studentsineurope

Tonight was the night I’ve been waiting for. I’ve been waiting for it for over a year, since before I first arrived in Sardinia. A good friend of mine is leaving for Greece tomorrow, where she will work as a waitress for the rest of the summer. Tonight we held a going-away aperitivo in her [...]

I used to think that the best souvenirs were those that could double as Christmas presents for those relatives you don’t see very much — most of the snowglobes, mugs and other assorted paraphernalia people brought back from Europe didn’t seem to have much purpose apart from being an occasional paperweight.
However, there are some real [...]

I had been to Italy five times before I made it to Florence, the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance, so I was thrilled when I finally booked my ticket to go.
I wasn’t disappointed. Florence is one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever seen, with medieval and Renaissance churches in every practically every piazza, interesting [...]

I’m always on the lookout for a great new cocktail, and cocktails are hard to find in Europe. European cocktail culture is quite different than American cocktail culture. There are fewer cocktails and most of them combine a maximum of two ingredients (think gin and tonic, which is the quintessential European cocktail). Sometimes you’ll find [...]

Aperitivo is one of my favorite Italian traditions. It’s like America’s happy hour, but so much better. Aperitivo starts sometime between 5 and 6:30 pm, which is helpful for student travelers who haven’t had time to adjust to the late Italian dinner hour (be warned – some restaurants won’t start serving food until 7 or [...]

Amsterdam is a wildly cosmopolitan city with no shortage of quality restaurants, and not just traditionally Dutch ones. It’s harder to find a place serving Dutch food (whatever that is) than Italian, Indian, or Indonesian.  In fact, it’s Indonesian fare that’s the highlight of the city’s culinary scene.
Due to the Netherlands’ one-time colonial presence in the [...]

You always have an excuse when you get seduced. You know you’re making a bad decision. You even know you’ll regret it. But your amazing powers of rationalization kick in and before you know it, the deed is done. In my case, I blame the muffin. I was wandering innocently around Groningen looking for an [...]

I confess, I’m the person for whom advertising was invented. Show me a clever ad campaign and I’m putty in your hands. I will buy almost anything if the packaging achieves that difficult-but-sought-after second look. I glance at it, look away, and then… turn back and look again. There it is: I’m a goner.
Which is [...]

When I first started scoping around for dinner in Groningen, I was shocked and horrified by the restaurant prices. “This is a student town?!” I wondered, not believing there wasn’t something less expensive. But everywhere I looked advertised entrees for upwards of twelve euros. The best deals were “plates of the day” for around nine-fifty.
I [...]

After ceremoniously saying goodbye to muffins before I left the states, I’m not sure if I’m delighted or chagrined to report that this year, for the first time in my experience, Europe is covered with muffins. I don’t mean those puck-like pastries that only residents of the British Isles think are muffins (we Americans know [...]