Souvenir

A souvenir (from French, for a remembrance or memory), memento, keepsake or token of remembrance is an object a person acquires for the memories the owner associates with it.

 -Wikipedia

Also known as "kitsch" and "the crap you bring the empty suitcase along for". And yes, I did that on the trip back to the US. I filled my empty suitcase with Amish peanut butter and French's Fried Onions. But my normal go-to souvenir wasn't necessary this last trip....because I don't need visual, physical reminders of home (reminders I have in abundance in my brain. *cue 'awwww')...

See, I collect magnets. Or rather, I attempt to do so of the places I have visited. I have magnets from Durham, Edinburgh, London, Pisa and Venice (bribed Roo to bring them to me), Munich and Whitby. And I'm starting tea towels now. So far: Durham, Whitby, and Kiddo's school. I hungrily eyed the London Underground/2012 Olympics tea towel at Heathrow while waiting for the connecting flight, but in the end... paying nearly $20 for a piece of fabric with the purpose of getting it dirty made almost no sense. The smidgen of sense it did make in my head was screaming at me to "GET IT NOW! WHO KNOWS WHEN YOU'LL BE BACK!!! IT'S THE OLYMPICS!! THEY ONLY HAVE THEM ONCE EVERY TWO YEARS!!!"

So my one concession to obvious kitsch is the magnets. They serve no other purpose than to decorate my fridge. Maybe the tea towels are a weird attempt to rationalize the magnets.

There. A confession. I'm catharticized now. And coming soon, I shall have a new magnet for my fridge...a Parisian magnet. Maybe a tea towel if les Galeries Lafayette has one...but I doubt it because it's the fucking les Galeries Lafayette! 

Yeah. Going to Paris all by myself, mais avec mon ami, Chloe. Je veux acheter beaucoup bon marche bouteilles de vin rouge dans un cafe pres de la Seine.

Here's hoping that Elisabeth Smith can help me with my pronounciation; it's colonial at best. I'm so glad I'm going with a native. I've been told that where I'm staying has a view of the Tower Eiffel. Is that important?


What is your go-to souvenir that you've maybe started/created a mini-collection? Pictures? Snow-globes or T-Shirts? Phone numbers?