Two Parties, Too Little Time

We are going to jump into the past for a little bit and look at two parties held during March that I didn't discuss earlier because 1) I was so incredibly busy, 2) I had not yet received good pictures, and 3) I have a major paper to be writing at this exact moment and I really don't want to.

The first was a Goodbye Party for Julia Rehmet, a German friend who was interning with the UN. She is also good friends with my neighbor Susan, and sometimes the three of us would sit around in Susan's room, drinking wine and talking trash. No, it's not true, usually we would drink wine and talked about the Holocaust or Judaism, which passes for casual conversation with my German friends. (Pictured: Me eating the cheesecake with my hands, American-style!)

Julia would also share with us stories of the UN and helped introduce me to a lot of other nice UN people at the I-House, like Arnav and Franceska, both of whom have also moved out in the past month. At any rate, Julia is a very sweet girl and I-House has been much quieter without her presence. Susan had held the party and invited a mix of Julia's work friends, I-House friends, and random people that I'm not quite sure how she knows them. We ordered in pizza and salad, a pretty American last meal, and drank quite a bit of wine. (Pictured: Julia with her American meal)

Pictured: Susan, Kinneret, and Julia

The next party was held by Leann and Marion, two neighbors a few floors down. Both Leann and her roommate Marion are opera singers, and they perform regularly for I-House events.It was a small affair, they've had at least two much bigger parties that I was invited to before, but because this one was focused on good food and not just good friends and drinking, it was kept a bit smaller. Leann has recently landed a wonderful job and felt like celebrating with fish tacos, baja style. I would never had ever dreamt of attempting such a culinary feat, but for Leann it's just another good meal. I got to help bread and fry the fish and prepare a sauce, but it was the eating I was really helpful at. It was just us three girls and Derek and Imre. We started a game which had the following rules: Imre would have to dance every time he said "Oh my God" or "I'm so full", which he was saying a lot. The rest of the meal was broken up with periodic bouts of dancing. It finally ended with surprise birthday cupcakes for me! They were coconut and oh-so-good. It was some of the best food I have had in months! (Pictured: Marion with the homemade cupcakes)

(Pictured: Imre, Kinneret, Leann, and Marion)