B3THANY READS

I'm pretty sure everyone's favourite thing about Christmas is the food. Or at least it has to be in your top 5 favourite things, otherwise that's just illegal. So, as I'm spending the run up to Christmas in another country, I thought I would talk about what I like about Swiss Christmas food in today's Blogmas post! Crepes I know, I know. Crepes in Europe are basically an all year round thing. But there's something extra special about them when you get them at a Christmas market. There are so many choices, there's always a long queue of people excitedly waiting for their treat, and it warms you up in a very sugary way! I always get the chocolate crepes (NOT Nutella), and here's one I had at Bulle's Christmas market. Churros Here's another Christmas market speciality. Churros! I know they are originally from Spain but for some reason Christmas markets in Switzerland are littered with churro stalls. Every time you turn a...

If you have read any of my other Blogmas posts then you might be sick of me mentioning it, but ... Guess what?! I'm on my year abroad!! So for today's Blogmas, I thought I would summarise my first thoughts as my first term here draws to a close. Here's some context. I study Comparative Literature and French at the University of Kent in Canterbury, England. So, like most English universities, I go on my year abroad in my third year. I had three options; to study, work or teach English. I didn't want to spend another year studying if I didn't have to, so I wanted to work. As I had previous experience tutoring English to school kids in England, I thought I would apply for teaching English. So that's what I did! For your year abroad you can pretty much choose where you want to go in the world. However, for the English Language Assistantship, you can put down your preferences but aren't guaranteed anything. I fell in love with Switzerland after a school tri...

What's Christmas without going to a Christmas market? As I'm spending the year in one of the most Christmassy places in the world, I thought I would take full advantage of the festivities here in Switzerland. So far I have gone to Christmas markets in three different places, so I thought I would share my experiences for today's Blogmas post! Montreux, Switzerland I had heard Montreux held the best Christmas market in Switzerland, so I booked a hotel and off I went. Firstly, Montreux is up there amongst my favourite places in Switzerland. I came here once before in the summer, but visiting in the winter is an entirely different experience. As you walk down the hill from the station to the lake, you are met with a stunning view. One of my favourite parts of this Christmas market was how, every so often, the mountains would peep from behind the stalls as you walked by. It was really easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of the crowd and forget about ...

So I've had a few days to think about my New Year's resolutions for 2018 and thought the best way to hold myself accountable is to write them down and post them on the internet. 1. Read 15 books At the beginning of 2017, I set myself the goal of reading 12 books; one for each month of the year. Having not completed a Goodreads Reading Challenge before I wasn't entirely sure how many books I was capable of reading in a year, so I just guessed that I'd be able to read 12. Turns out I was almost absolutely right! I managed to read 13 overall which I was super happy with. I haven't gotten around to writing reviews for many of these books, so just in case you were interested here are the books I read in 2017: The Time Traveler's Wife , Audrey Niffenegger Room , Emma Donoghue The Light Between Oceans , M. L. Stedman The Reader on the 6.27, Jean-Paul Didierlaurent Gone Girl , Gillian Flynn We Were Liars , E. Lockhart ( ugh ) Hex , Thomas Ol...