........spot the memories......

So, since most of you haven't got the chance to see my room....being that not too many people have come to visit me so far.....I thought I'd share with you the one shelf of stuff that I seem to take everywhere with me no matter where I'm living. It gets added to all the time, and is about the only colour to be found anywhere in my room....so let me take you through some of the pieces (wow this sounds cheesy, which it is....but who cares).

I've got sort of two rules when I get "souvenirs" from places i get either stuff that is just for normal common use in the place i'm visiting (such as bottles or signs..) which will remind me of the life I had somewhere or I get something that I can use later on (like a t-shirt or bracelet) that will remind me of where I've been after i'm gone whenever i wear it.

Probably the oldest thing up there in my list of memories is the mini-"Animal" the rowdy drummer Muppet which was randomly given to me one day by Rob Browne a good friend and ex-youth leader of mine........that's been to Chicago, Cambodia and back with me now to England....

moving on we got probably the next things are the diet coke and pepsi cans....these are going to make me BIG MONEY in the future (REALLY....) as they are still full cans of the dark stuff that went out of date before the turn of the millennium...that's how old they are....i have no reason what first compelled me to keep them back when I was a teenager but for some reason i still have them and well, don't quite want to give them up....

Next we got that familiar sign in the background with Iarnrod Eireann plastered on to it. This was a gift from Aprile Kavanagh....you know you've got a good friend when they'll steal for you.

Next the Egyptian bookmark was a gift from Jessica Hoffmeier who lead a bible study group for some of us students in Chicago. She'd done a degree in Near Eastern studies and was doing a masters in Archaeology (I think but probably wrong) as well. Let's just say that we got seriously in depth and she would spend time translating each passage fresh for us each week....that's commitment.

Directly to the right of the bookmark and under the pepsi bottle you can kind of see what looks like a glass eggcup. This I got at the famous restaurant Ed Debevics in Chicago...a restaurant where the staff are meant to be rude to you (don't ask me why). Anyway apparently this was the "world's smallest Sunday" and it came with a free glass holder. It was the only thing I could afford on the menu so that's what I got. It was from our first "big-sibs" outing to chicago during orientation to Wheaton....such a long time ago.

The silver Jameson flask was a gift from my brother for being in his wedding....hasn't gotten much use, but I'm sure that will change someday.

Next comes a bunch of stuff from my time in Jordan. All the glass bottles are all in arabic and the bracelets would get us some respect and friendly looks when we wore them around Amman.
That's where the money is from too.

There's a couple of other things my "70's" style sunglasses hanging at the back reminding me of California where I got them in a thrift shop.....The card at the side written to me by two friends from different parts of the world who ended up living almost next to each other (Laura Robinson, a friend from Ireland and Megan Hamilton, a friend from Wheaton).

There's the cambodia stuff, the Angkor beer shirt (made into wall hanging...it was a little too big...given to me by friends in Cambodia), the key chain my brother Teara gave to me, and the chopsticks I bought in the market (now inside the Pepsi or should I say "bebsi" bottle).

Then we got lastly but not least my "save the whales belt buckle" that my brother got me for graduation cause I'm "into social justice stuff.." and then the Chinese money envelope that a Chinese student who goes by the name of Daphne gave to me for helping her, carry her bags from the bus stop to her room back in September...I didn't see her again until December when she stopped by to give me my gift...completely unexpected.....

So there you have it (if you've lasted...this has been one of my more boring posts), most of my life fits onto a shelf.....crazy stuff...