Happy Koninginnedag! (Queen's Day!)

Well, I've survived my first Queen's Day in Holland. I have to say, this day was unlike anything else I've ever experienced. The Running of the Bulls in Pamplona was pretty darn close, but not quite as crazy as this!

Queen's Day is Holland's National Holiday, kind of like the 4th of July in the US, but it is the Queen's Birthday (well, okay, it was the FORMER Queen's birthday - the current queen's birthday is in January, which wouldn't be nearly as fun). The color orange is everywhere - it's the national color, and comes from the Dutch royal family, which is the House of Orange. There are orange banners, orange colored foods and drinks, and extreme amounts of orange clothing and creative accessories are worn as well. During the day (starting at about 6 am!), there is a 'vrijmarkt' ('freemarket'), which is kind of like a gigantic garage sale . Many people set up stalls or blankets in parks or on sidewalks. Most of the items for sale, I found, were pretty much junk, but people are still buying! I bought a few books, didn't really see any other "must-haves".

My friend Nadia from work joined me around 12, and we made our way through Vondelpark, which is pretty fun on Queen's Day. That park is for children only to sell their belongings, and it's really cute how they market their wares. We then walked up the city center, where the canals were packed with boats carrying many partiers. After about 5 hours of all of this craziness, we were pretty "knackered" (Nadia is British, so I'm learning all kinds of new words!). She went back to Utrecht, and I back to my cozy little apartment.

Check one more thing off of the life to-do list!

Here are some pictures from the day:

Many Dutch flags were flying on this national holiday!

The Street outside my apartment at 7:00 am! People were already on the hunt for bargains!

I'm not sure I captured the shear craziness of the "free market", but this is an idea... picture this for miles and miles!

Boats on the Prinsengracht

Craziness on Leidseplein (one of the main squares downtown)

More craziness on Leidseplein

Partiers on the Prinsengraght

The Amsterdam flag flying proudly

Next stop... London! I'm leaving tomorrow morning on an early flight! I'll give an update hopefully on Monday!

Normalcy

This weekend felt a lot like a weekend in Portland... most of the weekend was spent in Amsterdam, which is "home" now. I was so relieved for Friday to come... it had been a long week in the office. Some interesting notes from the week:

* It's a Dutch custom for the birthday boy/girl to bring in a cake for their co-workers, not the other way around like in the US. It was my boss's birthday on Thursday, and so he brought in some super yummy (lekker in Dutch) pastries.

* I am so blessed with nice people in my life. It seems like every time I start to get a little sad, there is someone there to help boost me up again. My lovely co-worker Claudia and her husband Manfred (who I kept thinking she was calling her "Man Friend" hehe) took me out for dinner on Thursday night, and then we went back to their home for coffee. It was a really nice evening.

* Friday night, after work, I had made plans with some lovely ladies, Karyn and Kristin, to try this amazing restaurant. I had called on Thursday, and was surprised that I was able to get a reservation. I got to the restaurant first, and was very disappointed to find out that our reservation had not been recorded, and so, we were politely dismissed. :( The other girls showed up eventually, and, disappointed, we found another place to eat. We settled with a cute Italian place near where Karyn lives. It was absolutely delicious, and we had a really great time chatting among "American" friends. Two bottles of wine later, we made our way home on our various trams. Fun times!

* Saturday, I was feeling really good in the morning. I was so glad, because I had to take nearly a week off of running and working out because I had been feeling just exhausted. The weather was gorgeous, and so I went out and ran my usual 9 mile run through Vondelpark - in shorts and a t-shirt! Summer is almost here! :) After that, I made my way out for some personal maintenance... I was in desparate need of an eyebrow wax and manicure, things that are surprisingly uncommon here. Three hours and a small fortune later (I think because waxing is not common here, they are able to charge a premium), I was on my way feeling like a new woman. :) The weather was absolutely amazing, so I just walked around, enjoying this beautiful city.

Beautiful Rowhouses along my walk...

The flowers... one of the best things about Holland. I'm not too proud to buy them for myself every once in a while! :)

A few hours into my walk, I started feeling really woozy, and decided I better get home. I took a nap, and woke up with a migraine. UGH. I was supposed to meet Siba for dinner, and I called to politely decline. I didn't think that a smokey and loud restaurant was going to make me feel any better. So, rather than being among people, I spent my Saturday night at home, planning my trip to London... I'm leaving on May 1st - I can't believe it! I booked a few tickets, including a ticket to see Chicago on London's version of Broadway, the London Eye, and my London City Pass, and I also came up with a basic outline of what I'm hoping to do each day. There is so much in London - I have a feeling I'm going to need to go back!

* Sunday I woke up with the same pounding headache. I'm really hoping that this is not the same thing that happened to me in October/November... during that time period, I had a migraine that lasted for nearly 4 weeks, which no doctor could quite figure out. Anyways... I was supposed to go to the beach with Nadia, a friend from work, and she called to tell me that she had... you guessed it - a migraine headache. She wanted to rest, which was definitely how I was feeling last night, but I was honestly a little tired of being kooped up in my apartment, so I decided to take the train to Zandvoort and take it easy. I'm so glad that I went. It was absolutely gorgeous when I got there. I spent about 2 hours walking the beach, then stopped at a little cafe on the beach for some lunch and beer. I read quite a bit of my book sitting there in the sun, and later continued my walk along the beach. It was starting to get a little dark and windy, which I have learned means that the storm is a'comin', so I started making my way back to the train station. I stumbled across downtown Zandvoort along the way however, and couldn't resist its quaint charm. I bought myself a yummy soft-serve ice cream cone and plopped myself down in the town square to listen to some accordian/guitar music. It was super relaxing. Eventually, I made my way home on the train, and I've arrived home, just in time to catch up with my friends in Portland, who are now just waking up. My headache is still lingering, but it's not quite the pounder it was when I woke up. Fingers crossed that it's gone completely tomorrow.

Here are some pictures from the beach and town of Zandvoort:

The other side of the Atlantic...

SBE... he's always on my mind!

The Train Station at Zandvoort

Young Dutch Engineers in the Making!

The beach had TONS of sea shells - beautiful for my eyes, and painful for my feet! :)

Musicians in the street

What European town would be complete without a beautiful church?

My First Visitors

My first visitors have come and gone. I can't tell you how good it was to be standing in the middle of Centraal Station and look up to see the faces of friends. Anna and Travis arrived on Sunday afternoon. Amsterdam was their last stop on their 2-week tour of Europe. They started in London, then stopped in Paris, then on to Bruges, and finally, to Amsterdam. After several rounds of hugging, we made our way down to their hotel in the Leidseplein area, and then took a stroll through Vondelpark on the way to my apartment. It was kind of the same route that I've been running, and it turned out too be a very long walk! Amazing how much quicker it feels when you are running! They were good sports though!! We had a nice dinner at my favorite neighborhood restaurant, and then called it a night. They were pretty exhausted from all of their travels, and I've been sick pretty much since I've been here and it really hit me this weekend, so I was ready for bed by 9. (yes, lame, I know).

Monday, while I was at work, they checked out quite a few of the museums that Amsterdam has to offer, and then that evening we met for a dinner outside (the weather was AMAZING!) and then a show at Boom Chicago (a comedy club run by a group of Americans). It was kind of a "Who's Line Is It?" kind of show, and definitely had its funny moments.

Last night, we had dinner at an Indonesian restaurant (Indonesian food is quite popular here - Indonesia used to be a Dutch colony, and a lot of Indonesians moved here when the country became independent). After that, we did the most interesting thing I've done in Amsterdam by far - we took a guided tour of the Red Light District. I love these kinds of tours - you always learn the history of a city that isn't published in books. For example... This is the city crest of Amsterdam:

Three crosses make up the center of the crest, which dates back to the late 1200s. They are Saint Andrew crosses (Amsterdam was mainly Catholic back then), and they protect the city against floods (water), fire and disease (the plague). In the Middle Ages, those were the biggest dangers in any city. Anyways, Amsterdam was the first major city to really export pornographic films (hmmm... why does this not surprise me?!?). So, when the films would arrive in their canisters, they would arrive at their destination with the city crest on them. The recipients of the canisters would proudly exclaim, "The XXX films have arrived!". And the rest, my friends, is history! :)

Anna and Travis left this morning, and I think that they were more than ready to get home to their cute little 2-year-old, Merrick. What an amazing few weeks they had though! :)

Anna and I outside at Leidseplein

The World Travellers!

Keukenhof - AKA "Tulip Heaven"

What is more Dutch than a tulip? How about 4.5 MILLION of them? :)

Today, my friend Siba and I drove to Lisse to visit the famous Keukenhof Garden. First of all, who is Siba? Funny, small world story... In the summer of 1998, I spent about 6 weeks studying Spanish at la Universidad de Toledo in Toledo, Spain. Siba was in the same program, and was rooming with my friend Fayza. We became good friends during the program, and, although she returned to her home in Aachen, Germany, and I returned to school in Toledo, Ohio, we remained "pen friends" for the next 9 years! Strangely enough, she ended up doing a post-graduate program in Amsterdam, and now lives and works here, and I'm here too now. We've seen quite a bit of each other, and it's certainly nice to see a familiar face. :) Who would have guessed where our lives would have taken us so many years ago?

Anyways, the drive to Siba's house actually took me longer than getting to Lisse. My crazy TomTom kept trying to make me turn down the wrong way on one-way streets. I seriously wanted to throw the stupid thing out the window! Siba lives about 10 mintues away, but it took me 40 minutes to get there! Anyways, once Siba was securely in my car, we made our way through beautiful tulip fields (yes, it really is just like what you see on tv) to get to the amazing Keukenhof garden. The parking lot alone was amazing - there were license plates from all over - Poland, Germany, Great Britain, Czech Republic... I'd venture to guess there are over 1 million people that visit this place every year. Although there were a ton of people there, it didn't feel too crowded - there were only a few bottle necks where I felt like it was a mosh pit rather than a garden.

The flowers were amazing... it was definitely more of an organized garden rather than just fields and fields of flowers like I had pictured. But, still impressive! We had a lovely picnic in the garden, and just enjoyed the afternoon walking around. I think pictures can definitely speak better than any words I can write, so I'll let you see what I experienced today:


Some interesting "art" in the garden

Yours Truly

Fields across the water

Siba!

Randomness

Some things are really different here... I'll just start with that statement.

Last night, I left work a little early, because my friend Nadia (who has also just started in the Hilversum office) was looking at a few apartments in a nearby city (Utrecht) and wanted a second opinion. We went and looked, and we think we found one. Afterwards, we checked out the town and had dinner at a cute Italian restaurant right on the canal. It was great (well, until all the smoking started - I am SO looking forward to June, when smoking will be banned!).

Fast forward to driving Nadia back to her hotel... we're driving along in Hilversum, and all of the sudden, we see lots of flashing lights and men in yellow jackets. I had no idea what was going on, but figured it was an accident or something. Not quite... it was a "drunkenness check station". The police officers stopped every car and made the driver blow, blow, blow. For some reason, Nadia and I thought this was just hilarious, and I couldn't stop laughing to blow into the little contraption. I think the guy was getting annoyed with me, but, not to worry, eventually I pulled it together and passed the test. Thank goodness we had stopped at one glass of wine!

So, that's my random story from last night... heading for the famous tulip fields today, so hopefully I'll have some pictures posted tomorrow (a HUGE thanks to my lovely friend Karyn, who has let me borrow her camera for the weekend!). Anna and Travis arrive on Sunday, and I'm definitely looking forward to seeing some faces from home!

Words to Live By...

So... I just thought I'd share this... these words come from a card that my mom and dad sent to me on my 25th birthday. I take it with me everywhere I go, and it's hanging in my bedroom here in Amsterdam. These words are what I live my life by, and have gotten me through many a rough patch... so, take a minute, and enjoy! :)

How to Make a Beautiful Life

Love yourself.
MAKE PEACE with who you are
and where you are
at this moment in time.

Listen to your heart.
If you can't hear what it's saying
in this noisy world,
MAKE TIME for yourself.
Enjoy your own company.
Let your mind wander among the stars.

Try.
Take chances.
MAKE MISTAKES.
Life can be messy
and confusing at times,
but it's also full of surprises.
The next rock in your path
might be a stepping stone.

Be happy.
When you don't have what you want,
want what you have.
MAKE DO.
That's a well-kept secret of contentment.

There aren't any shortcuts to tomorrow.
You have to MAKE YOUR OWN WAY.
To know where you are going
is only part of it.
You need to know where you've been, too.
And if you ever get lost, don't worry.
The people who love you will find you.
Count on it.

Life isn't days and years.
It's what you do with time
and with all the goodness and grace
that's inside you.

MAKE A BEAUTIFUL LIFE...
The kind of life you deserve.

I never tire of reading this, and I hope you enjoyed it too. :)

Haarlem

* One note - I've mailed my camera back to the US to be fixed, which is going to take about 6 weeks. I've been using disposable cameras to take photos, but I think my blog is way more interesting with pictures, so I've downloaded some pictures of what I've been doing from the internet... just wanted to give the disclaimer that these are NOT my photos! :)

Where to begin? What a beautiful, charming little city. I decided that this was to be my weekend destination about halfway through the week, mostly because it's pretty close to Amsterdam (about 45 minutes by train, which was how I decided to go), and because it came with strong recommendations from a few friends that live here.

I arrived in Haarlem around 12:15 by train. The train station was absolutely beautiful - decorated in Art Nouveau... it reminded me of a lot of the subway stops in New York City. Anyways, believe it or not, I didn't get lot on my walk to my first destination, which was the "Grote Kerk", or Great Church. First, I took a minute to walk around the bustling market that was going on in the city's Market Square. You can buy a wide assortment of things there - anything from knock-off watches to a wheel of cheese! I think that made me hungry, because I stopped for lunch at a small cafe. I had a traditional Dutch meal - the pannenkoeken, which is basically a large crepe with whatever toppings you want on it, kind of like a pizza! It was yummy!

Pannenkoeken

After that, I toured the Grote Kerk. This church was built from 1390 to 1540. It was amazing inside... the ceiling is made of strips of cedar, and the floors are made from old gravestones - yes, that's right. The wealthy members of the church were originally buried right there in the floor - evidently that is where the term "stinking rich" comes from! :) The most impressive item in the church was the organ, which is Holland's largest. It has over 5000 pipes!

Grote Kerk

The impressive organ

The interior of the church

After touring the church, I decided to visit the oldest museum in Holland, which is called Teyler's Museum. This place has all kinds of interesting things in it - fossils, 18th and 19th century "technology", all preserved the way they were preserved when the musuem originally opened - in 1784!! The museum also was hosting an exhibit on the Italian architect Piranesi, who I'm kind of embarrassed to admit that I didn't really know before today... but I've definitely seen his work. He inspired artists like M.C. Escher, and in fact, when I saw the piece of art below, I thought it was an Escher piece. Anyways, I learned a lot about this man, and it was actually very interesting. He did many, many drawings/plans for buildings, but only ONE of them ever was actually built.

The exterior of Teyler's Museum, on the Spaarne River

One of Piranesi's Works

My last stop was the Ten Boom House, which was a safe house for Jews during World War II. I almost didn't stop here, because my favorite tour guide, Rick Steves, didn't recommend this place very strongly, but I've always had a lot of curiosity about WWII and the Holocaust, so I decided I should say "screw Rick" this time and do what interested me instead of looking at a bunch of paintings of people that are dead now like he recommended. :) Anyways, it was time well spent. Growing up in the US, WWII and the Holocaust are mentioned in history classes, but you never really see or feel the impact of what something of this nature was like, since it wasn't actually happening in the States. I've been to the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, and this one was way more impactful to me. The basic story is this - a middle class, Christian family named the Ten Boom's decided that they needed to do something about the fact that the Germans were taking all the Jews in town to concentration camps. (on a side note - what a sad fact - 80% of Dutch Jews died in concentration camps during WWII. They truly believed that they were going to "work camps", and so most went willingly instead of trying to hide. This fact brought tears to my eyes). Anyways, the Ten Boom's became a part of the "Dutch Underground", which tried to help Jews hide from the Gestapo and the Nazi Party. The Ten Boom's hid about 4 Jews at a time, all in a small "room" that was hidden in the youngest daughter's bedroom. The room was about 1 foot by 5 feet - not very big. At one point during the war, someone gave the family away. The Jews hid in the secret room, and stayed there for two and a half days. They were never found, but the Ten Boom family was taken away to German prison, and eventually to concentration camps. Only the youngest daughter, Corrie, survived. She wrote a book, The Hiding Place, which I purchased and am looking forward to reading. It's hard to put into words how I felt at this place, but, trust me, I had a hard time holding back tears. Realizing that this was pretty recent history makes it even worse. It's hard to imagine how something like this can happen. It was one of the most powerful museums I've ever been to. So there, Rick Steves!

The exterior of the museum

The wall has been broken out, but behind the wall is the secret room

It was a great day, all in all, and I look forward to coming back to this quaint little town at some point.

An exciting day for the Pitstick (and Wolf) Family!

Well, it's finally official! My little sister, Emily, and her boyfriend of the past few years, Matt Wolf, are engaged to be married in April of next year! I'm so excited for them both, and I couldn't ask for a better brother-in-law!

Can't wait for the wedding, you two! :)

A Night at the Symphony, and Other Items of Note - Week 2

So, I've officially survived two weeks in my new job. Things are going well... I just have to keep reminding myself that I have to take things one day at a time... I wasn't an immediate expert at my old job either, and, even though I know the nuts and bolts of the position, the people and processes (or lack thereof) are all different. So, I need to give myself a break in other words! Eating the elephant one bite at a time has never been my strong suit though, I must say.

The most significant event outside of work this week was that I went to my first concert at the Concertgebouw this week. I've found some pictures on the web (I still don't have my camera!), so I'll attach them here for reference:

The Beautiful Concert Hall, built in 1888

The Interior - Picture lots of arches and golden accents

So, the reason that I went to the symphony? Well, honestly, I love going to the symphony. It's something that I didn't do nearly enough of while I was in Portland. There's something about 50 violin bows in unison, or a French Horn solo, or the confidence of the symphony director that gets me really jazzed every time. But, the reason I went to this specific show was this: it was the symphony orchestra from Cincinnati, Ohio - my home state! I walk around a lot during the weekends, and I kept passing signs for this show. I figured that, as the concert hall is only about a 15 minute walk from my house, I really had no excuse not to go. There was a violin soloist that was pretty amazing, and then the orchestra performed a few other pieces (Pärt, JS Bach, & Sibelius if you are curious!) Who did I attend this event with? Well, it was magnificent company made up of me, myself, and I! :) I got over the fear of going places alone a long time ago - it's actually quite refreshing, although I have to say that I'm looking forward to the day when I have a nice list of friends to call on!

The gods of Cameraland...

Okay, I'm not really sure what I have done to piss the gods of Cameraland off, but they sure are making my life not so easy right now... flash back to November, when I was in Hong Kong with my pal from work, Allison. We went to visit the world's largest "outdoor, seated, bronze Buddha" (you know, as opposed the the world's largest "outdoor, STANDING, bronze Buddha"). We had a great time there, and I got some amazing photos of both the Buddha and the countryside. We got on the bus to return to the city, which was kind of mass chaos. My camera was in my pocket as we got onto the bus... and not in my pocket as we got off the bus. I was upset, but what could I do? Allison was kind enough to burn me a copy of the pictures she had taken, so I didn't lose a ton, but it was still a big bummer since I had just bought the camera in February for my trip to Thailand!

Back to present day... As you can see from my website, I've been really enjoying the city and taking lots of pictures to document my time here. This Saturday, I decided to explore a small town in Holland called Delft. This is a pretty popular place among tourists, as it houses a factory that still produces "Delft Blue" pottery, as it has been for over 500 years. I drove there (using my handy new navigation device, who I have fondly named "Helga"), with no problems. Okay, I take that back. It was when I arrived in the city that my driving debacle began. Helga told me to turn left down this street... to be more specific, a one-way street, with a canal on the left side and houses on the right. "No problem", I'm thinking, as I confidently guide my sporty Jetta (Mariah, if you are curious) onto the cobblestone street. BIG PROBLEM, when I realized that a significant ways down the street, someone was moving out of their house. There was a huge moving van there, blocking the entire street, so I had to BACK OUT on this tiny little street, with the canal (oh, and no fence to prevent you from going INTO the canal, mind you!), in order to return from the intersection that I had come from. Holy smokes, was I scared. I broke into a sweat, but managed to back up about a kilometer without: 1. Going into the canal, 2. Going into a house, 3. Running over any of the crazy bicycles that were quickly skirting by my car the entire time or 4. Running over any of the many tourists, who, like myself, were there to get their fill of Delftware on Saturday. Confident and back on the road, I decide, hey, I'm proving my skills as a Dutch driver, I'm going to parallel park on the side of a canal! Remember how there are no fences or anything to prevent your car from going into the canal? Well, parking was a little scary to say the least! But, I did it, and there was no problem! I have a picture of the proximity of my car to the canal, but it's not here because... I need to finish my story!

So, car parked, I wipe my brow and begin to take in the sights, sounds and delicious smells of Delft. Almost immediately, I pass a bakery selling "appelflappen", which are basically like fried apple pastries. I bought one of those and a sandwich, and went to a small park to eat and observe. After gobbling down my delicious delicacy, I started to walk around. I took a few pictures of the "Old Church" (something interesting here - many cities have the "Old Church" and the "New Church" - still figuring out how they name which one what... those aren't the ONLY churches in the city, after all!). Anyways... I'm trying to get all artsy with my nice new digital camera (the one that I bought to replace my stolen camera), and, all of the sudden, the camera will not turn on!!! I was SO PISSED! I started to have some seriously irrational thoughts, such as "Well, if I can't have pictures for my scrapbook, then I need to go home and wait until I have a camera that works to come back". Seriously... still a bit on the emotional side. Well, I decided that there wasn't much I could do, so I just kept walking around. I went to the "Prinsenhof", which is where Prince William was shot in the 1500's. There was a lot of interesting Dutch Art in this building, including some that was a little disturbing. Evidently Delft was one of the pioneers of anatomical studies, so there was a whole room showing human dissection from the 1600's. Yikes!

After that eye-opener, I decided to buy a disposable camera, because I was really bummed to not be capturing all the beautiful things I was seeing. It's kind of POS, but, we'll see how the pictures turn out. I climbed all the way to the top of the New Church, and got to see some amazing views of the city, including the huge IKEA. :)

Finally, I made my way to the Delft Pottery Factory. Since I can't post any pictures just yet, here is the website: http://www.royaldelft.com/. The artisans there are making the pottery now just like they were in the 1500's. It was pretty amazing to get to watch their process. It's all done by hand. As with any place you go to, at the end is a store, where you can buy real Delftware. Um, if you are really rich. I had in my mind that I was going to buy a "tulip vase". They are typical in the Netherlands, and are basically a big vase with a bunch of little spouts to put individual tulips into. So... a SMALL one was 350 Euros! Which is about $500! I settled for a knock-off plate, and happily made my way back to Amsterdam. :)

So, that was my adventure into Delft-land. As for the camera, I e-mailed Canon about it, and, since the warantee is in the US, I have to have it serviced in the US. It's going to be disposable cameras for a while, it appears. I'm totally bummed out.

One thing that made me really happy this weekend, though, was my first "e-date" with Sean. We both have web-cams, and, since it's been really hard to chat with the 9 hour time difference, we arranged to have an e-date for my Sunday morning/his Saturday night. It was so good to see him! We chatted for 2 hours, which passed like it was 15 minutes. He's going to come to visit in May for our one year anniversary, which I'm really excited about!

Wheels, wheels keep on turning!

Okay, folks... look out! Crazy American driving in the Netherlands!! I picked up my car on Monday - it's a very sporty, very stylish (joking!) TEAL VW Jetta. Now if you know me, you know that several years ago, I had a slight OBSESSION with teal... my clothes were teal, I painted my bedroom teal, etc. So, I'm a little sick of teal! I laughed out loud when I saw the car, and then began to panic as I realized that I actually had to DRIVE it! I made it home that day with no big problems... I was never super confident that I was going the right way, but I kept seeing signs for Amsterdam (pretty much the only word I knew on any street sign), so I knew I was okay. Parking, which I was pretty worried about, has not yet been an issue. When I start to work a little longer hours, though, I think that might be the case.

The next morning, Tuesday, I decided to try driving to work instead of taking the train. White-knuckled, I set out on my journey. I knew I should be hitting the highway pretty soon (I live in the South of the city, which is right above the highway), so when I began to see the canals of city center, I almost started crying... I had somehow missed a turn, which I discovered today is NOT MARKED (missed it again!). Anyways, made it to work in about an hour and 15 minutes, even with the delay. I'm starting to learn a little Dutch - FILE means "traffic jam", and I saw a lot of signs with File on them - never a good thing!

On the way home yesterday, I was feeling confident... I had made the same trip the day prior, and had no problem. However, when I got up to the highway that makes a ring around Amsterdam, I wasn't exactly sure which way to go. Well, I picked wrong, and made a ring all the way around the city. It was a nice tour, but added about 30 minutes on to my trip!

This morning, again missed the turn, but realized it immediately. Made it to work in about 45 minutes. Yee-haw! I had no problems on the way home tonight, and even pumped my first Dutch gas on the way home... which is actually diesal - many cars in the EU run on this fuel these days.

To sum things up, I'm feeling much more confident on the roads. I'm getting used to the bicycles, which rule the streets, and figuring out how everything fits together... I'll get there.

Another important note - I started work this week. Things could have had a better start - I didn't have a badge (which is required to get in and out of buildings - kind of important), and no laptop either. I've been in orientation the past few days, so the laptop issue really is a non-issue. Fingers crossed that it's here tomorrow. Orientation was nice - I met quite a few people that I think I'll keep in touch with, including a few Dutch people that have committed with me to "one Dutch sentence a day". :) So far, I know "I don't understand" and "There is a car accident on A10".

I'm doing well... no major breakdowns to report... just a little homesick from time to time. In orientation, lots of videos were shown, and a lot showed Portland and WHQ. I'm embarrassed to admit that I got tears in my eyes a few times at the sight of my former home. I'm pretty happy here, and making new friends, which helps.

Thanks to everyone for all the e-mails!! Keep me posted on what is going on at all of my various "homes". Miss you!