The Bittersweet Life

Latest Episodes:

Bittersweet Moment #147: A Tribute to Doug Mar 24, 2022

Show notes

Veteran KUOW sound engineer and long-time colleague of Katy, Doug Patterson passed away this month. Much of the work that Katy created over her public radio career was made possible by Doug's technical abilities. She was asked to create an audio obituary for him, a project she accepted with a trepidation, considering her long professional relationship with him. In doing so, she got to know her former colleague on a deeper, more personal, level. Here's the result.

Find the original KUOW story here.

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NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Episode 420: Live Show: Objects to Love, Objects to Loathe Mar 21, 2022

Show notes

Ever had a souvenir that you' grew to hate? Something that you'd love to get rid of, but can't bear to because you carried it across the world?

Or what about the things you wish you had bought, but didn't? Objects that—whether because they were too expensive, too impractical, or simply too hard to get home—you failed to buy and have always regretted it?

For this conversation about the souvenirs we love, loathe, and left behind, we invited our regular Patreon and PayPal supporters to a live episode via Zoom—and some of them contributed to the conversation!

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Bittersweet Moment #146: Mailbag: Expat Friendships Mar 17, 2022

Show notes

We had so many listeners send us feedback about Monday's episode on the challenges of maintain long-term friendships when you live abroad for a significant amount of time, so we decided to share a few on this mini-episode.

Make sure you listen to Monday's episode first, then tune in to hear what a few of our listeners had to add to the conversation, including a bit of advice from an expat who has been keeping a long-distance friendship alive for almost three decades.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Episode 419: The Friend, the Bread, and the Knife Mar 14, 2022

Show notes

When you're a longtime expat, do your friends back home move on?

Expats often make friends with other expats in their adopted country. That can be great, but it also means that it's very likely that your new friends will, sooner or later, move away and you'll be back to square one. It's typical, therefore, for expats to consider their friends back home as their "real friends." But do those same friends feel the same way about them?

While an expat may consider their childhood friends as their closest friends, they have likely moved on.

Today we talk about this and other topics facing long-distance friends.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Bittersweet Life #145: Greetings from Casablanca Mar 10, 2022

Show notes

If you like podcasts (and we assume you do if you're listening to this one), you know how powerful the human voice can be.

While we love getting letters and emails from our listeners—and we often read them on the show—there's something even more special about getting a voice message. Today we share one we recently received from a new mom and expat living in Casablanca, Morocco, telling us a bit about her life and why our show resonates with her.

We'd love to hear from you too! Record a message on your voice memo app, and email it to us at bittersweetlifepodcast@gmail.com.

Hear more from our wonderful listeners around the world on Ep 309 A Day in the Life under Quarantine, Part 1, Ep 310 A Day in the Life under Quarantine, Part 2, and Ep 369 A Day in the Life: One Year Later.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Episode 418: Black Cake (with Charmaine Wilkerson) Mar 07, 2022

Show notes

Formerly close but now estranged siblings, two girls with a passion for swimming in the sea, a death that reveals long hidden secrets, a voice message from beyond the grave, and a tradtional Caribbean cake that ties it all together.

These are the ingredients for Black Cake, the bestselling new novel by Charmaine Wilkerson, who joins us on the show today.

In this fascinating author interview, we talk about family, memory, identity, loss, secrets, and so much more. Wilkerson reveals her own path to becoming an author, as well as a bit about her writing process, and some words of advice for aspiring authors,

Order Black Cake on Amazon, Abe Books, Book Depository, or pick it up at your favorite bookshop.

Find Charmaine Wilkerson on Instagtram, Twitter, or at her wesbite.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Bittersweet Moment #144: Free Art in Rome's Churches: Mosaics Mar 03, 2022

Show notes

Love medieval mosaics? Then you're in luck as Tiffany continues her Free Art in Rome's Churches series with a mini-episode all about mosaics— which Roman churches they call home.

From the Paleochristian mosaics at Santa Costanza to the innovative late-medieval mosaics by Pietro Cavallini in Santa Maria in Trastevere, follow Tiffany on a tour of these glimmering glories of the Middle Ages in Rome.

Don't miss Bittersweet Moment #142: Free Art in Rome's Churches: Statues and Bittersweet Moment #139: Free Art in Rome's Churches: Paintings.

Want to take a tour of Rome with Tiffany as your guide? Find out more here.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Episode 417: Patriotism for Expats Feb 28, 2022

Show notes

How long do you have to live outside your own country before your patriotism starts to fade? How long do you have to be an expat or immigrant before hearing your home country bashed doesn't phase you?

For Tiffany, the answer is at least more than 17 years. Even though she's called Italy home for over 17 years now, when she heard someone at the hair salon disparaging the entire population of the US, her dormant mama bear woke up after a long hibernation and bared its teeth.

We talk about this little encounter on this week's episode, and consider how, for Tiffany at least, spending decades outside her home country has not extinguished her instinct to defend it.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Bittersweet Moment #143: The Evolution of Seattle's Coffee Culture Feb 24, 2022

Show notes

On Monday we talked about Italian espresso, and what an integral part of Italian culture it is.

In the same vein, Katy describes the unique coffee shop culture of Seattle in the 1990s—a far cry from the sterile, uniform, laptop-laden Starbucks of today.

In their heyday, Seattle's iconic coffee shops were gritty, smoky, filled with grunge music (often live), and the place where Katy spend many long nights with friends during her teen years. On this mini-episode, she takes you there.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

Episode 416: The Art of Italian Espresso (with Wendy Pojmann) Feb 21, 2022

Show notes

What makes Italian espresso different from American coffee? Perhaps more to the point, what makes it better? And what separates good espresso from great espresso?

Today we are joined by author and Italian espresso expert Wendy Pojmann to talk about all things caffè.

An American professor and historian, Wendy was in Italy to do research, and every time she stopped for her morning espresso, she realized that what she really wanted to be researching was Italian coffee. The result was Espresso: The Art and Soul of Italy, a work of literary non-fiction that delves into the history, culture, and art of espresso—and why it is inseparable from Italy itself.

Also, listen as Wendy tries to get Tiffany to like espresso—the jury is still out!

Find Espresso: The Art and Soul of Italy on Amazon or anywhere you buy books. For an autographed copy, order exclusively at Parigi Books.

Find Wendy Pojmann on Instagram.

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ADVERTISE WITH US: Reach expats, future expats, and travelers all over the world. Send us an email to get the conversation started.

BECOME A PATRON: Pledge your monthly support of The Bittersweet Life and receive awesome prizes in return for your generosity! Visit our Patreon site to find out more.

SUBSCRIBE: Subscribe to the podcast to make sure you never miss an episode. Click here to find us on a variety of podcast apps.

WRITE A REVIEW: Leave us a rating and a written review on iTunes so more listeners can find us.

NEW TO THE SHOW? Don't be afraid to start with Episode 1: OUTSET

BOOK: Want to read Tiffany's book, Midnight in the Piazza? Learn more here or order on Amazon.

TOUR ROME: If you're traveling to Rome, don't miss the chance to tour the city with Tiffany as your guide!

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