I realized I never really told you all about my time in Geneva, Switzerland.

That was home base for summer of 2017 with my amazing boyfriend Stephen. Whom I had not seen in four and a half months. at the time. 

Where do I start with Geneva?

It was beyond beautiful, but she was also a gold digger as EVERYTHING was so expensive. For example, a combo meal at McDonald's would cost you about 15 USD. Back at home it would cost about half the price.

I will admit, I had help from my loving boyfriend so I didn't return home completely broke. What would I have done with out him? Seriously though guys...

Everything from a bag of chips to a meal at restaurants was about twice the price that i'm used to paying. I guess that is the price you pay to live in a beautiful country  where you rarely hear Police sirens. I heard sirens once... during the whole month! 

Why Geneva?

Why would we pick Geneva of all places to spend our month together?

Well I'm glad you asked. Stephen was in school there so I took advantage and made a trip to see him.... a long trip! At the time, I figured if we were going to do the long distance thing we might as well make the best of it. We spent most of our month in Geneva. We also took some small trips throughout Switzerland. We visited Zurich, Bern, and some smaller cities like Saint Cergue.

Towards the end of the month we booked a trip to my favorite city, Barcelona. We also tried to fit Paris in but it just couldn't happen. I will say that some parts of Geneva reminded me a tiny bit of Paris, of course without the Eiffel tower. Instead there was Jet D'eau, a huge water jet spewing water to the heavens. So maybe we a had a tiny bit of Paris right where we were.

What did we do?

Well for one I can say I hadn’t walked that much in a long time. Thank goodness I had a month pass for the public transportation but jeez..it still wasn't enough. For the most part, we explored the city a lot. Stephen hadn't done much exploring or touristy things since he was busy with school so we did it together. There was an old town area that was really cute (that's what reminded me of Paris). There was a huge mall with a nice movie theater. I came in town just in time for the big sale of the year. The whole month of July all stores had huge sales, my timing was perfect! 

We were physically surrounded by mountains so of course we mountain hopped. We saw the city from one of the best view points, Le Mont Saleve. It was right past the border of France. The mountain overlooks the city of Geneva and is so close you can see the entire city and beyond it overlooking Lake Geneva. It was quite the view. 

Now I'll be real, it was vacation too. So of course we slept... a lot. Sometimes I felt guilty sleeping in so much since I was away from home and in a new place. I felt as though I should be exploring a new place everyday. I quickly learned to be realistic and just relax sometime.  Also, the months leading to vacation wore me out, both of us. We desperately needed that sleep. 

We also spent time cooking together. As I said earlier, it's crazy expensive there. We decided to save some money and cook and only eat out sometimes. It was fun though, we never really spent a lot of time cooking together before so it was something new to us! And I got to put my skills to the test. 

Don’t laugh at me but I had to bring some New Orleans delicacies along with me. Only because I knew I would miss them and need them. I️ brought red beans, shrimp fry and beignet mix with me. Stephen was so surprised at what I️ brought but he loved it. I️ also brought some Tony Sacheries, you cannot forgot your seasonings! Can I get an amen? (P.S. If you don't know what that is, please google it and buy some. You can put that stuff in anything!).

My Favorite thing to do

This is hard to pin one thing down. But if I had to choose I would say chasing sunsets with Stephen. Ever since we became a thing we tried to catch nice sunsets but mother nature was never on our side. This summer we were pretty determined. We finally caught a few here and there. It's funny because I think the best sunsets we saw were actually from his apartment window when we weren't looking for one and happened to notice it.  

No french for me

Ya'll it was so bad. My plan was to magically become fluent in french a week prior to my trip. But my life became so hectic with working so much, it did not and could not happen. I could barely get the word bonjour out before crying for help. I at some point just gave up and decided to let Stephen do the talking. Except during our Barcelona trip, I could finally talk again... whew. Thank goodness for taking Spanish in high school and college.                                                                                                     

European food...ugh     

Let me tell ya... brandy and European food does not mix. I tried what I think was prawns for the first time. I was so confused at first, it looks like a mixture between a shrimp and a crawfish. When I ordered it, it said shrimp. When I got my plate...it wasn't what I expected. It still taste like a shrimp so it's all good. 

To be honest y'all... I cannot do European food. It's all sandwiches, fromage and other stuff that I don't eat. I tried to open my palate but I couldn't do it. I ran to Thai food wherever I could find it. That was the one thing I really enjoyed. In the end I couldn't wait to have a nice meal back in New Orleans.   

But I’m pretty sure Stephen thought I️ was going to starve. He was determined to find European food that I️ liked. Thai food and Gyros was the closest he got. 

We also spent time cooking together. As I said earlier, it's crazy expensive there. We decided to save some money and cook and only eat out sometimes. It was fun though, we never really spent a lot of time cooking together before so it was something new to us! And I got to put my skills to the test. 

Don’t laugh at me but I had to bring some New Orleans delicacies along with me. Only because I knew I would miss them and need them. I️ brought red beans, shrimp fry and beignet mix with me. Stephen was so surprised at what I️ brought but he loved it. I️ also brought some tony sacheries, you cannot forgot your seasonings! Can I get an amen? (P.S. If you don't know what that is, please google it and buy some. You can put that stuff in anything!).

In the end

Looking back to my summer I am so grateful for everything, even my daily clumsy trips. I literally almost fell on my face EVERYDAY.. at least once, it was ridiculous. I'm also grateful for being able to wake up to my loving boyfriends face and also realizing at the end of our month together we didn't kill each other.. or even argue. I think we just might last. 

With all of that being said, I can say that I had the summer of my life. As hard as it was being in a long distance relationship I will say that Stephen going to school in Geneva was a huge plus.  At the time I was stressing about not working in my field after graduation, and recently quitting my stressful retail job it was just the break I needed from reality. I couldn't feel any more blessed and I can't wait to see where we will go next!