Snowbound!

Its been snowing all day, and I was really pleased with myself as I finished off a translation before 9.30, then had a SKYPE appointment with one of my clients at 10, spent the rest of the morning tidying the living room and preparing a lesson plan for a student who was coming at 3.00 p.m for a lesson.
There I was all warm and feeling pretty smug that I had been making money without having to join the rat race, when I got a call from Jolanda from the bus stop in Amsterdam saying the buses were not running and she could not get home from school!
So I wrapped up warmly and filled my handbag with mars bars, cleared the snow off my car, and slid slowly down the N247 towards Amsterdam.
The pretty snowflakes that had been falling in Monnickendam turned into a blizzard with white-out conditions as I got past Broek in Waterland, and as I crossed over the Amsterdam Ring I saw the traffic absolutely nose to tail on the motorway. I glided into the bus stop bay, and was greeted by Jolanda and two friends. "Can you give them a lift to Landsmeer, they cannot reach their parents?" said Jolanda.
- Landsmeer is along the Amsterdam Ring in the direction of the immobile traffic jam......
It took me two seconds to say no - but I could not leave the poor things there in the snow, so they piled in and my little car slipped and slid all the way to Monnickendam with three shivering blond teenagers giggling in the back.
Monnickendam looked lovely in the snow, and once the girls got in and warmed up with the Wii, crisps, sweets and drinks they were ready for snowball fights and a sleepover.
As I write the house is cosy, the girls are full of chicken and potatoes, the christmas tree lights are twinkling and they are just about to settle down to a film.
We will work out how to get them home tomorrow - there is a national weather alarm tonight and nothing is moving, not even the police and fire engines!

Damstede skating day

The Jaap Eden Baan is Amsterdams big outdoor skating arena, It is open all winter. Serious skaters come every day to train in the hope that they will be fit enough to take part in the "elf steden tocht" a grueling race through eleven cities in Friesland which can only be held when natural ice has formed throughout the whole of the netherlands.

Last friday the peace of their training schedule was ruined by the kids of Damstede, who arrived for their annual skating day.

Jolanda and her friend Rosa were there too!

The teachers settled down to their own form of training!

School disco

I've not had the camera with me for a few weeks, and blogging has been pushed on the back burner due to other projects I've been working on - I may blog about that later!
Just before the half term holidays, Jolanda went to the school disco.
I found the photos on the school website, and liked the progression from wall flower to party animal!

Photo frustration

As you can see I've been playing around with my blog header this week - I'm slightly envious of my sister in laws blog http://bevs97.wordpress.com/ which not only has a catchy title, but also a customized banner - so I thought perhaps I could have a go at that.
The photo I chose was taken by my daughter (she takes much better photos than I do) last year in the new buttefly house in Artis. At first I just loaded it to the blog, but it was enormous, so now, days later, I've taken the time to trim it into a banner sort of shape and reload it.
Now the butterfly is too close to the text - and I cannot seem to move the text - I'm going to have to play around with it a bit more, but not today.
The colours on the photo are rather nice, though, and I've always liked butterflies. I love visiting butterfly houses, the warm, lazy atmosphere brings on a feeling of serenity in me.
If you enjoy them too, I can recommend the new one at Artis, but if you don't want to go to the zoo, try popping into the one at Hortus Botanicus - its small, but there are plenty of butterflies, and it smells like a tropical hot house should.

April 2007

Arriving in Amsterdam today is chaotic; Centraal Station, and indeed most of the city, is in the middle of a huge building project, the Noord/Zuid lijn – the underground system due for completion in 2011. Chaos does not stop Amsterdam offering an unparalleled tourist experience. The city provides everything from sex to soft drugs and diamonds to dancing; not to mention raw herring, cheese and tulips.

My Amsterdam is somewhat less brash, however. Friends hold art events in cellars or squats; we meet to eat and chat in small restaurants in the Jordaan. We walk along quiet canals on Sunday mornings, where we see no one but a serene transvestite in tweed skirts and beard arm in arm with his wife. We shop in street markets; eat Turkish pizza for lunch in a church reinvented as a grand café. We go to “The Movies” an art deco cinema which serves dinner before the film and dessert after the film ends.

My Amsterdam is intimate and inviting, seductive but paced to my needs and wants. I don’t feel rushed or pressured here, I have freedom to do anything I want, but most of all I can be myself.