And so the journey begins...

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Seasons greetings and Happy Holidays!!

As you may have guessed and if you didn't already know, I'm off again on a 2 month round the world trip. I have a 3 month summer break from uni so I figured "Why not?".

First stop: Sunny California.

I love this place so much. The winter weather reminds me of Brisbane. Christmas day was about 25 degrees. Nights are alot chiller though. I'm here to visit my good friend Marcus, who I orginally meet when travelling in Greece back in the summer of 2002. Since this was my second visit and it's Christmas, the agenda included visiting family and friends, baking cakes and eating and drinking.

Let's begin with the cakes....Marcus' family has been baking Christmas cakes for 4 generations (rather cool if you ask me) to give to family and friends at Christmas time. The list of family and friends added up to about 50 cakes we needed to back. The first day we knocked over 28 cakes...yes, we worked hard but it was alot of fun. But the fun really begins in the delivery of the cakes. Let me firstly comment on how happy people are to receive their cakes. They are delicious.

So the day after our huge baking day, we headed out with 6 cakes to deliver. We didn't get past our first stop. Oops! We got chatting, then drinking and eating. We did manage to deliver two cakes but only because John's son, Ikaika, dropped in. And so this pattern continued over the next few days until we baked again.

Now the food...I tried some of the most amazing foods on my visit this time. Definite favourites were the enchiladas that Marcus' mum made and Tomalis (not sure of spelling). They are ground up corn wrapped in a corn husk with various fillings, my favourite was the cheese and chilli. I had plenty of these too as although the are available all year round they are definitely a holiday food.

So that's been my visit to date. All items on the agenda have been meet, repeatedly I might add : ) but in a very good way.

Next stop is London.

Things I've learnt on this trip....
1. Mexican food in Australia is crap! I've now been spoilt with authentic Mexican food.
2. There is always traffic on the freeways in LA, even in the early hours of the morning.
3. Rob and Big is the funniest program ever....DO WORK SON!!
4. The stores give out gift boxes at Christmas when you buy clothes and accessories which you then put the items in and wrap them up....I was wondering why all the presents were in rectangular boxes. But also it's tradition in alot of familes to stay up until mignight on Christmas Eve to open presents.
5. Most importantly.....Don't mess with the chef! (hehehe....love you Marcus!)

Til next time....
M
xx

ps. I'm having slight technical difficulties with my camera but I will upload some photo's ASAP.

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