5 days left in Amsterdam

I've got a nice relaxing Sunday morning, just waiting for church music practice at 2 later. I haven't been knowing what I should really be feeling because I'm in such a wierd situation. The fnuny thing is that even though I have to say goodbye to my friends who are exchange students, at least in the past weeks I've been getting to know and hanging out with ultimate frisbee people more. And since most of these are Dutch, I won't really be saying a full goodbye since I'm coming in August and September.

My lease ends on Friday 26th of June. And right after that, I'll be playing in another frisbee tournament on the 27-28th of June at Delft. Delft is where Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer was born. Doesn't ring a bell? The movie Girl with the Pearl Earring was based on him.* After that, I'm going to slowly make my way to London through Rotterdam, Antwerp, Bruges and then to England. I've got people to stay with along the way. But haven't really figured out what happens when I cross the channel to England. I'm hoping to get to London around Monday 6th of July and spend a week there before going to Swansea, Wales, for my friends wedding. I'll be best man at Ben's wedding.

And after the wedding on the 18th, I haven't really figured out what I'm going to do. I'll stick around in the UK for a little longer but I'm also pretty set on visiting a friend in Granada, Spain. I hope to get back to Amsterdam in August and work.

I've decided to take the rest of the year off to travel. BDO Kendal said that I could start working with them next year in march or April so I'm just going to take the time to travel and see the world while I can. Truth be told, I am missing a bit of stability and familiarity. Its going to be good hanging out with old friends in London and Swansea. However, I'm sure when I start working in Sydney I'll be getting all the "stability" I need from my 9-5 job.

So after I get back to Amsterdam, I'm just going to work, do church stuff, and play frisbee while waiting for my friend to get back from the US. Hilco's a Dutch guy that was playing on the same frisbee team and he's keen on going to Iran and Nepal. And so in October we're going to head out for that trip. It should be some really amazing experiences.

I guess its going to be sometime again before I see some of you. These 1 year travel things are really quite a wierd thing. I wonder how other travellers feel about being away from familiar people for so long. And going back to "normal" life must be the worst thing. I can't imagine how its going to be next year when I get back to Sydney and start working. Think I'll ask Arienne from church about it later.





*Its actually pretty pathetic but half of what i know about Europe comes from popular culture. The only European towns and cities I know are the major football clubs: Eindhoven, Stuttgart, Munich, Valencia. The only reason I had heard of Bruges in Belgium was because of the movie "In Bruges", which I did not find that great. And I had only heard of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris because of Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame. Talk about immersing myself in history and culture...