Give Me Bananas

Hello from London!
We’re currently in the pub below the hostel – eating breakfast.

Our plane was more than 1hr late and we ended up getting to the hostel at 1:30am. Despite our late arrival I was wide awake at 5am. Excited about our stay much? Anyway, we got up at 6:30am, got ready and explored the area a bit. We’re staying near Pimlico which is an ok area but not very familiar to me. We ended up having a (first) breakfast at Prêt A Manger!

It’s probably my favourite chain “restaurant” because it uses natural food and often organic products. I had a “yoga bunny” yogurt (haha), cappuccino, water and hippie drink.

Oh and my eyes started shining when they brought in some edamame and I knew that we had to get some as well.

I could eat edamame for the rest of my life and be a happy person.

We’re currently waiting for our friend Christine to get here. She should arrive in about 30 minutes. For some reason we have some issues with our adaptor (it somehow doesn’t fit?!?!) and I don’t know if this laptop will have power for long. We’ll see. I hope that I can blog though. hehe.

Got to keep this short and tight. The power, you know.. got to keep that in mind if I want to continue blogging during our stay.

Blog reading won’t be possible but I’ll catch up with you guys when I get back, kay? (Guess you all understand that I prefer to spend my time talking to people and enjoying my time in London – and not in front of the laptop). Love you all though! hehe

I hope you’re having a great time as well! Enjoy your Fridays! The weekend’s near!

ps: your random facts are hilarious and so interesting! Though also kind of scary… Kalli got ran over two cars! Scary scary indeed.
You should go and check out all the other random facts too

I couldn’t publish this post yesterday for some reason… Let’s hope it works now.

There are few grains that I’ve ever cooked with. One of them is MILLET! I’ve had that lone package of millet for ages and finally gave it a try yesterday.

I had millet before but I’ve never cooked it myself which is also the reason why it took me 298583 years (and a few months) to try it.

I present you the Not So Average Millet and Chickpeas Dish!

Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 1 cup dry millet
• 4 cups water
• salt
• approximately 2 cups cooked chickpeas
• 1 onion (halved and sliced)
• 2 carrots (sliced)
• olive oil
• ground cumin
• 1/4 c raisins

Directions:

Cook millet according to the package (mine said to cook it with water and a pinch of salt for 13-15 minutes). In the mean time sauté the onion slices in a bit of olive oil. Halfway through cooking the millet, add the carrots and cumin. Once the millet is done add the chickpeas, onion slices and raisins.

It couldn’t be more simple!

Sorry, this pic is pretty ugly but I was HANGRY and needed my food fast! I’m sure you guys understand . On the side I also had a tofu kebab which went well with the millet dish.

Mmm I LOVED it! I had leftovers for lunch today and my co-worker said that it smelled so good. Mmm yes it was. Thankyouverymuch.

My day was pretty non-eventful. I was busy at work since we have a big event tomorrow night (which I am not looking forward to. I like my job but working til 9pm is not my idea of a “fun night out”).

Tonight’s pilates class was ok. We have a fairly new trainer and she keeps things very basic so it’s been boring me a lot. Actually.. Few people know that I once started to train to become a pilates teacher! I gave up after the second course because I’ve been too busy and couldn’t deal with everything at the same time.

Ha. That was some sort of random fact about myself.

Tell me one random fact about you!

I LOVE finding out random facts about other people . In fact (no pun intended) I always remember the weirdest facts about people – mainly celebrities. Yes, that’s what you need to know in life.

Darn. Is it 10:32pm already? I actually wanted to go to bed early so I could leave for the gym am 5:30am (crazy? Yes indeed, I don’t deny it). We’ll see how that goes.

I don’t know when I’ll be able to blog again because of tomorrow’s big event (and me getting home really late) and my trip to LONDON this weekend! I worked my butt off in March and can use my overtime for a few more days off so we’ll fly to London on Thursday night. I CAN’T WAIT! I will blog over there though (as often as possible) because the boyfriend is taking his laptop with him. Hooray!

But for now.. GOODNITE!

ps: the legs workout that I mentioned in my last post is a killer and I did it again today. My butt is in pain!! (Ok, I’m pretty sure you all wanted to know that.. –>insert heavy sarcasm)

ok I’ll go now.

See ya.

Sweet dreams.

Hasta luego.

Oh KARIN! Shut up already will ya???

..ok…

Why do days off always seem to fly by? I bet there’s someone who secretly steals a few hours.

Anyway, my Monday was super busy and active. I got back home from my boyfriend’s place at 9:45am-ish and started cleaning the apartment. It’s something that really relaxes me for some reason. "

Afterwards I did the 20 min strength workout of the “fit in 5” DVD, followed by this 20 min workout video that Tracy Anderson made for Gwyneth Paltrow. Now, I don’t really know what to think about Tracy since you hear all those weird stories (baby food, anyone??) but I adore Gwyneth and so I thought that giving this workout a try wouldn’t hurt me. Well, it kicked my ass. I wonder if leg workouts 2 days after a 10 miles race are smart (guess we’ll find out tomorrow) .

Lunch was a salad, black beans and a boiled egg.

After that I continued my cleaning-party. It was much needed, trust me.

Snackeroo came in the form of an apple and almond butter. You can’t go wrong with that combo. You just can’t.

Yes, that table’s supposed to look kind of messed up. It’s art. Seriously!

…Theeeen I walked to the train station (because the shops there are open today everywhere else) and got some essentials at the organic food store (aka lettuce, tofu, ginger lemon tea and onions).

In the spirit of the 20 minute workouts I decided to do the dance and yoga workouts of the fit in 5 DVD after I got back home. The dancing was a bit awkward. Even though I used to do ballet for 10 years I’m not really used to Latin moves. I’ll probably never warm up to “yeah! that’s fun! give me a smile!!” (–>super enthusiastic instructors) either. It’s probably motivating for some people but I just feel silly.
The yoga segment was a bit weird to be honest. It wasn’t real yoga for some reasons.

Dinner will be some sort of millet/chickpea dish. I’ll just throw everything together and call it a meal .

Q: Do you know the Tracy Anderson Method? If yes, what do you think about it? I’m not very familiar with the method itself but that leg workout is a keeper.

Back to reality tomorrow…

Oh boy what a race.

After weeks and weeks of rain and clouds we got some sun and heat yesterday. OF ALL DAYS. Despite the warmth (ha!) I had an amazing time which was completely unexpected. You see, last year’s Grand Prix of Bern was a pain but this year’s felt like a breeze.

I was so surprised that it went so easy that I didn’t really push myself. Even though I originally wanted to run a 1:35 I felt like it didn’t really matter anymore.

I guess I was just amazed that it felt so easy to run these 10 miles and I just wanted to take in the scenery and enjoy it. In the end I ran the hilly course in 1:39:10 which was 40 seconds faster than last year.

On other days I’d probably be pissed by the fact that I ran the same time even though I  trained for it (I didn’t train much last year) but I’m really satisfied. My time didn’t matter, I just wanted to enjoy my very first painless race .

Now that I saw that a race can be fun, I can run faster next year! Haha.

Anyway, the course is fantastic. I guess that’s why so many people also love this race. Silvio took most photos that I’m posting right now as he carried his camera with him so thanks for letting me use them, love!

The course went through woods..

And basically through the entire city of Bern

There was lots of water to cool the runners down.

That bastard who is my boyfriend ran the course in 1h 33 min! And without any training whatsoever! Crazy.

There are people who constantly look amazing, even after races. I don’t. I look like a tomato that’s covered in sweat. Don’t even try to say that I don’t – you didn’t see me after I ran through the finish!

Speaking of the finish.. The first thing I thought was “what, it’s over already?”. Clearly a sign that I didn’t give it all.

See what I mean with tomato face?
Oh and there’s some nipplegate action too. Classy.

Btw that’s Silv’s friend Daniel (who ran with woollen socks and no running shoes but was still the fastest of us!!!), Silvio (can you say “tall”??), moi la tomate and my dad.

Even though I might live abroad next year I can’t wait to run the GP 2011 as well. It’s such an amazing event and the organisation is beyond fantastic.

What’s sad though is that a 25 year old runner passed away – he collapsed 1km before the finish. My heart goes out to his family. It’s really tragic when something like this happens during an event that is supposed to encourage health and wellbeing.

After the race we went back home to my place and had some (vegan) kedgeree (or kitchery, kidgeree, kedgaree.. however you might call it). I will post the recipe soon – it’s incredibly good and simple to make.

Today has been easy peasy and extremely relaxing. Selina and I walked into the city, ate some ice cream and got ticket’s for tonight’s screening of the Prince of Persia. Haha, it’s probably a pretty silly film but that’s ok as long as I get to see a topless Jake Gyllenhaal .

Q: What are your worst race stories (if there’s any)?
Q2: Do you have Monday off too? Three day weekends are so lovely. They should always be this long!

Hope you’re enjoying your Sundays!

Hey there!

I’m currently prepping for the race (aka realizing that my favourite running shirt is in the laundry, hand washing it and hoping that it might dry in the sun).
I am really excited but also a bit nervous. The guys (my dad and boyfriend who run the race as well) take it so easy whereas I’m almost jumping around.

Anyway, yesterday after work we went and checked out the expo and collect our bibs.

Viktor Röthlin (one of the best marathon runners) was there too and signed autographs.

Afterwards we joined the pasta party and had some penne with napoli sauce. Which was boring (as expected) but good.

I’m in group 19 and our starting time is 4:30pm. They have several groups/sectors (or however you call them) so the start goes smoothly and there’s no pushing.

The bag says “The 10 most beautiful miles of the world”. Haha.

It’s funny. Races in the US are usually in the morning.. over here they’re in the afternoon.

Ah I can’t wait! My leg’s still not 100% well but fine and after 10 weeks of training I am ready to run the race.

Ok, I’ve got to go and have some lunch now. See you tomorrow with a recap!

Have a wonderful Saturday!

There are 3 main ingredients that you need for a good and simple veggie lasagne:

1. Tons and tons of veggies (duh)
2. Béchamel sauce
3. pasta

First you cook a huge load of mixed veggies (I used 1 yellow & 1 red bell pepper, 3 carrots, a few leaves of savoy cabbage, 1 zucchini and 1 aubergine) with one can of crushed tomatoes. Let it simmer for a few minutes and turn down the heat.

Next up is the béchamel sauce. To make that sauce you need 3 ingredients:

1. Butter
2. Flour
3. Milk

First melt 30g of butter on low heat then mix in 2 tbsp of flour. Let it brown a bit but watch it carefully! Afterwards stir in 4dl of milk and continue stirring (very important!) for about ten minutes. Season with salt and nutmeg and you’ve got your perfect béchamel sauce.

Now comes the fun part. LAYERING!

Béchamel sauce, pasta (uncooked!), veggies, béchamel sauce, pasta, veggies… until nothing’s left.

There you’ve got your perfect lasagne!

Now just top it with a bit of cheese (opt.) and you’re good to go (well after baking it for 30 minutes of course. You wouldn’t want to eat “crispy” pasta, would you?)

Ok, Italians would probably shoot me for butchering up that lasagne but it’s still an unbeatable recipe if you want a quick and good treat.

My boyfriend and I actually cooked veggie lasagne on our first date and it’ll always be dear to me.

Random meal of the day:

That, my friends, are defrosted zucchini patties from 9829847 years ago, topped with rice mung beans and savoy cabbage.

Oh and there was an egg or two too..

Ok, I’ll have to go and continue praying. My leg has been hurting like hell for the past few days which is making me slightly nervous since the race is in.. oh.. 2 days. Huh.
Or in other words: I’M FREAKING OUT!!

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

It’ll be fine. And if not..
well we still have two days.

Q: Have you ever had an injury? I haven’t! 23 years without one broken bone or any other kind of injury. I just hope that this trend continues *knock on wood*.

Well who needs a shrink when you have a blog?? Thank you so much for your comments, you are definitely the wisest and most amazing people out there.

Oh and just for the record.. if anyone thought that I was fishing for compliments or wanted everyone to tell me that I’m beautiful (HA!) then you’re wrong

You know, even admitting that we have issues is a huge step. I remember that it hasn’t always been like that for me.
Let’s embrace our flaws together!

But let me quickly quote the über-wise Ildie who wrote a long comment even though she’s on vacation. Hello? Who writes such adorable comments when they are away and enjoy some well deserved rest? You’re insane Ildie, INSANE! Go back outside, leave your laptop behind and enjoy the sun! ♥

“Ahhh fat talk. We ALL do it and those of us who say we don’t are lying. We all HATE our thighs or small boobs or double chin or flappy arms or “back boobs” and jiggly asses. We all have something we wish we could change. On certain days some of our bits and pieces seem particularly worse in comparison to the others and we DISSECT our bodies bit by bit because of it. It’s silly!!! Will we ever be able to stop? To be realistic, HECK NO! We just have to move past it. A pushup bra and the perfect pair of jeans that suck in your gut and magically lift your ass help! The rest is up to you. HA!

In the end, it’s who we are that makes us unique and beautiful. It’s the things we do with our lives and the people that we surround ourselves with and whose lives we impact and change that everyone will remember. Not the dimples on my butt. I doubt anyone will remember that. HA! Well except for me but that’s okay.”

Fat talk was completely gone when I dug into my amazing quinoa porridge this morning. Ah.. what an fantastic way to start the day. If I had the time (or money) I’d visit you all and make you a batch of quinoa porridge.
However, people who don’t like it won’t be my friends anymore. (Thinking about it.. I believe that Silvio wasn’t a huge fan. HA! That means I have to break up with him. What a pity! — jk jk!! ).

I nibbled my little heart away during the day. Sesame crackers until I dropped. Gosh, they’re like crack (not that I know how crack’s like ). Why do I keep buying them??

Oh and there also was a rice cake sandwich with herbs & garlic pâté. This pâté is crazy good and the main ingredient is nutritional yeast!

I also had a normal lunch (a sandwich. snore..).

I had plans to go to the 8:15pm pilates class so I had a very light dinner and cooked 1/4 red lentils with 2 handfuls of spinach and added some teriyaki sauce at the end.

The race is on Saturday and so I’m keeping it light and easy this week. Lots of yoga, stretching, walking and lying on the sofa. You know, the usual.. minus the running. Oh how much I’m enjoying it!

Have a great day!!

Yesterday’s run was hard.
I stomped around like a little child and constantly told myself what a fat, slow cow that I was.
In the end I finished the 10 miles in 1:39 mainly because I walked most of the last 5 miles. Not because I was that exhausted but because I was pissed off.

Being the drama queen that I am, I marched right past my boyfriend and dad at the end of the course.

But what made me behave like this?

Well let’s back up a little..
It all started nice and easy. Dad, Silvio and I walked to the nearby forest (where a cool 11 miles loop is) to warm up a little and I was really excited about the run. I knew that it was going to be a training run and therefore harder than leisurely runs. However, for some reasons long runs really relax me. In general. Not so much yesterday.

The first 5 miles were hard but doable. I wasn’t that far behind the two tall (think: very long legs) guys and it didn’t feel like I was dying. However, the next 5 miles were really really hard. It was ok that the guys ran ahead but I assumed that we would run the entire course together or else I wouldn’t have started that fast. And even though I thought that they should run their own pace I felt completely left alone.
You know that I’m usually a really happy person but it scares me that it sometimes doesn’t take much to make me feel really bad about myself. Thinking back I can’t believe that I constantly thought (during the run) what a slow and fat pig I was.

Come on! Fat?? Seriously? It really freaks me out that I sometimes consider myself as fat but I honestly don’t know how to stop myself. I’ve changed a lot and really like myself now (which sounds silly.. though it’s the truth) but the “old self” sometimes creeps back and makes me feel like the worst person on earth.

When I’m at my lowest I think that I do not deserve happiness and that no one really likes me anyway. It’s got nothing to do with self-pity, however, I sometimes really loathe myself. And for no reason!!

I am really ashamed of this because 98% of the time I really am at peace with everything.

There has been lots of improvement though. After finishing yesterday’s run I continued to be frustrated (“and I am so fat and slow and I AM NOT GOING TO RUN THIS RACE!!!!”) and behaved like a child. My dad said something like “you know, only 5% of all people could run this distance. Just think of all the lazy teenagers with their baggy pants!” and so on and my frustration wore off after 5 minutes. I’m glad that I don’t spend days feeling absolutely miserable anymore. Yes, I have my bad moments but I get over them pretty quickly too.

Still.. there’s something underneath it all that makes me think that I’m fat or not worthy of love. And even though I know that I shouldn’t take it seriously, I have to get rid of these thoughts.

I want to stop thinking that I’m bad. Once and for all. The only problem is that I don’t know how I should do that.

Any tips?

I realize that most bloggers – myself included – write about stopping fat talk and loving your body but rarely ever admit that they do think of themselves as fat sometimes. Why should we ignore this “weakness”? Because we as bloggers should be an inspiration to other people? I think that we should just be honest and write about things that bother us, even if that means that we have to admit that we have weaknesses. We’re normal people after all and far from perfect.

Q: Do you struggle with fat talk? Do you sometimes struggle with something else and don’t feel like you can admit it?

This post has been pretty heavy in words (I think it makes up for the lack of words in my last posts ) but let’s move on to pictures!

My eats have been far from exciting but I had dinner with my sister at Kabuki (a Japanese restaurant) which was really nice. Afterwards we went and saw the new Robin Hood film which I really liked.

We haven’t seen each other that often for the past few days and really needed to catch up. It’s weird: When she was at home, I was away (and vice versa).

Breakfast was the reincarnation of the god of boredom.
1 kiwi, 1 apple, 2 buns with honey.
Excited already?

Lunch was a huge salad and a banana. The salad was nice (and the banana too, of course) but yet again not so exciting.

Remember when I said that I wasn’t a huge fan of fake meat? Well there’s one exception. Those “spacebars” aka, seitan sausages. They’re fantastic.

Dinner started with a lovely cup of green tea…

…followed by some miso soup.

For my main course I chose the takuan (pickled daikon) hoso maki and shared an avocado and tamago (egg) hosomaki with my sister.

We still had some time to kill so we went to a lovely nearby restaurant called Pangäa which was fab. I got the “Drinkable chocolate” with cinnamon/banana flavour. Erm… drinkable chocolate?

Well you actually put that piece of chocolate into your hot milk. I LOVED it! (I also loved the fact that the chocolate was fair trade and organic). I will go back and try all their flavours soon.

Sel and I also shared some popcorn at the cinema. We were both starving (I guess these 10 miles are catching up with me).

Ok I’m off to bed now. Thanks for reading dear people. Oh and also thanks for the comments on my last post. My toe is fine – just slightly swollen but walking doesn’t hurt so I think it isn’t injured.. thank god.

x K

Ten minutes after writing yesterday’s post I collected some DVDs to take with me to my friend’s house but didn’t see the glass of water on the shelf. Well, I did notice it after it fell on my big toe.

So I really hope you don’t mind me posting a picture of my toe, otherwise just close your eyes and scroll down .

The glass didn’t even shatter but I still got a cut.

After hopping around like an idiot I decided to skip the run. However, I will try to run my 10 miles this afternoon.

Yesterday’s girl’s night was so much fun! We watched Love Actually (Hugh Grant’s dancing scene is hilarious!), The Notebook (makes me cry every time) and The Holiday (I wish Jude Law weren’t that handsome!).

We also had lots of goodies to eat.. It was a huge food fest to be precise!

Crudités

Olive tapenade and dipping sauce

Tortilla chips and guac

Cucumber tortilla rolls

Tomato mozzarella sticks

Brownies

Carrot banana mini-muffins that I made earlier in the afternoon.

We definitely weren’t lacking food. Or white wine .

A few people asked what the white frilly thing in my last post was. Well it’s cheese!

I haven’t done much today which is rather heavenly. I’m currently watching Avatar. I really like the message of the film even though the story’s a bit weak. Have you seen it?

Ugh. It just started raining. Running in rain is ok but still not my favourite thing to do (especially when it’s pouring down like right now).

I’ve got to get ready for the run now and drink some more water!!

Q: How much water do you actually drink each day? I usually drink 2 litres of water (and tea) but make sure to drink even more when I work out a lot.

Sometimes all you need is a bunch of friends or family members and a lovely brunch.

2 brunches in one week = heaven!

I am off to run 10 miles now and then I’ll have to make some food for our girl’s night. Snacks and chick flicks? Count me in!!

I just hope that my knee’s fine as it hurt after my last 8km run. We will see..

Have a wonderful Saturday!

Q: What do you always have to include in a good brunch? For me it’s fruits, pancakes or waffles and orange juice. I just have to have these.