Nascida e criada em Portugal. Já morei na Polónia, no Brasil, na República Checa e agora é a Suécia que me acolhe.
O meu blogue, tal como o meu cérebro, é uma mistura de línguas. Bem vindos!

Born and raised Portuguese. I have lived in Poland, Brazil, Czech Republic and now I'm in the beautiful Sweden.
My blog, just like my brain, is a blend of languages. Welcome!

quarta-feira, 19 de agosto de 2020

One year later...

This long break on my blog was only more or less intentional. Life got really busy last year and at some point, I stopped, reflected, and realized that blogging had become more of a duty than something joyful I did in my free time. I love blogging but I do not enjoy writing under pressure or when I feel I must do it. After that, I decided to take a break, let it go of my to-do list and return only when I felt I wanted to do it again. I knew I would miss it at some point, so there was never a risk for no-return. 

Today was the day. I decided to open my blog again and write whatever crossed my mind. Funny thing... My last post here was exactly one year ago!! I had no idea and thought it was a cool coincidence!

Here is a summary of what has been going on this side of the world.


August - September

Summer vacation in 2019 was spent cycling along the Swedish west coast and then in Denmark. It was of course great! Great views, decent weather and 10 days full of new things. After that, we started preparing and packing all our belongings to move into a new apartment.  

Lesson: no matter when you start packing everything, it is too late!

J. answering an important call from the bank regarding our mortgage. Of course, they called when we were cycling along a very noisy road...

October

October was marked by very extreme experiences. We moved into our newly finished apartment at the beginning of October. It was so new we could still feel the smell of the paint. Moving day was very intensive but fun. Unfortunately, I also got the worse episode of food poisoning of my life! J. had to leave for a work trip and I stayed behind in the middle of a million boxes, not being able to find tea or a pot to boil some rice. On top of that, the fresh smell of paint soon started making me sick and I couldn't even open the windows for too long because it's Sweden and it was 5oC outside. No, my first days in our new flat were not the best, but it only went upwards from there! I love it here now! 

Lesson: do not forget to eat properly, especially when doing something so physically demanding like moving heavy things.

Moving day!

November

November is a blur. We only had some basic furniture and a lot had to be bought (and chosen), mounted and fixed. All of this while working full-time busy jobs. The first weeks we only had portable lamps because we never got the damn connection to the ceiling lamps right. Once we were so tired of shopping at Ikea for the millionth time and only wanted to get it done, that we rushed and bought 7 lamps for different parts of the apartment. We ended up returning six... However, the flat was slowly becoming more of a home and less of a random pile of things.

Lesson: do not shop exhausted and/or hungry. Never!


December - January

When our new place was finally looking decent we had to leave it for a month, but it was for very good reasons. Our honeymoon! We spent the most amazing four weeks in Myanmar, Laos and Thailand. It was my first time in Asia and only the second for J., so it was all very new. We lived so much in those weeks that we feel we were there for a year. When we returned we were so relaxed and happy that I could barely remember what my job was... Do you know that feeling? 

Lesson: so so grateful for being able to go on our honeymoon before the big Covid-19 storm hit us all. 

Sharing a magic sunset in Bagan, Myanmar

February - April

Uncertainty. First at work, not knowing if Covid-19 was, in fact, going to hit us or not (so naive of us...) and then when it did, at home trying to adapt to the new reality without going crazy. The funny thing was that at the beginning of February I asked my boss if I could work from home a few days every week because I needed more peace to do certain things. He agreed immediately, without having the slight idea that that was going to be the reality for the rest of the year. My Easter trip got cancelled, as everyone else's did. My training improved a lot!

Lesson: Some wishes might become true way more than expected.

We live now very close to a big forest and have been busy exploring its best spots :)

May - June

Accepted new reality and re-organized life in general. We transformed our soon-to-be guest room into a mini gym and an office with a big screen and standing/sitting desk. Online meetings became normal as did walks several times of day to prevent pains in new places. Our patio became a small garden where we started growing some vegetables and a nice bar for having after-work drinks on Fridays. The good weather also brought everyone else out to their balconies and we started to get knowing our neighbours, which turned out to be very nice. 

Lesson: So many! Maybe the most important is to be grateful for everything I have and for having learned to adapt to challenges life brings me. These have made me handle the pandemic in a better way than most.

Rasmus, our nicest neighbour, who likes to hang and to nap in our patio 

July - August

First, it was crazy with work, including many many extra hours, but then it was summer vacation again. Once again we cycled around, this time only in Sweden, and once again it was great. Sweden is so beautiful! Now it's back to work, mostly from home for the rest of the year, which is ok, because I got used to it. Oh, and I'm also training for my first marathon! I will do it on my own, or rather just with J., because all the races have been cancelled. 

Lesson: Sometimes the calm comes after the storm, and it feels great!

Gotland, the largest Swedish island - a beauty!


And how have you been? Have your life changed a lot in the last year? Do I still have any readers at all? 


6 comentários:

  1. Hello hello, I was really excited to see you back here! What a year. I am so happy you had your wonderful honeymoon in our part of the world! Life in Thailand has been good, we are in our own little bubble and I'm enjoying exploring areas I've not seen before!
    There is a little written on my two blogs and like you I'm just beginning to find my creative mojo again.
    Wren x

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    1. Hello! Thanks Wren! It's a nice to be back. I do want to share my adventures on your corner of the world, it was all so great. I also need to catch up on reading other blogs :)

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  2. Olá Sara, que bom saber notícias tuas novamente! Que belas aventuras! Grande beijinho!

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    1. Olá Ana! Que bom que continuas dessa lado! Beijinhos

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  3. Welcome back Sara, nice to see you on blogland again:)
    We've been lucky in Perth with Covid. Just 9 deaths in Western Australia, and no community transmission for over 100 days. The 7 or 8 cases active at the moment are from returning Australians who have to go into mandatory hotel quarantine for 14 days. In the State of Victoria (Melbourne) they've had a second wave because of breaches of protocol with hotel quarantine, but after a few weeks of isolation and face masks they seem to be getting things under control. But in Western Australia, apart from the beginning when a lot of people started working from home, and everyone was going crazy buying toilet paper and emptying supermarket shelves, we've gone back to normal life, just practicing social distancing in shops, etc. Our borders are still closed with the other States and as well as overseas. You can travel with permission, but then you have to pay $3000 for 2 weeks in a hotel on your return, so not very conductive to travel... Job losses, the economy is down, but hopefully it will bounce back soon. I know Sweden took a different approach to the whole thing, I hope it's worked out better.

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    1. Thanks Sami! Weird times these we are living, with quarantines, lockdowns and shopping hoarders. It was not that different here, although Sweden had "recommendations" instead of "orders", most people followed those recommendations. Companies send their workers home in the early spring and are still doing it now until the of the year at least. Unfortunately, the number of deaths in the beginning raised quite fast, mainly among the elderly. Later on, it was understood that the caretakers of the elderly had lack of instructions and protection equipment, which was hard to get because it all comes from China, and what existed was being sent to the hospitals. A mistake who cut shorter many lives, especially in the area of Stockholm.
      Otherwise it was not so bad here (for me anyway), as Sweden has a lot of space and forest areas, so we could always go out for runs and walks in nature, which kept many of us sane.
      Let's just hope it keeps getting better from now on, so we can slowly go back to living a little bit more.

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