Category: life

By the way, you can text me at 06-20678810. Don’t expect a text back every time though. It costs me way more than you 😉

I’ll email my Bulgarian number around soon. No time today, sorry.

Well.. what can I say… this is a slightly different world. Wish I could upload pictures already, but I need to find a better internet center first.

A few things that struck me:
– Advertising EVERYWHERE. Imagine a marketeers wet-dream and then times two. It’s like they’re compensating for all the communistic years.
– Bad maintenance. I wonder how many people break their necks each year on the pavements. And then there’s the buildings, which look like they’re slowly crumbling to pieces.
– Less graffiti than in Holland. More basic styles most of the time, but when they go beyond the basic styles, it’s really a style of it’s own.
– People drive like crazy. My taxi trip from the airport to the hotel was very exciting 😉
– The center is packed with beautiful buildings. However my Lonely Planet guide says it’s mostly limited to the center.

Okay, I got to email some people and then head out to have a look at some appartments.

This is going to be a short one, because I’m really tired now. What a day, what a day. Trouble with cars, metro’s, bureaucracy, lost MP3-player chargers, lost pieces of paper I need, etc. etc. You can imagine what happens when you do stuff at the last possible moment 😉

Some highlights:
– Called Janneke in Ireland from my parents’ house. Spoke to her one final time before leaving. Was tough to hang up.
– Called my grandparents to say goodbye.
– Visited Anton (Bulgarian friend who helped me secure the placement) and received some great Bulgarian hospitality. He gave me a list of numbers I can call in Bulgaria. Friends of his. Awesome.
– Said goodbye to my brothers.

Charging all my electronic equipment and loading some more music onto my MP3-player. It’s gonna be a good trip and a great time.

Thanks for all the support people!

Well, what a great start of the day. I’m on the phone, calling my school to find out if there’s anyone there. We get into my mom’s car. While I’m wondering why we’re not driving away, I find out that there’s nobody in and I need them to sign some forms before I go. I hang up to find out the car’s battery is dead.

I grab my bike to go to the city’s administration so I can indicate I’m temporarily not residing in Holland. They gave me forms to fill out, get signed by one of my parents and I needed to bring copies of my passports. After doing that, I decided to call my school again and managed to get someone on the phone who said that it’s likely people won’t be in today.

Awesome. This day can only get better now.

To-do:
– Meet up with Anton (he’s Bulgarian and can hook me up with some contacts in Sofia, I guess, but besides that, he’s a friend I haven’t seen in a while);
– Pack;
– Decide on whether to buy shoes today or not;
– Hand in former work clothes at my former work place.

I guess that’s about it. I so don’t feel like this. Updates later.

UPDATED

– Say goodbye to friends, family and girlfriend;
– Find a place to live;
– Book a hotel room to stay at while I find a place to live;
– Get in touch with placement supervisor;
– Keep harassing my school to get in touch with my placement;
– Party my ass off;
– Get an extra insurance;
– Notify Dutch government I’m leaving;
– Hand in student travel card for extra study finance;

That’s about it. Looks doable.

Oh I forgot…
– Move out of apartment, store stuff somewhere;
– Pack!

So I figured I’d go out and have a chance to say bye to some of my friends. I took some pictures. Some ok, some horrible. Award goes to Thomas for looking the absolute worst on one of the pictures ;-).

Technorati Tags: friendship, club, party, pictures

Another thing DONE! I’ve moved all my stuff to my parents’ house and am going to stay there for the next few days. This is not totally true, because tonight I’ll be seeing friends and staying over at my mate Bouwe, who lives in the same building as I do/did. If you feel like meeting up, head over to the Tivoli in Utrecht after midnight. The picture to the right is my dad and little brother, Mark, who both helped out great. As you can see, we were well on our way of clearing my room.

There was some stuff in my room that I had no use for, but I didn’t want to waste it by throwing it away either. Sustainability and recycling begins at home, in this case literally. So what I did is the following, I put whatever I didn’t want in the hallway and put a “Free Stuff” sign over it. Someone must be interested in one of my books, instrument thingies (don’t know the name, you blow them and they give this buzzy sound), inflatable boxing plastic thing, or magazines. Don’t throw away what you can give away.

Technorati Tags: moving, house, blog, freeganism, sharing, recycliing, sustainability

Last night I said goodbye to Dou and  today I’m moving out of my appartment with a hangover. It was a nice night, we spent it at Len’s work at a beach bar in Amsterdam. Bought some bottles of wine and had a good time with Dou playing the music. Len, have fun in Denmark. Dou, see you when I get back. Pictures on Flickr!

Time to move!

Technorati Tags: friends, party, blog, goodbye

What a day. Said goodbye to my girlfriend at the airport, because she’s going to Ireland for two weeks, but when she comes back I’m gone. Her friends were there too and said goodbye for 2 weeks.. I had to say goodbye to her and her friends for 5 months. Wasn’t as hard as I expected. A bit surrealistic, because in just one week, it’s going to be me walking through the customs and waving goodbye.

Too much stuff to do to really let this settle. I expect it to hit me later, when things calm down, but who knows.

If you read this in Ireland, have a nice holiday. See you ’round.