They are feeling good

Dear future hubster,
you know you're doing something right with your housewarming/dinner/movie night parties if at some point you realize that you and the other hosts are in the kitchen/on the balcony, and your guests don't even notice your absence. 

The fist and the stove part II

Dear future hubster,
sometimes I try to meet all stereotypical expectations. Meaning I work the pizza dough dressed up to the nines, wearing heels and make up. Then the next day I wonder why my eeeeverything is so sore. It's hard work, pretending to be a wonderwoman.

The fist and the stove

Dear future hubster,
another stating the obvious moment: cooking is a beautiful allegory to life. Nothing good will ever happen if you are not willing to get yourself dirty. Cooking, just as life, is a messy business. But if you decide to put up with the mess, the outcome is so worth it. You may be covered in what looks like baby food spat out, but you still feel quite like a princess.

Do they know?

Dear future hubster,

Christmas feelings don't always come to me easily. Sometimes they don't come at all. 

It's not easy, when you haven't been through the usual indian summer-chilly fall-early winter stages, when it rains but doesn't snow, when you get a sunburn in early December, when all the Christmas decorations look just out of place and fake.

There are moments, however, when you can't help it. On a gray Monday morning, when all of Belgium is on strike, and there is not a single bus or tram to be seen on the streets, and people move around on foot or by car, quickly, hands in their pockets, or carrying boxes and gift-wrapped packages - it's all there, The air is cold and fresh, the city feels unusually quiet, you can almost smell the glühwein in the air... you can't deny that the jingle bells have started sneaking in.

And then, get to any given airport on any given morning after 15 December. No matter your destination, you will always see Erasmus students and eurocrats travelling home with suitcases filled with local cheese/beer/chocolate, hoping there will be no snow or strike or freezing rain to stop them from arriving, because they have so little time and so many places to visit, and you know exactly how they feel. Been there, done that. And yes, you have done that in all seasons, but still, when you see them dozing off at 5 am, children on their laps and winter coats on their seats, you know it's different this time of the year.

They are going home for Christmas.

It's all in my head

Dear future hubster,
it's probably no big news to anybody who's ever had one, but the human brain is a powerful tool. Mechanism. Organ. Thing?
It can present you with endless and rather unsettling versions and scenarios of should be-s and what if-s and how-s, keeps you awake at night, carefully planning your reactions to those pre-planned events you can actually have no control over.
Then, when you're thrown into the deep waters of conditions you couldn't have planned for, the very same brain just accepts them as reality and goes with them, refusing to even help you feel odd or out of place.
(Yes, speaking from own experience, thanks for asking.)

Is that asking too much?

Dear future hubster,
I'm not quite sure where this myth about me being a demanding princess is coming from... really. Just give me tap water that's safe to drink, and a hot bath, and I'm rather content. Ok, fine, you may bring the coffee to bed and watch tragically WTF music videos with me, but that's really the cherry on the cake.

Baby it's cold outside

Dear future hubster,
the thing with eternal summer is, that you easily and happily forget how winter feels. Not on your skin; they have invented clothes for that. But how the cold feels inside, when the air smells of chimney smoke, your nose gets red and your eyes start watering. And all you want to do is cuddle under a blanket with some glühwein, watch the Chirstmas lights from the window and think everything is going to be alright.

Walking on broken glass

Dear future hubster,
in case you were worried, I can confirm, my subconscious "emergency wineglass release" function still works quite well. 

Those who wouldn't grow up

Dear future hubster,
and dear fellow expats,
have you ever wondered about the real reasons of our runaways? That beyond the wanderlust, the professional challenges, the bitter and the sweet love stories, we just want to get away from the responsibilities of a "normal" life? The very same normal life we then try to rebuild in our temporary haven, until the burdens of an adult life become too cumbersome, and we set sail again?
Aren't we just a bunch of Lost Boys, following some invisible Peter Pan to a Neverland that keeps slipping away?

But all the same I hate it

Dear future hubster,
it didn't take long for me to receive the first invitations to somebody's farewell dinner or drinks. A couple of weeks after my arrival, really. Back then, those were courtesy invitations, from people I met once or twice, or bulk ones, sent out to everybody under the sun.
Not much later though, I started receiving invitations to farewell parties of people I actually knew.
And then, sooner than I expected, started rolling in the ones for people I happen to care about.
I know the day will come, not so far from today, when I receive one from somebody I don't want to see leaving.
Isn't it ironic (and not in the misinterpreted Alanis Morissette way) that we keep going away, leaving people behind, but feel betrayed when others do the same?

Closing Time

Dear future hubster,
it's funny how the same weather makes me listen to the same kind of music.
And how the same kind of music always makes me think of the same people.

By any other name

Dear future hubster,
it was so obvious and expected, that I forgot to mention when it first happened, but my princess attitude couldn't be kept hidden from my flatmates for long. Only they call me khaleesi.

We are the same

Dear future hubster,
if you thought that distance makes people different, you were wrong. Parking spot entitlements (or lack thereof) brings out the exact same petty fights, regardless of location.

There's always gonna be another mountain

Dear future hubster,
despite the self-confident and sharp image I may project, I am very often way too much concerned about what other people may think of me.
Sometimes, when climbing a mountain with Canadian soldiers, Australian outdoorises and Mexican capoeira teachers, and watching them passing by and getting to the peak without any visible difficulty, I get rather self-conscious because I have to stop every three steps and my breathing sounds like a lousy imitation of Darth Vader.
And then I tell myself that I still climbed the largest active volcano in Africa, and that it really doesn't matter if while doing so, I looked liked an unfit, fragile, whiny white girl. That volcano has not gotten any smaller because I got to the top slowly and am now in significant pain all over my body.

Even though I may not be a nice girl

Dear future hubster,

after the Emma Watson speech I found myself reading more female empowerment-related publications than usual (it may as well be occupational hazard), and came to a somewhat surprising conclusion. 

I'm not sure I want to have that proverbial corner office, but I sure as hell want to have the choice. If I want to work at home to raise our beautiful and smart children, I don't want to be labelled as someone who's given up. And if I want to raise our beautiful and smart children while working outside our home, I don't want to be labelled as somebody who's not putting family first.  

Now this, in theory, is something everybody can (pretend to) accept with a light "of course". But you, dear future hubster, need to be prepared to have a future wife who's going to be sensitive, articulate and at occasions passionate about this. Because I also want all other women to have the same choice, and I want them to be able to choose knowing they won't be judged. 

çıkış

Dear future husbter,
all my open-minded pretend coolness vanishes at a blink of an eye when I have to travel with airlines that make their announcements first in a language I don't understand. Doesn't matter that their astronaut food is on the better end of the scale, that they are rather efficient and polite, not even that I get to sleep across the entire row, but what is this nonsense language they use? And why do they talk so much? And then why do they have to repeat everything in English AND French? And why don't they let me sleep? And why is it so cold? And now why is it so warm? And why do my headsets not work? And why does it take so long to cross this vaste continent? Why is the Sahara so big? When can I take a shower?

Not an addict

Dear future hubster,
we have been waiting for the electrician to fix the stove since last week. On Friday we also ran out of gas. Which means we haven't been able to make coffee for almost 3 days now. Can you imagine how I feel about life right now?

And I'm not sorry

Dear future hubster,
I've been wondering about this whole independent girl thing. (Yeah, Emma Watson at the Assembly General, and Sandra thinking I'm becoming too independent may have something to do with that.)
Thing is, most of the time my actions, especially the ones that seem brave, bold, crazy or just weird are trigerred by others. Usually men. Either I do something because a man told me I can, or because he told me I can't. 

You never know

Dear future hubster,
not that I'm planning on doing it any time soon, but I heard everybody dies one day. Should you be still around when it happens to me, please make sure you have a party rather than a ceremony for me. And by party I mean open bar and tacky music. 

Just sayin'

Dear future hubster,
for your information, I can park the big white jeep, backwards, as Svetoslav taught me, even when five men, all in different uniform, are watching me in disbelief.

Who knew

Dear future hubster,
if you ever wondered just how much water one needs to clean themselves after a long day and a decent workout, I can tell you that an average (not that I ever associate that adjective with myself in any way, see also the infamous pickup line of Sir László "I like average girls", but for scientific purposes I can agree to its use here) female body requires 4.5 liters.

And tell you that I landed somewhere

Dear future hubster,
whenever I arrive to a new and thus unfamiliar airport, I get intimidated. I always think I've seen it all, but the same old stores are suddenly arranged in a different way, I have to figure out how the taps and hand dryers in the bathroom work, sometimes even the money isn't what I'm used to... it can be unsettling. So I go back to the shell of my shy self and retire to a corner somewhere.
Then, in that relatively quiet corner I pull out my good old Nick Hornby and very quickly become what I like being, the usual weirdo, laughing out loud in a corner, comfortably, blissfully ignoring the noisy overwhelming world around.

And I can kick air!

Dear future hubster,
I know it's stating the obvious, but after a day that feels inefficient and gloomy, a good workout can make me feel that I am alive and can handle anything and anybody that comes my way.
Until the next morning when I can barely move and my limbs are all made of lead.

ref: Cinderella

Dear future hubster,
there are not many things I know about this you and I, the where and when and how, but I will sure as hell do my best to wear Louboutins when I marry you.
To that end, dear future hubster, you'd better be tall.

Like there is a choice

Dear future hubster,
sometimes, for brief moments, I feel like I'm getting a grip on this life. I remember to make tea and coffee when the electricity is on, I remember that activities that don't require artificial light, such as reading, exercising and reflecting on the big questions of life should be performed during the bright hours of the day, and I even plan my housewife vs. bombshell maintenance in accordance with the practical restrictions of mission life. 

Sensitive little creatures they are

Dear future hubster,
I've just realized that avocados are like women: you never know what they want from you and when they want it, and when you think you've figured it out, it's probably too late, and then you just feel guilty and ashamed and they are sad and disappointed and there is no way to fix it.  

It was just a question of time

Dear future hubster,
you could tell that I am starting to settle in: I leave my rings and earrings all over the place. So far only in my flat though.

I have a big heart, OK?

Dear future hubster,
In addition, I have to admit that I'm also in love with zucchinis. And aubergines. And red lentils. And quinoa.

And the living is easy

Dear future hubster,
my current state of heartmind could be easily summed up as: I love Hemingway and Carter.

That is the question

Dear future hubster,
classic cliché contemplation coming up: why am I trying to be somebody (=sweet and easy, sociable party girl) that I'm not? Especially when I already have long and rather successful experience of being what I like being? A host of Feed Your Friend Fridays, for instance.

Or a thrill

Dear future hubster,
I thought it was a cliché, but like most clichés, it appears to be true: seeing the growing number of stamps in my passport still gives me a chill.

The way to the heart

Dear future hubster,
there are days when the only thing I can think of is Raluca's lava cake.
Now this is not one of those days. I keep thinking of a steak, Belgian French fries, and ice cream to go with Raluca's lava cake.

Life is a dance floor

Dear future hubster,
Who would have expected that I have to come this far to finally have my skills recognized and appreciated? The day has come: I am officially responsible for music selection in the office.

The nem bakfitty way

Dear future hubster,
If and when somebody finds you with their finding and pushing limits story, and makes it sound like an easy and pleasant journey, know that they are either lying or have never really tried it. It is bloody damn terrifying. And if it isn't, you're not doing it right.

I am what I am

Dear future hubster,
in case you were wondering whether I wear heels in Africa, this is to inform you that yes, I do.
But if you had to wonder, you are probably not the one for me anyway.

The magic cure

Dear future hubster,
this is a reminder for you that when I don't get enough sleep for an extended period of time, I start feeling that the world is a terrible place, there is no hope in this life, nobody loves anybody and everything is in vain.
This is also a permission for you to remind me in those cases that it's just sleep deprivation. When you consider it necessary, please take my phone, draw the blinds and order me to take a nap.

Tell your friends

Dear future hubster,
the latest and greatest adventures of your globetrotter future wife are being published here and here. Tell your friends.

Doesn't have to be Ben&Jerry's

Dear future hubster,
can you imagine how difficult it could be to live in a country of technically eternal summer, but with unreliable electricity, and therefore no safe access to ice cream?

Under purple sun

Dear future hubster,
all this being grown up and strong and brave and independent is only applicable until there is a thunderstorm. Between the lightning and the thunders all I want is to cuddle up under a blanket until it's over. And to hear you say it's okay.

We all come with baggage

Dear future hubster,
next time please remind me that the one thing I hate more than packing boxes and suitcases is not having a place to unpack them. 

In transit

Dear future hubster,
Right now, I would just really like to arrive. Doesn't really matter where. 

Can't buy me love

Dear future hubster,
I think I've expressed it before, but I cannot stress it enough: you will have to be the one in charge of family finances. I can make money and I can spend it very well, but I cannot be bothered with things like investments and saving accounts and anything abstract about money. 

Books and boxes

Dear future hubster,
if and when I ever get the brilliant idea of moving again, please remind me that 1. I hate this shit 2. this is what husbands are for (and therefore you will do it for me) 3. I hate this shit and 4. I have extensive experience that makes me get it done better and faster every time.

The news. They are broken.

Dear future hubster,
dear future, present and past readers,
this future wife is soon moving to Africa. For challenge-meeting, soul-searching, star-gazing.
Please stay tuned, as the hubsterblog will continue to report on what happens inside her head, and outside, in her world. 

Size does matter!

Dear future hubster,
do you think it would be to much to ask that clothing sizes make sense? I accepted that some are numbered 36-38-40-42, others are with letters S-M-L, the Commonwealth goes with 6-8-10-12, the French sometimes dumb it down to 1-2-3-4. That's already a lot of work for me, but ok. Now if I try on a 38 in one shop and it's waaaaay too tight, I expect a 38 to be just as tight in the other shop. Not loose enough to fit a guest. 

But the way they use their indicators is undefendable

Dear future hubster,
sometimes I understand the French getting irritated about how nobody else knows how to use a roundabout.

It would have been so cool if he'd said something about Pink Floyd then

Dear future hubster,
I hope that at least sometimes, you also stare at the moon in awe, because it's so big and orange (or yellow) and shiny, and close and unreal. If you then quote Bruce from The Kid, you definitely score some extra brownie points.

Yannick Noah ne devient pas plus jeune lui non plus, hein?

Dear future hubster,
just for your information: if the TV talks to me in French, I will talk back in French. Out loud. 

The road less taken

Dear future hubster,
this afternoon's trip is the perfect, if a bit literal example of how a series of mildly mistaken decisions can get you to beautiful places. Such as Hobscheid, Saeul, Tuntange or Septfontaines.

Elég lesz mindig négy liter

Dear future hubster,
how do I know where home is if the heart and the skates happen to be in different locations?

Dear future hubster,
in case I haven't mentioned, scents are very important.

Dear future hubster,
if a shopping cart tells you to insert a 1 or 2 euro or a 50 cent coin, know that a good old 100 HUF would do just as fine.

Dear future hubster,
I sometimes forget what a great friend good old Jason is. But then come cloudy Sundays,when it's only him and me and the ironing,  and I suddenly all pieces fall into place.
(Who am I kidding, there is no ironing with Jason around, but some serious serenades, to the infinite joy of my elderly neighbours. I have the same problems with Bruce the Boss. I watched my social media course while ironing, really.) 

Dear future hubster,
for your information (in case you were worried), I have returned to the kitchen. And I think I'm good :)

Dear future hubster,
I haven't been traveling anywhere since Tuscany last October. That was half a year ago! Don't you think it's unsustainable and you should be doing something to improve the situation?

Dear future hubster,
do you ever have the urge to go back to the university library, the old one (Somogyi), or the shiny new (TIK), and just be there and study, flip the pages, wear the extra pair of socks because the airco is running wild, and go downstairs for a coffee back up with the creepy transparent elevator, pass by the rows of computers where you once received a break up email, back to your art history books, for the course where you first heard about El Camino, see familiar faces everywhere you look, and have the strange feeling that you could spend your life doing this?
Wouldn't it be great?

Dear future hubster,
there comes a point, when one listens to Boyz 2 Men at 1 am.

Dear future hubster,
I think I would let you have the green ones from a box of Merci chocolates. Sometimes. When I think you've been good.

Dear future hubster,
when I get old, you will have to either install something similar to those automatic food portioning devices cat owners use, or you have to instruct my doctor to only prescribe pills of different colours for me. I can't keep track of my ibuprofen vs paracetamol, I can only imagine how much fun it's going to be when I will have to remember more than two types at the time. A pink in the morning, two blues at noon and a yellow the evening?

Dear future hubster,
I'm not sure you believed this would ever happen, because I didn't. But it happened nevertheless. Your future little wife went to the movies on a Saturday evening, wearing glasses and no make up. That's no big deal so far, it happened before. Except all other times so far she felt like she's giving the entire world the finger by looking like garbage, because she can. This time around she's done it because she felt comfortable like that. Now that's big.

Dear future hubster,
you can tell times have been difficult when you see that I have been wearing the same 3 pairs of shoes for weeks.

Dear future hubster,
If you ever plan to bring me flowers and wish "Happy Women's Day", please be prepared to listen to a speech something along the lines of "I already don't understand and strongly dislike Valentine's Day, what's that supposed to mean, can we only express our love for each other on one specific day, selected by some higher consumer power? But this Women's Day business with flowers... irritatingly ignorant at best, downright outrageous if I want to be dramatic. As long as there are countries where domestic abuse is not a crime, I really don't think there is any reason to celebrate. And there are countries like that, dear future hubster. Many. In fact, enough to host 603 million women."

Dear future hubster,
just because I mix it with vodka, it's still a smoothie, right?

Dear future hubster,
ça fait tellement du bien de retourner au pub quiz de temps en temps, et de ne pas en terminer tout dernier. Même si on comprends pas pourquoi la voix étonnée quand on annonce les résultats de "ladies" (déjà, on est pas de ladies vu qu'on sait monter nos propres meubles, mais bon), comme si ça prenait plus que deux femmes (ou bien au moins un homme) de trouver quelques réponses et bluffer le reste. 

Dear future hubster,
whenever I'm in a bad mood, whiny, disoriented, scared by not knowing what I'm doing with my life, just send me outside for a good run. 

Dear future hubster,
when the idea of writing about you first came to my mind, it was accompanied by the idea that you would come and pick up Bea and me from the movies. It would have been so kind of you, it was raining, it was a Sunday, and I chose not to drive because I usually don't drive on weekends, and because a glass of Riesling goes with the pre-movie sushi automatically (and very well).
Nowadays, I drive myself to and from the cinema, no sushi or Riesling involved, it still rains and buses don't run very often on Sundays.

Dear future hubster,
the selection panel for the casting of the movie that will be produced based on the novel I'm writing about the ordinary drama of my everdays (appropriately titled Story of My Life) is set up. They are currently debating which character should be played by Ryan Gosling.

Dear future hubster,
here's a list of songs that remind me of boys who have been important in my life. In chronological order, and without further explanation.

Dear future hubster,
sooner or later, there will have to be a make-or-break road trip. The one driving chooses the music.

Dear future hubster,
sometimes, the amount of good music that I have stocked on my computer amazes even me. Then I congratulate myself for my excellent taste, and give a free singalong show to my neighbours. I'm sure I would rock Nic Martha's Got Talent. It would be a pseudo-reality show where participants are rated on their impromptu performances that serve as a background to housework. I would definitely be killer in the kitchen theme episode, and would have good chances when the night would be about "Music I iron to". Shower-singing is so old.

Dear future hubster,
it is difficult to see that fine line between fighting for something you really want and making a complete fool of yourself. Unless, of course, you're fighting to make a fool of yourself, because that's what you really want.

Dear future hubster,
sometimes I want to tell you how deeply I am sorry. I want to apologize - for everything. Everything any woman has ever done against you. For those who were hurt and wanted revenge; for those who didn't want to hurt you but didn't know how not to. In the name of those who wanted to love you but couldn't; in the name of those  who didn't want to love you but couldn't help it. On behalf of those who wanted to give you all they had, even though you didn't want it. On behalf of those who were ready to give you all you wanted, but they weren't there at the right time.
Please forgive us for not knowing how to love you. We're trying our best, and one day it will suddenly make sense. 

Dear future hubster,
yesterday I almost believed I desperately needed a man. But then I kept trying and managed to open the amaretto bottle on my own.

Dear future hubster,
the good (and probably the only good) thing about working too late too often is that the radio plays better music and they talk a lot less.
Courtesy of Eldoradio, the past 8pm program:

Dear future hubster,
sometimes I fall in love with fictional characters. 

Dear future hubster,
I just realized that something very similar to the collective subconscious is playing a game with me. It doesn't matter how far West I have gone, I still find myself watching the Wiener Filharmoniker and their New Year's concert. While finishing reading a book on the fall of Yugoslavia.