN from the beginning!!!!!

So please stay away from me today, cause I'm not in a great mood at the moment :@

At least some news...

Got news from the lawyers!!!
Not good, not bad, just news... Our visa documents where submitted to the US Embassy in Milan, so now we just depend from them to have progress on our visa process. Which is quite good, because my colleagues where telling me that US Embassy is incredibly efficient and fast! So I'm hoping to have good (or bad) news soon!

Today's new words (from drivers handbook):
- Tailgate: follow another car to closely;
- Rubbernecking: slowing down to look at accidents or virtually anything else out of the ordinary.

In the meantime, I'm enjoying spring in Italy... it is just so beautiful!

Getting Excited

Fernando Flores is in Milan since last Wednesday. He is one of the Spanish guys currently working in Los Gatos office, the one in California where we are supposed to be going by the next month :).


Fer and Cristina having an Italian pizza ;)

He keeps telling us good things about Los Gatos, about the office, the people, the shopping... Ah!!! I wasn't so nervous about this delay in our trip, but now I'm getting excited and curious to get there. Specially after seeing Roberto's posts, hehe.

No news about our Visa yet... lawyers in Sanfran have all our documents already, they say that as soon as they submit them to the embassy, they will let us know... so, as it is being for the last 3 weeks... I'm STILL WAITING!!!!
In the meantime I could think of starting to prepare my winter luggage (lazyyyyyyy), the summer one came ready from Brazil... I didn't even touch it.

Seals

Still in Italy, still cold, raining now for 4 days in a row...

Still waiting for our Visa. Today I've been studying the embassy site to know a little bit more about our visa:

-Why can we have this Visa: "Section 101(a)(15)(E) of the Immigration and Nationality Act provides nonimmigrant visa status for a national of any of the countries with which the United States maintains an appropriate treaty of commerce and navigation, who is coming to the United States to carry on substantial trade, including trade in services or technology, principally between the United States and the treaty country, or to develop and direct the operations of an enterprise in which the national has invested, or is actively in the process of investing substantial amount of capital." It makes me think I'm important!

- "This visa must be renewed every other year, but there is no limit to how many times one can renew". Which is good, 'cause many Visas let you stay in the US for 3 or 5 years, but after this period you need to stay 365 days away from the Country.

-"Spouses and unmarried children under 21 years of age, regardless of nationality, may receive derivative visas in order to accompany the principal alien". First thing... ALIEN! hahahah I love this word :). Second If i wanted, you could be "THE WIFE" and wouldn't need to do a process for my own... but I'm happy I have mine. It makes me feel useful :P. in any case, I'm not married in Italy yet... this cross country documentation takes tiiiiiiime.

Good things about still being here:
- We've been snowboarding often these days...
- I went to see the Musical Mamma mia! yesterday, and I really enjoyed it. Mostly at the end of the musical, when everyone was clapping, and Rafa looked at me and said: Imagine ET's looking at us right now... we look like a bunch of seals clapping our hands:


Worst thing about being here (besides the rain and the cold):
- I SOLD MY ACDC TICKETS FOR 69 EUROS(same price as I've payed), BECAUSE I WOULDN?T BE HERE AT MARCH 19, BUT NOW THEY COST 200 EUROS!!! AHhhh! :@



Today's new word:
Yield: dare la precedenza - dar a precedencia.

There is no need to remember me that there is a Pearl Jam album with this name... I just didn't get it until yesterday!!!

Drivers License

I will be happy when I get it... but for now I'm only worried. To drive in California I will need to do ANOTHER drivers License, the third in 7 years: First the Brazilian, then the Italian and now Californian!! Ahhhhh!!!!

In the meantime, to save time, I've started studying...

Ciao!!
:D