3 months home allready!

The first month was really bad. I had big expectations about coming home, that it would be all fun but it was actually quite hard to get used to my own apartment and friends again. But that's all good now.

After about 1,5 month I found a job! So I was really proud of myself. It wasn't what I had planned though. I thought I would just relax the whole summer find a temp job as a waitress or something but then I saw the add for Business Analyst at a national newspaper and thought..damn that's the job I wanted after summer! But the opportunity was there now so grabbed it and got the job within a week woehoe!

I started on the 1ste may a bit tired from the weekend because I had had a wedding of one of my friends, Angela, on saturday. She got married in november in America but this was the big party with all her friends and family. Except form the "I do" part it was a complete wedding with cutting the cake and throwing the bouquet (didn't catch it ;-)!). Angela and I went crazy on the typical Dutch songs. I must admit they aren't always the best but that is one of the things you miss when you away from home and hearing it makes you really feel like "Yes, I'm home!". So had a lot of fun that night.

The next two days were also very much about feeling Dutch. Every year the Queens birthday is celebrated on two days. The first day is Koninginnenach, Queens night. All around the country there are parties and festivals in the evening. We went to Gouda, a town about 20 minutes from Rotterdam. You might know it from the cheese. Yes even in New Zealand you have real Gouda Cheese! My plan was to stay there till 11 pm and then take the train to Amsterdam were I was going to spend the next day with Philip and his friends. But I'm still in the "go with the flow" mode so plans change every minute. Drank way to much and ended up crashing at 4 am at a friends place.

The next day I went to Amsterdam which went surprisingly easy. The whole country tries to get to Amsterdam that day, Koninginnedag, the real Queensday, so usually trains are overloaded and have serious delays. But like I said I was lucky so all went smoothly. It really is crazy in Amsterdam. So many people, you can't even walk normally. So it took me about and hour to get to the place where I was meeting up with Maartje, normally about a10 minute walk! Had a nice day, the sun was shining, music everywhere and people are just happy! Unfortunately never got to Philip and his friends because his battery was dead, smart boy eh. Oh and If you want to know who's going to be the next to rule over our small country look at the picture. That's Prins Willem-Alexander and his three kids haha!

And then my first day at work arrived. So now I'm stuck in an office again ;-(. Job is Ok. Puts my brain back to work so that's good. My intentions are the get as much as possible out of this job, learn a lot and then get the hell out of there haha. Yep definitely don't see myself in an office working for the same employer my whole life. Don't ask what my plans are then because I honestly don't know... But for now it's good money and I even quite enjoy it.

Apart from working, there's also been time for fun the last month! Have a car now ;-) so been driving around the country like crazy catching up with friends and family. Partying almost every weekend. Going to the theatre with my mom and have been to a few concerts.

One of them was really cool. While I was in NZ I came to know Pete Murray, he's a Aussie singer kind of Jack Johnson like. And he was here in the Netherlands a couple of weeks ago. Concert was sort of promo tour in a little cafe on the beach and the only way to get tickets was to win them on the radio...but I was out of luck or so I thought. Shaz, a friend I met in Nelson is back home too, has a friend who's happened to work at that place so he got me in!!! None of my friends could make it but I figured after travelling alone for a year I could manage a concert. It was so much fun.

All is good with my friends again. Think I had to get used to them again and the other way around. Some of them surprised me two weeks ago. Sandra was coming for dinner at my place but when I opened the door all of them were standing there and took me out to dinner. It was really nice! Dinner turned into drinking to much wine and going to a 80's - 90's party! I really needed that gesture from them. It made me feel very welcome and happy again!

So I'm happy to be home but still very restless and don't think this country is going to be my final destination just yet...Will keep you posted.