Apr 3, 2015

Winterbreak - Home, Paris, Terschelling and Seattle

During winter break I decided to go home, mostly because I was missing my family. Being home was great - I got to see my family and best friends, I got to celebrate Christmas with family and friends, and I got to eat Dutch food again.

The first week of break was hectic. I met up with lots of friends, hang out with my family, celebrated Christmas about three times and went to parties. It was great to see how everyone was doing, but I have to admit that it freaked me out a little bit that my little brother and sister were growing up so fast. I still can't really believe how fast time goes, and how fast the people around you change. Most of my friends had moved out of their family's houses and were busy with their own studies and their new student life.

The beginning of the second week of break, my family, Marise (Julie her best friend) and I spent in Paris. We had a great time visiting the Eiffel tower, Musee D'Orsay, the Grand Palais and more. Paris is gorgeous, and every time we visit there are new things that catch my attention. Whenever we were not in some tourist attraction, we were either driving around or enjoying the French cuisine.

After a short pitstop in Haarlem, we left for Terschelling. We spent the last day of 2014 and the beginning of 2015 with both the family and some family friends. We walked around on the beach, "raved" in our hotel room and spent most of our time eating. It was a pretty good time.

Terschelling was fun, and after we spent some more time with family and close friends back home. It was soon time to leave the Netherlands again and go back to the U.S. Luckily I didn't go straight back to school: I got to spent some time with family friends in Seattle. I made it there in time, but my luggage sadly didn't.

In Seattle, I went to the movies quite a couple of times. I watched Selma with a bunch of college kids that I met on the day itself, The Imitation Game (great great movie) with Amy and Lynn and a documentary on the maintaining of sea life in a beautiful part of the world (I have no recollection of the name of this movie, but is was in an ONIMAX theater and it was beautiful) with Amy and Eric.

I didn't spent all of my time in the movie theaters: I also got to shop a little and see more of the city. Just like when I visited Seattle with my dad, I visited the Pike Place Market and the Seattle Museum of Art (SAM). Both are amazing. The market is adorable and the SAM had some gorgeous new expositions. After a couple of days with some amazing people in an amazing city, it was really time to get back to school.

Making dinner with Tessa


Serious Request in Haarlem

Jopenkerk with Hannah

Grace Kelly exposition with mom, Val, Jules and I

Christmas & Meeting a new family member for the first time!

Paris

Me, Jules, Marise

Oh Christmas...

Louvre, Paris

Family picture! Walter, me, Valerie and Julie in front of the Eiffel tower

Happy New Year!

Terschelling

Jules & I

Walter, Felix and Eduard in Terschelling

Goodbye again...

Pike Place Market, Seattle

Seattle Art Museum (SAM)

Making new friends!


Mar 31, 2015

End of the First Semester!

Time flies... The first semester ended after some hectic weeks. Here are some pictures of my last weeks at Wittenberg in 2014!

Hanging out with Vicky and Sarah

Dessert with Stas

Studying for my finals with Stas

During finals week - Maddy, Alex and I's last time out with David!

The bar - McMurrys

Apple store with Jenna and Martin - Martin broke his phone again

Coloring and puzzling with Riley and Elizabeth

Michelle and Carl during our pizza party

Michelle, Riley, Elizabeth and I had a pizza party on my last night on campus

Last time hanging out with the bunch of us

Saying goodbye to David

Bye bye Ohio, see you in 2015!

Sinterklaas and Secret Santa

The weeks before winter break were busy. Everyone had final projects and exams, and on top of that the holidays and break were coming. The Dutchies at Wittenberg wanted to celebrate Sinterklaas (a Dutch holiday) and invited some Dutch students (Seymour and David, both studying at Denison) over to celebrate it with them. We all had to buy two gifts of a total of $10 to $15 dollars. We ended up playing a cart game to divide the gifts over the bunch of us. We had lots of fun and got to show the fellow Dutchies both Wittenberg and Wittenberg its nightlife. Of course we also introduced them to the not so impressing CDR food, but studying in America themselves they already knew what that was like.

A day later the field hockey team celebrated Christmas. The field hockey team had decided to celebrate Christmas together by playing Secret Santa. Everyone bought a present and we played a game in which everyone got a number. The lowest number had to pick a gift and unwrap it. After that, the second lowest could either "steal" the gift of someone that went before them, or they could pick out a gift themselves. I ended up getting a cute gift with some random thing in it, under which a pretty cool hat.

On the same day, the internationals also decided to play Secret Santa, but played a cart game instead of the game we played with the team. One again everyone had brought two presents, and at the end of the game everyone had two presents to keep. I was pretty ecstatic about what I won. At the end of the day we all went out together and we ended up having a pizza party :)

Sinterklaas with other Dutchies

Car opening her gift

Party with the other Dutchies!

Secret Santa with the team

Sarah & I both got a pretty neat hat

Team picture!

Anne opening her first gift! It contained tampons...

Secret Santa with the internationals

Action picture

Secret Santa in Rayika & I's room

Pizza party!


Thanksgiving Break: Indianapolis and Chicago!

A while ago, we got a couple of days off: it was Thanksgiving break! A lot of students decided to just skip their monday and tuesday classes to go home early, but most people their break started tuesday, after their classes. Me and Riley left right after our Public Speaking class, heading towards her family in Thanksgiving to celebrate (my first) Thanksgiving!

On the first day, we didn't really do anything. We spent the entire day as couch potatoes, watching episode after episode of American Horror Story. The only other things we did that day were eating and going to the cinema to watch Mockingjay (which was a pretty cool movie).

The second day was Thanksgiving. We rolled out of bed around noon and spent the rest of the day eating lots of traditional food, getting to know each other and playing games.

The day after Thanksgiving was Black Friday: most stores had crazy stores, which in turn attracted crazy people. We drove to Chicago early in the morning and by the time we arrived, the craziness was already at its high. We spent the weekend wandering and shopping in Chicago.


Indianapolis


Chicago at night


Chicago's nightlife


Walking from one part of Chicago to another


Iceskating rink in the Millennium Park


Chicago Museum of Art


Dinner with the family


Riley & I in the hotel we were staying at


On our way back to Springfield