Holland: Rotterdam
This Europe trip has been so amazing so far! Even though I have only been here for one week with my second parents, Aysen and Tim, I have done so much and had so much fun! I've been trying to hold myself back a little on the blog posts and only post on Mondays so I don't overwhelm everybody, but turns out I kind of stabbed myself in the back with that idea because I ended up doing so much every day that it is going to be very hard to condense it into a summary. Oops 😅
Wednesday
Ok so Wednesday - Sinterklaas today! I know that Sinterklaas is a bit of a controversial topic right now, especially with the Zwarte Pieten, but for me it has no negative racial connotations to it, just reliving fun childhood memories. The morning began with the kids (Adam, 9 years old, and Dylan 4) bursting into the room very early to see what the Sint had left in their sacks by the fire. I have been sleeping in the living room all week because of how many people are here - which has actually been very comfortable - so I was able to stay in bed while we watched them excitedly open their gifts from Piet and Sint. It was really cute and cool to be there to see them and remember all the fun memories I had as a child too.
After a nice breakfast, me and Emma (Adam and Dylan's 21-year-old cousin) went walking around Rotterdam for a bit. I never really went to Rotterdam much when I was younger so it was really cool to see the city for real and all the AMAZING architecture. After that, Tim's whole side of the family came around for a nice family dinner and to open Surprises. Surprises are similar to Secret Santa. You are given a person's name who you have to buy a present for and then attach a poem to the front about them and they have to guess who gave them the gift. It was really fun and cool to be a part of and I got avocado socks and a letter writing kit for when I leave :)
Thursday
On Thursday morning we went out to this really nice breakfast place called Garmusch. It was funny for me because it was an American-style restaurant with American pancakes, waffles, and toast. I couldn't help laughing that I had come all the way from Oregon only to be eating American food again. Today Emma and I went walking around Rotterdam again and she showed me the market and some more of the little shops.
After going home, chilling for a while, and eating dinner, Emma and I decided to go for a night out. Since I'm 18 now, I can drink legally pretty much anywhere except for the US. So I was very excited to be in Europe finally to make use of that mature, adult privilege. Weeeell turns out that when you go out for the first time, you get a little carried away. Was definitely not my best experience. We left the house around 10:15pm that night and ended up going to two bars. The first bar was really cool because there was some kind of slam poetry and improv band playing that changed depending on the random music category that was spun. We had a gin and tonic, a whiskey with ginger beer, and a vodka shot before we left for the next bar. The atmosphere there was really cool, and in hindsight, I really wish we had just stayed there the whole night. After walking for about 20 minutes to the next bar, we paid the entrance fee and walked into... a mostly empty room. We had heard they had a special something they did every Thursday, buuut we also forgot that it was a Thursday night and that for normal people, who aren't on a gap year, Thursdays are still weekdays and not the beginning of the weekend. Aaaanyways, from that point on the night kind of went downhill for me. It was really fun - don't get me wrong - but I got just a little carried away with the power of being able to order and drink alcohol publicly. After getting hammered there, and losing most of my memory, me and Emma stumbled home at the end of the night. I vaguely remember puking, taking about an hour to walk home, and randomly crying a little bit. Super fun, I know. Anyways, it was fun to have that freedom and go out but I definitely woke up with some regrets the next morning. Yay!
Friday
So with that fun night explained: onto Friday's events. Sorry for the long descriptions before this, but thankfully this day's post will be very short. As you could probably have guessed, I woke up on Friday extremely hungover. Even though I had puked out my entire stomach's contents the night before, I still somehow had more that needed to come out. With an ibuprofen, some water, and a lazy day on the sofa though, I got through Friday pretty well. After lazing around all day, the night concluded with watching the movie Coco altogether. I've seen Coco about a million times but it was cute to see Aysen and Tim's kids watch it and also to eat some popcorn and ice cream.
Saturday
Today was another really nice and chill day. I know that probably doesn't sound very fun to most people, but if you know me, you know that I am basically an old lady and love to have cozy days at home with not too much hassle. Tim went out with Emma today to watch one of their cousin's who plays on a semi-professional team. They said that they had a lot of fun and that the team ended up winning 3-0, which is cool! With both of them gone, Aysen and I decided that we would have a girls day and leave the two crazy boys with Oma (granny). We grabbed a really nice hot chocolate, chatted, had a walk around, got some shopping, and went home. Again - very chill, but very much needed. We finished the night by introducing Aysen to Stranger Things and ended up watching it until about 2 in the morning. A perfect kind of night if you ask me. If you haven't seen Stranger Things yet, you're missing out. Best TV series. Ever.
Sunday
Sunday. My last day in Holland. When planning the trip I thought that a week would be enough to catch up... I was very wrong. The week went by soooo fast and I feel like I just blinked and now it's gone. For my last day, we had another lazy morning since we'd had another late night again, and then we went off to Scheveningen. I played at this beach a lot when I was younger so it was funny to be back there and see the Dutch coastline again. One of the things that I forgot about was how many seashells are on the beaches here though, especially compared to the Oregon coast - something I would have assumed would just be the same everywhere. In Oregon, you might find a couple seashells close to the water, but in Scheveningen, all the sand is covered with them. After standing out on the super stormy pier for about 5 minutes, we went to a really tasty fish and chips restaurant called Simonis where we stuffed ourselves with clams, calamari, and kibbeling before heading home again.
The last thing we did that night was to all put up their Christmas tree together. Well, when I say we I really mean them. I was very content just supervising the whole ordeal :) It was fun though to get into the Christmas spirit and made my last night feel really special - and just like old times.
~ So that was the amazing start to my trip. I am so happy I took the little detour to stay in Holland for a week longer, it was really fun and brought back a lot of really nostalgic memories. I'm sorry it was such a long post this time though... I might just reverse my previous statement about Mondays because I think that will be too hard over the next coming weeks, so I suppose you'll just have to keep posted for my random blog days! Thanks for reading!
Wednesday
Ok so Wednesday - Sinterklaas today! I know that Sinterklaas is a bit of a controversial topic right now, especially with the Zwarte Pieten, but for me it has no negative racial connotations to it, just reliving fun childhood memories. The morning began with the kids (Adam, 9 years old, and Dylan 4) bursting into the room very early to see what the Sint had left in their sacks by the fire. I have been sleeping in the living room all week because of how many people are here - which has actually been very comfortable - so I was able to stay in bed while we watched them excitedly open their gifts from Piet and Sint. It was really cute and cool to be there to see them and remember all the fun memories I had as a child too.After a nice breakfast, me and Emma (Adam and Dylan's 21-year-old cousin) went walking around Rotterdam for a bit. I never really went to Rotterdam much when I was younger so it was really cool to see the city for real and all the AMAZING architecture. After that, Tim's whole side of the family came around for a nice family dinner and to open Surprises. Surprises are similar to Secret Santa. You are given a person's name who you have to buy a present for and then attach a poem to the front about them and they have to guess who gave them the gift. It was really fun and cool to be a part of and I got avocado socks and a letter writing kit for when I leave :)
Thursday
On Thursday morning we went out to this really nice breakfast place called Garmusch. It was funny for me because it was an American-style restaurant with American pancakes, waffles, and toast. I couldn't help laughing that I had come all the way from Oregon only to be eating American food again. Today Emma and I went walking around Rotterdam again and she showed me the market and some more of the little shops.
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| The ceiling of the Market in Rotterdam |
After going home, chilling for a while, and eating dinner, Emma and I decided to go for a night out. Since I'm 18 now, I can drink legally pretty much anywhere except for the US. So I was very excited to be in Europe finally to make use of that mature, adult privilege. Weeeell turns out that when you go out for the first time, you get a little carried away. Was definitely not my best experience. We left the house around 10:15pm that night and ended up going to two bars. The first bar was really cool because there was some kind of slam poetry and improv band playing that changed depending on the random music category that was spun. We had a gin and tonic, a whiskey with ginger beer, and a vodka shot before we left for the next bar. The atmosphere there was really cool, and in hindsight, I really wish we had just stayed there the whole night. After walking for about 20 minutes to the next bar, we paid the entrance fee and walked into... a mostly empty room. We had heard they had a special something they did every Thursday, buuut we also forgot that it was a Thursday night and that for normal people, who aren't on a gap year, Thursdays are still weekdays and not the beginning of the weekend. Aaaanyways, from that point on the night kind of went downhill for me. It was really fun - don't get me wrong - but I got just a little carried away with the power of being able to order and drink alcohol publicly. After getting hammered there, and losing most of my memory, me and Emma stumbled home at the end of the night. I vaguely remember puking, taking about an hour to walk home, and randomly crying a little bit. Super fun, I know. Anyways, it was fun to have that freedom and go out but I definitely woke up with some regrets the next morning. Yay!
Friday
So with that fun night explained: onto Friday's events. Sorry for the long descriptions before this, but thankfully this day's post will be very short. As you could probably have guessed, I woke up on Friday extremely hungover. Even though I had puked out my entire stomach's contents the night before, I still somehow had more that needed to come out. With an ibuprofen, some water, and a lazy day on the sofa though, I got through Friday pretty well. After lazing around all day, the night concluded with watching the movie Coco altogether. I've seen Coco about a million times but it was cute to see Aysen and Tim's kids watch it and also to eat some popcorn and ice cream.
Saturday
Today was another really nice and chill day. I know that probably doesn't sound very fun to most people, but if you know me, you know that I am basically an old lady and love to have cozy days at home with not too much hassle. Tim went out with Emma today to watch one of their cousin's who plays on a semi-professional team. They said that they had a lot of fun and that the team ended up winning 3-0, which is cool! With both of them gone, Aysen and I decided that we would have a girls day and leave the two crazy boys with Oma (granny). We grabbed a really nice hot chocolate, chatted, had a walk around, got some shopping, and went home. Again - very chill, but very much needed. We finished the night by introducing Aysen to Stranger Things and ended up watching it until about 2 in the morning. A perfect kind of night if you ask me. If you haven't seen Stranger Things yet, you're missing out. Best TV series. Ever.
Sunday
Sunday. My last day in Holland. When planning the trip I thought that a week would be enough to catch up... I was very wrong. The week went by soooo fast and I feel like I just blinked and now it's gone. For my last day, we had another lazy morning since we'd had another late night again, and then we went off to Scheveningen. I played at this beach a lot when I was younger so it was funny to be back there and see the Dutch coastline again. One of the things that I forgot about was how many seashells are on the beaches here though, especially compared to the Oregon coast - something I would have assumed would just be the same everywhere. In Oregon, you might find a couple seashells close to the water, but in Scheveningen, all the sand is covered with them. After standing out on the super stormy pier for about 5 minutes, we went to a really tasty fish and chips restaurant called Simonis where we stuffed ourselves with clams, calamari, and kibbeling before heading home again.
The last thing we did that night was to all put up their Christmas tree together. Well, when I say we I really mean them. I was very content just supervising the whole ordeal :) It was fun though to get into the Christmas spirit and made my last night feel really special - and just like old times.
~ So that was the amazing start to my trip. I am so happy I took the little detour to stay in Holland for a week longer, it was really fun and brought back a lot of really nostalgic memories. I'm sorry it was such a long post this time though... I might just reverse my previous statement about Mondays because I think that will be too hard over the next coming weeks, so I suppose you'll just have to keep posted for my random blog days! Thanks for reading!
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