Liebster Award

This is like the Oscar for beginner bloggers! How super cool and incredibly encouraging to be nominated only six weeks into blogging. What’s even more fabulous is discovering so many interesting new blogs via Liebster Award responses!!

If you have just been nominated by me, here are the rules:
– Post the award on your blog
– Thank the blogger presenting you with this award and provide a link back to their blog
– Write 11 random facts about yourself
– Pay it forward and find 11 other bloggers with less than 200 followers who you think are deserving of the award and nominate them!
– Finally, the award presenter will ask 11 questions which you need to answer and then you, in turn, ask your nominees 11 questions, and on it goes…

Note: (These are the “rules” but please feel free to do as you wish. If you have 5 bloggers to nominate instead of 11, can only think of 7 random facts about yourself – go for it!)

My thanks goes to:
Polygotfun, a blog I stumbled on thanks to Ottominuti thanks to Lady of the Cakes thanks to her reaching out (you get the picture!). Learning a new language can be tough and yet opens a whole new universe of experience and understanding. I love Polygotfun posts – especially the choice of cartoons and visuals!

Eleven facts about myself:
1. I have traveled to 26 countries, worked in 9, studied in 7, lived in 2 (took my cue from Polygotfun for this one)
2. Family vacations meant travel so have been coast-to-coast in Canada, augmented by many side trips to various US states, including Hawaii
3. Today, I’m a recovering workaholic, humbly perfecting the art of doing nothing until I settle on something worth doing well for many more years to come!
4. Am a complete, utter and unapologetic whiskey snob. Thankfully have good company with a monthly whiskey tasting club here in Mumbai (The Oak League). Celebrated our 3^rd anniversary early this year. 🙂
5. Am super passionate about music of all kinds!  Except, well, country music. Sorry country music lovers – know you are fabulous folks but I just can’t seem to get into it.
6. Apparently when I was 4 years old, pestered my parents mercilessly til they bought me a violin… which only lasted a few years before switching to viola
7. I was born in the year of Woodstock – yes the original festival – and every once and a while my inner hippy child gets out to play
8. I did a commercial when I was 15 (?) for a teenage pregnancy distress hotline. Apparently the pensive punk rock chick look was “in” that year!
9. My great-grandmother was a divorcee – rather risqué for the time! Then happily re-married…
10. I fake being organized and technically adept
11. With time on my hands these days, have become addicted to TV series… Game of Thrones, The Borgias, The Tudors, In Treatment, The L Word, Hell on Wheels… Suggest more series with reasons why you love them and I’ll be searching for details on how to obtain!

My nomiees:
Zhongguo Jumble An American living in China, someone I was lucky enough to meet through work and discover a kindred spirit. She inspired me to start blogging. Thank you!!
Kiwi Gypsy A Kiwi in India – was surprised to find more than one!
Madam, Let me tell you one thing  Recently sent by a friend of a friend of a friend after she started reading my blog. It is both amusing and inspiring!
Fabulous 50s Here’s a gal who clearly embraces life & is living it to the fullest!
50 Year Project Talk about setting goals! “My challenge to visit 192 countries, read 1,001 books, and watch the top 100 movies”
International Sheanniegans Completely irreverent and amusing take on international mischief! Love it!
Dreaming in Arabic South African living in the UAE – enchanting!
An Enchanted Eye Lovely photos!
A 4star life Just check out “driving me crazy”
Lady of the Cakes Her statistics alone are worth checking out!
Ottominuti   Can’t help repeating. It is delightful…

Answers to the questions from Polyglotfun:
1. Have you ever told a joke so bad that you had to explain it, which only resulted in a worse situation? Oh yeah… seriously sad!!
2. What was the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever done in front of someone you were/are attracted to? Puke. Nuff said.
3. Which country will you travel to next? Thailand in two weeks for work. A couple of days home (adopted country India) then on to my country of birth – Canada!
4. Which country will you never go back to? Yugoslavia – only because as a ‘country’ it no longer exists! I loved the time I spent in Slovenia, Serbia, Macedonia, etc. A special part of the world.
5. Do you enjoy being the center of attention? Um.. well… er… where did my spotlight go…?
6. Have you ever experienced a natural disaster? Tornados, floods, earthquakes in more than one country… 
7. Have you thought about becoming a great writer, only to experience writer’s block immediately afterwards? I’m barely scratching the basics of blogging, let alone have delusions of being some ‘great writer!’ Think I’m safe so far…
8. Your favorite city in the entire world? Really tough to choose only one city! I love the pulse of NY, Mumbai and Hong Kong.  However the multicultural mix in Montreal is memorable even years after I left.
9. Sea, land, or sky? Sky… absolutely sky… especially a prairie sky at sunset or the northern lights.
10. How do you motivate yourself when you face something you don’t want to do? After attempting to ignore it completely, engaging in all sorts of procrastination techniques, plunk myself down, break it into several more manageable parts and just do the darn thing! 
11. Do you enjoy tongue twisters? “She sells sea shells by the sea shore…” Argh! I think we can safely say that I do not.

Questions to my nominees:
1. What is the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning?
2. Last music concert – who, what, where and when?
3. Fess up! Food-wise, what is your indulgence or culinary guilty pleasure?
4. What prompts you to blog?
5.  What is the most unexpected or surprising thing to happen to you in the last year?
6. Are you a dog person? Cat person? Neither?
7. Who is the most remarkable person you have ever met?
8. What was the secret fantasy career you dreamed of as a child?
9. All-time favourite film and why?
10. In how many languages can you order beer?
11. Fast forward three decades, what is one thing you want to be most proud of accomplishing?