July 24th, 2007
(4 Votes)
I’m still tired from the transition party yesterday. We made a happy bunch over there, so many Romanians in one place again.
Now, it’s almost over, a few hours more and I will be on a plane back home. Right now I have an odd feeling in my stomach and mixed feelings … I’m so anxious to leave, in the last days I’ve been counting down the hours. I even went to buy a train ticket to Schipol a week before my departure.
I can’t say it’s been good or bad experience. I’ve been trough a lot and I keep telling myself I’m to blame for building the wrong expectations. What I can say it’s been nothing I imagined it to be.
July 19th, 2007
(2 Votes)
Planning
Going to Düsseldorf by car was my idea. Gwen[1] was telling me about visiting a friend in Düsseldorf, by train. As I had a similar experience two years ago, I proposed to rent a car and have some fun together. The best part is that I came only with the idea. Martin and Gwen handled the rest (renting a car, checking gas prices, mapping routes).
Issues
Till Friday all was done, except a little thing that slipped our mind: Gwen doesn’t know to drive a stick-shift. Imagine: in the U.S., they actually give you the driver license on an automatic shift.
So, I[2] was teaching Gwen about the “extra” pedal called the clutch. Things started OK, on the first try Gwen actually started the windshield wipers[3]. After a nice test ride in the city all was prepared. We went home to pack and started our journey.
Well … not quite, a few meters of the parking lot Gwen managed to place the car in the middle of the road and because being stressed and all she couldn’t manage the fine moves of the clutch and gas pedal required to get the car moving forwards. OK, we moved … in small steps, hick-ups, engine dying, engine start, car shaking, hick-ups engine dying. As this kind of movement was killing the engine, building a long queue behind us and was not getting measurable results, I[2] had to take over and drive a few blocks to a parking area.
July 8th, 2007
(1 Votes)
The return to Amsterdam was planned a week ago. I wanted to see the city again … see how much my perspective has changed. We got at the train station 2 hours later than we agreed up-on :). Typically! I think I got somewhat lazy in this 1,5 months. Waking up at 9, reaching the office at 10. I will have real problems re-accommodating once I get back home as Romania is also one hour ahead.
Well we got there eventually but the other party was also late. We enjoyed a smooth ride to Amsterdam Centraal mostly glancing out the windows and chatting. The city has pretty much unchanged in my eyes, except maybe for the huge number of people (mostly tourists) walking down the streets. I felt like in Bucharest … simply too crowded and too noisy. I wished I could visit some of the museums there, but our crowd was so undecided … I learned my lesson: having more than 4 people around when traveling is not a very good choice. Everyone wants to go somewhere else, everyone wants to eat something else, everyone has different ideas on how to achieve these and in the end nobody gets what he wants.
July 4th, 2007
(1 Votes)
I was never a good dancer … well maybe at AIESEC dances :) Anyway, last Wednesday I we were invited to take a crash course Salsa lesson by our lovely Sabine[1].
After work we walked across town, to a bar near Erasmus Bridge. After some refreshments we were invited below, into the “classroom” :). We started with basic moves and advanced rather quickly to more advanced stuff. I must say tough it looks pretty simple, when it comes to repeat the moves yourself, it’s a whole different story. Sabine and her boyfriend are really good at this. They cracked jokes, explained everything in detail and used very cool methods to prevent us from making basic mistakes.
After 2 hours we were all deadly tired. I think I still need a lot of lessons :) but I managed for my first one. Sabine invited us to a Salsa club called “The Beach”[2] at the “Niew Maas” river to practice what we learned.
Remember what I always told you about trying new things? Remember Titanic? Some of you might have found the movie stupid … I for one liked it and learned from it. Rose promised she will follow her dreams … and she did. She really lived her life as it were not tomorrow, she loved as she would never love again. She dies happy in the end surrounded by all her memories all the things she’s done, all the people she touched. I wish we all could go like that.
PS: No pictures this time … we were to busy getting our moves right.
Cheers,
The Lion.[3]
June 29th, 2007
(1 Votes)
I love water, this is one of the reasons I like The Netherlands so much. Everywhere you look is a canal, a lake or the open sea. I choose to see Kinderdijk this weekend … mainly because it because it involved a 35 minutes boat ride.
Saturday it poured down all day and the sky cleared just 20 minutes before our departure. Nothing unusual in The Netherlands. Weather here changes from sunshine to heavy rain and vice-versa in just a few minutes.
