#Foodspiration: vegetarian

Recently I went to a music festival and there I discovered the best vegetarian food restaurant ever! Everything they had was so healthy and mouthwatering. Too bad that we don't have this specific one in our country. But since the festival I've been very excited to try out and cook more vegetarian meals myself. Right now I eat meat, however, it's mostly chicken or fish. A few years back I loooooved meat, any kind of meat would make me happy. But on the other hand I always felt guilty to eat it, I didn't feel like I deserved it. So I became a vegetarian for the idea of it and at first it was all fine, it was surprisingly easy to give up meat even when I loved it so much. But I was too young, I did not know how and what should I eat to get all the nutrients that I needed. After a while my body started getting really unhealthy. I used to be a person that never gets sick, but I was a vegetarian for exactly a year and in that year I got sick 7 times. I still try to get back to the healthiness level I was in before my vegetarian phase. 

 However, when the year ended and I decided that I need meat, my taste in it changed. Now I can only eat chicken and sometimes (but very rarely) beef and I can't even look at pork - I don't like the smell, the taste, the view. Also I think everything vegetarian looks so tasty and good for you. So sometimes I'd much rather eat something vegetarian, especially in places that I don't know too well. Today I've been browsing the internet for vegetarian meals all day and I'm very pleased with what I've found. So these are my 5 best choices. Bon appetit!

1. Brussels Sprouts Pizza with Balsamic Red Onions

2. Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto Pasta with Roasted Vegetables

3. Creamy Spinach and Mushroom Lasagna

4. Creamy Avocado and Rocket Pasta

 5. Layered Roasted Veggie, Sweet Potato & Black Bean Tortilla Pie 

 Enjoy!

- Kamile

The first half

The first half of summer was spent studying non stop for a month and then finally living: reading literature and drinking cold coffee, visiting new places and making old dreams come true, eating healthy and taking care of myself, volunteering and photographing, drinking too much and dancing all those beautiful but short summer nights, visiting family and friends in other cities, meeting new people and falling in love with them, saying too much goodbyes and hoping that they are not forever, singing in the candlelight and laughing until we cry, enjoying the sunsets and greeting all of the sunrises, feeling free and loving life. I don't know how the second half will be able to match the craziness of the first one, but I hope it will.

 - Kamile

#Inspiration: Summer road trips

Ah.. Who doesn't love Summer and it's adventures? I'm going on one big road trip to a festival in another country in a couple of days and when I get back, I'm leaving for another one to another country. I can't wait to leave! So meanwhile I gathered a few inspirational pictures from pinterest to get myself in the traveling mood even more. Enjoy!

You can find more inspiring pictures in my pinterest account HERE.  

- Kamilė

10 tips for surviving a Summer Festival

It's summer festival season yet again! And even though they are really fun, festivals tend to be messy and chaotic at times and surviving them might become a challenge. So since I can proudly call myself a festival junkie (13 festivals visited and I'm not stopping here) and in less then 10 days I, myself, am going to one of the best festivals around, I decided to leave some tips on how to experience a festival in the best way when being well prepared.

1. Pack light. I went to at least 6 festivals by bus/train/hitchhiking and I always reconsidered if I needed all the stuff I had to carry on my back. However, this rule doesn't apply to you if you're getting there by car. Actually if you're getting there with a car I would recommend to do the complete opposite - take as many things as it's humanly possible to fit into a car. You never know what you might need.

2. Prepare for any weather. Bring extra clothes and always always always bring something that can keep you warm. You can never know what mother nature has in store for the weekend. There were times when the forecasts were saying it will be sunny and perfect and in real life it rained the whole time. So bring at least one full outfit for any (rainy, cold, sunny, hot) weather. And I just have to emphasize how important it is to bring warm clothes. Even when the days are sunny and boiling hot, the nights still tend to be cold. So if getting sick is not your intention - bring warm sweater(s).

3. Don't let the rain catch you unprepared - take a raincoat or a rain poncho. Yes, I know - they are extremely ugly and uncomfortable and just ew... But it's better to wear one then to get soaking wet and sick the next day.

4. With or without a poncho/coat -  enjoy the rain. Dance in the puddles, have a dirt war or create a full body mask from dirt. It's still a festival and don't forget to party in any kind of conditions.

5. This might seem weird but it's very very useful - if you're living in a tent, don't organise your things. Live in total chaos. Yupp, I know it will be very hard to find your things, especially if you're not living in the tent alone, but this tip is coming from experience. A long time ago me and my friends used to keep our things in our backpacks and we would leave them in the tent (because you can't cary everything you bring to the festival). Aaaand we got robed. It's extremely easy for the bad guys to take everything you have if you keep it all in one place/backpack/anything. On the other hand, if there is a mess, no one will find anything (especially if you can't find anything).

6. Bring A LOT of food. If you're a broke university student just like me and can't afford to buy all your meals in the festival restaurants then bring food from your home - it's okay to do this. But just remember to bring two times more food than you think you can eat. Yeah, sometimes it's very hot and I barely eat anything in two days. However, most of the times I feel reaaaaally hungry because of all the extra moving, dancing, partying and being in the fresh air.

7. Don't forget shower wipes/wet wipes. Some festivals have showers, some don't. The ones that do usually have extremely long lines that take 3-4 hours out of your festival experience. If you think that waiting for it is not worth it, then wet wipes are your salvation. I don't think I could ever survive a festival without them. Also, I can wash my hair 2 times a week and they stay tolerable, but if your hair tends to get dirty and greasy quickly, dry shampoo will be your best friend.

8. Don't take your favourite and most expensive clothes. Everybody wants to show off their festival fashion but I recommend you do it in cheaper, disposable clothes (they still can be pretty!). Festivals are messy. Things get ruined, ripped, dirty, lost, etc., so take only the things that you don't mind saying goodbye to.

9. Take an extra phone battery or a portable phone charger. Unless you have a Nokia 3310 that can last for 2 weeks, bring these things! Because your phone will die and you will need to to contact your friends/take pictures for instagram/check facebook/call your mom to tell her you're still alive.

10. And finally don't forget to  have a blast! Wether you're going with your best friends or all alone (you can find friends there!) festivals are an amazing experience. It's a place where everyone is 10 times more fun, friendly and awesome. So have a GREAT time! Cheers!

- Kamile

Hello July

It's funny how fast everything can change. One moment I'm sitting and not believing how happy I am, waking up from my dreams and realizing that the awaken life is better than anything I could dream of and starting every day with a huge smile on my face. And suddenly another moment comes and I'm back to where I started, only with a huge hole inside because for a little while I experienced how good it could be. I am not depressed again, I'm not back to the place I was a few months ago. From that horrible time I understood that doesn't matter how cheesy it sounds, happiness is a choice and despite everything I still choose to be happy. However, now I understood that there are very different levels of how happy I can be.

Last night at midnight I was standing in the bus station, hugging a group of people I don't even know and waving to a bus while crying our eyes out. It was the first friend of my many new friends leaving. Even though I knew her for a couple of months and we started our relationship as frienemies, very quickly we grew very close together and the time to let her go came too fast. The city where I happily lived my whole life without ever thinking that it's missing anything suddenly feels too empty, too quite, too sleepy.

The bus left the station and so did we. We got into a car and a boy suggested that we should have a night ride around the city. We all did not know each other but everyone agreed. For an hour we were sitting not talking, the radio was playing and we just rode around. Everybody was enjoying the moment in nostalgic silence, thinking about the adventures we had with the girl and from time to time someone would silently wipe a tear of their cheek. Someone got hungry and we rode to a supermarket, some guy bought us all icecream. For a second the moment was perfect: it was 2 a.m. we were standing in a parking lot in the middle of the city, the summer night was warm and everybody was just eating icecream, telling old stories and laughing. But the moment passed and the thought that we will never see each other again like this came back. A boy in the car said that this is why it is worth living - nights like these. I couldn't agree more, but it doesn't make it any less sad.

- Kamile.