Where should you live?

Even though Austin is on the smaller side of things (especially compared to our last city, LA), it has a ton of neighborhood options to choose from.  You can choose between yuppie downtown lofts/condos, college-town houses, quiet residential homes, and so on.  You can choose to live within walking distance to a ton of bars, restaurants, and shops, or you can nestle into a wooded area far from any popular commercial districts.  You can find almost any type of area, except for maybe beachfront or mountain terrain.

We initially focused our search on the 78704 South Congress (SoCo) area because we heard it was the up and coming social area.  And since we were going to rent for the first year while we became familiar with the city and decided where to buy, we wanted to be within walking distance to plenty of fun places to eat, drink, and be merry.  We jumped in a car and drove around SoCo and its surrounding areas, including Travis Heights and Bouldin Creek, and found plenty of houses that would do the trick.  We refreshed Craigslist pages every 5 minutes waiting for new places to pop up.  But it wasn't until we had a real estate agent drive us around Clarksville did we find the area that was right for us.  It provided quiet neighborhoods with spacious housing and a decent back yard, along with great restaurants, a grocery store (that has an amazing beer selection, btw), cafes and even a soda shop/drug store that was ripped right out of 1955 and serves the damn best burger and shake I've had in a long time.

So we chose Clarksville, but it may not be the right choice for you, so below is a quick recap of some neighborhoods that might tickle your fancy:

• SoCo (South Congress) - Sount of the river on Congress, you'll have the trendiest of neighborhoods on the block.  You'll be able to stumble to/from popular restaurants like Guerro's and trendy spots like the Hotel San Jose's pool.
• Downtown - Grab one of the trendy lofts while you can so you can stumble to and from the trendy bars downtown and on West 6th
• Hyde Park - Join the UT kids and get a decently sized house in a decently located neighborhood and enjoy a decently convenient commute to anything in the city
• Clarksville - Just a short drive/long walk to downtown, it's a quiet option that still has an old-school town feel with quaint options for shopping and eating
• Barton Creek - Apparently the new, fancy spot, it's a reach from any night life, but filled with beautiful homes and terrain.
• Travis Heights - Just east of SoCo, this is a quiet woodsy neighborhood  with only parks to walk to.  You do have easy access to the 35 and SoCo, and the houses are beautiful, so get in here if you can.
• South Lamar - The area most symbolizes what old Austin is like.  The north is known as yuppieville while the south is keeping it real.  There is plenty to do, eat and drink down here.
• The East Side - If you're looking for cheap land/housing and strong Hispanic influence, then hop over the 35 and get the prices low while you can.  There are pockets of social life, but more or less, it's the cheap housing that brings people over here.

That's just a quick look at the different areas to live in, so be sure to talk to your friends and Realtors about other possible options.  No matter what though, look at them all because you're bound to fall in love with one of them.

 

We may not be from here, but...

We'll be using this space to teach people little lessons we've learned since moving to Austin.  There's a lot to talk about because even though things are much bigger here in Texas, there are a lot of those little things you'll need to know.  So, let's start with something that's not necessarily a lesson, but instead a bumper sticker that caught our eye, and made us feel right at home.  

A Memorial Day Surprise

So Tania and I have been back in the States for two months now, and we've filled our time with family, friends, memories, and planning for the next phase in our life together.  We've spent countless hours with our 14 month old nephew Ian and seen him start walking and almost start talking, all the while seen his personality blossom into the most unbelievable little boy around.  We've visited our friends in LA for a bachelor party (Matt DeVille's), to visit friends, to dance our asses off at Coachella, and to celebrate our friends Luke and Thu at their wedding in San Diego.  We joined thousands of people down at the state capital to protest the SB 1070 law.  We've climbed 6 of the 7 summits in Phoenix (your ours next time South Mountain!).  We rooted on the Suns as they beat the Spurs and fought hard but eventually losing to the Lakers in the Western Conference finals.  We've eaten at amazing restaurants and visited beautiful parks like the Botanical Gardens.  And we've spent as much time with the Palumbos as possible knowing that we'd be moving on to the east with the Shershins soon enough.

Our last weekend in Arizona was spent with Tony, Anna Marie, Scott, Emily, Ian, and plenty of family friends playing golf, poker, Scattergories, and barbecuing together in the incredibly gorgeous setting of Forest Highlands.  It was the perfect way to spend quality time with Craig's family before heading onto a fun cross-country trip starting the Tuesday after Memorial Day. 

All in all, the two months after we got back from Asia were filled with family and friends, allowing us to ease back into the pace that only this country can provide.  And we were reminded of all the reasons we love this country so.  But one story from this weekend reminded us of our time in Vietnam, and of why we all get a day off during this national holiday of Memorial Day.

Today, I played the first 9 holes at the Canyon course of Forest Highlands just with my father, Tony, and his brother Mike.  After 9, Mike walked back to his house and a member of the group behind us asked to join Tony and me in our 2some.  Of course we accepted and he tee'd off with us at 10 while introducing ourselves.  When he heard our last name, he asked whether we were related to the kicker from Notre Dame 10 or so years ago.  When we told him Scott was indeed our brother/son and that Ton had attended ND law school, conversation progressed to uncover that both this new member of our group, John, and Tony had been in Vinh Long, Vietnam, in 1969.  Then after much more astonishing discussion about this coincidence, they realized that John's company was moving into the same floor of Tony's building on Central Blvd in Phoenix.  This definition of "it's a small world" blew us away along with the cloudless and windless skies above the Canyon course, a site to be seen by itself.  Yet with this random occurrence happening in the middle of our round together, it was a story to be told as soon as we got off the course.

Any way, this memory of taking Tony back to Vinh Long for the first time since he was there 40 years ago reminded us not only of the incredible time we had with him and my mother there, but of how small of a world it is that we live.  We're grateful of the service they provided, ironically on this Memorial Day weekend, and grateful of the ability we have to relate to the land in which they served so long ago. 

Thought you'd want to hear that story.  We're off to the Grand Canyon tomorrow, then onto the cross-country trip on Tuesday.  Check-in with you soon.

Phase 5 - Malaysia and the Philippines

Here's the video from the final leg of our trip.  Tania did an amazing job putting this together, so we hope you enjoy it!

Music by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Metric

Day 133 Tuesday March 23 Going home ☹

We flew out of Manila through Tokyo and Los Angeles, finally landing in Phoenix 22 hours later.  We ate some good noodles and drank some good beer in Tokyo in the hopes of knocking us out for the long stretch of the trip, but no luck, neither of us slept very much, meaning the jetlag is going to be bad; a decent price to pay for what we did over the last 5 months.

And that's all folks.  We hope you enjoyed following the trip through these blog entries and the videos we made.  Along with this being a trip of a lifetime for us, we realize that a lot of people lived the trip vicariously through us, which was our hope all along.  We hope you learned a few things about that far away region, and we hope you gained an itch to explore more of the world yourselves.  All we can say is that wherever you go and whatever you do will be worth it.  It always is.

Stay curious.  Stay energetic.  Stay passionate.  Stay open-minded.  And most importantly, stay happy.

Thanks to everyone for all of your support.  Now that we're back, we hope to see all of you very soon.

Cheers.

The Palumbos

Day 132 Monday March 22 Manila, Philippines

Not much to report here.  On Sunday, Tony drove us from Punto Fuego, past the Tagaytay volcano (actually a volcano within a volcano - so cool), and back to Manila.  We tried to get massages once back in the city, but there were no available therapists, so we just headed back to their condo for a quiet evening.

Monday was all about prepping to head back to the US on Tuesday morning.  We washed our clothes, packed our bags, bought some last minute gifts, and of course went to get one last massage.  Man we're going to miss being able to get such inexpensive and quality massages on a regular basis, because we know how expensive they are in the US, along with just about every other thing one needs or wants to buy.  Yet this is the exact type of thinking we spend all day stopping ourselves from concentrating on because we knew that if we dwelled on it too much, we really would be depressed when we got home.  Instead, we focused on all of the positive aspects of what going home would offer, including family, friends, comfortable surroundings, and especially for me, Mexican food.

We spent our last night of the trip taking Tony and Annie to a nice Italian dinner inside the Fort Bonifacio Global City.  We were so lucky that Diana organized for us to stay with her parents while we were in the Philippines, because not only did they provide top-notch accomodations, they were such amazing people to spend time with.  They are such amazing people that we will cherish having gotten to know and gotten to share their lives in this amazing country with.  The last few days really were the perfect way to end our trip.  Thank you, thank you, thank you Tony and Annie for everything!

Dinner with Tony and Annie

The last picture of our trip

Days 129-131 Friday-Sunday Punta Fuego, Philippines March 18-21

Let's just get it out of the way...Tania and I are the luckiest people in the world.  We are lucky to have the family and friends that we do, lucky to have had the greatest wedding in the world, lucky to be on this trip, and lucky to have found the perfect love with each other.  We admit this, and could never describe how truly fortunate we feel every day of our lives.

Now that that's out there, we'll tell you about our time in Punto Fuego.

After saying goodbye to the Child Fund team in Taal, Hubert and another team member drove us to Annie's sister's, Jenny's, house at Punta Fuego, which is a private coastal town west of Manila.  Jenny is one of the sweetest women in the world, and her house was equally beautiful.  We spent the weekend lounging by the pool, chatting over meals with her other sister and husband, the Colombos, taking the boat out to remote corners of the area for some swimming in the crystal clear water and snorkeling through the exotic marine life, including some giant clams that were opened to expose a transluscent blue inner shell, and just enjoying this incredible corner of the world with some incredible people.

 Sunset on the golf course above Jenny's house in Punto Fuego.

The view from Jenny's house in Punto Fuego.

We could not have imagined a better way to relax after the week we had in Taal.  And on top of that, we couldn't imagine a better way to wrap-up our 5 month journey through this region.  It gave us a chance to reflect on everything we had seen and done, and to prepare for what was about to come when we return back to the US.  Would we be changed people when we got back?  How much would we miss being on the road, experiencing something new and different every day?  What did we miss the most about the US, and what would we do/see/eat during the first few days back?  These were just some of the things that we pondered in the waning days of our trip.  There were no clear or easy answers to any of them, so we decided to relax and simply enjoy the home, setting, and meals that our immensely gracious and generous hosts were providing for us in Punto Fuego.  We could answer the questions when we got back to the US, or maybe during our 22 hours of travel we had ahead of us on Tuesday morning.

 Captain Tony driving our boat around different snorkeling areas.

Tania with the ladies at dinner.

Thank you Jenny, Annie, Tony, and Colombos.  Your homes and lives in Punto Fuego are amazing, and we appreciate you taking us in like you did more than you know.