Asia's Sail Away birthday party in Den Haag

Finally, finally, finally I can post these pictures! I was almost getting sick of seeing them on my desktop already.

Schrobbenmaster's Polish friend, Asia (pronounced Asha) had a costume party for her birthday on May 1. The theme was Sail Away, but only a few ppl came dressed in 'costume'. Most just made the effort to wear stripes.

There was a live band called Vuigtuig (try saying that aloud and you'll probably get it wrong - not talking to you, eenbrauw). They were pretty good, I liked their music, kind of a moody punk sound.

Watch the video below for a sample of the music. It starts soft and slow so you'll first hear the buzz of the crowd, but wait a bit and it'll become nicer.

Snake Plissken from Escape from... LA?

He actually looks kinda like a little Japanese boy who attracts those perverty Japanese uncles.

If you're wondering what they're doing, check out the video :D

Next up, an attic party! Very bohemian experience.

Happy (belated) Mother's Day :)

I finally found this photo amongst all the bits and pieces of photos that make up my computer.

It's a Mother's Day cake! I took this photo to give Mumsy Bumsy on her day because the post is so unreliable from NL to KL. Schrobbenmaster posted me a Valentine's card this year and I never got it. I, on the other hand, was so paranoid that he wouldn't get it from KL that I actually took photos of the outside and inside before I posted it, just so he could still see it if the post failed on me.

On the bottom left, a translation:

A shiny heart

In the deepest

Strawberry red

For a mother

With a heart of gold

Anyway, Mumsy Bumsy, I'm looking forward to yours and Yelleh Belleh's arrival! Will buy you both a nice cake to make up for all the times I'm not in KL to makan with you guys :D

Coffee breaks in Rotterdam II

I forgot to post about this place yesterday amidst all the internet going haywire and dying on us in Amsterdam. During the Netherlands match. I suppose you can guess why it died :)

Urban Espresso Bar on Pannekoekstraat (website)

I actually forgot the name of this place, but one thing I love about NL is that you can find anything and everything online, even a small cafe such as this. Well, it's small, but it's trendy. I've even seen people sitting outside in drizzle at this place. Which is ridiculous to me, but I dunno, maybe their showers aren't working.

The name of this street is also really cute, if you haven't noticed it yet from last year's 'Word of the Day's. Pannekoekstraat means Pancake Street. And awesomely, there is a pancake restaurant right on the corner of the street. Never been there though.

Anyway, at this cafe I had a 'Rijk Chocolade Taart', which means Rich Chocolate Cake. Not many places have chocolate cakes, so I jumped on this immediately, of course.

It looks yummy, doesn't it? It was just okay though. I know I've been spoilt by Alexis' awesome awesome oh-so-awesome Chocolate Cinnamon cake, but I can still tell when another chocolate cake is good or not. I would definitely order this again, but only because there's nothing better around.

Schrobbenmaster had an apple tart, which he really enjoyed. Also, he finally got his wish for lemon tea, which isn't to be found in many places here. Apple tart though, you can find absolutely everywhere. I'm not a big fan though, as I find that the apple can be either too sweet or sour sometimes. I'm more a fan of the pastry part of tarts. I love it when bakers get the right texture of pastry. Which is why I'm also quite picky with my egg tarts. But of course, sigh... being here, I have to suck it up and eat whatever quality of egg tarts I can find.

To end, here's a really cute picture of Pim.

Coffee breaks in Rotterdam I

Sometimes eating out is too expensive (and the quality of food not as hoped) but we wanna head out on a nice sunny day. So we go for coffee and cakes. Here are two places - besides Bagels n Beans - that we go to once in a while.

Mockamore on Korte Hoogstraat
Very trendy place, sometimes with queues coming in - doesn't say an awful much about the place though, since as you can see, the door is right next to the ordering counter. The coffee and service is just normal, but prices are pretty steep. One would only go there for the trendiness and cosy look of the place. However, there are loads of cafes that look like this in KL anyway, so, nah, I'm not gonna be hanging out very often here.

Cappuccino on Korte Hoogstraat
I really like the look of this place. It looks posh, and while it could easily go wrong and look more like a wannabe bar, it does succeed very well. Always very packed and it is worth the steeper prices and smaller portions of drinks just because the ambience works.

It's not really this dark in there ;)

Look at my chocolate-flavoured cappuccino!

So nicely presented! The chocolate chunks were tasty too. It's almost like a snack instead of just a drink. I like!

Not very busy at work today, so I'm working on my next post already... photos from a birthday party I attended on, well, the 1st of May.

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Wow, the internet of the whole office just went down, causing my post to be halted on its way to blogger. Thank goodness the whole thing is still here (I think). And that's why I disappeared off MSN for so long, apologies, frachely!

And this whole internet going down thing is due to... the World Cup!!! So many people are watching live streams via internet that it just couldn't take it. Wow. At least it gave us an early day home :D

Our new balcony!

I'm so excited this weekend because we just got a new balcony!

Well, I say new balcony, but I really mean a "new" balcony, since obviously when one stays in apartments, one can't just get a completely new balcony.

Anyways...

Our balcony used to be pretty messy and used somewhat as a store "room" for things that can last the wet and cold winters. Big rubbish bin, ladder, buckets, empty plant pots, outdoor broom and other not very pretty odds and ends.

I've always wanted a really nice balcony to enjoy, especially as our balcony is rather sizeable compared to other parts of the house. What made me rue the state of our balcony even more was that our next door neighbour has one of the nicest balconies on our whole street, and definitely the nicest in our view. Seriously, it's like a year-round garden there, with cushioned sofa and plants hanging everywhere.

So, finally, Schrobbenmaster agreed to start the balcony project with me and we headed to the garden centre yesterday. After walking for a bit, we found our perfect set of furniture, and then decided to also get a plant to give the balcony a warmer feel.

Chose a modern black pot for it and named the plant, Bess.

I'm so thankful we have a car now, because without it, many things wouldn't be possible!

Unfortunately, we don't have an assigned parking space, so we have to park wherever we can find the space, and in this instance, it was a little far and we both had heavy things to carry.

Anyway, we made it, and brought everything out to the balcony to fix up. A couple weeks ago we had gone to IKEA to buy some shelves and knick knacks. We now opened the box for the new balcony shelf and here's me making it.

We bought a white shelf cuz most of our furniture is white (except in the living room and office), but in the end we realised that forward planning would have been a good idea, as a black/grey shelf would have matched better. But oh well. I DID want a black and white balcony after all.

Now to unpack the main event, the 'bistroset'! The two chairs and a table.

It wasn't difficult but a little tricky putting together.

And, voila! The end result...

I'm so happy with it! It actually looks nicer now because at the time of photo-taking, Bess was still on top of the white shelf, whereas she's actually supposed to be on the wooden table. Try to picture it in your mind, since it's dark and grey skies now and I don't feel like taking a photo.

Now I just need to start collecting black pots, ornaments and whatever other outdoor decorations I can find to fill the top two rows on the shelf. Whoever wants to bring a gift for me, here's an idea! :D

Today, we had lunch outside, naturally.

It was really lovely at lunchtime because it was cool with only a light breeze - winds just usually spoil everything as it becomes too cold to do anything. I was telling Schrobbenmaster that that moment was really perfect because I was experiencing all the important things at the same time - European weather and greenery, and eating Asian food (I haven't had noodles all weeeeeeeek!).

Later in the day, we took a little impromptu road trip to Zeeland, 1.5 hours away from Rotterdam so that Schrobbenmaster could pick up his newly bought iPad from Alejo. The journey was beautiful, but the place itself wasn't very exciting. The town we went to, Terneuzen, near the Belgian border, was pretty dead, the only highlight being that the country's biggest 'coffee shop' is there. I have some photos, but they can wait for another time, if I ever deem it interesting enough to write about again. Haha.

Koninginnedag in Rotterdam 2010

On 30 April every year is Koninginnedag, Queen's Day, which means it's the Queen's birthday, but which is actually the current queen's mother's birthday, which is a national holiday... yippee!

I'm such an awesome and clear writer.

Here's an easy copy-and-paste version from Wikipedia:

When Queen Beatrix succeeded her mother Queen Juliana on 30 April 1980, she decided to keep the holiday on 30 April as a tribute to her mother. Furthermore for practical reasons, the weather on her own birthday in the winter on 31 January tends to prohibit the traditional outdoor festivities, while 30 April normally has better weather.

So practical, so Dutch.

The streets and houses are covered in orange flags, cloths, hats, crowns, cakes... I even saw crown-shaped chicken nuggets in the supermarket.

It's a day when anyone can set up a stall on the street and sell their old junk (I was tempted to buy some old Russian army medals from one stall where this Russian guy and his 2 exotic-ly pretty young daughters were selling other Russian army stuff like uniforms, medals, photos and cards). Apparently, it's not a good time to let your children loose with loose change, as they will miraculously come back with arms full of other people's crap, which you'll have to sell next year.

Schrobbenmaster and I ventured out to have a look at the festivities on this day.

Orange cowboy hats...

Yummy fresh strawberries!

More ballooooooooons!

Many street corners and open areas were taken up by these South American/Peruvian/Native Americans playing their pan flutes. This group was the only one I saw which actually dressed up for the part.

Orange shirts, caps and scarfs.

Orange hair...

A bunch of modern-day hippies with music.

And the kind of modern-day hippie I like better - actual cool, arty people. At least I assume they are, since they're standing in front of a cool burger place and a modern art gallery.

Hope you enjoyed a little Dutch culture in this post today!

Tijn

Several weeks ago, Schrobbenmaster and I went to visit his elder brother and family, who live in Amsterdam. It was to see his little nephew, Tijn, for his 5th birthday.

We had a typical Dutch spring dinner of little boiled potatoes, yummy ham slices, asperges (I think it's small asparagus), yummy boiled eggs and... I think that's it? It was really lekker.

After dinner we had some cake, and since it was just before Koninginnedag (Queen's Day), where everyone displays loud and proud national colour orange everywhere, our cake had an orange layer on top instead of the usual... pink, I think.

Wasn't a big fan of this cake, as the bottom biscuit layer was REALLY hard and really messed up the whole cake whenever I tried to cut a piece off to eat.

After dinner, Schrobbenmaster, his brother, brother's wife and I stayed at the table to chat, while Tijn played with his new Lego tractor. Then all of a sudden, we hear a bump and a huge swelling yell coming from his direction.

Poor boy had slipped and fallen onto his Lego tractor, scraping his elbow :( After lots of screaming and yelling and pampering and coaxing, Tijn's dad brought out a little mirror and showed him his crying reflection, which had the desired effect of causing instant laughter from the little 5-year old. So cute!

After which, I found a little bruise on his knee and asked if I could take a photo of him, and he gladly obliged with a pose.

He obviously doesn't speak English, so it was quite interesting trying to get some contact with him in the little Dutch that I can converse in. So we moved on to what kids know best: playing balloons.

And apparently in bed that night he told his mother: "I like Junee very much!", and another time the next day at his party, "Is Junee coming today?".

Aww...!

My first sponsored Dutch class. Class? Hmm.

I just got back from my first gemeente (district?) sponsored and compulsory Dutch class.

I was told to be at that class today from 6pm till 10pm, so I was all geared up to spend 4 friggin hours in the tiny classroom. Then many students came late, including the teacher, which made me a tad annoyed because I hate waiting for people, especially when it's a scheduled class/meeting/show etc. But whatever, I took it in my stride cuz I really wanted to see what everyone is like.

We started off with filling up one form. Which took 1.5 hours. And 2 girls.

Seriously, man, this is not the first time I've had to go through some Dutch process in order to get something and you can bet your bottom dollar that none of them were efficient and organised.

On the invitation card for the class, you're asked to bring your ID card and a form stating that you have a job at your particular company. And when you bring it, they're supposed to make a copy of it and put it in your file.

There were around 10 of us new people today, and it took one tiny brown girl the whole 1.5 hours to copy our IDs and job letters.

You know what's the problem? She didn't announce what she was doing. The guy sitting next to me (nice Polish guy named Jack... or Jac. or Jak. Or maybe even Chzak, for all I know) had his ID card on the table because he had to check his ID number. The tiny girl swished past and picked it up, saying, "Oh, I need to copy this" and went away. So I was thinking, "Do you not need mine?" and I just waited and listened to the teacher who was helping us fill in the forms because the tiny brown girl was flitting around.

Ten or fifteen minutes later, she comes back with some copies and then I ask her if she needs my card too. And she says Yes and flits away again.

An HOUR later, she reappears with some work letters and then I ask, do you need mine? And she goes yes, so I give it to her.

O.M.G.

The teacher couldn't assist her own existing students on the other side of the class because Tinkerbell kept disappearing making copies of 10 ID cards and 10 work letters!

Is that organised? Is that ORGANISED? Grr.

And that one form which had to be filled out also took an hour. I can understand, since it was in Dutch and she had to help the people who didn't speak Dutch at all, with her basic English. But honestly, is it so hard to just announce in the beginning that they need to collect our cards and letters? And then make the stupid 1-page form in 2 languages? She said that it was alright to answer in English anyway, so what's the problem there?

Friggin waste of time, I tell ya!