In 2003 Mr Cool and I moved to London for 18 months. It was the coolest thing I have ever done, bar making people that is! We had such a blast, but it was hard as well and we learnt so much. We ate our way through various countries, taught in some really really bad schools, met some fabulous people and found that our Mr Cool and I are actually, quite simply, perfect for each other.
Way back then, people didn't really have blogs, but I began sending emails home to friends and family, telling tales of our travels. It was a great way to journal about what had been going on and sharing the crazy, embarrassing and nutty things we got up to. The fun thing was that my friends and family would forward my emails on to their friends. Random people would email me asking to get added to my email send out - talk about flattery! It was great. So, now, all these years later, I thought I might add them to my blog, as 'Vintage B' items. It is a great way to remember our travel tales and also some hilarious moments!
These posts are not edited or formatted in anyway, they are literally plucked from the 'Airport' and pasted onto the blog post thingie. I really want them to be authentic travel tales. So, if there are errors, I apologise, I was probably in the middle of bustling Covent Garden avoiding spilling my coffee on the terminal, or a caravan park in Wales with hippies cueing up behind me to use the internet, or bobbing somewhere in the Mediterranean while my dinner table was being set.
I hope you enjoy them. Beware, there are lots and they are being chosen randomly.
Mwah,
Date: Sunday, 20 April 2003
Subject: Belindaland: Bikes, Spekalaas and Wild Roosters
Hello from Holland!
What a great time we are having here in the land of my
parents. It is strange, but my parents actually make
more sense to me now that I have been here. When I
was young I used to get really embarrassed when my
parents spoke to strangers, everyone here does that.
When my mum wanted our attention (like in a winkel
(shop) or something - she would make this high pitched
"yoooo hooo" sound - and of course I would be
embarrassed. Here everyone does it, which really
renders the sound and the waving of the arm useless.
I used to get embarrassed by so many things, only to
realise that there is an entire country of people who
say, "heh heh" whenever they sit down, or talk to
animals as if they are real, or require at least one
deep fried item to constitute a meal, or who like to
have 'lekkers' with their coffee. Although my dad
would probably be keen to know that I have not seen
anyone wearing socks and sandals.
Before we came I had a list of about five things that
I wanted to do whilst in Holland, and about a dozen
things that I would like to eat. So far I haven't
touched the list of things to do, but I have eaten a
lot of the local 'lekkers'(yummy things). Potat met
mayo 4/5, Spekalaas (spiced biscuits) met coffee (yes
Catherine it was warm too, and I did think of you!)
5/5, Croquette (not as good as my mum's!) 3/5, Satay
met pinda saus (satay with peanut sauce, of course
served with potat) 5/5, many varieties of Hagel
(sugary stuff you put on bread etc) 3/5, and so much
drop (salted licorice) ... the side effects are not to
be discussed!
We are staying in a town called Apeldoorn with a
friend of my sister Wendy's called Iris (Wendy
actually lived here for two years). It is nice to
stay with someone rather than in a hotel or something.
We have been given the main bedroom of Iris's house
which is gorgeous and she is taking very good care of
us and giving us lots of advice. Apeldoorn is so nice
(moi) it is clean, tidy, friendly and just ....
gorgeous. It is a lot like my home town in many ways,
but different too. There are bike paths everywhere
and we have been riding bikes everyday, either into
town, getting lost or into the forest. We are really
loving it.
Because the last few weeks have been so flat out, we
didn't actually plan as much as we should have, so we
arrived in Holland with no clear plan of what we
wanted to do or see. It was a bit frustrating, but it
gave us the chance to just rest. We slept late, ate
lots, rode bikes and kicked around basically, which we
both really needed. It also gave us the chance to
plan what we were going to do.
Yesterday we went to a town in the North of Holland
called Groningen. It is near where my mother is from.
It was a gorgeous day with blue skies, a bit fresh,
but a perfect day out. We walked into the town square
to find that it was the annual Easter flower market,
it was so nice just walking along looking at the
flowers and people watching and just being swept along
by the crowd. We had lunch there, looked through the
infamous Groningen museum, had coffee and had more of
a look around. Just a nice day out looking around.
The train trip was just gorgeous, the Dutch
countryside is just so lovely. Looking out the
windows of the train onto lush green fields with
thatch roofed houses and windmills, there were sheep
grazing, rabbits hopping and deer wandering ... it was
like being in a post card.
On the way back we had to change trains at a place
called Zwolle. We looked at the timetable and
realised that the train we had to take was leaving in
one minute, so we ran for it, jumped on just in time.
We were happily sitting on the train, when it stopped.
We looked out and didn't recognise it, or the name,
Kampen. So we jumped up and we ran out of the train.
There was a man on the platform who I am sure was a
bit nutters, but didn't offer any help, just looked at
us and laughed. We found the timetable and looked up
when the next train would come, we realise about 10
seconds too late that the train we were on, was the
next train to leave, it only went from Zwolle to
Kampen.
So, we found ourselves in a lovely little place on a
river with a cool bridge and a killer sunset for forty
minutes. We walked along the bridge and sat on the
viewing platform, and as it would happen a big boat
came along and the middle section of the bridge was
hauled up to allow the boat to go through. It was so
cool! We were glad that we caught the wrong train or
we never would have seen that! When we went back to
the platform, the nutter was back and started saying
something to us, probably: "You stupid tourists, you
don't know the difference between your clogs and your
kopf". I thought about unleashing my amazing
bi-lingual swearing prowess, but I wasn't sure how a
nutter would react to being called a mouldy cheese
head.
Tomorrow we go to a place called Maastricht. There is
a famous bike race there (of course) that we are going
to watch. It is also meant to be a lovely medieval
city. It will be nice to just be the two of us for a
while. From there we go to Amsterdam for four days.
That is going to be great, we are hoping to go on a
canal cruise, to the Van Gogh Musuem, Anne Franke
House, Rommel marts and the place where my father
lived before he immigrated to Australia. It is going
to be great.
I have proved not to be such a good travel companion
for Mike of late. We were in a museum and I thought
that we were approaching a mirror, but I wasn't quite
sure, so I stood back to see if Mike ran into it
first. Then we were having potat met mayo from the
traditional paper cone, I saw that others were using
the little fork that came with the chips to eat -
rather than get their fingers greasy. I thought Mike
would realise this, but he was at the bottom of his
cone with mayo up to his armpits when he stumbled upon
the little fork. I am also struggling with the
driving on the different side of the road thing,
yesterday I very nearly had Mike run over by a bicycle
taxi, he just kept pushing him to the left to get out
the road - which was actually dead in line for a
fatality!
Last Saturday we became official travellers/Londoners.
Mike was pick pocketed. It was awful - he has been
so careful and made sure his wallet was always in the
front pocket of his jeans - and it was still
'jacked'(nicked as we would say). We rang some
friends to check what to do, cancelled the cards and
then went home. Our friends then made us dinner and
assured us that it happens to everyone at least once.
Thankfully it was the end of a shopping day - so there
wasn't much cash left. The timing was rotten as we
were relying on Mike's credit card for emergency funds
while in Holland. The biggest concern of ours was
that his Australian drivers license was taken, which
we thought would be really hard to replace - thanks to
Mike's super parents, it is all sorted. (Oh, the
problem was that Mike wouldn't be able to drive
overseas using his international licence without his
Australian one as proof).
Well, that is about it (finally) from me. Oh, Mike
wanted everyone to know that he made a complete
transaction in the Hema (yes W we found it) without
using any English. Mind you, putting things on a
counter and handing over cash is the same in any
language! But seriously, I cannot believe how well
Mike has picked up the language, he is 'ja'ing and
'nee'ing and 'danke'ing left right and centre. I am a
bit too shy to try this, but have been surprised at how
many words and phrases I recognise (potat, frites,
croquette, sla).
I hope you all have a nice Paas - Easter and remember
that it is a day of celebration for the rising of our
Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Wish I could give you
all a big hug, and thanks for the emails and
electronic cards, it is so nice to hear from home.
Lots of Love,
B
P.S. I just realise that in the title I mentioned
Wild Roosters! This is actually written on a road
sign and it means that there is grate or a cattle grid
in the road. It made me think of long drives with my
parents through the outback where there are cattle
grids everywhere, we would go over one, nearly have
our teeth rattled out and dearest Patricia would yell
out "GRID!" and we would all laugh and laugh. So now
Trish, you can yell out "WILD ROOSTER!"
