Double Journey

I recently read an article describing the cost of a wedding and the impact it can have on your finances for the rest of your life.   It made me extremely glad that I had my wedding the way I did because it ended up being a lot more fun, much more memorable, and , believe it or not, much cheaper.   Don’t believe me?  I’ve decided to lay bare exactly what I spent on the wedding just to demonstrate how one can save money by doing a destination wedding.   I didn’t spend anywhere close to the average of $20,000 that the typical wedding costs today.A little bit of background.  My wife and I went to Capri, Italy to get married.  We wanted to go to Europe for the honeymoon and we wanted to get married with a beautiful view of the ocean.  Capri provided both of those.  We sent out about thirty invitations and we ended up with thirteen guest (two guest dropped at the last minute).  We only sent invitations to people we really wanted to go but even if we sent out much more I do not think our attendance would have been much higher than it was.  We spent a total of fifteen days in Europe.  We paid for our own wedding and honeymoon, neither of us asked for help from our parents.Here is a list of typical wedding costs

• Cost of the venue
• Ceremony officiant
• Flowers
• Cake
• Reception
• Wedding Attire (dress, tuxedo rental, etc)
• Entertainment (DJ or band)
• Photographer

This does not include all the little things that people end up paying for in a wedding like various gifts and decorations so cost can end up being much more than would appear on this list.  So how much did I actually spend on the wedding?  My official number is $3885.  This includes

• Photographer - $1600
• Reception Dinner - $1700
• Flowers - $45
• Driver - $225
• Her Dress - $180
• Her Shoes - $70
• Wedding Invitations - $45
• Various snacks for guests - $20

I did not however include some other cost that might normally be associated with the cost of the wedding.  Most of these things are not specific to the wedding itself.  Things like my suit and shoes, (which I have used for other things) and our hotel room (which we would have spent anyway since we would have to pay for it anyway on our honeymoon).  However, I will list these items just in case people want a full comparison.

• Flight to Italy - $1500
• My suit and shoes - $700
• Hotel Room - $925

So that at the outside put the total cost of my wedding at $7010.  That’s it.  Things I did not spend any money on included

• Venue - Hotel let us use their balcony, and it’s amazing view, for free
• Officiant - It was hard to coordinate an officiant in Italy so one of our guests volunteered to do the ceremony
• Cake - Didn’t have one
• Entertainment - Didn’t have a huge reception so didn’t have to provide entertainment

Despite “doing without” on some of these things, I have to say it was one of the best weddings I ever went to (I am admittedly biased).  The food was amazing.  We went to the best restaurant on the island and it was better than any Wedding food I had ever had.  Heck, it was better than any food I have had period.  The venue was breathtaking, see the picture above.  I honestly could not have had a better time at my own wedding.  I often hear people talk about how they just never get enough time to talk to their guests.  That definitely did not happen to me as I felt I had ample time to talk to each and everyone of my guests.  I did not waste any money on things that just did not make the wedding more memorable or directly added value to myself or my guests.To sum up.  Had a great wedding.  Didn’t spend a lot for it.  Couldn’t ask for anything more.Don’t mortgage your future for one day.

This week, I got an iPhone 3Gs.  I actually got it through work, they replaced my Blackjack.  Although I have never felt compelled to get an Iphone, I was still interested in what all the hype was.   The people I know who have one swear by them.  My wife always jokes how I’m addicted to the internet and so the thought of having a device like the iPhone at my fingertips was appealing to me.  It probably was not as appealing to my wife.

A few days in and I have to say that I have mixed feelings.  It definitely is a great device.  It is easy to use and extremely useful.  the App Store is fantastic and you really can find an App that does pretty much whatever you want.   I’ve mostly used it to keep up to date on my e-mail and to do things like check the traffic or sports scores.  I could do the same thing with the Blackjack but it is easier to do with the iPhone as there are built in apps to go and get that data.

But I’m struggling with the iPhone on several fronts.  The  biggest problems I have come across

• The battery life is just poor.  If I don’t charge it overnight, the thing will be dead by the next morning
• The network is slow.  Probably more a problem with AT&T but it is still kind of annoying
• I hate that it doesn’t multi-task.
• Typing things in is a pain in the ass.  I am constantly typing things wrong.  This thing needs a real keyboard.
• I can’t tether it to my laptop without jumping through some hoops
• The e-mail client my work uses is actually better on the Blackjack.  On the iPhone it doesn’t automatically download new messages.

I think Apple hit their target market.  It is a great consumer device.  It is just a bad device for work.  I’m probably happier with this device than the Blackjack but only because it makes my personal life a little better.  Ironically, my wife, who probably won’t like me being glued to it while we are out, is now hooked on one of the iPhone games.  She is literally playing it right now and completely ignoring me.

On a similar note, is it just me or is the iPad kind of a disappointment?  Seriously, what problem is this trying to solve?

I decided to open up an account with Charles Schwab.  After getting married, my wife and I needed to setup a joint account.  We have split our finances for a while now, and marriage has not changed that, but we wanted the convenience of having one joint account.

Setting up the account has not been the best experience.  For whatever reason, Schwab seems to not have come into the 21st century.  It was possible to setup a brokerage account online but it was not possible to set up a checking account online.  This required that I physically print out an application.  I thought I would be able to walk it into a Schwab branch and open an account right away.  There was a branch just down the street so this is what I decided to do.  However, all that did for me was save me some postage.  I guess the branch couldn’t setup the bank account either, so they mailed my application to some central location.   They told me they would call me that day to tell me the brokerage account was opened.

No call came that day.  They cashed the check that I used to fund the account and yet still no call.  I called to check what had happened and was told that the account was opened and someone must have just forgotten to call.  OK, no problem.  The next step was to wait for the information on my bank account.  I waited and waited.  I waited two and a half weeks and heard nothing.  So I called again.  It turns out that the person who entered the information failed to enter the apartment number.  So my checks and my bank card seemed to be lost in the mail.  I was told to wait a few more days and it should show up.  The checks did eventually make their way to me, but no card.  I had no means to use an ATM and withdraw any money.

After a few more days, my wife called in.  The first person I spoke to did not seem to fix the missing apartment information.  Customer Support said they fixed the information and the cards would be coming.  A few days passed and my wife’s new card did indeed come.  My card did not.  So she called again.  It turns out that for whatever reason, my information was not updated until later and a new card was not sent out at the same time.

So here I am.  It is the end of January and it has been over one month since I started this process.  I still have no bank card from Schwab.  On the plus side, the customer support, in terms of wait time, has been pretty good.  Each time I call, I get connected to a human right away.  But I am disappointed by the fact that I have had to call so many times to find out how good the response time is.  I have not used their services too much as of yet, I’ve bought no stock through the brokerage account as of yet, because I don’t want to move money into the account until I have full access to it, so I can’t say too much about the other features of the account.

One last annoying thing.  Setting up money transfers is a real pain in the ass.  Once again, Schwab has not come into the 21st century.  The only way I’ve been able to fund the account is to “push” the money there.  That is, i go to my other online accounts and setup a transfer from them to Schwab.  Schwab makes it VERY difficult to “pull” money from other institutions.  It is impossible to do this online.

So given all my problems, I can’t strongly recommend Schwab.  I really like their customer service but that’s about it.  I don’t think any of this will cause me to close my account, but I’m somewhat disappointed that things just haven’t been smoother.

I’ve been quiet over the last several weeks.  I’ve been wanting to blog but with the holidays I have found it difficult to sit down and focus on what to write.  I really haven’t had anything meaningful to say either.

The holiday’s came and went.  It was a rather quiet holiday.  I did not have to do too much shopping and work was rather subdued since most of the staff was out.  I try to make some headway with my reviews but somehow found a way to not get very far on those.

That is my challenge for the upcoming week.  I have to get through my employees reviews.  I once again find myself doing way more reviews than I want.  I think it is important to do a good job with them, so I’ll get them done right, but I often just wish I could wave a wand and have them done.  The tool my work is using even has something similar to this but I feel it is a cheap way out so I refuse to use it.

I have been EXTREMELY quiet when it comes to my trading activity.  I really just don’t know where this rally came from and now have no desire to get in at these levels.  I’ve waited for the pull back that never came and it looks like i missed out on some really great gains.  Lesson learned but no need to compound my mistake by doing something foolish now.  I’m looking carefully where to invest.  I recently opened up a new brokerage account, separate than my other one, so that my wife and I could invest together.  I opened it up at Schwab, so now I have accounts at most of the major brokerage houses.  I’ll give a review of them shortly.

So I’m back.  Hopefully I won’t take a hiatus as long as this one again.

I recently got a message from this blog asking me if, two years later, I thought it was worth it to move back to California.

Before I get into this, I have to say it did not really occur to me that I have been back in California for two years until I got this e-mail.  I knew the two year anniversary of my job was coming up but it did not really sink in how long it has been until I got the message.  The past two years have been such a blur and it seems hard to believe I have been at this job longer than I was at Microsoft.  Maybe that says more about the job I have now compared to the one I had before.

Now on to the question.  Was it worth it to move back to California from Washington?  Ironically I answer this question the same day that it was pouring rain in Los Angeles.  But this makes my answer to this all the more certain.  Yes, it was absolutely to move back to California from Washington.

I was thinking about this as I rode the elevator to work.  I am in a very high skyscraper and the elevator has a television in it that I find myself catching news clips as I enter and leave the building.  On the ride down today, the news had “Storm Watch” flashing on the screen.  Now, after living in Washington for two years, I can tell you.  The rain wasn’t all that severe.  It came down hard, but it would be a pretty normal day in Seattle.  The reason this made me think of how good I have it is because weather like this is so unusual we make a big deal about it here.  This is the first time it has rained in the last several months.  Think about that for a second.  It is December and it probably hasn’t rained of any significance in several months.   I actually can’t even remember the last time it rained. You can’t buy weather like that.

Of course, that is not the only reason I am glad to move back to California (but it is a big part).  I’m happier with my job and I am glad to be around family and friends.  My wife is happier (weather affects her more than it does me) so that makes my life better.  So if I had to do it all over again, I would do it in a heartbeat.

But I caution anybody from taking my experience and translating it to your own.  My situation is unique in many ways.  First off, I grew up here.  The culture and lifestyle just really work for me since I grew up here.  Moreover, I have a base of friends and family here.  Moving out here, not knowing anyone, can be really difficult. I find it easy to make and meet new friends but this is not true for everyone and California can be a lonely place if you don’t have any friends or family.  But perhaps the biggest deterrent to moving out here has to be the money.  Can you make it work?  Moving to California with no money is not an easy tasks.  It is not easy even if you have money.  Housing is expensive and taxes will take whatever you have left.

My situation is likely not the same as yours.  I make very good money and I live very frugally.  While I certainly “miss” the money that California extracts from me, I probably will not miss it as much as those who live paycheck to paycheck.   The cost of living does not affect me nearly as much as it would other people.  And make no mistake about it, California has a high cost of living.  You combine that with our high unemployment rate and (still) high housing prices, and it can be a daunting financial burden.  This has gotten so bad, I have written how I think the California Dream is vanishing for many, even myself.

So while I have no regrets about moving back here this is not to say I won’t once again leave.  High taxes and high housing is driving me away, I’m sure it will drive others as well.  In fact, I had such a conversation with someone about this on Saturday.  But I’ll write about that in my next blog.

On the first night in Italy, we slept.  I think we slept a total of 12 hours.  Liz was getting over some sort of bug and we were tired from the long journey.  Because we went to bed really early it did not prevent us from getting up bright and early the next day.  This is something we have tried to do consistently throughout the trip because I wanted to take as many pictures as possible and the best time to take landscape pictures is first thing in the morning. Unfortunately for me, the day ended up being pretty cloudy in the morning, but I made do with what I had.

One of the odd things about Southern Italy in general is the preponderance of dogs just walking the street.  I am not sure if Italy just does not have the same amount of animal control as the States do but the loose dogs on the street was quite noticeable.

The golden dog pictured above became our guide in Sorrento.  He seemed determined to show us the sites and followed us wherever we were going.  It was early, and the streets were empty (another advantage of taking pictures really early in the morning) so he probably had nothing better to do.  He eventually guided us down to the coast where I was able to get some good pictures of Sorrento early in the morning.

After the hard day of traveling the day before, it was very serene to be on the Sorrento Coast with nobody else around.  After walking around the city in the early morning, our next stop was to make it to Pompeii and see the ruins.   This was supposedly a short train ride from the Sorrento Train station but like most things in Italy, my wife and I found a way to make it difficult.

On the train, called the Circumvesuviana, has two stops marked for Pompeii, Pompeii and Pompeii Scavi. For those who do not know anything, Pompeii seems to be the right one. But for those who know Itallian, Scavi means “dig”. So Pompeii Scavi is the right stop if you wish to go see the ruins of Pompeii. It is also the easier stop to get to as there is no transfer while there is a transfer of trains to get to Pompeii.

My wife and I were in the last train car and were confused about which one to get off on. We guessed “Pompeii” and as it turns out we were wrong. Only one person in our car got up to exit the train at the Pompeii Scavi stop so we figured we were OK. But when the doors closed we saw a throng of (excuse me for being racist here) white tourists who had exited the train and heading toward the site. We quickly looked up “scavi” in our dictionary to find out what it means and quickly determined we had missed our stop. To compound the situation, the train heading in the direction back passed us on the way to the next stop meaning we had to wait even longer for it. When we got off on the next station it was clear we had made a mistake. We were the only ones to get off the train, clearly not something that would have happened at a major tourist site. On the bright side, my wife and I will always remember that “scavi” is the Italian word for dig.

When we finally made it to Pompeii Scavi, the ruins were right outside of the small train station. The site is huge. It is hard to imagine a whole city like that being buried by a Volcano only to be dug up later by a bunch of archaeologists.

While I think it was an interesting place to go I think I was somewhat disappointed by the whole thing.  For me, the ruins start to blend into each other after a while.  One pile of rubble starts to look like the next pile of rubble.  What was even more disappointing was that all the best places to go were restricted to tourists by gates.  Below is a picture of a typical experience for us.

It is probably safe to say that a third of the places listed on the audio guide were closed off to the public.  It is probably equally safe to say that all of the best and most interesting places were gated off.  It became increasingly frustrating that the audio guide would tell you to walk through a doorway and see a beautiful fresco painting only to be met by a locked gate.  Even worse when you could not walk into the site in the first place.   Since there were so many places that were closed, we were able to walk around the whole of the Pompeii site in a matter of about three or four hours.   Our luck being what it was with the trains, we saw the train back to Sorrento pull out in front of us so had to wait for the next one.

That night, we went to another out of the way restaurant.  I had the calzone, she had the spaghetti with clams.  They were both excellent.  It was seriously the best calzone I had ever had.  The crust of the calzone was excellent and the cheese was just superb.  We were also given some of the local champagne, prosecco which ended up being pretty tasty.  Thus far we were pretty impressed with the food we had been served in Italy.  And this was only the beginning of the trip.

We decided to get to Italy a few days before the wedding to set some things ups.  We wanted to check out the hotel, find a place for the reception, get a bouquet, and settle a little bit before the wedding.  Our original plan was to spend the night in the city we landed in, Naples, and eventually make it to where we got married, Capri.

After doing some research and reading we decided against that plan.  Everything we read about Naples was umm … interesting.  All the guidebooks warned tourists that Naples could be dangerous.  They made it sound as if thieves were around every corner and the mafia was just waiting to shoot you in the street.  So we passed on Naples and went to the other town with an easy ferry to Capri, Sorrento.

We booked through Expedia a small little hotel called Hotel Sorrento City.  Picture below.

As it turns out, it was a great location, right on the main drag in Sorrento.   One of the disadvantages of taking a long trip is that you spend a lot of money on lodging simply because you have so many nights to account for.  My wife and I have decided to stay at relatively modest hotels to save some money and because we are not really fancy people anyway.  We only require a safe location, clean room, modest bed, and a nice hot shower.  Most other problems we can deal with.

Hotel Sorrento City satisfied these conditions so it was adequate.   But it was not more than that.  The room was definitely small but not that small when you compare it to the European standard.  It was somewhat odd that there were built in pull down beds on the side of the wall but I guess that could be convenient for some.  I wish there was free internet access but there wasn’t.  I wish there was wi-fi but there wasn’t.  Just a small little pay station in the lobby.  The breakfast that was provided was pretty good though.  My wife really liked the coffee out of the coffee machine but she has liked all the coffee that we have had since coming to Italy.

Sorrento itself was a very nice city.  Our very first stop was to the center square to catch a bite to eat.  Right in the middle of the main square was a place called Fauno Bar.

It seemed to be a typical Italian outdoor cafe but bigger.  There were lots of people there, and that is usually a sign of an OK place to go, so we asked for a table.   I had the cannelloni, my wife had the gnocci.  It was seriously some of the best Italian food we had up until that point.  The pasta was clearly fresh and the cheese was very tasty.  Part of it was that I was pretty hungry by this point but the other part of it was that Italian food is just better in Italy.  Go figure.

One of the odd things we noticed while we were eating was that we were THE ONLY people who ordered food.  I’m going to write more on this later but it seems that Italians eat really really late.  Dinner doesn’t start until 7:30, and in some places 8:30.   After dinner we were wiped out from the trip so we went back to the hotel and just fell asleep.  That concluded our first day.

OK, I’m finally back blogging.  I’m still in Italy but I finally have some time to sit down and blog a little bit.  My intention was to blog along the way but there was a little hiccup with that plan.  Internet access has been spotty and I was way busier with wedding stuff than I thought I would be.  I’m going to try and catch up in the next few days but we will see.  I have a week left to go in my vacation and the second half is probably as jammed packed as the first.

Getting to Italy was an adventure by itself.  We had booked a flight to Naples Italy with stops in Seattle and in Paris.  The stop in Seattle was fortuitous because I got to visit Rick and make a stop at one of my old favorites Sushi Land.  Great to see Rick, not so great to go to Sushi Land.  Maybe I’ve been away too long or maybe something has really changed, but it just wasn’t like I remembered it.  The pieces were smaller and the fish not as fresh.  Oh well.  After stuffing myself with fish and saying goodbye to Rick, we were on our way to Paris.  It was a lovely twelve hour flight.  I slept some and then watched The Hangover on the plane.  I’m usually not a fan of these types of movie but perhaps my low expectations and my being trapped on a plane with no choices made it entertaining. 

After departing this flight, this is where the fun really began.  All I have to say is the Paris airport probably needs to be rethought.  I had two hours to get to my connecting flight.  I barely made it.  First, I had to walk what seemed like an eternity to Passport Control.  I walked so long I seriously thought they were going to make me walk the rest of the way to Italy.  After getting through Passport Control, I had to walk again through security.  This was very odd to me.  Security in Paris was odd.  They asked for our passports (not odd) but then made me empty out my camera bag.  Then they stopped my (then) fiancee and checked all her stuff again.  Then they asked for her passport again.  So now she has had her passport asked for three different times. 

By this time, we are cutting it pretty close to the time.  But my fiancee is extremely hungry and thirsty so she needs to stop for some food and water.  As we approach the gate she stops at a small cafe.  I can see our plane boarding and I’m worried because we have quite a bit of carry on and I want to be sure I can get a spot.  She gets her food and water and we rush to the plane only to be once again be asked for our passport!  This is now four times since coming into Paris that she has had to produce her passport.

When we finally reach Italy we land in an airport where there they make you exit onto the runway before reaching the terminal.  Just outside is a bus waiting to take us to the terminal.  So we board the bus and, I’m not exaggerating, the bus drives 20 yards to the terminal.  It was kind of crazy.  We wait for our bags, which comes really fast, and then look for some sort of official looking person to either ask us about our bags or to check our passports.  Neither happens.  When you compare that to the Paris experience you can see why we were quite confused.

At this point, my fiancee is pretty ill and is in no mood to get on a bus for an hour.  So we sit in the Naples airport with all of our stuff for about two hours until she feels well enough to get on the bus.   She is not getting much better but time is running out for us to get to where we need so she muscles up some courage and we get on the bus run by CURRERI Viaggi .  It is a private company who specializes in making the trip between Sorrento and Naples.  However, hen we get to the bus, the driver tells us he can not take us all the way to Sorrento, he can only take us part of the way.  There is some stupid bike event or something blocking all the roads to Sorrento.  Seriously, they stop all the traffic going into a city for one stupid event?  What am I getting myself into?  Looking back, I kind of doubt they did; I think the bus driver was just being lazy and not wanting to drive us the whole way (we were the only people on the bus). 

The driver drops us off at a train station, the Circumvesuviana, close to Sorrento but still a 15 minute ride.  Here we are, tired and weary from our long drop, and still needing to slog through the local train to get where we need to be.  To make matters worse, we have no idea where the hotel is as soon as we get there.  It could be on the other side of town for all we know.  When we finally arrive Sorrento much to our delight, the hotel is just minutes away from the station.  We were REALLY lucky because most of the hotels are not that close.  Most of them are quite far away.  We get to our hotel room, which is quite small but typical of European hotels, and just finally relax.  We shower and then go get a quick bite to eat in town (the above picture is of the main Sorrento square).  More of Sorrento in the next post. 

All of this reminded me of why I really hate to travel sometimes.  It wears on you.  Things are never as easy as they should be and you are usually not as comfortable as you are at home.  This is magnified when you are in a foreign country where you don’t really speak the language.  All in all, it was an ordeal to get to Italy (and every time we have had to move) but so far, a great trip.  More on that in the next post. 

It’s been about a dozen days since my last post.  In the two years since I’ve started this blog I’ve probably never gone more than 4 or 5 days without a post.   I try to stay pretty consistent, even if it is only a quick post, but I just haven’t been able to lately because I’ve been too busy.

You see, I’m getting married in a week.  To make matters worse, I’ve been in the middle of finalizing a huge platform change for my company.   This has left little time for anything other than work and planning for my 2.5 week trip to Italy.  Since I’ll be gone for several weeks, and I will not be following current events or work,  the topic of my posts will be quite different.  So instead, for the next several weeks, I plan on blogging about my wedding and my trip.   Hopefully I will have some good pictures and some good experiences to share with everybody here.  So if you are interested in my travels, stay tuned.  Otherwise, see you all back here in about 3 weeks.

I am trying to plan out my vacation to Italy.  One of the hard parts about the trip is that we want to go from Southern Italy to Northern Italy.  Taking a train could take several hours and sitting in a train is not my idea of a fun vacation.  So we decided to look online to see if there were any cheap flights from Naples to Italy.  I figured there might be some sort of deal like Southwest Airlines which offers really cheap flights within California.

So I went to Expedia to search for a deal.  I was not really expecting anything really cheap but figured it was at least worth a search.  What I found I still can’t quite believe.  I bought two tickets from Naples to Italy for $67.  That is not $67 each.  That is $67 TOTAL.  What seems even odder is that the taxes and fees for the flight are $65.  That means the tickets were $1 each!  The tickets are from what seem to be a reputable airline, Meridiana, so I’m at a loss to understand how a flight can be so cheap.  To compare, every other flight listed on Expedia with other carriers were for $330 each.

So what do you think?  Am I going to show up at the airport only to fly I’m going to fly in the luggage compartment?