Back

Well, I am back in the States again.  It was 100 degrees in D.C. when I arrived.  I was pretty ready to turn around and fly back the Netherlands where it was 65.  Then, on the drive back, we got stuck in an almost tornado that dropped dozens and dozens of trees across the highway.  It was an exciting welcome home.  But, now I am sitting on the porch, and it is less than 100 degrees, at least at 6:30 in the morning EDST (12:30  in the afternoon, my time) and I have a good buddy who was awfully glad to see me and who seems pretty content to just hang out.

And here is another little "peak" at what I have been "up to"!

A Little London Update

Since I am wrting this from my little Kindle, which can't upload pictures, and since I don't want to spoil any surprises, I thought I would just give you a quick  glimpse at my trip to the U.K.

This morning, at at about 8:00 am, I ate a breakfast of a cumberland sausage on a roll, with a cappaccino,, while sitting in the sunshine, on a park bench, beside Westminster Abbey, looking out over the Parliament Buildings, and listening to Big Ben toll the hour.

So, spoiler, AWESOME!

The Almost Last Post (Kind Of)

When I set about to write this blog for you guys, I looked at some other travel blogs, just to see the kinds of things that people were writing about.  For starters, I was surprised at the number of blogs named "Hannah's Fun Traveling in Europe Blog" or some variation thereof.  I always forget how popular my name got a few years after I was born.  (It took a few years for  my fame to spread.)

Another thing that I noticed was that every. single. blog. began their last post with the sentence "I cannot believe how quickly the time has gone".  I swore then that I would not do the same thing for my last blog post.  Not so much because I oppose cliché (sometimes things are clichéd because they work) but because I hated to seem so derivative.  Well, having almost reached the end of my European Travels, I am terribly, terribly tempted.  I will remain strong, but it is a struggle.  Because events have proceeded with greater alacrity than would have seemed conceivable in the past and, indeed, than seems creditable at present.

Yesterday was the last time I will hear the early-warning sirens tested.  Yesterday I also had my very last exam.  (Although I do still have to finish writing my thesis and I do have a presentation later this week.)  This coming Sunday will be my next to last Dutch church service.  I probably won't need to go to the grocery store again because I will just be eating to clean out the fridge and my cupboard.  I will be flying out in just a little over three weeks.

It's been quick.

Not to worry though: what with one thing and another, I have not kept up with all of my exciting travels so I may be putting posts here for another year (or two).  I currently have about two months of draft posts waiting to be finished and at least another couple of weeks worth of posts for which I have not even organized a draft.  And, since I will be travelling to England and visiting Penny and her husband next week, and will be visiting Albania--with a little layover in Italy along the way--the week after that, I will still have loads and loads of things to talk about.  Maybe while I am house-sitting for Mom and Dad (since they plan on leaving on vacation as soon as I arrive to look after their stinky and varied fowl) I will have time to finish up all of those posts.

But in the meantime: I can't believe . . .

Kinderdijk

This was our boat, docked at Kinderdijk.  They had announcements in English, German, and Dutch about historical and cultural items of interest as we sailed up the Maas.  It was about an hour each way, with an hour at Kinderdijk.

After Jael had arrived, I got a Groupon offer to go to Kinderdijk (where I had gone previously) and we decided to do that.  This wasn't a Pancake Boat trip (that would have been way more expensive) but we did get a free coffee or tea with our ticket and one of the best things about Dutch coffee is that you always, always get a little cookie with your coffee.  Even if you order a piece of apple cake with your coffee (which Jael and I did on our way back, to get a "true" Dutch experience) you still get a little cookie.

This cookie with coffee or tea tradition is actually a really integral part of Dutch culture.  One of my colleagues at school said that she had taken a practice Dutch nationalization quiz (the kind of test you take if you want to become a Dutch citizen; she is Dutch but she just wanted to see what the tests were like) and one of the questions was about how many cookies you should serve with tea.  (The answer was two cookies.  I have always only gotten one cookie but maybe it is different with coffee.)

There's just something about windmills . . .

We had a pleasant day, walking around and chatting.  We didn't go in the working windmill because it was kind of expensive and it seemed like more fun just to stroll.



There were birds and ducks and things all over the place.  On the right is the ubiquitous coot.  On the left is some weird bird with a red head and pointy horns.  I don't know what it is but recently I saw one with babies and one of the babies was riding on its parent's back, like a loon.

Kinderdijk had a really good gift shop, plus a couple of others.  I think that we for sure decided to try the apple cake on the boat when we were in the shop because they had apple cake slices on display and they looked delicious.

Jael was so much fun to have along.
I did all of the touristy, fun things vicariously through her, got funny pictures, and didn't have to do anything but hold a camera.
Win-Win-Win.  (The other win is for you guys, since you get to see the pictures as well. 

Jael Takes Rotterdam

Jael is handy to have around because she climbs on things and gets into the picture taking spirit--as a model. So, we kept running across stuff and then she would climb on/in/over it and I would get fun pictures.  She did say I wasn't allowed to publish the really funny posterior shots of her climbing on stuff but there are still some pretty good ones.

This giraffe is part of a pretty nifty playground/park area that is on my walk home from school.  There are little parks all over the place in Rotterdam and they are a lot of fun to stumble across.  This one has a play ground area with a  bunch of wooden animals in it.  (There was also a giant wooden alligator but Jael was bored of giant animals by that time.

The park also has a big collection of giant climbing rocks that are pretty nifty.  There are also a few seating areas, a large section of reeds or bamboo or something that I've seen bunches of kids playing in.  The big, empty middle area is used as a soccer field.  The last time I walked through there, a couple of days ago, there were some kids playing soccer there.  Then one of them started calling "Mevrouw! Mevrouw!" (Ma'am! Ma'am!) and I looked over and realized that there ball was bouncing toward me and they wanted me to stop it before it got to the street.  So, I kicked it to them.  And it ran into a rock and then bounced back to me.  I eventually got it kicked to them and then I zipped away.  Now I feel kind of goofy going by there again because I was so obviously inept at kicking a little soccer ball. 

I had class one day while Jael was here and so I went off to class earlyish in the morning while Jael slept in.  (But then she did the dishes so I forgive her for not having to go to a boring class. =-)  She walked over and met me so we could go off and do other fun things.  She had to wait about a half hour  past the time I told her to meet me because the class went long.  I don't know if it makes it better or worse that we never once got out of class less than 5 minutes late the whole term.  This picture, though, is of Jael by the statute of Desiderius Erasmus, the famus Dutch Enlightenment-era philosopher, translator of the Bible, and name-sake of Erasmus University.

This is just what the metro-station at Rotterdam Centraal looks like.  They have been doing all kinds of renovations and have decorated it mighty pretty.  The colored stripes on the ceiling are just long, hollow, colored tubes.  And the have colored spotlights on the walls.  All of the metro stations are decorated just a bit differently from the others.  

We're flying!!!

When Jael and I were hanging out in the Copenhagen Airport, we were pretty impressed.  Besides the weird goblin-face art display, they had a science area for kids, although there were a bunch of adults who were checking things out as well.  They had displays on how the length of a pendulum affects its swing and other things.  They had a display on sound waves, too.  There was long tube of water with speakers pointing at it.  You could fiddle with dials to increase or decrease the volume and frequency, which made ripples in the water and, one time when Jael turned one of the knobs, made it almost boil.  That also made a really loud and startling noise so Jael and I quickly zipped away to a quieter display.  They had a mirror display where you could get pictures of yourself "jumping".  It was difficult to photograph effectively.  Also, Jael had trouble trying to smile and stand on one leg at the same time.  It was entertaining.

There were also Lego shops, the most massive duty-free shop complexes I have ever seen, and loads and loads of Danish-themed souvenirs.  They had, for some reason, loads and loads of wooden shoes and "wooden" shoe fuzzy slippers.  I don't know why they were trying to take over the Dutch distinctives but they are, apparently.  It was a pretty good airport, though.

(I do have a few more things to say about what we did in Copenhagen but those are longer and more complicated posts to write that, what with my thesis, I haven't had time to finish like I would like.  So, I've decided to skip ahead a bit and will post some of the other fun stuff we did back in the Netherlands (and hopefully we will get some nifty food posts too (*eyebrow wiggle at Jael*)) and I will get back to the historical stuff when I get some more time.)