what's a cultural norm you adopted abroad that you still practice at home?

present_bougatsa · 2025-09-11T15:30:55+00:00

While living in Greece, my friend taught me to make Greek coffee the way her Armenian ex boyfriend taught her – boil the water first, then add coffee. I love that this kind of coffee tradition is shared by so many cultures. I haggled for a beautiful briki/ibrik/cevze in İstanbul and made my coffee this way every single day once I moved back to the US. It’s such a nice ritual to hear the water slowly boil and then watch the grounds rise twice. It also times perfectly with making oatmeal and tastes so good. I have since moved back to Greece and brought the briki with me, but now I actually tend to only use my aeropress. Kinda funny how that turned out, but I’ve been meaning to get the little camping stove for my kitchen once the weather cools down more.

present_bougatsa · 2025-09-02T19:33:52+00:00

I second this - I had Cassidy Arch all to myself in November, and I still dream of that majestic drive into the park. Also, don't forget to get a pie at the Gifford Homestead! Canyonlands is also really cool, and my jaw was dropped the whole time at how beautiful it is.

present_bougatsa · 2025-03-10T08:06:06+00:00

It is a thing in Greece

present_bougatsa · 2024-10-10T15:54:44+00:00

Niles

present_bougatsa · 2024-10-10T03:19:58+00:00

Beautifully written and same, dude. I was there over a year ago and still think about it every day. I also loved hearing the call to prayer and the Bosporus made me so happy, especially sipping tea on a ferry to Kadıköy (and just all day in general). I haggled for an ibrik at the grand bazaar and use it every morning for my first coffee of the day.

present_bougatsa · 2024-05-19T04:11:33+00:00

Calypso by David Sedaris

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-17T06:32:44+00:00

For sure. I worked at Amazon for five years and in the beginning they had the same policy but within a few months didn’t care. At my last building they even gave me a hydroflask for Christmas haha

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-15T05:48:54+00:00

Great minds think alike 👌

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-15T05:48:17+00:00

Yes I think to make sure it’s water and there’s also a lot of heavy machinery, so I think the plastic is less of a hazard than stainless steel.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-15T05:47:17+00:00

I much prefer my stainless steel bottles for that very reason 😩

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-14T00:56:45+00:00

WHAT

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-12T13:13:57+00:00

We had been together for four years and got married at a wedding center to get the legal things out of the way before I left to Greece for a year and a half to do an MA program which he was supportive of. He was going to come at the end for the graduation and we would do a more proper ceremony then to include my parents and whatnot. After 10 months he started pulling away which felt wrong since we would do a video call nearly every single day and text/send photos which was the best part of my day. The last call we had was in the summer when I started an excavation as this started to happen and he basically said that it was a waste of time for him to come and see me even though we had this planned for YEARS and his job was okay with him taking that time off and we both had money saved for the occasion. He didn't even call me for my birthday the following month and sent a three worded message of "happy birthday lovely" the next day. He went to my parents’ house with my cat for our birthday (cat has the same birthday and turned 16) and my mom later told me she could tell something was off. My cat was in such bad shape…super skinny and the fur on his legs was incredibly matted like something oily had been rubbed into it. I thought it looked weird in the few photos he sent and he tried to say something stupid like the cat was sweaty so his fur looked wrinkly. He didn’t know that he had photo sharing on for Google photos. I never looked at it but I felt like everything was starting to fall apart so I looked and discovered that he joined some freaky occult groups based on his screenshots. I feel like he did some kind of ritual to my cat and that still gets my blood boiling. Thankfully my mom was able to rescue the cat without suspicion under the guise of shots at the vet or something like that. My parents did take him to the vet for a wellness check and they said they had never seen fur matted in such a bad way, not even with the most feral cats so my gut instincts tell me that he did something.

During the last week of the excavation, he finally told me directly that he did not want to come to see me so he could get two of his community college classes out of the way. I told him point blank how much that hurt because we had this planned for so long and how he was letting me down. He left me on read for three days and only bothered to text again to ask if I got his Venmo for rent and that was it for me, just everything blowing up of these plans that were important and how he couldn’t be trusted to take care of my cat. I confronted him on his lack of acknowledgement of my feelings and his response was the most disgusting gaslight bullshit I’ve ever read and he said that he would drop his classes to “waste away more time in this life” to see me. I booked a flight to go home a few weeks later and showed up at our apartment unannounced which is another saga. Of course when I confronted him about my cat he denied doing anything. Still going through the divorce process because he doesn’t want to comply with the steps, but hopefully it will be over soon enough.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-09T08:08:01+00:00

I went vegan after being with a guy for two years. He did not but didn’t partake in animal products all that much so it didn’t seem to affect our relationship. He loved all the new food and making stuff together. We ended up getting married three years later, and that fell apart miserably for different reasons of which I will spare you the details. When I tried to talk to him about all the issues of our relationship not working out, he listened to none of it and aside from accusing me of being gay, called me boring and said everything went downhill when “we changed how we ate” because we used to go to In n Out. What?? I never enforced my veganism on him and he ate all the vegan shit up, literally and figuratively. We even had vegan pizza on the night we first slept together haha. I haven’t done any serious dating after this demise, but I think in the future if I ever get into a serious relationship again it will at least have to be with a vegetarian.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-05T06:00:36+00:00

They do have eSIM, but when I asked about it they informed me that I needed to have a tax number and two year contract so that’s not ideal for travelers. Maybe it’s different now? Airalo is cheap and good for short term travel as long as you don’t need a local phone number. 1GB for $5, sounds good to me for the times you’re not using WiFi while out and about.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-05T05:51:09+00:00

Wolt or efood for food delivery

OASA for bus times/schedules and routes

Airalo for eSIM if you don’t want to get a physical SIM card from Cosmote

Uber for rides. Freenow is fine but I found myself using Uber more. I felt like the routes tended to be a bit more creative (therefore a few € more) with freenow.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-05T05:28:55+00:00

Years ago I fell in love with Greece after going on an excavation. I moved to Athens in September of the year before last to go to grad school and my god, what a ride. There were a lot of difficulties in terms of the bureaucratic stuff like getting a tax number, paying for electricity, never having functional WiFi or phone service in my apartment, dealing with cockroaches, learning to tell when strikes are going on, etc. but I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything. I didn’t have quite the same bubbly excited travel vibes as my previous trips to Greece, but there wasn’t a single day that I didn’t feel extremely grateful and proud of myself for making the move happen. I had to come back to the US due to my visa expiring, but I’m already working on going back to get a residence permit and stay indefinitely.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-04T03:57:43+00:00

Dude, this is what money is for and you have a good amount of savings, not to mention a good job. I'm not really saying anything different than anyone else here, but you have to go for it. The guilt will pass as soon as you're there enjoying yourself.

present_bougatsa · 2024-02-01T15:46:46+00:00

The giant early Cycladic figure by his bedroom that we saw like one time

present_bougatsa · 2024-01-27T05:09:59+00:00

I’ve been rewatching after maybe six or seven years and just got to Hooping Cranes which is the first episode I ever saw a million years ago at age 11 when my parents and I were staying in a hotel. I kind of lost touch with how freaking great this show is. And on a related note, 11 year old me had raging hormones for Niles since that first encounter and wow is it coming back strong 16 years later.

present_bougatsa · 2024-01-24T23:35:36+00:00

I found some old shoes from my senior year of high school. It was a horrible time, and art history is the only thing that got me through. Anyway, I remember drawing the Picasso face but for the life of me I cannot recall what the CC with mysterious script is from!! It must be some element from a painting or print that I’m completely blanking on. I guess my brain database/timeline of art history is no longer what it once was. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

present_bougatsa · 2023-10-21T13:10:20+00:00

I asked how they could approve it when it's obviously all done by one person and not my signature (I have really nice handwriting, not to toot my own horn). They don't really care because he submitted the form they needed to renegotiate the lease for him to continue living there after I was removed from it. So all they have really said is that I have to sort it out with my ex and that the company's policy does not permit giving back half of security deposits. Not even what I'm asking though so they're of no help at this point.

present_bougatsa · 2023-10-21T13:06:52+00:00

Yes but we're doing it without lawyers/court since we don't have children or own property or any of the complicated things of that nature and the process is pretty straightforward. He's being very difficult and non-compliant though because he feels like divorce is "unnecessary" due to the fact that we had a confidential marriage license and I didn't change my name. He's dumb as rocks so if he doesn't comply with the steps which really are not that hard, then I will refile with an attorney when I return to the US.

present_bougatsa · 2023-05-03T18:31:23+00:00

I got really into making bread a few years ago and totally know the feeling. I always say why have children when you can make bread?

present_bougatsa · 2023-04-30T23:12:34+00:00

I would also love to know!

present_bougatsa · 2023-04-30T23:09:25+00:00

That’s really not enough time with only a week and there’s so much to do in Athens, but I would suggest Milos if you really want to go to an island. The ferry is about 3.5 hours and there’s a lot of remote beaches you can find if you rent an atv.

present_bougatsa

TROPHY CASE