Running around in Hamburg

As a model, you have to do a lot of castings and go sees. Remember America's and every other country's top model TV shows? (Can't believe I'm going to compare the real model life with that TV show, but anyway :P) but it's kinda like that. You run around, don't know the city and you go from appointment to appointment to introduce yourself to the photographer, production company or fashion editor to get more jobs booked. Well that's the reason why I'm in Hamburg now, I just got signed to MGM Models so I'm here now for a few days to run around!

You never ever ever know where and what time your appointments are for the day before the same morning that day. So every morning you wake up and your day will be one big surprise! Around 10:30am you just get an email saying: Hi Claudia, here are your appointments for today (...) And during the day you get some text messages with new additional ones. That means you have no idea when or even IF you have time to sit down and eat something. For me it's important that I fill up my by bag with healthy bites before I ran off in the morning. I always stock up on a bottle of water, fresh fruit, nuts and/or a fruit-nut bar. This will keep you going throughout the day or until you have some free time to sit down and relax and have a normal lunch.

Me eating a raw cacao fruit/nut bar in between castings

The next tip I would like to give you as a model is; find something in the city you are in, that will get your mind off modelling and give you a piece of mind. For me this is working out, so that's why I always bring my running shoes with me wherever I go. I mean you can go for a run wherever you are in the world! And if I'm in a city where there is Bikram Yoga, I'm in!! I love Bikram, addicted to this typical kind of workout since my stay in Capetown. As soon as I know I will be on-stay in a city I check the web if there is a Bikram Yoga studio near by. Bikram yoga is a 90 minute class doing 26 yoga postures in a heated room of 40 degrees. Yeah you will sweat like hell, but it just gives me such a great feeling. I calm down, relax and enjoy it so much! 

How my Bikram class looks like before we hit it off

And now, obviously we have to talk about food. When you are on-stay as a model in Hamburg, or just travelling or just visiting Hamburg hereby some tips. I always stock up on fruits, crackers, honey, oats, eggs, fresh vegetables, ready-to-eat-soups and some protein like chicken breast. This way I can whip up some healthy meals in seconds. Perfect when you walked around all day for castings (I once measured, I walk about 10km a day). So when you come home, you just want to have food on the table in seconds rather than minutes. So for example, this time I bought a carrot-ginger-coconut soup and some shrimps. Throw it together heat up, give it a stir and there you go. Or whip up a salad with your fresh vegetables, fried chicken (fried a complete packet and store it in the fridge, saves time for the next time) and some avocado. A recipe for one of those salads will be online soon!

Now, let's talk about restaurants. Where do you need to go in Hamburg when you are looking for a healthy bite? I already mentioned one of my favourite restaurants Dean & David. They have amazing salads, wraps and they are all delicious and healthy. Plus, I'm addicted to their coconut-sate dressing...  I want a jar of that please!! Oh and do eat some bread when you visit Dean & David. Germans are just so incredibly good and baking the best breads ever.

Salad at Dean & David

Then another great salad bar, a bit similar to Dean & David is Feld's Salat. Pick and choose your own salads or choose one of their extremely delicious curry's or soups.

I also love to take a salad from the salad bar at Edeka supermarket, you can just fill a bowl and pay for your weight. Perfect when you don't have time to sit down but need something on the go.

Then there is the Asian vegetarian restaurant Loving Hut. Amazing fresh and healthy food!

Oh and for the Sushi Lovers, go and visit Sushi Lô. They have the most amazing fresh sushi and if you order before 18 they have a special price!

xoxo

From Hamburg

A hectic week as a model!

Heey Guys!

I'm incredibly sorry, I have been sooooo busy there was like zero time for blogging.. I went for a trip to Hamburg where I met my new agency MGM models check my Portfolio. And after my meetings I had a date with one of my friends, gorgeous sweetheart Sanny (Bartlema).

Me and Gorgeous Sanny

The first day in Hamburg I did some serious meal prepping at home (very important if your on the road all day long), I made a simply salad to go (quinoa, smoked chicken, cucumber, avocado and cherry tomato). Healthy, easy to eat on the road and very delicious. Because I had meetings all day I knew there wouldn't be time for a quiet sit-down lunch. And since I'm always hungry.. yep I NEED food prepping ;-) hahaha of course I also had some snacks in my bag as always: some fresh fruit, nuts and this time I also took the NAKED bar with me. It's all natural, has a great taste and it's easy to take with you wherever you go! So some tips you can maybe use when you are planning a trip anytime soon!

After all that was done me and Sanny went food shopping in rainy Germany, definitely time for some comfort food! We bought a bottle of Italian wine (Nero d'Avola, my favourite) and had tapas for dinner! We chose a variation of cheeses, spelt bread, salad, grilled eggplant, olives, corn salad, fresh grapes, fig jam and some nuts. And as a dessert we had my healthy home made brownies (recipe coming soon). Heaven on a little side table!

Fooooood and wine!

The next day we went on a very healthy detox after all the cheeses, nuts and wine and had a lot of fresh fruits and veggies. We went to the cinema, "the other woman" with Cameron Diaz and amazing model Kate Upton (still don't understand the hype about her, but yeah she is gorgeous). A really good woman movie, so I would say check it out!
After the cinema we went out for some shopping and bought some amazing sale items in town, scoreeee! After are big shopping succes we ended up having dinner in Dean & David, you may remember the name? I told you about them in one of my older posts Click! We had an amaaaaaaazing carrot, ginger and coconut soup. One of the best soups I ever had.. really.. we thought about it the entire evening haha and shard a huge chicken salad with coconut-satay dressing. Please if you are ever, ever, ever in Germany try out Dean & David.. the smoothies, juices, wraps, panini's, salads and soups.. it's ALL good! =)

The Carrot-Ginger-Coconut Soup

After the food we went home and rented some more movies, a very chilling movie day it was! The day after it was time to go home, I needed to continue healthy eating and work out.. seriously.. because I booked an amazing job.. The cover of Men's Health!!!

So excited to book the job, that would be on Tuesday. 2 days left, to be in my very best shape I needed some prepping. For me that means eating healthy 100% of the time: lots of fresh fruit, vegetables, chicken and fish. Not food that will blow you up, but things like beetroot, celery, ginger are very good. And also it's very important do drink a lot of water and green tea, to get rid of all toxics and it cleanses your body well.

The photoshoot was amazing, wonderful people, a great photographer, good looking male models ;-), amazing make up by such a sweet make up artist. Really the entire day was having such a good vibe!! And yes, we also had very nice food! We could choose our own salad or bread, of course all the models took salads since we weren't wearing that much clothes ;-) I chose a chicken salad with avocado, pine nuts and parmesan cheese. But most important, I had soooooo much fun! These are the kind of jobs that make me so happy and feel blessed I'm able to do this work for a living!

Backstage at Men's Health

Well so far the start of my week and I promise I will tell you all about the rest soon and upload some recipes!

xoxo