Saturday, July 24, 2010

Delft July 2010

C: Oh Delft! Home of Vermeer and... well, Delftware. Your canals are so lovely, not full of bodies like Amsterdam's! We are here to work on a project with www.id11.nl at an old school building from the turn of last century that is currently being converted into artist's studios etc. http://www.kadmium.nl/.

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C: Having said that, parallel parking must be terrifying, there is nothing stopping you from reversing into a canal.

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C: We were shown (by Art, one of the wonderful people from Kadmium-the school we're projecting in) this amazing op shop yesterday. It's called Flinstones, and if I had a house here (or we weren't already way over EU luggage allowance) I would have walked away with a Bobby's helmet and a huge ceramic collie.

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Poodle? Check. Ice-skates? Check. Operation Icy-Poodle is go!

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C: Sometimes, when you're traveling, you see some pretty random things. The trick is to just accept it. I've accepted that the Netherlands issues drivers licenses to giant worms. Like, whatever.

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C: Also, cars are pretty small here. This is basically considered a van.

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C: We are staying in an apartment with another couple near the Technical University, which is huge (despite only teaching architecture, engineering, science etc.). It's the size of a Melbournian suburb, absolutely massive. Also, they have a Millennium Faclon!

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C: Those crazy Dutch! It's all very civilised, what with the nerds, no keg parties or anything. Although they do have a Goose gang. Someone (I'm looking at you, Mum) told me a terrifying story about being attacked by a marauding goose as a child (when I was a child) and I've had a vicarious fear of them since. D's kind enough to humor me and cross to the other side of the lake when they're looking particularly nasty.

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C: Shops are fantastic here! Once you accept that, as a foreigner sans Dutch, you're never going to find anything useful (supermarket, chemist, gin distillery), you just relax into the wonderful ateliers. This is an Art Deco lighting shop we strolled past today. Gimmie Gimmie!

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C: Hmm... what else? The food is amazing, our fridge looks like a cheese shop. Gorgeous giant foxgloves grow like weeds here, outside everyone's houses.

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C: And here's our lovely flatmates (who are also part of the project), Adam and Keiko.

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C: And last of all, here's me, captured by that rascally gentleman photographer. I'm trying to dye my hair, but was too lazy to run the instructions through Google Translate (tm). Wish me luck!

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Domburg July 2010

C: After Amsterdam, we jumped on the train and headed down to Domburg, in Zeeland (Sealand!) to stay in a castle. Alas, we didn't arrive by helicopter, I totally stole this picture from their website because I was too damn relaxed to take photos.

We did go for an afternoon bicycle ride through the forest though, and saw a baby deer. I wanted to take him home but he ran off. There's also a lovely beach nearby, where we went for a little spashie.

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C: All very civilised! I had to prepare some stuff for uni that resulted in an all-nighter, so it was nice to just ride about. Everyone here has those lovely old vintage-style bicycles (the ones Melbourne hipsters pay silly amounts for so they can pretend they're in Helsinki), it's really sweet seeing little old people riding along the canals. Having said that, the Netherlands is possibly the flattest country in the world, so...

Amsterdam July 2010

C: So after less-than-favourable previous Amsterdam experiences, we weren't all that enthusiastic about spending two nights here. Well in our faces! It ended up being really nice. We stayed in Amsterdam Zuid (South, apparently. Which I discovered weeks later after getting on the bus and asking for Zweed-port, confusing the driver, my friend explained it was pronounced South!-port. The 'south' part is all shouty).

Anywho! It was really nice, we stayed in a hotel from space and the future, each room's 'atmosphere' is controlled my a little gadget, and the shower and toilet pods are like something from, well, future-space. D kept turning the lights dark red (aka 'evil room is going to eat you atmosphere') while I was powdering my nose.


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C: An speak of the devil(room), here he is, in 'dreamy' mode.

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C: And me!

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