Project 365

I was invited for a dinner in Helmond with a couple of friends. It was lovely! We had a nice conversation over dinner. And the foods were just DELICIOUS! It was a full course Dutch dinner, consisting of 6 different courses. I LOVE THEM! 🙂

Jessie, if you read this… I wish you were here with us :'( MISS YOU! xoxo

Found this group on Facebook and I thought I put up some points that I really like and that apply to me here 😀 (And I edited some)

So… You know you’ve been in the Netherlands for too long when…

• Walking from your faculty to the cafeteria has become unimaginable. You take your bike, even if it’s for 50meters
• Eating 7 slides of bread for lunch doesn’t scare you anymore
• You think 15°C is warm
• You don’t remember what a mountain looks like
• You still don’t know how to speak Dutch. But your English has improved. You don’t even bother to ask "do you speak English?", you just speak English right away
• You always check the weather before leaving home
• You have 4 seasons in one day
• You know that kapsalon is not a typical Turkish dish, but a hairdresser
• You can ride your bike in the rain, wind and even snow
• You “wash” the dishes with a detergent without rinsing them
• You go to the market and you only buy the stuffs that fit in you bike
• You have mastered the art of riding a bike and drinking coffee/smoking/eating lunch at the same time
• You understand why they don’t serve coffee at a coffeeshop.

I went to a small city called Weert today. It’s about 20 minutes from Eindhoven by train. Sam, mbak Linda, and I were invited to Ian’s house. These were the people I met during the Boekenfestijn and we became close ever since. Sam and mbak Linda were a married couple originally from Maluku (Moluccas). Sam was half Dutch Indonesian (we call it Indo or Indische), while mbak Linda was pure Indonesian. Ian also had an Indonesian background. His father was a Dutch and his mother was an Indo born in Surabaya.

Anyway… in the afternoon, Ian and Sam were busy making some music while mbak Linda and I were busy shopping in the centrum (city) 😀 After shopping, we sat for a coffee and had a very interesting conversation. This was the first time I talked to her and had a deep conversation. We talked about many things, including our life, future, and Maluku! (I’m going to put this into two different posts: here and here). I had a great time! After our coffee time, Ian and Sam joined us and we had few more drinks. I got to try on a Dutch food (fish) which I forgot its name now!! It wasn’t bad at all.

Then we went to Ian’s house to meet with his parents and had dinner together. They were very nice and their house was very cozy! Ian’s dad cooked so many Indonesian foods and they were very very delicious! They were rendang, tempe goreng, and chicken among other things. You know, it’s amazing how it’s not unusual for the guys here to cook. All the guys on the table (Ian, his dad, and Sam) loved to cook and it’s quite rare for the guys in Indonesia to be able to do that. Once they get married, the wives were expected to do everything in the house, including cooking and doing house chores. But for the Dutch and many other Western people (and MY OWN DAD!), they took turns to cook. They split the house chores with their wife. Isn’t it great?!?

We stayed in Ian’s house until 9pm! It was a looooong day and we were all very tired. But it was a great day and I had such a wonderful time! 🙂

I had a decent day today as usual. I went to the Dutch class after skipping so many lessons. I was supposed to go to the centrum (city) with teh Rita to explore some sales, but I was stuck in doing chapters after chapters of my Dutch book. It was fun actually and I felt like I didn’t miss anything huge when I went to class.

My Dutch teacher told me something interesting today. The Dutch language for “I sit in front of the computer” is:

Ik zit achter de computer

… which literally means: I sit behind the computer (achter = behind). She said that Dutch language was the only few languages that used “behind” rather than “in front of” in this case. Cool! 😀

After the Dutch class, I had a three-hour-long meeting at the computer lab. Couldn’t believe time ran so quick! But I was glad we made a progress 🙂

Then in the evening, I was invited to Reyhan’s place to have dinner with mbak Rining and Pak Agus. We had a really interesting conversation — well, actually Pak Agus told us so many things about some failures of our education system in Indonesia and some nasty bureaucracy at one of the best universities in our country. I really wanted to share it here but I’m really tired now. Plus, I’ve got an assignment to finish. Hmm maybe next time!

Welterusten! (good night)