December 2008

I came to Berkeley in December, a winter month. I remember on the day I landed in San Francisco airport, it was really cloudy and the sky was really gray, so gray that I even thought, aha, looks like I'm gonna have a rainy winter then. And that was how it was. It rained a lot in December last year, and it was freezing cold, the cold with high humidity that reminded me very much of the winters in my home land.

I was really lucky with my Couchsurfers (by that time Marie-Anne and Véro were still my hosts - now it feels funny to recall them as "my hosts", though). I felt like home right from the first minute I entered the apartment, the one that became my apartment not long after that. The girls helped me settling down in Berkeley, lent me their bikes, showed me stuff around, introduced me to our beloved neighbor Salah who lent me an air mattress, etc. So it was for the best that we decided to stay roommates. Now I still feel blessed that I met my French angels, they definitely belonged to the most essentials of my Berkeley stay.

And there was my birthday in December. It was just 2 days after I arrived. Coincidentally, the Cal Sailing Club had a BBQ at the marina right on my birthday. So for the first time I biked to the marina, a place that I was going to spend some really good time later on.

Sunset over San Francisco, taken from the marina.






BBQing at Cal Sailing Club. It was the first time I tried grilled mash mallow. Fun to try, but still I'm not a fan of that sugar foam thing, whether grilled or not.





After discovering that there was a birthday kid at the party, people started to sing Happy Birthday for me. How lovely! So my first impression about the CSC folks was pretty positive, and they actually were nice people.

At home, my roomies even made a small celebration for me with cake, candle and sake. Such sweet rommies :xxx





Although I've been living far away from home since years and getting to a new place on my own was not really a new challenge, I still truly appreciated Marie-Anne's and Véro's welcoming, hospitality and helpfulness. I felt so pleased I've got such sweet roommates and over the time I've felt it more and more. People are the essentials that make a place the place, and I definitely had the right people for mine :).