Happy New Year Everyone!
It has been a few months since the last update in October. Here are some highlights from the past few months.
Steve and I spent Christmas and New Year's resting and relaxing at home. On Christmas Day, we went to the beach and flew a kite. The beach was surprisingly crowded despite the fact that it was about minus 1 degree Celsius. But the sun was out, thus people were out in droves. We also took a day trip to nearby Utrecht on the long weekend around Christmas and went to the neighborhood park to ice skate on New Year's Day. It was very cold in The Netherlands during December and just before New Year's the canals and public skating areas were frozen solid enough to support ice skating. The canals have not frozen solid enough to support skating in a number of years, so people were very excited to finally have the opportunity to get out on the ice. The canals were packed with skaters of all ages and abilities on the weekends and after school. We had great fun skating when we could. During the last full moon, a few people were out skating in the moonlight. It really was a wonderful thing to see. The temperature rose and stayed above 0 in early January, so the ice has melted and I think outdoor skating might be finished for the season. But, it has been cold the past few days and it is even snowing today, so maybe we will ice skate again before spring arrives.
In late November, we saw the arrival of Sinterklaas and about 300 Zwarte Pieten from Spain. Unfortunately, the pictures did not turn out very well because we didn't have a very good vantage point in the massive crowd that gathered at the Scheveningen Harbor to see the SS Madrid arrive. From late November until December 5, Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet travel around Nederland and visit children. Sint Nicolaas Day is December 6 and that is when children receive gifts from Sinterklaas. And they get loads of gifts on Christmas too!
In November, we had a fabulous trip to Washington and Oregon for Thanksgiving. We visited with several friends and spent a few days with Steve's family. Given the unusual amount of snow at Christmas time affecting the Seattle and Olympia area, we are glad we chose to visit in November. Unfortunately, the house we are renting out in Olympia sustained a little damage from the weather and we are experiencing our first wave of repairs, frustrations, and related expenses associated with the rental. We hope those of you who are in the area made it through the snowy weather without any major mishaps and that you were safe from the recent flooding.
Also in November we took a day trip to Munster, Germany. It was a Sunday... so we learned a good lesson about traveling in Europe outside of the peak tourist season: many places are closed on Sundays. Munster is beautiful, however the day was not very fulfilling as we drove for a long time, arrived in town, parked the car, walked around, ate lunch, and then left and drove again for a long time to get home. I think our next trip to Germany will be more thoroughly researched. One great thing about Germany that doesn't seem to exist in The Netherlands is public toilets! We saw our first European roadside rest stop on the way to Munster. It was a very welcome sight.
We seem to have created somewhat of a routine and it feels more like we live here now. I am not saying we feel settled; everyday is still a learning experience. We have delayed unpacking many of our boxes because we have been hoping to move from this apartment, so we are still searching for things in boxes on a semi regular basis and still uncertain about how long we will stay. However, with much of the bureaucrazy of moving from the US behind us, we have finally been able to focus more on living here and getting to know our neighbors and community a little better. I finished a 12 week Dutch course in January (Steve's comment - Candi received a very high score on her exam!) , and will be starting the next level on February 3. Together Steve and I are absorbing more of what goes on around us, but it is still a guessing game most of the time.
We recently had dinner with some neighbors who made us a traditional Dutch meal including two varieties of homemade stamppot (a mix of mashed potatoes, cooked green vegetable, and one of several types of mystery meat) and griesmeel pudding for dessert. It was very good, and incredibly filling. It took us three days to be hungry again after that meal.
We discovered that for New Year's one of the the traditional sweets is oliebollen (literally "oil balls"), which, we are told, are a precursor to donuts. Oliebollen are only sold in sidewalk kiosks and bakeries during the couple of weeks before and after January 1. They are deep fried balls of dough (i.e. huge "donut holes") either plain or with currants and sprinkled with powdered sugar. Yummy. Also for New Year's the whole country goes crazy with fireworks. We have never seen anything like it. It put our Fourth of July to shame and I think it even surpassed the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympics. The major differences here are, all the fireworks are set off by random people in the streets. The show is not a publicly sponsored event put on by professionals and it doesn't just last 15 - 20 minutes; it goes on for hours. Standing on our patio was like being in the center of an Omnidome theater with fireworks blasting from every possible direction. The downside of it all was that the air was thick with smoke through the next day and the streets were littered with firework debris for weeks afterward. Not pretty. We read in the paper that the population of the Netherlands (approx.16,645,313) spent 65 million euros on fireworks for New Year's. Incredible.
All in all the Christmas holiday and New Year's were interesting and filled with new and unusual experiences, however, we both found ourselves missing home and longed to be with family and friends.
This past weekend we got off the continent for a few days and spent a fabulous weekend in London, England. It was a very relaxing travel experience since were were somewhat familiar with London from previous visits, but we also got to experience several new things. Since we were lucky to have some sunshine, we walked for miles and miles despite the cold, windy weather. Of course we were happy to warm ourselves in pubs with hearty food and great British beer.
We are looking forward to visits from friends and family in the next few months and we are planning a few trips to see more of Europe. We hope to share more travel stories and pictures in future updates. We wish you and yours all the best in 2009.
Here is a link to some recent photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/Candi.Wines/January2009?authkey=ZTg-C1_lIIY#
Cheers!
Steve and Candi
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