who knew that April was over?

So,

I know that I never quite finished my Irish tale, and I haven't told you of all the stuff I've done since then. Here's a quick update:

1. Irish Vacation: Super fun, we went to Howth, ate twin cones, went on a free tour of Dublin, learned lots of historical stuff from a super cute Irish guy named Connor. Flew home after every flight into Amsterdam had been delayed because of all the fog.

Enter Amsterdam,
it was a beautiful morning, and since the fog (which was now no where to be seen) had delayed our travels, I missed class. That turned into a trend, because that entire week, I only went to my two hour dutch class.


I went to a CIEE dinner at Hannah's house. Her chocolate lab, Sadie, is the cutest thing ever, or at least the cutest dog I've seen in this country. We had tacos, which weren't that great because Dutch people hate delicious, spicy, Mexican food.

There was another week of class. I had trash duty for my apartment. I don't remember much of what we did. Although I did start watching 30 Rock, which is a tremendously funny sitcom, and I am currently on a huge Tina Fey kick. I've watched Baby Mama and Mean Girls as well.

The last weekend in April (who knew that April went by so quickly!?!?!) CIEE took us on another outing. This time we spent the weekend in Schiermonnikkoog. It means Grey Monk Island, although I suspect that it isn't really a direct translation from Dutch. Oh well. I went mudflat walking, laid out in the sun, ate more yummy ice cream, hung out at the beach, and in the forest, and generally had an excellent time. I brought tons of fun things to do, and everyone wanted to play frisbee, or cards, or catchphrase. Best weekend ever.

After we returned from the grey monk island, we had three days of classes until a huge long weekend full of holidays. Queen's Day is the biggest national crazy party. I don't know how long it has been going on, but it is a celebration of the Queen's birthday. The current Queen, Beatrix, celebrates her birthday on April 30th, which was her mother's birthday. Beatrix's birthday is sometime in January, which doesn't really translate well to national party time. So on this day, everyone wears orange, drinks a lot, and has garage sales. Queen's day is the only day of the year that Dutch people are allowed to sell stuff on the streets, so everyone busts out blankets and any old stuff they have lying around. We had a little barbecue on Prinsengracht, which is one of the main canals. It was so much fun to hang out and watch the boats go by playing really loud music. Drinking at like 10am and sitting out in the sun all day is actually really tiring, so Justin and I went home to nap at around 4.

Apparently during a parade in Appledoorn, some small town, someone crashed their car, in an attempt to kill the royal family! This was a big deal, but you can find clips of the crash online, and it seems rather pathetic. The Royal Family was riding in some not-classy double-decker bus, and the car didn't even hit the bus. FAIL. Not that I'm condoning it or anything, I just thought it was a crappy way to go.


So, that was Thursday. Alice, an Oxy student who is spending the year in Berlin came for the week. We tried to ride our bikes to see the tulips, but we had really bad directions, and decided instead to go to Vondelpark. I'm glad that I finally went, because it was always really embarrassing to admit that I'd never been. I do like the westerpark much better (that park I blogged about a long time ago). Speaking of which, one day between now and Ireland, Justin and I went and read books in the sun at the westerpark. It was a beautiful day.

We made really spicy sezchuan stir-fry with tofu and yummy vegetables the other night. It turns out that the chinese food was where the dutch have been hiding their spice. It was soooo spicy. We went out to a bar, played some card games and took Alice on a tour of the red light district (duh, you have to do that whole tourist thing when people visit, except maybe parents).

Yesterday was a self-proclaimed lazy day, but let's be real, I'm on a 6 day weekend, so what day isn't? We watched movies and lounged around. I discovered that you can watch episodes of Good Eats on Youtube! so we watched about 5 episodes and decided that we were hungry. Justin and I plan on doing lots of cooking this summer. We both really enjoy cooking and eating good food. Yay. I'm super into having an oven again, because there is so much that you can't do without one. I want to make fresh bread and eat lots of fresh summery foods. Justin wants to invest in a really awesome barbecue setup, and we'll marinade yummy things and find a butcher (if those even exist anymore). The only problem that I can foresee, is that we want to make all this delicious food, but we also talk about all of the restaurants and new places we want to try. I'm sure I am up to the challenge though. So much food.

I didn't get the summer senior interviewer job, which was sad, because it would have been fun. Today was supposed to be a productive day, so instead I finally got around to blogging! The weather here has been fantastic. This weekend, Justin's mom is coming to visit, so it will be another excuse to eat out at fancy Indonesian restaurants and go to the touristy things that I still haven't managed to go see on my own.

This is the last week for those back at Oxy, and I'm super jealous. Other study abroad programs are ending too, so there are people coming and going throughout May.
If you didn't hear, I bought my ticket home. I'll be in LA on June 3rd. I'm still trying to plan my first meal home. I know that la superrica is calling to me, but I think I might stay in LA that weekend because it is Kit's 21st birthday on the 5th. Yay. I do plan to spend a bit more time in Santa Barbara this summer, because SAMI GOT INTO UCSB!! So I'll be visiting every once in a while.

Until next time, which will probably be sooner rather than later, because I hate writing papers!
May 7-Ethnic Diversity and Popular Culture collage
May 14-Dutch final
May 20-Emotion and Mental Health paper
May 26-Moving Manhood paper
May 28-Ethic Diversity and Popular Culture paper

then packing, saying goodbyes, and fun!