Welcome! I’m Sarah and you have stumbled across a blog about life in the Foreign Service. My husband is a Foreign Service Officer. We’ve served in Tashkent, Uzbekistan; Belgrade, Serbia; Brussels, Belgium; and are now spending some time in the DC area.
Besides the two of us, our little family includes our daughter and Scarlett, our miniature poodle. We never thought we’d be poodle owners, but when we saw her we fell in love and we’ve been happy ever since. Of Ukrainian descent and born in Tashkent to ethnically Russian owners, she is quintessentially American. We were lucky enough to find her in Uzbekistan and she is now happily settled wherever it is we call home.
Why keep this blog?
When my then-boyfriend joined the Foreign Service and was assigned Tashkent as a first post, we decided to get married and I decided to write a blog to keep friends and family back home updated on our (mis)adventures. It took a while before I actually started this blog, but here it is now!
This means that the aim of keeping a blog has altered and now we would like to keep our friends in/from foreign lands updated as well. I also learned some important things during our first year of marriage, many of which are related to food. As it turns out, I can cook (who knew?!), and I actually enjoy cooking. We like cooking together. Living abroad does present unique challenges when it comes to working in the kitchen: unavailable or strange ingredients, unreliable appliances, and any number of other unknowns. I also tend to alter recipes and then forget what I did, so another reason I am writing this blog is so I can keep track of things.
Maintaining the unique lifestyle that is the Foreign Service is a challenge in and of itself, and I’ve found that reading about others in similar situations can help me see my own more clearly, and I think writing about things myself will only help more. So yes, this blog is here for some selfish reasons, too.
Leaving friends and family to go live in a place most people have never heard of a week after getting married (to each other, for the fourth time… it’s a long story) wasn’t easy but we’ve had a lot of fun and are looking forward to all that is to come.
kitchen cables 
Hi Sarah,
I’m accompanying my FS spouse to FSI and then Belgrade, too…also our second post. We’ll get there May of 2014 with our dog and two babies. We also were an A-100 marriage. 😉
Maybe you and I will be in Serbo-Croatian together at FSI in Sept., 2013!? We are leaving our post in the Dominican Republic in two weeks at the end of June.
Hope to cross paths,
Erika Furey
Hi Erika!
We’re actually already in Belgrade, but it looks like you and I will be overlapping here for a year. We’ve been here for less than three weeks but are loving it, though I don’t know how it will compare to the DR. Let me know if you have any questions over the next year and I’ll do what I can to answer them!
Sarah
Hi Sarah,
I found your details while looking for expats in Uzbekistan! I am looking for expats who have recently moved there to profile on the television show I produce, ‘House Hunters International’. I know that you no longer live there you have lived there but I wonder if you know any other expats who have recently moved to the country or have any suggestion on how to contact expats in Uzbekistan? Or would you be interested in telling your story about moving to Belgrade?
House Hunters International is a half-hour TV show currently airing on the Home and Garden Television Network (HGTV) in America. The series is designed to de-mystify the international house hunting process, by going behind the scenes of a house hunt where expats tour 3 homes. At its core, House Hunters International is a travel show concentrating on the idiosyncrasies of the locales and what makes them special and different.
Here are some examples of the show that you can watch on Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=reYI3L3lC-c – Barcelona from LA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOiump3__Mo – Vienna from California
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tblIVLw0coE – Panama from Pennsylvania
We would love to film a show in Uzbekistan or Serbia – such fascinating places, so please do get in touch if you may know anyone who would be interested in the show.
Best wishes,
Michelle
Michelle James
CASTING PRODUCER LEOPARD FILMS
1-3 St Peter’s Street, London N1 8JD – +44 20 7704 3300
michelle.james@leopardfilms.com
http://www.leopardfilms.com
Sarah,
I came across your blog and would be interested in a few recommendations (hotels, towns, restaurants) from your last adventure..down the Albanian coast as my husband and I are planning to do a similar trip. FYI, my husband and I bought and are in the midst of renovating an apartment in Sarajevo.
Any recommendations are welcome. And..where is your next posting?
Donna
Hi Donna!
I’d be happy to give you some recommendations — please send me an email (my address is under “contact”) and I’ll see what I can do!
We arrived in Brussels, Belgium this past summer and will be here for three years 🙂
Hi Sarah!
What a great blog you have! I’m actually also living in Brussels, and my partner and I are preparing to move to Belgrade for his next posting (he’s a Dutch diplomat) in two months! I hope you’re enjoying it in Brussels, I love this city. My partner and I are in our late twenties with no children. Do you have any tips for where to live in Belgrade? Also, I saw on your pros and cons list that many people speak English there. Of course, I will take language courses, but have been worried about the language barrier as I am unfamiliar with Slovak languages. Any tips you have I would really appreciate! Feel free to email me if you have time. Thank you!