Pad Thai: adventures in southeast Asia

I don't eat weird food. I never have.

While I was abroad, I stuck to a safe staple: margherita pizza.

It didn't matter if we were traveling to Paris or Prague, Florence or Amsterdam, if there was a pie with mozzarella, tomato and basil, it made it's way into my mouth.

Sarah, being younger but wiser, always ordered the boeuf bourguignon in Nice, fish and chips in London, gnocchi in Venice and schnitzel in Germany...all while I was wasting my time not culturing my pallet and certainly not broadening anyone's horizons...so much for stepping outside a girls' comfort zone.

Insert fret and regret here.

BUT, instead of torturing myself with the terrorizing trifecta coulda', shoulda' woulda', I decided to right my wrongs and get on a path.

A small footpath, mind you. But be sure, it's headed somewhere.

The first stop on my road to recovery was to try Indian food.

Um, what? Isn't that little intense, you ask. I was wary. Luckily, I work around a group of truly well traveled individuals and I have access to the best advice and first hand knowledge about where to get the right food in this town.

Enter Kevin, peer advisor to southeast Asia. As an alumni of our USAC program in Bangalore, India, he suggested the staff head out to the Indian food buffet at Cafe Culture, a small restaurant located within walking distance of our office.

Best.Idea.Ever.

However, this post is not about Indian food, it's about Thai food.

Second on my list of must haves was Thai food.

Not because I was particularly interested in yet another Asian invasion, but because it was Frank's birthday, and we decided that it was only appropriate to take him to to dinner at his favorite Thai place in town, Sophia's.

Generally, I shy away from places I've never been, as far as eating goes. This is especially true when they have an address that includes Nord Avenue after the street number.

As I pulled into what appeared to be the driveway - I use driveway loosely, it was more of an alley-my eyes fell on the two other cars in the parking lot - and by parking lot I clearly mean slightly bigger alley where cars park.

Here's what I was expecting to walk in to: a tiny, probably smelly, maybe musty, likely chintzy room with spicy, hostile noodles, chicken feet soup and perhaps a precious fish dish of some kind.

Sophia's was definitely not any of those things.

Walking in was like being transported back to my time in Europe, which is weird since it was a Thai place. The thing is, our time overseas was spent finding hidden gems down back alleys, in corridors and around shadowed corners to find the most authentic food, and of course, my pizza.

I had no idea what to get. Everything sounded like it would burn my mouth off, which wasn't as enticing as it sounds. I was worried that my lips would be on fire and my nose would be running just looking at the curry dishes. Cute.

I decided on the Pad Thai, which is s a dish of stir-fried rice noodles with eggs, fish sauce, tamarind juice, red chilli pepper, plus any combination of bean sprouts, shrimp, chicken, or tofu, garnished with crushed peanuts, corianderand lime, the juice of which can be added along with Thai condiments.

It was uh.maiz.ing. It came as a heaping pile of beige-brown noodles covered in red sauce with red peppers, crushed peanuts and a myriad of new flavors for my delicate taste buds.

Pad Thai had me at hello, in a proverbial sense.

It was a picture perfect blend of firey spices, peanut saltiness, saucy noodles and red-hot chili peppers, which all hit my tongue like a ton of bricks as soon as my fork passed my lips.

Not only was Sophia's a great experience to expand my palate pleasures, it was a lesson in friendship, and the importance of f(r)amily.

F(r)amily is a term I found deep in the pages of Cosmo. I coined it with my BFF's and made it a part of the words I use every day, to describe the friends I love and lean on whilst away at college.

The importance of a college network full of f(r)amily members has become more and more important as I have gotten older.

There comes a point in your life when you no longer list your mom as your emergency contact, and when you need to change your tire, you don't call your dad. You list your roommate who has been on a 16 hour train ride to Prague with you as your emergency contact, and you call your boyfriend to change your tire.

As we all sat there around the table, with our mouths on fire, eyes watering and food being passed around like a family at Thanksgiving, I realized how these great friends have truly become my family.

San Diego: A Whale's...Lady Parts

Before you get offended, please travel back in time to 2004 and recall the wildly popular Will Ferrell movie, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. The movie tells the tale of an outrageous newscaster in downtown San Diego. Turn those hour glasses even further to recall the film is set in the 1970's, and has the toupees to prove it.

All of this is to say that last week I visited the city "which course, in German, means a whale's vagina."

My best friend and roommate in Chico, Sarah, grew up in Encinitas and her parents continue to reside there. Often during breaks at the holidays, I like to get out of northern California and head south, where the Mexican food is straight across the fence and the weather is continually 70 degrees.

Nikki, our third traveling companion last year in France, joined me on my flight from Sacramento. This was my second time traveling to San Diego on Southwest, and let me tell you, they have yet to disappoint a girl.

The Diet Coke is always crisp (vital) and the peanuts are always plentiful. PLUS Southwest keeps it real with the classic airline snack, which makes a seasoned traveler feel at home when a bag of peanuts is tossed over her sleeping, drooling neighbor (and yes, I am talking about Nikki).

After our long, drawn out totally treacherous hour and ten minute flight (read:sarcasm), we arrived at SAN and set out for a mid-day meal in Hillcrest, which is undoubtedly the gay-friendly 'hood, with its Urban Outfitters on every corner, French restaurants, men in tight jogging shorts and rainbow flags waving proudly.

Our lunch, to say the least, was uh.maiz.ing. We had a giant oval-shaped 1/2 BBQ chicken 1/2 pesto bruchetta pizza at the 4 star rated joint, Pizza Fusion. We loved this perfect-for-a-lunch-date place for its gluten free menu, soy cheese options, save the earth mantra and organic veggies on every slice. Oh, and the waitress had dreads. Win.

After lunch, we hit Buffalo Exchange, which is a not-your-average-thrift-store type of joint, specializing in recycled designer threads. Last time I was down there, I got a Vera Bradley wallet in Pacific Beach for $19. Yes, PLEASE.

Wednesday morning I woke up with Los Angeles on the brain.

Recently, Sarah and I have decided we want to move to LA this summer; which for me means post graduation and for her means summer internship. City of sun and sand, here we come!

Why LA, you ask? It's far, far away from here.

Don't get me wrong, my heart beats for northern California, and always will, but the itch to be somewhere new has crept up on me in the last few months, and I'm yearning for a different adventure.

PLUS.

LA has more job postings on Craigslist than any other city west of New York.

What a lot of people don't know about the PR industry is that there are so many sectors of the biz.

Though all cities have ALL categories, here's a few IE's: San Francisco frequents tech jobs (hello Silicon Valley!), Sacramento agencies have food and wine clients up the whazoo, and LA is fashion forward, lifestyle and celebrity PR.

What says Caitlin Wallace more than fashion, lifestyle and celebrities? Not much.

I've been obsessed with Kate Middleton ever since she and Bill vowed to seal the deal, I've @'ed Chris Colfer so many times on Twitter that I'm expecting his restraining order via USPS any day and I knew Lance Bass was gay before he frosted his hair in the late 90's.

I have a gift for celebrity gossip- I can see it now: PR pro to the stars.

The three of us spent the day galavanting ( as we so often do ), with lunch on the way to LA at The Cliff in Laguna, which has oceanside dining and an avocado spread to absolutely die for.

The must haves on the menu are: The Southwest Chicken Wrap and The Turkey Wrap (try the fresh fruit OR the fries). Don't even get me STARTED on the sun-dried tomato mayonnaise!

See lunch options.

Thursday morning, we hit one of our favorite hidden gems, Saint Tropez Bakery and Bistrot.

Not only have I been to the cafe's namesake, but the minute I walked in, I felt a stab of homesickness for my time in Provence. The tablecloths were a delicate yellow with olive branches, just like all the fabrics in the boutique shops from Nice to Avignon.

The glass pastry case in the shop filled with the glazed raspberry tarts of our past lives as students on the french riviera washed waves of familiarity over us as the pink, green and brown macaroons stared back at us just like they did in Paul, our favorite patisserie in Aix-en-Provence.

Along with morning tea at Saint Tropez, riding The Coaster downtown is a must do in San Diego. For about $12 roundtrip, you can ride from north county (Carlsbad-Encinitas) to downtown, sans traffic and gasoline. The train follows the tracks oceanside and takes about 45 minutes.

If serious shopping is what you're into, look no further than Horton Plaza. This outdoor shopping mecca has some of the best stores and selections of anywhere I've been, and is well taken care of, due to to it's roots in the Westfield family.

I fell in love with downtown San Diego, before we'd even reached the famous Gaslamp Quarter, which is often considered to be the heart and soul of the city.

Friday morning, we arose early to catch our flight back to the Northstate. The familiar security measures seemed gloomier than before ( and not just because we were felt up by TSA ) as we left our wonderful vacation behind.

One of catch 22's about traveling is that just when you think you need to take a trip to satisfy a need, you get on your returning plane or train yearning for your next adventure.

I often find myself telling future study abroaders that I went abroad to see Europe, because that's really all I wanted to see; I thought a year over there would quench my thirst for world traveling, but as I returned home, all I could think of was all the places I have yet to see.

“Adventure is a path. Real adventure – self-determined, self-motivated, often risky – forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the earth and you will bear witness. In this way you will be compelled to grapple with the limitless kindness and bottomless cruelty of humankind – and perhaps realize that you yourself are capable of both. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.” – Mark Jenkins

* Also a HUGE thank you to Mark and Virginia Mann. As always, you were truly wonderful hosts and I appreciate your willingness to let us spend our holidays in your coastal villa.

When Nouns Become Verbs: How Language Keeps Up With Technology

"Well, right after she facebooked me, I googled the best places to live in the south bay. I told her she could always just jump and Craigslist and creep out some apartments for him...whatever works."

Wiki-wha?!

Because of my experience traveling (and living ) in places other than the good ol' US of A, I know what it's like to struggle through a language barrier. I've played my fair share of charades games with shop owners, waiters and French teachers in order to get my point across...but what happens when the words of my own language start to blur?

The advent of social media changed the way Gen Y-ers talk (and write ).... to each other.

As a child born right in the middle of Generation Y ( 1982-1995 ), I started my MySpace page when I was a senior in high school (2004-2005), and had to wait a few weeks until my university made it onto the exclusive Facebook network (2005).

I remember MySpace before you could customize your background, and Facebook when you had to have a college e-mail address to join.

Though MySpace is virtually extinct, Facebook is alive and well; Mark Zuckerburg was just named Time Magazine's Person Of The Year for 2010. Though I would love to go on and on about Facebook (due to my mild obsession with Mark), I'll get back on topic.

The term "MySpaced" came about as a short cut for, "he wrote me a message on MySpace", or "she commented on my MySpace page"

...soon this snowballed into, "he facebooked me," " facebook messaged me" and later, "she facebook chatted me".

So I ask you, when did Facebook become a verb?

Did it slowly creep up on us with the advent of texting? It seemed innocent enough to relay something someone "texted" you.

(Texted is even more hilarious because it delves into the fact that it's past tense of a non-existant verb...texts are just that, TEXT..like, words on a page...HOW is that a verb?!)

Was it when Google became the universal search engine? It seems like I say "I'll just google it" at LEAST twice a day.

(Also hilarious because Google is the name of a COMPANY. It's like when people claim they need a Starbucks when I KNOW they mean they need COFFEE)

Was it when LOL because so universal that our Gen X parents understand it, even TEXT it to us?

Or perhaps when Twitter limited us to 140 characters?

And speaking of Twitter, why do tweeters "tweet" and not "twit" or "twittered"?

I twittered it. That DOES sound dumb.

Is it just slang? For now, I think so.

If I was writing to a teacher, no WAY would I write that someone facebooked me...my spell check doesn't even recognize it. I would write the long hand version, stating that someone wrote me a message on Facebook.

Social media isn't going anywhere. Despite news stories about social media coming into conflict with the workplace, it can absolutely help people and businesses market and promote, as well as reach out to a large audience on a more personal level. I mean, let's be honest, I follow Chris Colfer on Twitter, that's real.

Moral of the story, Gen Y's, aka lovers of all things social media, can turn anything into a verb. I personally am guilty of just plain making up words. I even turn verbs into adjectives when I can.

As a lover of language, I say bring it on.

(Can you believe after all that I ended my sentence with a preposition?)

I knew you could.