Anyways… happy reading!


(Written during day 37)
Mmmkay. As much as I’d like to recap the last two weeks (sidenote: make that five weeks) it’s getting more difficult to hone in each day’s details, especially since I mostly write these from memory rather than consulting field notes. So what I’ll do for this post is summarize the highlights:

- I visited the letterpress room several times. I mentioned earlier that I’m buddy-buddy with Wim, the letterpress technician, but I actually didn’t know his name until the last time I went. Hahaha. But working with the letterpress was pretty sweet stuff. Well, the first few days I was working very slowly – almost too slowly for Wim I reckon – and as he was going through the tutorial I had several moments of stupidity. By the haste in his voice I could tell it was frustrating for Wim too…

But eventually I got through it all and I typeset my typographic mag cover! Hooray! Actually I was really just winging it with the typographic covers to be honest. In the end I experimented with analog and digital (typesetting the print, then scanning it, then using the copier to print onto the original print, then scanning that again) and it eventually resulted in this huuurrr:

What the hell is this epic suck?

The requirements for the spread was that we did a cover and an ad for a personal magazine (a la Oprah or whatever). The one on the right is an ad for a vinyl toy expo cause I like toys. Hehehe. I wanted to make it look “urban” and concrete like. The one on the left was an experiment of sorts, but I wanted to treat type as an image and do something simplistic, retro and sort of Japanese inspired. The theme I had for the magazine was “multiple identities” (hence the corny subtitles), hence the multiple e’s. But this is more apparent with my photographic one:

Omgah multiple hedz!!

For this one I wanted to make it a bit unconventional and combine the cover with the ad. If you hadn’t noticed before, the fold of the magazine is actually the Asian way rather than Western, and although this was actually an accident (shh my teacher doesn’t need to know!) it ended up complimenting my “multiple identities” concept anyhow. Playing on the whole East-meets-West, I’m a CBC thing.

Personally I like this cover better because of the bolder colour palette, but my teacher preferred the typographic one. Well, what do you think?

Surprisingly, alot of people had good stuff to show. I say surprisingly because my graphic design critique came out underwhelming.

- So for graphic design we were supposed to present 3 A1 sized posters based on the film Rip! A Remix Manifesto – one a traditional film poster and the other two “critical reactions”. I was stressing a bit on where the hell I could print these huge things in a short time but turns out that certain print shops are hella fast! At home, I’m used to booking appointments to my school’s DOC, which is run by an infamously anal-retentive “mean guy” (who’s actually not that bad once you get to know him) and a man I affectionately refer to as the “teddy bear” (because he’s so much nicer and comparatively more bear like), and I always need to do so much prep work coming into the centre. Usually, it’s pretty expensive and the turn around time is a day or two, depending on how busy it is. The school here is supposed to be around two days. Yet, this place did everything in 20 minutes! Granted, I didn’t have much of a choice on what I wanted to print on, but it was sufficient for my needs. A bit pricey though at 35 euros. Well, I’ve paid more for smaller work so I’m not too concerned.

[This is where I'm supposed to put up said images but it's much too burdensome to open and convert them to web files on Podochop so I'll just post the one I already had converted, which is incidentally the one I like best]

Totally just violated a lot of copyright law posting this here. Can I has a copyright infringement lawsuit? Harhar…… um.

(Written during day 59)

Hmmm. Okay. This task of recounting the highlights of something that happened…. 5 weeks ago is starting to get a little hard. How about I just update you on some of the major changes that have happened since then!

- Dutch language course! YEAAAAH where initially I was the only one that paid! (Awkward sentence. Whatever you get the gist.) Well it’s going pretty well, I’ve learned alot of phrases since last month. Now I have:

ik kom uit canada, waar kom je vandaan: i’m from canada, where are you from?
ben je getroud?: are you married?
heb je kinderen?: do you have children?
een biertjes graag: one beer, thanks

…in my arsenal of basic Dutch phrases! Hooray! Though I must say, it was a little odd learning “are you married/do you have kids” before learning how to order or greet someone.

- Silkscreen! Since my time at this institution I’ve been able to use the digital photo studio, the letter press and now the silkscreen facilities with upmost ease. I keep telling everyone this but back at home we can’t access the facilities unless the courses we register for require them (or unless we pay some fees), so it’s really awesome being able to use everything for a relatively low price. For instance, I didn’t even need to buy my own screen – there were TONS of them (from super big to A2 sized) available for use. And same goes for inks! Ooooh my god the amount of pigments/inks they had in stock… the kicker was that they even carried heat sensitive ones! How sick is that! Anyhoo I was only there briefly for a t-shirt project (it was so weird being able to do everything in a single evening; btw a picture of the product is on my twitter feed) so I didn’t have the opportunity to do some exploring. But I will find a way soon!

- Project week! This occurred last week and it was a week where 2nd/3rd year students from all faculties come together to work on projects lead on by instructors or working professionals. There were about 20-30 that we could sign up on, although only 6 of them were in English and hence available to exchange students (unless you didn’t care for the language barrier and signed onto the normal ones like other exchange students did. Sigh).

I have mixed feelings about project week. At first I was brimming with anticipation for my chosen project, as it had something to do with “mapping the senses”. I was hoping it’d be something really cool and interactive and stuff but it was mostly just working individually on infographics based on made up data about air travel. Not really crazy awesome, unlike some of the other projects (doing photoshoots, making zines, building bbqs… sigh). But in the end I got to connect with some of the other exchange students and we made something kind of nice in the end. Even if I had to bash my head against the wall a thousand times along the way.

An infographic about mapping the senses as the fluctuate during air travel. My instructor (Rogerio, a Brazillian designer based in Amsterdam) said it looked sort of 70s ish and had pretty typography, although the thing on the right could’ve been a little more.. how to say, intuitive?

I don’t necessarily regret taking on project week (I know quite a few others that skipped it to go traveling instead..) but I do wish I could’ve spent the time working on motion graphics instead. Which leads me to…

- Motion graphics! I’m certain I left a nasty rant somewhere on the Internet (probably saved as drafts here) but to paraphrase, after having spent several weeks frustrated at the lack of progress in the Typography minor I decided to jump ship and swim to another: motion graphics! It was really spontaneous and I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to but I just wanted to confirm my low possibilities. And so I was pleasantly surprised that I’d be able to make the switch despite my lack of experience and despite the fact that I would be behind five weeks but WHATEVER. Typography, you are now officially DONE WITH. The thing is though, I have to learn how to make a 20-30 second motion graphic on a program I have never used before (After Effects). It’s going…. well, it could be worse I guess.

Okay, cutting this off prematurely but I’ll finish off by updating about my trip to Texel Island/Amsterdam later! Right now I have a motion graphic to finish!

ETA: My mom suggested that I also post how many days I have left til I come home (to Edmonton). Well, as of now it’s 61 days left! Yikes I’m already half way!

[Day 18//13.09.10]

Monday. Typography minor. We didn’t do much except work in groups in the library. This class is so lax. Lol.
Joao, Pauliina and I made a group together since we literally have the same schedule. The topic we decided on was about devising new standards for legibility of text on the web/new media. Or something like that. We called it “designing for the infinite”, LOL.

For the rest of the day Stefan, Susanne and Baptiste (another exchange student, this time from Strausbourg! Ooooh.) invited us to go to a workshop at the letterpress. Naturally I agreed to go, I mean why not? If I’m allowed to use it then I should take the opportunity to learn it! Joao and Pauliina declined though.

The letterpress room, which is located in the basement next to the photo labs, is a dream come true. In Emily Carr we have the same thing except stripped to a bare minimum of incomplete typefaces/cases and a few hand powered machines. I think the only thing we have a “one up” is the foil press, which can press foil into pages/book covers to make shiny things. But in WdKA, there’s an complete array of Helvetica (from 8pt to GIGANTIC), Perpetua, Bodoni, Gill Sans, etc. Not all of them are complete, in fact the most complete is Helvetica (no surprise there), but it’s very amazing nonetheless. At the entrance there’s a paper cutter machine that looks like a monster, except it’s completely safe with sensors and foot pedals and the like. And finally, to the left wall there’s two letterpress machines that operate on the push of a button. SO FANCY AND COOL.

The guy who takes care of the room’s stuff introduced himself as Wim and at the point of writing this (Sept 25) I’ve met him about… 5-6 times. We’re practically chums but not really because I get scared of him sometimes. I can’t tell when he’s mad or just making a joke! Agh. Dutch people are particularly hard to read, and I’m pretty good at reading people too. We on the other hand introduced ourselves as Stefan, Susanne, Baptiste, Erica and Namso. I really had no idea what Namso was doing here since she’s in Audio-Visual design with the Italians, but she seemed quite earnest. And considerably less drunk compared to Saturday.

Overall, t’was fun!

[Day 19//14.09.10]

Tuesday. Graphic design. Except not really. Why? Because my instructor was sick! Yay! I mean… um, ooh what a shame it is to miss a day of learning. *snorts*

It sort of sucked because I rushed to school too thinking I was going to be late, and came in looking like a sweaty hot ass mess as per usual. Other than that I don’t remember doing much. I played with Timothy a little bit, lol. By playing I mean we decided it would be a good waste use of our time to do the Netherlands Citizenship Test. It was seriously stupid and hard. Halfway it seemed like a personal survey, asking ridiculous questions like “if you got robbed would you a) call the police; b) stop and survey the damage before calling the police or c) do nothing” or “if you were holding a party would you tell your neighbours about the noise?” or “if your third daughter got drunk and passed out…” and blahblahblah. I got 3.8/10 .___.

On the other hand, Timothy got 65% on the Canadian Citizenship Test! Damn it! It’s too easy to be a Canadian!

[Day 20//15.09.10]

Wednesday. Day off. The highlight of the day came in the evening, when I scheduled myself to do a self photoshoot. When I booked the shoot I figured I wouldn’t need anyone but myself. But nooooo, the technician didn’t tell me that I needed someone else to push the buttons for me! Argh. But anyways. The concept of my shoot was to do multiple exposures in one frame to express my multiple identities in my typography magazine, and this would be done with multiple flashes. What was really nice was that the technician actually helped me to set it up (because I was new) and with my student card I got to loan a pretty sweet ass Nikon, a power supply-thing, a light meter and a flash kit. The tripod was already installed onto this bar thing that reached the ceiling, and was moved with the help of hydraulics (or something). Pretty cool. But it was useless unless I had someone there with me, so I called up Mary-Alice and THANK THE HEAVENS she came after work. I cannot fully express my gratitude for her being there!

Once everything was set up it was a pretty fun shoot; we played around a lot with the flash bulb a lot. Some of my stalkers can see the results of the shoot on my facebook, but later I might post up some unseen ones here as well.

[Day 21//16.09.10]

Typography. Last time we were basically dicking around and this class wasn’t very different, except we had to actually show our progress. And I had progressed since last week thanks to my photo shoot! Hehehehe.

Obviously the rest of the day was not very interesting because I can’t remember much else worthy of talking about. Oh wait, I had my first Dutch culture class. The presentation was disorganized and underwhelming. It was supposed to be about humor in Dutch design, and although the material could have proved interesting (droog design is actually really similar to my interests) the presentation was an unfunny mess. I mean, basically the guy was talking about how he idolized a douche bag. The coolness of Prezi couldn’t save it! Our homework was to add more examples to the mess.

ETA: I forgot to add, at the beginning of the Dutch Culture class there was a woman that introduced the course and the like. Joao and I had a very interesting exchange that went something like this:

Joao: the teacher… she has a male voice.
Me: you mean she speaks like a man?
Joao: yes.

LOL. That totally made my day.

[Day 22//17.09.10]

Finally. Friday again. Crosslab. We were supposed to have stuff on iGoogle/NetVibes, but I was really running low on ideas. I still am actually, and it’s over a week later! Omg. Anyways, we started off by waiting outside for the class before us to finish using the classroom. Earlier that day I was ironing my clothes on my couch and I accidentally burned my knee. I started off the conversation with that (“So this morning I burned my knee with an iron..”) and they laughed at me .__. Fernando tried to kick my knee too. Tsch that kid. Doesn’t he know I got martial arts running deep in my veins? Hahaha. Timothy also tried to do the same (after he deadpanned, “so you really burned your knee huh..”)

For the majority of the class Fernando and I were really just dicking around, having this random non-sequitur of a conversation (involving ironing knees, pranking people with money on fishing poles, piggy banks, blenders, all that jazz) and it reminded me of Bevin. Actually he really does remind me of Bevin, except he’s White and less perverted.

—

(P.S – WordPress has a function where I can see where I get my traffic, and for some reason I’m linked to this site Financial Info Zone. Lol! I think they might be following the wrong person… )

Okay, so I realize the time that spans between posts is increasing ever so steadily. Now it’s been 10 days since my last post. That could either mean I’m either too busy to post, or that I’m lazy. Or both! Anyways I will try to recap the last ten days to the best of my ability:

[Day 13//08.09.10]

Very vague. The only thing I can remember about this day was that I went to school in the morning to fill out papers for my resident permit. And I only remember this because while I was filling out the date some girl was like “look, it’s 8-9-10! What a special day!”. Yeah, definitely.

During the meeting I bumped into an Aussie exchange student (Smriti, who I befriended at Rotown), a Korean (who goes by Namso but also Sohyeon? I dunno. She’s very skinny) and a guy from Montreal doing his masters at Piet Zwart. According to him alot of Emily Carr kids go to Concordia University and vice versa. Oh, and the lady next to him kept budding in with random things, it was a bit annoying. [Sidenote: as I'm writing this Lady Gaga's first album is blaring out of someone's speakers outside. LOL whatever not complaining.]

Seemingly nothing significant happened afterwards. I think I stayed in school and did things.

[Day 14//09.09.10]

Hmm, Thursday. Ah yes, I had typography. It was fun because we didn’t really do anything. Well technically we were supposed to discuss our concepts in groups which our group (which consisted of Timothy, Pauliina and Joao, the other exchange student if I haven’t established this before) obviously did not. Nor did the others. But anyways Joao and Pauliina (but mostly Joao) kept talking about all these different illustrators/graphic designers they liked and it led me to bookmark a bunch of pages. I’ll link them at the end of this post*. Joao also kept going on and on about his country (Portugal) and his hometown (Funchal) and it was pretty interesting. Funchal is on a small island! Apparently they hold the Guinness world record for their new year firework shows. Again, I will link it at the end because it’s SO AWESOME. Can’t remember much else but it’s clear to me now that Joao likes his home. Very much.

Towards the end of class Joao invited me to go to his friend Tiago’s birthday dinner at a place on Witte de With straat called De Bazar at 9 pm. So late. But I went anyways. Funny enough I didn’t get the memo that my bus only runs every 30 minutes in the evenings so I missed my bus by two minutes. Low and behold, I bumped into a guy I met at my apartment’s bbq (I don’t remember his name but he came towards the end and told me to visit coffee shops and strip clubs). He helped me get to the place by directing me to the tram, which was very nice of him, despite my impression from our earlier conversation. Also when I tried to confirm with the tram director if they went to Witte de With he replied “only for you”. LOL, okay then.

So after a few stops I reached Witte de With safe and sound (to my relief, I really didn’t know where the hell the tram was taking me), and I had to find Bazar. Because the Witte de With festival was on its way to start I saw a bunch of umbrellas in the canal accompanied with glowing light things. It was cool though I had no idea what they were for at the time.

Had no idea where the hell I was going, as usual. The screenshot of google maps I took indicated that it was at the end of the street. Lol I passed it without knowing it was the place (granted it said HOTEL Bazar, not DE Bazar) and I also encountered a coffee shop for the first time. In a conversation I had with a Dutch man later that night I learned that there aren’t as many coffee shops in Rotterdam as in Amsterdam. Ha.

So anyways I met up with them eventually and turns out a lot of people that didn’t RSVP came (probably around 20-25? Twas a big group.) Met a lot of faces that night, some were familiar while others weren’t. There was a Romanian from London, a few Norwegians, Aussies, the usual Italians, and yeah. Although we intended to have everyone together, we ended up splitting into two groups, one inside the other outside. I was inside with the birthday boy, Joao, the Romanian (Sandra?) with her Dutch boyfriend, and a few other Italians (Roberto, Fabio and Julia, I think). Boy, it was loud. But the atmosphere was GREAT. In the inside they played samba music and had an eclectic assortment of lamps on the ceiling. You could say it was like.. a bazaar. Lol. Also, the food was HELLA BIG. No joke. For 12 euros I had the chicken kebab, which came with salad, fries, rice and nice dipping sauce (mmm). Obviously I could not finish, but it was well worth it. I would definitely recommend it. Julia (I remember her because she was the first I met at Rotown) had something called Ghora or something that involved a tomato-based sauce with rice in a tortilla-looking shell. It was 9 Euros and also looked really appetizing. Maybe I’ll have it next time.

The Romanian girl Sandra decided to test out the breakfast menu so she ended up having yoghurt with fruit. LOL.

Can’t recall the scope of our conversations very well. Actually something I forgot to recall earlier was a conversation with Mary-Alice about the difference between Sinterklaus and Christmas. Apparently on December 5 the Dutch celebrate Sinterklaus, which is obviously what Santa Claus takes after, except here it’s a patron saint of Amsterdam named St. Nicholas who delivers presents on a horse door-to-door with some little black kid. (Or slave? I dunno. I suspect it might have to do with the country’s history of African colonization). Christmas is another day of gift giving, except it probably has more to do with Jesus than Coke Santa (unlike in Amuuurica). Anyways the reason why I brought this up was because I wanted to confirm this with the Dutch man. According to him there was once a controversy over the black kid so people started colouring their faces in other colours than black one year.

The night ended with a rude surprise. While we were paying our bill, it appeared that the other table’s drinks were put on our tab! 11 beers, several glasses of wine and the like = 42 euros. We were like WTF where’d the hell this come from and fair enough, one of the guys from the other table came back to pay the rest. Other than that everything was fine. (:

[Day 15//10.09.10]

Friday. Crosslab! We had to show our videos for the webcam-profile-picture-slash-business-card assignment. In terms of content, the range of quality varied. Some people filmed and fast-forwarded their daily lives, others did creative random things. One girl filmed her bunny sitting under a chair for a whole minute and claimed that’s how she felt with her design assignments. I feel like she could’ve taken this clip and said the same thing. :\ (But one thing I should note is this girl REALLY looks like Lily Allen! I’m still trying to sum up the courage to say that to her in person.) One guy (Fernando) did this cool thing where he set up a blog TV thing in his room and made it like a surveillance camera, but I guess the teacher wasn’t so amused because it technically didn’t happen (“missed opportunity”). But for it to work he’d have to skip class, so I’m not feeling her criticism.

Since I interpreted the assignment as doing a video-business card, my concept was to show a business card being made. So I did a pixelation with an avatar/icon I made of my face, to show that I’m interested in the process in design. Towards the end I had my face (in a mirror) juxtaposed next to it because when you give BCs out it’s important to have a lasting identity. I couldn’t tell what the teacher thought of mines, she said I had to link the icon with my face more. It’s hard to read her expression. I think I also interpreted the assignment incorrectly. But I dun curr. It’s just an intro assignment anyway. Maybe I’ll post it later too.

Later that evening I went to a remix festival thing with Mary-Alice (upon my teacher’s recommendation) at 362 Nieuwe Binnenweg. We biked there, and it was then I discovered that N-B is a HUGE place undiscovered. It certainly felt different from the other places I’ve been to, more sketch/ghetto-like. I certainly saw more coffee shops there. I also nearly fell off my bike as the wheel caught onto the tram tracks. Eek.

But other than that we went to the place unscathed, where we ate pizza out of wood oven (I forgot what they called it, but it wasn’t made of wood. It was in a stone oven heated by wood) + salad for 7 euros. Since the theme of the night was “remix” we got to choose our toppings! One funny thing I’ve discovered is that people here eat mozzarella cheese in big chunks, and the bucket of mozzarella chunks did not look very appealing.

So after the pizzas were done MA and I sat ourselves down in a little table near the cakes and drinks. Haha. They decorated the tables as if it were an intimate pizzeria. In the back were an assembly of old (but real!) trams! Since that area wasn’t lit it was very scary, but at the same time so cool. I took a look and it looked like they were from the late 19th/early 20th century. It’s a pity I didn’t bring my camera. Anyways Mary-Alice was hungry so she practically devoured her plate within minutes. LOL. We took turns buying drinks and cake, which were totally not worth 3 euros each (especially the cake — it was dry!). But other than that the atmosphere was very nice. Surprisingly a lot of young families were around! Lots of little blonde kids running around.

Since we finished eating early we decided to wait til 8 to see if the film was going to be worth seeing. It was supposed to be a remix of Shakespeare’s Richard III or something. As we were waiting we made shapes with candle wax. Heh heh. But by the time it turned 8 it was evident that the film wouldn’t be worth the watch, as 1) it was in Dutch and 2) although Mary Alice can understand it, translating it would have been a pain in the ass, so our time would’ve been better spent going to the Witte de With Festival. So there we went.

Now now now, this festival was really something else. Even in retrospect I still can’t pinpoint what the festival was supposed to be about, but it involved lots of music, art and drinks. Lively and exciting would be the keywords to describe the atmosphere. It was practically like being in a bar (or multiple bars) but outside. So awesome! We first went to see this party thing by the canal situated in front of an ongoing cardboard building project thing (obviously I am lacking in vocabulary at the moment so I’ll redeem myself with a picture later) where we encountered an Aussie exchange student (Kate, who I previously met in Rotown) with her friend and Namso. Apparently they got free wooden stools! Haha. Some guy from Belgium was making them and giving them away for free. I forget what we talked about, but it was probably interesting.

Later we went to check out some art (the gallery with Surinamese art was interesting) and we eventually met up with Mary-Alice’s sister, whose name is already out the door. What was striking was how young she looked! We chatted a bit and then came her boyfriend and Mary-Alice’s childhood friend. We were planning to go to a club so we waited by the Surinamese gallery, heads grooving to some DJ mixing up something I couldn’t recognize (except for that annoying Don’t Speak Americano song**). I was really amused by one guy’s dancing so I filmed him. White boy dancing = fun to watch.

By the time 11pm (or was it 12?) rolled around we headed for the club. I nearly laughed out loud when I saw the words “GAY PALACE” on the sign above the doors. Turns out that this night would be “straight night” with free cover! Couldn’t pass this chance up!

My first impression was that the club was rather… small, with a lot of mirrors. I think it was trying to compensate for its size. My second impression was that the music was rather… unknown? Something that sounded like Euro-techno-whatever. It was decent, but sometimes you just want to lip sync to trashy top 40s hip hop numbers, you know? So the three of us (MA+friend+me, since MA’s sister+boyfriend went elsewhere) left a bit early, I think at around 1ish, for another club at Nieuwe Binnenweg called Vibe. Totally different atmosphere! Finally trashy hip hop! From the very beginning we lost MA’s friend to her smoking habits (and as it turns out, some stranger whom she bonded over books with) so we were mostly dancing by ourselves, save for the very beginning when this weird random guy started dancing with us. I tried my best to avoid eye contact. He took the hint an hour later.

I can’t say I wasn’t enjoying myself, but it was also really repetitive. Dance-dance-get a drink (water for me)-dance-dance-breather-dance. I started getting restless at 3 am. The highlight of my evening came shortly afterward, when a greasy and noticeably drunk Italian guy came up to us. I think he noticed me staring at him (though that was because I was fascinated by his drunken dancing), so after he whispered something to Mary Alice he turned to me and said the following in my ear:

Him: you are so beautiful!
Me: -confused face-
Him: I am Italian!
Me: -more confused face-
Him: -something in bad Chinese-
Me: -confused face growing into wtf!face-
Him: … are you angry at me?
Me: no no! I’m just confused..
Him: …(sulks away)

I suppose I should’ve felt bad, or perhaps even flattered, but I was more perplexed if anything. I mean I was sweating up a storm! Clearly I looked like shit! I think he was wearing his beer goggles too tight.

Well anyways shortly after that little encounter I left Mary Alice and her friend because I just couldn’t take it anymore. My energy reserves were running short. So there I left, biking home at 4 am. -___-

And that’s how day 15 ended! TGIF!

[Day 16//11.09.10]

If I remember correctly, this was the day of a roof top party hosted by another exchange student. I had no idea who he was except for his name, Daniel. He’s supposed to be in graphic design. Anyhow it started at 2pm so I had time to buy some stuff at the supermarket. I didn’t feel like bringing drinks since I knew there would be eventually (there always seems to be this endless supply of beer here) so I brought Pringles. Lol.

I biked to Oostplein to drop off my bike then metro-ed to Delshaven where I spent 15 minutes trying to figure out where the hell I was before I realized I was walking the opposite way. >_>”

Now, first off, this area is one of the older (pre-bombed?) neighbourhoods of Rotterdam, and hence there were older buildings that didn’t look irregular or geometrical or precarious. Daniel’s place was in one of these buildings, and therefore the stairs were very VERY steep and narrow and very European. Even more steep was the ladder we had to use to get to the roof top. Now, when I heard “roof top” party I didn’t think it would literally BE the roof top (I figured it would be one of those publicly accessible terraces like my apartment’s) but no, we had to use a ladder to get through the freaking skylight to get to the roof. Scary? Yes. Doubled by the fact that the ladder was not attached to anything hence UNSTABLE. I think my heart nearly fainted at that point.

I managed to get to the roof though and my oh my, the view was FANTASTIC. Plus the sky was clear and we were sitting on floatation devices (since the roof is also made with crushed/powdered glass) and sipping on our Heinekens. It was beautiful.

A lot of people came, as always! It was really like a party. Lots of conversations were happening, everywhere; most of the time I played observer, but it was fun nonetheless. Listening to the Aussies talk was funny, as they were chomping at my Pringles (“omg it’s gluten free!” nomnomnom) but it was also sort of nonsensical, since they were talking about insider stuff. I met a few people for the first time, such as a guy from Baltimore named Colin, who looked like the quintessential suburban American boy. The way he carried himself seemed sort of dorky but cute. Lol. I recall a conversation with Joao and Guilla (Italian girl from Rotown) about how Portugese and Italian basically sound the same except accented, and another about the illogic behind engendering nouns in Portugese/French/etc. I’ve always found that part to be the most nonsensical part in French class, and Joao confirmed it! There really isn’t any sort of consistent logic, but they just grow up learning them.

By the time it started to get dark we all headed for the Witte de With fest. I managed to get down the ladder fine! What wasn’t as fine was when I attempted to ride on the back of Joao’s bike. (Had I known we’d be biking there I would’ve brought my bike as well! Ahh hell.) Either I was too heavy or Joao was too weak (or perhaps a combination of the two) because we epic failed. So we just walked it. Luckily Alessia (another Italian I met at Rotown with really poor but cute English) took pity and walked her bike with us, since we didn’t know the way (turns out it was just… straight. Lol.) We had a cute conversation about food. Italian food is incredibly varied! I think she said that the center of Italy is known for their spices, while the north? is known for incorporating fish into their dishes. Everywhere has pasta of course, just different kinds.

Finally after a 20-30 minute walk (through the shady part of Nieuwe Binnenweg) we reached our destination in front of the Witte App (a bar at the start of the street). We stayed in front of a bar inside the street (past a mass of bodies into another mass of bodies) and just drank beer and shit. Then we migrated to another part of the street to do the same thing. Pity we didn’t go further because apparently there was a breaking competition.

I kept getting drinks complimentary of other people so that was nice. Even nicer was when we went to a partything at someone’s flat along the street (everywhere seems to be an apartment) which was selling beer/wine for 1 euro! It was bottled too, not like sippy cups. There was a DJ and seizure-inducing videos and everything in a small packed room. It was awesome so we stayed and danced our night away. Namso was so wasted.

Memories are hazy but I left with Smriti and Stefan (Aussie girl and Swiss guy respectively, whom I met earlier but in different situations) because they lived nearby. I think it was around 2am. Well, time flies when you’re having fun with fun people.

——
*Note: here are the links I was referring to earlier:
Agent PEKKA (lots of awesome Finnish illustrators)
Cristiana Couceiro (this looks like graphic design but is classified as illustration. Still awesome!)

**Note: About the Don’t Speak Americano song, so this annoying remix song is apparently all the rage now in Europe, playing basically well, everywhere. And guess what? Apparently Kate’s friend actually produced that song! Strange coincidence, huh?

It’s been pretty much a blur what I’ve done so I’ll just summarize what I remember, as I listen halfheartedly to a podcast about epigenetics:

[Day 6]
- nothing happened. really.

[Day 7]
- I had to endure the most boring 2 hour lecture during typography class. the instructor took 2 hours to go through his past work. granted, the latter half was much more interesting than the former, however… it would’ve greatly benefitted from editing. really.

[Day 8]
- Friday. I had a class called crosslab, which is about working with new media. Our assignment was to create a “business card” using a webcam. (Still working on it, heh). The one thing that should be noted is that this is the first time the third exchange student came to class! Hooray!
- After class, I witnessed Timothy and Pauliina engaging in a heated debate about Dutch vs. Finnish bread. Apparently Finnish bread is much more superior than Dutch bread, according to the Finnish girl. The Dutch guy obviously disagrees.

[Day 9]
- There was supposed to be some sort of touristy hangout thing with the other exchange students but that fell through. Lack of planning.
- So instead, I spent an hour and a half strolling through Lijnbaan and Meent. I hoped to take pictures but they ended up looking lame.
- At about 7pm (or 19.00) Mary-Alice and I went to a bbq thing on our apartment’s roof. In sum, it was a night of a TON of beer, TON of lost-in-translation awkwardness, lack of English and drunk conversations. Not by me, I only drank a couple glasses of their cheap supermarket wine. I witnessed a couple guys downing beer after beer… 20 times. As for drunk conversations, the most memorable one was when someone (seriously) asked “what’s your favourite traffic sign?” (seriously). Then later a couple guys were in a heated debate over whether it was physically possible to have a swimming pool on the top of the roof… I left shortly afterward.

[Day 10]
- Sunday. I think I caught a cold from the night before.
- During the evening Mary-Alice invited me to eat out at a restaurant we spotted while waiting for a tram at Meent called Furore. It was pretty cool, I liked the interior’s aesthetic. Quite chic. We parked ourselves at a corner of the restaurant so it took a while before the waiter gave us our menus. Actually Mary-Alice had to get it herself. Lol.
- I found it to be reasonably priced given what was on the menu, it was semi-casual semi-high class. The menu unfortunately was in Dutch so Mary-Alice had to translate, and had a hard time doing it. Lol.
- As an appetizer we ordered Bitterballen, which is basically a croquette except it has meat instead of cheese/potatoes inside, served with mustard on the side. It was good! It’s very creamy/gooey-ish.
- I eventually ordered steak with something that translates into mashed potatoes in a circle. Well, at least I think it’s steak. It was called “jodenhaas”. Mary-Alice translated it as “rabbit” at the time but google translator claims it’s “steak”. Regardless, it was meaty. And very, very rare! Literally raw inside. I’m surprised they didn’t ask how I wanted my meat prepared, because usually they’re supposed to.
- I can attest that Coke tastes better in Europe. Much better. It’s has a refreshing taste that doesn’t sting or leave a lasting gummy aftertaste, if you know what I mean. The downside was that the 200ml bottle ended up being 2,30 euros. [Note: I noticed that commas and decimals/periods are switched when it comes to numbers. Instead of say 2,300.00 it's 2.300,00 here. I find that quite strange, haha.]
- Our orders also came with a bowl of fries (served with mayo) and salad, though we were already full that we barely touched them. I was disappointed to discover that in Europe (or at least in the Netherlands) it’s not customary to doggy-bag food home, except for in fast food restaurants (which doesn’t really make sense, I mean aren’t they already made for take out anyway?), according to Mary-Alice. So all those fries and greens went to waste. :\
- Throughout we talked about casual and stupid things. From double joints to alphabets. It was nice.
- Before we embarked our journey home I discovered that there are headlights in front of bikes, where the bike’s wheels control the motor of the lights. Hard to explain, but it was SO COOL. Unfortunately mine didn’t work. I think city by-laws make them mandatory for night use.

[Day 11]
- Monday. Start of my typography minor! This is different from my other typography course, where it’s about the application of typography through projects. This minor concentrates on theory… which I need.
- Two unfortunate things happened: 1) turns out it was in the WORST ROOM POSSIBLE. It was literally a meeting room. There weren’t enough chairs for people, and we only had about 10 in the room. There was also a sink. Yes. A SINK. And in the cabinet next to it were cleaning supplies. -_(\
- 2) Half way through the instructors unintelligible presentation I realized this was a terribly disorganized pilot class that seemed to have absolutely no aim or focus whatsoever. The material presented also appeared outdated and useless. I was disillusioned by the midway point.
- Hence, I was considering switching minors. But given the fact that the other available minors either a) needed prerequisite software knowledge or b) were just as if not more unattractive options, I decided to stick with it.
- Later I spent nearly 2 hours studying the material he wanted us to study, pausing and making notes every so often, only to find out that on PAGE 59 there was a SUMMARY of all the previous 58 pages I was taking notes on! WTF.
- Even later I spent practically half and hour trying to print two bloody pages of text (that I wouldn’t even need, as later learned the next day) because the freaking printer is in DUTCH! First it was because I was trying to print LETTER instead of A4 (damn you ISO) and second was because my card wasn’t working. OMG.

[Day 12]
- Today was interesting because it was the first day I took the bus instead of biked to school. I ended up being 5 minutes late.
- First class was grafisch ontwerpen. We had to present our ideas to the rest of the class. It was then I realized my ideas needed some work. (They weren’t bad per se, just needed refining. Lol) I was too embarrassed to show my sketches so I withheld them, heh.
- The whole class went on like this so towards the middle-end it got quite long. Naturally, I started doodling. I noticed the girl next to me, Martja(?) doing the same thing with the guy sitting next to her, Fernando. The subject of the posters was about copyrights, so they were drawing pirates going “fuck you”. So then I decided to join in and started doodling more stupid things and we eventually created a masterpiece involving pirates with eyepatches, balloon animals, some sort of crab thing dancing to disco, and stupid little profanity ladened phrases. It was genius.
- Then we did the thing where you fold the paper into three panels, and each person draws on one and passes the next to another until you form something new. It was also genius.
- And that’s how I made a couple new friends! Fernando called us the three (pirate) musketeers. Bahahaha.
- I’m too tired to finish the rest but it involved Pauliina and I pushing to drop the ‘text’ class for illustration (after enduring another awkward assignment session and perceiving it as both frustrating and pointless), a presentation with the exchange students (dutch culture course? what? you never told us that) and futile attempts to mingle afterward, and basa fish ladened with garlic cream cheese and spinach for dinner. Mmmmm.

Dutch word(s) of the day:
jodenhaas: either “steak” or “rabbit”

Finnish word of the day:
Moi: hello or goodbye, depending on context/how it’s said (Moi! Moi!)

So here’s a recap of what happened these past few days:

[Day 3]

- Mary Alice, my roommate, was really kind and took the time to show me around some of the places in town, like Lijnbaarn and Meent (the shopping centres). Surprisingly it’s very easy to walk! Or maybe that shouldn’t be much of a surprise, considering how the country is so small.
- It was at Lijnbaarn where I picked up the cheapest cellphone I could find at Vodafone (35 euros including 10 euro prepaid credits). Compared to my other phones it’s pretty… crappy looking. It’s very small, and the screen is super small. But apparently it gets good reception. Given my whole debacle with the iPhone and crap I didn’t think I deserved to get another expensive phone.
- M.A. and I went to the supermarket afterwards. It sort of reminded me of a cross between IKEA, Safeway and the colour orange. We bought salmon for like, 7 Euros. Eek. But we had a good supper between us afterwards.
- Right after we came out of the market, it rained like NO TOMORROW. Since Lijnbaarn is an open space we had to wait for the rain to stop at the side before we walked back home. We should’ve known it would rain like this, as the day before also had a thunderstorm.
- We made salmon with cream cheese. Mmm.
- Later at 8pm I went to Rotown to meet with some other exchange students in the student group I’d joined. Rotown is a very popular bar among students as it houses a lot of local talent and big names. We chatted over culture differences over beer (mmm Heineken) and wine. There were about 10 people, more than I had anticipated, from all over: a couple Australians, a German, a handful of Italians, a couple Norwegians, and one from Belgium. Oh, and one Canadian. Ha. It was fun, especially listening to the Australian talk about how everything is so “cheap” here compared to home. Lol.
- Took the metro from Eendenscheplein or whatever the hell it’s called to Oostplein and walked home in the wind for the rest of the way. So. Bloody. Windy.

—–

[Day 4]

- Introduction to the school day!
- Met a few of the graphic design students and a couple in advertising during an introductory meeting. It was a relief being able to know my timetable FINALLY (literally the day before school like WTF). I saw some other students who came from Beijing. They seemed very reserved, and sounded like one of them rehearsed her introductory speech. Lol. But who wouldn’t anyway, especially if English is your second language.
- Only one of the other students is in my “group”. Unlike in ECU (well except for foundation), the classes are separated into groups, meaning that students from that group stay together in the rest of their classes, starting from first year. So that was a bit of a let down.
- For our minors, we had to choose between Cultural Diversity or Typography as those are free, graphic design related and taught in English. Personally I don’t really care for either but my typography skills are quite lacking so it might be useful to take that course. Plus, the other one is taught by my graphic design tutor and I don’t want to see his face all the time. [Note: When I'd registered for exchange I had to fill out the learning agreement, but I guess that all went to the trash. So much for getting AdCom! I saw it coming though.]
- After getting some paperwork figured out we went on a tour of the Blaak building, the one that used to be a bank. I was so surprised at how many corridors there were! The looks are really deceiving. In that small building they were able to fit in a huge computer lab (that looked REALLY nice btw), two print rooms (one for letter press, the other for other printing techniques such as silkscreen and intaglio), two photo studios (one analog, which can be used freely, the other digital which is new and a little harder to come by), a library, an arts supply store, a printing/large format printing place, etc. I guess since it used to be a bank there naturally need a lot of places to hide… money.
- Speaking of money, another downside is that the school doesn’t use cash! They pay everything with a “check card”. I’m starting to find the country’s obsession with chip cards a bit annoying. [Note: not only does public transport use a "chipkaart", but the city also uses a "chipknip" to pay for things, much like a credit card. Except more annoying for people outside of the city. I still don't know if my credit card doesn't work here or if buying my train ticket was just one anomaly.]
- After the tour and introduction we were free to go home. I decided I needed to refill my chipkaart and the only place I knew was at Rotterdam Centraal station, because I did that the very first day I came. So I biked there in spite of the wind and refilled it with 20 euros. I now have about 26 on my card; in so far I’ve used 6 euros these past few days of occasional transit use, so I think that’ll suffice for the time being.
- I decided I was hungry so I bought a “turkse pizza” for 1.95 euros in a donair place at the station. It was rolled and I was hungry so it tasted good.
- Biked home (I think I’m starting to know my way around, despite not knowing the street names besides Boezemzeg, Oostplein and Goudensppealkdfdfaf…) and it rained like a bitch again. By the time I came home I was completely drenched, head to toe. So I spent the rest of the night watching ItsKingsleyBitch’s videos and anticipating the next day…

[Day 5]

- First day of school! Woke up at 7:30, left the house at 8:40. Once again I biked and I realized just how fat I am in the inside. I was sweating so profusely! It was actually ridiculous.
- First class was graphic design, or grafisch ontwerp(en) as they like to call it. [Note: The "en" suffix indicates that the word is plural, as does "s"] It was a bit disappointing to see that only one other exchange student was present, and that was the one I’d met yesterday, a girl from Helsinki who looks like she’s 14 but is actually 24. Glad to see she’s as short as I am.
- First impression of my teacher: he looks pretty young, and thus makes it surprising that he’s already the Head of Graphic Design even only after three years of teaching. At ECU, the associate professors are practically in their 50s-60s. He seems a lot more comfortable speaking in Dutch, because he always pauses to search for words when speaking in English. :\ Some of the other students are also the same way, which makes me feel even more bad for my Dutch illiteracy.
- We had introductions in English, where I learned and forgot many names at the same time. Some have studied at other universities prior, a couple come straight from high school, etc. What’s striking is that the class has very distinct cliques (eg. the boys together with the boys, the girls chatting like birds in a cluster of their own) just like ECU and high school. I guess some habits apply to all humans beings after all.
- After a very boring presentation on the teacher’s past works (it looked nice but nonetheless was quite long), we were supposed to watch a film called “Rip: A Remix Manifesto” as it relates to the next assignment (a traditional poster and a “visual reaction”). However, the power went out so we were excused for the rest of the morning.
- Deciding to make full use of our time, the girl from Helsinki (Paulina) and I went to get our check cards as we were unable to the previous day. Except, the power was out so we couldn’t get our cards in the end. Damn it.
- Without a check cards, we couldn’t eat lunch, so we went to the closest supermarket. I paid 2.30 euros for a disgusting chicken Caesar sandwich. :\
- When we walked back to the academy, we noticed that everyone was forming a cluster outside. We later learned that because of the power outage, the staff and crew evacuated everyone outside. Like wtf? You’d think it was an actual emergency, like a fire or something. Paulina agreed with my disbelief.
- The next class was something called “text”, which is supposed to involve CV/resume/cover letter writing and all that jazz. I think it’s pretty pointless, given that this is stuff you learn in high school.
- Apparently, people in Europe don’t care about being on time, unlike certain Canadian institutions who dock 5% off of your final grade for being late twice. >:\
- Just before class started, I had a short conversation with a guy (who had earlier recognized us as the international students) named Timothy. Turns out he did exchange at Mass Art in Boston, MA last year and needed to do another semester to make up for what he’d missed. Also, his friend came to ECU last year as well. I recognized his name from the exchange blog but I’d never met him in person. All in all he was very sweet and offered to translate for me if I didn’t understand anything.
- For the rest of the class we had to connect all the tables, make ourselves name tags and arrange ourselves like some seance. Turns out we were about to do this conversation exercise where one person asks a question to another person in the room in front of the whole class, and these questions had to invite conversation and insight into the person being asked. Questions like “if the house was burning what would you take with you” or “what was your favourite childhood toy”, etc. It was all very awkward and nerve wracking, and these feelings were amplified when the teacher would interrupt at points to either critique our questions (“that’s not a very good question, what else can you ask?”) or ask us why we asked those specific questions, etc. Plus, I had to hold the urge to pee for the entire time. :\
- Because no one wanted to go first (haha) Timothy got the ball rolling. Then after he asked the question the person he asked had to ask another random person, etc etc. By the questions they asked it looked like they were picking on things that they’d already knew about the person.
- Also, as time went on it was clear to me now that not everyone liked to speak English (the whole exercise was in English btw). Timothy had told me this earlier, that even when the kids don’t speak English very well they all need to give up Dutch just to accommodate one exchange student. .___. (Oh, don’t I feel the burden now…)
- As it turns out I ended up being last. -___- My question was about what made me choose graphic design and I sort of rambled a bit. The teacher didn’t seem to mind. Lol.
- Also coincidentally, I had to ask Timothy the last question. Mine was “what is your definition for success”. The teacher seemed to be impressed. Lol.
- Second to last, we did some exercise where we were split into groups and had to describe a picture for the other group to draw. Been there done that; moral was, good communication is essential and not everything can be described with just words.
- Lastly, our assignment for the next week was to compile 20 excerpts of text from different sources. I don’t really understand the point, but whatever.

Annnnnnnd that’s about it! I think I’ve hit it all. Pictures may be edited in later. For now, you’ll just have to draw it from my words.

[P.S: I have a giant zit right next to my eyebrow and it's so damn annoying. D:<]

Day two in Rotterdam and guess how it started? I overslept.

Woke up at 2:30pm, probably because I was up til 4am yesterday due to jetlag (or due to this blog, hmm). I’d set my alarm for 8 but naturally I didn’t hear it. I had a crazy dream about a black woman who had AIDS but refused to tell her kids out of love. Seemed like a plot for a Hollywood movie.

Despite it being the afternoon I decided to eat cereal for breakfast. Apparently Dutch people really like to have shavings of chocolate in their breakfasts! So my cereal ended up being somewhat sweet. Traditionally they also put chocolate sprinkles on toast. How cute.

After an hour of loitering around I decided to go to the local Turkish market to buy some food. I bought quite a few things and it ended up totaling only 9.40 Euros, surprisingly.

Then I went and spent a third of that amount on a food container at another store nearby. Funnily enough the cashier spoke Dutch to me after speaking English to the woman before me. I could even understand when she asked me if I needed a bag. Haha, what a triumph. P:

The street with the supermarket, located just behind the apartment.

De Wijze Uil = The Wise Owl? (pronunciation wise, Dutch isn’t so different from English really..)

__________________________________________

Since I was only expecting to meet Julia in the evening I decided to spend some time exploring the city by bike.

Easier said than done.

Sanoera had told me that her bike tires were flat, and later I had learned that she hadn’t used the bike in some time. So naturally my first inclination was to fill the tires with air. I’m typically not this clumsy but trying to get her bike out of its’ parked space was a HUGE struggle. Not only did I knock down the bike next to it (breaking its bell by accident) but I also hit my head on a few bike handles. :\

Then when I tried to pump the tire, turns out the pump was broken! It took me 15 minutes plus the aid of another girl (who was so helpful, bless her soul) to realize my efforts were futile. So by her suggestion I stole the pump from the shed next door. Then it took me 30 MORE minutes to figure out that I was using the wrong pump valve. By then I was drenched with sweat and shame.

Damned things that ate up 45 minutes of my time.

After that whole ordeal, I hopped on the bike and was ready to hit the city. Sanoera is just about the same height as I am so I was (unpleasantly) surprised (again) to find that the bike seat was SO HIGH. Even at the lowest height it was too high for me, so I had to use a cement brick to boost my height, much to my embarrassment once again.

Other than that biking was a breeze. I didn’t have a clue where I was going but I tried to go along the bus route towards my school. I said earlier that the bike lanes were pretty well established, and this little trip confirmed it. Unlike in Canada, where bikers share the road with humongous, fast-driven cars, Holland has separate bike lanes for the most part which are smooth to ride on. And the cars drive slower too, so biking on the road isn’t a pain either.

For the next hour I rode to where ever I could go, turning here and there and every where, stopping every so often to take pictures. It was quite the adventure! And naturally I got lost. The surprising bit was I actually found my way home, without having to ask for directions or consult a map, and came home at 6:30 as expected. I’m feeling more and more street savvy these days.

Around this time I officially met my new roommate, Mary Alice. I found out that her parents, like Sanoera’s, are Surinamese. Looks like a lot of people here are from there, and I didn’t even know that part of the world existed. She’s doing her final year at a school in Utrecht. Anyhow I made pasta with a lot of carrots for the both of us and we ate in her room, chatting about certain things. Law & Order was playing on the TV with Dutch subtitles and it reminded me of Yasemin. Turns out they play crime shows from America this time of the day. It was around then I realized Julia hadn’t come knocking at my door like she said she would, so I decided to give her a call, and apparently she forgot as well. She then took me on a tour around and gave me the usual low down on rules and junk. She was younger than expected, and told me she came from Moldova. She said I probably didn’t know where the hell that was and she was right. (Psst, it’s in Eastern Europe!)

Mary Alice and I had made plans to see an outdoor cinema show at 9 pm but it rained. More like poured, plus thunder and lightning. So we ended up watching Seven Years of Tibet on her TV, with unwanted Dutch subtitles. It was really really long. Good, but long.

Anyhow, it seems my right wrist feels inflamed, so that’s a sign that I have to stop blogging and start sleeping. Tomorrow afternoon I’ll be going to the city centre in search of a new phone, then later I might be meeting up with some other exchange students. Wonder what will happen then!

Day 2: Things to Do List

1. Get new phone. Screw trying to unlock the iPhone. (And screw you Steve Jobs!)
2. Meet up with exchange students at “19.00″ (a.k.a 7 pm)

Dutch Word(s) of the Day

goedemorgan: good morning
bananen: banana
peen: carrot (LOL)
uien: onion
ja/nee: yes/no

As a consequence of my jet lag I slept this afternoon and now I can’t seem to find the will to sleep again. Maybe I’m just too excited. And a little hungry.

First, a couple side stories that occurred on the plane:

1) Sad Revelation

A couple months ago, in preparation for this trip, I had gone to Daiso to buy a travel neck pillow, the type that fills with air. I must have not paid attention to what I grabbed because… because… it turned out to be for KIDS! D’:

Child’s neck pillow… age 4+.

When I came to pump it up, it seemed like one of those floatation devices that kids wear. The neck size was the width of my rear arm…

2) Strange People

I had made a note about this on my iPhone, but due to certain technical difficulties (lack of wifi) I couldn’t post it. Anyways, on my flight to Amsterdam sitting next to me was a cute man. His habits however were not as cute. First I noticed he used the complimentary blanket as a blindfold. Then later he used the blanket to cover himself from head to toe, resembling a mummy of sorts. Then he put butter in his rice, when clearly it was for the bread. But it looked like a good idea anyway. Then when he accidentally got woken up by the seat in front of him (literally reclined on his head. I suppressed the urge to laugh..) he started making those gestures that Catholics perform whenever they enter a church. Lol.

Or maybe I was just staring way too much.

_________________________________________

Anyhow, I made it to Amsterdam, a little anxious about immigration, luggage and even more so Sanoera! My texts wouldn’t send through and I had told her I’d be coming a hour before I had actually arrived. But eventually all was well. I was pleasantly surprised that we had a lot to chat about, particularly about our culture differences, etc. I’m also glad she liked the gifts I’d sent.

Afterwards I took the train, although the process of getting my train ticket was a bit strange because my credit card wouldn’t work (despite the reassurance from the screen that it would). I’ll have to check that out sometime.

On the train I was immediately struck by how LARGE the train was! It had three floors. The train station at Leidsplein(?) was similarly large, very vast. It reminded me of London’s. Every so often Sanoera would converse with the train officers and such and it would fly completely over my head. I can see I have a long way to go with the Dutch language… Certain words sound familiar though, which is a small relief.

Rotterdam Centraal’s elevator (or shall I say lift) smelled horribly of piss, but thankfully the rest of the station didn’t. In a little cute “lost-in-translation” moment I learned that station in Dutch is called “spoor“. Hahaha!

In Rotterdam, the transit system is much more established than Vancouver’s, and understandably so. The same probably goes for the rest of Europe. They not only have RET trains but also trams (which run much like the street cars in San Francisco), busses and the metro. The trains in particular are separated into categories. Stoptreins stop frequently and at every sub stops while Trankys are the more expensive trains. And of course, the bikes! Unsurprisingly, bikes are popular thanks to how flat the surface is. Routes are pretty prominently indicated on the roads, as they’re coloured in red. In Dutch, bikes are called “fiets“.

Interestingly enough, recently (last year) Rotterdam installed a new way of purchasing fare that eliminates the need for cash fare on transit. They use something called an OV-chipkaart which can be purchased and refilled at the RET stations (I think), and basically you scan it once you board the vehicle and once you leave. The first scan credits the card (something like 4 euros) while the second one debits back fare appropriate to the trip’s length, I think. It’s pretty cool, although it’s new and unique to the big cities only so might not be as convenient if you were to travel elsewhere.

Basically we traveled to and fro, starting with her apartment at Boezemsingel. It’s pretty compact, just like everything else in Europe, compared to Canada. I can see why the history of European design revolves around conserving space. It’s decent for my needs though, and there is also a series of small ethnically-owned shops in the back. I look forward to visiting again soon.

We also visited the school and I got to get a taste of what I’ll be expecting in the months to come. Looks exciting! It was around that time I started to feel dizzy and jet lag was coming back to bite me in the ass. :\

But needless to say, it was a pretty neat introduction to the city! I look forward to exploring more in the future.

_____________________________________

Day 1: Things to Do List:

1. Figure out banking needs. Do I need a bank account? Talk this over with Mrs. Willemstein.
1b. Find out how to refill chipkaart. Does it need a card from a local bank account?
2. Find out how to unlock iPhone, otherwise buy used prepaid at the central market.
3. Buy food. Especially fruits.
4. Appointment with Julia at 7:30 pm. Ask about laundry room tokens.

Dutch Word(s) of the Day:

fiets: bicycles
spoor: station
dank u vel: thank you
astoobleeft: please

This was one of my bookmarks but I can’t remember from when. Either way, pretty sick stuff. I love his style.

http://juntosotravez.com/

Enjoy!