In November 2011 we traveled to South Africa and brought Charles's parents along for the ride. We spent a week in and around Cape Town, a few days near Hartbeespoort and the Cradle of Humankind, a couple days at Pilanesberg National Park, and two days with my friend Stephanie and her family in Pretoria. It was a FANTASTIC trip!
There are (currently) 78 photos in this album and don't include some of the great places we visited or people we saw. I may add more as we finish weeding through the approximately FOUR THOUSAND photos we took. Seriously. It was a great trip.
Korea takes four gold medals in Olympic taekwondo and the U.S. takes three!
Unfortunately, the big WTF story of the day (pun intended) was the beyond unsportsmanlike conduct of the Cuban 80+kg competitor. He took more than the one minute allotted to him to tend to an injury, and when he was disqualified he attacked the referee and a judge. I was glad to see the IOC erase any record of his participation in these Games and the WTF ban him from any future WTF-sanctioned championships.
It's almost 9am on Saturday morning and we're gearing up to watch a little Olympic taekwondo online. I had hoped to watch the Olympic team via the NBC site, but alas they are prejudiced against those of us outside of the U.S. and we will have to watch it online via some Dutch channel. (Watching Dutch television? This will be a first for us!)
In the meantime, we're amusing ourselves watching this old clip from Jeux Sans Frontières. It is safe for work in that there's no swearing or nudity. But you might find yourself laughing so hard you wet your pants. I'm not kidding. You've been warned.
I think my dad is impressed by how much traveling Aldus has done in his 15 months. He's even written a song!
I've been everywhere man, I've been everywhere man
Been to a German fair man, breathed the Shanghai air man
I've been everywhere.
Well, I've been to . . .
Amsterdam, Rotterdam
Diever, Dwingeloo
Italy, Sicily
Inchon, Osan
Belgium, Denmark
Groningen, Michigan
North Carolina, Mainland China
I've been everywhere.
Aldus picks out reading material for his flight to the U.S.
There will be some construction work at our office next week requiring the use of the majority of our parking lot. Staff have been asked to park their cars at a lot a half-kilometer away, and a small shuttle bus has been hired to drive us to and from the office. This shuttle will be available from 8-9:30 am and 3:30-5:00pm.
It is expected that one will leave the office by 5pm. (Or maybe that's when the shuttle bus company requires its driver to clock out!)
Can you imagine if the Google shuttle bus only ran during these hours? If most Americans were expected to do their work between the hours of 8:15 and 4:45, plus take a scheduled mid-morning coffee break and (more-or-less) required 30 minute lunch break, nothing would be accomplished!
Then again, maybe we'd be a little better at actually working at the office and keeping personal time free from work. Maybe these crazy Dutch are on to something...
I've been thinking a lot lately about whether or not I want to stay here for another project cycle or try to return to the States. Of course one of the biggest factors is whether I'd prefer to raise Aldus here or there, and one of the biggest factors within that is the parenting environment in the U.S.
It struck me long before I even became a parent that the climate of judgment of other parents' choices and parenting abilities is so very nasty there. Worse than that, it's not even constructive. Parents are paranoid of making mistakes, not because it's in the interests of their children, but because other parents will think ill of them. Everyone's got an opinion about how to feed a child, discipline a child, teach a child - as though there's only one right way to do any of these things and theirs is it! Maybe it's the same over here and we're simply insulated from it by not being fully immersed in Dutch media or social circles with other parents. But I doubt it.
I've also been trying to come to terms with the fact that I don't want to join the baby-education rat race (membership required for any of the NYTimes articles linked here) manifested in Baby Einstein, Junior Kumon, etc. For the most part I really feel like kids need to be kids. There's no need to start strapping headphones on your belly to make your child a genius before it's even made its grand entrance into the world. (Though maybe I'm the one being judgmental now.)
But I also worry that kids going through the American school system don't understand that the U.S. is rapidly losing ground in the global market ("Why Nihao, China! Didn't see you there!"), or the lengths that kids in foreign countries (and their parents!) go to to be competitive.
What's a hopeful parent to do? How do you find the balance?
Merrill came to visit over a long weekend. Woo hoo!
I met her at the airport Thursday night and spent Friday and Saturday showing her around Amsterdam. We went to the Van Gogh Museum, Rembrandthuis and Anne Frank House, and also just spent a lot of time hanging out, catching up, playing with Aldus and pondering why he occasionally makes himself gag. Aldus and Merrill even had a lovely duet on the Museumplein chimes:
As a bonus, Charles joined us on Saturday, hung out with us for a little while, and then took Aldus back home with him so that Merrill and I could enjoy a nice dinner out. (One more reason I love this man!) The food at Restaurant de Luwte was even better than when Charles and I were there last year. We didn't even mind the light rain as we sat outside, but maybe that was the biertjes and proseccos.
On Sunday we showed Merrill around Dwingeloo a little. It's too bad the wind and rain kept us from taking a good long bike ride. I really wanted to bike out to my new favorite spot for koffie en appeltaart: the theehuis in Dwingelderveld. Oh well.
Monday we went to the museum, WWII transit camp site and memorial and telescope at Westerbork, then up to Groningen for more pancakes and some shoe and dress shopping. Can I tell you how jealous I am of the three new pairs of shoes she bought? I'm daydreaming of a wardrobe revamp of my own.
I won't speak for Merrill, but I had a really great time and am sorry that it has taken so long for us to be able to spend so much time catching up with each other.
Merrill, good luck with the upcoming mini-tour (warning: music will start automatically), and best wishes to you and Brian on your move to the new house!
Aldus heard a lot of bad words this morning. I think it's time - for both our sakes - for him to go back to Marcella's tomorrow and play with some other kids again.
At least he's had a bath and the banana is out of his hair. I hope all the rice is out of mine!
YES! Thank you, New York Times Magazine. Someone with a much larger audience than I presents what you're supposed to do when entering a merge point on the highway. (Emphasis mine.)
Then everybody begins to slow, not too much, all in concert. All cars remain in their lanes, using all the real estate... People in the narrowing left lanes refrain from shooting ahead, while people in the right through lanes...leave big spaces in front of their cars for the merging that is about to commence... Finally, at clearly marked or somehow mutually agreed upon places, everybody starts conducting beautiful “zipper merges.” That’s the technical term — one-two, one-two or one-two-three, one-two-three — as indicated by the roadway configuration. The process has now worked at its ideal efficiency/equitability ratio...
I reiterate: fill all available real estate and then zipper! Now don't you feel better?