Tan By the Sea: 07.11.15

HAPPY NOVEMBER EVERYBODY

October was as crazy as crazy can be, but gosh was it filled with so many wonderful experiences. Being a 5th year, I couldn't help but feel nostalgic as many of the university events I am attending will be my final ones as a student.

As you all read from my previous post, I attended my first concert with Big Bang, a Korean boy band, with Tiffany! I think I must've lost a lot of cells around my throat from all that screaming, but damn it was worth it! Not to mention I bought a $50 light stick, or as Samir calls it, the $50 torchlight (flashlight for all you North American readers)! MERPS, can't wait to go back to another BB concert someday and even more excited to one day attend a 2NE1 concert - PLEASE COME TO CANADA!!

If you haven't figured it already, fall is my favourite time of the year with all the warm colours and beautiful leaves! To take advantage of this fabulous season, some of my closest university friends and I took some grad shots with the most amazing photographer - Yu Hang!! Who is also one of the great friends I have met through uni!

Trying to rent grad gowns for the photoshoot was insanely difficult. Some of us gathered for lunch the day of the photoshoot, at the brink of giving up as we were still unable to obtain any gowns, when Drew miraculously got all 6 gowns for us! Thank you so much again to Drew, and being able to spend some time with all my amazing friends while taking photos to commemorate our friendship meant a lot of me. I am so touched to everyone who agreed to do this shoot with me and I can't wait to see where we will be heading towards in the years to come! p.s. haven't gotten the photos back yet, but I will sure post them somewhere when I do get them!

Then there was yesterday. For all of my friends who love when I write a long post, well this one is for you. Tiffany and I pretty much decided to do a post birthday celebration (as if the pre-birthday celebration with Big Bang wasn't enough) by joining a wine tour organized by Slow Foods - University of Guelph. With this tour we visited three different wineries within the Niagara region - Malivoire, 13th Street, and Foreign Affairs.

No word of a lie, the wine tour turned into more of a food and cheese tour than an actual wine tour itself. For one we had the most beautiful tomato soup with a grilling cheese skewer at a food truck right outside Malivoire. Now you must understand that although today was indeed a beautiful day, it is still November, meaning the winds are inevitably chilly. This warm soup was not only insanely rich and hands down the best tomato soup I have ever had, but also the perfect comfort food on a cool November morning!

We also had some awesome cherry tarts and cranberry almond scones at the bakery by 13th Street, and by awesome, I mean I laughed in excitement after taking a bite into that tart, which is my default stamp of approval. After visiting 13th Street, we headed to Grand Oak Culinary Market where we had lunch and tried some pretty funky cheese. We had the Kokos coconut gouda, , the horseradish cheddar, heavenly (or at least a brie cheese from Chateau de Bourgogne that might as well be named heavenly), and a beautiful cheddar that has been aged for 8 years. So this brie was at about room temperature and you can scoop it as though you're eating brie cream and I think it's probably one of the best cheese I will ever taste. It is so flavourful, yet completely inoffensive as a lot of cheese could be. I mean yes all the other 3 cheeses were beautiful too, but the brie was the unprecedented winner.

The wineries were all very unique with Malivoire being modern and classy, 13th Street having that cottage, farm house feel, and Foreign Affair with their rustic personality! All 3 of them have a spectacular vineyard and yes I went a little nuts with the photo-taking, but in my defense, I haven't held Cameron for a while so it was very exciting! The best thing about this trip (yes, something can be better than food, wine, and cheese!) was meeting 4 new friends on the trip! Gosh, Oliver and his free run juice! It was fantastic getting to know all of you, really just added to the overall experience of this tour!

Tiff and I arrived back in Guelph at about 6pm, but the night was far from ending. We joined Lauren and Claudia on an Asian food trip to Waterloo. We visited Kinkaku Izakaya, where we had a marvelous Japanese buffet dinner! It was so good that it triumphed not only Japanese food in Guelph (which is not really a feat anyway), but also many Japanese food places in Toronto / Markham. It was funny when Lauren was telling Claudia at the end how we forgot to take any photos of the food and Claudia replied that it was impossible because Lauren, Tiff and I inhaled the food! Hope we didn't scare you with our monstrous food eating capabilities

Indeed the past few weeks was more pure insanity than fun, but it makes all of these and other events that I attended even more precious. It's only a few months left for me as an undergrad student at Guelph, cheers to a whole load more of wonderful memories! Till next time, ciao!

Malivoire Winery: