Dad visits! - Chicago

I was beyond excited when my dad told me that he was going to visit me. I couldn't wait for him to see where I was currently living, for him to meet my friends and for him to get a taste of what my life in the U.S. was like. I was also a little excited to eat food that wasn't form the CDR, to leave campus and get to see some more of the U.S. My dad arrived Friday afternoon and after giving him a first glance at campus and at my room, we left to have dinner together. I didn’t realise how much I had missed my dad until I saw him again.

We didn't make it a late night on Friday, because early Saturday morning we wanted to drive to Chicago. The drive took a little longer than we had anticipated, because the Ohio weather had decided overnight that it was time for quite some inches of snow. During the drive, we made a few pit stops, one of them being the Waffle House for some breakfast. It was my first time ever eating there, and it was endearing to see that people from the village that we were in all came there to have a cup of tea or coffee and to chat a little about the weather. We made it to Chicago in the afternoon. Our first stop was an outlet centre, to get the shopping out of the way ;) We bought way more than we were planning to, and found gifts for most of our family members. The drive and the shopping had tired us out a little, so we once again didn't make it a late night, planning on making the most of the following day in Chicago.

Sunday was amazing. It was freezing outside, but in the sun the cold didn't seem so bad. We spent a good part of our day in the Millennium Park. Not only did we walk around, enjoying the skyline, sculptures and the Bean, we also went ice-skating. It was fun to finally ice skate again (I realised that I did really miss this) and it was even more fun to do so with my dad. After a while we got tired and decided to hop onto the underground to get to the Museum of Science and Industry, one of the best museums in Chicago. The museum was incredibly large and had many interactive exhibitions that could keep my attention all day long. When the museum closed, and we had to leave, we decided to go out for dinner and to see Kingsman in a movie theatre close to our hotel. It was a busy but fun day.

Monday was our last day in Chicago and we made sure to make the most out of it. We were so intrigued by the Museum of Science and Industry, that we decided to go again. We had barely seen half of it on Sunday, but had seen most of it at the end of Monday. We also got to see a documentary in the ONIMAX theatre in the museum on D-Day. I had no idea about some of the behind the scenes actions and strategies that were used on that day, and am still impressed by how precise the plan of invasion was. To make this experience even cooler, we got to see one of the very few U-boats that were captured during the war. I cannot get over how interesting it was to see one of them in real life, and to learn more about their role and about how big their role in the war was. After the museum we went to the Watertower, where we got dinner and where we were trying to find a gift for mom and Jules. We spent our last night in Chicago catching up.

Dad arrives in Springfield

On our way to Chicago

Breakfast at the Waffle House

Millennium Park - Dad and The Bean

Millennium Park - The Bean

Millennium Park

Open Theater in the Millennium Park

Iceskating with dad in the Millennium Park

The Pear and The Bean

Taking a break from iceskating

Museum of Science and Industry

A real U-Boat in the Museum of Science and Industry

Museum of Science and Industry

Italian!

Chicago

Last breakfast in Chicago

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Parties

Every weekend there are parties at Wittenberg, Most of them are closed, some of them are open. I try to make it to all the parties that I get invited to, because it's a great place to catch up with people, to have fun and to make new friends. Often, after a house party, people go to the bar to hang out and dance some more, and sometimes people go the bar simply to get a pizza.  While most parties don't have a theme and are just relaxed, playing sprite-pong and getting on a sugar high of sprite, a lot of parties do have a theme and I love it.

Some of my favourite parties here at Wittenberg were "highlighter parties". The theme is simple: wear a white t-shirt that may be ruined. At the parties, there are highlighters everywhere for everyone to use. You write on people their shirts and they write on yours. Because of the backlights that they use at these parties, everyone can see what people wrote on you. It's lots of fun and the t-shirts are great souvenirs from a fun time.

One of the more recent parties I was at had four themes - one of them being Mexican. I personally didn't really have any Mexican clothes, or colourful clothes in general for that matter, and borrowed an Aztec dress from Neo. Martin invited me to this party and it was lots of fun to see everyone dressed up differently. Once again I had a great time drinking sprite, dancing and playing sprite-pong.

On Valentine's Day I had two fun parties to go to, both with the same theme: while they weren't formals, the theme was. I dressed in a red dress and started the night pre-gaming and getting my ticket into the bar at the blue house. After hanging out there for a while, me and my friend Akbar went to the first party. There were lots of snakes here and it was fun to hang out with them again.  After a while, Akbar, Tom, Francesca, Anna and I went to the next party by car because there was snow and ice everywhere (don’t worry we were all completely sober). The party was held on the second floor of the bar, and the sprite was taken care of. Anna, Francesca and I were the only snakes in a sea of DG's, but we had lots of fun. The party ended at 12, after which everyone moved downstairs to continue their night at the bar.

Parties are lots of fun and once again a great place to have fun, hang out with friends and to meet people and make new friends. If you are a prospective student reading this: please go to lots of the open parties in the beginning of the year! This is the way to not only get invites to closed parties, but also to meet people that you would have never met if it wasn't for those parties. Some of my best friends now I met during those parties, in the beginning of the year. Also, know that there is no pressure to drink sprite (or alcohol for that matter): no one cares about whether you are sober, on a sugar high or drunk: they only care about getting to know you and about (you) having fun.

Highlighter party - Everyone had neon paint on their face

The highlighter party

The highlighter party

Party with Josh, Alex and Jenny

Dumb & Dumber

Selty, Kiersten and I

Valentine's with Bebeto

Valentine's with Micky and Martin

Valentine's with Mac and Elizabeth

Valentine's with Amanda

Snakepit at the bar! With Anna and Francesca

Rave/ Highlighter party with Akbar

Friends! Meghan, Sabrina and Nicole

Twins!

Victoria & Maria at the rave

Rave

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Wittenberg Field Hockey Tigers

Being a Field Hockey Tiger for Wittenberg University is amazing. The team is great, we're like one big family. We meet up quite often, having four practices of 2,5 each and two games a week, and often have study tables or parties with each other. We meet up an hour/ half an hour before practice to get dressed and chat, dance and sing the hour away. After practice, we all take a quick shower and get dinner together. If you need help with one of your subjects, there's always an upperclassmen that's there to help you. If you need to go to the store, there's always someone willing to drive you there. I love my teammates. The coaches and sports doctors are great too, they're always there to help you, give individual practices, tips, etc. and are so nice. Even though season is really intense, it's lots of fun too. Here is a preview of a(n away) game day.

Game day

Departure - If we're having an away game, we meet up about half an hour before we're supposed to depart. We get a bag that we fill with our uniforms, shoes, mouthguard, shampoo etc. and make sure that our Tiger Buddies get the packages we prepared for them, without finding out that who their Tiger Buddy is. When we have everything we need, we bring our stuff to the bus and get to our seats, taking our own Tiger Buddy package, schoolbag, a blanket and a pillow with. The drive, whether it is one or four hours away, is filled with doing homework, watching movies, listening to music, chatting, and sleeping.

Two hours before - Everyone is in the locker room, getting dressed, seeing the sports doctors, re-reading the report on the team we're about to play against. We listen to music with the volume turned all the way up, dancing an getting pumped up for the game. Fifteen minutes before we're supposed to walk to the field, we all exchange our individual goals and pump each other up a bit more.

An hour before - Time to start with our warmup. We walk to the field in pairs of two, usually in our practice jersey while carrying our game jersey and stick. We do our usual routine, which consists of running, one vs. ones, the "W"-shaped offense drill, a four vs. four attack/ defense drill, corners and tip-ins. 

The game - We switch our practice jerseys for our game jerseys and line up in order of our numbers. In two long lines, both teams walk up to the middle of the field and spread out into one long line of players and coaches. The game commentator gives some information about the game and starts with voicing both start-ups: every player that starts the game gets named, once again in order of our numbers, and gets a round of applause from both the other players and the audience. After voicing both start-ups, everyone is asked to take of their heads, face the American flag and sing with the national anthem (players put their right hand on the right shoulder of the player in front of them). After this, both teams do a quick yell and it's time for the game to begin.

During the game, the players that are not in the field support their team by cheering them up and acting as if they are assistant coached. When a player on the field switches with someone who's on the bench, the commentator let's the audience know who switched for who. When someone scores, the commentator lets the audience know who scored. When someone gets a penalty corner, the commentator will let you know. Everyone can see the competing teams, remaining time, the score etc. on the score board, and the entire game is videotaped.

It's quite an experience.

Team dinner in the CDR

Team Roster - The Wittenberg Field Hockey Team 2014-2015

The Wittenberg Field Hockey Freshmen of Class 2018

Bus ride with the team / With Carlijn, the other Dutchie on the team

 Wittenberg vs. Oberlin(I'm #18)

Wittenberg vs. Oberlin (I'm #18)

Getting ready for a party with some teammates

Field Hockey Roster

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Fun Fact Friday!

So… I meant to post this on friday, to make it a legitimate fun fact friday, but I totally forgot.. My bad! I've been busy. We had a stay over in Indiana last week, which means that we had two away games in a row and stayed over in a hotel. Then on monday, I went to the movies with Maria and Riley. The cinema was in a super sketchy neighborhood so I was really on edge, and the movie (If I Stay) was so depressing and beautiful that we cried for half the movie and came out all teary eyed and red nosed. The week went by in blur and I had my first Witt Wednesday (wednesday is the biggest party day at Witt). I went to a fraternity party and had a blast: I met a lot of nice new people who kept introducing me to others ("Guys, come here, one of the Dutchies is here!!"). Then this saturday, we had another stay over, in Ohio this time, and won twice :)

Anyways: since we have fun fact fridays every week (everyone shares fun facts with each other), I decided to do a fun fact friday about Wittenberg! So here are some fun facts about Witt.. 

• We wear our dorm keys as bracelets. We attach a (rubber) band to our keys so that we can wear them, because honestly, everyone loses their keys. All the time. One of my teammates had to get her lock replaced twice already because she lost hers. 
• We have puppies and kittens all over campus. The puppies are part of a project on Wittenberg, where students help raise guide dogs. We have the most adorable labradors walking around and everyone loves them. The students love the kittens, that are actually homeless, as well. Some of them have been adopted already, but the ones that haven't been yet aren't having a hard time either. Students buy them water bowls and cat food all the time and everyone loves petting them. The faculty members are not necessarily as happy about it as the students are.
• In the CDR (the cafeteria), there is this huge ass piano that people like playing on. This means that there are almost always students making live music while you're having dinner, which is so nice.
• Student-Athletes are super easy to spot. You can recognize them so easily. A lot of them just wear sports clothes, all day, almost every day. If they're wearing normal clothes, you can recognize them because they carry around their water bottle everywhere (we have to, because we have to stay hydrated and stuff) and because they have the worst and the weirdest tan lines. 
• There is always something to do. There is always a comedian, a play, a fair, a party, a game or something going on. We have over a hundred clubs that organize fun things to do all the time. You want to go to a museum? Big chance that the history is going on a trip somewhere this week. You want to climb mountains and see caves? There's a cave club for that. Want to participate in martial arts, an acapella group or play quidditch? Just find their club. There is literally always something to do, so you'll never get bored.
• Pillow pets are hot. They're the cutest things and everyone has them. It's basically a pillow and a stuffed animal in one, and they're the best. You can buy a turtle, dog, bee, bear, unicorn.. I've seen it all. And I'm buying one as soon as I get off campus again.
• The biggest, most popular and most fun tradition that we have on Wittenberg, is streaking. Everyone has to streak down the Hollow at least one during their four years on Wittenberg. The Hollow is this hill on campus, that leads to the Synod Hall, which is next to the police office on campus. You get rid of your clothes on top of the Hollow, run down naked, touch the doors of the Synod Hall with your naked butt, and run back up the hill again to get dressed. A lot of people enjoy the rush so much that they take it a step higher and make a goal out of streaking through all of the buildings on campus before they graduate as well, which I think is hilarious. Me and Carlijn couldn't ignore a tradition like this and made sure to be one of the first of our year. (Those red chairs on the Hallow are so cute and they're everywhere on campus. People learn, hang out and sleep in those chairs all of the time. They make our campus even prettier and more fun.)

I miss you guys!

The key to my dorm can also be worn as a necklace

The cutest puppies ever (next to Yess of course)

Lunch with the team - Look out for those tan lines!

A comedian - I ended up with my mouth being duct taped

Pillow Pets

The Hollow

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Columbus - Day 3 & 4 + Tanger Outlet

On day 3 in Columbus, my mom had a lot of work to do and the hotel room still smelled like smoke. This is why Julie and I spent hours exploring the gym, pool and supermarket. The gym and pool were empty, so we used all the space we could get to do… nothing really. After a couple of hours we got bored and went to a Wholefoods Supermarket, a biological supermarket, to get our lunch. 

After our lunch, my mom was done working and we decided to pay Easton another visit. We went to a candy store and some clothes stores, but the candy store was definitely the coolest. Because we went to Easton before, we didn't spent too long there. We went to my all time favorite American restaurant Steak 'n Shake and decided to go to bed early.

We spent most of our fourth day in Columbus in the Columbus Museum of Art, an amazing museum with lots of cool do-it-yourself's (we made some art pieces ourselves), interactive art pieces and paintings. Mom even got dressed up. The nice lady that gave us our tickets heard about me going to Wittenberg University and got me a host family while we were in the museum, how sweet!

When we had seen all of the museum, we went from one big store (Five Below) to another big store (Target) to get some presents for the family and to get some last things for my dorm room, which will be my room in two days!

On Wednesday, it was time to go to Springfield. We went to the Tanger Outlet on the way to Springfield (not really on the way, but it was close enough) and spent hours in many stores, which resulted in buying a lot of new jeans, shirts, jackets, etc. for not only ourselves, but for my dad, brother and sister as well. After a lot of puzzling we were able to get everything in the car. We can't deny looking (and acting) a bit like shopaholics.

Our hotel room in Columbus

The Candy Factory in Easton

Steak 'n Shake - Best milkshakes ever

Mom dresses up nicely in The museum of Art in Columbus

The museum of Art in Columbus

We might've went overboard with the shopping..

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